jwmlee – Member

Anyone else feeling the same way?

WEll funnily enough I’m sat here sweating after my first foray on the road in many a year, not a full blown road bike but with a sort of GT cruiser with road wheels and a ‘sport’ frame, sit up and beg style so on the road retaining a sense of not all bent over in lycra style.

What an ordeal! Bloody pot holes everywhere, I went out helmet less and came back with my trusty Avita, all those cars in close proximity, exhaust fumes, why do they do it to themselves? They go faster, no doubt and the sense of speed and effortless pedalling I ‘suppose gives you the same sort of thrill a spinning class might deliver, but as things stand, not for me, I’m thinking of building some custom suspension road jobbie, if ever I fancy a lunchtime commute again, Graeme I maybe, Obree I aint.

We have to keep a big rock pebble thing on top of the pedal bin, he is also an inveterate thief and bin raider, he’s had whole fish, bits of meat, loaves of bread, if the bread knife gets diverted momentarily by the phone or someone at the door.

He’s had three pairs of my etnies, countless bb caps, totally shredded a spare wind blocker hoody I gave him last winter when I felt sorry for him thinking he was cold, the only favour he did me was to eat my spd’s resulting in a nasty banning incident some time ago before I was fully aware of the sensitivities of this place, so that was also his fault.

In fact looking back on it all I think I shall go home tonight and give him a good kicking, make me feel better, all this bad weather giving me sad syndrome in the summer ffs. 😉

Clingy? He barks in Klingon!

Thanks for that link I shall have a look.

Isn’t he lovely?

Except when he’s chewing up your new BB cap,
or incessantly barking at anyone who walks by, even your riding mates, or crapping indoors even six months after the point you thought you had him house trained, or failing the not chasing the sheep test spectacularly, or the ‘don’t stop dead in the middle of a Berm to pee’ test, so I can’t trust him on the trail and have to keep him on the lead, which at times is a great ‘dog uplift’ but the rest is a massive inconvenience if we end up near livestock.

It’s even more annoying I wouldn’t part with him for the world, why is that? What is it about the worse they are the more stupid you become. Has he dominated? It is a dominant dog thing…

The pair of them, together we’re a three man wolf pack, battling it out at the foot of the family food chain (other than us it’s an all female family)

Edit.. er that little one isn’t entirely doberman, it got crossed with a Jack Russell, don’t even ask…

Yes, we made that mistake a couple of years ago after we lost our Rottweiler and love him as we do, it was a big mistake.

It’s not that they need the exercise I can cope with that, I wanted a trail dog anyway and he is as fast as they come.

It’s the defiance, and disobedience we’re struggling to cope with, we’ve had lots of dogs over the years but this b’stard has been the toughest training call ever.

Personally my advice, get some other breed unless you have had a lot of experience and the patience of jobe.

I shall post a couple of gratuitous ‘isn’t he wonderful pics’ plus his latest companion, another attempt to keep him from shredding the place (get him a friend) so now they both shred the place (female logic).

Assumption is the mother of all swear filter ups.

The answer is always at the bottom of the glass

Time is life – use it well.

Never trust a man with a beard my old mum used to say to me (the old man had a beard).

Thy do itch a bit during the transition from stubble to full curly twisty stuff, so you either go with designer stubble (tolerable) or wait, endure the itchiest of stuff growing in it until the moment arrives when you can enjoy your food, drink or other oral diversions for several hours after in your bearded luxuriance.

But be warned, lots of women folk think men with beards are of bad character and have something to hide.

Not sure if its a regional promotion to us down here in Gods County, but they are running a promotion on the TV saying book now at £53 per car.. I’d check their website, all the X Channel bookings are down this year, so the deal might be Nationwide.

+1 on the water, it wasn’t til after as I was driving home high as a kite on my achievements I realised i was totally dehydrated and it was only that which caused a bit of late afternoon fatigue..

Can’t remember if I wore knee pads or not, he won’t put you in a position that you’ll need them I don’t reckon.

You might if you start getting carried away with your new skills..

Karinofnine – Member
What does that mean? £2m of discounts?

It means the outdoor business among other is having the worse spring to early summer since probably foot and mouth, so they have two million quid over stock that they’ll be blowing out on deals…

It really has been the perfect storm of terrible economic combined with climate conditions for seasonal businesses like the outdoor world.

Now is the summer of their discount tent.

