Following on from the Mammut mention, SportPursuit still have some sizes left of the Sccarpa Trek GTX boot at 50% off.

https://www.sportpursuit.com/catalog/product/view/id/1853405

I bought one pair from Cotswold Outdoor on sale and was impressed enough to buy another pair alightly cheaper from SportPursuit. I do use some Superfeet insoles, which added to the cost, but the green ones match the boot liner color, which is nice!

A lot of the paths round here are pretty rocky or rutted and the the gras paths can also be rutted up by illegal motorcycles and these boots have helped massively with ankle/foot stability compared to my previous fabric Merrell Moab IIs.

Use Scarpas HS12 cream to keep them in good condition and water repellent.

Not based on fact but in a similar vein, I always thought this advert was fantastic:

Any Boomers talking about sound quality are deluding themselves. Hearing deteriorates with age and no amount of money spunked on media or hardware will buy you new ears.

Not that I am into classical music at all, but Radio 3 live broadcasts have always been acclaimed for sound quality and they are just going through a 14 bit digital system, so sound quality doesn’t depend on those high frequencies until they are severly curtailed.

Basically if you are complaining that CDs don’t give you the experience that vinyl does, you are not really into the music otherwise it wouldn’t really matter. The important bit is the music and I would rather spend the money on a system that makes the music sound better and encourages me to listen to more music, rather than having more bits of cardboard to stare at.

And if you stick to digital and use a system like Roon to manage your music and playback then it gives you an even better experience than just fondling your cardboard record sleeve.

Sticking to digital also opens up the use of apps like Receiver Radio and access to streaming an awful lot of high quality music and radio stations from around the world.

Sticking to digital also opens up the possibility of using a ‘room correction’ system, which are increasingly becoming common. The room is one of the biggest factors in determining how your system sounds, so this can be useful.

It certainly is, and it’s also, and always has been a lossy format, by its very nature. Vinyl cannot cope with the frequency range of a digital recording, it has to be EQ’d at both ends of the frequency range at the mastering stage, the lowering of the high-frequencies accounts for the ‘warm’ sound vinyl fans rave about, and low frequencies have to be cut to avoid transients that can cause the stylus to jump from one part of a groove to the next, skipping most of a line of a song.

It’s not just that though. Unless you have a linear tracking tonearm then the cartridge/stylus is actually only tracking square to the groove for a very small fraction of the records surface, so you basically have distortion for most of the record.

Then there is the problem with dirt/dust, which only expensive stylus profiles deal with well. Same with groove wear.

And then the issues with tonearm resonance/pivot quality and leading to yet more compression of the signal.

And then issues with the motor quality and accuracy, leading to more distortion becaause of speed fluctuations.

So if you are really into the music, why would you want to put up with all this BS nowadays ?

and lots of boomers seem to forget the simple joy of music spend thousands to get the ultimate sound quality

Being that a vinyl LP can be three times the price of a CD or digital download you can then have 3 times as much music to listen to, and at a higher sound quality for less money than buying a basic record player, allowing you to buy even more music. And no cartridge to keep having to replace, so even more music can be bought.

And how is the signal path on Rega turntables any shorter than any other turntable ?

Inflation adjusted vinyl prices are one thing but you get higher quality versions of the same product for significantly less in other mediums.

There are then several components that are much cheaper than a reasonable quality turntable that will play that music back at significantly higher quality levels of sound quality than you would get from a turntable.

The only reason to prefer new vinyl is if you want to pay exhorbitant amounts of money for a big piece of cardboard with artwork on, as if you are preferring the sound of vinyl to a high quality digital source then you have other issues with your system that the problems inherent in record playback are enhancing – like channel crosstalk making you think your system images better, or your system needing extra compression.

Whereas  you could use the money saved on the digital playback component and cheaper source material to invest in the rest of your system and fix those issues that you need a record player to mask over.

Kitty has been reserved !

For her forever home, or at least until they figure out that she’s too much for them to handle…

Is this to use with existing vinyl, or bought from a second hand shop?

The price of new vinyl is ridiculous, especially when compared with the high quality digital downloads you can often buy more directly from the artist.

