My ride came to an end after a disagreement with a pothole on tarmac! The weather would have made it a great day as well. Oh well there’s next year. I’m going to ask them to put on a 70km distance to celebrate my birthday. I rode the first 10 events and have returned another 10 or so times over the years. A very special event run by a great club and team.

Absolutely what Jamesoz said.

We have had a couple of Flat Pandas and they have been surprisingly good to use (drive and cary stuff) and reliable. We got my 90 year old mum had an automatic one with 20k miles on the clock for under £2000. It outlasted her.

Here’s an illustration of what you could get.

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202408142873976?sort=price-asc&advertising-location=at_cars&make=Fiat&model=Panda&page=2&postcode=MK11%201HP&price-to=2000&fromsra

They have never passed my consciousness before but went in one at the weekend…. twice. It was a 3 month old one. Hybrid taxi. We had a 40 minute trip each way to a festival in Sussex and it seemed quite smooth, pulling well in the lanes. The impressive thing was that there were six adults and the driver. Three of us are reasonably built and the two who were shoehorned into the boot seats are having physiotherapy to unlock their legs from their armpits but if they had been under 5 foot it would have been fine.

We’re a Hyundai Ionic 5/T5 family at the moment but it struck me as a reasonable runaround with bike lugging potential. I would go and have a drive if it was the type of thing I was in the market for. Surprised at how well it handled all of us although the return journey was bit of a haze.

So sorry to hear this. But live your life and do the special things. Do it without regret.

The whole point is IT’S SHIT BUT DON’T GIVE UP!!!!!

Got a acquaintance who was diagnosed with exactly this about two years ago and is still going though. He is special kind of person (as are you) in his single mindedness. He was extremely fit, positive about everything etc etc. He was even told off for riding his bike to get his chemo!

He did a lot of research and has gone to Germany to get extra treatment when the NHS gave up. There are obviously so many variables between cases but he is an example of positive survival. He gave up alcohol, carbs, got into fasting and slept in a hyperbaric chamber (which friends helped purchase). All seem to have helped and he’s still riding with the fast groups he dominated for years. Mind you it’s on a e-bike now but he’s still doing the things he loves with the people he loves.

Where are you? PM me if you want me to ask him to chat to you about his experience.

I don’t carry my 25 year old Leatherman unless it’s for a specific activity (camping, allotment etc) and when I do its in its leather pooch at the bottom of some bag or other. Having worked with teenagers in the youth justice system I’ve heard plenty of stories that indicate that its not just their age range who carry for unsavoury purposes.

If you are on bad day and get “loud” with someone who has just jumped your parking space any passing police could legitimately search you and take a view about your intent.

Tea bags! Loose leaf please.

Mister P it’s only pressure from Mrs W and her sister that means I’m going to betray my love of MK. Don’t worry though, I’ll drink through it…….

Manc sounded great but 2 seats have popped up on another flight so Amsterdam is back on!!! Only £300 extra robbing beetards.

Thanks guys and I’d have done the Turin Brakes gig. Suppose it will just have to be me, the brother in law and several litres of Amstel!

An interesting character whatever you think of him. His personal experience was probably broader than anyone we have on the political stage at the moment (certainly in Britain). Fleeing  Nazi Germany, working in factories, fighting in WW2, etc. Perhaps this shaped a pragmatic rather than ideology driven attitude. Although bombing and coups are absolutely unacceptable conclusions (in my book) he was instrumental in driving better relationships with China during a very iffy period. Realpolitik was dark but Detente was a move in the right direction.

He was absolutely the personification of “power is the ultimate aphrodisiac”

Got one this morning. No 4/10 available and even the  4/8 was out the back. I’d got the £9 voucher for signing up to the newsletter so trotted off to the till. “Sorry sir you have to spend over £100 to get the discount”!!!!!! Its 1p!!!!!! 

The old couple shuffling up behind me in the queue were only buying a single packet of cheese crackers. I asked how much it was – 39p. I made their day when I paid for it and got my billl over the £100 required. They were totally floored that I didn’t want the money off them. As I passed them in the street they looked so happy. I reminded them not to eat them all at once and it was nice to see their shy smile. I almost went back to get them some cheese!!!!!!

Watched it all and Coogan is excellent. I think everyone should watch it. It might be criticised for not holding the BBC to account but I think the real message is we all need to be held to account. How many times have concerned people not spoken out when they feel uncomfortable because they won’t be believed against some superior person or organisation?
I was in Stoke Mandeville for 3 months in 1982. My parents and wife used to visit and regularly saw Jimmy pushing trollies of bedding about and thought he was a generous eccentric. He relied on that image to get away with everything.
I do work in schools around safeguarding and tell everyone to watch it now.

