May mate got his car broken into on a pub car park one night – his company mobile phone was in a pocket on the centre console, so what did Mr junkie take?

Correct, his RayBans and a packet of chewing gum…

Personally I’d steer clear of the Crank Bros wheels products full stop.

Crank Bros as a whole have an attitude that stinks. IME their products are complete gash. The final straw came for me with some of their 50/50 pedals.

Within a month of fitting them, the bearings were completely lunched (and I’m not hard on pedals, I’m still using a 5-year-old set of SPDs and some Wellgo B24s which are 3 years old) and when I replaced them I discovered that the spindles were actually made from Cathedral City.

I e-mailed Crank Bros directly and (politely) told them what I thought, and received the snottiest, couldn’t-give-a-toss response ever, to the effect that they weren’t designed to be abused (eh??) in the way that I had, and what did I expect?

Red rag to a bull, vowed and declared never to buy another Crank Bros product ever again. And I haven’t.

We are refusing to use our power, wealth and military influence to stand up for the right thing and, by those actions, have lost the right to say that we are a country to be proud of.

Do you really think that acting militarily will do anything to stabilise the region?

I think it was a clever and calculated gamble that has paid off in the long term.

The problem here is Russia – don’t forget that we buy an awful lot of natural gas from Uncle Vladimir.

Cameron had to be seen to be at least trying to do something about Syria – it was probably fairly certain that he would lose the vote anyway, but if the hawks had had their way, then it may well have resulted in Russia turning the taps off and the lights going out.

Upshot is – Cameron seen to be doing something (winner); British people get their way (winner); Russians happy and gas stays on (chicken dinner).

The Yanks don’t have this problem, so it’s more likely that they’ll act unilaterally – I don’t think that the cheese-eating surrender monkeys will go in with Uncle Sam without us there to hold their hand.

Or try Campyoldy

Ebay? NOS?

Although on second thought – LINKY

Cut up marrow, place in a cool dustbin. Possibly the most pointelss vegetable ever. After salad courgettes.

My mates dad bought a brand new one last year.

He doesn’t drive it. Says it’s too complicated… 8O

Ah misinformation, stereotypes and piss taking. As I say, for a very honest bit of detail key me know

Er, no – it’s true…

We had a tennant in our local pub from Rotherham. Him and his missus stole the kitchen when they left. Nice people.

If I can’t think of a smart arse response, I just say that I’m just a house-sitter and that the owners are abroad for X months/years/centuries.

why is it a popular health scare story?

There was a move a while ago to add flouride to ALL drinking water. As per usual, the eco-hippy sandal-wearing Guardian readers got hold of it and heralded it as the first signs of the Rapture or Armageddon or something. As it is, flouridisation of tap water only occurs at the request of local health authorities under the Water Act 2003 – if a request is made, the utility compnay is duty bound to comply. United Utilities and Severn Trent are among the utility compnaies who do flouridate the water supply in England.

Toothpaste has been full of the stuff anyway for donkey’s years and nobody died of toothpaste poisoning. Your dentist should have asked for your consent first though.

Maximum width for a car-towed trailer in the UK is 2.55m or about 8 foot 4 inches so I guess you’ll be OK under that.

If you see him again, go and chat to him about the bike in a way that makes you look as though you’re really enthusiastic. Ask him how it handles off road, that sort of thing – throw in some technical questions that he may answer incorrectly.

Based on his answers you might be able to get a better picture of whether it is dodgy or not.

I like ’em. They often get criticised (as did the old Mountain Kings) for having paper-thin sidewalls which are easily torn, but touch wood I’ve never had a problem.

I did have an old Mountain King blow out on me once (bead came away from sidewall) but as it was all but worn out and due for replacement anyway it didn’t bother me.

Good all round tyre and pretty fast rolling.

I’d go with having it changed based on age rather than mileage.

I wouldn’t. It’s perfectly possible to rack up 60k in a year. That means the belt would have done 240k in four years!!

Mileage every time for me. Better safe than sorry.

There’s a (free) car park at Rodwell End on the A646 between Tod and Hebden Bridge, or a large lay-by slightly closer to Hebden.

Either that or go up to Lumbutts and park on the road by the chapel between the Top Brink Inn and Mankinholes village. Good grub and beer at the Top Brink for post ride refereshment.

