American Gangster
La Haine (if you don’t mind subtitles)
Kick Ass (if you don’t mind trash ;-))

Lets be honest, in global terms, we are all extremely wealthy, so if your not happy, money is not going to be the root cause…it’s how you perceive money that affects your happiness.

The number of guitars you own?

Is that a mid 80’s Kramer your playing chipps? Sweet guitars.

There has been loads of good music on Fridays nights too, the British reggae documentary was ace.

I’ve used Hercules, they are OK, and have not damaged Nitro finshes, but wouldn’t use the screws/rawlplugs they supply.

So as there are a few guitarists on here, where would be the best place to start?

IMHO, the best place to start is finding a good teacher. I’m learning drums at the moment (been playing guitar for year though), and some of the faults in my drumming would be impossible to identify without a good teacher sitting with you as you play, to work out what can be improved.

still tempted by a 550D as I’ve heard it’s basically a budget 7D but without the dust/splash protection

Don’t think the AF is quite as good on the 550D either. The dpreview of the 550 covers the differences…

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canoneos550d/

Some people are weirdly snobby about them for some reason

I can’t understand it either…they are a big help in getting good composition for stuff at low level….anybody who takes pictures of kids for example, the shots look so much better shot from low level, rather than looking down.

600D has just been released, which seams very close to 60D, but cheaper…might be worth a look?

S95 is next purchase.

I’m really getting into Lightroom at the moment, I think it’s amazing, so that’s keeping me out of mischief.

Don’t forget the sticker…

‘Don’t Laugh…it might be your daughter inside’

On mine, it expires, I think the original lasted about 3 months, subsequent top ups last a month.

I don’t have to spend money on my wife in order to make love with her.

Your lucky mate, she charges me £20 (and that with a group discount). :-)

Good news about your dad CFH. My Mrs has a Tiguan, it’s OK. We wanted a Yeti, but the waiting list was to long. She got a base model really cheap new from a dealer. I can’t say the build quality feels that good, but it was absolutely fantastic in the snow, and it’s a nice relaxing drive. It’s good on fuel (mid 40’s) and VW did a £300 service package for 3 years, which was money well spent.

My Mrs didn’t want anything big, and she finds it really good to drive.

It’s pretty windy today!

I thought the single sounded really good, CD should arrive 2moz (fingers crossed).

I have a couple of the Sansa Clips, I think they are really good for not much money.

That’s interesting, I looked at it before Christmas and I was sure I could not get it using my kids primary school status, but checking back it looks like they had changed it. It’s a bit of a nightmare really!

I think if you read the small print, Adobe products don’t qualify for primary school kids (Microsoft do) and if you buy the Adobe Edu. version and you don’t qualify, you loose your money.

Sorry, I thought you were after lightroom and CS3 (I thought I read 1,200 quid… I am a dumbass)

I got it for £180 from Amazon.

unfortunately not

TBH, it’s cheaper to register for a course than pay full price. No, I don’t think £145 is legit, unless it a student copy.

I’m practising accents on the hihats…it’s enough to want you stop making drummer jokes :(

I regard a ‘professional day’ at a term which applies to contractors on day rate, and it’s basically 10 hours. For contractors on hourly rate, you book what you work. For staff, it depends on the organisation, but I always think it’s not unreasonable to do an hour a day extra, if the workload demands it. Problem is, more and more staff jobs are paying for 37, and expecting 47, 57 or 67 hours a week. Which is great, until you realise you earn less per hour as a professional then working in a fast food outlet. :D

if that’s how you see it now I can see why they’re worried you’ll be leaving in 6 months…

That’s a good point!

It’s actually a very intelligent piece of engineering,

What, a Naim power amp? Are you serious? It’s an very intelligent piece of marketing, not engineering.

I have gone from bell wire to tri-wired Linn cable, and yes there was a difference (the Linn cable was not expensive back then, dunno what it costs now?).

As for interconnects, I have done comparisons between standard free cheapo cables, Linn’s standard offering (c.£20) and Linn’s Silver cable (c.£175) and could not hear any significant differences. I don’t know if the suggestion for using ‘van den hul at least’ was a joke, but in the context of your system, it should be taken as one.

Yes, Elf sounds familiar. Great speakers, they had rubber feet! A pleasant change from metal spikes. Lots of holes drilled in the bottom if I remember right.

TBH, I don’t think what your doing is unreasonable in any way. Every employer I have worked for operates a system where they block out 3-4 days a year over Christmas as the office is shut. These days come out of the employees holiday quota.

I work in engineering, and TBH, where i’ve worked as staff, if you kicked up about something trivial like this, you’d be laughed at, and ‘managed out’ soon after.

On a personal level, I’d try to get your employee’s onside with it. I understand employment law as got to be considered, but if your a small business, you are going to have to keep focused on doing what you do, not all the BS surrounding H&S/employment law/data protection.

If one positive thing has come out of this thread, at least you have found a cheap way of psychoanalysing future potential employee’s….Give them a selection of STW threads to respond to and read the answers.

Some of the responses on this thread show just how far from the real world some peoples expectations have got.

Good luck!

How about this bad boy…

http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/offers/special_buys3_17502.htm?WT.mc_id=2011-02-04-11-16

Almost – they are Shahinian, the model is the Arc

Nice, I tried a pair of their cheaper speakers (c.£600 ish) 10 years ago. I really liked them…dunno why I didn’t buy them (well I do actually…I was up my own ass thinking Linn / Naim were the holy grail of Hifi :-)

he one thing I’m maybe considering there worth is for Pensions,

I don’t think you don’t have a choice, I think you have to use an IFA for a pension (I think FSA rules mean you can’t buy one direct). Our IFA set up a pension promising annual reviews, and did nothing. His advice on what funds to pick was poor (he suggested putting everything into property 3 years ago…luckily my wife suggested that was not a good idea!), the pension provider he advised has been abysmal.

When the economy hit the fan 2 years ago, he did nothing.

He phoned today and basically said that if we want annual reviews we have to pay 1% of the fund value per annum…..suffice to say we had a fairly frank exchange of views about what he had promised and what he had delivered. When I asked why he had done nothing to protect the find when the biggest postwar financial crisis hit, he said that clients with large funds took priority, and they were too busy to get to plebs like me until a year later.

So overall…not too impressed w/IFA’s right now :(

Many products are only available through IFA’s, so you may have to use one. I have never found one which as been any good. The ones I have delt with are scum sucking pondlife. I’d love to find a decent one, they have a role to play, but I reality, I’ve found them overpaid slimeballs who promise much and deliver less then nothing.

Maybe a bit modern, but there is plenty of Brian Setzer Orchestra on youtube.

Thanks Footflaps, it’s to to know someone thinks it’s a good idea! My understanding is that you don’t have a room stat, which I find a bit scary, and also that the radiators spend quite a bit of their time at lowish temperatures. I always thought radiators should get hot, then shut off.

Am I missing something? You didn’t offer the asking price, someone else did, what’s wrong?

Commiserations CG, stay strong.

Hazel Blears…a truly loathsome individual.

Ed Balls…a frozen eyed slimeball.

Nice work GH…very tasteful, great phrasing!

bought album ‘maximum balloon’ by david sitek

Have you heard TV on the Radio? Class band…well worth checking out.