Thanks leffeboy thats really helpful info.

Steve G, how did sound change for you with the perforation?

No kidding Julians. My housemate is getting bored of it now, so is either not bothering to speak to me or does that exaggerated speaking to the deaf stuff. He also keeps turning up, trying to help, with stuff saying hearing loss is permanent if its misdiagnosed. I can just hear videos on my laptop now if I turn its volume up to full.

On the more interesting side, some of the internal sound effects were interesting and weird. The shopping centre (my first trip out yesterday since this started) was much improved by being less noisy, but was too worn out to stay for more than just a coffee.

In the past I have found it the 35-55 age bracket who are least willing to learn, adapt or change to new developments. Often 55+ people have a lot more flexibility and openness to new stuff. I have no idea why. The very worse group of people to train are middle aged teachers and academics, a significant number of whom seem to think teaching other people enables them to legitimately totally close off their own minds. Very puzzling and also sad, as you would expect them to be the most open of all to new educational situations.

I know people who have garden maintenance as part of the rules in their contract. Comes out the deposit if they dot keep stuff up.

Both have kept the gardens immaculate and have spent large amounts on plants etc. It depends on the nature of your renter. Get one who likes gardens.

Another trick is to offer a ‘rebate’ each month if the property is well kept. Even a small amount seems to work as I know of one person who gets £10 back per month and it seems enough to encourage them.

By discreet I do not mean unreported, but the very high profile reporting and the images released are to me more negative than positive. Best reported without images of blood soaked fear filled ‘shoppers’.

I cannot see why the photographic media needed to be brought in -other than someones ego or political ends over-rode the sad situation of promoting fear among the UK population, and it has caused fear, just look at the Daily Mail comment section.

Does this help fight terrorism or promote it? It screams ‘hey look at the impact you could have by doing this for real’.

Or perhaps realistic enough to see a possible reality.

Both the political statements and the exercise could have fallen on any non consecutive days of the year, any gap in 365. Even just a week apart.

But they did not. One was immediately after the other.

What should have been a discreet exercise is everywhere in official photos.

Photos that effectively support terrorism and undermine public confidence. why would anyone think it good for the UK to release them?

Its the timing of it all, plus the mass of photos released of ‘blood; soacked people, which look like ‘official photographs’ by a pro photographer to me.

Only during the last couple of days has there been such high MP comments that Europe will soon be at war (due to Brexit) which have been added into the recent rise in ‘Europe = better terrorist security” line.

Its the precise timing directly reinforcing the Europe at war politician comments and what seem official photos at an event.

This exercise could have been fully reported without images.

The photos are clearly intended to promote public fear and should not have been released.

The images released are an absolute gift to terrorists of any kind.

The timing, the intentional mass release of distressing images, the political fear raising about conflict of the last few days…. the politicians and/or organisers of this training event are clearly politically manipulative or just stupid.

So sad, for both him and his wife. They always seem so happy together, it looks a wonderful relationship for them both. I have envied them that happiness, in a nice way – its nice to know some people manage to find it.

Chris Boardman from as far back as 03 Jun 2010

“I sat at a meeting with the UCI last year and drew on the blackboard exactly how this might work. I showed them how some the sophisticated boosting technology now available, mainly from F1 teams, that can get a kilowatt out of a single AAA battery.

“And don’t forget electrically operated gears are legal these days so there is already a power source on many bikes. I think it would be fair to say there was a stunned silence after I said my piece.”

“It would be very little trouble adapting a power source to give you maybe a couple of hundred watts for 20 minutes or so, which would basically gives you 40 per cent more power through the pedals in a time trial say.

“You could reduce that power and spread it over a longer period of time or go for one “hit”.

“Its potential is obvious. You could use it when you are trying to establish a break or on the crux of the last climb of the day or maybe in the latter stages of a long time-trial. “

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/cycling/7801538/Chris-Boardman-I-warned-UCI-officials-about-possibility-of-bike-doping-a-year-ago.html

I have seen opinions elsewhere that say cheating could be integrated with electronic gear changes or via radio from the team car etc so no direct rider involvement would occur.

Using the search phrase

coin collectors uk forum

got quite a few results on Google.

Hi Nick /NJA

Thank you for your reply, its much appreciated. I may well get in touch, though it will not be until next week.