You can buy cheap gear nowadays that will give outstanding results playing back that digital music, whereas it has always been the case that you need to spend serious money on a turntable setup to get decent results, certainly results anywhere approaching that cheap digital playback system.

when you then add in the inflated prices for vinyl I just don’t understand why vinyl is becoming so popular again, it was always a flawed medium and a flawed playback system.

My girlfriend son buys vinyl at those stupid prices (3 times that of a CD, or more) and plays it back on some cheap Bluetooth linked turntable – if anything summed up the stupidity of millennial and later generations this seems to me to be a contender.

And yes, I have a decent turntable (Technics SP10 in custom corian plinth, Origin Live Encounter tonearm, Denon DL304 cartridge, Mitchell ISO HR phono stage).

Marmite cashew nuts…

Unworn Seiko Alpinist SARB017 on Ebay :

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/225922052216

She was being walked by a 60 year old lady (who was in good shape, to be fair) who was also walking a Husky at the same time. She did say that Kitty was a bit of mad though.

Not that I am contemplating adopting her, I have enough trouble with my girlfriends Maltese and certainly not enough experience for a dog like that. Plus I have two bite-sized British Shorthair cats at home.

Because staffies have a reputation of being bread as fighting dogs

Is that not ages old and not true anymore:

“The Stafford is considered a family pet and companion dog, and is among the breeds recommended by the KC for families.[7][41] Relative to the breed’s ancestral progenitors, the AKC states: “From his brawling past, the muscular but agile Staffordshire Bull Terrier retains the traits of courage and tenacity. Happily, good breeding transformed this former gladiator into a mild, playful companion with a special feel for kids.”[16]”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staffordshire_Bull_Terrier

I bought some Oakley braces – very nice and not so geeky looking.

I would go for leggings, like HH Lifa, under the waterproof trousers – can change the warmth of the leggings according to the outside temperatures and they will also feel nicer if the leggings aren’t brilliantly breathable/clammy.

I washed my British Shorhair once – big mistake – very dificult to dry – cat ended up shivering I seem to remember.

In the end we wrapped it in a rug and put a couple of microwaved heatbags around him, seemed to help as he was soon curled up and snoozing.

I picked up an ion 3 layer coat from sportspursuit

I bought one the Ion Shelter 3L jacket from SportPursuit, then bought another in Tidal Hreen from BikeInn as they had it on a further reduction from their sale price, so £58.49

There’s the real risk of a big EV backlash at the moment based on the massive insurance and repair costs – if that ‘story’ gets rolling within the general public it could stall things badly.

The smallest accident runs the risk of writing off the car – battery packs are not being built to be economically repairable, or even repairable, and there have been several cases (mostly in the US) where people have been quoted a larger sum than the original car for a battery replacement (Tesla actually seem to be more reasonable than some others). A couple of cases of $55k Hyundia Ionic 5 being quoted $60k for a new battery.

Often this damage might be small – a Porsche with a 3mm gash in underside of the battery case – £50k new battery please because the cooling tubes are damaged.

Those sort of prices will kill the second hand market and lead to a lot of written off cars, killing any possible green gains.

Bought some Scarpa Treek GTX boots in the black friday sale – £150 instead of £250 – and just bought another pair from SportPursuit for £125. They fitted and broke in well so if I look after them, then with resoles they should see my hiking career out, maybe.

Bought one of those Ion Shelter 3L mtb jackets from SportPursuit for £74 after a recommendation on here, then noticed BikeInn selling a different colour for £58 recently, so bought one.

Had some nice Specialised mtb shoes (expert or similair – stiff carbon soles), then picked up another two new pairs for around £30 each from ebay, so that should see me out as well.

Bought two pairs of those Madison waterproof trousures from LeisureLakes after checking that they fit.

Got four pairs of Enacfire F1 headphones as I like the sound and battery life.

Obviously they are illegal on the roads…

However they are a shed load safer than those stupid escootrs, much more stable and larger wheels to ride over stuff.

Ban escootors, legalise electric unicycles…

As long as the rider uses a tether…

even if the DWR isn’t working the water shouldn’t be coming through the material if it is suppossed to be a waterproof material. The DWR just stops it wetting out.

They are pretty easy to ride if you have basic balance skills, which you will have if you mtb.

