I cycle 5 miles each way. It’s loads quicker than the bus, slightly quicker than the car (parking is very expensive).
I don’t especially enjoy my commute if I’m being honest, but the time/health/cost benefits are what make it worthwhile. If I didn’t cycle I’d probably get a 125cc Scooter/motorbike to commute on.

Bike wise I found the year-round biking just destroyed the drivetrain and brakes. I tend to max out the C2W allowance (often not for commuting 🙊) but my latest bike is a £1k C2W Gazelle Cityzen, bought because it’s practical and virtually maintenance-free (belt drive, 8 speed hub, hydraulic discs, rack, chain guard etc. etc.). I don’t like it though. But it is practical (and zero maintenance since October other than pumping up the tyres)

Erm ..
Seiko 5 automatic
Seiko Prospex automatic
Rohan quartz
G-Shock solar/wave ceptor
Garmin Forerunner

So 5, but non are expensive. All get worn bar the Garmin. Plus a Mi Band 2, but I don’t class that as a watch and wear that all the time on my other wrist.

It’s clear the sky is the limit on cost.
Thinking about it I’d rather get a starter kit and then worry about upgrading things later if I become more serious.
I can upgrade my version of Cubase LE to Elements for £42.

A starter interface, microphone can be had for £60 £60 or £80 £80
Add in ancillaries (mic stand/pop filter etc.) and I’m over budget but good to (I think?)

I’m only 15 minutes from the big Gear4music showroom so I might pop there for a good look. Budget is flexible if spending a bit more gets something that is easier/better/more versatile. I might look at night classes too. The last time I recorded anything was at school for my GCSE music compositions, I think things have probably moved on since then!

next question. Which free auto-tune software 😂

Yeah, the budget thing is a difficult. Spend too much money, lose interest and find it’s wasted. Or buy cheap, get into it and then spend even more money a short time later…🤔

Guitar wise, I have an electric and an acoustic. Potentially I’d look at using both in recording, but initially just the acoustic via a mic (same mic as the vocal).

I want to use my old laptop, which is tired (it’s an i5 with 8gb RAM – but it’s pretty slow at times, probably due to its age). So the software needs to not be processor heavy.

I don’t intending gigging etc. so a USB mic would be ok I assume (assume this negates the need for an interface between the laptop and mic?). I don’t know at what point the law of diminishing returns kicks in. E.g. would a £50 Marantz USB sound dreadful? Or passable? That SM57 gets great reviews but would it actually make my distinctly average (at best!) voice sound any better? 🙉

Also you’re not comparing like for like, a £3k Honda is competing against that £12k BMW. A £4k electric bike is going to be more like the <£1k unknown brand mopeds from China.

Say what now???!!! 😂 A £3k Honda is competing against a £12k BMW… Er, nope 🤦.
£3k is less than many people spend on bicycles. You’re talking commuter fodder which is cheaper to buy/run than buying car parking or a bus/tube season ticket for a couple of years. I’m not saying the £4k electric bike linked up the is actually any good, or more/less reliable/better etc. I’m just saying if someone has £3-4k to spend and they want the option of something that will do around 60mph and be either electric or petrol, then that’s a choice they can now make.

It’s not really a relevant comparison to compare a second hand petrol scooter to a brand new electric one though. You could say that about a Tesla and a 15 year old Focus… A better comparison would be say a new PCX 125 @£3kish Vs that electric one @£4k. Servicing and other running costs should be far cheaper on the electric one. No idea on insurance/residuals/reliability though. Just saying…

The BMW scooter looks ace but not cheap. I looked at other eScooters and nothing ticks the right boxes at the moment. The little Yamaha had a range of 14 miles. Range not speed is what a scooter needs.

That depends how far your want to go (not being flippant btw). Agree that a 14 mile range is extremely low, maybe it would be ok for a 10 miles/day commute assuming it was garaged/charged each night (I wouldn’t though). My 5 mile each way cycle commute has a section of 40mph road in it, no way I’d want to ride something with an engine/motor that couldn’t do the speed limit of the roads of want to use it on (I’ve seen a few near misses with people overtaking mopeds – probably no worse than cycling but…)

I am quite seriously thinking about getting an electric scooter thins summer – £1,200 to buy, 30mph top speed, 70km to a charge, no “road tax”, nothing to really fail on a MOT and supposedly around 1p/mile motoring

mopedy fun

That does seem cheap, not sure I’d be happy with a 30mph limit though. The 75mph one that can be ridden on a CBT would be tempting if only it had bigger wheels (like a PCX) and didn’t cost so much.