I am actually one of the 2 Executors named in the will (no one bothered to tell me until weeks after the death, when I found out by accident!) and I have done all of the admin work for probate, the other Executor has done nothing as they did not want to be involved. They are also named as a Trustee of the estate, as am I.

I will call them Executor X as I do not want to post too much detail on the web. They are a relative of the deceased and someone I know little of, so I know minimal amount of their likely behavior.

In the will there is a property to be held in trust, plus a smallish sum of cash in bank accounts of a few thousand which was left directly to me.

Executor X is entitled to live in the property (via a trust which consists of themselves and myself according to the will). X has to pay for all bills and upkeep of the property while residing in it.

By the will X can only live in it and can do nothing else with it whatsoever, so they cannot rent it out or let someone else use it. On the death of X (or of X not residing in the property), the property reverts to other recipients in the will.

X does not want to live in the property but has openly told me that they will “fake living in it” with the intent of stopping it being passed along to other people. They intend to continue to live in their own much nicer property. They are proposing to live in the inherited property one night a week or less to ‘make it legal’.

The relatively small sum of money in the bank is supposed to come to me – but all the expenses of insuring and running the property (heating etc) were and are due to be paid from that sum while the probate etc was being sorted.

We now actually have probate granted and the paperwork for this has arrived from the probate court so the distribution as per the will could now take place.

I have told X this is now the position and asked them a few weeks back to formally state their intent so I as Executor would have a record of their wishes. I have received nothing from them other than verbal statements and evasion. Therefore I feel I cannot distribute according to the will, as X will not state formally if they will reside in the property or not and the only significant part of the Estate is the house.

By taking this position it leaves X free of paying any house bills and leaving the Estate/Trust to still carry them – effectively leaving all the bills to be paid from what would eventually have been ‘my’ sum of money.

At the moment I have borrowed money to pay for the bills as I have not had access to the bank accounts and am personally short of cash (I had thought it would all be sorted, so had not worried, foolishly, about this to start with, oh how we learn!)

Yesterday I told X I wanted the bank accounts closed and the money moved to where I could access it to pay for the upcoming council tax, insurance, bin collection and power bills which will be due again soon. X is now trying to obstruct me having access to the money. I cannot go on borrowing money, X is offering nothing towards any bills for the property and I cannot rent out the property so it is self supporting, as X has the right to live in it.

There is nothing in the will that says when X must make up their mind about habitation within any defined time period, so there seems nothing to stop them stringing this out for months or even years.

If they decide in the end to renounce the property I have been told they must sign an official statement to that effect in front of a solicitor.

X knows there is little money in the Estate other than the property and they also know I am pretty broke so cannot run up big sums of legal fees to challenge them. I cannot challenge them via the Trust as X themself are the other Trustee.

I had thought a probate specialist might know where to go with this, and if Executor X in the end decides to let the property go, I will need to commission the document from someone, to be signed by X. I have been advised to shop around for the creation of this document, due to cost.

At the moment X is demanding about half of the lump sum in the bank accounts or they will fake residence or will leave me to go on paying the bills which I cannot afford to do. I also have fears that the demands are going to increase beyond that initial sum, there are already indications.

Much of the background to this could be about showing domination and control (an issue that runs in the family, hence my having nothing to do with most of them).

To be honest, I wish they just moved in the place properly as it would make my life much easier. They are clearly not short of money themselves as there are new cars about, one on order, lots of ongoing decorating, gardeners, cleaners etc.

Its incredibly difficult as I want to be fair and decent, but the controlling, demanding and shifting attitudes of X is getting to me and I am getting the flack from other people for the non distribution of the will (probate granted mid December 2015).

X has waited (leaving me to do all the work) until this very late stage, then abruptly made demands they had been claiming they had no interest in during the early stages. I just feel beaten down and pushed around by all of this.

Sorry, I did not mean this to be such a long post. I just needed to get it off my chest I guess.

Bump, to catch the morning viewers.

I wish they had put all this time and effort into investigating David Kellys death

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/jul/16/david-kelly-death-10-years-on

People who come off it abruptly instead of tapering off get problems – a colleague used to stop abruptly, get panic attacks then concluded he had better stay on it for life. For some reason of his own he refused to ever cut down in small steps which is how you are supposed to do it. He is now stuck on it with a number of side effects (digestion, blood pressure) which he has to take additional pills to counteract.

If you decide to go on it, get CBT counselling or change your life to treat the cause of your problems. Definitely set a time limit of how long you are prepared to stay on it, doctors seem very keen to put people on endless prescription renewals.

