I have beech worktops.

No problems with staining or swelling or anything in 10 yrs – apart from a couple of marks from rusty steel / plant pots. IMO they are less damaged than laminates would be by now.. Wood holds less bacteria than plastic and anyway its not an issue. Using bactericides is a waste of time if you keep your kitchen clean and harsh chemicals will damage the wood.

Wood if you are prepared to look after them Mine get an annual scrub and reoil with occasional sanding

For me a cheery helo – can we get past seems to work. I stop if its narrow or needed. Bells spook horses I :-)

Never had an issue

Well done to all the riders. I was there supporting and everyone who went out in the small hours of the morning was a hero – driving sleet and snow. Brrr.

Fun in a sort of mad way

I have a good choice – from Halfords on an industrial estae to shops in the city centre

An alternative view is that having insurance encourages folk to sue.

As a nurse I now carry insurance as part of my union membership but until the last few years it was the policy of my union not to insure members so as not to encourage folk to sue individual nurses.

The dog in the OP had already made one attempt at getting into the neighbours house so I would think it highly probable that the need for "’if the owner knows it was likely to cause such damage or injury unrestrained’. would be met

AS for the coppers / motorcycle one. Cops not knowing the law shock – it happens all the time. No ordinary copper can be an expert on all obscure bits of law.

What a fantastic bit of flying from the pilot. To get the plane down without casualties on the ground or in the plane.

Zedsdead – dang – too late to this thread as I could have identified them all – although I wasn’t totally sure if it was a garelli or a fantic cabalero (sp)

I lusted after the garelli when I was 16. They were the coolest.

The only two bikes I have left – neither running properly :-(

The top one – anyone know what it is? The basic bike should be identifiable but what are all the non standard parts from?

Oh – and good luck to all of you

I will be up there supporting rsome racers – hopefully under a mlehworld banner

a progressive coil spring is one that is wound so that the spacings are progressivly larger. Each section / turn of it is linear – but as you compress it more and more coils bind so you have less coils active so the total effective rate goes up.

Air springs will always be progressive but depending on the ratio between the volume at the start of the stroke and the end it can be very slight progression or great.

another experiment. Take a set of old school ‘zocchi open bath forks. take all the oil out – you get an almost linear spring. The more oil you add the more progressive it becomes as you alter the ratio of the volume at the start of the stroke to the end of the stroke until you reach a ponint where you cannot get full travel as you have zero air gap left thus infiniate pressure before you get full travel.

Daffy – true – but has the singletrackworld science masters repealed boyles law?

take a syringe full of air with the nozzle blocked and try it out. the first bit of movement is easy but you will never compress it to the bottom as at zero volume you get infinite pressure.

quote the sale of goods act at them and raise an action in small claims court. The law is on your side

sobalias – it does not have to be deliberate. a dog owner is responsible for any damage the dog causes as Mildred says above. No defense. the dog causes damage the owner is liable. animals act 1971 – its there on the net if you google for it.

What a load of tosh air springs are progessive, Boyles law? half the volume double the pressure. coils springs can be either depending on how they are wound.

pcb – take your pick http://www.tuc.org.uk/tuc/unions_main.cfm
Find out if any of the others are unionised and what union they are in?

GMB / PCS / unite maybe?

a couple more weeks yet at least depending on what the injury was at a very vague guess

Join a union ( sorry but its by far the best advice)

She needs to see what is written in the company HR handbook and contract/. IIRC if you reach the end of a probationary period it is normal that you are assumed to have successfully completed probation unless your contract / hr handbook states that you have to receive confirmation to complete probation. ( it is getting more common tho that you have a clause in your contract that you have to be notified that probation has ended otherwise probation continues}

I gather you believe that she is being eased out because she is pregnant?

You do not normally have recourse to tribunals with less than a years service unless it is a case of discrimination. Being sacked for being pregnant would however count as discrimination.

I say it again – join a union. I do find it amusing that any mention of unions on here gets slagged off severly but every week there is an employment query like this. CaB / Law centres are another source of free advice or there are other solicitors or commercial advice companies.

How long is a piece of string? a couple of weeks would be my view.

Coffeking – – not meaning to be offensive or patronising – sorry if I seem that way. My experience of this is that folk hugely underestimate the amount of calories they consume. Lots of stuff gets forgotten in the caluculations. The fats used in cooking, the odd snack or drink, milk in tea, it all adds up

A few glasses of wine a week and a pint or two- thats a thousand or more calories there – a few bags of nut – ditto.

If you are not loosing weight on 1200 calories a day either you have a very odd metabolism or you are consuming more than that. Your body requires more than a thousand calories a day just to sit still and breathe.