2.5tdi’s a re notoriously unreliable

Well that’s bollx for a start, so I wouldn’t trust much that they said after that.

Is it? Volkswagen/Audi and BMW got slated recently for having some of the worst engine failure rates, something like one in every 23 fails catastrophically. Think there was only Vauxhall was worse.

Given that there’s no legit access for bikes onto Glaramara, and it’s redsock central, I doubt it.

I like girls arses as much as the next man

Unless the next man happens to be Louis Spence, Elton John or Graham Norton…

if it is wasting police time

Assuming that it’s true, then if you report it, it isn’t wasting police time.

Crushed bucket.
Stuntman’s knee.
Sack of spanners.
Melted welly.
Greiving pug.
…like you’ve been bobbing for chips.

How did you nearly hit someone on the pavement whilst in your 4×4?

He was coming out of the bookies…

That, my friends, is sexual assault, believe it or not.

About a year or 18 months ago there was a similar case in my neck of the woods – the perp started out in similar fashion, then it progressed to indecent exposure, then attempted rape which is when he was caught.

One for the federales.

Nowt. He was on the other side of a dual carriageway and I didn’t have my phone with me at the time.

Sounds like the threads in your BB are on the way out.

That was my next thought. There’s also a VERY slight possibility that the threads on the BB shell and the cups might not be the same (e.g. British/JIS mix or something like that.

Hmm. Have to admit I was in two minds what to do about a little twunt I saw in Audenshaw a month or so ago.

Classic scrote type – Burberry cap, Reeboks tucked into white socks and Rockports.

Only thing was, he was riding a brnad new Orange 322…

Trouble is, it COULD be a completely innocent situation (if highly unlikely) – if you take the law into your own hands, YOU could end up the twunt.

Do your bit if you must but look after number 1.

It’s a good way to lose a friend IME.

It’s a good way to lose the best friend you’ve ever had IME… :(

Count Arthur Strong or John Shuttleworth

I’m pretty sure that any insurance would be invalidated if your vehicle is not taxed.

^This.

Either get the current owner to put 6 months on it at your expense (this is what I do when buying a vehicle with no tax on it, most people are fairly accomodating), or get the paperwork, go to a post office and buy your VED disc BEFORE driving it.

You can guarantee that if you try to wing it, something will go wrong.

Collect it.

Let it ferment.

Distill it.

Hey presto – Italian moon-shine!

Run away. Now.

When you say “it keeps coming undone”, do you mean that the BB itself comes loose in the frame, or the crank arms are coming loose on the axle?

If it’s the latter, then I’d suspect that the square hole in the crank armed is borked.

BTW rugby studs tend to be longer than football studs, and most football studs are plastic these days.

Most sports shoe studs have an M6 thread, be they football boots, rugby boots, MTB shoes, some golf shoes (although I wouldn’t recommend golf spikes!!), whatever. All much of a muchness.

Football/rugby studs are usually sold with a key to insert/remove them too, although if they aren’t, Sports Direct sell keys separately.

Newcastleton, is also in Dumfries and Galloway – you know that?

No it isn’t, it’s in the Borders Region.

Bit naughty isn’t it? No legal access for bikes. Unless it’s dark of course in which case all rights of way law goes out the window.

You can get a pack of 20 aluminium rugby boot studs from Sports Direct for £1.99….

I suspect it’s a prime case of buy cheap, pay twice.

Correct. If you don’t mind changing them every few months then fair dos, but personally I’d rather get branded bearings such as Hope’s own (which are INA-FAG anyway) or SKFs rather than some no-name Chinese crap.

If you know what you’re about then it’s quite possible to change the bearings with an ordinary hammer and a drift of some sort to knock the old ones out, then use an old socket and a soft mallet to knock the new ones in.

The debate about compulsory helmet wearing is a stupid one, there’s no way it would be enforceable.

The same was said about motorcycle helmets in the 1960s, but how many motorcyclists do you see not wearing a helmet? Very, very few – and they’re usually pikeys, so don’t count.

I don’t know about anyone else, but if I’m going to take part in a potentially hazardous activity then I’m going to make damned sure that I come out the other side if not completely intact then at least 95% of the way there – so anything that improves my chances of surviving is a good thing.

Mind you, having said that the sooner that all the brain-deads have got what little grey matter they aleady possess smeared all over someone’s windscreen and the better. At least that way I won’t have to share my oxygen supply with them.