My parents moved from South London to Wisbech when I was thirteen.

Teenage boy in London to a town where having only two nipples made you a freak.

….just imagine

😥

That should not have made me laugh as much as it did.

😀

IME no it's not worth it, with a fleece WYSIWYG is a key factor.

So if you know what you want and how to look for it i.e polar or arctic fleece, water proof, windproof etc then buy what looks the best quality.

My trespass £20 in teh sale fleece with padded shoulders and elbows which they criminally only made/sold for one season has been to the arctic circle with me and back along with numerous other hiking, climbing & MTB adventures.

I had the DVD drive or should I say the "DVD" drive replaced three times in my Dell PC before I gave up and decided that watching DVDs on a computer obviously wasn't meant to be.

I always use my personality to the best of my ability in an interview, there's nothing worng with querying and commenting that there was not a sallary advertised or attached to the pre-interview literature and you're terribly sorry for asking but….

That way you don't look a cock and avoid a confronataional situation but invite them to a resolution by casting doubt on their initial advertising etc so they have to deffend it and notice that you have scrutiniesd the information.

NB, this can back fire if it was in the ad' bold as brass and you missed it.

As a general rule if buying in Notts stay out of teh NCC/central Polcie covered area (with a green wheelie bin) the drop in crime is quite dramatic in the conurbation outside of this border.

ebygomm is right, Route 6 through Newstead abbey is V nice, simple and will take you to Mansfield

If anyone is genuinly serious about getting an MTB dog sled hybrid thing built I would love to meet them as I know people would deff' buy one especcially if I were to suddenly start whipping the opposition on one.

my hotmail is mpjones79

muddydwarf – so you in then?

– there's no restrictions re weight or wheel size in dog sledding I can show up on a full suss light as a feather machine and fly over the rough stuff.

everyone else uses steel and old bmx cast offs, it's like shooting fish in a barrel.

8)

I race sled dogs and it's ace!

I'm trying to combine my two hobbies in building a nice aluminium MTB inspired sled to make the dogs go even faster over rough stuff.

😀

Mapperly is a good idea as you're dead high up with a lovely (downhill)ride onto the A60 and easy access to XC routes accross to Mansfield.

I live in Gedling and it's ace! So many Nottingham city cops live there it's super safe.

Stay away from old mining vilages with nothing else there like Newstead. The local rag is full of tales of racism and casual violnce that deprivation brings. Riding through some is a scary experinec as everyone comes to their windows to glare at you for having the front to ride a shiny expensive thing through their village.

There are some lovely vilages out towards the East of Notts like Lowdham.

Kimberly and Nuttall aren't bad too.

No Jail as he's probably learnt his lesson. Lengthy community service deffinatley though.

Notts city centre is pretty tied up with evans having the corporate approach that you'd expect with added numpty factor that my friends and I have encountered when trying to get good advice:-
"Do you have anything like this?"
"Yes, this one which is cheaper"
"What's the difference in quality etc"
"um I dunno, but it's cheaper"

Freewheel are clobbered by their indie status and city centre location therefore not having massive buying power to drive down prices, but definatly the best workshop in the area (I know people who travel from S.Yorks to use the workshop).

There are also Bunnys bikes, Decathlon, Sherwood Pines and several road specialits shops on the periphery like Langdale lightweights.

I think Somewhere near the good rding sights in Derbyhsire is the best bet.

I have to agree, I don't think the promotion of drink culture in relation to a sport/bike culture is a necesary thing.

Fair enough if it's the odd refernce along side that of other parts of journo's life eg kids, DIY, family, finances etc or anything else that has a RELEVANT point. But I don't like the idea of giving the impresion that you must act a certain way if you're a member of a sporting subculture.

STW is clearly aimed at those of an older age bracket who have gone beyond sudden trends and are happy with themselves and their chosen style of riding and therefore probably has less of a responsibility re' setting a good exampe as we're all grown ups. MBUK on the other hand is clearly aimed at the younger market

I'm sure my mates and I weren't alone in desperately apeing the antics/bike set up/phrases of the big boys in MBUK when we were impresionable Yoofs keen to have an identity and I think this is an important thing for an editor to bear in mind.

Jordie is right.
Seal skins have a design flaw in that they are waterproof all the way up to the nice blue line.

This line is just wool and when this gets wet it sucks all the water down into the toe via capilary action.

I was 20 miles into the Robin Hood ride last year when I felt all the water in my now soaked tights (it rained all the way there and back)suddenly get sucked into my toes like a straw, cue numb feet for the remainder of the ride.

I got a faulty meter fitted by our water provider, every time something with a big electricty draw was switched on (like a kettle) it bumped up the meter.

