Mike at dialed bikes…isn't athelete's foot a fungal infection?

Why come on here and ask what a tradesman you have already instucted should charge? Ask the tradesman before he does the job!
If you don't, you are leaving yourself wide open to being overcharged.

Tradesmen get a lot of stick, in part due customers not understanding what is involved in performing the required task(s) and not knowing what a reasonable sum is to make it worth his while. You are not only paying for his time, but his expertise. He has studied and qualified to reach a level where he can certify gas installations. Don't expect him to have made all that effort and gone to great expense for nothing!
There are other considerations; one small job in a morning prevents him doing a whole morning's work, so expect to pay half a day's money at least.

If you want cheap bills, find a friend who is qualified and who will give you mates rates!

Come back when you can remember driving a Morris Ital and thinking it was a nice car.

Don't you mean Morris Marina?

Daft rumour!

Is reading that like some sort of birth control?

What photo?

But has he now actually succumbed to the dreaded pig pox?

Oh dear!

I like a lot of jazz, but this is sxxt! Jazz is a very diverse genre, so diverse that it's stupid to label it jazz. And as all modern music is derived from it, one couls argue all modern music is jazz.

Sorry, it didn't! Very drab!

Pigface – Member

Is that real???

😆 😆 😆 😆 😆 😆 😆 😆 😆

The numpties who make up words like "jhey" or "ghey".

How queer!

'blown to smitherenes' – what the bloody hell are smitherenes? Grrrrrr that makes me real mad!

RANDOM!!

Driving style does have a lot to do with it. Twenty years ago when i was doing 50k miles/pa, my boss actually called me in to his office just to ask me how i was averaging 43mpg in the Petrol 1.9L Peugeot 405 they'd given me. I used to drive at 80mph plus on motorways ans fastish on rural A roads (60 plus). The difference between me and others is i drive smooth! Jerking gears, foot down at all times and stamping on brakes kills your fuel economy, brakes, tyres and your health.

It never ceases to amaze me how slow drivers can waste so much fuel. Their non-fluid driving style creates conjestion and generally screws up my drive. For this reason i always opt to drive when the roads are at their clearest these days.

My 2001 1.9L 130bhp Audi A6 is supposed to achieve 65mpg on a run. It can easily achieve this so long as you drive smooth. Speed doesn't seem to make a massive diiference.

The trip computer is lame. Sometimes i can get it showing in excess of 80 mpg when driving sedately, but the figures is always seem to calculate around 62~63mpg (approx. 70% long runs 30% short semi rural runs).

Can't imagine any other large estate bettering that!

Yachts are my ideal mode of transport however;
MPG = Zero
Number of people impeding your progress = zero
Numbers of speed cameras = zero
Agressive idiots = zero
Alcohol limit = unlimited
Officious rule enforcers in open waters = zero

A few nice bikes here, except that pug ugly Yamaha at the top of this thread which looks like it was inspired by the form ofa hippopotamus.

Who cares about the Ashes anyway! It's a tiny thimble full of ashes. Can't see what all the fuss is about.

Saccades – Member

bbq lighter fluid.

Erm, I don't think so!!

Garmin Edge series are the ideal bike GPS.

However, if you need a new mobile phone I can't recommend the Nokia 5800 more highly – running the free Nokia Sportstracker app. NST is simplicity personified! Upload your routes to your own account ont the NST website as well as view them on the phone. Very very easy to use and very impressive.

Also, but not in you list of must haves is the £20 Viewranger App. A swift download and you have OS mapping of your choice. Just spent 2 weeks on the Isle of Wight and found it massively helpful. I'd literally have been lost without it! 😆

The batteries last for absolutely ages (more than a day using gps). Oh and you get BBC iPlayer capability – store hours worth of tv, web browsing, Youtube and Facebook capability, a music library and FM radio – 3.5mm audio jack. Mine even runs as a torch using the camera flash LEDs.

Sorry to go off on a tangent, but all my old GPS units are now drawer bound and are collecting dust. This is since I got my phone in February.

I still highly rate the Edge series, but you just can't beat having the whole shooting match in a mobile handset.

Yeah, what is GFY?

Anyway, I don't know what the people of Lewis are moaning about (sorry, the devout Christians). 😆

Scotland had trading on a Sunday years before the rest of the UK did.

Bloody religion!

Marmite which is like licking the inside of an oven

Have you ever tried this?

Envisions Samuri licking out an oven – random!

Telemarking seems to be on the increase, though is still very exclusive. Looks very difficult to me and very tough on the knees.

How about a STW skifest? We could book a couple of large catered chalets.

One for the boarders, the other for the skiers. 😈

I did manage a two mile round trip on foot to collect the tamiflu a couple of days ago though, so I may just have a superhuman tolerance to misery.

