david_carnell

7.29! God, I think I was still in bed then this morning....and hungover. Clearly my work ethic needs looking at.

I think that's just Giles typing after a few too many glasses of Sauvignon-Blanc!

Maybe it's a Stringer Bell-style front. Do they offer photocopying as well?

I bow to your pedantry, sir. It's the only we we will evolve. Indeed it is 'indefinite'. Maybe I did derserve that D grade for English Language A Level after all!

And all over a definite article! To be fair, I'm kinda with Giles on this one.

pasta with pesto = the middle class turkey twizzler nutritionally worthless but tasty and cheap.

I'm worried about this potato though. It's all very well showing the effects of a pasta-based dietary regimen with examples of fascism and corruption but look what those potato based societies were up to.... The potato, as we all know, originated in the Americas - Peru and Bolivia to be precise. Now, I don't like denouncing entire nations based on their culinary dispositions but boy, did those guys know how to do a human sacrifice! The potato will be the end of all of us - mark my words. We'll be throwing bodies on flaming pyres at the top of Dog Kennel Hill before you can say "blight". Stick to couscous - much safer and benign.

And I reckon with the weak pound and the cost of travel they're not even that cheap. I'd be better off looking for Eastern European prostitutes in this country. Thanks for the messages and PMs so far, any more non-white-slave-trade suggestions are welcomed.

blinder999 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > In the absence of a full breakdown of scooter vs > motorbike relative pollution, I'll trust the > evidence of my hacking cough and blackened lungs, > and continue to opine that they are not > 'environmentally friendly' Hyperbole? Not a bit of it I'm sure. 1100cc scooter?! Twist and go? Or with gears? At what point is that just a regular motorbike with a different seating position?

And eggs. You're right though JRussel, pot noodles are terrible for you. Edit - waaaay too late on the eggs addition.

I'm sure my relationship with hannah6_6 (mrs_d_c) would deteriorate rather quickly if that option was taken up, but thanks for thinking of me Ratty. If you want a lads trip sometime, well, you know....don't come to me.

Try Wahaca for authentic mexican as well.

So if we could leave East Dulwich where it is, and its proximity to London, but if you head south, where Forest Hill or Crystal Palace used to be is now vast veldt and rolling Scottish hillsides with perhaps a caribbean beach in Norwood - we'll all be dandy.

Sit behind something runnning off bio-gas and it stinks too, doesn't mean it's polluting. Although the test did involve scooters and small engined bikes it would have been skewed by the larger engine machines. The same way as if you'd tested lots of Minis and Fiestas but also bunged in a Hummer and a GT40 as well - doesn't really give an accurate picture. And most commuters use small engined machines. For eg I look at the bay outside my window and 90% are scooters or similar. I'm aware some use mid-range or larger bikes (esp. couriers) but they are certainly in the minority.

blinder999 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Motorbikes aren't environmentally friendly at > all: > from the Guardian > > "The importance of emissions has been > underestimated in legislation, giving > manufacturers little motivation to improve > aftertreatment systems," said Dr Vasic. The tests > were carried out on a variety of Yamaha, Piaggio > and Honda 50cc scooters and Suzuki, Honda and BMW > motorbikes with engine sizes ranging from 800cc to > 1150cc.> This final paragraph reveals the fatal flaw in this test. These are large engine sizes for a motorbike. Scooters, which are the most common form of commuter motorcycle only have engines of 50cc - 125cc. Much smaller than those tested here. They are not nearly as polluting. Very few motorcycle riders into central London would bother with something so powerful. It'd be like driving a Ferrari around town. My Pa, for eg, had a small engined Yamaha to commute on and something more powerful for the weekends and trips away.

Brendan Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > SeanMacGabhann Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > "just for 1 or two years - see how it goes" - > and I'm still > > here. > > Ditto Bloody immigrants, you give 'em an inch and they take a mile! I'd like to echo MPs comments. The home-counties suburbs are truely awful places and I'd never go back despite (or maybe because of) having lots of family there. Wilderness does have appeal though. I know my better half loathes the idea but part of me is excited by truely wild bits of Britain with very few people. I don't think I could offer you advice on the whole "only gay in the village" thing - not without baseless stereotyping vast swathes of rural England. Although, of course, I'd probably last about five minutes before realising the nearest shop is 20 miles away and it doesn't stick my clinique moisturiser before scuttling back to the great metropolis.

I'm off to Prague on Monday for my Summer hols with hannah6_6 and wondered if anyone who has previously been has any recommendations out of the ordinary. I went in my student days backpacking in 2002 (spent getting drunk on cheap pivo!) but hannah6_6 has never been so I expect we'll do some touristy stuff (Charles Bridge, Castle, Churches etc) and hopefully some off-the-beaten-track stuff. Any suggestions gratefully received. The second week we're staying in Cesky Krumlov so if anyone's been there as well and has suggestions that would be great. Thanks.

You think Communist Smurfs are bad? Try He-Man the Nazi!

Tamu Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I wonder why the Smurfs only had one girl in the > entire village....? Maybe it's because they were COMMUNISTS!!!

It'd be funnier if you were drunk in charge of drunk minors. How minor are they? Can we not put some brandy in their bottle of milk and allow them to sleep thru the whole evening? Never did me any harm. *hic*

I would have thought subsidising a more efficient means of transport (motorcycles) by charging those using less efficient means (cars) would have made more sense. Why not pay for these improvements with money raised thru increased car parking charges - something we can all support. More carrot, less stick.

I've begun to lose sight of where your irony ends and where your spit-flecked genuine rage begins, Brendan. On this one though, I'm firmly with kford and on the side of the motorcyclist. The idea of unlimited use for your ?1.50 is ludicrous. Almost all daily commuters will park in one place only and then go home. Not move from bay to bay on some sort of shopping expedition.

"Who took my marshmallows?" "Where have my marshmallows gone?!" "Did you hear that?"

Ted Max Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > None of it matters, though, if three of your top > five batsmen play like tarts. On this, I think, we are in unanimous agreement. When do we start asking serious questions about Vaughan? Could we relieve him of his captaincy and hope the batting improves? Who replaces him? And his captaining duties are the only bits he does well. Field placings etc.

Catch-22 - based on MP deciding he'd like to be Yossarian and me realising I never finished it the first time I read it (or tried to). So far, so good. Just before that I read the 4th novel by Charles Cumming - a young Scottish writer of spy/espionage thrillers. His first three were great and this proved even better. His depictions of foreign lands are second-to-none imo. You might like his third book MP - it's set in Madrid for the most part. Anyway, if you like Le Carre and all that stuff rather than Clancy et al give him a try. Start with Spy By Nature and finish up with Typhoon (which is the one I've just finished). I can lend people any of them except the first one which I've lost if they're interested.