I once had a wee credit card multi tool thing all but forgotten about in my wallet – one of these: https://www.swiss-store.co.uk/victorinox-swisscard-lite-pocket-tool

On a work trip back from Germany, the xray staff at Frankfurt were having a right good look at something in my belongings that I’d put through on the tray. They summoned me over, and as soon as I saw what they were looking at, I knew what it was. Or so I thought. They weren’t interested in the knife or scissors in it, they were looking at the tiny screwdriver thing, as on the xray, it looked like a 10p sized shuriken.
Bearing in mind, I’d already travelled out with the same thing in my wallet via Glasgow, Schiphol and Frankfurt.

If it locks, its illegal, no matter how nice you or it may be.

Fitnotes. Its just a workout tracker, doesnt sync with anything, doesn’t suggest workouts, its just a fancy diary.
But, it is so hassle free, its a joy to use. The free version is fine, but I like it so much, I paid for the full version.

They warrantied my Titus frame last year with absolutely no hassle. It was less than a year old, right enough.
It cracked at the NDS seatstay\dropout weld. I still have it, I may look into getting it repaired.

Episode 3 picked things up a bit! Thats more like it and I’m feeling a bit more hopeful now.

I’ve been buying thrift shop Levis for the last couple of years. You can usually get them in good condition at a fraction of the cost, but, its mental the variance in size and fit you get with them. Even with what are meant to be the same size and fit. I suppose given the size of Levi’s supply chain, their QC might be a bit complicated, not to mention the prevalence of fakes.

But you’ve prompted me to have a look at Uniqlo’s jeans. Like their shirts and t-shirts, so will need to give their jeans a try.

Slightly underwhelmed. So far, so “Memphis Belle”. Which is a shame, as I was really looking forward to this.
Not that theres anything wrong with “Memphis Belle”, a decent wee film.

Almost everything I came here to post has already been posted by Qwerty.

Theres something about exercises hanging from a bar that appeals to me. They shouldn’t, as I’m fat, but they do.

Don’t think about your arms, think about your shoulder blades. Doing sets of scapular retractions hanging from the bar can be good initially. Where I differ from Qwerty is that I go from a dead hang with straight arms and return there (slowly!). So that scapular retraction is the start of the movement and is what gets me moving.

The sub-maximal reps is such good advice. I aim for 30 reps total, in however many sets it takes to get there. Usually sets of 3 to 5, but the point is not to exhaust yourself so that you start grinding out crap reps, so if I need to drop down to single reps I will. Every month or so I’ll test to see what my 1 set max number of reps is, and it always goes better when I’ve been working below my max rep threshhold.

For pullups (palms facing away) try a false grip (thumb over the bar, with the rest of your fingers)

Buy chalk.

I’ve said it before, Briskers are not a winter glove. I’ve never felt discomfort like it with those on cold days.
I recently bought a set of these: https://www.galibier.cc/product/barrier-deep-winter-cycling-gloves/
They are ok, but once they get damp, I find the cold starts to bite my fingers still. Maybe they’ll do better in proper cold with a liner glove.

I’ve got an Octane One Kode singlespeed thing that I put mudguards on for short winter fitness rides. The toe overlap terrifies me, but then, I did manage to put myself over the bars by forgetting about it and pushing the front mudguard into the wheel.

Theres a M&S next to the platform in Queen St, if you want something with the illusion of quality over Greggs. Might be an idea to get straight to Queen St from Central, that way you know how much time you have.

Yep. Not sure why, though the constant grim weather and short days won’t be helping.

Is this how the apocalypse starts? An ancient evil unleashed into the physical world via an otherwise innocent post on a bicycling forum?

As someone previously involved in setting up some large contracts with Government departments, the endless process and hoops you have to jump through in order to get on contract / draw down funding even as a fully-qualified contractor/supplier. The only people who have the authority to over-ride these rules are Department Under Secretaries and Ministers, so we’re obviously only seeing half the story here and the role of various people in the setting up of the VIP Lane and the circumvention of regular process in order to commit large-scale fraud. Its pretty clear that the likes of Gove, Hancock and other were involved here and they should be as much held to account as they facilitated the fraud.

With that in mind, not to absolve them of anything, do you think they are being served up as a conveniently high profile scapegoat?
The only point she made that I halfway agree with was, everyone was doing it, why are we the bad guys? Neither of them benefit from the old school ties that will protect the government, Gove, Harding et al, so their very public skewering will do nicely as a distraction.

This thread has been great! I used to be a drummer, and really, would like to be a drummer again, but for reasons of space and noise thats unlikely. Biggest reason is availability though. I don’t have a kit any more. But what I do have, is my son’s old Squier jazz bass.
So, I’ve decided to give that a try. I’ve tried guitar before, but don’t have the patience for it, but bass? It’s only 4 strings and all about rhythm, right? Should be good.

I think I’ll give Yousician a try over the christmas break, when I’ve a bit more time to put into it.

