When you’re abroad with your partner, do you ever feel that the conversation starts to sort of run dry by a certain point?

Of course, you might spend your lives together – but there’s something about spending all day, every day with each other that can occasionally leave you both a little lost for words.

While a comfortable silence can be exactly what the doctor ordered, these lulls can sometimes feel like an indicator that your relationship isn’t quite as strong as you once thought.

However, according to relationship expert Dr Charlotte Russell, aka The Travel Psychologist, this is very normal and there’s actually a name for it.

According to research by the travel experts at Booking.com, around one in four couples experience a “dialogue drought” while on holiday.

For most couples, this seems to hit around day five but for some couples, it can happen by day three.

For couples who have been together for two years or less, it’s more likely, with 56% of newer couples admitting they hit a so-called dialogue drought on their last trip away.

Don’t worry if it happens to you, though. Dr Russell assures “it’s not a sign that your relationship is in trouble”.

“Spending all our time together on a trip inevitably means that the conversation will dry up sometimes,” she added.

But when there are awkward silences a-plenty, here are some ways to keep the chatter going…

Excursions – such as tours, boat trips or structured activities – can make a huge difference. Almost three-quarters (71%) of the people Booking.com spoke with said that they felt closer to their partners following new experiences on their trip.

Additionally, 65% of holidaymakers agreed that the best holiday conversations happen while doing something.

If there’s a time to dig out your deepest and silliest questions, it’s on holiday. You have all the time in the world to debate and discuss their answers!

Dr Russell shares her favourite conversation starters:

1. What’s one weird habit of mine that revealed itself to you on this trip?
2. What’s an assumption you had about me early on that turned out to be wildly incorrect?
3. Which one of us would survive longest if we were stranded on a desert island, and why?
4. If we could bring one person along for the rest of the trip, who would be the best addition, and why?
5. If you could teleport us anywhere in the world for dinner tonight, where would we go, and what would we order?

Some of my favourite travel memories stem from the experiences I’ve had when connecting with other travellers. A bartender in Barcelona, some musicians in Berlin, a writer in Brooklyn, their stories were ones that I brought back and shared with others.

Dr Russell adds that putting the effort in makes a real difference, saying: “By being intentional, we can move past everyday small talk, reignite meaningful conversation, and build deeper connections when on the road.”

As women, we are used to the more passionate sides of ourselves being denigrated. Our determination is called “bossy”, experiencing anything other than constant glee is “moody” and being loudly passionate makes us “fiery”.

In fact, according to research done by Sweaty Betty 9 in 10 women have reported being described negatively using words such as moody, icy, dramatic and temperamental.

This is so surreptitious that even our dictionaries use these stereotypes in definitions, such as:

Now, as part of its Born for the Storm’ campaign, Sweaty Betty is urging language resources to better reflect attitudes of women and society today.

Interestingly, these words are also how we describe the weather, and this is consistent throughout history.

Between 1953 and 1979, storms were named exclusively after women*, partly because they were perceived as sharing similar qualities: dramatic, unpredictable and impossible to ignore.

Despite this, attitudes are evolving and the overall picture is one of confidence rather than caution. Yes, we are impossible to ignore and so we should be.

75% of women say being called a “force of nature” is a compliment, 76% believe women described in this way should be celebrated, and 71% would happily use the phrase to describe an inspiring woman in their own life.

Melissa Mullen, Brand President, Sweaty Betty, says: “People have spent a long-time comparing woman to storms. We see that as a compliment. Whether it’s being called fiery, relentless or a force of nature, these are the qualities that help women keep going when life gets messy.

“The research shows women aren’t interested in shrinking themselves, softening themselves or waiting for perfect conditions. They’re getting on with it. That’s exactly the spirit behind Born for the Storm. It’s a celebration of women who keep moving forward whatever the forecast, and whatever life throws their way.”

English lexicographer and etymologist, Susie Dent who started her career working on both bilingual and English dictionaries says that if we continue to reclaim the language within society then dictionaries will follow.

Susie Dent says: “It’s remarkable that women still regularly hear and receive such adjectives as “fiery” or “icy” in their everyday lives. Dictionaries, as always, will track these uses and reflect them in their examples, which are drawn from solid evidence of current language.

“Today’s lexicographers describe the usage they document rather than prescribe how words should be used. When together we begin to shift our language from negative to positive, our dictionaries will change alongside us. This research by Sweaty Betty proves just how powerful our word choices can be.”

