Damn, you lucky bugger.

Does anyone sell tin foil cycle helmet covers?

Oh and a magazine that you check to see if anyone you know has been struck off!

Ah, like the Nursing and Midwifery Council ’Hearings and Outcomes’[/url] page. Often makes for interesting reading.

One of the advantages of living in a private, i.e. un-adopted, road was we never had Google Street View.

Some private/unadopted roads do appear on Google Street View.

Moonlander

Still chomping on cheese twists in Peaslake?

Not so bad, switched one blue uniform for another. Believe it or not the NMC let’s me give drugs to people.

ThePrawn?

It’s been a while.

I too have little belief in NHS trust indemnity schemes, which is why I’m a member of Unison (rather than the Royal College of Nurses).

The RCN stopped providing personal indemnity coverage as part of their benefits package (although they didn’t drop membership fees to match the reduced benefits), so like many nurses I jumped ship to a union that does provide coverage.

Left LCL injury, caused by an opposition player clipping me during an ice hockey game.

The guy was thrown from the game, whereas I’ve been off the ice since August. Not a fair swap but all part of the game.

Hoping to get the all-clear to get back in my skates next week.

Surely the ultimate is midget hookers with silver trays of toot balanced on their heads?

Mcmoonter – Now you’re talking. That’ll be insane to drive.

Our Nursing & Midwifery Council fees are £100 per year, rising to £120 next April. If you don’t pay you can’t practice, full stop.

There are few (if any) perks for registrants. The NMC is predominately a judge, jury and potential executioner that we have to pay for, rather than the general public who it ‘protects’.

They’ve a nice HQ in the middle of London and a few regional offices in the not so cheap parts of other cities, not that we get a chance to see/use them (unless we’re in trouble).

4 billion years? What my pension will be worth then, is more of a worry.

If the Tories get their way, as a nurse, I may not have retired by then!

Soma Rich – Thats the one.

It also works with ‘Rivendell’ as the start point.

There was something a while back about walking to Mordor, Holland. At the beginning, it said something like, “Be careful, one does not simply walk to Mordor”…but I can’t repeat it.

In Google Maps.

1) Select ‘walking’.
2) Field A – ‘The Shire’.
3) Field B – ‘Mordor’.
4) Get directions.

Japan to New York = Kayak 6,423kms across the Pacific Ocean (Step 23)

or

Take your pick, it’ll be useful for digging people out of the rubble.

(Ithankyou)

……she wasn’t worth £600 worth of forks!

Surely knocking boots with an actual female who is interested in mountain bikes is worth something, no matter how brief?

Hmmm, depends how much you like the warranty.

althepal – Emailed you.

IM – I’m not a regular reader, as anyone who has seen my dress sense (shorts and ice hockey jerseys mainly) will probably attest to. I once flicked through a copy whilst waiting in the doctors though and, well its why that was my one and only experience of said magazine.

It doesn’t stink (a common problem with buying second-hand body armour) and has a few fairly insignificant scratches on the elbow pads (probably from leaning on the bar post-ride). It hasn’t seen a hard life by any stretch of the imagination.

Link to photos is on here.

This is like GQ, turned up to eleven.

UK based but so trendy they use the term ‘fall’ instead of ‘autumn’.

I have a 661 Pressure Suit in medium (which I’m selling, strangely enough) and I’m 5’11” with a 42″ chest and it fits me just fine.

I tied a small and although, as you say, 661 products seem to come up large it just felt too short on the body and the back protector didn’t feel as if it came down far enough.

Medium should be fine for you.

Enough about you,what’s Sooty up to now……..

Spends most of his time in my daughter’s room now. Bloody user, he has found someone else….

I read GCHQ – it’s a high-level luggage and bondage mag

Ooooo, you’re going straight to hell for that one. 😆

Keep an eye out for him.

Jeez- that’s a PROPER break.

Knackered my back messing about on dinky bikes at a BMX track (don’t give the triple ‘one more go’ is my advice). I was unable to walk for three months, then couldn’t walk unaided for a further four months and didn’t start rehab proper until after this.

My work were, understandably, less than impressed. When I got back to work it was made clear that if I injured myself again MTBing that it would likely lead to dismissal (though not in such direct terms) and as if to fire it home, I was ‘promoted’ to running the night shift, which left me too knackered to do much riding anyhow.

I ended up quitting, went back into full-time eduction in order to prepare me for going to university to do a nursing course (which I am currently doing) and during that time got back into playing ice hockey, so MTBing sort of slipped my mind.

I take it you went straight to pub afterwards to toast your return

I popped into the Trent Navigation and had a pint of Thieving Rogue, brewed just next door by Magpie Brewery. Apparently it is isotonic….

do you know hemlock at all? there some fun stuff to build your confidence back up if you want some showing around

Opposite side of the road from Hemlock Stone/Bramcote Park? I might take you up on a meet if you fancy riding up there sometime.

I owned an early version of one of these many moons ago.

Loyalty to my Michigan roots over-ruled my usual “give it a test ride first” head and I brought one, untried. Silly mistake to make, just didn’t feel right at all.

I don’t have any photos I can post unfortunately. I have some 35mm shots of it but don’t have a scanner at the moment.

Visitors will be banned from bringing their own alcohol to the venues.

Of course a bottle of juice/mixer with spirits poured in them would look much like other bottles of juice/mixer without spirits in them in a cool bag.

It seems slightly more expensive than sporting events but it’s not surprising.

Slightly more!

I went to Trent Bridge to watch the test cricket on Sunday. A pint of beer (proper beer, not fizzy training water) was between £3.10 and £3.40 a pint.

Perhaps beer is being priced high at the Olympics because they actually don’t want people to get leathered. Serve beer, because then it brings in a sponsor, but keep the prices high and you don’t have to spend so much policing the numpties who can’t handle their beer.

splashgordon – I love that site.

This is quite odd.

Looks uncomfortable.

So Napoleon only wanted to be different? Or was a response to the change in sword style or liklihood of ambush from the side?

A bit of all of the above probably.

Eh? Surely it makes it EASIER to attack you if you are on my right? If you are on my left I’d have to draw and then spin around..?

The traditional style of swordplay in England when the idea of travelling on the left arose called for the first attack after the sword is drawn to travel cross body from high right to low left. This is mainly as a result of the heft of swords (two-handed greatswords) of that period and the reliance upon gravity to assist in initial blows. We’re not talking dainty swordsmanship here, rather good old lumps of English bludgeoning steel.

In addition to greatswords, knightly (or arming) swords (with a small shield known as a buckler) were also in use and were often carried when travelling dismounted. As the buckler was the primary means of defence (knightly swords being single-handed weapons) and was also carried in the left hand, by leaving the right side ‘open’ to passers-by they were displaying trust in fellow travellers. Anyone not displaying such trust in return would, as previously mentioned, be considered potentially hostile.

Just watching Alien now as an appetiser…

“We ain’t outta here in ten minutes, we won’t need no rocket to fly through space.”

Not sure, wasn’t it Napoleon who set that precedent over here? Something to do with being ambushed?

Think you may be confusing the historic reasoning behind why in the UK we travel on the left.

In days of yore a knight/gentleman always carried his sword on his left and drew with his right, this makes it awkward to attack someone who is on your right. Therefore to show they had no ill intent when a strangers approached to pass each other on a path/trail etc they would pass right shoulder to right shoulder.

If, on the other hand, someone approached to pass by your left shoulder it could be assumed they may have nefarious intention and you would be in a better position to defend yourself.

Left-handed folk were, and still are, the spawn of Satan of course and aren’t considered at all.