My two nephews pestered their mum into it long before the actual “allowed” age. They’re right pains in the arse on it, but they do have some sexy friends.

@Deadlydarcy – aren’t the friends also children? 8O

I like him, and I often listen to his show on Radio2 with Melanie Sykes….if you don’t like him then fair point

by the way…this show is the biggest waste of air time going…two people guffawing constantly, mercilessly, hysterically, yet in an obviously scripted way, about things that are simply not funny in the slightest. I am afraid they both come across as empty-headed and the show is boring, unless of course you like inane tittle-tattle, lame puns, manufactured segues and of course, to listen to two people laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing………

Alan Carr is funny? :|

Just out of interest, if there’s any builders reading this, what’s the generally accepted tolerances for out of square and so on in the building trade ?

I’m setting all this out on my own on a sloping site, around an existing building which means I can’t check the diagonals.
I seem to get a different measurement every time I check it.
It’s an 8090×6740 building and I reckon I’m within 5mm for level, using a water level.
How does 20mm over 8m sound for out of square ? That’s my worst measurement and works out at 1:400.
Are proper modern houses built that accurately ?

If you send me an email address I will send you the British Standard for building tolerances.

I still don’t understand exactly why a quote for work, once accepted, can change. If I tell a customer what I’m going to do will cost them £1000, knowing I’ll make £100 profit, if my profit drops to zero because of increased costs then I have to swallow that loss and re-think my strategy. Why is it different in this kind of venture? All that seems to happen is people quote stupidly low (or reasonable) prices and then as soon as the first 5 minutes are up there’s tooth sucking and head shaking and it’s as twice as pricey as the most expensive quote. idiotic.

Most engineering contracts quite rightly feature clauses for unforeseen circumstances, things that cannot be quantified before the works begin – like the amount of services in the ground and their location. The only ones that don’t are Guaranteed Maximum Price contracts.

M74 £2000 / inch
Trams about £2500 / inch at the moment

expensive eh?

I don’t know the veracity of this but there is quite of a lof of information here

Wiki trams

which appears well substantiated and I would recommend anyone who is interested at least have a read.

That’s fantastic! Great to see that a bit of fairly alternative lifestyling is still possible in the heart of the uk. Nice one :-)

Do you have any food intolerances?

I can’t eat food with even moderate amounts of chilli in it, or cous-cous. Both make me bloated and my stomach painful.

why not get a pint, then make your next drink a half and a pint of waterf

one thing that I used to do if I was out for a long evening is have intermittent tonic waters as you can’t drink them fast like pop but aren’t alcoholic

Yes this can lessen the issue in the right company but the overall volume will still be critical I find. Thanks though.

The problem I’ve got currently is that I’m not thinking about anything in particular, but my brain is still going LALALALALALAIMAWAKELALALALALALALA at Silly o’Clock and it’s utterly frustrating.

I’d say that was anxiety…it can take many forms..

Have you ever been able to drink alcohol? It seems that you have a severe reaction to what is actually a pretty small quantity of alcohol, regardless of how much water etc you drink. Perhaps you lack the gene for processing booze (as some Asians do for example). Or have you ever been ill and had liver trouble? I know someone who had hepatitis in their 20s and not been able to have more than a quarter of a glass of wine at a time since. Or you could simply have a very low tolerance, which in itself isn’t such a bad thing.

Yeah totally, I was fine with it until I got to about 29/30 then I started to get worse and worse hangovers. Hence the 8 year layoff. I’ve never had liver trouble, no, but I had wondered if I should get a check up now. Agree re low tolerance. I think maybe I should just give it a miss and put up with being a bit on the outside of things. It wouldn’t be so bad being a bit left out if I had something to focus on in my spare time but to be honest I am so consumed by work that I don’t have any spare time. I have a lovely and amazingly tolerant girlfriend, whom I only see at most once a fortnight because I am so busy at work. Such a shame! Oh well, at least I have a secure job and a nice and very tolerant girlfriend eh?

You clearly have a lot of time on your hands. For God’s sake be careful with that crane. I don’t think it will take 20kN…?

What’s with the lifestyle? It’s very interesting, looks fun, engaging and healthy, pray tell us more?

jesus let the guy have a moan, it’s not like anyone owns the internet…

I sometimes think the at least 50% of the hangover feeling is sleep deprivation. If I could sleep I would feel better. It’s not that I lie awake staring at the ceiling. I don’t know if anyone else gets this but I will just be dropping off to sleep and I will suddenly have a little panic about something and be awake again. The things are not serious, my life is fine, it’s basically stupid “have I tuned the gas off?” type stuff. I don’t normally get this, not especially a worrier. I have quite a high stress life, but so do lots of folk. Oh well, enough of my moaning. Thanks for the contributions.

Quite a few folk asking what liquids I generally drink and I have to say that generally I don’t drink enough liquids during the day, or more specifically I probably do what a lot of people do and drink too much tea and coffee. Having said that, even when I make an effort to drink more water, I still get rubbish hangovers from little alcohol. It makes no difference what I drink but darker drinks and ales are the worst culprits.

Drink more water when you are out, and before you go to bed, lessens the dehhydration. Just drink more water generally

Makes no difference at all unfortunately.

Stopping drinking completely – I have tried this before, for 8 years in fact, and while having the obvious benefit of no hangovers and saving money I found it socially isolating and very stigmatising. People assume you are an alcoholic with a problem, which was not in fact the case. I would rather not go back there.

I am guessing she is letting the backing singers take most of the strain as it would be hard to sing wiuth any consistency while jiggling around as impressively as that. I don’t dig Beyonce, but I can’t dent it’s a good performance.

very nice

how tall/inseam/what frame size are you ?

Both engineering and business are skills, ones that can be learned by a wide range of people with a reasonable level of intelligence, common sense and time. A degree of aptitude benefits both, but I know people who toil away at both without any and get by. I do both, I find both hard, but I’m successful at both. If I had my choice I would probably do neither as the levels of stress and responsibility are too high.

I have no time for the technician/engineer debate. If that is the most important thing you have to worry about in your job you are doing ok, believe me. As for chartered engineers, well, fair play for making the effort to get the qualification, but it’s just a series of tests and you can train a fresh graduate to pass them if you want to, so it means nothing to me, get over it. I only value track record on the job.

Transferring from engineer to manager or engineer to businessman or the reverse can be very hard as different skills are required. If people are unwilling or unable for whatever reason to learn the skills then they will probably do a poor job, naturally. There is nothing unique in engineers in this regard.

Make of that what you will.

Recommended read – Jeff Schmidt “Disciplined Minds”

I must also be doing something wrong, x9 all the way, never had any real problems, last ages, really reliable, don’t need that much adjusting.

Looking forward to a spin on the Frankenbike tomorrow

first aid kit, mobile phone…

she isn’t implying you are a beast, she just doesn’t like it when you are visible.

I think it’s probably worth being sure you get the weaker more visual version and have an experienced ‘sitter’ with you if you try it. Then you will have an interesting and thought provoking experience like most people do. It’s not more-ish but when use correctly even the weak one is very strong. Interesting effects include meeting beings who, to all intents and purposes, appear to have independent intelligence – independent of your imagination that is. Very curious. As with all psychoactives, if you have a history of mental illness I would recommend you leave it alone.

harsh but essentially fair by TJ

it really does look like a spoon.

Nope, never was, CBA removing it for pic.

Just imagine it’s not there

We can but dream…

sure looks like it….why has he done that….and to a Ti frame no less?

please can you explain what you have done?

I would love to, but I can’t :(

I think TJ’s point is that this would be no way of announcing someone’s death to those that knew them.

That’s a helpful explanation 8) Good work.

Meg White? What?

Yeah Rebas look better(!) And SIDs only in Maxle Lite since this year I think so you have to buy new to get that.

Black Box damping is better than Motion Control so bear that in mind. Top two SIDs have Black Box while only the top of the range Reba has it.

Perhaps a nice padded cell? Your nerves are obviously in tatters…. :D

Article in The Guardian about this, this weekend, I learned a thing or two.

link

One thing you will find is that the Life has better heel clearance than the Soul, as the former has hour-glass shaped seat and chain stays while the latter has straight ones, at least in the photos on the Cotic website. This probably contributes to a marginally more forgiving ride on the Life also.

I have a Life with 120mm Rebas. It’s very good uphill and down. Lots of fun and confidence inspiring. Not too harsh not too flexy. I test rode a Soul a few years ago and was a bit underwhelmed, not really sure why. Maybe I was expecting too much. I didn’t test ride the Life before buying, mostly because I bought it from The Bike Chain, whom I trust, and I did my angles and weight homework before hand of course, but also because it was inexpensive enough to make it not a huge deal.

Photos of Life[/url]

That is called an “Oxford comma” and gives the desired spoken flow to the sentence 8)

The standard of grammar, punctuation, and on first examination also logic, in this thread is appalling. 0/10.

I say ‘Meh’.

More King of the Hill….

i hate it when a rubbish thread get’s threadjacked and becomes doubly rubbish. pfff :roll:

God I feel really bad now, I split up with a girl a year ago. I hear she’s really happy now, I cry myself to sleep.

That is just the yawning existential void at the heart of modern life at your advancing age dude. It’s nothing to do with your ex bird being happy. She was also a scrubber. I should know.

a few too many details.

We think you should share….