For 80’s and 90’s kids, E.T: The Extra Terrestrial was a real family classic. Often on the telly, this cosy sci-fi adventure was the perfect mix of comforting and a little scary.

However, originally, our little alien pal was supposed to be much, much scarier. In fact, it actually was originally supposed to be an alien invasion film called Night Skies.

In this story, a family is terrorised by hostile aliens on a Kentucky farm in the 1950’s, according to Screen Rant.

As Steven Spielberg and special effects legend Rick Baker got to work on creating the alien, Spielberg was unsure whether this spooky path was one that he wanted to continue on.

Slash Film explains that screenwriter John Sayles’ script, “depicted a small group of malicious aliens — Squirt, Skar, Klud and Hoodoo — that threaten a rural family and brutally kill livestock with one touch of their long, bony finger, which emits an eerie light (this device is used in “E.T.” in a very different way).

“The kind-hearted alien Budde befriends the family’s autistic son Jaybird, and their sweet, playful scenes are moments of respite from the overall terror.”

As time went on, Spielberg realised that this sub-plot was what he wanted to explore, feeling himself pulled towards the ‘gentle’ story.

In the book The Films of Steven Spielberg by Neil Sinyard, Spielberg admits that he was growing weary of dark stories around this time saying: “I might have taken leave of my senses. Throughout [the production of] Raiders [of the Lost Ark], I was in between killing Nazis and blowing up flying wings and having Harrison Ford in all this high serialised adventure.

“I was sitting there in the middle of Tunisia, scratching my head and saying, ‘I’ve got to get back to the tranquillity, or at least the spirituality, of Close Encounters.’”

E.T: The Extra Terrestrial is available to stream on Disney Plus.

Donald Trump said “everything’s going to work out fine and dandy” after an attack on a Saudi-operated oil pipeline, then gave a rather convenient answer after being asked when his costly Iran war might finally come to an end.

The US president insisted the conflict, which is now in its sixth month, would reach a conclusion “probably right after” America’s midterm elections in November.

Israel and the US launched the war at the end of February, with Trump at the time claiming it would only last around six weeks.

Asked on a visit to Dublin when it might end, he said: “I think very soon. I think it’ll be probably right after the midterms.

“They’re trying to hold out as long as they can, to complicate the election, but I think people are wise to it because Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. It’s very simple.”

Trump took questions alongside Irish prime minister Micheál Martin during his two-day visit, repeating the decades-old talking point from Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Iran was “weeks” or “months” away from having a nuclear bomb.

“And they would have probably hit us too, before we put out the fire,” Trump claimed Saturday. “But they cannot have a nuclear weapon. But I would say [the war will end] shortly. And oil will come tumbling down when that happens; oil prices will come tumbling down.”

Trump’s claim that the war will end shortly after the midterms arrives amid disastrous approval ratings, largely due to his handling of the economy and unpopular Middle East conflict.

He has given several contradictory reasons for launching the war and appears to have achieved none of the core goals he set earlier this year. As a result, energy and food prices have spiked as Iran responded to US strikes by closing the economically-vital Strait of Hormuz.

The conflict escalated on Thursday after a major oil pipeline in Saudi Arabia — a US ally — was shut down following drone attacks launched from Iraq. Trump, who baselessly claimed Iran was responsible, tried to reassure the public.

“I have made a call with [Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman],” he said. “He’s a good friend of mine, and it’s going to — I can just say everything’s going to work out fine and dandy. It’s going to be very good.”

The Iran war has already cost at least 18 US military service members and more than 3,000 Iranians their lives.

Some Republicans have distanced themselves from Trump, who is making the midterms a referendum on his supposed successes — despite his plummeting popularity.

EastEnders star Lacey Turner has opened up about her decision to sign up for Strictly Come Dancing.

Ahead of her dance floor debut later this month, Lacey – best known for her work as Stacey Slater in the long-running BBC soap – admitted that she’s “always wanted” to take part in Strictly, but until this year, she claimed she’d “just never been brave enough”.

“I’ve had a friend do it every year, so I know how hard it is,” she told the BBC. “A lot of my friends are physically fit, and they have been exhausted.”

On why she had a change of heart in 2026, she claimed that while she’s “not working on EastEnders this year”, she “thought it might be a good time to do it”.

