I do, and it has it's good points and bad points.

Bad for me is the fact that I am the least financially-minded person I know, so all the fastidious receipt keeping, bank statement filing, VAT returns, personal tax returns and all that jazz really gets on my tats. I have to get someone else to do it. The other bad thing is that I sometimes look upon social engagements in a "bloody hell, how much is this going to cost me?" kind of way. I occasionally have to miss whole periods of work so I'm able to make a wedding, for instance. You don't work, you don't get paid, so that weekend in London doesn't just cost me travel, accommodation and beer money.

Good for me is that I can work when I want and where I want (within reason) and work doesn't tie me down to anywhere in the world. I.e. I could live in France and still do what I do now just as effectively.

tis a problem in towns and cities unfortunately.

Hehe. Too true. I work on quite a large site for a couple of weeks at a time, and everyone says "hi" to everyone else all the time. I get home and give a quick nod to Joe Schmoe walking down the street and they look at me like I'm pointing a gun at their face.

I was assuming you just want PC-portable versions of your DVDs. .iso does take up a fair bit of space on the HDD though… If you want to rip to mpeg, then I reckon you'll have to pay (or, perish the thought, p2p) for some kind of program.

I've always liked the look of the Eddy Merckx bikes. The AMX-1 comes in at just shy of a grand. Depends if you're happy with Tiagra though.

imgburn[/url], then Daemon Tools to create a virtual DVD-ROM drive to mount your DVD image onto.

http://www.hornblasters.com/

i'm leaning towards the wakes the dead model

+1

One of the only reasons I make it out of bed in a morning when I'm offshore is the lovely Catriona Shearer.

That, and the fact that I have to buy Cokes and Mars Bars if I turn to more than 5 minutes late.

Try this[/url]

The 60W RMS would appear to refer to the rated output of the head-unit, but I'd generally take that figure with a pinch of salt.

As above, anything from any of the known manufacturers would be good. I'm currently falling in love with Vibe speakers. Not to everyone's taste, but I'm finding the clarity in small cabins (MR2 then MX5) is superb.

I'd go with a set of Vibe Slick 6×9 in the rear, a set of Vibe Edge 5.25" components in the front, and if you really want to beef it up, a 12" Vibe Slick Subwoofer paired up to some kind of amp: Vibe Black Box Mono was my choice, but I've also powered my sub with a cheapo £30 2-channel one from Maplins, bridged the outputs, and heard very little noticeable difference over the Vibe one.

If you're on a budget, FLI are to Vibe what Frank Stallone is to Sylvester.

Yup. Tried an alloy Pronghorn XC which is a magical ride but unbelievably fugly. Eventually plumped for the carbon Pronghorn cos I thought it was slightly less nauseating than the alloy, but it has since grown on me. A lot. It's a phenomenal bike to ride, too.

Popped into The Bike Chain in Edinburgh last Wednesday for an inner tube. Nice and friendly, and the chap didn't even roll his eyes when I couldn't work out the Schwalbe sizing on the box.

Prior to that, Flying Fox Bikes in Alva cos they let me borrow a super-swish Argon 18 Gallium road weapon for the week.

Water-powered kiddy ride. Kind of like a see-saw, but compact. And for lazy kids.

I had something very similar to this. Tried everything and everyone sorting the brakes out, and it turned out that the cones in my rear hub needed tightening. The wheel kept leaning on the disc under strain cos they were loose. Tightened cones (thanks EBC) and problem solved.

Flying Fox Bikes have loads of Gore and Craft stuff, most of which is under £100. Not all of it is on the website, but if you give them a call they can sort you out.

I guess I should stop wingeing and buy a new computer!

Suddenly, these iPod things don't seem like such good value.

Nice idea, but I'd rather it be something worse than him pissing on the floor of my house.

Plus, the bit where I would spray him with white gunk? Not so much.

Ab Ripper X Part 1. Part 2 is out there somewhere.

Just every other day and it's doing me good. Can't see the 6(8?) pack yet, but that's cos I'm still eating like a relative slob. Under the padding, though, there are muscles that didn't use to be there.

Was lucky enough to capture some of the most beautiful skyscapes I've ever seen in the last month. Here are a few:

No tinkering in Photoshop, either.

Petrol station price boards where the '8' is put in upside-down. Shows a distinct lack of pride in one's work.

I have yet to drive a mid engined or even RWD car.

Fixed that for you :wink:

All I'm trying to point out is that sometimes people take what is spouted off on internet forums as gospel. You get any Joe Schmoe in an MR2 losing the back end, and maybe they'll think: Hang on, that Edukator guy (gal?) said if I lift off the throttle I'll be fine. I'm saying that it's dangerous information to be putting out there because 9 times out of 10, you lift off in your MR2 and you end up backwards through someone's garden wall with your eyebrows on fire. But what do I know, eh?

The centre of garvity never moves it remains at the centre of gravity surpisingly enough.

OK, so centre of gravity is not what I'm thinking of. My bad. The point I'm making remains the same though. The car's momentum acts at the car's centre of gravity, shifting load forward or backwards depending on whether you're accelerating or decelerating, and increasing/reducing grip on the front/rear tyres accordingly.