I’ve had one snap in the cold.
Although, I suspect that the air temperature was less of a factor than the crash I’d just had.

If you want to see the real Glasgow may i suggest the route i use to get out to the north.   Sarracen street Possil and lambshill

Saracen St\Balmore Rd\Auchenhowie Rd to Milngavie to pick up the start of the WHW. Now thats an adventure route!

3 of the 4 mudguards I have are RRP ones.
Proguard Standard front and rear on the full sus. The rear just keeps spray away from linkages and that, it doesnt do much to protect me.
I’ve a Proguard Max front and Mudhugger rear on the hardtail. The Mudhugger is a god awful ugly looking thing, but the point is to keep me and the bike clean, I suppose.

The RRP stuff is my preference.

Now that we’ve had some cold weather, how did you get on with the Briskers?
I hate them for cold weather. The only glove I’ve had that leaves me with painful fingers. I think its because once wet, they stay wet and aren’t windproof.
I really need a better glove for the cold.

It’s a fair point coming up here that the A82 after Tarbet is horrible. You can ride on cycle path of one sort of another all the way there from the centre of Glasgow, but after there, it’s narrow, winding and busy country road. I wouldn’t ride it, and it always gives me the fear when I encounter cyclists on it.

It’ll be fine. Back in the day, the Yoker bit, at the old railway bridge, could be a bit sporty, but I always just worked up a good sprint to get through it as quickly as possible.
Nowadays its fine, specially in daylight, as someone said.

I wouldn’t bother with road sections at all, just get onto the riverside (itself part of NCR75) from Central and go west. It becomes NCR7 somewhere around the SECC and you can follow that west all the way to Balloch. South Street can be a bit of a racetrack. It sees a lot of hgv traffic, and theres a bus garage on it, so traffic is heavy and is pretty potholey, NCR7 runs on an old railway line next to it, so I don’t see the point in not using it and staying away from the South st traffic. It gets a bit annoying where it passes through Clydebank, it transfers from old railway line to path to canal path, so is a bit confusing. Same in Dumbarton. Just keep an eye out for signs.

Theres a decent cafe and bike shop en route, at Bowling Harbour, if you need to make a stop.

Because I have an essay due on Thursday with a lot still to write. My favourite riding conditions too, cold, dry, no wind. I think I might cry.

The only thing that offers me even a glimmer of comfort is, I don’t have decent winter gloves for riding when its this cold. Only my stupid Briskers, which are worse than useless when the temperature is this low.

Re kids bike, it’s a Mythique VRX

He’ll have got the same white label 2.3s that came with my Mythique then.
I’ve never liked either the HR or HR2 on the front, so I stuck a WT DHF on the front of mine. I decided, as tyres are dear, and you can get away with more with rear tyres, to use the HR2s that came with the bike up. So they are seeing out their lives as a rear tyre for my Mythique. It’s been fine. Usual worn Highroller vibe, now its wet. The centre nobs are pretty shallow and heavily ramped, so once they wear you can get a bit of fishtail action if you are pushing hard in the wet, but nothing lethal. Lean em over and they are fine.
Can’t be that bad, as I bought a DD version to go on the back of the winter hardtail.

It depends what you want from your weight training.
I used to do Starting Strength inspired stuff for years, have had a couple of goes on Stronglifts too. I always ended up dreading the Squats, once they got past a certain weight, and I’ve hurt myself a couple of times with heavy Squats and Deadlifts.
So now I’m old, I just don’t do that any more. I’m not a competitive powerlifter, so I don’t need a massive Squat and Deadlift. I lift to make myself healthier and enhance my life, so have judged the risk of heavy Squats and Deadlifts not worth the reward, for me. Squats have gone, I only barbell Deadlift sometimes and use the hex bar Deadlift more often.  I enjoy the gym more, and am injured less.

If you must Squat and Deadlift heavy, try to keep them as far away from bike rides as you can.

I’ve had mixed success with them. I go through a phase of wanting to try them every now and then, and currently have the basic Rimpact fitted front and rear. I’ve had Rimpacts before, plus Nukeproof ARDs (not great) and the lightweight Effetto Mariposa one (pointless).  I got these more for rim protection than anything else, as they don’t stop cuts or punctures. Even then, I’m not sure how much they are actually doing that a realistic number of PSIs wouldn’t do. If I impact my back wheel hard enough to dent it with my 100kg bulk, I doubt 10mm of foam is going to stop much.

Worth it? Dunno. I mean, it’s unlikely you’ll ever know when an insert has saved your ride, but when they do fail, you are left with the pain in the arse of a sealant-covered foam hulahoop to do something with. They are also a massive bawache generally: fitting, removal, particularly when changing tyres. The instructions helped a lot, but it’s still an unnecessarily painful exercise. They absorb your sealant and often block your valves, even insert compatible valves, so you can’t easily get air out.

Would I buy them again? Dunno. Maybe, in a couple of years, next time I become insert-curious, but I probably won’t replace these immediately, once they are worn out.