They can stop pretty fast, according to the skill of the rider.

Lean forward and the motor drives you forward, lean back and the motor stops you – depending on how fast and at what angle you can lean back determines how fast it stops. Modern wheels have very powerful motors and large battery packs that can provide the torque required. MOst people ride with ‘power pads’ which help you have better control over starting and stopping the wheel.

These modern wheels also can attain very high speeds – I’ve done 30mph on mine but modern ones are much faster than that.

Face plants used to be much more common as riders overpowered the wheeels ability to keep itself upright by providing current to the wheel, plus QA failures from different companies – Gotway/Begode in particular.

My biggest ride was taking the train to Clapham Junction and then riding along the Thames Path to the Wey Navigation, down the Wey Navigation to Guildford and then along the Downs Link to Shorehan, and then along the coast to Brighton station.

84 miles, took 12 hours with two recharging stops at pubs. Modern wheels, like the Sherman, have enough battery to do the whole trip in one go, certainly if there is more tarmac involved.

Maybe because of more use of satnavs in cars – you can see your ETA and the fact that driving like a knob doesn’t make an awful lot of difference to it, but just means more risks, more stress and more fuel costs.

What about profit?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasongoldberg/2022/02/04/amazon-reveals-its-most-profitable-business/

https://finty.com/us/business-models/amazon/

“This probably will come as a surprise to many. Still, every year since at least 2014, more than half of Amazon’s operating profit has come from the online retailer’s cloud division, Amazon Web Services (AWS), which provides online services and tools that software developers can stitch together to run websites and applications. It’s an impressive business in absolute dollar terms, not just percentages: AWS ended 2020 with $13 billion in operating income, which helped Amazon report a total net income of $21 billion for the year.”

It’s a chunk, but not all as you said earlier.

I believe that they first built their cloud infrastructure for their own purposes, then opend it up to third party developers, and were surprised by the interest, and that prompted the eventually release of AWS for retail users.

This contrasts with Microsh1t, who built their system seperately for retail users, so consequently it has the usual Microsoft niave implementations and problems, and AWS remains popular because of it’s maturity and as a way of not getting involved with Microsoft, which is always sensible…

My old 26 Turner Flux got rebuilt for the girlfriend to use, or my sister when she comes to visit and wants some uplift at BPW.

For an occasional rider the 26 is perfect as it feel less ‘big’ and therefore more manageable.

I’ve put an ebike kit on my Turner Sultan but I might swap it to my other 26 Flux (a large, the one above is a medium) and keep the Sultan and 650b Flux as normally aspirated.

Other than that the Fluxes are a source of spare DW-Link parts for the other dw-link bikes.

I bought an Ion Shelter 3L jacket from SportPursuit after a recomendation from here.

It arrived the other day – the material is soft and pliable and light so packs down small. I was expecting something stiffer as it is described as 3 layer.

It has a large helmet sized hood as well.

https://www.sportpursuit.com/catalog/product/view/id/2656116

£73.99

If i’s trailbuilding I assume that you will need to get there somehow so therefore preferred not to take a wheelbarrow.

How about some sort of bike trailer that you could get there attached to your bike and then remove to use to shift the rocks.

I found GPX Studio pretty useful for cutting and splicing together bits of GPXes into routes:

https://gpx.studio/

I use OSMaps and flip between the OS mapping and the Satallite view (plus some 3D/Google Earth viewing) as basically the ROW bridleways and paths marked on the OS mapping are hit-and-miss as to whether they still actually exist here in the Rhondda – sometimes they are gone and sometimes the path/route has moved elsewhere – so I use the Satellite view to try and figure it out.

Also many of the bridleways are unusable as such so you wouldn’t want to plan a cycle route reliant on them unless you had experienced them before.

Some of the routes that are listed on OS Maps are also dodgy as they are old and the routes they followed have ‘dissappeared’ from lack of use/landowners rrstricting access/wind farms trashing them/logging activities blocking and hiding the entraces/etc.

My girlfriend has a Maltese dog that I am looking after as she works as live-in care for 3 months at a time.