Correct that the NHS is not always right and advice such as that is often behind the times.

I have to say I simply do not believe 1000 calories a day. A pint is a couple of hundred or more depending on type.

Most men on a thousand calories a day would be unable to function at all.

Did you really stick to 1000 calories a day? No alcohol at all?

I eat around 3000 – 4000 calories a day and am slightly overweight but not gaining at all. 5’10" and 11st 10lbs

" Ten weight-loss myths

So much is said about losing weight that it can be hard to sort truth from fiction. Here’s the truth about weight-loss myths.

1. Starving myself is the best way to lose weight
Crash diets are unlikely to result in long-term weight loss. In fact, they can sometimes lead to longer term weight gain. The main problem is that this type of diet is too hard to maintain. Your body will be low on energy, causing you to crave high-fat and high-sugar foods. When you finally give in and eat those foods, you will often eat more calories than you need, causing weight gain. "

http://www.nhs.uk/LiveWell/loseweight/Pages/Loseweighthome.aspx

"Research clearly shows that crash diets don’t work.

This is because by drastically reducing your calorie intake (crash dieting), your actually reducing the rate your body can burn calories. If your aim is to lose weight, then dramatically reducing your intake of energy (produced by food) over a short period of time is not the way to go. "
"People who crash diet tend to put weight back on quicker than those who follow a long-term healthy eating plan. This is because once you’ve stopped your crash diet your slow metabolism will not be able to process the increase in calories. These calories will be stored as fat meaning you end up putting on more weight than when you started."

http://www.nhs.uk/chq/Pages/2468.aspx?CategoryID=51&SubCategoryID=165

Coffeking – as far as I am aware that is not the consensus in the medical profession and certainly is not what I was taught.

Accepted wisdom ( which is not always right of course) is that starvation diets do more harm than good.

FBK – I think that there is some evidence it works but it is far from conclusive. studies as usual are contradictory and often badly flawed in their methodology. My position would be open minded scepticism.

As for anecdotal. I have mild osteo arthritis. Taking it in recommended dosages for six months made zero difference to me. Cod liver oil increased pain noticeably. Perhaps I didn’t believe enough?

However as there is no great evidence of harm being caused ( far less harm than Ibuprofen for example) then I shall sit on the fence and say take it if you want.

I have not got the decorators in! My list was partly serious and partly not

I really dislike the deliberate harm the Americans have done and still do – the counter examples given about Britain are also true but are mainly very old and the more recent stuff involves far fewer deaths.

Take Chile for example. Salvador Allende was democratically elected. He was deposed in a coup by American backed forces. This resulted in decades under dictatorship where tens of thousands were killed.

Or Venezuala. They democratically elected a socialist. The USA has attempted to oust him several times despite Chaves having an obvious popular mandate.

Iran / Iraq war – there was a deliberate policy to arm both sides in the was to ensure maximum destruction of both countries.

I really think they have been a major driving force behind much evil that has been done since the secoind world war.

The folk on here who say things about living of 1000 calories a day are very foolish if true. You are damaging your body and are putting your body into starvation mode. No reputable dietician would recommend that. Its a crash or starvation diet and makes future weight gain more likely.

There are (IIRC) 3 sources of noise from joints.( all put very simply and its years since I learnt this stuff

The noise of the bone ends rubbing together due to arthritis / wear on the cartilages meaning you have a rough bearing surface – this is the creaking noise
Popping of bubbles of vacuum / dissolved gas in the joint – as the joint moves in certain ways the effective volume of the joint space changes lowering the pressure – this can lead to small bubbles of vacuum forming then collapsing. this is a sharp "pop" with no obvious alteration to joint movement
A "click" as ligaments / tendons slide over each other and momentarily catch and release

If there is no pain associated with it is is usually benign. Pain means trouble – go get checked out.

As for the glucosamine / chondrotinin – there is no scientific evidence IIRC for this doing any good. No benefit proven in double blind studies. However the anecdotal evidence is that it does do some good and there is no evidence of harm so ther would be little to lose by taking it.

Mrs TJ has BB5s on her commuter. I wish we had bought hydros for her as the fettling / adjustment they need to work well without dragging is a pain. they need adjusting every week unlike hydros that self adjust and (using hopes) require almost no other fettling at all)

As druidh said – get a map / books and make your own route.

Depends on the sort of riding you like but we took the tandem on a loaded up camping tour last summer – 200miles ish mainly offroad but almost all easy double track ( don’t like laden bikes and highland singletrack)
route was Callender / Crianlarach / Bridge of Orchy / Kingshouse / Kinlochleven / corrour/ laggan / dalwhinnie / Kinlochrannoch / pitlochry. took five days and went right into some of the most amazing scenery going.