Most of all dont use such stuff as a way of merely enduring a crap life instead of actually changing your world and getting rid of situations and circumstances which stress you or make you unhappy or sad. Its easy to take a pill, numb out and just continue endlessly in the same situation, I have seen that with other people way too often, scared me away from any pills and into counselling, best choice ever.

Check out how much a new one costs, check around and see how much comparable 2nd hand ones cost.
If there is little difference, buy new, as spares might be easier to get and you have a guarantee anyway.

Remember, any negative reviews for any service or product could be posted by competitors, so never just believe them, any more than really good reviews – consider reviews with some care and look for evidence they are genuine.

Never had any issues. Renewed again happily this year.

Tech support has been good and was UK based when we used it last (couple of years back).

Project, thanks for the tips and support.

The Probate has turned out to have hidden problems due to a very poorly written will (solicitors errors) enhanced by an obstructive Executor who is suddenly looking to use this to personally gain financially in inappropriate ways. Without the self serving and somewhat immoral Executor all this would be done and dusted by now, done without solicitors.

You are right that the government is now chasing for return of money, bit late in the day. They only just sent some money to the estate a couple of months back and we never even knew what the payment was supposed to be for!

At screaming point to be honest.

Final Duties company is a UK national service for allocating probate solicitors, sorry in my original post I made it sound local to a specific area rather than national. I am nowhere near Surrey unfortunately or I would look into the Knoll Road suggestion as well. Apologies and thanks for your post Purist.

The Guardian article is an interesting read about how Banks and Solicitors rip people off.

“Here is another thought, these crazy 38-42 years olds who are shitting themselves about having children and ask you would you consider having your snip reversed? LIKE WTF?”

So you dont like being messed about, used, taken for a financial ride and various other moans and complaints – but when women are genuinely up front and totally honest with you plus do not wish to waste your time as well as their own, you sneer and call them crazy.

Wow, and here you are wondering why none of your relationships work out and why you are alone.

Ever thought of seeing women as actual people instead of just useful objects or irritating obstructions?

” [Labour] Membership jumped from 201,293 on 6 May last year, the day before the general election, to 388,407 on 10 January.
[Dragon – member]
Just a blip when over 45 million are registered to vote. “

The conservative party seemed to get enough votes to win last time around – the membership count of the conservative party was and still is tiny in comparison to Labours membership now. Besides I don’t think correlating membership directly with voting works – there must be many other factors involved.

“Latest estimates – based upon party press releases and media reports – suggest the Conservative Party has around 149,800 members, Labour 270,000, the SNP 110,000, the Green Party (England and Wales) 61,000, the Liberal Democrats 61,000 and UKIP 42,000.11 Aug 2015”

[The Labour Party figures will have gone up since this statement from last August. Amazed the Librarals have any members other than Clegg the deceitful].

http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN05125.pdf

Contact the actual property owner. Just say you want to make sure your bid has been passed on to them, as an estate agent has let you down before. Fair chance they will give some useful comments about your bit or others,

A family member found out this way that her estate agent was not passing on bids – in order to sell her house cheap to his builder mate, the ‘only’ person to have made an offer on the property, or so the agent had claimed….

I hope Labour kick this guy out asap:

“The Labour MP Simon Danczuk charged £5,000 for an interview with a national newspaper in which he discussed intimate text messages he had sent to a teenage girl.

The revelation will see Danczuk – who was suspended by his party over claims he acted inappropriately… open to further charges that he has been seeking to profit from his growing notoriety.

“On Monday the MP for Rochdale admitted to the BBC’s Newsnight programme that he had received £1,100 from a photo agency for pictures taken of him which were subsequently sold to newspapers. He refused to apologise for the arrangement. “I don’t think it’s wrong at all actually,” he said.

The Observer understands that the Sun on Sunday paid Danczuk £5,000″

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jan/09/simon-danczuk-5000-sun-on-sunday-interview

“When asked by The Observer about the alleged £5,000 payment from The Sun, Mr Danczuk reportedly replied: “I am not talking to the press.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/simon-danczuk-mp-sold-interview-about-sexting-scandal-to-tabloid-for-5000-a6804121.html

You could try this lot for advice too:

http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/

If you are in a rush, or need hints and tips for this task, try asking nicely on here and they will guide you or maybe even if you are very nice do this first job for you if you are in a hurry.

https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums/

Its free to join, they never mail you about anything unless you request stuff, dont sell your address and are generally a very helpful and kind bunch.

