if the vote goes yes, then it will be the English property investors that will benefit the most when Scottish house prices crash, they will be snapped up by the English looking for holiday homes, and to increase their buy to let portfolios.

this will piss the Scots off soooo much.

Alternatively if interest rates go up to help defend Sterling, the whole UK housing market incl/esp London will tank… (which would suit me incidentally, I want to buy a house!)

Either way, it’s all this uncertainty which will most likely impact on us in the immediate turn and falls in Scottish co shares and Sterling today aren’t suggesting good news for Scotland or rUK on 19th…

My Soul makes me ride more carefully than I did on my Five. The Five will take everything in its stride. The Soul makes me pick my lines and slows me up, which is a good thing even if it’s harder to ride.

FWIW, I broke a collarbone in 2007, was off the bike for 18 months cos it wouldn’t mend. Started riding again, fell off and broke the scapula on the other side! Loved the Soul but seriously felt like selling it after falling off it twice. I lost faith I could go for a ride without breaking myself – the second crash was harder to deal with in that respect. Mentally that was a difficult rut to get out of.

Luckily I have a friend who’s a guide and a coach and I mentioned this to him. We did 3 separate sessions – my brief to him was to help me give me basic confidence back and sort my head out, with a focus on dealing with jumps and drops (lack of confidence in this had led to the first crash).

I’ve not looked back and not had a big crash since.

So not ignoring your points OP, but repeated crashing made me seriously consider changing the bike but it was sorting my head out with training that helped me the most.

My Howies merino stuff has holes in it after 5+ years – which ain’t so bad I suppose, except all my Helly tops which are 12+ years old and half the price are still going strong (and not smelly)

I bought an expensive carbon bike and it made me faster…
1. I figured that if I rode a £3k bike slowly I’d look like an ATGNI MAMIL so I’d better get fit and ride it properly!
2. It’s a gorgeous bike to ride so I ride it lots and stay out longer… and so I’m fitter.

It does feel a lot more efficient at putting out whatever my legs can put in (compared to my steel winter bike for instance) but I’ve not quantified this in any scientific manner.

So yes, buying a better bike may well make you faster, but £6k seems excessive to me – £2.5/3k would seem to be enough to buy you a good frame with a lightweight group IMO

New international language: Cymraeg!

Great, we’ll all just be spitting over each other trying to get the Ll pronunciation right!

I can understand the general feeling of discontent with Westminster government but regional devolution/independence (whether Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, Yorkshire, whatever) away from Westminster government isn’t suddenly going to make life any better…

Partly – we’ll still be governed by politicians (and I’ve not noticed a better calibre of politician at local level than we have at national level – look at your local cycle lane provision for a clue!)

But mainly, the current economic mess is not actually of Westminster’s making. USA, Spain, Ireland, France, Portugal, Italy, Greece etc are all in a mess too.

Globalisaton is beyond the control of Westminster. The West hasn’t always been wealthy and powerful – we’ve just been lucky enough to live in a time when we have been. Globalisation is what’s changed our fortunes. Fair enough, we’ve not prepared for it too well, but show me a Western government that did…

No-one has power and wealth forever – Romans lost their empire, Ancient Greece lost its way, so did the Ottoman Empire, so did Soviet Union – happens to all wealthy nations eventually…

I can’t see how rejecting Westminster (as ineffective as it is) is quite going to help us compete against the rising economic and political power of China and belligerence of Russia…

Junkyard – lazarus
I know that sounds ridiculous but to make such a major decision on such flimsy, emotional grounds seems deeply, deeply unwise to me.

Some people think other things are more important than money
You are free to insult them for this.

It’s not supposed to be an insult, sorry. The consequences for Scotland, for rUK, now, for our kids and our grandkids are massive. Maybe for the better, maybe for the worse, who knows.