+1 Reverb

and even better next season with the Stealth reverb with the cable routed inside inside the seat tube.

I wouldn’t go with a bulldog as a first dog personally and they aint much use as a trail dog, not fast enough and they can be very dodgy (=expensive) due to overbreeding, read up on them, good ones are £850+ so find out why it’s so cheap.

Other dogs to avoid = Doberman, bloody nuisance, difficult to train but fast as hell, I can’t stay with him.

A lab is a good first dog, they’re generally reliable if you’re not used to dog ownership all of which has been amply described.

Personally we as a family wouldn’t be without one, love them to bits and are currently dealing with another puppy, Doberman cross Jack Russell, (don’t ask, it goes with the other one and the furniture).

Mosquito, now there’s a plane.. I’m still in contact with a Mosquito pilot, old boy, Ed’s his name still sharp as a razor, can’t help us as he’s neither a relative nor a Lanc pilot, but tells a good tale and in a plane that fast, didn’t run the risk the bomber boys did.

Edukator – Member
Discussing allied bombing with Europeans can result in very mixed reactions.

That’s also true with our guys (who are also Europeans these days) My dad became fully reconciled with it all, travelled to Germany even tried to learn the language this was in the sixties so still fairly avante garde for one of his generation, Uncle Ray on the other hand was of the ‘only good kraut is a dead one ilk’ and hated them to his dying day along with Japs, I guess surviving being a tail gunner allows him that.

Personally I’ve studied WW2 extensively since childhood, played in the bomb sites as a kid and have travelled and worked extensively in Germany and generally still avoid discussing anything to do with the War. The type of folk a lot of the Germans are, I still believe rightly or wrongly they would do it all again if lead in that direction, there’s just something about their compliance with authority. I’m not saying it will and half the reason for the whole European deal which is being tested at the moment is to keep the lid on it all.

Now you definitely wouldn’t get sufficient numbers from our current generation to fight a war like that again, not to mention getting a Lancaster Bomber past health and safety…

Father a flight sergeant, and later arial reconnaissance specialist, an ‘uncle’ WOP/AG in Lancasters, a tail end charlie who survived the highest mortality rate, neither survived to see this memorial, the old man never collected his medals, and neither of them really talked much about it.

What happened to the discussion about bomber command?

Agreed a long overdue recognition of a job that at one point was the only ‘response’ feasible to actually get at the Germans.

When discussing this you must remember the Blitz in London, and Coventry and Bristol which was never accurately reported at the time because of our low moral.

We came to the very brink of extinction, for the folk that fought it, including my parents and their peers, the bombing was completely justified, and cracking on about our guys when the yanks nuked japan doesn’t exactly sit well with me.

The actual participants fought just as hard as they could and the RAF without doubt saved our bacon, along with the folk who built the planes and the engines that gave us (and the yanks)eventual air superiority.

They deserve our respect, gratitude and this memorial is long overdue.

Tell them it’s for your canal or houseboat.

jam bo – Member
I got told the two best days you have with a powerboat are the day you buy it, and the day you sell it.

😆 Lot of truth in that.

I’ve had lots of ski-wake boats of different varieties over the years and the best time was when there were three of us splitting the costs all committed and we were single. We used to burn 10 gallons an hour quite often, then we were competing.

I have to say if I were doing it these days I’d look for a diesel set up and a bit of water where you could run it on red diesel and I wouldn’t ask anyone about the legalities.

But definitely only if there were a few bods sharing..

I ought to declare an interest we sell this brand these days[/url] but more and more folk are just riding the parks (which the boards our lot make are eminently suitable for).

Interesting discussion, I tend to the view that at street level we’d probably be better off had Labour stayed in office, it was as if the wheels came off everything when VAT increased, that combined with the general press frenzy about ‘Austerity’ which became a self fulfilling prophecy in the private sector. Expecting us in the Private sector to drive jobs and growth with increased taxation at point of purchase and banks being constrained by both the economy and ever harsher lending constraints placed upon them by Basle agreements was not just naive but stupid.

As to employment, having just written a cheque for £3000 to an employee a partner sacked without following the absolutely exact procedure for stealing money from a till, caught red handed, does not exactly fill one with the desire to employ folk at all, better to hunker down and do what you can with your own resources, stay small and if possible stay off the tax grid.