“I’m not sure I am physically or mentally fit enough to do both jobs at the same time as well as run a household with three feral children!” she added with a laugh.

Looking ahead to her time on Strictly, Lacey enthused: “I’m actually most looking forward to the training. I think that I will enjoy that bit of it the most, and meeting everybody else.

“I’m obviously most terrified about the live Saturday nights and sitting in the makeup chair for that long, I’m not very good at that! I’m going to try my best and work on my patience.”

The award-winning actor is one of 15 stars taking part in this year’s Strictly, with the cast consisting of famous faces from across the world of TV, sport, music and beyond.

As well as the cast, Strictly is also welcoming some new faces to the ballroom in the form of its new presenters, Emma Willis and Josh Widdicombe, while former pro Johannes Radebe will complete the new hosting trio.

Strictly Come Dancing returns to BBC One on Saturday 19 September, with the first live show of the series following a week later.

April Spiller has plenty of experience with kids. She’s been a teacher for the past 11 years, has nieces and nephews, and has multiple friends with kids.

“As a childless adult who has been around and helped raise over 2,000 other people’s kids, if I am giving you advice, it’s because I have either been there or have seen others going through it,” Spiller told HuffPost.

But she’s learned the hard way that her advice is rarely taken seriously because she’s not a parent herself. So now, she keeps her thoughts to herself.

Her experience raises an interesting question: is it ever OK for childless adults to give parenting advice? Even if you don’t have kids yourself, it’s natural to have opinions about choices your siblings or friends may make when raising theirs. But having opinions and being able to relate are different experiences.

To dig deeper into this debate, we talked to parents, childless adults and an ethicist for their opinions.

Valentina Rebeschini is a photographer living in London with a 14-year-old daughter. She’s been on the receiving end of plenty of parenting advice, and she’s done listening to people who don’t have kids themselves.

Simply put, she finds that people without kids rarely know what it’s actually like to parent them.

“The moment I mention I have a teenager [to someone who doesn’t have kids], I get the classic ‘oh good luck,’ without them actually knowing the situation. It’s judgment without knowing what’s going on underneath,” Rebeschini told HuffPost.

It’s a situation she’s seen play out throughout her kids’ childhoods. “When my daughter was younger, people who didn’t have children would say things like, ‘I wouldn’t give a child an iPad,’ or ‘I wouldn’t let them watch TV,’ and then found themselves doing exactly that once they had their own. Now, with a teenager, it’s the same thing. People imagine what ‘teenager’ means without knowing the developmental history, the day-to-day reality or whether there’s any neurodivergence involved,” she shared.

Even when it’s coming from a place of lived experience, giving advice to someone with kids can backfire if you don’t have one yourself. “If I had it all to do over again, I would not give my friends with kids parenting advice. This isn’t the only reason this friendship ended, but it definitely contributed,” said Darrin Smith, a 37-year-old childless web developer.

Smith shared that a few years ago, one of his friends had a baby and insisted on using gender-neutral pronouns. “Posts would say things like ‘my child’ or ‘my baby.’ Her reasoning was not wanting to force gender norms on her kid,” Smith said.

As a gay Black man and her friend, Smith felt entitled to offer his opinion, which was that by withholding basic gendered language, she might be creating a problem before one existed. Ultimately, the friendship unravelled.

“It didn’t matter how logical or well-intentioned my perspective was. Giving unsolicited parenting advice is almost always received as a direct attack on their values as a mother,” Smith said. “If I could do it all over again, I’d just keep my thoughts to myself.”

Not every experience of a childless adult doling out parenting advice is a bad one. “Some of the best advice I have received as a new dad was from a friend who doesn’t have kids,” dad Asim Zahid told HuffPost.

Zahid said that as far as he’s concerned, the value of advice is not dependent on whether somebody has kids; it’s the way the advice is given. As long as the advice isn’t accompanied by judgment, he’s all for it. “Advice becomes unhelpful when it’s perceived as criticism,” he said.

Vanessa Gordon, a mother of two, feels similarly. Recently, she said, a friend of hers who does not have children pointed out that she interacted with her kids as if they were her friends, not her children. “He also told me that he has noticed how my children can be very manipulative and how easily I give in to them, especially as I am juggling work and time with them at the same time,” Gordon said.

