@Forest_No_22@imwittering5 Our then 6 year old used to take an iPad and get cross with the crowd for being too loud! He “supported” Man City too 🫣. He’s 12 now and has come to his senses! Forest through and through and denies ever liking City. There’s hope!
@petermblackburn What a great read - you’ve encapsulated what it means for me to be a Forest fan. It’s not just about the football, it’s about the heart. Stevie & Nuno brought that in spades - hoping Vitor can do the same. I feel a bit of hope kindling in my heart ❤️
British TV anchor @KamaliMelbourne of Sky News with a moving, personal response to Trump’s posting of the racist clip of the Obamas.
I know Kamali just a little. I’m proud of him for saying this — and sad we’re in a moment when he has to.
Lady in blue, "Will student loans be the next misselling scandal?" #BBCQT
Oli Dugmore, "My three year course, £9,000 a year for the tuition, on top of that a maintenance loan, I left uni with £37,500 of debt"
"From the day I was charged RPI interest"
"Since I went to uni in 2012, the amount of interest I have accrued is £32,000"
"Was it missold to me when I was told it would cost me £9,000 a year? Yes"
"On top of that its a regressive system"
"If you're wealthy enough to pay the fees up front, you don't get charged interest - if you're rich enough you don't pay the same as me"
"The government changed the terms of the agreement, I call that loan sharking"
Fiona Bruce, "How else would you pay for university?"
Oli Dugmore, "How did you guys pay for it?"
"The state paid for it, didn't they?"
Fiona Bruce, "They did"
Oli Dugmore, "Good enough for you, good enough for me?"
My father once told me the secret to a happy marriage.
“Stay out of the kitchen. Let her handle the holidays.”
I was 19. He was in his recliner.
My mother was cooking for 14 people.
She’d been up since 5 AM.
He’d been up since the football pregame.
I didn’t think anything of it.
That’s just how it was.
Fast forward 20 years.
I’m in the recliner.
My wife is in the kitchen.
She’s been up since 5 AM.
I’ve been up since the pregame.
My daughter walks by and I see her watching.
Not the TV.
Her mother.
Then me.
Then her mother again.
That’s when it hit me:
She’s taking notes.
My father taught me that holidays were for men to rest and women to work.
He didn’t say it.
He showed it.
Every Thanksgiving.
Every Christmas.
Every Easter.
The recliner passed from him to me like an inheritance I never asked for.
This morning I woke up at 4 AM.
Not for content.
For the turkey.
My wife found me in the kitchen at 6.
She didn’t say anything.
She just stood there.
Then she cried.
Your kids are taking notes.
Not on what you say.
On where you sit.
The recliner is an inheritance.
Be the generation that stands up.
The lady at the charity shop today told me that she wishes people would clear out their children's old toys in the lead up to Christmas rather than after because she always sees a number of parents in the days before Christmas looking for toys for their little ones who might be strapped for cash. She said there's very rarely anything in just before, but that they get inundated with toys in the days after.
And it really made me think about it in a way I never would have before.
If you know your child is going to get lots of presents from Father Christmas this year, by clearing out your cupboards a few days early, you could make another child's Christmas a lot more special too.
Saw this & thought I'd repost.
A message from a Kindergarten teacher:
After forty years in the classroom, my career ended with one small sentence from a six-year-old:
“My dad says people like you don’t matter anymore.”
No sneer. No malice. Just quiet honesty — the kind that cuts deeper because it’s innocent. He blinked, then added, “You don’t even have a TikTok.”
My name is Mrs. Clara Holt, and for four decades, I taught kindergarten in a small Denver suburb. Today, I stacked the last box on my desk and locked the door behind me.
When I started teaching in the early 1980s, it felt like a promise — a shared belief that what we did mattered. We weren’t rich, but we were valued. Parents brought warm cookies to parent nights. Kids gave you handmade cards with hearts that didn’t quite line up. Watching a child sound out their first sentence felt like magic.
But that world slowly slipped away. The job I once knew has been replaced by exhaustion, red tape, and a kind of loneliness I can’t quite describe.
My evenings used to be filled with construction paper, glitter, and glue sticks. Now they’re spent filling out digital reports to protect myself from angry emails or lawsuits. I’ve been yelled at by parents in front of twenty-five children — one filming me with his phone while I tried to calm another child mid-meltdown.
And the kids… they’ve changed too. Not by choice.
They arrive tired, anxious, overstimulated. Their tiny fingers know how to swipe a screen before they can hold a crayon. Some can’t make eye contact or wait in line. We’re expected to fix all of it — to patch the gaps, heal the trauma, teach the curriculum, and document every move — in six hours a day, with resources that barely fill a drawer.
The little reading corner I once built, full of soft beanbags and paper stars, was replaced by data charts and “learning metrics.” A young principal once told me, “Clara, maybe you’re too nurturing. The district wants measurable results.”
As if kindness were a weakness.
Still, I stayed. Because of the small, holy moments that no spreadsheet could measure —
a whisper of, “You remind me of my grandma.”
a shaky note that read, “I feel safe here.”
a quiet boy finally meeting my eyes and saying, “I read the whole page.”
Those tiny sparks were my reason to keep showing up.
But this last year broke something in me.
The aggression grew sharper. The laughter in the staff room turned to silence. The light went out of so many eyes. I watched brilliant teachers — my friends — vanish under the weight of burnout, their joy replaced by survival.
I felt myself fading too, like chalk on a board that’s been wiped one too many times.
So today, I began my goodbye. I pulled faded art off the walls and tucked thirty years of handmade cards into a single box. In the back of a drawer, I found a letter from a student from 1998:
“Thank you for loving me when I was hard to love.”
I sat on the floor and cried.
No party. No applause. Just a handshake from a young principal who called me “Ma’am” while checking his notifications.
I left my rocking chair behind, and my sticker box too. What I carried with me were the memories — the faces of hundreds of children who once trusted me enough to reach out their hands and learn. That can’t be uploaded. It can’t be measured. It can’t be replaced.
I miss when teachers were partners, not targets. When parents and educators worked side by side, not in opposition. When schools cared more about wonder than numbers.
So if you know a teacher — any teacher — thank them. Not with a mug or a gift card, but with your words. With your respect. With your understanding that behind every test score is a heart that cared enough to try.
Because in a world that often overlooks them, teachers are the ones who never forget our children.