And the French were not bothered by him being her teacher. Do they not have the same duty of care laws there.

I think that it’s culturally a bit different. President Macron’s wife was his teacher (and has two kids that are older than him), although they didn’t get together until he was 18, apparently.

Right now it’s :

Fear Factory – Demanufacture
Metallica – Master of Puppets
Pantera – Far Beyond Driven. Or Alice in Chains – Dirt.

This is haaaard. :(

Ok, so at my school there was:

Nine underage pregnancies (that I know of) during my time there – a couple were to lads of the girls’ own ages (in one case, one girl had an abortion because her boyfriend said he’d leave her if she didn’t, he ditched her the day after), most were fathered by blokes in their mid-20s to mid-30s. Grooming of teenage girls by blokes 10-20 years older was pretty common.

Quite a few teenage neo-Nazis, who would tippex Swaztikas, 88 and Combat 18 onto their bags. As the town was overwhelmingly white, they’d kick the crap out of anyone who was different – nerds, metalheads, etc.One kicked a baby rabbit to death on the school field, he was later done for attempted murder and arson (he set fire to a corner shop with the Asian family in the flat above, they all survived).

A young teacher who was forced out of the profession by his students being cruel little shits.

Several drug taking lads who exchange packets during physics, one became a murderer, another died of an overdose.

A music teacher with anger management issues – he broke a filing cabinet by punching it when a lad (the aforementioned racist arsonist) lit up a cigarette in class and swore at him.

A CDT teacher who was blatantly a pervert, all the girls knew not to be around him alone.

One lad was really angry and vicious, a complete bully. Turned out years later that his dad had died when he was younger, and hid mom was dying of cancer – he never told anyone. He actually turned out to be a nice bloke as an adult!

There’s loads in Leamington, even more since the council shut a load of the shelters.

There was 50p woman – she’d always wander up to people and ask for 50p. She was apparently a factory supervisor and always well turned out, until her husband died and she had a breakdown. Somebody set fire to her whilst she was sleeping rough in a doorway – not quite being shot, but will that do?

We’ve currently got a homeless chap sleeping in the back doorway at work, by the bike racks. Poor sod looks freezing. :(

Our lad started nursery at 8 months, I’ve had a cold ever since and have used over a week of holiday due to him either being sick or poopy on various occasions. He’s not been ill for a few months now though!

Fortunately my bosses all have young kids, they also have to take a lot of time off!

Guess How Much I Love You, a tale of how Big Nutbrown Hare is an over competitive dad.

Enjoy riding through wet sand interspersed with shiny pebbles? Come to Cannock

Unless you go off piste, then you can find trails with sticky, claggy mud.

Official trails ride fine in the wet, but you may start going through components at an alarming rate…

Horrible news, his poor parents.

I had a friend who committed suicide in his early 20s. He was funny and clever, he’d just got funding for his PhD, and it was a complete and utter shock. I remember his parents trying to make sense of it. It breaks my heart even more now that I’m a parent myself.

I think that all you can do is be there for them.

The key is fully turned, and the button won’t press unless it’s unlocked, so definitely unlocked!

Another ‘yes’ here. I traditionally despise camping, but got a 2 minute fresh and dark tent for Pivot. It was ace.

Maybe that’s because the London cabbies are a bit less… you know… ‘rapey’

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Worboys

You listen to radio? How adorably quaint!

“French and electrics”.

Oh lawd, don’t joke about that. I had a Nissan Micra (just after they started being stealth Renaults).

*shudder*

It’s a Bosch motor isn’t it?

Yamaha.

Personally I wouldn’t put any bike on the back of a car and blast down a wet motorway so for me its a now. Highspeed wet grit and salt blast.

Neither would we in an ideal world, but it’d mean no biking for 80% of the year! :(

My stomach was iffy recently, I thought it was an attack of IBS, which I hadn’t had for fifteen years or so. I can’t remember if it was before or after the event though – time and space lose all meaning when you have baby induced sleep deprivation (amusingly he’s very recently started sleeping through, but I’m still waking up :/)

My bottom bracket has completely seized. Took it into the bike shop and they broke their allen key trying to get the cranks off…

My new shoes to replace my old ones (which ended up in a skip in Newnham Park) should be arriving soon. New chain is also on order.

Racing in the British summer is expensive! Fun though!

Was there only the one photographer there (the one linked on the Pivot FB page)? He managed to completely miss me, he got my mates at various points around the course though!

(Thanks again BTW!)

Mrs Toast – I think I may have given you a hand back upright on the cottage return. Green bike?

Yes, that was me, wiggling like an overturned beetle and blocking the way! :lol: Went left to let people by, but it was a terrible line and I went over. Annoying, as I nearly did exactly the same on my first lap (didn’t go over that time though!)

Mrs Toast, I looked for you but couldn’t see you, hope you’ll give it another go next year. I’ve prebooked the good weather!

Definitely, it left me keen rather than traumatised like MM 2012!

Found some interesting bruises tonight, to go with my scratches and cuts!

Do you think Single Speed would have been a good choice or is it too steep?