He’s brilliant, loads of energy but doesn’t require walking every day, and he loves coming out with me on walks round the hills and valleys of the Rhondda, which I normally keep to around 10 miles – the 15 yesterday was maybe a bit too long but he was still pulling hard on the 10m lead at the end, just looked a bit knackered when we were in the house. Last year I took him on 5 consecutive days of 10 mile-ish walks, although I was a bit worried that I had broken him a bit afterwards.

Are you american? We do not have fire roads in the UK 🙂

What’s your definition of a fireroad then ?

An ebike pretty much wipes out the option of parts of the trail where you have to suffer a lot, like steep climbs. The option of upping the assistence level is too easy to succumb to. If that’s what you want as it is an important part of your fitness training, then keep the ebike for fun or lazy days. Climbing a hill in zone 2 doesn’t really count as suffering…

A good option would be if you could get an add-on to your turbo trainer so it charges your battery up, then you can do the pain part on your trainer, and not feel guilty just having fun on the ebike as you’ve already earnt the climbs.

I’ve slept with Shures on when needed.

I normally sleep with cotton wool in my ears – although I also have hyperaccusis which is sensitivity to noises, so the birds chirping in the morning will wake me up.

Cotton wool muffles the sound, whereas ear plugs will just emphasis the tinnitus.

I’ve had tinnitus for donkeys years, probably due to narrow eustachian tubes and not good ear ventilation – made worse by colds, etc. It means that I can’t dive, for example.

If that’s the case then pinching your nostrils and inflating your ears to get a mild pop can be beneficial.

In terms of wearing headphones, the in-ear headphones that seal the ear canal are the best option as they are much more efficient at loading the ear and so you do not need anywhere near the volume, and too much volume can obviously make the problem worse. Non sealing ear buds are awful for me – I can’t wear for any length of time.

I used to as my stomach was pretty sensitive to food, and quorn. If something wasn’t right my stomach would start making it known in about 20 minutes…

The probiotic (from Amazon) did make my stomach more robust and I used it for quite a while, but nowadays I have changed my breakfast to Jordans Super Nutty Granola and either Rachels (Honey) Greek style yoghurt, or Yeo Valley (Honey) Greek style yoghurt (which might have one more bacteria than Rachels) and my stomach is even better, plus that cereal is so filling that I normally don’t eat act until about 4pm for my final meal of the day.

I also bought a 4K Freesat box – the quality of the picture seems to be a step above what I had from the Sky Q box, for some reason (could be Sky trying to persuade you to get their 4k service instead of HD).

Menu system is OK but not fast, but there is an app that I run on my iPad for a better experience of browsing and choosing what to record.

An ITV X subscripton could be worthwhile as it offers all the ITV stuff in HD without ads, and also all the Britbox catalogue (doesnt work the other way round with a Britbox subscription).

1 less medium Ion Shelter jacket now available…

Immigration from all countries is now treated equally – whether or not it should be treated differently is another matter, but it is at least equal.

One thing that bugged me and would make me vote for Brexit is how people who had come here from countries outside the EU, such as to work in hospitality or care, had a much harder time to come and stay working in the UK, particularly financially, compared to people from the E.U.

Why should we favour countries in the E.U. – some of which we have more cultural differences with than many other countries in the world, particularly those in the former commonwealth?

Seemed a bit rascist to me.

So, I’ve built him a cotic bfe, 26 inch

26…

got a little pair of scissors that are blunt and the blades don’t meet very solidly – very useful for stripping the sheath from electrical wires.

used an old teaspoon that I had in the shoecare box from years ago (army cadet days) that has wrapping around the handle ready for heating up for treating leather – rescued an expensize Selle Italia SLR Kit Carbanio flow saddle that was looking pretty poor and scuffed up after soaking it with polish, and working it in with the hot spoon.

If Cotton Traders and Peter Storm would remove the logos from their clothing I reckon they would sell a shed load more.

The proportions make it look like it should be a gravel e-bike…

I know that you said that you wanted to get rid of freesat, but I recently bought their 4k box and the image quality of live broadcasts seems to be pretty good to me, strangely enough noticably better compared to my old Sky Q which was using the same LNB and dish, and also better compared to live streaming over the net.

EPG isn’t brilliant but can also use EPG on my ipad and program recordings on it.