That's funny, my mate had a script for Tamiflu, but the doctor told him they would not give it to the patient. You have to get a "flu buddy" to pick it up.

Avocado is just wrong! Yuk!

gonefishin – Member

The downsides are getting on and off lifts and it's not much fun if your group contains skiers and boarders. Buttons T-Bars and chairs, all a hassle on a board.

They really aren't that bad you know. Most boarders that complain about them haven't put the time in to learn how to do it properly. As part of one lesson I had on a board we had to use a T bar without holding on. It was "entertaining" but not that difficult.

Well my buddy of some ten years still hates T-Bars and buttons. He's a menace on chairs. Always crossing my skis and clumsy getting off chairs. He prefers to take a gondola (which I dislike becaue I don't like taking skis off and putting them back on all the time).

I find, as a skier, it's generally harder to predict where a boarder will go.

If you were to learn how to board, you'd have a much better idea of where a boarder will be going. Not having a go but I think that is down to your ignorance (i.e. lack of knowledge) of snowboarding more than anything else.

No, I have a snowboard buddy who I always ski with. His technique is advanced. He has a rhythm and a style that is totally predictable, like a competent skier. The difference with novice skiers and novice borders is that the skier's incompetence is immediately telling. Not so much so with the boarder. Or perhaps they are great boarders who don't give a stuff about anyone else on the mountain!

I am not ignorant about boarding! Whilst my experience is very limited (commencing in 1992), I do also talk to boarders. I've been doing this for at least 10 years, but I have my eyes open and observe a great deal.

I think these are mostly novices who are confident beyond their ability etc

This can apply to skiers as much as boarders.

Yes, but as I said, skiers who don't know what they are doing stick out like a sore thumb.

One thing that boarders always seem to be doing is clipping in and unclipping their bindings. I looks like a complete pain in the butt. I'm always towing my mate on the flat sections and he hates stopping on anything other than steep sections. Most of the time boarders have to sit down when they stop. Getting up on a steep slope is a lot easier.

Personally, these impracticalities when boarding and the fact that the bindings don't release puts me off. Skiing is a more flexible solution, just harder to learn and not percieved as cool as boarding. Each to their own eh!

Smee – Member

I went from never having been on skis to being confident on black runs in a matter of hours, but then I had been snowboarding and kayakin for many many years. Its all about remembering what your edges are doing and what you want them to do. Confident or overconfident? 😆

Two things here:
1) Ski run grading is a very random thing. Take Val D'Isere The main run which ends up in La Daille is graded green, but it's a challenging red over considerable sections. In Tignes there's a black run adjacent to a red run that is far easier to ski than the red as the red is always in sun and thys turns to a sheet of ice much of the time.

I am 100% certain that nobody can go from being a total beginner to confident on black runs in a matter of hours! If Smee did, it will certainly be because he hit one of those gay sections on a black run.

2)Where is the relevance of Kayaking to skiing?

Maybe it was the spirit of Noah. Perhaps he had ARC withdrawl symptoms.

Religion = stupidity

She once advised the RAC man at the motorway services that she didn't need a membership as she was (and I quote directly here) "with the Lord".

20 yards out of the car park and her car dies.

*booming Almightly voice* I may have created the heavens and the earth but i don't do ****' breakdown recovery.

LMFAO(Laugh My **** Arse Off)

The Plastic Pixie! 😀

She would be good reading children's stories coz she's so sweet.

How about one of these:

Proof of what druidh?

I ban them all!

Bedside lamps – 80w the pair (if you're old fashioned). Router a – few watts, DVD player – a few watts, TV – depends on it's size and type. LCD 20" TV – a few watts 42" plasma 400w. Hairdryer – 1500w or more. I doubt if you'll use 2k at worst. All things going, but without the hairdryer, 200-300w probably.

You can have as many extensions and sockets as you like, so long as you keep to a safe load, up to about the rating of the fuse (3KW).

Jack Nicholson in "As Good As It Gets". He's a successful author in the film and a swooning female fan asks him "How do you write women so well".

Nicholson looks at her, pauses and says "Well, I think of a man, then I take away reason and accountability", he smiles and walks away.

Awesome!

"neighbors" is American! 😀

oldgit – Member

One of our neighbors drives their kids to school every day, ok not a real problem but it's in the same road.
So I decided to measure it, less than 200 yards!
Then come hometime she will park up early to get a space right outside the gates.
I can't believe I measured it.
I really am going all Victor Meldrew.

This sounds very much like the sort of thing that happens in America! Are you in the US?

mrmo and I did stumpyjon!

You don't need any of that nonsense! Just get a Nationwide current account and a Nationwide credit card.No overseas charges, good exchange rates for any sum. Simple!

I have one of these. Only £20 in The Range last time I was there 2 weeks ago.Needs a regulator and gas.

Mine works a treat.