#UK Steel Industry

[theuksteel]

Fabricated Custom Components for Precision Engineering

[news-buzz]

Labour plan to renationalise British steel industry blasted | UK | News News Buzz

Labour considering renationalising British Steel is a “complete disgrace”, according to a former minister who has accused the Government of bringing about the demise of the UK steel industry. Sir John Redwood told Express.co.uk: “What are they nationalising? They’re closing it all down. So why do you need to nationalise something you’ve closed. I think they’ve made a bad mistake on that. “They’ve…

[strangelandofbritain]

Follow the money... some Tory donors or cronies will benefit from this, you can be sure.

With the Crooked Conservatives, party and profit always come before country and jobs.

“Several Tory MPs in “red wall” seats, backed by the Labour party and steel industry leaders, are furious that a government body has officially recommended that protections inherited from the EU to safeguard UK producers be ended imminently by the government.”

From 2021. They were warned.

[supplyside]

Rotary kilns under construction at the Vickers-Armstrong Steel Foundry Tynesie, UK (1928)

[bibleofficial]

if trump actually does put tariffs on fuckin everything that could be very good for america in the long run tbf

[dedi-ashour]

اليوم العالمي للسرطان 🎗️🌎

4 - فبراير

اليوم العالمي للسرطان الذي يقام كل 4 فبراير هو مبادرة عالمية موحدة يقودها الاتحاد الدولي لمكافحة السرطان (UICC). من خلال رفع الوعي العالمي وتحسين التعليم وتحفيز العمل الشخصي والجماعي والحكومي .

🔺ما هو السرطان؟

السرطان هو مرض يصيب الخلايا في الجسم، مما يؤدي إلى نموها بشكل غير طبيعي وانتشارها إلى أجزاء أخرى من الجسم.

🔺ما هي أعراض السرطان؟

تختلف أعراض السرطان حسب نوعه، ولكن بعض الأعراض الشائعة تشمل:

تغيرات في الجلد

كتل أو تورم في أي مكان في الجسم

نزيف غير طبيعي

ألم أو إزعاج مستمر

تغيرات في عادات الأمعاء أو المثانة

فقدان الوزن غير المبرر

التعب الشديد

ماذا يمكننا أن نفعل معًا لمحاربة السرطان؟

نشر الوعي حول مرض السرطان وطرق الوقاية منه،

🌹🎗️دعم مرضى السرطان وعائلاتهم

🔴 اليوم العالمي للسرطان

"اللهم اجعل الكيماوي برداً وسلاماً على مرضى السرطان"

اللهم اشفي جميع مرضي السرطان

اللهم اشفيهم شفاء لا يغادر سقمآ🤲🎗️

[rjzimmerman]

Greener Steel at Britain’s Largest Plant Comes With Heavy Job Losses. (New York Times)

Excerpt from this New York Times story:

The British government and the Indian conglomerate Tata said on Wednesday that they would jointly invest 1.25 billion pounds, or about $1.6 billion, in the country’s largest steel mill, in Port Talbot, Wales, to make operations there less polluting.

As part of the overhaul, about 2,800 of the company’s 8,000 steel jobs in Britain will be lost over time, a spokesman for Tata said, in part because the electric technology will require fewer workers.

Still, the plan was, from the point of view of employees, an improvement on a proposal announced last year when Britain’s Conservative government was in power. Both deals include the same £500 million in government support, but workers facing layoffs will now be offered the option for paid retraining for other occupations.

The government says this project will cut overall emissions in Britain 1.5 percent by shifting steel production to a process of melting down scrap metal — an operation that depends on the availability of this raw material and, some critics say, cannot be used for producing the highest-quality grades of steel.

[townpostin]

Tata Steel Reports Strong Q1 Performance Amid Strategic Changes

India Operations Lead Growth in ‘Best Ever’ First Quarter Tata Steel achieves record Q1 sales in India, growing 5% YoY despite maintenance shutdowns. Global operations show mixed results, with UK witnessing strategic realignment at Port Talbot facility. JAMSHEDPUR – Tata Steel has announced robust production and delivery figures for the first quarter of fiscal year 2025, with its Indian…

[bharatwireropes]

[dr3amfyr-e]

brat. - j.v. ( w. 4.5k )

꒰ in which the boy you see every summer enrolls in the same university as you. ꒱ — modern!jacaerys velayron x reader

୨ ⎯ i cannot stress enough, football means ⚽️ not 🏈. childhood-friends-to-lovers, but you have to get through my 2000 word psychoanalysis and backstory first. light angst. mention of the death of a parent. lots and lots of talk about the velaryon-targaryen-hightower family dynamic. light make out action. reader's family is implied to be wealthy enough to have a summer home. almost everyone lives au. set in the uk, not westeros. omitted daemon rhaenyra marriage because there’s no way to to make it even semi-normal. realizing now i omitted daemon entirely erm sorry. pushing the laenor agenda bc he’s my favorite character. this is abhorently long. extreme overuse of the em-dash. uhh the perspective is wonky in a few places. part two. ⎯ ୧

i had to write this twice. i'm offering this to you with shaking hands, like a peasent child begging for coins. i may write a part two because i have more to say, but i don't want to figure it out rn.

On the cold January morning that Jacaerys Velaryon-Targaryen was born, the media went into a frenzy. 

The Targaryens were old money, their fortune rooted a century back in good investments. Historically adept at finding their way into things, the empire had a string to pull in every industry. From art and law to technology and shipping, if business prospects looked good there would be a Targaryen investment.

And then there were the dogs — regal greyhounds, with long, thin bodies and sleek coats. The Targaryens bred them as far back as bloodline records went. The pups were never for sale; sometimes they were used as show dogs, and successful show dogs they were, but more often they were pets. It was a status symbol, to nonchalantly own such a coveted creature. 

The Targaryens were idolized in the public eye. They were all stunning, with sharp features and silver hair, and each member of the family seemed to possess a Midas touch. But, where Valyrian blood ran hot, so did the press. It was no surprise when magazines started to turn a profit from silver heads plastered across their glossy covers. It was the price that came with God-like aristocracy.

From editorials to gossip columns, people devoured the insider life of the untouchables. When Aemma Targaryen died, there was a four-page spread in nearly every magazine; complete with pictures and quotes. Business papers filled with opinion pieces about Rhaenyra’s inheritance claim to her family’s empire; magazines exploded with the announcement of her engagement to Laenor Velaryon, and subsequently Viserys’ marriage to Alicent Hightower, the daughter of his lawyer. 

When Jacaerys was born, reporters lined up outside of the hospital doors. There were cameras and microphones and crew trucks, and Rhaenyra hated it. It wasn’t the way she wished to welcome her child into the world — swarmed by people who didn’t know nor care for him.

Laenor had always been good at navigating the attention, and Rhaenyra was constantly grateful. So, when he pulled his gaze from the babe and steeled himself to deal with the onslaught of reporters outside, tears pricked at her eyes. Appreciation, exhaustion, adoration? She couldn’t be sure. 

Looking down at her son, she thought, he’s perfect. He had a smattering of dark hair, and he was quiet but not concerningly so. Wispy lashes fell upon his cherub cheeks, and when he eventually blinked up at her his eyes were dark. He looked nothing like her — she didn’t care. 

She refused to talk to anyone outside of her family, and had the curtains in her private room drawn. To expose her son, her heart, to the prying eyes of the bored masses with nary a care for his well-being was a nightmare. She wouldn’t have him exploited. 

At the time of Jacaerys’ birth, she and Laenor had been married for a little over a year. Laenor’s father, Corlys, managed the bulk of the import and export for Viserys’ company. Corlys was a good man, he hadn’t dreamed of marrying his son off. But Laenor and Rhaenyra were both in the same impossible situation: the wiles of youth mixed with the ever critical public. 

They had both fallen into scandalous relationships, both preyed on by paparazzi. If they married one another, it would save face for both of their families. Plus — both being the eldest and heir, this would clear the expectation of a dignified marriage. They agreed to leave each other to whatever youthful fun they wanted to have, as long as everything was discreet. 

Both the Velaryons and the Targaryens kept a summer home in Dragonstone, a private community in coastal Wales. It was the perfect place for Rhaenyra and Laenor to begin their life — far from her father, close to his parents, and out of the line of sight for any nosy journalist. 

The public eye had looked to other things by the time Lucerys was born, two years later. Again, Laenor dealt with the small gathering of reporters with the utmost grace, and Rhaenyra submitted a written statement. 

Alicent divorced Viserys that same year. 

As she watched her boys grow up, full of energy and life, Rhaenyra thought, there was no one better to parent with than her best friend — a title Laenor had rightfully earned. They hadn’t had much choice in knowing each other, and they certainly would never have chosen to be married, but he made a bearable roommate. They had things in common; they liked the same music, and the same men. They drank the same wine and frequented the same restaurants. And, they both loved their boys. 

As Jace and Luke grew up, they found the best company in each other — the school in Dragonstone was so small, though, that there were very few other options. They both played on the school’s small football team, and Jace took piano lessons while Luke learned to fence. Where Jace was driven by emotion, Luke was level-headed; where Luke was cautiously quiet, Jace spoke his mind. It was an ideal childhood, the Welsh coast was an idyllic backdrop to grow up upon, with the sea in their backyard. 

They were ten and eight when Joffrey was born, both excited for their new brother. Their mother brought him home, bundled in a soft red blanket. The boys sat on the couch beside Rhaenys and stared at him for upwards of an hour. 

Hardly a week had passed when Harwin Strong died. He was a family friend, a frequent presence in their home and life — Jace and Luke had been upset by this, of course. 

In time they came to understand the situation fully. Jacaerys first, fitting the pieces together with the evidence he found in the mirror. Neither Rhaenyra nor Laenor had dark hair, like he and his brothers. 

His matriline was uncontestable though, as he grew into himself. He possessed the same nose, jaw, brow, and high cheekbones that Rhaenyra wore. The comparisons between the two became more frequent as he grew older, and he found himself to be quite proud to look like her. 

Her attitude lived in him as well, the temperament she had been so notorious for as a girl festered in her eldest son. She had once been christened ‘The Princess of Dragonstone’ after flipping off a reporter at their summer home. Jacearys earned it for himself when he was fifteen, after loudly berating a reporter. He had been defending Luke, but no one seemed to care when they deigned him ‘The Prince of Dragonstone’. He took it with grace, claiming that he couldn’t help but be his mother’s child.

It instilled a sense of public propriety he strove to uphold. 

Rhaenyra remarried the same year — to Alicent Hightower — and moved her children from Wales to London. It took a while to adjust to the new life — Jace liked his new school, but he detested his step-brothers. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t come around to the idea of living with Aemond and Aegon, who took so much pleasure in making he and his brothers miserable. 

After the first month, Jacaerys fell in brilliantly. He performed well in school, quickly being enrolled in the advanced literature and history courses. He got on well with his peers, and made a number of friends. He joined the football team and spent his Sunday afternoons learning piano concertos. 

Living in London made him a more publicly prominent figure in his family's legacy. He knew how to play his role as heir; he carried himself perfectly — confident and charming and elegant. He didn’t particularly like being in the public eye, but there was a certain sense of satisfaction when he did something to receive positive public attention. 

King’s Landing, much like where he had grown up, was a community reserved for the upper echelon. Situated in Northwest London, and surrounded by wrought iron gates, it was regal and dignified. The house had high, vaulted ceilings, large stained glass windows, and more than enough bedrooms. It rained more, Jacaerys noticed in the first month. When it had rained in Dragonstone he would watch the droplets bounce off the sea, where it lapped at the sandy bay. Here the rain splattered unceremoniously upon the pavement. 

For as wonderful as life in London had turned out, Jacaerys found himself longing for what was left behind in Dragonstone. Laenor lived there still, and while he called often and visited as much as he could, it wasn’t the same. Jace’s childhood bedroom remained, along with all of the memories in the house he grew up in. And his friends. There was an assortment of people he only saw between late May and early September; the children of the other seasonal residents. The number had dwindled in years past, with fewer of them returning for break — favouring more interesting places, like Ibiza or Rome, as they got older. 

Far too few of his childhood friends he kept in contact with, especially after the move to London. You were the exception. 

He was grateful, on days when it stormed in London, to receive a silly text or too-long voice note. It made things feel less dull — you had a way of doing that. 

He took to reading theory around the time he turned seventeen. It’s queer theory, at the suggestion of his cousin Baela, who lent him his first Judith Butler book. He finished it that weekend. 

His aunt Laena and her two daughters lived in London, and Jace found a close comrade in Baela. She played competitive tennis and listened to riot grrrl, she was much cooler than him and he knew it. Her bedroom held two massive bookshelves, and she let him pillage her collection for De Bouvier and Didion and Gay. Hours were spent lying across the floor in Laena’s house, studying, or reading, or talking. He enjoyed Baela’s company more than any of his school friends, favouring anything with her over anything with the boys from his football team. 

His youngest sister, Visenya, turned one around the same time. Baela, staying with Jacaerys while he babysat one night, inducted him into the eldest daughter club. 

“You’re so keen on driving your siblings around, and taking care of them. Plus, aren’t you your mother’s closest confidant?” She asked. 

True, Jace supposed. He was the oldest of Rhaenyra’s children, and the most responsible of his brothers and step-siblings. His mums both worked full time, they were busy but as involved as possible. Jace just did the menial things. He made Joffrey breakfast, picked Luke up after school, and watched Visenya when necessary. He didn’t mind.

Baela argued that he should mind. 

He had been a sensitive child, more so than his brothers, but it made him incredibly emotionally adept as he aged. So many boys his age prided themselves on stoicism, but that was never something Jace felt connected to. He always felt things too deeply to bottle them up — it accounted for the occasional temper that flared up when he was upset, but also how empathetic and kind he was. 

Jacearys was set to graduate with honours in the first week of May. It was three months before when college acceptance letters began to appear in the mail. He had applied to a number of places, and been accepted everywhere. The University of the Vale was where his hopes hinged though. 

Just after Valentine's Day, it showed up. The envelope was wide and stuffed full, and sealed with a wax stamp. His acceptance letter was on the very top of the stack of papers — the thick paper heavy in his hands, as he admired the blue printed border and silver flocking. 

Rhaenrya sorted through the informational packets while Jace reread the letter. Part of him couldn’t believe it was real.

He sends you a picture of the letter, and you respond in kind with one of an identical nature. 

You hadn’t planned to go to the same university, but it certainly was a happy coincidence. 

After graduation, he was beyond excited for the reprieve that Dragonstone granted. The promise of early morning hikes, and evenings spent on the beach — the once empty house, full of life and bustling with bodies. 

You were the first thing Jacaerys thought to look for when he set his bags down in the summer home. 

It was late May, and you were guaranteed to be out of school. I’ll text after I unpack, he thought, pulling clothes and books from his suitcase. 

His room in Dragonstone had once been his childhood bedroom. The walls were a warm tone of white, and the small bed was still covered with his blue and white checkered duvet. Piano scales and pictures of his brothers and friends adorn the walls. There was a soccer trophy on the back edge of his desk, something he had won when he was eleven. It was stuffy from nine months of stagnance, but familiar all the same. 

He pushed the curtains back from the window to let sunlight filter into the dusty room, gazing down at the beach, when he spotted your figure. He was quick to rush downstairs, out the backdoor, and across the stone path that leads from the patio to the beach. He greets you with a call of your name and a tight hug, sunglasses perched atop his head and linen shirt half buttoned. 

It had been a year since he’d last seen you. You had kept in touch during the school year; Jace favoured Snapchat and FaceTime, delighted with the pleasure of seeing the mundane things you were up to. There was a nearly constant text thread, and voice memos passed back and forth. But, it all paled in comparison to physical company. 

He abandoned his housekeeping duties, keen to sit on the beach and talk. And you did so for hours, about everything and nothing. He tells you about his last year of school and listens as you do the same. When the sun dipped past the treeline, he leaned back on his elbows, watching the water crest on the sand. He felt more at ease than he had in a while, enraptured by the ease of your presence. The conversation flowed, there were no awkward lulls and no pressure to talk about something dignified. It was comforting to be so close to someone who didn’t see much of his life in London — you knew the best version of him. 

Your friendship had always felt like that, from a young age. On days that smelled of sunscreen and sea salt in his mind, you would meet in the mornings and depart past dark and then do it again the next day, never tiring of each other. Your parents knew his, so you had always been welcome in his home — invited or not. You had shared a bed during sleepovers, drunk from the same cup, and fallen asleep on the couch during movie nights countless times. Quick glances and imperceptible expressions were a language you communicated in, reading each other without words. In your presence, Jace was the most comfortable.

The summer slipped away as it always did, taking long nights and leaving memories of sand and sunshine. The days were ambled away in the water, on rocky hiking paths, or in the meadow that sat a mile away from all of the homes. 

Jace had started The Hobbit before school ended — most days he found himself sprawled out in the park or on the beach, reading. He had also taken to running with his dog, Vermax, in the mornings. He relied on the serotonin boost to start the day, and with no football to play a jog was a decent alternative. 

When the summer drew to a close, the typical melancholy that befell the return to the real world wasn’t present in Jace’s mind. He presumed it had everything to do with the fact that he would see you every day now

You have one college class together — a nine a.m. medieval literature discussion. 

Clinging to familiarity in the new environment, he glued himself to your side for the first week of classes. He memorized the way to your dorm, meeting you outside every morning to walk together to your first lessons. The meandering conversation was a good start to the day, and he silently relished in your tired eyes and quiet voice, not yet used to the early schedule. 

On Friday he all but begged you to come back to his dorm after the discussion; it was your only class that day so you had given in. You hadn’t seen his living quarters yet, and he wanted to spend time with you, worried for when your schedules would fill up and you would lose room for each other. 

The discussion had been mind-numbing. You reviewed the same syllabus as the lecture, and went over the same rules and policies as every other class. With the thirty-five minutes remaining, the teaching assistant made everyone watch an incredibly monotone video about the history of medieval England. 

Jace linked his arm into yours in the hallway after class, pulling you to the doors. The cool morning air was refreshing, waking you up more as you walked across campus. His dorm building was new and modern, seventeen floors with grey siding and big windows. It was private housing, clearly expensive. 

He had a single room with an adjoining bathroom and a small common space. The walls were typical dorm white, with laminate wood flooring. Joffrey’s school photo is hung on one wall, the frame clearly decorated by the child with glitter and string. Scattered across the other walls were photographs in thin silver frames, a large world map, a clock, and a cross-stitch of a rainbow stag beetle.

Sitting on the couch, you observed the unframed photos that lay across the coffee table, inspecting a leggy grey dog as you plucked it from the pile, “Who is this?”

Jace leaned into your side, gazing at the photo, “My mum’s dog, Syrax,” He reached over you to tap the picture, “Syrax is my dog’s mum.” 

He slipped his hand into yours as you walked with him to his second class of the day.

In the third week of school, Jace asks you to attend a mixer for a pre-law society with him. He doesn't know anyone, and doesn't want to be alone at the party. You meet at his dorm at a quarter-to-six so you can walk to the event together. 

The dress-code is emi-formal, and when he opens the door to you his hair is slicked back with water and he smells like his cologne — musk, sandalwood, and amber. 

“Are your clothes pressed?” You ask, grinning at his freshly ironed slacks and the three buttons undone on his shirt. 

He rolls his eyes, locking the door behind him as he escorts you down the hallway. The walls of the elevator in his dorm are mirrored, and you laugh at him when you catch him taking pictures of himself. He makes you take one with him, and sets it as his lock screen. 

The mixer was in the dean of law’s massive house, buzzing with young people in smart outfits. Jace abandons you about fifteen minutes in, spotting a group of poli sci majors from his social psychology class. 

From his childhood spent between galas and his mother’s business meetings, Jace was good at navigating these situations. He was charming, leveling the professors with charismatic smiles and confident posture. He was good at holding an intelligent conversation, discussing theory and strategy. 

You were on the patio, watching the stars, when he found you an hour later.

His arms brushed yours as he leaned against the railing, “Sorry for leaving you,” His voice was quiet, and he stared at your profile, watching the way the moonlight illuminated your skin. 

You wave his apology off and make him buy you coffee in recompense on the way home. 

You’re stood talking together on the quadrangle a few weeks later, a cup of hot chocolate warming your mitten-less hands, when you realise just how cold it’s gotten. It's just too cold for the thin jacket that you try to sink further into, hiding from the wind that bites at your delicate skin.

Jace watches you shiver, observing your lack of appropriate attire. 

“Are you cold?” He asks, reaching out to run his hands up and down your arms, half to warm you, half to gauge how thick your jacket is. Not very. 

You nod, “I didn’t check the weather this morning.” 

He sighs with exaggerated exasperation and slides his arms around you, careful of the paper cup you held. Of course, he’s worn the right coat, and you feel the downy material of his hood against your cheek as he rubs your back to generate some warmth. You smell the cologne on his collar and the expensive shampoo he uses; he grumbled something about taking better care of yourself. 

Then, one particularly cold Friday morning he has forgotten his coat. Dressed in a hoodie, he mirrors your excuse from the week prior, smiling sheepishly — face flushed from the chilly air, dark curls blowing around his head like a halo. You take pity on him, slipping your scarf off. You loop it around his neck, tucking the ends down into the collar of his sweater, and leave him with a fond peck on the cheek; his skin is cold. 

He's appreciative, though the scarf does little against the cold wind cutting through his sweater. Still, he doesn't give the scarf back. 

With the cold, comes midterms. You’re the first person Jace asks to study. 

Your dorm room is closer to the central part of campus, and thus a shorter walk in the bitter cold. Jace brushes snow out of his hair as you unlock your door, ushering him inside. It's small. Two twin-sized beds, one on each wall, with nary enough room for two bodies between them; a desk is crammed into the small space between your bed and the window. You let him take the desk, spreading your books and notes out across your bed.

Your dorm is old, and the room has very little ventilation. Despite the frigidity outside, the room is stuffy and almost hot with both of your bodies inside. An hour into studying Jace shrugs off his heavy, knit sweater and pushes his glasses up into his hair. 

“What are you working on?” You ask, leaning forward. You’re bored, working on the same power point you started yesterday. You want to talk to him, though he doesn’t seem keen on the idea

He doesn’t look up from typing as he speaks, “Analysing The Art of War.” 

You shut your laptop, bent on distracting him, “The book?” 

He nods but doesn’t give a verbal response. 

“Who's that by?” You ask, fighting to suppress a grin

This time he does look up, glaring at you over his glasses, “Sun Tzu.” 

His tone is short, but it's amusing to annoy him so you grin, suppressing a giggle, “Sounds very interesting.” 

“What do you want?” He asks after a beat, still holding your gaze. 

You shrug, “Nothing. I’m bored,” 

The next time you study is even less productive, school work discarded on his floor in a matter of minutes. 

“We can’t be trusted to work together,” He tells you, watching as you calculate his astrological chart, geometry homework forgotten. 

You attend your first college party together in November. When you arrive at his dorm, he’s dressed much more casually than normal. 

You reach out to tug at the thin silver chain peeking out from his shirt collar, “This is fun,” You tease, giggling, “Aiming to impress tonight?”

He rolls his eyes in mock-offence, turning you around by the shoulders to shove you out of the doorframe. 