I’m just genuinely shocked that no-one appears to have asked the proponents of either the Yes or the No argument for some data (GPD and employment projections, backed up with the underlying assumptions for e.g) to back up their assertions…

Princeton economist slams independence movement.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/opinion/paul-krugman-scots-what-the-heck.html

This is exactly what I was on about yesterday – sensible, serious consideration of the technical matters involved – if the economics works out, Scotland should be ok but if the economics doesn’t, both Scotland and rest of UK could well be worse off.

But I’ve not seen any evidence (in the online discussions at least) of the technical matters making up any part of the decision-making process that the Yes voters are going thru. And that’s scary.

The main criteria seem to be ‘we want independence’ or ‘we hate Westminster’ as opposed to ‘a deep analysis of the data and well-informed projections of future economic growth show Scotland will be better off alone’.

I know that sounds ridiculous but to make such a major decision on such flimsy, emotional grounds seems deeply, deeply unwise to me.

have you ridden one? I don’t agree with the best of both claims but the 650s I’ve ridden were better (in my opinion) than the 26″ bikes.

Fair enough but if I can’t run my 26 Soul any longer because I can’t get spares because the industry isn’t supporting that standard anymore, a 650B bike will cost me c £1800 that I don’t want to have to spend, with no way of offsetting that cost by selling the old one…cos it’s worth nowt despite being a premium bike…

If the industry really had confidence that 650B was better, it would have given us the choice, not bailed out on 26 and forced 650b on us.

Who knows?
Some companies currently based in Scotland have already announced they’ll be moving out if there’s a Yes vote – Standard Life and Bank of Scotland being 2 significant examples. Being financial you’d expect them to move to London where the skill base is – therefore greater inequality for UK but good for London…

I suspect it’s bad news for any foreign investors who wanted to put money into Scotland – they’ll either pull out completely and put money into another country, or find somewhere in UK to put it.

I suspect demand for other regions in UK to have more independence from Westminster – not a bad thing per se but the economic argument will need to stack up if that’s the provide opportunities for the people, rather than greater debt burdens – North West seems to be the best candidate in that respect…

In the immediate term I would expect Sterling to fall, foreign investment to stall and interest rate on government bonds to rise (making our debt harder to pay off) simply from the lack of certainty about UK economic future and lack of clarity on the consequences…

UK is in an economic mess already – can’t see how a Yes vote is likely to improve things

I asked a minister and a shadow minister specifically about why do you not directly expose Salmond’s BS on currency, debt , Defence NHS etc ( the list of long) and the answer? We are advised not to.

Surely they have a better reason than that 😯 I would hope they did but weren’t allowed to tell you…

10 days away from potentially sleepwalking into chaos – so epic

The Economist article about money leaving already, and significant employers planning on leaving is what’s worried me… it shows clear intention.

Of course, if it sends jitters through the markets and through Joe Public, maybe house prices will crash and I can afford to buy something at last 😀

I wonder if there’s a Yes vote and the response of the markets and English and foreign investment is to leave (or announce intention to leave), then maybe all those who voted Yes will ask for another vote so they can annul it).

Coalition of Conservative/UKIP govt in near future. Lead by Boris and Farage, both of whom are keen to strip funding from Scotland.

Tories won’t need UKIP – Labour without Scottish seats won’t have a chance of getting back into power outside a coalition, Tories will be dominant.

I’m right of centre but I don’t want the Tories to not have to fight for their vote, I want them to prove they’re worthy of it each and every time.

A dominant single party isn’t a healthy democracy IMO… so rest of UK will lose out politically as well as economically…

I’d prefer to see Scotland with its own currency or the Euro.

Euro area currently in worse state than UK and deflation looking increasingly likely…

I’m particularly keen to know how the markets will react to the “it’s not our debt” stance, and what that will do to Scotland’s cost of borrowing. You know, the borrowing needed to patch up the £15 billion+ hole in Scotland’s budget given that all the oil money is going to be used to create a sovereign wealth fund instead of paying for public services.