For so so many reasons the system is totally screwed, we don’t have democracy here at all as someone else mentioned, the markets are driving us, markets that themselves are controlled by nobody, a collection of algorithms written by redundant NASA scientists designed to generate profit from nothing other than the movement of funds driven by perception.

Certainly beyond the comprehension of our politicians whatever the flavour.

Sorry about to have a bad day, needed a rant.

DezB – Member
So what is your favourite Bowie album?
Hunky Dory still rules for me.

+1
Favorite track Queen Bitch and her bibity bobity hat..

Listen to this one..
Young kid 16, active windsurfer (not many windsurfers smoke) gets a job working in the hols at a local hotel, waiting table, bashing dishes, tedious stuff minimum wage, notices all the smokers get fag breaks, so takes up smoking…

Had to use no end of pressure to get him to stop, (we’ve had a couple of deaths recently to relatively young guys who did smoke, cancer /smoking related).

So it’s not just peer pressure, it’s the perceived benefits smokers get..

Personal smoking history did it when young, gave up when first child was born after a long night smoking then being handed the child only to notice my stinking back smokers fingers holding my newborn little girl, gave it up there and then.

Cockney

Classic TV, still going on with the last Ziggy concert..

Bowie ruled the early seventies. Amazing talent.

oldgit – Member
FFS. Seriously?
I didn’t think it was too bad an idea, there are no rules at all are there. It reminded me of this….

😀

I can’t wait to take a m/cyle through Winterfolds personal best and claim I was on a Bandit. (with slicks of course don’t want to totally destroy him)

Well I think it’s just one of those wonders of the Internet age you can take or leave and get what you want from, prior to this I used to use trail guru which up and vanished taking a load of pics I took on a ride in the
Pyrenees with it. So with this incarnation I content myself with following winterfold and his hetracil avoiding roadie mates struggling with their mid lives and very entertaining it is to, a few of us are running book on the first heart attack, winterfold currently being odds on favourite.

cheese@4p – Member
I don’t see why strava should be held responsible for the stupidity of it’s users.

I’d agree with that, why only today they ‘Strava’ were bothering me as to why I hadn’t posted of late and I’d actually stopped using it because of the stupidity of others keep beating my fast times…

Such an idyllic typically English summer shot..

Then so is this one…

😆

Nice defence mechanism laughter, it must have been a proper shock, for you and your fellow none colour coordinated nerd mates, coming that close to ‘Style’ and proper sartorial elegance…

Seriously Nols you can get help[/url] for problems like that.

Did you even get that Blindside dirty?

I’ve never seen it dirty..

Thanks for every ones efforts, hope to meet some of you this weekend at FlyUpDownhill, maybe over a beer. No sign of any recovery yet, but a Blue Transit was spotted entering and leaving the car park fairly swiftly. Unfortunately there is no CCTV in Monmouth so no recourse to security tapes, but the bike is so unique it could well yet surface.

This won’t effect the Transition free uplift deal, there are dealers turning up along with coaches who may be persuaded to swell the demo fleet, I’m bringing up another couple of Coverts so it’s only a Bandit 29er we’re short of, so not totally the end of the earth, the Carbon bike was not supposed to be seen and would have been locked away anyway.

It’s fun riding with those Transition guys a mix of fun and information, should be a good day despite this tragedy and thanks once again for everyones help with twitter, Facebook and word of mouth, we really appreciate it.

Couple of pics I had from yesterday at Herts Shore

{Pics removed at Transitions request! – Mod}

alfabus – Member
one of which is a totally unique Carbon frame Transition Covert
If I help find it, can I have a reward in the shape of a:
Carbon frame Transition Covert
?

pretty please?

I’m sure they would be very very grateful and that might not be totally out of the question, it’s the only one they have, it’s not due to launch until next year and there are still refinements going on with it.

They’re still in Monmouth right now, but obviously these bikes are the sort that will show up in trail parks or on ebay so if we can prevail upon everyone here being vigilant maybe we’ll get lucky..

Much appreciated.

Aha the thread’s already been bumped, if anyone needs a ride and a tailgate hangover along the route from M20, I may have a couple of seats in the truck of joy, probably leaving crack of Sunday a.m. first come, contact the office here.

Looking forward to meeting a few of y’all in the flesh, put names to I.D’s…

Sadly Sam from Transition has lawn mowered his toe off or something stupid so isn’t riding, so bike space for one more then…

Graeme.