Specialized Langster

I went to Bath after work today and bought a friend's old bike off him, I'd been meaning to try a road bike for a while and I wanted a single speed/fixed speed bike too, the opportunity to combine both came up so I went for it.

I got home, fitted my pedals, adjusted the saddle and set off on my regular commute route to see how I did. Apart from a few problems setting off from stationary in a higher than usual gear I managed all the hills non stop and even overtook people for a change. In fact the 13 mile route I managed in just over an hour, not bad for a fat bloke on an unfamiliar bike I thought. I attempted to cycle up my local very steep hill when I got home - one that I struggle to manage using my Brompton's lowest gear. I slowly ground to a halt with little chance of setting off again. That will be my next challenge.

Luckily it's quite an attractive bike too - I say luckily, as it's going to have to live in my living room!

Do humans dream of electric cars?

I've just got home from a talk that my friend Martyn invited me to. It was a chap from Sustrans ostensibly about about alternative travel - ie not being so reliant on cars and stuff. However in the question & answer session afterwards he did seem to go off on a personal crusade about sustainable living.
Now, I'm all for being as environmentally friendly as possible: Yes, I do have a car but it's one of the lowest emissions cars available at my price point and anyway I cycle to work on average nine and a half times out of ten. This chaps vision, as I understood it, was for a future where we all lived in self reliant communities, which sounds quite nice.
Our orator seemed to go further with his living local plan, asking that we forgot about the outside world and concentrated solely on ourselves and our neighbours. Whilst I like to support British and local companies as far as possible, I also feel very strongly that today we live in a global world. I don't mean a world of global consumerism, but a world where the troubles and concerns of our neighbours and friends we've yet to met near by and all over the world affect our daily lives. How much of the news we read today concerns conflicts, tragedies and successes overseas, often in places that we may never have been and most likely never will? One question asked of this chap was how could we address the energy uses and waste of other developing and developed countries? He responded by telling us that we needed to concentrate on ourselves first, advocating a life we have not seen for a number of centuries.
Whilst I understand his sentiment of trying to get mankind out of a lifestyle of reliance on transport and the fuel it requires, the way we live today simply cannot become the one he desires. If we all suddenly lived in our idyllic sustainable communities without outside influence or any way to influence others then the world would be a poorer place. If we could not learn of, or help our friends and neighbours in their time of need or work toward adverting tragedy then one day we might be plowing our perfect field for the next crop whilst a cloud of toxic waste or a missile headed our way, and we'd be none the wiser and then we would wish we had done something about it.
The way to combat harmful effects to our world is not to hide ourselves away and do our little bit. The way to save the world is by shouting loud, twittering like mad and involving everyone we know to make the world a better place, one that all mankind can enjoy.

Brompton front brake

Brompton front brake
Originally uploaded by kylet

Had trouble with my front brake cable routing, old one got kinked, replaced it and new one kinked within a couple of weeks. I thought about doing this last time, wish I had as it works great.

Cellnet issues

My issues with Cellnet as was revolve around a couple of times I went travelling. I have a rather good mobile number that I had had for five years and didn't want to lose it. In 2000 I asked if I could put my account on hold whilst I went away, which they did no worries and I returned six months or so later and restarted my contract. In 2004 I wanted to do the same and was told that it was not possible - but I could reduce my contract to 'only' £25 a month whilst I wasn't using it. I asked the lady on the phone is they weren't interested in keeping a customer that had been with them for nine years, she said no - who says loyalty pays? I asked for my PAC, which she gave me without any questions and I transferred my number to a Virgin PAYG account, which I then didn't use whilst I was away, and went to Orange on my return. Then T-Mobile introduced their Flext deals and I've been with them for the past three years. However it's coming up to renewal time and there is no mobile phone I've used that seems to live up to the iPhone, especially now there is MMS coming and the thing *just works*. So I guess I'll be giving them another go

Shiny shoes for beginners

Last week I got my RAF #2 uniform, including some DMS 'Oxford' toe cap shoes in smooth Dr Martens style leather. Having spent six months getting my combat boots shiney, I wasn't looking forward to starting again - especially since I have two pairs - one for daily use, one for parades.