The lights in the house are dim, and they strobe slowly through different colours. It’s too dark and too bright all at once. The music is almost unbearably loud and people are packed in like sardines, it’s all incredibly overstimulating. 

When he senses your unease, Jace takes your hand, pulling you tight against your side to lead you through the throng of bodies. He’s looking for someone, but you’re unsure who, and he canvases the whole space before giving up on finding them.

The backyard of the house is quieter, but the ground still vibrates from the bass of the music. People are scattered about, smoking cigarettes and sipping from bottles of cheap beer. 

You both learn what Jell-O shots are, and make out in the bathroom back at his dorm. It’s not the first time you’d kissed each other, trying it a few times in your adolescence just to see what it was like. But this is different, tipsy and sloppy, as you giggle into his mouth. 

It's forgotten in the morning, when you wake up in his bed still dressed in your going-out clothes, head pounding.

But then it happens again, the week before finals.

You had stayed at the library far too late studying, leaving the pair of you to walk back to his dorm in the dark. It's positively frigid, cold December air whipping snow into your face. 

There are still snowflakes in your hair as you shed the thick coat you’re wearing, pulling off your gloves and hat. 

There's a bottle of wine in Jace’s freezer, left by Aegon the weekend before. It's expensive and rich and red, and Aegon would likely skin you if he found out you were drinking it — but, that's part of the fun. There's a baking show on the small television, and you’re curled into Jace’s side to steal some of the warmth from his body.

When the program lulls he brings his hand to your hair, combing through the tangled strands. You pay it little mind, leaning into his touch as you watch a contestant on-screen whip macaron batter. His fingers slide down to your jaw, turning your head so your eyes meet his. He’s studying your face, cheeks flushed from the wine or the cold. 

The attention is odd, and you giggle nervously under his gaze. His hands come to cradle your jaw as he leans towards you, nose brushing yours. The air is charged with an unusual tension, his mouth a breath away from yours. 

When he kisses you, he’s slow and gentle, his whole body angled into yours. Everything feels warm, a welcome contrast to the weather outside, and you chalk it up to the glasses of wine coursing through your bloodstream. 

It's pleasant, different from times past; this certainly doesn’t feel like an innocent, experimental kiss. It's heated, tinged with passion. He uses the placement of his hand to ease your jaw open, tongue sliding slowly into your mouth. 

There's a vibe, something you hadn’t felt before with him. It's communicated through the gentle touch of his hands, and how his breath hitches when you kiss him back with the same sort of force. 

The moment is broken by the announcement of a winner on the television. His hands slide down, resting on your shoulders, pulling your frame into his. 

You don’t talk about it afterwards. 

[baddywronglegs]

England doesn’t have a North-South divide. But if it did have one, Cornwall would be in the North.

Now I’m not saying there isn’t a big geographical divide between like, Manchester and Canterbury, or that the country’s a homogeneous patchwork, what I’m saying is this divide isn’t north-south and thinking about it as such masks a lot of things.

Oh, and I am, for necessity of discussing this divide, going to be ignoring the Midlands. I hope you forgive me ignoring the deep cultural ties between Birmingham and Rutland.

Map Men made a video about the North-South divide in England (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENeCYwms-Cc&ab_channel=JayForeman), which focused on the line determined by Danny Dorling in 2008.

… Which isn’t a north-south divide. It’s a northwest-southeast divide, going up at more than 45 degrees – it’s more an east-west divide than it is a north-south. It also includes Wales in “the North” but we’ll get to that.

But it was a north-south divide he set out to find, so a north-south divide he sort of drew, excluding exclaves and enclaves where the metrics he was looking at would make that not a north-south divide.

Notably, several would seem to put the west country peninsula in “the North”… So what’s up with that?

(Dorling's full paper is here, and I recommend looking through the whole thing to see how he arrived at the divide he eventually concluded: https://www.dannydorling.org/wp-content/files/dannydorling_publication_id2938.pdf)

Anyway. This is what’s up with that:

This is a geological map of Great Britain (and the Isle of Man, which isn’t actually part of the UK or any of its constituent countries but I guess it’s here anyway.)

Here again, in the boundary between Jurassic and Triassic geology, is that diagonal line from the Humber to the Severn, but continuing past both. For convenience, here are those two lines superimposed on one another.

With Danny Dorling’s line (frequently following county boundaries or other administrative boundaries) in blue, and the geological divide in red.

One line was drawn in 2008, the other has existed over 200 million years.

This isn’t a coincidence – it’s the reason for the divide.

What made “the North” is the industrial revolution. And one thing that drove the industrial revolution was the mines: coal, iron, silver, tin, the rocks beneath our feet and the people who dreamed they were worth more than the people they sent into the dark to bring it into the light.

