S-Westerly

There's an idea. I could borrow my daughter's from Barnard Castle. It worked for Dom after all!

If I'm in North America I stock up on one of their heavy duty insect repellents as if they work on Texas mosquitoes or Canadian black flies which make Scotch midges look like insect wimps they'll work on them. Probably mean any children I might have may have two heads but as I'm well past the age of producing offspring I don't really care.

Absolutely so. The fish will not be cooked though that I'll be doing myself and what exactly it will be depends on what the fish monger has.

Well tomorrow I am out on the bike as I'm legitimately part of my son's support network and need to drop something off to his place west of Bristol. A46 will do to start. Then I need to pick up some fish on the way home so will cross the bridge to Wales just to trail my coat then up the A 48 to Westbury and then home via Gloucester. Legitimately as far as I'm concerned.

Unfortunately lakes or lochs even tend to by definition have low boggy areas around them even the ones on high ground. When we used to take the boat up the west coast we used to anchor offshore a bit to be sure we were midge free. More than one beach bbq was hastily abandoned due to the little horrors. As for the Crinan canal the bast*rds got us there. Really, really hate them.

Those damned bitey things! Used to fish hill lochs up there - walk in, walk out and camp by the Loch side. Great until the wind dropped and then the little f**kers would be out in their millions. Totally take the fun out of life.

OD'd on Netflix have we? My lockdown vice is PC games doing which I have wasted days of my life. Saddo that I am.

Welcome back. Never rode an MT09 but had a test ride on the GT900 once. Decent bike and I believe performance wise the MT09 is way better?

Even in the smaller towns the moped riders have been riding like mad nutters on speed for ever. The legality or otherwise of it doesn't seem to matter.

Yep, I've got the tinnitus as well. Though I never have burst an eardrum. I've regularly had my ears syringed / vacuumed without any issues but the amount of gunk that emerges is amazing.

Bought it as well as the other raffle ticket for new Triumph.

I've tried all these and to a degree it works. However apparently my ear canals are odd so they've a kind of kink in them that stops wax from doing what it should do and also causes it to get jammed up. It also prevents me from scuba diving. Any depth more than about 4 metres I cannot clear my ears.

Tried it, repeatedly. Apart from making a horrid mess on my collars or pillow it didn't have any effect at all. I had mine vacuumed last week after a week of olive oiling and what came out was about 1 cm3 from each ear of a tarry glop. Took a lot of hot water irrigating first as well.

To be honest I really don't care. Government has completely shut down my life by decree. When anybody can find something in it to be excited about please let me know!

The reason my audiologist told me never to stick anything down my ears. Having serious wax problems have also made the mistake of googling for "how to clear it" (short answer you can't). The consequences are as you say gross!

It's under a cover so not totally bare to the elements. I see it every day when I pass so it's survived quite well for 2 1/2 years. When I'm at sea it's garaged at my daughter's place.

When I returned to biking after many years away from it they were the most reasonable insurance I could get but I never made a claim. I believe if you do have to make a claim they are not very good. As always its a case of pays your money, takes your chance.

There are quite a lot of decent leather jackets around for bikes that don't look like power rangers. However most of them are on the pricey side.

Must weigh a ton?

Ditto nothing. It's tipping down with rain and mine lives outside so not good for owt.

That's a proper yorkie- none of these effete little round things!

I carry the toolkit that came with the bike, a puncture repair kit inc. 12V pump (Dynaplug), and maybe a small can of chain cleaner / lube if I'm away for any time. Otherwise it's Bennett's bike recovery. That said I don't think there's anywhere in Western Europe where you are 250 miles between places!

Some marine crankshafts are rather large but there's a shed load of smaller marine diesels around.

When we had a boat I was discussing Seagull outboards with someone and we came to the conclusion they were really good emergency anchors but effing useless as engines. Really liked my Honda outboard on the dinghy. Started first time every time.

I'd say he was a candidate for the Darwinian Awards.