After a week or so basic brush polishing I have just sat down and bulled them to a mirror finish - in about half an hour. I've read all the bumf one can find on the internets about bulling shoes, and I've just hit on a method that not only works, but doesn't take hours to achieve - and uses standard Kiwi polish. I expect this is nothing new, but here it is written down for posterity, with photos to follow.

Equipment:
Three tins of Kiwi polish, two black, one black parade gloss.
Two shoe brushes, easily differentiable.
A cloth (I use a Tesco car cleaning cloth, with six month's worth of polish residue on it)
A glasses cleaning cloth (from an old pair of Specsavers glasses...)
A lighter.

Method:
From one tin of polish (use only with the brush) apply polish all over shoe with one of your brushes. Apply to both shoes.
Take the first shoe you applied polish to, brush polish it off with the other brush, then do the other shoe. By doing them in order you allow time for the polish to work its way into the shoe.
From the clean tin of polish (use only with the cloth) apply polish to the toe cap, I just rubbed it all over, none of this small circles malarkey. Again do each shoe. Brush polish the toe cap well.
Apply parade gloss to the toe cap, both shoes, buff off with cloth again allowing time for the polish to work into the shoe.
Take your lighter and heat up the toe cap a bit - just wave it around all over once, that will do. Buff the area with a glasses cleaning cloth, perhaps using a bit of water (I keep a small mister for this). Apply a small amount of polish all over the toe cap using the glasses cloth - just a dab, enough to cover to toe cap and to dull the shine. Heat this up with the lighter and buff with the glasses cloth, a mirror finish should be emerging. I say this took less than half an hour, but obviously I had a few basic layers of polish already on the shoe, so it might take a few goes. However I now have very shiny shoes that anyone wold be proud of - no cheating, no messing about with rubbing in tiny circles.

Quote of the day

"Police aren't there to be an emergency supply of flat shoes."

FCC Okays Nudity On TV If It’s Alyson Hannigan

FCC Okays Nudity On TV If It's Alyson Hannigan

Meme

If I ever had a band it would be called Tin chloride
Our first album would be called limits of the world
The cover would look like this


This is a fun meme. Click here for your band name, click here and use the last four words as your first album, and click here and get the 3rd picture in the row as your album cover.

Some tickets still available...

I was looking at the BBC website and saw the section 'apply for tickets' so I thought I would see what's on:

"Hey Hey We're The Monks": Thirty-one, unemployed and single, Gary Woodcroft has never done a single useful thing in his life. There aren’t many places so chronically understaffed that they’d take on someone of Gary’s prospects so the unexpected vacancy at Buckley Abbey is a Godsend. Plus the food’s free, the accommodation’s free and, if he’s honest the vow of celibacy doesn’t make that much difference.

It has been described as "Father Ted meets Men Behaving Badly", from the sound of it I would describe it as "scraping the barrel".

I think I might decline.

Lands end to John O'Groats

This weekend just gone a group of doctors and a nurse set off to cycle the almost 1,000 mile journey from one end of the UK to the other in aid of the Bristol Children's Hospital intensive care unit
Have a look here for details and sponsorship.
http://www.justgiving.com/thegrandride

K800

I now have a new mobile phone, a Sony Ericsson K800, which I am rather impressed with at the moment - I am connected to the internet at broadband speed, and am now going to get rid of my home phone line and broadband connection - why pay extra when for £12.50 I can have unlimited internet wherever I am.

Wee Free Opticians

Red Nose Rally Karaoke - I'm Too Sexy (in Italian)

Me singing Right Said Fred's I'm Too Sexy... in Italian.

An entry for Red Nose Rally Karaoke 'rallyoke', or more acurately me making a fool of myself... again.



New version with correct audio/video sync.

As heard on Scott Mills' Radio 1 Show: