Does this mean we’re not the most hated club in Manchester?

No. Sorry.

Is your nick-name Tyres? Are you a 24hr cycle courier? If the answer to either of these questions is no, then DON’T GO THERE

Those light blues / Robinsons – I live 200yds from their shop in Cambridge and walk past those bikes in the window display every day. They just look ‘right’ for an commuter / winter road bike. Even the orange one (there’s also a nice grey version). I just think they’re over-cooking it on the price for that spec compared to what else is available. Steel fork as well. They are definitely on the right track though so I wish them every success.

Series 1 of Mighty Boosh is on there at the moment – worth a go. Also first series of Uncle – very good. Not on iPlayer right now, but look out for it when it comes back – People Just do Nothing. So so good. One of the best things I’ve seen in a long time. Otherwise, as has been mentioned, get yourself over to All 4 for Toast of London (series 1 and 2 v good – not watched 3 yet), Fresh Meat, Catastrophe (loses its magic in series 2) and of course Peep Show (bit marmite)

Done a couple of night road rides on unlit Cambridgeshire lanes with my Smart 700 lumen now. £30 off Amazon I think. Rarely needed to put it on full power – most of the time lowest setting is fine. Some might say its a little floody for road use but not been flashed yet, and noticed cars switching down from full beam before I get round the corner.

That my friend is an (over-filled) chip muffin. Not seeing a lot of butter either. Assuming the brown sauce is out of shot?

That is a proper bargain at £520. I have the 26″ 2013 which is the same apart from wheel size and I thought that was good value at £600 18 months ago. It’s a great bike in 26″ flavour. I most definitely would! Be aware QC ain’t great so you might need to just face bb, headtube etc before building. This is just from CRC reviews – mine was fine.

Sometimes when I catch myself asking ‘whats the narrative around this?’ at work I have to take myself in to a dark room and set about my head with a blunt object.

‘Inhale’ as in ‘He was so hungry he just inhaled a banana’

‘Banter’ as in ‘just having a wee bit of banter bruv’

‘Chapeau!’ – Eurggh. Ironic or not, makes me cringe every time.

I’ve got a 1:100k of Manchester (N-30-92) hanging in our downstairs loo in Cambridge – my Dad bought it very early 90’s I think, and I kept it as it covers where I was born and raised. He was a proper map geek – guessing these things were pretty hard to come by back then.

?????? ????? Footflaps – we must have met at those dinner parties 😉

I was in hospital for a week a couple of weeks ago (excruiating abdominal pain turned out to be twisted bowel) and they could extend the ends of the beds out by a good 6 inches or so – worth checking.

Got a morphine button? Press it every time it lights up and the hours will fly by 🙂

I actually enjoyed letting go of everything – stepping off the merry go round of life for a while. Sleeping, reading, sleeping, netflix / iplayer (managed to cadge a wifi password), sleeping, chatting to the old codgers about their war stories, and so on.

Beautiful in Cambridge. Alas recovering from surgery 10 days ago. Been beautiful weather most of that time. Beginning to go slightly mad. Might try a gentle spin later in the week.

Well done mate – a mighty achievement. 200 miles next time, right?

Er seriously? DOCTOR, ASAP! At the least call 111 or whatever the NHS direct type thing is. Then feel free to discuss here.

A cautionary tale from a man in a hospital bed as he types – Thought I just had severe food poisoning Tuesday night. Saw doc Weds am who went along with my self-diagnosis, but checked my records and saw i had a bowel op when i was 1. packed me off to A&E for xray ‘just in case’. Turns out I had a twisted bowel as a complication of previous op – same day emergency surgery means I don’t have to poop in a bag for the rest of my life. Just saying like…

Not directly answering your question but last time I was up there I paid a tenner to park the car for a couple of nights in the campsite up near the old dungeon ghyll. We told them we were heading off to another campsite.

Fast cat from Portsmouth Harbour to Ryde. Walk on with your bike and put it in the bike racks at the back. 15 min journey. No bother whatsoever. Careful riding down ryde pier at the other end though – always think I’m going to lose a wheel in the gaps!

Another vote for both Rave and their Colombian Suarez. Just put an order in yesterday for a big bag of beans, and going to try their brazilian medium roast as well. Well priced too.

Some good recommendations here – thanks folks. But seeds? Really? In a nut thread? Jeez, you guys… And twicewithchips – lets not even go there. Think my head might explode.

Pistachio – Tracker, I’m with you on the self-regulating nature of this fine nut, but for me thats a negative. Think of your fingernails.
Hazelnut – nope, bland and too dry. I consider this a ‘filler’ nut. Given up buying mixed nuts as they tend to be a bag of hazelnuts with few token almonds thrown in.
Brazil – now we’re talking. These are definitely on the list. Best coated in yoghurt flavouring but also works well plain. However, a bad brazil is a real turn off. My other half claims there is no such thing as ‘off’ brazils but I maintain its a common experience.
Pecan – Good, but needs maple syrup in the vicinity to work AFAIC
Almond – Think this might be the one actually. Tasty. Think this will be my next bag.