How quick you pick up skills of your own depends on
1) how good you are at learning
2) how good your art skills are. Retouching is ok to a certain level, then you hit a wall due to how good or bad your general artistic skills are. People tend to forget the artistic element is an issue, though practise certainly helps.

“wondering why there are lots of photos and comments in the media about what the Police and Army are doing to help, but nothing of the fire crews.”

Reasons for keeping good publicity [and minimising public sympathy] about the fire service out of the news:

“South and West Yorkshire Fire Services have cut about £20m from their combined budgets since 2011.”

“Fire services in South and West Yorkshire could be merged in a bid to save money.[b]make even more financial cuts[/b]“

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-34812427

The government are proposing merging ALL fire services with the police to try to justify even more budgetary cuts

“Theresa May risks “turning the clock back 140 years” with discredited plans for police and crime commissioners (PCCs) to take over fire authorities…“

“these proposals threaten to damage the well-earned trust of the public in firefighters, hamper innovation and will lead to the fragmentation of emergency services delivery across the UK“

Any centre or right wing news delivery will have made sure public sympathy for the dedication and bravery of the fire service is kept to the absolute minimum.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/dec/19/fire-brigades-union-voices-anger-at-plans-to-hand-oversight-to-pccs

“Corbyn for example: a principled man mercilessly pursuing his own agenda irrespective of anybody else views (including the electorate or his own party as long as he has an email from Dorothy from Doncaster)“

– At least 60,000 people have joined Labour since Corbyn became leader.
– Over 200,000 people have joined the Labour party since last years govenment election.
– The membership of the Labour Party is massive compared to that of the Conservative Party
– Corbyn was elected by a huge majority of long term Labour Party members – without even counting any additional votes from affilates or £3 voters, he still romped home.
– Corbyn has the biggest mandate from Labour membership of any leader in the partys history, even wiping the floor with Blair when he was in his prime.

“pursuing his own agenda irrespective of anybody else views“
Your accuracy with that statement is totally non existent. Try doing some research instead of taking right wing headlines completely at face value!

Agents

If you look up some of the web sites of adventerers, you will see most of them employ an agency to seek out work, appearances, writing opportunities etc on thier behalf. So I would say, get some experience in some subject, then track down an agent or 2 and ask what they can do for you, then pick one.

Welcome Badnewz to the club of the angry and disenchanted voter.

I have met a very diverse range of people who have moved to Corbyn. People who have been very solid for years previously in thier non left views. Even my retired neighbour, a lifetime Conservative voter has had enough of the last decade or so of UK standard politics.
Many of us see Corby as ‘the last decent person’ in visible politics.

I think it is brave and honest of people to re-evaluate who they wish to vote for. I just hope he holds on in there, with the party members and voters and is not destroyed by the so called ‘Labour’ MPs and the press both of which put greed before country.

God knows what politics will become if he stops being head of Labour, as ruthless and hishonest politicians will no longer see any barrier at all to treating the population of the UK like disposable toys, useful only for wealth creation and as an outlet for sadism.

I have no issues with people marrying abroad, provided

– the couple accept without resentment that they may have no guests attending, as its a consequence of their decision on location.

– no one is emotionally blackmailed into attending the event, esp if they have to use up annual leave or are not rolling in spare money.

– the couple offer to pay all costs of flights/travel/accommodation to anyone they send an invitation to.

I think its about time couples stopped assuming other people view a wedding as an event they should be grateful to be invited to attend.

Attending such events has become a huge financial burden when you add in ‘destination weddings’ even if out of region but still in the UK, plus gifts, clothing, stag and hen all weekend/all week events and the attendance costs of multi-day weddings (meal Friday night, wedding Saturday, family get togeather Sunday morning/lunch before going home).

Realise its all rather scary and would be best if the problem had never happened.

However you should try to be grateful they can offer solutions at some point in the future. What sort of activities and games would you be playing with your kids, in fact what kind of life might you have, if your shoulder bones continue to die and are left to break and crumble?

You are so lucky to have a repair option available to you at all. Some people get ill or damaged so much they dont live to see their kids, let alone play with them. On those terms, thinks not looking so bad for you, so take comfort from that.