It was only when I receved another bill for my old flat after I'd moved out having thought I'd cleared it that I phoned up to query it. I was told that it was the final bil and the previous "final bill" had been the last period not until the day I moved out.

A helpfull water co employee probably talked himself out of a job next.

I called to query the bill after he had given the above statement he casualy asked if I'd lived at the flat on my own to which I said yes and he commented that the meter might be wrong as I appeared to be filling an olympic swimming pool each day from my meter.

Still took three months and two missed appointments to get it sorted not to mention my having to get access to my old flat again.

(awkward foot shuffling and embarased look) I stripped huge elephant ears of artex off the walls of an old venue I used to run to turn it into a club using a flooring chisel and a mallet, should I have been dressed up like a nuclear engineer?

AND I got my mates to help too.

Shiiit 😯

Reminds me of that Mooby Chef who boasted of running cyclists off the road in the press.

Once upon a time an EDITOR would have EDITED the article to avoid crap like that. These days the amount of shocking typos and poor grammar betray a slightly different story in a lot of the magazine press.

(STW excepted of course 😉 )

Overzelous H&S?
there'l be hazard tape on all low branches soon too 😀

This year is unseasonably warm, but Aviemore and further West in the Highlands can suddenly snap to type easily and go from mild to V cold. Best take some cold weather gear with you and leave it in the car/hostel if you don't need it.

I'm racing my dog team in the sled dog races there in january, it'll be very snowy then – or at least it'd better be or else the dogs will have their work cut out!

Clubber- I'm not a qualified engineer so no I'm no more sure than anyone else with a modicum of experience.

My comments come from from advice/information shared with me by a tool maker/engineer friend and my LBS.

I'm happy to be proved wrong. 😳

They are extremely strong being made out of one piece as opposed to several forged bits. They will therefore bend under stress as opposed to snap and can withstand massive amounts of torque.

IMO If you are a gorilla and capable of exerting enough lateral torque to rip the trunk of a tree in half then you need one, otherwise nice bling but overkill .

I worked in a second hand/collectors record store for two years. If you sell in bulk to a shop they will buy at wholesale- one third of the price they intend to sell them for.
In the cacse of bulk non collectable records you are looking at a unit price of approx between £1 and £3 a unit.

If it is dance music it will be worthless as there is no market for second hand dance 12 inches etc unless they are "classics".

If you have the time Ebay is more profitable as you are going to the market direct and selling at retail instead. When my mate wound up his shop and spent the last three months selling all over the world via ebay instead he made a mint.

There will always be brands that I shy away from due to irrational adverse associations.

I find brands which have huge budget ranges or associations hard to take seriously, my memories of loads of kids at my school with £200 giant ATBs in the 90s makes it hard for me to take Giant seriously or lust after.

Bit of Top gear esque snobbery really like when Vauxhall try and make sports cars and Jezza et al take the piss.

SSC fit the bill perfectly, I've had my fingers burnt buying some kit from there despite damning reviews and then finding that the reviews were spot on. But I still get sucked in by the odd deal on the website.

I rode normal SPDs for eighteen months but found myself using my heel to bash down without clipping in on one pedal over sections where I needed one free foot frequently, I swapped to platform SPDs and I get a better area to ballance on without clipping in likewise if I can't get clipped in properly and I haven't got time to faff around like on a rocky downhill I've still got a stable platform to pedal and ballence on whilst sliding about for second or two to get secure.

As for getting the look?- WTF! pedal are pedals , if I want platforms I'll get some, it just happens that this suits me best as a perfect halfway house. I'd happily use white plastic oval pedals off a halfords kids bike if I found it was best for me. Surely people aren't that fashion concious are they?

That has made me smile through a right crappy cold at work.

Thanks. 😀

My wife used to live in Oz where pretty much everthing in Nature wants to kill you. She goes mental over spiders, I didn't understand till she showed me one of her old home videos from when she was little.
A spider the size of my hand scaled the outside wall of her house to head height and then leaps out and catches a bird swooping in to land on the lawn.

Cool, that's got me feeling a lot more confident. I was feeling a little crest fallen at having to "downgrade" my nice full XT set up to a LX or SLX whatever it's called. That said though, nothing could be worse than those awfull flappy shifters.

Skidding to a break assisted halt and then playing guess which gear you're in now is never a great way to pass the time on a ride especially when your screaming down a rocky hillside.

I race Alaskan Malamute sled dogs along side of MTBing and have experience of rehoming poorly trained/ aggresive dogs as well as having done work for the dog charities, my day job is in law enforcment too so I can answer a few queries here.

