Timbo

Olympic cycling has become a must watch at our house...not so much for the sport but my other half's commentary. "What's the point in that?" her most frequent comment whilst watching some guy riding a Raleigh Chopper at the front of the keiran. "If he'd stop looking behind him and watch where he's going he might frame better!" in the sprint! "He's got Kim Kardashian's bum" yesterday's gold medal winner. As for me the highlight was the Dutch Women's Cyclist riding up the wall. uq4lv7I.mp4

Routing I found difficult, probably because the damned machine scared me to death. In the end I went for a powered routing table or spindle maker from axminster tools (on offer at the minute at £150 ish). Both 1/2 and 1/4 inch collets and I'm now starting to enjoy routing, particularly pattern routing. I just wish router bits with the guide at the end of the cutter were easier to come by. I really got to grips with routing though when I picked up a Makita trim router...so much easier to use. I have to admit, just like Grendel, I learn by my mistakes...there are just more of them hence the spare bits of the step stools I'm making at the minute in every available space. Not so much a dead man's handle more a remote controlled extension lead from B&Q which I plug everything into. I have a separate one for the 50 liter dust extractor so that I can turn it on or off independently.

Relieved everyone is OK Doug and as you know I can deeply sympathise with the emotion having had a similar event happen to RT. Incidentally without Doug's skill, help, support, advice and encouragement RT wouldn't be as far on as she is...and I wouldn't be happily making sawdust learning woodwork. Here is the link for Finney's stains and finishes Doug http://www.finneyswoodfinishes.co.uk/ . Send the guy a small sample of the timber you are trying to match and he will do his level best to help produce a stain to match. Incidentally he has a product for use on interior wood on boats which dries quickly and gives a tough level coat. He designed it for interiors on canal barges. There's a sample of it and some of his rosewood stain in RT's stern well.BTW for woodworkers out there I can highly recommend the Finpol Special Polish, excellent clear shellac concoction really easy to apply and gives quite a tough but beautiful finish (not for exterior use though). Honduran mahogany? Timberline in Kent according to a local chap I know restoring a 1966 Riva boat here in Lincs.

Just three questions Doug Is everyone in Nipper's Crew OK? Hele, Mum, Maddy and t'other one? You do know that if you need a hand with anything just yell? The bag is packed. Have you run out of swear words yet? If so I can cuss in two modern languages and three ancient and will happily write a list out.

The We'll Help Restore Royal Tudor So She Can Be There Next Year Formation Varnishing Team? The Single Ladies Under 21 Free 5KW Diesel Heating System Free To A Good Home Blancmange Wrestling Team?

Beefed up is one word. I was watching the British women's gymnastic squad the other day with my Mrs. What I was thinking was 'not the right shape for a leotard really' but my Mrs beat me to the gun exclaiming 'They've all got legs like mine!".

Well done that man! Although they did miss a design trick...it's a well known fact that putting a bit of cardboard in between the frame and spokes of your wheels makes your bike sound like a motorbike and consequently you go faster.

Of course many people criticised Michael Caine for the portrayal of a British Officer in the film Zulu.Although it was a difficult role for a cockney to play as the person he was playing was of course a Yorkshireman!

Mrs Trellis of North Wales writes..."could I just point out to the management that there's a serious breach of labelling going on in this thread? It clearly states under the Admiral's name 'moderator', which photographic evidence proves he is clearly not.I would also like to point out that after viewing the above photographs of the Admiral that the big statue of him in Trafalgar Square looks nothing like him! Yours faithfully Mrs Trellis"

Yes indeed Yorkshire is God's own county,the divine T'Eeebaagumgutufutofahstairs the little Yorkshire god of exaggerated vowel movements holds his county in high regard. Little known fact here but Yorkshiremen discovered America way before Columbus, taking with them the worship of T'Eeebaagumgutufutofahstairs which was adopted by the Aztec culture illustrated by the naming of their pantheon. T'onatiu,T'laloc,T'ezcatlipoca...I hope you all recognise the pattern developing here.Another little known fact is that in the original Star Wars, Luke Skywalker was a Yorkshireman. Here is the evidence. I'm fairly sure that, should we get the thumbs up, everyone will be welcome. You mean some of my ideas aren't good?

We've contemplated it, talked about it on occasion but are we actually going to go ahead and ask permission from the management team and set a date for the Yorks and Lincs Chapter of the NBN Annual General P U ? I suppose in a way a bit like the Antiques Roadshow...thinking about it... exactly like the Antiques Roadshow, a load of geriatric boaters getting together to bring some of that NBN magic a little closer to home for those whose timing, purses or opportunity don't run to attending the big meets or for those who are gluttons for punishment? Just an idea, I was wondering what the management thought of the idea? Perhaps towards the back end of the year when it's a bit dark and dank and summer season boating seems such a long way away?