Given how the NHS is being destroyed on ideological grounds, I would suggest you start financially saving to be able to pay for a future operation (seriously, not a joke) as no medical insurers will touch a pre-existing condition with that kind of major expense attached to it. I suggest you find out how much a private op costs to get some kind of feel for future monetary planning and also some extra allowance in case anything goes wrong during or after the op (gets expensive fast).

Best of luck. I am sure your operation option will be massively more positive and beneficial than you seem to think right now. Just ask anyone with a hip replacement how it has improved thier life.

“… who really goes to the Library these days ? Libraries occupy expensive and valuable property in town centres and sadly are yesterdays news, the world including publishing is increasingly online these days. “

Ah a “Cameron style” deeply ignorant statement if ever I read one. The glorious assumption everyone has money to spare and a comfortable home to sit in.

I regularly go to 6 different libraries in my county/city. I have also been to Libraries in several other towns not nearby. Often tourist info and other local info can be found in them as part of the service. I can only think of 1 library I have been in that was not well used each time I was there, and that was a local branch in Cardiff which was in appauling physical condition – seems they had run down the local assessible branches to fund the newer library in the middle of the city.

If you bother to go into a library that has been supported by its council you will find reading groups, play groups, local information and loads and loads of PCs as well as bookstock and audio/video titles.

You will find somewhere for the elderly and unemployed to go, to find entertainment and heat and to apply for jobs via the computers.

Everyone can get internet access, as much as it would surprise you and Cameron, some people cannot afford computing equipment and line rentals at home. I wonder how many unemployed people looking for jobs can afford a replacement PC etc when thier entire budget for food, electricity, clothing, bus fares to interviews, materials for job applications etc is £60 per week. Not many job centres have lots of pcs to use.

I cant go into any of our local libraries without seeing people of all ages using up at least 95% of the available computers. Often there are queues to get on them.

I can only assume people who think Libraries are a waste of space never go in them and are self absorbed enough not to realise they are hugely important to much of the community. Libraries will become more and more important as more people are priced out of education, computing equipment, social activities and even basic life requirements such as heat in the winter.

Try your local library. Many of them have a deal with, I think its called ‘Ancestry’, or something like that. Its to do with tracing family history. I think use of it is totally free via the libraries in our area.

Also ask while you are there about local history/family history groups in the area as its a popular hobby and people who are in them could give you a lot of ideas and support.

Try searching the photography forums for peoples experiences and alternative programs.

Peoples main concern has been finding themselves stranded with a load of unusable personal files if for any reason they can no longer pay the subscription.

Also you can’t really have a stand alone non internet machine as to continue using CC Lightroom or photoshop you have to connect to the internet to keep validating your program or it stops working (things may have moved on from that last one marginally, I no longer follow CC stuff).

Lightroom standalone 6 is still available, but Adobe have gone back on their word. Originally they said they would continue the stand alone version but as soon as they released 6 they said it would be the last non subscription version, then immediately made a big deal of upgrading the CC version of 6 and leaving all the stand alone new purchasers already dumped with their brand new copies. Yes,lets just slap loyal customers in the face.

When my stand alone copies of LR and Photoshop are no longer viable I will be seeking out a new supplier as Adobe are 2 faced. Having said that, many people who are happy to pay a subscription for the rest of their photographic life seem happy with CC, though the automatic upgrades do not always run smoothly.

Also remember Adobe was one of the compnaies who had a major hack last year. They told everyone it was small and harmless then the numbers of hacked accounts went up and up and up, I was one who had to cancel a now possibly unsafe credit card. I will never give them a card number again, not just because of the hacking but because they did ‘damage contol’ by not admitting how really bad it was for weeks…

GIMP (awful name) is a well respected and free photoshop type program.

Forums

Mostly UK
https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums

International
http://www.fredmiranda.com/forum
http://photography-on-the.net/forum/index.php?full
http://www.thephotoforum.com

I have left job interviews for the following reasons:

1) (On more than 1 occasion) Turning up for interview at a specified time, only to find other people or sometimes lots of other people all there waiting for the same ‘slot’ all unaware it was a shared slot /queue or group interview system and that the interview becomes by default the whole day. This annoys me as all transport and personal arrangements etc get screwed up as the interview is suddenly extended from maybe an hour or so to instead hours of waiting and queuing. To me its a sign of a selfish arrogant and very incompetent company. If I was warned at the time of notification I would feel differently/that I had a choice instead of my time being wasted highhandedly by people who could not organize ‘an event in a brewery’.