As an aside, anyone still crack their own nuts these days? Tried it the other day – OK, you get a fresher nut experience, but blimey, what a faff.

Yep, I use the toe covers. They’re cheap (<£10) and make a big difference this time of year IMO

Thank you very much for your donation of £25.00 to the British Red Cross – Nepal Earthquake Appeal Your payment reference is: 9N3633815E0041438

Props to Rockape63 for getting this one going. I have some incredible memories of the country and its people.

Does this help?

Great frames btw

What worked for me – Glute (that pretzel one above), hamstring and hip flexor stretches, and front and side planks. This seemed to address the cause of the problem. Foam rolling helped a bit with the symptoms but didn’t sort out the underlying cause.

Took me about 6 weeks to be symptom free but probably half that time wasted on doing the wrong things – most of the time that was advice picked up from internet forums 😉

I’m there for a conference next week and that In de Wildeman bar is perfectly en route between my hotel and the venue. It would be rude not to take up the recommendation from such esteemed forumites – Proost!

Other recommendations – just wander the canals, they’re real pretty, especially around the Westerkirk area. Vondelpark is good for a wander, and the area around Sarphatipark is a nice neighbourhood to just hang out in. Don’t go in to a coffee shop and get the most mental stuff they’ve got – likely to wipe out your day. Go mellow is my advice 🙂 . Another observation – the locals are genuinely really nice!

Those supermarket bakery cookies you get 5 in a pack. I never start off intending to cane the lot, but I invariably do.

OK, most of Coldplays output is bland, middle of the road, and I won’t shed a tear if they cease to be, but I’d rather be subjected to their whinnying than 95% of the offensive garbage I hear on Radio 1.

Oh, and when they do split, don’t expect them all to gracefully retire in to the background – the planet might have to endure 4 x ex-coldplay solo projects! Think of the kiddies 😐

Nice people in being nice shocker 😉

Wasn’t expecting it to be as formulaic as it was after all the positive reviews I’d heard. Having said that, it was still pretty compelling.

I took a nukeproof mega am out on a demo, i loved it’s stability etc on the downs, but buying one would mean hating every climb i came across. I’d be gutted if that was my experience with the heckler

I recently replaced a 2008 heckler with a mega TR. The mega climbs (and descends) a hell of a lot better than the heckler ever did. Same wheels and forks. Just saying.

Anyone use a Durano S dual compound?
Are they any good?

I do. Fantastic wet weather (and dry) tyre. Noticeably better grip than the GP4000s I also have, and in a different league to cheapo rubinos I had before that.

Got a 2nd gen Moto G (5″ screen) for £150 when I needed a new phone urgently last weekend. Comes with Kit Kat and will upgrade to lollipop in the not too distant. Expandable memory and dual SIM, which works great for me – got work SIM in there as well so all my data goes on that and means my personal SIM can be a cheapo giff gaff. Might not be quite up there in terms of specs as the N5, but I wouldn’t notice. Camera seems fine (better than my broken HTC One anyways). Sorry, what was the question?

Here’s mine.

Its a 26″ (XL) TR, and is a really really really good frame for the money (I paid £680 – might be even cheaper now). Since updated with inline post and replaced the 2×9+bash with 1×10+NarrowWide which after a few teething problems works great. Just bled the 9 yr old saint brakes and they work a treat! Next up is servicing the forks and converting to float.

Cheers folks. Looks like it will be worthwhile.

Best thing about TALAS is that it gives you a nice idea of what travel to go with when you do convert them (I went with 140)!

– didn’t think you could change travel? Conversion kit says its only 160mm…

eskay +1 (NH hotels Museum Quarter) – stayed there a few months ago. Nice neighborhood, out of the hubub of the centre but only 5-10 mins on a tram, or a nice walk. Some nice bars the other side of the canal opposite too.

No auto adjust – the 130 and 160 settings stay where they are, but they won’t go in to the lowest 100 setting (which I never used).

Yeah, like the look of that topeak one – cheers!

Rave +1. Good price for good coffee.

Got an alpkit manta. Nice powerful, adjustable beam, but not greatest build quality. Overall am happy with it and would recommend.

Use dropbox a lot and love it but don’t need anything like 1TB cloud storage. Would happily pay smaller amount for a smaller allowance.

What do they offer in terms of European roaming?

Thats a really good point actually. I recently moved to giffgaff and all fine so far. However, it looks like if I plan to use my phone abroad the charges could be very high, and unlike the other networks they don’t appear to offer any discount bundles on data or calls for going abroad in advance. EU charges aren’t too bad – 18p / min to make a call, and 19p / MB data, but if you plan to use outside EU it could very quickly get very expensive – If you make or receive a call it will be £1 / minute, and data is £5 / MB! Ouch

I bought a car there once. Took about 4 hrs. You could do that?

Thanks folks – good to get your experience. Looks like its an XL for me. Luckily even XL doesn’t look too gate-like from what I’ve seen. I have a 65mm stem at the mo but sounds like I might want to go shorter.

for the price CRC are knocking them out for at the moment it’d be rude not too really

I hear you brother 😉