I was a child of the 60's but like most folks we "dint have two 'a penth' to scratch are ar...bum with" as the saying went in Donny. In some ways we were very lucky as every one in the family was a gardener. We had three allotments, my Uncle grew nothing but potatoes. My Dad grew cabbage, carrots, celery etc. My Granddad grew salad crops, blackcurrants, blackberries, gooseberries, strawberries had an apple tree and kept chickens, my other grandfather had a large greenhouse stuffed with tomatoes. All of the produce was split between the families. As a kid I grew up eating raw veg straight out of the garden. Carrots, green beans, peas...ooh broad beans and even potatoes. I still do eat most veg raw...one for the pot and one for me...one for the pot. I will still go and peel myself a potato and eat in raw. Like Mojo stew featured a lot. There were two types of stew. 'Round stew' cooked in a large saucepan on top of the range (yes we had a large range in the 'parlour' right up until 1974 and a 'copper' in the kitchen for hot water), and a 'flat stew' that was cooked in the oven. Sunday was chicken provided by Granddad and on a Wednesday I would be sent down to the local butcher for 2lb of 'pigs fry' which was a bit of belly pork, bacon, liver and several other nameless yet hairy bits of a pig. Mince seemed to feature a lot...big thick 'slabs' of mince and onion inside a large Yorkshire pud'n. Bread and dripping with salt and pepper. Prawns 'on an ashtray' from Donny market were a rare treat. 'Finny 'Addock' or Finnon or smoked haddock with bread and butter was also a rare treat. On the odd occasion we were really flush Mum would prepare a large pan of mushrooms in gravy, once again with fresh homemade bread. When chest freezers became available we all clubbed together as a family and bought three of them, one each. We then started going to the butcher and ordering half a cow, pig and sheep and a whole lamb and butchering them at home and sharing between the families. A bit bloody hunter gather when I think about it now. 1977 we moved out of Doncaster into a small village to a house with about an acre of land. All of this went under cultivation and we had a wide variety of fruit trees from apples through pears to plums and cherries. We also kept chickens, ducks and geese. I've always had a large appetite...'hasn't are Tim finished eating yet' was something I heard said quite often. Only just started putting weight on at 50 yrs old. As a kid if I uttered the words 'I'm hungry' Mum would come straight back with 'I'm angry' which would be swiftly followed by instructions to 'B****r off down the garden and find yourself something to eat'!To this day I cannot abide pre prepared food with one exception. Tinned potatoes. Joy of joys I love tinned potatoes. I am a firm believer that the Aunt Bessie woman needs to stop peddling her tripe! I can remember Mum bringing home a 'Vesta meal' shared between all of us (two adults and two kids) once. I can also remember asking her if it was a sample as I was still hungry. Edited to add I am a 'pickle fiend' due to the glass sweetie jars we used to have stocked floor to ceiling in the pantry filled with pickled cabbage, onions, mixed pickle, and homemade piccalilli the essential accompaniment to a meal of pigs fry!

I have to stop speed reading posts...as this became this And I've been laughing for the last twenty minutes. Sorry Vaughan but I just couldn't resist.

Hi Andy, enjoyed meeting you at Aquafax a few weeks back, nice to put a face to the name. Got sorted out in the end...just got to get the boat in the water now. To be honest I don't have an answer at the minute, not that I entertain much hope of getting a straight one anyway, but I'm hoping to at least put the question in a couple of weeks time at a faculty dinner. I usually head straight for the free bar on these occasions but might just ask the question...before heading to the free bar of course. I will post if I find anything out.

Was that a ?

But Grace...we were hoping you'd hang on to our dignity...cos we've got some serious letching to do !

I'm surprised no one had the idea of putting a hose onto the pitch for a few days before the start of the women's rugby sevens!

Oh but Iain...don't you just miss the old Olympics where men were men, and so were most of the East German ladies team. David Hemery running the steeplechase behind his big moustaches and smoking a pipe while clutching a pint of double diamond. I was damned good on those bars I tell you. Took great delight in beating Harvard in the 1500m, then totally thrashed them in the 15 pints.

Is it me being...well,... old is the term...but has anyone else noticed how, now how do I put this delicately? I know....how crap modern gymnasts are? OK I admit it, I used to have a crush on Nadia Comaneci...truth be told she can still come and do the dishes at my house any day of the week, but her modern successors have all the grace and poise of a dump truck. Their movements are stilted and jerky. Nothing flows, there's no grace, no beauty of movement and then they land like a sack of sh shpuds! That is of course if they have not fallen off, missed a grip or movement, bumped into the apparatus...and they still give full marks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yi_5xbd5xdE And while I'm at it...what's with all the new 'lingo'. Listening to the radio commentary on the swimming the other night I keep hearing the announcer mention 'he'll be swimming the fly'. It took me a few seconds to think 'oh the butterfly' as all I could picture was some bloke splashing around on his back impersonating a blue bottle in a puddle.

Quetzalcóatl now don't be spitting feathers! I can appreciate the going through school bit. In my case it was a nickname. Uncle Albert in his idiocy decided it was a good nickname and started to do things like paint it as the name on my canoe, get t-shirts with my nickname printed on them...hence my glee when the villagers christened him Uncle Albert and it stuck. Of course Uncle Albert has gone through his adult working life using his middle name. You see at one point both he and my Grandfather worked at the same place and shared the same name. My Granddad was Richard known as 'Big' Dick...and my Dad decided he was called Gordon.