This is what I mean about facts – it appears that very little of the debate has been around measureable/forecastable figures (which Scotland can hold Salmond to if he doesn’t deliver)…

And as Epicyclo says, UK economic growth could well fall away (ITEM Club forecast is for lower growth next year than this in any case) – and referencing Tom’s point about RestofUK losing influence – a split could lead us all into outright recession if the markets and foreign investors think UK’s in long term decline as a result.

Worth reading this: some money’s already leaving Scotland in anticipation of a split. For e.g. if there’s a ‘yes’ vote Standard Life and RBS walking away – taking their jobs and their corporation taxes with them… (most likely to London, further increasing inequality across UK).

Scottish Finance, a case of the jitters

+1 for comedy rather than factual stuff, especially old radio comedy – Morcambe and Wise, Peter Cooke/Beyond The Fringe etc

Careful tho that it’s not too funny – you might crash, or at the very least get weird looks from other drivers 🙂

I want to buy one of those stem spacer bells just because they’re called an ‘Alexander Graham Bell’ and patter like this 😀

There’s nothing like the strong, clear sound of a solid brass bell to announce your presence to inline skaters, stroller pushers and joggers.

Built to replace a 10mm 1 1/8″ headset spacer, the Alexander Graham™ is a classy addition to your rig without sacrificing any of your precious handlebar real estate.

BBC, Guardian, neither present an unbiased picture.

I really haven’t seen any of this emotion they’re all talking about. Certainly no worse than a normal political campaign.

Any discussions I have seen or been involved in have been good-natured. Any nastiness is from the very few bampots on each side – although strangely the real violence seems to have been perpetrated by the No side.

I’m not talking about the editorial, I’m talking about the comments from the likes of you and me underneath the editorial – it can’t show bias other than it’s comments from self-selecting individuals…

And I never said anyone was being nasty – just emotional ie: people are quite scared about what it means or triumphant, depending on which way they want the vote to go, which is just divisive – emotion (fear, anger, resentment) tends to drive people to entrenched extremes and conflict rather than pragmatism.

It also appears that a major decision which will affect every one of 60m people in the UK is being based on emotion and idealism rather than reliable forecasts of economic growth, foreign investment levels, employment etc. I grant you that’s not a lot different from your average general election but it’s not ideal to make such a major decision on so few facts IMO…

When would be a good time pleasethankyouverymuch?

At least when both Scotland and restofUK have reasonably strong economic foundations with manageable levels of debt and a positive economic outlook (and don’t forget our ageing populations, which reduce the size of the economically active population)…

Honestly, whether you’re Scottish, English, Welsh, Northern Irish, for or against Scottish independence, this is possibly the worst time in a generation to do something which creates so much uncertainty about the future (on which investment and spending depend – both our own and foreign investment). Money is already beginning to leave Scotland because people aren’t sure what their money’ll be worth in a couple of year’s time…

Looking at the different comments on bbc, Guardian on here, people are quite emotional about it. It’s incredibly divisive because of the uncertainty it’s driving at a time when we’re desperate for some stability and confidence – pitching Scot against Scot and Scotland against England (in particular)…

Either way the vote goes, the polls show Scotland is clearly a divided country. If they stay in UK then the Nationalists will continue to campaign for independence, leading to continued uncertainty.

If they leave I would imagine the Unionists will be doing their very best to expose the lack of evidence for Salmond’s claims of increased wealth, which at it’s most extreme might lead to a reversal.

Back in the land of stark reality however, investors both large and small are already pulling money out of Scotland in the face of the uncertainty which will have an immediate impact at a time when our ‘recovery’ is very tentative + over the longer term independence could directly lead to Scotland become poorer as it becomes less attractive to outside investors…

Either way, it’s not what the UK needs at a time of such economic delicacy… we need some certainty and reason to be confident about the future… Salmond is making it worse for the whole of the UK, and very few of us voted for him or can vote him out…

First pic is 26 and second is 27.5?
Looking at distance between the frame and the wheels they look exactly the same to me… marginal at best

Couldn’t find much on connection/similarity between Aspergers and Introversion – which suggests it’s not been explored much. Quiet describes my preferences much better than Baron-Cohen tho.