Stungun- Don't even think about it, classed as a fire arm and illeagal.
Ditto Mace/Pepper spray or anything intentionally made and/or carried for the same purpose.

Amonia- yes the hormone affect mentioned earlier will case a dog to back off, but I have had a very good result from a water pistol filled with lemon juice & a bit of water- squirt this in/at the open mouth and they stop dead- all the saliva disolves in their mouth and has a simlar affect as being kicked in the nuts mid coitas- takes away all performance and desire.

A sudden shot of any cold liquid will sober or stun most animals enough for a get away though.

There are holds that prompt a dog to back down. It regresses the dog to it's puppy stage as it mimicks the mothers way of controlling them but I wouldn't recomend trying this if you don't know what you're doing.

Best way to passify a dog is to turn sideways, lower your eyes bellow that of the dog and look up at it- this is dog talk for "OK You're the boss"

If a dog is biting on you or something you need back like a bag or bike put your hand over the top of the snout and push it's lips under it's teeth, it will realease it's jaws as it will be biting itself.

If you REALLY need to fight a dog off or else it will KILL you, push (from below) or pull (from above/behind) the dogs front legs apart, this will kill the dog dead due to lacerated internal organs and disslocated legs.

yep Genesis is there too- I didn't give the Gen' a second thought, is it worth a look?

Crickey things are soo complicated these days. I agree take them down having explained to your ex the situation so she doesn't think you're erasing your past or anything nutso like that.

There will come a time where she will have a new beau too and likely as not he'll not want to see them either. It's not like the good times didn't happen but an online tribute to them is a little daunting for any new flame.

My old Mum used to have pics arund her house of me with my ex, but when we split up they all went in a box including my sister's wedding pics although she did hilariously offer to get the wedding pics cropped so my ex was chopped off the end!?!?

I'm suprised to see so many people with exactley the same system as me & Mrs PM re'pocket money.

I have to confess I found it a little hard to adjust to at first as I used to have a cheap flat and after bills about £300 a month to spend on myself (big dinners every lunch etc) and now it's less than half that once we conbined and got a mortgauge. But on the upside I have all my bills paid and a lovely house instead of a pokey flat.

I got a quid for every year of my age given to me on a monthly basis to budget with until I was sixteen and at collgege thirty miles away whereupon I got £50 a month to budget on- buy clothes, lunches etc.

Alowing for inflation maybe £2.50 for every year of age paid monthly?

To be honest I still use the budgeting it taught me now with all my monthly DD's coming out on the same day and a big online food shop being paid for having built it up over the previous month which has me living off £150 a month for any other expeindture such as dinners at work or bike bits.

I like a quick training type run on my own after work somewhere where I could walk back if I needed to or would be found if I was in the bushes with my helmet/head split open

I have had too many scares/scars to risk riding somewhere where I'm totally alone as a mechanical failure or unconsciousness may leave me stranded or seriously in danger.

Normally I ride in a pair, I don't like big groups- too much democracy in where we go and you're always waiting for someone- usually me.

Bizarely the right of everyman to collect windfallen wood as enshrined by Magna Carta was abandoned recently, so yeah- you'll have to ask.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3264458/Forestry-Commission-scraps-Magna-Carta-right-to-collect-woods-from-forests.html

Yeah, I'd appreciate your mate's details for some advice.

mpjones79@hotmail.com

Thanks for your help.

Re Hippy, sorry I should have said Dreadlocked Freeloader, I've no probelm with those who spread the love and try to live in an idealistic society of mutual respect, good luck to them.

This guy was just an idiot stoner who begged for food all evening and then tried to light a fire using fence posts and green wood before trying to get people to give him a lift home the next day as he hadn't realised that the busses might not run frequently in the country on a sunday… oh and he didn't actually have a tent either he expected strangers to share the love and let him sleep in theirs with them.

I think the wild swimming comments were the icing on the cake or the thin end of the wedge

Thanks, I'll get looking for a mig set up. I've a pile of old steel ATBs as donors.
I'll try and get some evening classes on welding to get some practise I haven't done any major metal work since school fifteen years ago but can't wait to see some faces when I roll up to the start.

I got cornered by a hippy at a camping site recently who tried to tell me all about how they really wanted to try "this wild swimming, man" and how it was " really unconventional because it's like in rivers and stuff"

I’m still struggling to separate and establish whether my rage came from their attitude, the fact they were an unwashed sponger who turned up at the camp and then went from tent to tent asking for “a bit of food” or just the bizarre sheep like buying into a repackaging of swimming.

I might try wild walking next week, it’s like walking but you do it through puddles and sometimes it rains…..

FFS!