Tom D

I' not sure what you mean by the "city" The financial services sector is spread across the whole country... Personally I think the euro is doomed, at least in its current form, imagine if people in the south west could retire at 55 and those in yorkshire had to work to 68, that is the situation in europe. If it it going to work benefits, retirement ages etc will have to be standardised across the whole eurozone, if it is not seen to be fair then the germans, dutch etc will not accept paying for the greeks and italians to carry on as they are. And if the southern states are expected to adopt the regimes seen in the north of europe then the people won't wear that either. The eurozone will be dogged by political unrest and strikes for years and will probably collapse anyway. We are better off out of it.

Its not just the banking sector, its the whole financial sector, this is where most of Britain's money comes from. We are net importers of goods and we need to export in order to stay solvent. We export financial services on a massive scale, anything that threatens that could be disastrous for the whole country. Its like trying to get the germans to vote for a windfall tax on manufacturing. The good thing about financial services is that they still continue in a recession, businesses may stop buying new equipment but its unlikely that they will stop buying insurance.

I received a letter from this company claiming to be representing Lloyds bank, regarding a balance of £144, (they don't say if its a negative balance). They ask you to contact them.... I haven't banked with lloyds for 10years and have a good credit rating so I guessed that it is a mistake. But something about the letter just isn't quite right, its badly written and makes no reference to any account number (lloyds). It has its own reference number, and if you go to the website and key it in they still don't give you any info on the supposed debt, if it is a debt.... There's a lot of stuff on the net from people claiming that they are a scam, and also a lot of people who claim they are a genuine debt collector, do you think it is possible to create a fake on line reputation by going on forums and the like? One thing's for sure they won't be getting any information out of me until I know they are legit. anyone had any dealings with them?

The eurozone has been eyeing up the city for a while now, it would be disastrous for britain if they get their hands on it. At the end of the day we buy more goods from europe than we sell to them, they need us to keep buying french cars and stihl saws, DC did the right thing. That is his job after all, to look after our best interests.

we did some tall trees today, mostly storm damage, but i also did a 10% reduction on a tall ash, ran out of rope on the decent, and needed ladders to reach my ropes on the wellie.

is that a picture from today?

Hadn't noticed that Will, very sad.

you can clip into the same crab, just don't get an oval one, get one with a wide top.

This storm has had disastrous consequences for me. The high winds have increased the draw on the chimney causing the oven to get hotter and burnt my chips. And the mobile network seems to be down, if I loose the landline I won't be getting any work out of it. At least I'll get a good nights sleep!

Its hard to say, thicker cord makes a bigger knot and therefore uses up more length. Best to tie 1 fisherman's then your hitch, get the length where you want it, then tie the other fisherman's, then trim off the excess. After that undo it all and measure the cord and make a note of it. Then you will always know for next time. As a guide I'd start with 1.5m:001_smile:

Hard thing to find, I was looking for a while ended up getting this... 5.5k

Remember with a closed hitch you can use thinner cord so its less bulky.

one final thing, that is a closed hitch i.e. both legs must be attached to your krab, unlike your blakes which is only attached on one leg.

That isn't a knut, is a howard hitch with a knut finish, it will tend easier than a blames for sure. A straight forward knut would be another choice.

Having used both I'd go for the 88.....

If you really don't want to go down the HC route (although I think you should) then try this. http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/climbers-talk/21327-dave-rich-howard-knut-combo-treeflex-mod.html

I've often wondered that Tom, will the shakes be worse felling whole or just the stick? The brash slows them down in flight and acts as a cushion when they hit the deck, but does the action of smashing the branches off when t hits cause more damage than the stick landing on its own. I'd love to know.

I put some chip down in my garden, got the same shrooms. The interesting question is, were the spores in the chip, or were they in the soil already and the chip gave them the energy they needed to fruit.

Why is it you never see an intelligent articulate racist. I only watched the first few seconds. We should ship all these people to the isle of white, let them have their own little colony.

Good reach on that care John. Nice one.

If I have embers in mine I just put more logs on and open up he air..... thats all it needs. And if the stove is out, I just take some embers of the rayburn and chuck them in it, put some logs on and it works every time.

Thats disgraceful, phone the police, She should get a talking to by the boys in blue at the least.

The best forests (for looking at, waking in, and wildlife) are made up of a mixture of species.

at the time I thought this was the best boxing match I had ever seen, this was tainted by the injuries suffered by mclellan. This is a very interesting program so far, turns out mclellan's trainer is a nutter, maybe benn should have lost in the 1st round, and mclellan wasn't a very nice person...

Today's beech reduction..