Logged on to post something trivial about music and saw this sticky thread. Such sad news. Never met him but read followed his posts and was always amazed by his candour, bravery and determination to carry on fighting. Nothing to add, but puts my own current issues into context. RIP.

Don’t expect that when you replace your washing machine. The extra efficiency of modern machines seems to have come from increased time soaking vs being agitated. The ‘standard’ 40C cotton wash on our new machine in the best part of 3 hours. I think even the ‘short’ synthetic wash is over 90 minutes.

Our Bosch washing machine is 2:40, but it has a ‘speed perfect’ button which knocks it down to 60min. Eco takes 3hrs+

I have a sensing condensing one. I’ll put stuff on a timer so it helps warm the house a bit when people are about. It’s a Hotpoint one that was cheap warranty replacement for those ones that burned people’s houses down 😬. Hotpoint are crap but the original one was cheap. The sensing works ok on cotton (high)/mixed (medium) setting but is useless on the synthetic setting. I wouldn’t buy another – I’ve had a fault code that I’ve managed to fix because the sensor for the heating element gets covered in fluff/lint. I had to take the back off it and the amount of fluff around the heating element was a real worry! (especially as it’s a replacement for one that was a known fire risk!). I won’t put it on when there’s no one at home.

I’m not sure how people manage without tumble dryers in winter, especially people with kids.

I’ll go heat pump next time, though not being able to dry a full load in about hour will be a shame (especially as that’s the same time it takes for the washing machine)

What is that Triumph up there with the weird exhausts? I can decide if I like it, or I really like it.

Alan Rickman (RIP 😔)

Whoa! that WAG’s Bentley in truly hideous. TBF, footballers get crazy money, they’re young, under a lot of scrutiny and working/living in a very laddish/materialistic environment. It’s hardly surprising there’s an element of one-upmanship and they choose to spaff a ton of money on cars. That one Binners posted is gopping though 😂

I get sleep paralysis fairly often, and as above feel that I am suffocating, it is absolutely **** horrible. I am aware that I am asleep, unable to breath and trying to wake myself up, but am unable to.

^That is a really accurate description IME. I count myself lucky I’ve only had it a few times, it’s really unnerving. Getting it regularly must be really shit 😐

I’ve had sleep paralysis a couple of time (but not for a few years). It can be quite scary when you’re just laying there, unable to move. Last time I couldn’t snap out of it just had to go back to sleep (easier said than done!).

I bought a bargain Giant 29er full suss off them a few years ago. No complaints. I’d use them again

Bank it. Put it in a high-interest account. If they ask for it back in 6 months time you’ll have made 27p, which will buy you… erm…
I’d bank it and not spend it (for a while at least)

I’m burning some dried hardwood logs on my 5kw stove right now. The logs are really big/chunky and with this batch I find I need to run it fully open unless it’s really hot (I’ve run out of soft wood to supplement it). It’s f….. Freezing here so that’s not such a problem.

I do do same, open all the vents to maximum and leave it to burn out fully/quickly. The other thing is not to put a log on it <30 min before you’re about to go to bed (obviously)

Typo surely?😲
£150? (Which still seems steep)
EDIT: my offer of £7.49 was declined, ah well, it wouldn’t fit me anyway.

Sounds like a mink. I saw an otter just before Christmas when walking the dog, it was huge! It climbed out of the water and its body just kept coming – I was shocked how big it was (I though they were the same size as stoats! 🤦)

Linky

https://www.ford.co.uk/shop/specialist-sales/fleet/phev
PHEV Van anyone?

I bought some Berghaus Deluge after them being recommend on here. I was between sizes but went up as I’ll mainly use them for commuting (cycling) and thought the extra mobility might help. Seem good so far.