2) Interview panel dithering for 45 minutes plus between me and another applicant, expecting me to wait while they know I would miss my only transport home that day. I waited a fair time period then was polite, said I was no longer prepared to wait and walked out expecting to have lost the job. They offered it first thing the next morning. I nearly turned it down due to them being inconsiderate to staff but took it in the end only because I did not like the changing direction of the job I was in so there was not much to loose between them.

3) Getting offered the same money I was on for more responsibility. It took them days to make a money offer after the actual job offer and that made it worse, as again I did not feel they were either organized or trustworthy. They asked to meet with me again but I refused.

4) If not shown around (which is normal in my field) I ask to be taken to the office or workspace I will be spending my life in. Any refusal or look of surprise, panic or alarm from the interviewers and I figure they have something they really don’t want candidates to be aware of. Excuses not to show you can be entertaining as they are usually clearly made up on the spot with a touch of desperation :-). Most places show you around without needing to ask them though.

5) A personnel officer asking me if I had a serious relationship or intended to have kids in the next few years. I presume she had got caught in a time warp from 1930. The fact they had not reprimanded her, retrained her or sacked her said it all.

To me an interview is where a company should be making its best impression (same as I should be doing as an interviewee). To fail to look good even in the short time period of hosting an interview just reeks of incompetent disorganized management and displays a negative or arrogant attitude towards employees – its only going to get worse once you work for them and they think they have you trapped.

Hope this helps you with your study. All the best.

Employers are supposed to be supportive of changing hours to promote work/life balance if you have young kids. Can you make use of that to both help out your wife and move towards self employment/different employment?

PS thanks for comment Keith, nice of you to say.

Questions I have not noticed asked (but could have missed them)

– How soon could you move from the new job to something physically closer?

– what is your chance of ever getting a fitness offer again – this could be your only chance ever.

– If the new job does not work out how difficult would it be to get back in to your present field of work at least for a while?

– Are there any options to do more than one job part time so you could combine options?

– Can any of this lead towards you being self employed given you are mostly just fed up of poor management?

– Can you move to another company in the interior design field to get away from the poor management and would that be as helpful as changing fields totally?

General notes:

– I cant stress enough how getting out of an oppressive job changes life and attitude.

– Rubbish management can be found in many places, a new job may not solve that aspect.

– You have to factor in buying transport or travel as the winter and extra stress on your wife is going to require this, so it will equal more than a 10% pay cut and fuel prices/tickets may well go up again.

– How does your wife feel about moving?

– What aspects of the change does your wife fear – get specifics from her as people generalise and you both need to know what her specific worries (and yours) are really about.

– Be honest with yourself – there is a fair chance you may regret whichever choice you make, so don’t be too intimidated by potential regret, no one can read the future and even horrible things that happen you can end up being glad happened at time goes on as they set you on a better path in the long run.

– Factor in pensions, leave arrangements and sick pay as they do have some relevance esp if you have family responsibilities.

Good luck. Let us know what you decide.

Walking boots are overkill, hot and heavy. Trainers or sports scandals are best.

Wear some cushioned sports ankle socks or 2 pairs of thin socks. If they are not seemless, wear them near to your foot one inside out so the seem is away from rubbing your skin. I have also found sports sandals with no socks to work for me well if hot or raining (dry fast) but you really need to check out things on a few walks first to see what works.

Take blister plasters though really if you get the footwear right you will not need them.

Also take layers of clothes, things that open full length down the front rather than just at the neck – you will soon get hot walking about at a reasonable pace. Also take a lightweight waterproof.

Good luck, have fun. Urban walks are very entertaining as there is so much to see, esp if you like buildings, building details and gardens. Time will fly. Leave the headphones at home.

I have used a GPS watch and found I often did 7-10 miles just going round the city shops. I know what you mean though – have had people offer me lifts of only 500 yards or so on the basis ‘its too far for you to walk’. Makes me wonder how they cope with going up that mountainus route to bed every night 🙂

Anyway I used to get a lot of backache if walking slowish or stood about. Then I sleep on a floor for some weeks (out of choice, too long to explain) and after the first few days of discomfort at loosing the soft bed the back aching in day to day life stopped and now I do not get issues any more. It forced my core muscles to improve. I sleep on a harder surface out of choice now and my body flexibility has improved a lot too, without doing any exercises to achieve all this. So I would say try to find some suitable way to improve your own core strength and walking will become more comfortable for you.