I used to be a C Programmer, but somehow I now find myself as an Environmental Engineer.

Studied Geology and Computer Science with the idea of working in Geophysics, but finishing my degree in the middle of the early 90’s recession put paid to that.

Last bit of C I did was converting a load of ‘NATURAL’ database programs. Considering the NATURAL code ran like a three legged dog and the company was charged by the second for CPU time, in the first month they went live I think I saved the company £20K. Didn’t get any thanks for it though and was made redundant (for the third time in 5 years I might add).

I still try to keep my hand in, playing with Linux on an old laptop; and I sometimes miss the creative elements of the work, but these feelings soon go away when I think back to the 18 hour days trying to get a system to go live and being made redundant again because the company is sending all the development work ‘off shore’.

Went to the Czech Republic last year.

Pros – Lovely people, very welcoming. Great food if you’re not a veggie (some of the best food I’ve ever had on holiday), cheap too. Cheap flights, ski hire, accomodation, booze. Nice snow, not too cold. Depending on the resort, good for kids as there is was a water park and sledges and those innertube things, not just skiing.

Cons – Small resorts that get busy during half term. Need to be intermediate skiers as the runs are shorter and steeper than some others in western europe. Three hour transfer from the airport. Depending on the resort, lots of kids.

Had a great time and would certainly go again, but my other half is a lecturer and we have to go during half term. She tells me it’s no busier then France or Italy. I’m used to Canada and America, where I have skied for an hour without seeing anyone else other than on the chair lift.

http://www.prestigetimeservices.co.uk/%5B/url%5D

Haven't got time to read through all the other posts, so my apologies if this is a re-post.

Have you tried THE DUTCH SHAVING SHOP.

I got one called Lord Metal Double Edge Safety Razor -Krabbertje.

Been very happy with it so far. I'm still in the process of finding the best blade, oh and the nicest soap.

Here is a little more detail.

Lord Metal Double Edge Safety Razor ,,Premium,, Lp.1822.

Lord Sterling 3 pieces Razor is made according to the high standards to give you a premium shave ever get.It,s durable metal parts hold the blade at the perfect angle to the face .This critical angle along with Lord blades makes your shaving smoth and close all days long.

Lord has be owned by Schick-Wilkinson for a long period of time.

3 pieces metal quality razor for a nice price.

Comes with 1 lord double edge Razor Blade.

Best Tested by the shaving forums.

Lord The Art Of Shaving-Made in Egypt.

I bought a selection pack of blades and so far the best have been the Lord ones. Funny that! Still only another 53 blades to use.

My best ever was a brand new Canon waterproof case for my camera (I scuba dive in another life). Retail at over £200, bought from main Canon dealer for £32 including shipping.

Stronlight JP400
RPM FSA Power Pro JIS

Just got a roof rack.

With my old mountain bikes, I was happy to put them on the boot mounted carrier as I wasn't bothered about the bikes getting bashed about. I've used the foam pipe lagging to try and stop them banging together, but it never stops everything. I also noticed that the first time I used it, the rack put 2 small dents in the boot lid and rubbed the paint where the pads moved when the rain got underneath them.

Got the roof bars and carriers to use with mine and the gf's new road bikes. The bikes are kept completely separate and do not touch one another. The only problem I have noticed is the front wheel on my bike wobbles in the carrier. I think it's due to the rim being deep section, but a couple of better straps will sort that out.

If I could have afforded it, I'd have gone for the tow bar route, but that was not within my budget.

4 at the moment.

Tifosi CK7 Road Bike built by me with 9 speed Campag stuff
On One 29er with SRAM X7
13 year old Giant Terrago (with lots of mods)
30 year old 26" Harry Quinn Road Bike stunningly refurbished with up to date Campag kit.

You may also want to have a look at the Co-op.

Bike cover is only up to £1000, but that is enough for my bikes.

A Luton has internal dimensions of 4.0m x 2.0m x 2.2m high. The wheels are below the bed of the van too, so wheel arches shouldn't be a problem.

You will certainly get more in a Luton, but 34 without scratches could be pushing it. The owners will have to bring lots of blankets and bubble wrap.

thisisnotaspoon – Member

Get them all to get bike bag/boxes from halfords and box them up? Might get ~20 in then.

Great idea. Pedals off, wheels off, turn bars round and get a load of boxes from Halfords. You could even stack them then.

Is that thirty four or three to four? If I read it at thirty four, you will not fit anywhere near that many in a transit.

Load capacity of a LWB Transit is 3.4 x 1.7 x 1.7m giving 9.826 cum.

Given that a bike is approximately 2.0 x 1.0 x 0.45m giving 0.9 cum, you could theoretically fit about 10 in.

As you can't stack them, the floor of the Transit is 5.78sqm and the footprint of a bike is about 0.9sqm, you might get 6 in.

Hope this helps.

There is Surosa in Oldham if that's any closer.

There is Surosa in Oldham if that's any closer.

Fay seems like a game girl!!!!

Not sure I'd fancy cycling with a wet chamoix after a dip in the res. Must have been a scorcher!

Just put a tape measure across my wheels. Came in at about 740mm. Funily enough that about 29".

I was lucky enough to meet him and most of the other member of Sabbath in the Red House in Newcastle in 1992 (My hero Tony stayed in the hotel).