I finished Quiet. It’s a very reassuring read – and she’s spot on that in general introversion is not accepted as a ‘different way of being’, but as somehow ‘wrong’. I’ve been told to my face that I’m weird, told I should talk more in meetings etc – irrespective of the fact that my work is always of a high standard… Both these individuals were generally rather lacking in empathy in any case!

The best chapter for me is the one which says you should find a job you really believe in, as that gives you the motivation to act extrovert when you need to.

I’m still scared that if I take a perm job (esp in a corporate) that I’ll either wear myself out trying to act out of character or get thrown out again.

Being a contractor removes all of that as I believe in myself and as a contractor I’m working for myself rather than the corporate… it’s hard to explain how much easier it makes things but it does.

Tom – why so negative on Myers Briggs? It backed up a lot of my own insights and for what it’s worth I did it with a very good friend of mine who’s a senior HR manager – she wouldn’t have recommended it if she didn’t think it would be helpful…

Zoopla is an estimate based on some unrevealed calculation isn’t it? Land Registry is factual data…

When I put floorstander speakers on my budget system instead of bookshelf speakers on stands, it made a massive difference to the sound quality and detail – if you’re spending that kind of budget I’d consider floorstanders.

FWIW I think you can spend a whole lot less than that (<£1k) and still get a very impressive-sounding system.

IMO the more you spend, the more you expect perfection and end up feeling dissatisfied and constantly upgrading, whereas when you buy budget stuff you’re not so bothered, even tho its still sounds pretty good.

As mentioned above, speaker position and what you put them on can make a surprising difference. Following a previous thread on here I now have 5p pieces underneath the speaker spikes and moved the speakers and the sound is definitely more detailed

If the previous owners simply ran out of money (which it looks like) then expect all kinds of repairs needing to be done on the house – chances are they’ve been skimping on maintenance for a few years if they were that skint. Can you not get a survey first to check there’s nothing major?

I was just about the post that Guardian link. If the vote goes in favour of independence the shock could well derail the ‘recovery’ as business confidence and certainty about the future falls off the track.

From The Economist this week:

Capital is already taking flight from Scotland

If the prospect of a departure worries bankers and investors, of course, an actual one would cause enormous upheaval. Nationalists have set a date of March 2016 to separate from the United Kingdom. That is probably too ambitious. However long the negotiations take, they will be tortuous and ill-tempered. Almost everything, from currency to nuclear weapons, would be on the table, making for a fluid, uncertain picture. Expect the jitters to continue.

Of course, if those people who voted yes see money leaving the country as a direct result, they may well ask for their voting papers back…

Isn’t the survey supposed to pick up on stuff like this?
Surely the previous owners knew about this… so aren’t they liable for the cost in some way?

One estate agent explained that the current “house market optimism” meant that vendors were listing their houses for sale at the more optimistic end of the valuations but were prepared to accept a lower more realistic price if no sale transpired within the first 6 weeks.

That doesn’t sound like optimism, that sounds like scared the market’s going to drop and they want to sell within 6 weeks. I suspect there’s more than a few sellers now who were going to sell earlier in the year but decided to hold off on the basis they could get more if they waited a few months. Now the sentiment is that prices are beginning to fall and the outlook’s not so positive, they want to get rid asap before any crash…

Take a look at land registry (actual selling prices, not Zoopla made-up prices) and other similar properties in the area and what they’re priced at…
Also, look at what they bought at and think about whether the increase is justified when compared to general inflation, or even overall house price inflation over the years.

The fear amongst FTBs that prices will keep rising and rising is leading to sellers overpricing. To me, the way it’s been labelled ‘fixed price’ tells me they know they’re overpricing and lack the confidence in a negotiation (or have offered more than they can really afford on their own place), which actually puts you in a stronger position than them…

As you say indicies are all over the place. Every other economic indicator in the UK suggests we’re hard up and getting harder up. Only house prices are running counter to this. Sellers will be worried they need to sell now in case the market resumes it’s fall…

Who says it’s fixed price? Up to you to offer what you want, there’s no law that requires you to pay what the seller’s hoping for.
Right now, I suspect sellers are hoping to force FTBs to overpay based on sentiment like Teef’s above (fear they’ll miss out) … which may or may not turn out to be the case…

OP: does your OH need both jumpers? From your original post, she was looking to buy one, but ordered the second when she realised she could get it for free.