I’m 105kg and much prefer the Z2s that came with my bike over the Yaris off my old bike. Even with the thicker stanchion and 10mm extra travel of the Yaris.
Never felt like stiffness was an issue, but the Z2 is simple and just felt better straight away. The Yari (2020, B1 spring, FAST YariUp damper) has always felt too divey, and with all the adjustment available to me in the YariUp, I’m never sure that I’ve got it where I want it.
I definitely don’t think I’d be going to a Rev over a Z2.

I feel that this is an opportune moment to share Not Always Right

1967 Revised Edition rules, you said? I’ve an amusing story about trying to shoehorn Merkland Street in under those rules that led, eventually, to the splintering of the Drumchapel and Clydebank Mornington Crescent Society.

Anyway, I learned the hard way. Charing Cross.

By the time you think you need it, it could well be too late. Not sure of the law where you are, we had to get Guardianship for my dad (Scotland). It was a lengthy process, involving lawyers and government offices.

I’ve had mixed success at anchovy repairing these. The one that worked had to be periodically redone, as the rim eventually wore through the anchovies I’d jammed in. Was good enough that the tyre saw out it’s usable life though.

Acoustic kits, while often beautiful to look at and play, always sound terrible at home. Just too noisy. At least with an e kit, you can make it sound good and at a reasonable volume. I can’t imagine the low volume heads and cymbals you can get now sound any good either.
If I had time, space and money, I’d get some sort of Roland kit for the house.

Another alternative is, are there any practice rooms nearby? Don’t have a kit at home, practice at full volume on the practice room kit. OK, its not as convenient, but it takes away a lot of problems. I know a gigging drummer who does it this way.

Thanks!

The only experience I have with this sort of bike is the medium Octane One Kode singlespeed that I do most of my winter miles on. It only ever sees mostly flat cycle path and tarmac.

A Trig in L is looking right to me now. Slightly longer in reach, ETT and stack than the Kode, which I assume will be good for the longer gravel miles that I’m planning.

https://geometrygeeks.bike/compare/ragley-trig-2022-medium,ragley-trig-2022-large,octane-one-kode-2019-m/

A question for all you Trig owners – how’s the sizing in use?
At 5′ 11″ its the usual smack in the middle of M and L situation for me. Never ridden this sort of bike, I’ve got no frame of reference to know if sizing up or down is the way to go

Have you emailed them? They are really helpful.

Front to back play – daft, but…have you checked both saddle clamp bolts are done up tight?

I’ll call your built in oven and raise you gas boiler replacement.

@Poly – you make a great point about the PoA. If the recipient doesn’t want it, for whatever reason, they aren’t getting it.

However, I respectfully disagree with “People always say its a nightmare if there is no POA. I’m not sure its quite as bad as is made out.”
It took a year to work through the Guardianship application process, involving lawyers and government. Once granted, you are overseen and need to regularly provide accounts for audit by government – regarding both financial and welfare guardian activities. And that’s just the guardianship side. With no PoA, you need to jump through hoops for every provider of every service your relative consumes – health, council, utilities, taxes, driving licenses, tv license, broadband, phone, banks, **** store loyalty cards etc etc etc etc.
As you pointed out yourself, you have never been there, so you don’t know.

s there a country that you think has “got it right”? (Genuine question)

No idea. I’ve only had to deal with it in Scotland. Why did you put “got it right” in quotes, out of interest?

Hmmm. Should the thread be retitled “How to deal with parents whose offspring **n’t look after them,”

So who do you think should give up work to look after the parents, in this situation? The OP? His partner? Both of them?
Have you been in a similar situation?

It really is a shite state of affairs, how poor the provision of elderly care and support is in this country. Its all too easy for it to become a crushing burden on children that assume the role of carer. As happened to my mum with her mum. Oldest daughter, felt a duty to provide care, which, I feel, kind of ruined what turned out to be the last years of her life as she died suddenly in her mid-60s.

So, your first duty is to yourself, partner and any children you have. You’re of no use to anyone if caring for your parents has ground you down.

PoA is applied for, right? Has there been any diagnosis of dementia or similar? If so, you might be too late. I had a similar thing with my dad, whose mental decline became really noticeable after my mums death. We reckon that she’d been managing/hiding that from everyone, but it became impossible to miss. Eventually, after multiple goes, my wife managed to pretty much force his GP to take it seriously and get him assessed, so by then, we’d missed the PoA bus and had to apply for Guardianship (not sure if that’s just a Scottish thing). Which was and remains a massive legal and bureaucratic ballache.

But, the whole situation is brutal, and typing this out is bringing a lot of grief back to the surface and I’m now sitting here with tears welling up. I’m really sorry pal, I hope things go as well as possible for you and your family.

The Hut Group rang a bell. I had a search and it turns out they own Myprotein, which might explain why they were the worst online retailer I’ve ever had to deal with.

Aye, that’s the ones. I am a Tolkien geek, that’s why I’m asking.