Buy cheap uns. I really like my solar lights and it doesn’t really seem to matter what you buy – they get knackered quickly.

B&Q cheapo ones that I can chuck away without feeling pained…..

Maybe all courses are not created equal, but the one I did 18 months ago was pretty dull and un informative.

They didn’t really tell me anything about speeding. It was just a brush up on basic Highway Code knowledge.

But, it did seem better than the points…..

The course leaders did think I’d been hard done by. 44 in a 40 limit. But I was in my van which apparently makes them judge you more harshly. The fact I was driving to the Peak for a days riding is irrelevant.

The course was painless though. Three hours. Dull. But I got tea and a biscuit. Learnt nothing new.

A more interesting question would be “if you could erase all human existence, would you (including your own)”.

Whilst I appreciate the paradox in the question (erasing your own existence), the question is more around whether Earth would be better without us.

Personally I’d happily pull the plug. But I have no kids, so I’ve no vested interest in the next generation.

Happy Comic Relief day……

Slacken the gear cable off a bit?

I’ve had brand new ones that leak 🙁

Hope did stuff all to fix them, just sent them back to the shop moaning I’d fitted them badly.

My theory would be Hope aim for excellent quality, but miss the mark too often, and then rest on a mixed reputation of being helpful to fix.

I don’t want to get all 1980’s, but Right First Time might be a better mantra for them.

I’d never touch their brakes again.

The intro and outro to Iron Maidens Seventh Son of a Seventh Son.

As suggested above a cardboard box from a bike shop has been the best way of transporting bikes. All my issues occurred using bike bags, which I think the handlers just see as awkward, heavy things to chuck around.

Get to the airport early. And check your bike at arrivals, and complain immediately.

Or drive…..

BA lost mine four times. It always turned up though.

And they damaged it three times.

I drive now 🙂

Toasters. Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.

Some interesting thoughts here.

Ken was (is!) and educated man with a long professional career and a family. I get that, in the grand scheme of things, these facts don’t matter much (Harold Shipman as mentioned above for instance).

I think the reason I posted this thread up was just the sheer shock of it all.

I really liked Ken – we’d even spoken of going on a camping trip together in Vermont (and normally I’m a right miserable sod in terms of making friends at work).

I guess it has knocked my trust. If Ken could hide this secret then what is being hidden by others. I appreciate that sounds like the beginning of paranoias but it’s what it feels like today. I’m sure it’ll subside in coming weeks.

I’ve been doing my bit today by making sure everyone who worked with him knows the news…….

How can people hide like that?

I do read people well. But I missed this.

I guess that’s what I don’t get. When presented with proper evil, I missed it. And it worries me. We had talked about all sorts over the years. Even quitting the rat race and setting up doing something different. He was a good mate.

Never in a million years could I have seen, or guessed, that he’d be doing this sort of nonsense (words aren’t ideal as the swear filter will find what I feel).

It makes me question everything. How many other friends are weirdos, peados, murderers? **** me off I can’t tell (and do something about).

I’d be too paranoid to ride that.

It might last a while, it might die next ride. I tend to go for the worst case scenario….

Zelda, Ocarina of Time

Super Mario N64

Manic Miner

Doom

Half Life 2

I’ve got a 320d M Sport touring. It is lovely to drive, very easy to do lots of miles in. It’s not as frugal as BMW reckon it should be (and I don’t thrash it). If you can get he professional entertainment system as the larger screen is great.

Missus has an M135i and it’s plenty big enough for a bike in the boot (front wheel off).

Both are good cars. Drive them both and choose. But I personally prefer the looks of mine to hers….

Yes but they exist.

Other people’s wives and parents also exist, but don’t love them the same way. So existence isn’t the be all and end all – it’s about the feelings we ascribe.

Think of a piece of art. We don’t value them for the paint or canvas, we value them for how we feel about them.

But, then we start mixing religion with spirituality again. If something feels good we often say it’s lifted our spirits. Perhaps that’s what the OP was meaning…..

There is either people have have a mental illness that enables them to attach meaning to the abstract who are called “religious”, and everyone else who doesn’t

Attaching meaning to abstract things is what makes us human. I love my wife, for instance, and my parents. I don’t think I’m mentally ill because I’ve attached meaning to these people in a way science struggles to explain.

If I then choose to love life, to love the world, does that make me mentally ill?

Spirituality and Religion are not synonymous and I think this thread has allowed to two to blur together.

Sat watching Top Gear on Dave due to redundancy.

Tbh I’m quite happy about it (redundancy, not necessarily watching Top Gear repeats).

There is plenty of work out there in my area thankfully so I’m not planning on being out for long, and my previous employers were generous with the settlement.