Edukator – wrong

Hint: there's a reason why you very rarely see pro drifters in mid-engined cars like the MR2 or the NSX, and loads of them in front-engined cars like Silvias and AE86s.

If power is being applied to the rear wheels in a *mid-engined* car and you then lift off, the centre of gravity shifts forward and 'unweights' the rear tyres. Do this when you're already in an oversteer situation and you're going to spin. The best way to counteract oversteer in a mid-engine car is to not get into that situation in the first place by understanding weight shift and your car's limits.

Your technique is more likely to work in a *front-engined* RWD car.

Edit: just seen your waffle about understeer too. You lift off in an understeer situation and the same weight shift happens, transferring grip from rear wheels to front wheels and thus reducing the factors causing the initial understeer. In reality, what would probably happen is a shift from understeer to *lift-off oversteer*

I love the way my "clutch down and steer" is being rubbished.

"It's called "lift-off oversteer" and it's pretty damned unrecoverable."

That assumes you're in a FWD car.

Erm, no. Lift off oversteer is quite hard to achieve in a FWD car. Centre of gravity and all that. Hence why I was specifically talking about mid-engine, RWD cars.

Using 300bhp spiritedly means ignoring the speed limits on the public road… …In removing all propulsive or engine braking forces from the driven wheels you can recover from excesses of either…

You might find my sweeping statements sily, I find a 300bhp road car silly.

What utter, utter pish.

A 300 bhp BMW will take half the time, if not less, to get to whatever the speed limit is, compared to a 80 bhp Fiesta. Therein lies the fun. You don't need to break the speed limit.

Also, try driving a mid-engined RWD car and "removing all propulsive or engine braking forces" halfway round a corner and see how well you recover. It's called "lift-off oversteer" and it's pretty damned unrecoverable.

I like to 'drive' my car. I 'drive' my 300bhp auto VR4, and it handles like a car half its size and weight due to the fancy AYC and 4wd, but is it as much fun as my old MR2, or my wife's wee MX5? Not a patch. Half the fun is heel-and-toe and slick gear changes, and you simply don't get it in an auto.

Currently drive an auto, but as soon as I can get rid I will be doing so. I understand that auto makes more sense if you just use your car for going from a to b, but I enjoy the actual driving as well and auto just doesn't cut it.

Hang on. He stopped taking his depression medicine and then did this? Was the medicine actually to make him depressed?

I'm bloody working. Offshore, and stuck here due to the combined efforts of the weather in the Northern North Sea and the ash pouring out of Eyjafjajkenfnnjbfjrewallllfebwqeu=okukklllokull. I was originally due home last Tuesday. Now me and the future missus are shitting it cos I'm due to get married on Friday.

They allow the rider to apply more torque as the rising, otherwise idle, leg can also contribute, provided the cardiovascular system can deliver the extra demand.

That's what I mean. I'm a lowly biological chemist though, so my brain doesn't compute in forces and moments and torques. As I have so obviously demonstrated.

is "around a circle" the same thing as a direction ?

"around a circle" is the same thing as a direction, yes. I don't know what your point is though.

as I said before, a force is a different thing to a torque

Yes, but where does the torque come from? From the forces exerted around the circumference of the circle. If it was a force exerted upwards only and a force exerted downwards only rather than around the circumference, you'd end up with the "up" pedal/crank arm pulling at TDC of the circle and the "down" pedal/crank arm pulling at BDC of the circle. In that situation they would cancel each other out.

You're exerting forces in opposite directions

Nuh-uh.

You're exerting forces along the circumference of a circle. Draw it on paper and the forces look opposed to each other, but you're only looking at the forces being exerted at that instant; they're actually in the same direction along the circumference of the circle and thus the total force is the sum of both.

Ads, that is. Not boobies, more's the shame.

Between this and the thread about advert boobies, I decided to turn Adblock+ off.

8O

They're everywhere…

Motorised #1:

Motorised #2:

Non-motorised:

I've found Spybot S&D generally sorts things out when all else fails: Spybot S&D

Seeing as this postal vote malarkey has seemingly struck Edinburgh, and I never got mine before I came out to work, this'll have to do:

Labour 8
Conservative 2
Lib Dems 16
Green 0
UKIP 0
BNP 1
NF 0
Respect 0
SNP 1
Spoiled/Void Ballot 1

Kwak ZXR 400?

My buddy is from Japan, and at the last election he turned to me, with a face contorted in shame and horror, and asked me why the Prime Minister was talking about "you know, problems downstairs". Seriously, the Japs really have no concept of the letters 'L' and 'R'. It was even written on the TV channel's scrolly banner thing "election night special" or something, and he still didn't get it.

Oh, how we laughed.

I'd take Meredith Grey out for a nice seafood dinner.

/I would call her again.

I'd go for the £378 one and stick a £20 wifi card in it. They should do that at Overclockers for you if you speak to them nicely. You're under budget, and for the use you've mentioned above it's unikely that there's any noticeable difference between any of them anyway. Apart from in the wallet department.