what I have learned today.

[spesh]

'Thought leader' is not the kind of role I would like to hold, but I wouldn't mind being a "Thought manager". I just did a quick google to see if such a job exists, and I found a blog about how managers should aspire to be "Thought partners" rather than micro-managers... 

http://thecontextofthings.com/2017/03/14/thought-partner/

"Your mind to my mind... your thoughts to my thoughts..."

Urgh, nope.

[citoyen]

You know what it means, do you? Please tell me, coz I don't

Well, I can't claim to know but I've long assumed it was just a modish way of describing a kind of role that has existed for a long time, that might previously have gone under other titles such as "Creative director" or "Editorial consultant" (make up your own job title to suit the context).

Job titles are rarely meaningful, I find.

[Mr Larrington]

I have just learned that the first deployment of the USAF's F-22 fighters from Hawaii to Okinawa had to turn back when the aircraft’s software proved incapable of changing gear when crossing the International Date Line

[ian]

I liked being a Thought Leader, I got to write papers and make pretty infographics of complicated things (that weren't very exciting), and flutter around the world with a generous expense account talking to people and presenting at conferences and meetings. I reported to no one in particular and had no targets. Unfortunately, it's one of those roles that didn't directly make money. Why can't the salespeople do that? they'd bleat on the mothership bridge. Because they're salespeople, I imagine.

So they started to clamp down on budgets and approvals, until it became a bit pointless since I couldn't do much. Basically, they evicted me from the role with strategic frustration. I got tired of arguing about it. Cunning. Alas, I'm was too expensive for redundancy, so they gave me a new hat and a pay rise, and thus now I work in Strategic Product Command. I still have Tidy Hair™ though.

[Canardly]

That 10% of the Population were slaves at the time of the Doomsday survey.

[T42]

That 10% of the Population were slaves at the time of the Doomsday survey.

Is that in addition to serfs or counting serfs as slaves?

[Canardly]

Slaves as slaves methinks.

[PeteB99]

Who Mr Prawo Jazdy is.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/7899171.stm

[Cudzoziemiec]

Who Mr Prawo Jazdy is.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/7899171.stm

That's given me a laugh!

[ElyDave]

As anyone who's ever cycled the seemingly endless road up from Thorne into a wet againsterly knows, Drax isn't so much a place as a state of mind.

I got as far as Goole services before I turned round and rode back the other way.

Admittedly, this was planned, being the route of the Flatlands 600. And actually, come to think of it, that didn't go through Thorne but passed somewhere nearer Scunthorpe IIRC.

misread that as Google Services

[Kim]

The latitude and longitude coordinates of the virtual cycling world of Watopia on the Zwift cycling platform coincide with this island, and websites such as Strava therefore show Zwift rides overlain on a map of Teanu even though Teanu has no roads and rides seem to frequently cross between water and land.

I had wondered what was going on with the weird maps of people's computer game rides.  They should have used the complex plane or something.

[Mrs Pingu]

That The Guardian has a chocolate column.
This could be expensive both financially and calorifically.

[rafletcher]

That The Guardian has a chocolate column.
This could be expensive both financially and calorifically.

Coincidentally, my wife commented that she never reads the Chocolate column (which has been running for a while). Neither do I.

[Ham]

That The Guardian has a chocolate column.
This could be expensive both financially and calorifically.

Is that the same as the US politics column?

[TheLurker]

That The Guardian has a chocolate column.
This could be expensive both financially and calorifically.

Is that the same as the US politics column?

That would be the Chocolate Fireguard column. 

[mllePB]

This week I learnt that fly grazing is a thing.

[rafletcher]

That the porters at Lloyd’s of London are called waiters, in a nod to the origins of the insurance business in a coffee house.

[geraldc]

Putting a fly sticker strategically on a urinal can cut toilet cleaning costs by 8%, due to the reduced spillage when men have something to aim at. I can only assume places like Australia where there can be plenty of flies in toilets, the cost of toilet cleaning is higer due to the massive number of targets of opportunity

[Tim Hall]

At the weekend rather than today: The spoingy socket on a fluorescent light fitting is referred to as a "tombstone".

[Efrogwr]

Putting a fly sticker strategically on a urinal can cut toilet cleaning costs by 8%, due to the reduced spillage when men have something to aim at. I can only assume places like Australia where there can be plenty of flies in toilets, the cost of toilet cleaning is higer due to the massive number of targets of opportunity

The urinals in the Victorian toilet in The Hayes (Cardiff) had targets (painted on before glazing) at the point of least splashage.

Some urinals of the same era had pictures of bees under the glaze; the Latin word for bee is apis... such wit!

[robgul]

If you happen to go to/through Garstang in Lancashire call  into Barton Grange Garden Centre - the ultimate urinal destination.

See  https://live.staticflickr.com/8546/8668399302_54b4685321_b.jpg   (Google "Barton Grange" and select images and you'll see a whole range - washbasins too in the same styles)

My daughter advised making a visit to the gents . ..  (I assume on information from her husband?)

[T42]

Putting a fly sticker strategically on a urinal can cut toilet cleaning costs by 8%, due to the reduced spillage when men have something to aim at. I can only assume places like Australia where there can be plenty of flies in toilets, the cost of toilet cleaning is higer due to the massive number of targets of opportunity

The urinals in the Victorian toilet in The Hayes (Cardiff) had targets (painted on before glazing) at the point of least splashage.

Some urinals of the same era had pictures of bees under the glaze; the Latin word for bee is apis... such wit!

And the glaze on the target is usually thicker than elsewhere.

[citoyen]

The reason why there was no Jaguar A-type or B-Type...

The C-type was officially the XK120-C, where “C” stands for “Competition”.

I knew the first part, just didn't know the C actually stood for something!

[Giraffe]

My father took his old Anglia van to a mate's garage to have some work done. He came back in car - XK120! Couldn't shut the garage door as the rear end stuck out. Neighbours stopped talking to us (not all of them) then were shamefaced 2 days later when the Anglia appeared.
I didn't have a ride in the Jag as dad hardly dared to use it.

[darkpoint]

My father took his old Anglia van to a mate's garage to have some work done. He came back in car - XK120! Couldn't shut the garage door as the rear end stuck out. Neighbours stopped talking to us (not all of them) then were shamefaced 2 days later when the Anglia appeared.
I didn't have a ride in the Jag as dad hardly dared to use it.

I have sat in a XK120, I always thought they looked awesome.  (particularly liked the headlights)  Driving them is apparently interesting as visibility is compromised.
The one I was in sounded like a box of spanners being shaken about, no idea if that is standard.