My previous was work paid 3% and matched up to additional 4%, I did the minimum term on that and just made into the final salary/retire at 60 pension before they stopped it. My contributions rocketed as a result but still worth it (as long as I see out the next 20 odd years ok and they don’t stop it 😁)

Technically public sector so was going to say no chance of them going bust, but with the ‘B’ word, who knows?

The OP’s deal seems really good

He’s morphed into James Arthur, Benjamin Button stylee

My Amazon account got hacked last year, my address was changed to a flat in New York and somebody changed the payment method to a (probably stolen) credit card. I changed it back before there were any orders and reported it.
I’ve now got 2 stage verification on my account so the only way to log in is to also have access to my mobile for the code they text through (you can nominate ‘safe’ devices so it’s not actually a PITA to do). I’ve got the same thing on PayPal as a precaution after my OH’s PayPal account was hacked

In summary, get the two stage verification set up as Amazon seems extremely lax when it comes to security (‘one click’ purchase anyone?)

Yep, I’ve done that a fair few times (generally only on work nights out).

Hard Magic – Larry Correia

Got on an Audible deal of the day and subsequently used credits for the other two.

Wait! You can buy an electric egg boiler??? <Heads off to Google>

EDIT: was going to ask about small ones (not going to eat 8 boiled eggs in one sitting!), but that one two posts up looks promising

Or if switching on too many luxuries, such as lights sees the Voltmeter dive through the floor. Causing a petrol car to run out of electricity.

Then it’s new battery and/or alternator time

What if the poster has a Zoe or a Tesla ?

He doesn’t, or he wouldn’t have said:

Haha, have got to admit the fuel consumption thing did cross my mind, but only in a theoretical sense, I definitely notice the engine note changing when I run AC etc.

Saves fuel to run sidelights only on my car.

Ok, sounds likel it’s time for a quick fag packet calc. Sidelights  are 5w. Dipped headlight 55w. So 100w extra for two.

The efficiency of an engine in converting fuel to electricity via the alternator is around 20% (so says Google). So that 100w extra output needs 500w extra input.

A litre of petrol has around 34.5MJ of energy in it. the lights need 500 J/s. So a litre of fuel would in theory power the extra lights for 69,000 seconds. Or 19 hours ish. Assume fuel is £1.30/l. That’s around 7p an hour saved in fuel if you drive round with side lights instead of dipped. Don’t spend it all at once!

*These numbers might not be right 😁

It’s legal but people will think you’ve forgotten to put your lights on/being a numpty. It’s a stupid rule IMHO, if it’s dark just put your (proper) lights on. The other problem with sidelights is that they generally illuminate the dash, so some people then venture on to faster roads whilst still only having crappy side lights on and not realising…

Automatic headlights – it’s the way forward 😉

New phone, though badged as ‘Black Friday’ was on sale over a week earlier. £200 for a Moto Z2 Force and a free pair of gawdy headphones. Bargain.  Just need the Moto Mod power pack to come back into stock on Amazon to compensate for the meagre battery.

The rest of Black Friday was meh.

There are some REALLY good Submariner homages out there if you’re that way inclined. Bar the ROLEX branding, the casual observer would not tell….

$119…..

I don’t really want a Submarine homage as such (I don’t actually like the date bubble on the Rolex). I just really like the look of the Longines, which compared to other Swiss brands is pretty ‘cheap’ (yes, it’s all relative)

Is that G Shock a limited edition? If you stop wearing it and put it in its box will it be worth anything in a few years? (I’ve literally no idea) – just wondering if you could justify it as an ‘investment’ and just buy the Garmin😬

I’m quite restrained as none of mine are expensive and I’ve recently got rid of a few. I could easily have another 5 watches and still want more though…

Prospex automatic- either black canvas or brown leather strap – it’s amazing how different the watch looks with a different strap. General wear but reasonably smart. Quite chunky.

Seiko 5 – General wear. Feels/looks tiny.

Rohan quartz analogue – bit more ‘dressy’, don’t wear often.

Garmin Forerunner – don’t really use now due to bulk and time taken to fix a signal

G-Shock – solar powered, radio controlled. Unbreakable.

… And an activity tracker/HRM thing on my other wrist.

I really want a Longines Hydroconquest (aka poor man’s Submariner) – one day…

EDIT: This one