djbobbins

Three of the four jobs I've had have been under collective, mass contracts and hence not negotiable but I honestly don't think a paid lunch break in an office job is the norm. Based on my experience, I completely agree that working late one day may get recognised another day in a more flexible approach to e.g. a need to finish a bit early, but that depends on the manager. Certainly in my current office job I am lucky to get a sit down, dedicated lunch session away from the desk or work-based meetings more than once a week. The grass is not greener! I fully acknowledge that I have chosen an office job, so nor am I saying that the grass is greener doing arb work full time. On a nice sunny day in summer I may look out of the window and wish I could be working outdoors, but when it's persisting down or brass monkeys, a warm dry workplace seems attractive. I don't know about retail - if shop staff get an hour off paid to chomp butties and drink coffee every lunchtime then perhaps I'm in the wrong game!

So, the test proves that a £800 Stihl saw is better made than a £100-odd Chinese one. I should hope so too! Okay, so this most likely means that the Stihl will last a lot longer in normal use, but again, only to be expected. What the test didn't prove for me was whether the cheap saw was fit for normal purpose - does "normal" pressure on the chain brake make it apply and stop the chain? Will it start and run reliably out of the box without overspeeding and hence releasing the centrifugal clutch by itself? Don't get me wrong, I absolutely disagree with counterfeit goods - deliberately trying to pass off a product as something that it isn't is out of order. But if someone can make and sell a saw which is useable, at a low price, and doesn't pretend to be something that it isn't, then why not? Arb pros might not buy them, as the adage goes - you pays your money and you takes your choice.

Yeah right, more like 8 til 6 with at best 10 minutes to buy a sandwich and eat it at my desk or in a meeting.... I have had a range of different office jobs and have never had a contract which included paid lunch break.

Don't know about the legality of it but a mate of mine from work, who lives on a canal barge just off the Trent, goes off to the river with a barrow and chainsaw to collect all the wood that washes up on the inside of a horseshoe bend. I can't see that it's doing any harm to anyone; I suspect the police would be willing to be practically-minded over it. As an aside - what does the law say about picking up deadwood from by the side of the road? Does this strictly belong to (a) the local authority or highways agency on whose land it is sitting; (b) the landowner whose tree the wood fell from (be it public or private land); © the first person that decides it would be useful and is willing to load it up??

Didn't someone cast an aspersion a while ago that they break transfer boxes for fun though?

... and the axe in the boot ... and the machete ... and the spade ... and the 880 just for good measure? All tools of the trade, obviously:001_unsure: Seriously though, interesting thread. I've had a few stressful months at work over the last few months and identified with some of the feelings mentioned. Fortunately things have now calmed down a bit but it's very good to reflect on the situation and think about how it was that I came to respond in the way I did.

There was a guy in court a while back who'd stolen a parked up tractor unit and curtainsider, which it turned out was loaded to the gunwhales with green shield stamps. From what I can remember he got six months detention and a hostess trolley...

I used to drive a LWB, high-roof 17 seater LDV minibus full of drunken students home around Manchester in the late 90's. Believe me, whatever anyone says about the manoevrability of them, when you have got half a busload of drunk students in the middle of an area that makes Moss Side look like leafy Surbiton, you can make an LWB LDV do a three point turn!!

That's mad... At uni me and a like-minded engineering mate made a gas powered spud gun out of tin cans and a chunk of 2" waste pipe; the "chamber" would have been about four litres and the barrel about 50cm. We only fired it a few times but gave it up after setting it off one time, obviously having got the fuel / air mix just right, and the explosion taking all the seams apart between the tin cans. Eeeh, them were the days...

It's Dutch, not German, but I'll let you off this time!! Good to see that VW roll out similarly cheesy adverts elsewhere in Europe too! Oh, and I wish my Mk 3 Golf had been anything like that robust - I spent over two grand in garage bills in about 15 months before deciding that enough was enough and flogging it on fleabay. Sod's law, saw the thing bumbling along down the road whilst I was out on business about a year later...

Wonder what the legal and insurance situation is on that? I've got the home insurance that covers me for any mishaps whilst I'm doing DIY, but I'd bet money that (a) there's some small print that excludes really major work like felling trees, and (b) it wouldn't cover public liability if I dropped a tree on someone's head. So assuming these people that are having the work done, and the fellers, are both uninsured for public liability, in the event of an accident who gets sued / jailed etc??

The benefit against "high street" prices is very small. What you do get with e.g. a BP fuel card is a standard price, so if you have got vehicles on the motorway you can fill up at normal prices rather than motorway services. Personally I have gone for the Tesco clubcard credit card approach and use it solely for fuel; effectively means 4 weeks free credit on my fuel spend and a few reward points as well (more if I use a Tesco forecourt, obviously).