You are right there MM, it is very much a case of 'same old, same old'. Hopefully the antics at executive level will start to be more widely reported and something will be done soon to address the pachyderm in the ziggurat. In the current political climate the Broads Authority is an anachronism and is quickly becoming as antiquated and ever so slightly more sinister than the Milk Marketing Board. It may take a while for the current incumbents of Westminster to differentiate between the terminus of the alimentary tract and medial epicondyle of the humerus but eventually they will get around to implementing policy. Interestingly that policy centers on the removal of the governing structures of organisations, such as the Broads Authority, in rural areas both domestic and foreign, and 'encouraging democratic decentralisation'. The policy in effect wishes to instate institutionalised democracy into organisations 'in which political agency and access to information are frequently limited by traditional and modern-bureaucratic systems of hierarchy and control'. And that is exactly the case we have with the Broads Authority.

In all seriousness though Poppy...obvious intentions to a yachtsman/woman are as clear as mud for a member of the public confronting maneuvering around a yacht particularly if you are a first time hirer. One of the reasons why I'm so keen to learn to sail is so I know what is exactly involved in navigating one of yon flappy beasties. I used to think there was some kind of rhythm to a yacht's tacking, I would try and adjust my speed to correspond with the yacht so when they made their turn I would just gently motor past. Even though I had watched an approaching yacht tacking, timed it, watched for the relative position to the bank that the yacht turned at...as sure as eggs as eggs the yacht will make a longer run at the bank before turning, stop to fiddle with something usually right in front of me. The end result a lot of throttle work..often complicated by a hirer zooming up at full speed to complicate matters further. I agree we all ought to have a lot more understanding of each other. But honestly yachts are so random Rainman would have a hard day working out where they are going to go next. I had a rather pleasant experience on the Bure a few years back. Four or five hire craft were confronted by four yachts going one way and three going another. One yachtswoman cheerfully and confidently (obviously a school teacher before retirement) started giving instructions to yachts and hire craft and we were all past each other with no mishaps, no cross words, just cheery waves.

It's not that the signalling is unclear Poppy...we are just shocked and stunned a yachtman actually signalled. I used to watch yachtsmen avidly for instruction of intent...but soon discovered most I encountered never bothered. I still give them the opportunity but tend to shout a prompt these days. I must say my polite enquiries don't receive such a quick response as Uncle Albert's joyful hail of 'Oi wazzock! Giz a clue then?". Strangely most then seem to give hand signals of where they want us to pass...but to do it twice.

I did, I did indeed! Straight A student! To go off at a tangent...what me? On this forum? Never! I have to say I had the pleasure of staying with Ted Ellis on a couple of occasions in my mid teens at his country 'pile'. At the time he and Phyllis had just had central heating fitted the pipes running through the doorways as he didn't want holes putting in the walls. His habit of working in one room as a study...until it filled with so much paper that he moved onto the next room and started filling that with paper appealed to my teenage self as common sense. Listening to a conversation he was having where he defended boats and people in the Broadland landscape seemed to fly in the face of the modern conservationist views..."The people and boats are as much part of the landscape as the wildlife and both must learn to coincide!" he said before nipping off to his current study to fetch something...but never returning as he'd got distracted. What sticks most in my mind is the lift he gave my friend and I in the Renault 5 he had with the dash mounted gear shift. I'm sure Ted thought this had to be randomly fiddled with to put petrol in the engine as he would motor along at high speed and suddenly slam the car into first or second gear the engine screaming its pain before Ted would then stick it in fourth as the car juddered from five mile an hour back up to sixty when he'd stick it back in first. When the lift was over...including a butt clenching moment when he kangarooed onto Reedham Ferry my friend and I both kissed the ground.

Whoa! Not even lunchtime on a Sunday and a phone call to a former colleague, now working with the English Heritage, got me an 'earholing', a very long reading list and cost me a dinner! Ah well. It seems water meadows do indeed lift the water table and the height of rivers. They produce large quantities of silt if operated correctly. Water management of both sluices and ditches in the meadow and of the neighboring river are essential this includes regular dredging to avoid silting up of channels downstream of the meadow and the removal of reed beds. Apparently there is some controversy if not a little anger in the weird world of water meadows. Restoration of water meadows is done in the name of 'heritage' and under the cover all of 'benefitting wildlife'. However the 'spuggie worriers' are loath to operate the water meadows correctly as this, as I already mentioned, means the removal of reed beds. To add to the mess nature conservationists can't seem to get it through their heads that water meadows do not contain standing water and water should not be left to lay in the meadows no matter what the current state of the wading bird population. The current feeling amongst the heritage faction is that it was a mistake to use the umbrella of nature conservation as conservations fail to see the four legged horned beastie that is the end product in the equation. Seems I have some more reading to do!