Towns grew around mines, from Walker to South Crofty, and more than just the mines defining them, it was the mines closing that would cement the divide.

“Byker Hill and Walker Shore, collier lads forever more”

“Cornish lads are fishermen and Cornish lads are miners too”

- Two folk songs about regional identity’s roots in its industry, from opposite ends of this dividing line

In the West Midlands, the Black Country didn’t earn that name with caviar; it, like Manchester and Leeds, reinvented itself when the industry collapsed: cities built in the brick ruins of the temples built to the exploitation of the workers, blackened by the smokes of the cremation of its labour industry. When the light catches the steel and glass just right, you can still see the ghosts.

Even the country life outside the cities is shaped by this geology: the terrain north-west of this line doesn’t lend itself to large, flat expanses of land for arable farming, and the divide is visible again when looking at agriculture:

With the majority of land south of the Jurassic-Triassic line being arable, mixed and market gardening, with a fair amount of cattle in the Cotswolds and Chilterns and along the north side of the Thames, and the majority north-west of it being cattle and sheep – which are almost absent from the south side of the divide with the exception of the Isle of Wight and therefore, ironically, Cowes.

Not all farming is the same, the yearly flow of labour and of marketable goods between livestock and arable having little in common beyond being intensive work out-of-doors and taking huge amounts of land to accomplish.

But one thing that also goes hand in hand with this is that sheep aren’t mostly farmed for their meat but for their wool, and what drove industrialisation in the Pennines was the steam-loom: the mechanisation and mass-production of wool.

(Incidentally, on this map arable farming and market gardening also correlate with several types of English traditional dance: Molly, Border an East Midlands and East Riding plough dances, which began as a way for seasonal farmhands to make ends meet by busking with menaces in the winter off-season, but that’s for a later Morris ramble).

But hang on, that puts Hull on the same side of the divide as Kent, not, for example, Liverpool. So what gives there?

The East Riding isn’t built on mining - a kid with a bucket and spade could find the water table in most of the county.

Hull, and other ports of Yorkshire with it, was built on whaling – and not many industries have collapsed harder than whaling. For once, the geography of the land has little impact on this, but the geography of the sea does:

Between England and the European continent is a shallower stretch of sea called Dogger Bank – named for the Dutch cod-fishing boats known as Doggers which fished on it. But shallow water isn’t great for whales. So where is there water good for whales?

Well, whalers from Great Britain would venture as far as the Antarctic ocean in search of whales, and often hunted off Greenland – but there was water closer to home where whales did and still do frequent:

(There is still whaling in the North Sea. Around 500 minke whales are killed by Norwegian whalers each year “in objection to” the global ban on commercial whaling.)

Outside of this, there’s also a divide between port cities dealing primarily in cargo or primarily in passengers, something which is somewhat evening out by one means or another, but here’s a current map of UK passenger ports and their passenger numbers:

Or at least circles sized to correspond to their passenger numbers - source with stats: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/sea-passenger-statistics-all-routes-2021/sea-passenger-statistics-all-routes-2021

Compare this with a map of cargo ports by load:

Source with numbers: https://safety4sea.com/uk-ports-record-steady-performance-during-2018/

Generally showing passenger numbers getting lower the further you get from Dover, but not the same correlation with cargo (Plymouth and Holyhead both bucking this trend at a glance).

So, if not “The North” and “The South”, what name does make sense for this divide?

I propose “the South” be known as Lloegyr.

These names still exist: Domnonea still exists in Brittany both as a name for that same region from which Brittonic settlers came to Brittany and an area of Brittany named for them, and in Welsh, yr Alban is Scotland, Cymru is Wales and Lloegr is England.

Wales isn’t part of “the North”. “The North” is part of Wales.

[theuksteel]

Customized Fabrications in the UK | The UK Steel

At The UK Steel, we specialize in customized fabrications in the UK, delivering tailored solutions to meet your unique project needs. Our expert team crafts high-quality steel structures and components, ensuring precision and durability for industries of all sizes. Whether you require bespoke architectural steelwork, intricate designs, or heavy-duty fabrications, we’ve got you covered.

[literallymechanical]

How significant is powder metallurgy for the use of bastardly-to-machine stuff like inconel these days? it's just i was checking out some quotes for DMLS printing recently and there wasn't *that* much of a price delta between alu and stuff like maraging steel and superalloys

I can’t speak to other industries, but in rocket engineering and fusion engineering it’s huge. Everybody loves to 3D print inconel, as well as funky copper alloys (shoutout to GRCop-84) and steel. It has terrific mechanical properties and you can make almost any arbitrary shape. The hot new thing to do is to 3D print as much of your rocket as possible.