“Working this weekend finally. I’ll get more of an idea of what’s what”.

Well?

I’d love to see reduction in the numbers police carrying guns. Anyone carrying guns! Even though we might have “foreign  agents”/drug gangs tooled up how many situations require an armed response? It’s all a very chicken and egg type of argument but intelligence led policing should be able to reduce the number of guns on the streets. I’m generally against punitive jail sentences but carrying gun is always a choice I’d of thought, so life sentences for possession let alone use might be justifiable.

That’s the attitude I’m going to take but interested in experiences.

Had our Ionic 5 for a year now. 8.5k miles in and nothing to fault it apart from a poor turning circle. We charge at home off the solar panels and for several months its been brilliant for tan lines as well as charging 🙂

So my question is – servicing… Had the first annual service done as part of the purchase package and all is well. But Mrs W was put under quite a lot of pressure to take a service plan at £350ish a year. Luckily she didn’t succumb and I always run a mile from this type of thing. Looking at the service booklet and handbook don’t really give any real indication of what needs to be done when. Lots of visual checks but nothing else really. The tick box option in the service records annual/10k or 20k miles! No list of what we used to get in a typical planet destroyer of course and I wasn’t expecting one I suppose.

Given that there’s next to nothing to do other than checks what are people’s experiences of servicing and associated costs?

Mum with her last birthday present

Me and my girl

Real royalty. Been giving me advice all my life.

Working with friends is always problematic. Do you ever do it for your friends? How would you expect to be treated?
We have a house that requires bonkers amounts of input. I have employed one friend regularly but we are ultra clear about everything. My general advice is don’t do it if you can avoid it.
There are mates who just help me lift stuff when they’re here and get unrestricted access to the biscuit tin for the 10 minutes help they gave. Others pop over for the day and we go to the pub at the end of the day and have a few with a steak or I pay for the Travelodge next time we’re away riding. If you hand over cash you are putting a value on their friendship as much as the job so it must be fair.

But from the way I read this if you want an invoice things must be ultra clear from the get go. Helping someone is laudable but separate friendship and business. Agree the job/expectations/time frames/materials including whose collecting them/travel etc. £20 an hour if they provide their own tools, £18 if they don’t and point out the tax issues as said above.

I think you’re probably right BruceWee but was trying to highlight that given the potential explosive gas capacity and low human involvement its not surprising these things happen and that animal welfare must be minimal.

Obviously we don’t really understand the scale of “factory farming” as db says. Given massive methane potential with that number of animals together disaster is a significant risk I suppose. What also struck me was in a disaster (particularly if you’re a cow) like this how only one person was injured. Does that indicate that it was a mainly mechanised facility? If so what does that say about animal welfare? And I’m a meat eater but it does make me shudder.

Watching with interest not for kids though. In our road about 6 households are going to get to the needing carers stage in the next 5 to 10 years. Over wine there have been semi serious discussions about employing stereotypical blonds from Nordic countries and assorted attractive variations to care for us jointly in the coming years…..

UK sportive are bonkers price wise. I do quite a few Dutch ones because we have family over there. The two that I do in March and September regularly are fantastically organised with timing chips, great signage and gpx files, and free food, coffee etc. When I say food I mean food, none of the one gel, half a banana and a bottle of water rationed out to try to make sure everyone gets something. The March one is generally supported by a baker whose team stands at the exit of the stops forcing you to take half a dozen of his Chelsea buns. The coffee is plentiful, the energy drinks are by the gallon and hot food is available.

Oh yes the entry fee – €12

Been away for the weekend and we took the Ionic 5 fully charged. 8 o’clock yesterday morning at -2 degrees it was on 75% and showing 165 as the range when I would have expected something in the 190/200s. Moving carparks and 5 miles of odds and sods the range rose back up to 180. Left the car in an underground car park last night and topped up it back to 100%. Bitterly cold (0/-1) but the 50 mile trip home tonight equated to 19% (about normal).

So what I have learnt this school day is – The start up range is drastically affected if parked in the open, the initial warm up brings it back to reasonable efficiency pretty quickly and if you leave from a cold environment where there isn’t direct frost exposure things seem to be within normal margins of variability.

Its only got 2k on the clock so still new I suppose. Continue to love it.

