S-Westerly

There is a global standard- the Maritime Labour Convention (MLC) introduced with great fanfare a few years ago and like most things associated with shipping open to a great deal of skullduggery. This is because many operators on the fringes of shipping are one step away from good old fashioned pirates. You have dodgy registries whereby the flag of the vessel is powerless and has absolutely minimal standards. Think Mongolia for example, purely a legal fiction. Then you have coastal states such as the UAE which basically don't give a shit. As many contract workers there are effectively indentured bonds men for the duration of their work permits the UAE government doesn't give a toss for its legal obligations under the MLC and if a couple of dozen seamen wash up on their coast who cares? Finally the citizenship of the seamen involved comes into play. Some countries make quite a fuss over the mistreatment of their citizens,most don't, including sadly the UK for most of us. From the seamen point of view it also gets complicated. If the owner doesn't pay your wages the crew can exercise a lien on the vessel which basically means that if its forcibly sold even for scrap the proceeds must first pay out all the crews outstanding wages. However if the vessel is classed as a wreck that doesn't apply. (I maybe wrong on this as it's a few years since I studied maritime law and this kind of thing isn't my everyday work life!) Also if the crew leave or abandon the vessel they forfeit their rights to claim. There's loads more I could write but without going into technicalities that's a broad summary.

Why would they be? Democracy as we know it died in 2020. Whether we'll ever get it back remains to be seen. The attitude towards lockdown lifting would seem to indicate we won't and most people don't seem to care.

Well I suppose all those killjoys whinging about loud motorbikes will have to find something else to moan about.

Shame we can't get them banged up for years though.

Living in Somerset you'll be enduring some of the hardest water in the country. When we lived in Portishead we regularly had issues with our heating due to lime scale deposits causing chaos. Gloucestershire is better, still hard but still a lot less than Somerset.

Might make you go with a bang but better than bzzzzzz.

Series 3 bmw was almost as bad. Had to do it from inside the wheel arch. And if it was the so-called halo lamp that was a cool £70 plus fitting as virtually impossible to do outside a pro garage. Who designs these bloody things?!

My first house cost me more than double my salary which is certainly cheaper than today as houses have gone up a hell of a lot more than pay. However I was paying 15% pa interest in my mortgage which is hugely more than today. Also in 1983 unemployment was pretty high and government was not quite so quick to throw money about. And yes I'm a boomer.

Had an appointment in Cheltenham for ears. So rode there and back the interesting way. Have to do the same again on Thursday so what a shame. Might only be 30 miles or so but it's nice just to be out on the bike.

Saw that last night. I have dynaplug and so far I've not needed it. I do like his little vids on YouTube they are always good.

Or the bimble even.

I like the Ghost D30 armour and now have a full set which I can swap around between various bits of kit as needed. I don't actually like back armour that much although usually wear it. So far it's been the only bit of armour I've owned that's failed in use (not during an off either) although it was RST own brand stuff so probably not the best.

A while since I've been to ours but pre-Covid you just rocked up, dumped whatever you had in the appropriate place and went on your way. If you were in a van you needed to show it was not commercial and proof of address. Nothing more.

In the long ago our first (new) house was in Washington New Town. About two weeks after we'd moved in there was a bang and a flash and every single electric device that was live (Inc. the heating system) was toast with the exception of our insanely expensive Bosch oven which survived. Turned out that down the road where they were installing mains the jcb driver managed to partially sever the mains electric and sent all the live current down the earth. About 15 houses affected and a huge amount in compensation to pay out for all the destroyed kit.

I'm planning on JT sprockets.

We've had one fitted since house was new. Never had an issue with it but the energy supplier? Bloody useless - for 2 years tried to say we had 2 electric meters and charged us double. Turns out they had conflated our house number with another property in the same road which had the same site number during construction. Idiots.

Those two brands are in the frame along with RK. All are in the £120-130 range plus sprockets.

Probably, which is quite disheartening if you are trying to avoid boosting the Chinese economy .

Sounds good. Proper old school Brit.

We used to have the same thing going where some folks used to always get relieved on time while others regularly ended up doing an extra month away and then be pressurised to go back early so the other guy didn't have to do longer. If you had a regular back to back most guys were fair but there are still some chancers who'll buddy screw at the drop of a hat. With Covid if you're lucky enough to get away you have no idea if you'll do 3 months or 9.

Hope there wasn't any bat on the menu.

What he said.

No walk today. Minus 3 and a wicked wind. No fun at all.

I'd not be surprised but the season is over now so it's going to be October before there's another shoot.

With my bike living outside and spending months 'resting in my absence my chain is probably going to need replacing in a few thousand miles. OEM is DID and is okay but anybody got any experience of other brands? Looking for long lasting and robust. Within reason cost isn't an issue and yes I'll change the sprockets at the same time.