HOWEVER, in nuclear fusion, inconel in general is kind of going out of fashion. For those of you in the room who aren't familiar, inconel refers to a class of "superalloys," structural metals that can retain their strength while very close to their melting point. One would think this would be a super useful property in a fusion reactor, and one would be absolutely correct. JET in the UK went hog-wild with inconel, as did TFTR at Princeton.

But, depending on the alloy, inconel is anywhere from 50% to 70% nickel. Nickel is particularly problematic in areas of high neutron flux (like, say, in a fusion reactor), where it captures neutrons and "activates." Almost every element does this to one extent or another, but it's real bad when it happens to nickel.

I'm not a neutronics person, but from what they tell me, the various transmutation reactions give you both radioactive byproducts with annoyingly long half-lives, and pockets of helium that lead to severe embrittlement. A nickel-rich alloy is just not going to have a good time in a fusion power plant, long term.

[mydaddywiki]

Peter Bottomley

Physique: Average Build Height: 5’ 8" (1.73 m)

Sir Peter James Bottomley (born 30 July 1944-) is a British Conservative Party politician who has served as a Member of Parliament (MP) since 1975, and who currently represents Worthing West. First elected at a by-election in the former constituency of Woolwich West, he served as its MP until its abolition at the 1983 general election, and then for the Eltham constituency which replaced it, until 1997. He moved to his current constituency at the 1997 general election. Following the 2019 general election, Bottomley became the longest-serving MP and therefore Father of the House.

Cute grandpa type. And the british accent puts him over the top. I wonder if he is what his name implies! Doesn't matter anyway as I'd happily do him.

Born in Newport, Shropshire, England, UK, Bottomley was educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge. He previously worked as a lorry driver and in commerce and industry, including in the steel and engineering sectors. He is qualified in personnel management.

In 1967, Bottomley married Virginia Garnett who later became a Cabinet Minister (Health Secretary), and a life peer in 2005 as Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone. Together they have three children.

[supplyside]

Atlas Works at at Sheffield, Steel City

[afeelgoodblog]

The Best News of Last Week 🐧

1. ‘Robin Hood’ energy strikers give free power to French schools, hospitals, low-income homes

Amid national strikes in the energy sector, some workers in France have found a novel way to protest. On Thursday, "Robin Hood" operations – unauthorised by the government – provided free gas and electricity to schools, universities, and low-income households throughout the country.

Among the facilities provided free energy were public sports facilities, daycare centers, public libraries, some small businesses and homes that had been cut off from power. 

2. UK scientists discover method to reduce steelmaking’s CO2 emissions by 90%

Researchers from the University of Birmingham have developed an innovative method for existing furnaces that could reduce steelmaking’s CO2 emission by nearly 90%.

The iron and steel industry is a major cause of greenhouse gasses, accounting for 9% of global emissions. That’s because of the inherent carbon-intensive nature of steel production in blast furnaces, which currently represent the most-widely used practice.

3. Watch this cargo ship fly a giant kite to save fuel and cut emissions

The 2,700-square-foot parafoil is helping to tow the cargo ship and lessen the workload of the massive diesel engines — reducing the ship’s use of dirty fuel.

4. Scientists discover emperor penguin colony in Antarctica using satellite images

A newly discovered emperor penguin colony has been seen, using satellite images of one the most remote and inaccessible regions of Antarctica.

The colony, home to about 500 birds, makes a total of 66 known emperor penguin colonies around the coastline of Antarctica, half of which were discovered by space satellites. Emperor penguins are the only penguins that breed on sea ice, rather than land, and are located in areas that are very difficult to study because they are remote, inaccessible and can experience temperatures as low as −60C

Kowalski, analysis!

5. Dungeons & Dragons Scraps Plans to Update Its Open Game License

Wizards of the Coast, publisher of Dungeons & Dragons, announced yesterday that it will no longer be pursuing deauthorization of the Open Gaming License 1.0a. The deauthorization of the OGL 1.0a was a huge sticking point for fans and third-party publishers who made a living using a license that was granted nearly two decades ago.

6. Turning problem sea algae into a replacement for plastic

Excessive outbreaks of seaweed and microalgae are clogging up waters from the Caribbean to the Baltic. Now both are being harvested alongside farmed crops to create ingredients for cosmetics and food products.

7. German parliament officially commemorates LGBTQ victims of Nazi regime for first time.

The German parliament for the first time on Friday focused its annual Holocaust memorial commemorations on people persecuted and killed over their sexual or gender identity during World War II. Campaigners in Germany have worked for decades to establish an official ceremony to commemorate the LGBTQ victims persecuted under the Nazi regime.

“Today’s hour of remembrances focuses on a group of victims which had to fight for a long time to achieve recognition: people who were persecuted by the National Socialists because of their sexual orientation or their gender identity,” Baerbel Bas, president of the Bundestag lower house, said while opening a ceremony marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the anniversary of Auschwitz’s liberation.

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