I’m trying to find the bright side. If I can find another job soon I can retire a little earlier if I invest my payment well.

Or, more likely, I’ll look for a more meaningful job that might not carry the same salary as I had and use the payment to clear the mortgage.

I think it always looks worse than it is in reality. There are lots of people getting made redundant at the moment, and I know people will react differently to the process. But see it as an opportunity.

UKLinkSkills 😉

Redundant and quite happy about it.

After 15 years I needed a change anyway.

My last day is tomorrow 🙂

I got made redundant – which to be honest, I see as a bonus 🙂

My wife is wonderful, but my boyfriend is better in bed.

Yeah, mine turned up on time, just needing it’s handlebars straightening and pedals bolting on.

Great service from On One and really good communications throughout.

Just need two things now – A: some snow and B: my wife to stop laughing at it…..

So old Arnie is in the past already waiting to save people from young Arnie who has been sent back from the future?

And slightly less old Arnie made an appearance in T3.

And a more middle aged Arnie made an appearance in T2.

Surely at this rate, by T10 the modern day will be populated solely by Arnies of varying ages. Surely meaning the machines have won by default.

Concrete drive.

I’ll try and get some quotes today – tbh I’m just glad the entire thing didn’t give and my car wheel disappear down it….

Yeah, I know I need to get all the fragments out 🙁

It looks like a couple of large segments and some shrapnel.

Sounds like I’m buggered and it’s new frame and lid time if I can’t persuade a local engineer to make me a new lid.

Welcome to SingleTrackWorld where having fun on a bike is a crime 🙂

Cool – might need to go spending then……

How tall are people for the size they’re buying? Stuck between 16″ and 18″ (5’11”)?

I love sprouts. Steamed and simply served.

However, as a bet, I pickled some a few years ago with quite a bit of chilli – and they are wonderful. Really nice with cold turkey.

A tenner?

They’re ancient and not very good….

There seems to be a real dichotomy of opinions here.

Wouldn’t it be easier for every woman, old person and sanctimonious person to have a power limited car that’s restricted to 70mph? The rest of us can have sufficient power to ensure we aren’t frustrated by them?

I don’t often speed – but I do like power. But then I just drive an ickle Focus Estate (ST3).

It was ‘orrible.

The mud was vile 🙁

Must get mud tyres and a slightly more XC race orientated bike me thinks.

Thanks Yak 🙂

Sounds great. I’ve not done anything competitive for a while so was worrying a little.

Happy to come last – just didn’t want too much of a pounding.

Two hours in one of the ‘aged gentleman’ categories.

I’ve never done one of these before OR raced at Minley. What’s the course like? How muddy is it likely to be?

Also sort of wondering how competitive these events are – I know they’re races, but I don’t really want to be to humiliated…..

Chip, imagining your gentleman as Sir Michael Gambon isn’t helping.

This wasn’t supposed to be a thread about horror stories of the member….

I just want a simple answer to my wife’s question. Where does the little man hide when it’s cold? He doesn’t just evaporate. He reappears when warm, and not gradually, but with aplomb.

So where has he been – and I’m sure it’s not to London to see the Queen.

Rachel, we understand our bodies to a certain extent, and we accept that which we do not understand.

My wife, on the other hand, won’t accept my answer of “I don’t know” when asked where it’s gone.

Chip my boy, informed answers are so much less interesting than uniformed opinions, hence the thread.

I rarely trust the “truth” of the internet and so decided to ask assembled wise men (and women) on this forum.

So far I’ve learned little more than if you’re a monk you might get kicked in the nuts a lot.

Rachel, yours has come closest to an answer, but sadly not a complete one.

I can understand that the vascular nature of the area my make it prone to shrinkage. But this is more, much more. The button mushroom that is left after a ride seems to have somehow become tortoise like and burrowed within.

A warm shower doesn’t just grow it. There comes a point where it pops back out.

So, something was there, and not just deflated and cold blood vessels. And something popped out.

Where did it pop out from?

The wife really wants to know in case she needs to go digging with a warm tea spoon one day.

I’m now more confused than ever.

It is true that the Monk in the video is a true man of steel (or at least his gentleman vegetables are). And as for the Bruce Parry link….. Well I don’t really see my meat n two veg as a sausage roll to be squeezed and tortured,

These are all highly informative items. But WHERE does it go.

Moses – I feel your pain (well I would if they were visible after a cold water swim). But where had they gone?

Globalti – I accept your suggestion that things down there are spongy. But that doesn’t account for them just disappearing.

I dread the day I might see my gentleman on the side of a milk carton as part of a “missing” campaign.