At work we own and insure a coal ship capable of carrying a 22,000 tonne payload and I'm guessing we pay less than that. Interesting comparison though!

I'll tell you, just so you can all say what I said when I saw it (which started with what the...) It was £100,554. Yup, you heard it here folks, over a hundred grand to insure a £5k car for a year, with 5 years no claims!! I kid you not, I looked and re-looked at it thinking my eyes were deceiving me, and even got one of the guys that works for me to check it as well.

Higher than all of those, much higher!

I got a quote today for re-insuring my wife's Nissan Note shopping trolley, from the price comparison website that uses the Iranian standup comedian for its advertising (don't know if I'm allowed to mention specific website names). It's a standard car, 1.4 petrol, basic model. My accident history is clear but my wife had a no fault accident last year. Cheapest quote was just under £300 fully comp, protected NCB etc. Anyone want to hazard a guess on what the highest quote was, for one year's cover? No prizes but it might be worth a laugh...

Or you could just buy chickens in Tesco and sell them at a farmers market?! Not that I'd advocate that of course, 'cos it would be entirely unethical... but I did wonder how well "posh" locally produced charcoal would sell at a farmers' market. I was thinking of selling by weight on a "choose your own" basis with a choice of e.g. alder, ash, etc, with printed labels saying where the wood came from, what the properties of the charcoal were etc. As an extra product, I thought (if any was available) chipped fruit woods might sell well as a flavour enhancer for the bbq, or for using in a smoker. Anyone got any drawings or instructions for making half decent looking homemade smokers? Just another sideline maybe...

I'd been wondering about making compacted logs out of a mix of sawdust and paper, but hadn't bothered because of too many other things to do. I had even thought about boiling the paper and sawdust in water to help break the cellulose down - I thought it might help the end product bind together better at e.g. 70% sawdust : 30% paper, which would presumably give less of an ashing problem. Whilst I've got a plentiful source of free alder logs I think I'll give it a miss. FWIW my mother used to reckon a Yellow Pages was a good way to get the Rayburn going at home...!

Salt water makes me retch but I've taken to rinsing with Listerine total care mouthwash (the fetchingly-coloured pinky purple one) and highly recommend it - it's got antibacterials and I think there are salicylates (i.e. chemical the same group as aspirin) in there too. It's helped me out with nagging aches and I'd recommend it to anyone. Glad to hear you got the abcess sorted mate; I had one years back (under a troublesome wisdom tooth) and it was murder. Had some antibiotics to get rid of the infection and then had three wisdom teeth out under general anaesthetic.

I built my domestic logstore out of 3" x 3" x 8' tannalised posts and boards, with a paving flag base. I reckon if you missed out the solid base, but set the posts into the ground and laid pallets as a floor, you could put three timber sides onto your posts and enclose your logs that way. Say a dozen posts set in a 6x2 grid, 6' apart, would give you 1,080 cubic feet at 6 feet high stacking. Or about 31 cubic metres. Of course if you wanted to be braver about it (don't know how much it would stretch planning definitions of a roof) you could put some ribs across the top of the posts to stretch some form of waterproof cover over. It'd be temporary covering, of course...

Working tomorrow, I guess until about 2pm, although the boss has promised that anyone who's in by 8:45 will get breakfast bought for them! Back in on the 29th til NYE, then back again on Tuesday 4th...

Cheers guys; I have been doing the topping up with 1:1 mix of water and concentrated anti-freeze (so heavy winter mix) - so hopefully at least it won't freeze up. And for info it's the 3.2 V6 petrol beastie so no turbo to worry about; just the thirst bigger than George Best, Alex Higgins and Oliver Reed on a night out. Before they croaked, obviously.

I thought exactly the same about the woman in the 1 series; clearly she didn't apply the best common sense but as for the guy filming her out of the window rather than going to give her a push, well, I suppose chivalry is dead after all!

A guy that used to work for me has just gone to work in Hanover. He's got a BMW 1 series (as per the woman driving into the house) but as per German law has had it fitted with winter tyres. A couple of weeks ago in freezing temperatures he did a 1500km round trip to Copenhagen over a weekend and said that the difference in tyre performance is amazing; hardly any loss of traction. Clearly that wouldn't help on sheet ice but I suspect goes a long way to explain why current snow and compacted snow conditions in the UK cause chaos relative to other countries where law does not allow people to drive around in cars fitted with hard compound low profile summer tyres in snow and ice.

Thanks for the feedback guys, much appreciated. Along with radweld I can think about raw eggs and something that looks like porridge. Mind you, if anyone suggests other breakfast related fixes - e.g. poking a bacon butty and a couple of hash browns into the rad - I might start to think there's a bit of urine extraction going on... Good call about keeping another bottle of radweld at hand; will pop back to the shop tomorrow if I get time. I'll keep an eye on the coolant levels and if I remember to do so will post my experience on here.