This really is context.
My wife is black British born in Nottingham. The first time I introduced them, my Mum (75 at the time living in the most remote part of Devon) asked her the very same question 20 odd years ago. But it wasn’t about heritage, it was about were she lived, how did we meet etc. My wife to be, my 20 year old kids and I all burst out laughing at its inappropriateness and then pointed out how many people used this phrase in a racist way (intentionally or not). Mum was horrified and really got into being careful about phraseology from then on. An unintentional, non-malicious mistake by someone who had little or no experience of different ethnicities is forgivable.
Someone who has had years of meeting foreign dignitaries, was married to the chairman of the BBC and Times newspaper should know better and not continue to push the point. That is very worrying behaviour at the heart of the most privileged group in the country. You’d think they would know better, have some training/awareness, but no…… sinks into an anti monarchist rant.
My best friend is black (I’m married to her) so watch your language because even if you are a right on sandal wearing whatever you can get it wrong!
Just stepped out to say goodbye to Mrs W as she goes off to a meeting and asked her if she would be upset if I said “Some of my best friends are black”? Yep she would so I responded that “my best friend is black” to which she responded “Your best wife is black!!!!!”. I’m just of to check the second best one…..

You won’t get probate until the tax return is done. Dependent on the size of the estate this will be the difficult bit. My mum’s estate was borderline so I got an accountant to do that (best £80 I ever spent) and did the probate forms myself. As Fossy says there is a backlog so don’t do simple things like take the staples out of the will when you photocopy it. They question that and of thing and the time scales start again from each query they ask of you.

As above but a big consideration is that with school budgets under increasing pressure for the foreseeable future supply is the first area that schools will look at to chop.

That’s why I’m reluctant to edit mine down. Like Dickbarton I do keep numbers of people who are “dead to me” to avoid talking to ****.

So sad when a role model disappears…

Not watched it yet but like many have regular interactions that aren’t too pleasant, including a very heated exchange at a friends house with a bast**d who proudly claimed he tired to drive us off the road! I was restrained in several ways.

But getting back to the what to do issue, yes we should refer to “people on bikes”, build infrastructure, go to council meetings, create and participate in family orientated critical mass events and much more. Perhaps the BC relationship with Shell could be used to some advantage. An awareness campaign at every fuel station, warnings on receipts etc. Get a Top Gear episode where the presenters are riding bikes and passed by a few different vehicles at different speeds and judge there reaction.

I’m a helmet wearer but do remember some (Canadian I think) research that showed that riders who wore helmets and glasses weren’t perceived as human (more robotic etc). Part of it also showed that those riders who had red beam/arms with flags on the back to increase visibility were driven closer to as it implied they had a safe space. This was twenty odd years ago but it always had a ring of truth to it for me. Following this I never wear glasses on the road as making eye contact at junctions does seem to have some effect.

So molgrips is right I did need it there and then. Its a Michelin 20″ with EV, Extra load, acoustic etc etc. Looking on line now I can find the same for about £35 cheaper but I think stock is an issue for many dealers so the point about Hyundai playing silly buggers seems valid. I mean in a car this advanced why oh why isn’t there a road debris removal app!?!! Still I think it illustrates whatever way you travel there’s a cost to pay one way or the other!!!

Well we’re five weeks and 1k miles in with the Ionic 5 and loving it. Been getting free top ups at the nearby Tesco and got a Zappi installed last week. Used it once so can’t give any cost analysis that is meaningful yet.

However the love dropped a notch today. Picked up a nail right on the edge of the side wall so a repair isn’t viable. £325s worth of new tyre on Thursday!!!!!! A mates Aston has cheaper tyres FFS.The fitters reckon theres a real shortage of the appropriate EV tyres with Hyundai being responsible for the shortage. Apparently the are buying up any available stock.

robingrant – just got an Ionic 5 and I think you’ll need to drop the front wheel out but theres plenty of width. Had ours about two weeks now and its bloody great on all fronts. I post more experiences after next week when we will have done couple of longer trips.

This thread has been an inspiration on so many levels TJ. Well done and thanks.Your efforts have kept our dreams alive. (even if you didn’t stop in Milton Keynes!)

One of my Dessert Island Discs. Great student story.

Without trawling through 70 odd pages what home chargers are people using? Collecting a Ionic 5 in about an hours time!!

Whatgoesup will do. Getting very jittery about what a colossal amount of money it is but I’m at saturation point with bikes I suppose!

Yes we will look at getting a home charger. Considering a solar set up specifically for charging. Thought we’d got another 6 months to get all this decided. Plenty of chargers around us including Aldi and Lidl with their cheap/free set ups, so no immediate rush We need 200 miles to be comfortable for the common journeys that aren’t local. On the test drives I was impressed with it as a vehicle.

Looks like you’re in our position worksterbo. We have the T5 if we get worried about longer journeys but I think this is the first car I’ve been genuinely excited about. Well the Caterham was scared rather than excited I suppose! I’ll report back,