We were not sure it was him because, as muddydwarf pointed out, he was tiny. But what a really genuine nice guy. One of the friends I was with got him to sign his T shirt. Ronnie also took a dollar bill out of his wallet and signed that for him too. We must have spent about 2 hours chatting with them about Sabbath and Dio and rock music in general. We also reminded Vinny Appice of a night at Bingley Hall when the dry ice machine behind his drums exploded and gave his arse frost bite.

A sad day indeed!!!

Don't think I could date Vicky. My damaged ego couldn't take being beaten in EVERY sprint.

Might get a nice new bike out of it though.

Wouldn't worry about it. We can see from the photo that the gear cable is holding everything together!

Ever is a very long time.

Edinburgh Castle on the plug of an extinct volcano. The north western tip of Scotland was once part of the North American plate. Loch Ness is on the line of the Great Glen Fault and they reckon that the highlands of Scotland were once higher than the Himalayas.

Why couldn't it happen? There is no proof that it couldn't.

poppa – Member

Looks a bit Mickey Mouse to me

And Pluto and Goofy. A bit Donald Duck'd too!

But 1400 lumens for £80.

soma_rich – Member

Is this new too? perfect for helmet mounting?

No, been available for a while. I think they do just the helmet mount if you have the other light.

Definitely very fugly, but once again, how do they manage to do it for the price? I know the quality will be questionable, but as many of the home made light builders say, the parts would cost more.

I've had one of their track pumps for about 3 or 4 years. It's not the sturdiest piece of kit I've ever used, even though the barrel is aluminium, and I always feel like I've got to take a bit more care pumping my tyres, but it works well enough up to about 120psi and for a fiver, I'm more than happy.

For mtb tyres it's been great.

The front mech hitting the tyre is a constant problem on On One 29er's.

Here is a LINKY to the solution. A bit dramatic though!

Merlin are doing a PG980 plus a PC 971 chain for £47.95.

Been to St Mary's a few years ago. Took the mountain bikes to the island because we couldn't be bothered hiring a car (not even sure you can). Cycled around the perimeter of the island in a couple of hours even with a stop for a very nice cream tea. Can't even remember if there were any hills.

One good thing, you won't need to worry about security. We locked and hid our bikes round the back of a garage. Walked down to the pub and noticed most of the bikes on the island were just left in peoples front gardens.

Lovely place though!!

You might want to have a look at the Planet X Kaffenback or Uncle John. Don't have one I'm afraid, but I do have an On One 29er XL size. At 6'4" with 36-37" inside leg, it the best fitting bike I've ever owned.

Get them on a good day and the prices are hard to beat too.

I was in a similar boat with my beloved hand built 26" Harry Quinn (from the original shop in Liverpool). That bike had seen me through too much to put it on a skip or sell it to some barbarian on ebay.

So what did I do? I hear you ask, well I took it to Bob Jackson in Leeds and got them to do a full refurb. Re-spaced the rear drop outs to accept modern hubs, new Rosso Red enamel and my cycling history was back to as good as new.

Now all I have to do is loose 3 stone and get some new legs and I can ride it again.

Auchentoshan is pretty unique as I believe it's the only tripple distilled whiskey left in Scotland. Makes it very smoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooth (with a capital oooooooooooooooooooooo)

I recommend you take loads of sun cream at that time of year.

Black Sabbath – A horror film with Boris Karloff

For me, technological advances, and to a certain extent health and safety, have killed most motor sport.

F1 – enough said!!! Crap.

Rallying – Only a couple of manufacturers interested, no night stages, short rallies (remember when it was the RAC Rally over 5 days and nights). And it's not Rally GB it's rally wales.

Touring Cars – They do their best with weight penalties, but when they started using space frame chasis and a body that looked a bit like the car it was supposed to was the death of it for me.

MotoGP – Even my beloved MotoGP gets it wrong. Traction control and start assistance on a bike is just wrong. It might be safer for the rider but does nothing for us poor suckers watching it.

WSB and BSB – Is probably my favotite, but even they started getting it wrong and messing about with what they could do and still call it a 'production' bike.

Aerotech are pretty true to size and everything is measured in inches. The quality is good because Americans wouldn't accept anything else (well maybe not Harley Davidson in the 70's).

If you get some for the lady in your life, womens sizes are a bit different, but the mens is pretty standard.

International shipping is from $13.25 for up to 4pounds.

Have you had a look at Aerotech Designs[/url] ?

Quality stuff and although they're not exactly cheap, not too bad either.

mastiles_fanylion – Member

Am I the only one to *really* not get Mel Brooks?

No.

Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein and the Producers in my opinion are his best works, don't think much of the rest. Spaceballs is particularly poor.

"Not the face!!!!"

Awesome, but I think he's taken that edition of 'Mouse Trap' a little too far.

I'm a cyclist, a biker and a car camper and I'm still looking for the perfect tent.

At the moment I've got a 3 man for the bike (tent will fit in my topbox when it's all packed up) and a 5 man for the car. Made the mistake with the 5 man of having the big sleeping area (standing up room; I'm 6'4") and the smaller porch. It will just about take two bikes, but the chairs and the table then need to go in the sleeping area. Usually take a small tarp and lock the bikes together under the tarp at night and if we go out in the car.

I will certainly be thinking about the Quechua T4.1 for my next tent (or something in that style). I did notice in the new Argos catalogue that Regatta have developed a range of tents. Checking on the Regatta website, it would appear that they are only selling them through Argos. I've not found any reviews yet, but I'd certainly be interested based on how long some of my Regatta clothes have lasted.

Why not just use some thread lock?

Used these GUYS superglue and epoxy and it's great. Don't see why their thread lock should be any different.