Options for doing devils staircase / blackwater dam and Laggan wolftrax along the way

Absolutly nothing. ( bar perhaps some scenery)

things to hate – plenty.

Guantanamo
5% of the worlds population, 25% of the worlds pollution.
Warmongering
Cultural imperialism / disneyfication
Deposing of democratic governments and imposing puppet dictators. – (chile venezuala for example)
Arming rebel groups ( Nicaragua)
Arming both sides in wars for profit ( Iran Iraq)

IMO the USA is the biggest force for evil in the wold. Responsible for far more deaths than any other country since WW2

And breathe

A couple of scare stories for him

One friend of mine had a major heart attack at 48 and then died at 50 due to a bad lifestyle – drinking, eating takeaways and smoking. Another has had a stroke at 50. This is what can and will happen if he continues as he is.

If he is time short then the best bet is to use his commute to work as his exercise. Killing two birds ( at least) with one stone. It takes little longer and your daily exercise is incorporated into your daily routine.

Forget faddy diets. ( except perhaps take note of hi and low GI foods). Its really simple – you need to burn more calories than you eat.

You need to train your stomach to feel full on less food – this takes time as your stomach needs to physically shrink so you will have to accept feeling hungry for a while. High fibre foods can help in this.

You are a big chap so need more calories than a smaller chap as your body burns more than a smaller chap just in staying alive. You should be aiming for a weight loss of no more than a couple of pounds a week. Starve yourself too much and your body goes into famine mode which actually makes weight loss harder and weight gain easier.

My advice would be go to your GP and ask for a referral to a dietitian. DO NOT CONSULT A NUTRITIONIST Dieticians are registered and qualified, anyone can call themselves a nutritionist. There are good nutritionists out there but many are total charlatans – see McKeith for one well know charlatan.

Balanced diet, ditch the sugar and exercise. Get professional help.

Kit – I did / do not mean to sound patronising.

However I constantly look thru the rear window of any stationary car beofer I pass it to see what the driver is doing, and filtering I would not be going fast enough to cause damage if I did hit a car. I always filter at walking pace.

Always expect the unexpected. Assume all car drivers will do the most stupid and dangerous thing possible as this one did

Dorset Knob – for sure a lot of hyperbole and bigotry on this thread – but also some useful stuff. I hope that my contributions have helped some dog owners see others point of view – and perhaps reinforced dog owners obligations.

Most of the dog owners who have posted on here have been reasonable and thoughtful and hopefully a bit more empathy for others views will be apparent in future. I may even have learnt one or two things myself.

I think it sums up as

Not everyone views a playful dog in the same way. Most dog owners are responsible. dogs can be trained properly but some folk won’t / can’t do it. A well traine4d under control dog is no problem. A badly trained dog can and is a real issue for some.

Did you get his insurance company details? If not do so. Get your witness to write a statement now and get a copy of it.

As an aside always ride far enough out in the road that an opened car door will not hit you. Always look into every car you pass to see if there is someone about to open a door. Basic defensive riding.

Oldfart -Bumping a thread means posting on it again without any real content to put it to the top of the page.

I think done in moderation is OK – overused will annoy folk.

Hora – a dog running loose in a field of pregnant ewes can lead to many of the ewes spontaneously aborting which could easily wipe out a large part of that farmers profits for the year. The farmer has an absolute right to shoot any dog running free on his land if it is harassing livestock

Have a read of "The road to Wigan Pier" Orwell does some good analysis of this sort of issue which is as relevant today as it was then.

in part
"When you are unemployed, which is to say
when you are underfed, harassed, bored, and miserable, you don’t want to
eat dull wholesome food. You want something a little bit ‘tasty’. There is
always some cheaply pleasant thing to tempt you. Let’s have three pennorth
of chips! Run out and buy us a twopenny ice-cream! Put the kettle on and
we’ll all have a nice cup of tea! That is how your mind works when you are
at the P.A.C. level. White bread-and-marg and sugared tea don’t nourish you
to any extent, but they are nicer (at least most people think so) than
brown bread-and-dripping and cold water. Unemployment is an endless misery
that has got to be constantly palliated, and especially with tea, the
English-man’s opium. A cup of tea or even an aspirin is much better as a
temporary stimulant than a crust of brown bread. "

IMO the road to Wigan Pier should be required reading for all us comfy middle class warriers

I am not sure but is the list of sites visited not still in index.dat or some other file – even if he deletes the history.

Perhaps changing his permissions so that he cannot delete search history or removing his internet rights would be the way forward