My wife had a Cooper from new for 10 years and it never let her down. Lovely car to drive and very roomy compared to the original minis that I grew up with. Suspension a perhaps a bit harsh but overall a great car.

Stay

Granary bread, butter, Wensley Dale or Lancashire cheese and just a hint of Strawberry jam. Forget the crisps.

Brilliant, must not turn programmes off before the end in future.

Since they got rid of the concrete surface on the M6 and with the prevailing wind you hardly hear the M6 now.

Another vote for Penkridge, still feels like a village, has a station, handy for A5 and M6 and as already mentioned has Jaspers.

Once or twice a week I go round my local trails collecting the rubbish mountain bikers have dropped. Lucazade bottles are by far the most common plastic bottle dropped on the trails followed by Red Bull and Monster. Then gel sachets and chocolate wrappers followed by bike parts, mud guards, inner tubes, etc. Cigarette packets and Polish lager cans are also fairly common!
Never see any one dropping the rubbish but lots of people saying thank you to me for picking it up.
One suggestion if everybody who used the trails picked up one or two pieces of rubbish on their way round it would help.
Driving down the A14 a month ago I was shocked by the amount of roadside rubbish. Northamptonshire was by far the worst, a lot less when crossing into Cambridgeshire.

You will still have the form on the aeroplane to fill in and make sure you get the official ESTA site when you go online. There are a number of sites that will charge you extra on top of the official charge if you use their sites.

Mine never blinked, got it at a discount price though. Managed to enjoy the album without the blink.

The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts.

My God, it’s full of stars!

I think I was a bit unkind to my LPs as I still listen to my CDs, that replaced my LPs, waiting for the jumps and scratches in certain tracks. The only thing I miss from LPs are the covers. When’s 8 track going to come back into fashion I’ve still got a player and about twenty albums in the shed?

For me it has to be the Sweeney, Morecambe and Wise, and Mash. Mash being one of the very few TV programmes to come out of the USA worth watching.

I’ll second the Blue Lake. Nice walk up through the old slate workings then great view over Fairbourne and the estuary to Barmouth. Then walk through the tunnel to the Blue Lake. As twinw4ll says best on a sunny day as slate can get slippery, good in an evening when you get the sunset. Ask a local for the way.

The Four Tops, Liverpool Empire 1971

Pour over tinned pears, Sunday treat during the 60’s.

Very quiet in my garden at the moment, a couple of pigeons, robin and earlier in the week four or five long tail tits.

I thought it was a good show, better than expected!
Murray is a well deserved winner, good to see it coming from Northern Ireland, and the Tyson Fury issue handled reasonably well. A good celebration of a year of British sport. The break dancing, brilliant, what a party piece!

Complete over reaction. Whatever happens at school the biggest influence on a child is the home. All you have done is probably ruined the head’s Christmas and possibly yours. You are obviously worried about what you have done, and all for what you got upset because at the end of a nativity play a minister said some prays. I assume you don’t celebrate Christmas at home. Send the head an apology as soon as possible.

Everybody is frightened of making a decision, airports, motorways, power stations, railways, it all takes years to decide on anything and mean time our infrastructure just gets more and more out of date,

BBC News channel stayed with the pen and you saw it go from pointy pen to floaty pen!

Some great albums being listed but no Moody Blues yet!
So here goes….

In Search of the Lost Chord

Agree with steveoath, Prof.Sue Black. Heard her on Desert Island Discs, an amazing person. The programme is well worth a listen but be prepared to be shocked and upset at her description of her work in Kosovo.

I have couple of pairs of Karrimor boots bought from Sorts Direct a couple of years ago, could be three years ago and I’ve been very pleased with them. I use them for biking in the winter. Have kept my feet warm and dry in all conditions. I find them light to wear and best of all they were cheap. Just leave them to dry out after a ride though I did give them a good clean and waterproofed them for the first time during the summer.

Echo the above, I’m sure F1 must have lost a lot of followers since it moved to Sky. Although I have continued to watch it on BBC it just feels more distant, it just does not have the same appeal anymore.

This afternoon – Robert Johnson The Complete Recordings

Josh T Pearson Last of the Country Gentlemen (My daughter plays cello on this album)

The Great Escape – Richard Attenborough/Gordon Jackson “Good luck” scene.

Fuel at a motorway service area. £1.09 at local petrol station, not supermarket, £1.22 at services on M40.

1965 mini van which in 1971 got my brother and I, two slalom canoes and camping gear to Italy and back via the Simplon Pass and Grand St Bernard’s Pass. To keep the engine cool on the passes we raised the bonnet six inches and this was just enough to stop the engine boiling.

The last time I rode Swindley, end of August, I found the numerous short cuts (Strava?), mostly across corners, very confusing and they ruined the trail for me. Since then I’ve heard someone describe them as “riders being creative”!

Silverstone 1995, the only F1 race I’ve been to, Damon Hill took himself and Michael Schumacher out of the race in an overtaking move, Johnny Herbert won and David Coulthard came third. The thing I remember most was the noise of the engines as the cars accelerated to Copse Corner from the start. Unbelievably noisy and exciting!

I’ve always had Tom Tom and been very pleased with it, however my latest vehicle came with a built in Garmin. Far easier to use than the Tom Tom but its route selection can be very poor. Trying it out on local roads it would not use a B road to get me home, it kept prioritizing A roads which if followed would result in an extra five miles on what was a 5.5 mile journey! My wife’s car also has Garmin and does the same thing. There is no way of changing priorities on it and so Garmin gets the thumbs down from me. It does always get you to your destination just not sure sometimes of its route selection.

Just checked my VIN number on the VW website and it seems VW will be getting in touch with me when they know how to correct the software in my car. They are very sorry for causing this break down in trust and all the necessary work will be carried out at their expense.

There used to be a to scale solar system outside Jodrell Bank. Always impressed the children I took there from school.

Fantastic place, volcanoes, rain forests, cloud forests, coffee plantations, pineapple plantations, hot springs and the wild life is wonderful. Best beaches are on the west coast though the east coast is good for the Caribbean, laid back feel. We had a 4×4 to drive round in as the roads, when you get away from the main centres, are not up to much. Highly recommended.

I’m on my second Trek Superfly HT and can’t see myself going back to a smaller wheel or going FS.

I’m going up this morning litter picking, I will have a look.

Does Amazon Prime show adverts during programmes?
New Ripper Street back on BBC, I assume this is the series that was shown first on Amazon Prime.

Dr Strangelove
2001
Les Miserables

My brother and I used to ride our bikes up and down the cow paths that crossed the fields on my dad’s farm back in the early 60’s. We’d call it single track now!
I had a Dawes D’Artagnan, single speed with white wall tyres!

http://veterancycleclublibrary.org.uk/ncl/pics/Dawes%20Super%20D%20Artagnan%20-%20Nov%2062%20(V-CC%20Library).pdf

Still haven’t made up my mind yet. Have voted Labour, Liberal and Conservative in the past. Moving towards Conservative but still put off by their terrible education policy, the referendum regarding Europe and the uncertainty that could bring.