Saw loads of people on singlespeeders overtaking me, so not impossible! I think Team Sumo were on ss fatbikes?

You know I said it wouldn’t be biblical…. I’m sorry.

:lol:

The one advantage of doing Mayhem 2012 was just being able to shrug and say, “Meh, seen worse!”

I’m really chuffed with myself for doing two laps, which sounds a bit pathetic (OK, so it is…), but given it took me 2 3/4 hours/over 3 hours per lap, was still a lot of effort! :lol:

You’ll have to drink the unclaimed ones yourself! :)

Called it a day after the second lap, I came off a couple of times and got horrendous cramping several times (thanks to Catastic and the other chap who came to my aid and waved my legs about!)

I’ve had an awesome time though – a load of the course is amazing even in this weather, it would have been legendary in the dry! I’d prefer to do this in the wet than Mayhem in the dry, and I enjoyed it even more than Sleepless in the Saddle.

And everyone was incredibly polite and friendly, lots of encouragement (and help when I binned it on Cottage Return due to my poor line choice!). And lots of random chatting too.

Just a shame about the weather, there were only seven in my category and a bunch didn’t sign on!

Just finished my first lap, just under three hours.

MY PODIUM AWAITS!

Was spotted whilst riding, I’m sure that I looked the epitome of athleticism!

I AM FILLED WITH REGRET!

Over a five hour drive to get here, sitting in a tent expressing with a breast pump while it hammers down, knowing that riding through thick mud is not my strong point (I don’t actually mind riding in the rain when the trails hold up, I’m a bit of a trail centre softie like that!).

Still going to try and get my two qualifying laps in though, I owe it to my son (who apparently slept through the night, although there’s the possibility Mr Toast is lying to stop me from worrying! :P)

Cheers for the update!

For some utterly insane reason, I’m doing the 12 hour solo race. Despite swearing off racing after Mountain Mayhem 2012. Despite having been off the bike for ages due to having a baby.

I’m terrified it’s going to be too technical for me, or just a horrendous mud pit, and I’m having to leave my baby for the first time ever.

I’ll be the short hobbity woman on a green Stumpjumper, probably weeping in a bush whilst getting overtaken by unicyclists.

If you think it’s only this forum that thinks this then you can’t see the wood for the trees. It’s a bad joke, misfired. Just because the event is good doesn’t cancel that out.

True, I said something similar in reply to a giant thread on one of the women’s mtb FB groups about it. Lots of women thought it was shit, a thought it was fine.

It’s obvious they’re using the word “whore” with the more modern meaning of using something a lot.
Still, it’s a bit silly.

They’re not using it just in that context though, are they? Three of the four categories are named after terms that are used (often negatively in the case of Whore and Cougar) to describe women according to their sexuality. That’s not exactly a coincidence, is it?

I can see that they were going for an edgy comedy angle, but I think if you’re wanting to attract more women into racing, alienating the ones that don’t go a bundle on being in categories named after terms that define women according to their sexuality is a great idea. Especially when one of them is ‘whore’.

I like a lot of offensive humour, but I think there’s a time and a place, and I have to admit those categories make me a bit uncomfortable.

You people are all shattering my chance of a beautiful carbon road bike.

Just get one the same colour as the old one, she’ll never know the difference!

I’ve only had five bikes.

I should have more bikes.

Cheers all!

I should probably have mentioned that I ride a full susser, so I’m not sure how rear seats would work! I don’t actually know how full sussers are with trailers, come to think of it, so I might have to get a new bike too. :P Does anyone know if trailers hitch onto ebikes easily, I don’t know if the motors make things awkward…

Don’t forget that unless you have the front window permanently deployed on a trailer, a full rear mudguard and flap is a good idea.

^ That’s the sort of thing that’s good to know in advance, rather than learning through experience!

Also, you can’t stand to pedal so big monster hills are hard

I’ve never been able to stand to pedal – I’m missing ligaments in knees and have terrible cartilage, so it’s granny ring and slowly spinning all the way. Big monster hills are already hard as are slight inclines in general, doh. So yeah, I think weight of the trailer is definitely going to be a factor.

Mumsnet is ace, and curiously addictive. Come for the pregnancy and parenting advice, stay for the parking threads (with diagrams).

They also have pretty good product tests, I was gutted that I couldn’t put myself forward for testing the Thule Chariot Cougar last year (was pregnant at the time, therefore didn’t have a child to test with – still looking for a good trailer now our spawn is ten months old). :(

I got Applejack, the first of many My Little Ponies, for my fourth birthday.

Awww. Waiting for our son to hit 12 months, so we can pop him in a trailer!

This thread is weird. Of course I don’t socialise with men, they smell, obsess about football, and carry boy germs. Eeeew!

In all seriousness, most of my friends have been guys since my mid-teens. I work in an industry where bepenised folk make up 94% of the workforce. If I head out to lunch with one of them, I’m don’t see them as being someone else’s husband, I see them as a colleague and friend, because I generally treat people as individuals and not possessions.

They should’ve seen it coming..