She easily could have been offended by his advice, which she hadn’t even asked for. But Gordon told HuffPost that she actually appreciated it.

“His perspective was helpful because he was observing the situation from the outside. Parents can become so immersed in the daily realities of raising children that certain patterns are missed. A person does not necessarily need to be a parent to recognise patterns and issues involving boundaries, communication, respect or behaviour,” she said.

Conor Keenan, a dad of two kids, told HuffPost that some of the best parenting advice he’s ever received came from his sister, who doesn’t have kids but used to be a special needs teacher, and from his friend Cat, who doesn’t have kids but is a court-appointed child advocate.

“I think people without children have every right to care about what kind of adults we’re collectively raising. That doesn’t mean every piece of advice is good advice. But I’d rather hear someone out and decide for myself than dismiss their opinion simply because they don’t have kids,” he said.

According to Byron Hyde, an ethicist and philosopher of science and public policy at Bangor University in the UK, there’s a whole field of philosophical study devoted to what makes someone a good source of knowledge called epistemology.

“Many people assume that personal experience is a good source of knowledge and tend to look down on ‘book learning’ or other sources that are perceived to be ‘too academic’ or ‘intellectual,’” Hyde explained.

But he emphasised that the reality is that personal experience is considered the weakest type of evidence. This means that just because someone is a parent doesn’t mean their advice is automatically going to be good.

With this in mind, Hyde told HuffPost that the value of parenting advice depends on the evidence for where it’s coming from. “For example, if you’re friends with a child psychiatrist, why would you ignore their free advice, for which they normally charge as a professional, just because they don’t have children themselves?” Hyde asked.

But even childless adults who don’t work in career fields having to do with children may be worth listening to. “Don’t forget that everyone was a child once,” Hyde said.

There’s a time and place for giving advice – especially when it comes to something as personal as parenting. Hyde recommends that childless adults only offer parenting advice when it either comes from specialised training or knowledge gained through personal experience, such as something that they went through as a kid.

Otherwise, it’s best to keep quiet – even if you have opinions you’d really like to share.

Even if you do have advice that stems from trained knowledge or personal experience, Hyde recommends only sharing it when you’re asked. Unsolicited advice is rarely well-received.

Reform UK has received a £36 million donation from a crypto billionaire who gave Nigel Farage a controversial £5m gift.

Christopher Harborne’s donation comes just hours after another crypto billionaire, Ben Delo, gave the party the same amount.

Thailand-based Harborne also gave Reform £9 million last August.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Harborne said the donation was “a philanthropic gift to our country” intended to help Reform prepare for government.

He said: “Whilst I have been making donations to Reform of around £1 million a month, Ben Delo told me he was going to make a record donation of £36 million.

“My competitive spirit inspired me to match it, so that is what I’ve done. And I hope others may join us.”

Farage said: “I am honoured and humbled that Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne have shown such confidence in Reform.

“Both men know that we are the only party that can turn the country around and win the next General Election – thanks to their generosity, we are now able to fight that election on a level playing field.”

The donation means Mr Harborne retains his position as Reform’s largest donor, having already given £9 million to the party last August.

The £5 million gift from Harborne to Farage is at the centre of an investigation by the parliamentary standards watchdog after the Reform leader failed to declare it in his register of interests.

In his Telegraph article announcing the donation, the billionaire said the UK needed a “profitable and dynamic economy” to be able to address the three “existential threats” of nuclear war, AI and climate change.

His donation comes a day after it was reported Delo had given £36 million to the party, saying it would ensure a “level playing field” between Reform and its opponents.

Delo, who moved back to the UK from Hong Kong in order to avoid a proposed cap on donations from overseas voters, was pardoned by US president Donald Trump last year after a conviction for violating the US Bank Secrecy Act.

The Telegraph reported he had intended to give Reform £1 million a month up until the next election, but was donating the money in a lump sum in case the government introduced a cap on all political donations.

MPs last week backed measures including a cap on overseas donations at £100,000 and a suspension of funding through cryptocurrency, but the draft legislation still needs to be passed by the House of Lords to become law.

Backbench calls for a cap on all donations have not been successful.

The twin donations offer Mr Farage’s party a boost after a summer dominated by scrutiny of Reform’s finances, including the launch of a criminal investigation into allegations it breached rules on political donations.

Reform UK denies any wrongdoing and has said it will co-operate fully with the probe.

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