In the news

Shinzo Abe shot from behind whilst on the campaign trail. Of all the places in the world Japan would’ve been the last place I’d expected this to happen.

The Rest Is Politics podcast 'Johnson Resigns' episode worth a listen, some interesting points including the fact Johnson will continue to be incredibly damaging to British politics in whatever he does next.

Chinese social media already proving to be a cesspit following Abe's shooting. Japanese social media not doing much better (blaming Korea). Unfortunately Abe is almost certainly dead, based on the wording in Japanese news reports.

Fuck. Have any reasons come out as to why he was shot?

That is brilliant!!

Not yet, the suspect is ex-military apparently, though I'm not sure whether that has any bearing on anything.

Japanese colleague says that cardiac arrest is used when someone is dead but a doctor hasn’t officially called it. In any case Abe would’ve been in arrest for several hours now… Guess officials are waiting for the right people to do what needs doing.

I do wish journos would stop referring to cabinet ministers as the new x, and start calling them the current x.

Yeh they are saying it's a homemade gun as well, which is bold

Homemade shotgun. Guns are pretty hard to come by in Japan, so homemade is probably easier than procuring one, esp if you have da skillz.

I'm not sure where you'd get a gun from in Japan, maybe the easiest thing is to make one? Giant sword, huge knife, all fine - but guns? Hard to get in Japan. Same here in China (incidentally there was a knife attack just down the road from my office last week! obvs didn't get a lot of coverage in state media)

edit: kl beat me to it

Yeh, you got to be confident you're not going to blow you're hand off though

Also expect to see Americans saying this shows anti gun laws don't work

Knife laws are also extremely strict in Japan. Much stricter than in the UK.

Japan has its own tradition of deeply odd protestors.

The likely weapon and detailed DIY instructions were featured in a recent-ish mainstream American gun fan magazine, also helpfully online too.

Planning on heading there this year, excitement is ramping up for this season.

An ex colleague of mine made a colt 45 in the 70's, he had full plans for it and it was fully functional. I pointed out to him a few years ago that having it on his wall on full view was probably not the best thing to do.

He was an incredibly skilled machinist and the gun was almost a perfect copy.

blow you're hand off

My limited understanding of this is that you can buy the critical gun parts as spare parts from US websites. Much less likelihood of getting caught if it's just a 6 cm piece of machined metal turning up in the mail. Then you can 3D print everything else and assemble.

Somone has leaked the quote/invoice for the Downing St flat refurb to the Indy. Knives out!

https://archive.ph/704F9

How do I kitchen thread >

Those are real "I saw you coming prices". Totally guessing but maybe they'll get 30p in the pound reselling the furniture?

Obviously the labour and decorations a deadweight loss.

Shinzo Abe confirmed dead.

Why do you need £2880 worth of material for sofas that cost £7560 each?

Same for the chairs?

We're all in this together.....

You can helpfully look them all up on the website though. Here's a £3.5k trolley:

https://www.soane.co.uk/furniture/nureyev-trolley-medium

edit: here's his wall mounted candle sticks, at £1.7k each:
https://www.soane.co.uk/the-aten-hurricane-wall-light-with-candle

Am I wrong? That does seem quite expensive, even though it has been beaten by Cornish Coppersmiths

Jaysus, our house renovation costs less than that (though we got our hands dirty and did a lot ourselves).

Locally made materials are far more expensive though, an English made curtain pole is £170, one made in China is £40. Even so, surely somebody of Boris' influence can get a beautiful design with mostly used furniture/rugs and then splash the cash on wallpaper etc.