So, if she takes the offer of a freepost bag she still has the one jumper she really wanted, she won’t be any worse off financially but the business won’t have lost any money and the person who made a mistake will be feeling massively happier…

It’s pretty hard keeping afloat for a lot of businesses at the moment, they’ve accidentally given away £160 of revenue and are willing to meet the postage cost to get it back, which kind of tells you they can’t afford to lose it…

Up to you, I don’t want to moralise but given your OH only ever wanted one jumper, why not send it back? I know I’m very grateful when I screw up and the people it’s affected show me some generosity of spirit

Is there a major sport without proven instances of PED abuse or cheating/betting scams at major level?

I hope that all of us on this thread, and anyone watching that video takes the time to think a little more about how we/they drive/ride next time they go out…

I think you’ll find that those people who like driving fast are also normally interested in improving their driving skills, maintaining their vehicle to high standards, and normally genuinely care about the standard of their driving.

Nope. Government stats don’t support you with that assertion I’m afraid. Pretty much everyone likes to drive fast.

A staggering 70% of drivers admit to speeding, which is especially dangerous in busy and built-up areas. Think! Dept of Transport

From the AA – hardly an anti-driving organisation

Probably right about speed not being the main contributor though – from the same source:

Speeding is a contributory factor in over 30% of accidents.3

. I assume 70% of accidents come from something else.

Agree on the focus by government and police on speed being so wrong not being very helpful too – aggression, poor attentiveness and general lack of respect for the rules are the main risks in my experience as a cyclist

Why do they do that caterpillar thing? What’s the advantage to that compared to a rider stopping and manning the junction until the convoy is through and then rejoining the back, like a through and off?

Probably cos it pisses the perpetrator right off. One copper coming up, having a word and then just sitting there till the race has gone, is nothing like as annoying as every 10 secs, another copper come up, look at you like you’re a div, say something disparaging, and then buggering off… not least cos they’re coppers so you can’t retaliate 😀

This thread, and the way this story has even become a story shows you how much damage Armstrong et al have done to the sport…

Can’t believe the driver’s employer got round their operating ban so easily… presumably they’ve been banned a 2nd time?

unklehomered – Member
Google self driving cars will hopefully make all of this irrelevant.

Given the bike came from behind a slower vehicle it would be an interesting test scenario to establish the capability of self-driving vehicles (which I’m all for btw)

Modern cars make the drivers feel so safe and are so isolated from the outside world and therefore other road users I think this screws most people’s judgements of what’s risky and what isn’t… plus we drive much more frequently than we used to… so the chances of a collision are higher…

Worth remembering this when you’re out on the road whether walking, cycling or driving (whether speeding or not). The risk of a collision is largely outside your control

I’m with you scaredypants. The first thing i always say is how much something should’ve been to which she pretty much always replies “You do find the bargains, don’t you?”

So you fall for the whole ‘was £100, now £60’ and claim you’ve saved £40 when a quick look at your credit card statement will tell you that, in fact, you’ve spent £60 🙂

me too! I wanted a BMX, my mum knew I wanted a BMX, all my mates were getting BMXs

ended up with a Grifter – more comfortable saddle apparantly

Thank your lucky stars! I ended up with a Dawes Kingpin (ladies shopper).
Still went mountain biking on it tho 🙂

I eat butter but spread as thinly as I can.
Marg is highly processed/manufactured and butter is (relatively) natural whilst containing nutrients from the milk.
IMO just because something natural is reckoned to be bad for you doesn’t mean it’s more healthy to substitute it with an artificial alternative – better just to reduce your consumption of it. Same as sugar…