flatyre

forgot to say nice sites Steve, just been having an initial browse through themeforest, any prices are in $, is there an additional charges? sorry for all the questions, i'm sure you guys are thinking "just pay somebody to make a site will you?"

was tidying up an old lady's garden yesterday when she produced one of these, normally I pay no attention to gardening gimmicks but as it was made by Fiskars I thought i'd give it a go. I must have pulled out hundreds of weeds from the lawn in no time at all and once i'd run the mower over the grass you couldn't see the holes left behind by the removed weeds. Have just ordered one off amazon as a number of my customers gardens could do with it. Just thought i'd share it with those of you who have a gardening run, though you probably already have one:001_huh:

thanks folks i'll give themeforest a look later.

just had a go at the free wordpress web designer, it would be fine for a basic blog but too limited for a full website, wouldn't even let me load up my logo. Does anyone have a wordpress website up and running so I can see what the premium package can do? I thought these web templet sites allowed you to create the site before paying, but wordpress seem to want the cash first so I can't see what i'm buying until pay for it:confused1:

there are many conflicting figures out there, who knows which set are closest to the truth, certainly not the governments, or any of the pro tory pro labour tabloids, obviously different parts of the country have varying levels of immigrants, personally the majority living in my area have jobs and work as hard as anyone, whereas my village is coming down with homegrown lazy bar stewards who never worked a day in their life, claim DLA and every other benefit, and drive better cars than me. As I said before the problem isn't the immigrants, its the benefits system. I believe the training was fair and non biased, its relevance to this thread was not in the facts and figures, but our mislead perception of the current situation which politicians including Farage use to launch their own agendas. Basic fear mongering. Yeah Hitler, Stalin, Sadam, and Bin Ladin were strong willed, determined, and stuck to their principles, nice bunch of lads in hindsight:thumbup:

few pages back in the thread there was a lot of talk about immigration, I've just been sent for "diversity training" at the public estate I do casual work for, anyone who's been on diversity training will know its relevance to this topic. Anyway having seen the fact and figures there are actually a very small percentage of "foreigners" in the country and make up a tiny percentage of those claiming benefits. Its easy to adopt the attitude that one section of our society is to blame for everything and without them life would be rosey. Truth is the country is in dire shape for many reasons, if it makes it easier for you to blame one single aspect then blame the government for poor management, over subsidising some industries, refusing to help other industries, giving too many benefits to those who don't deserve them, then not having the money to give decent benefits to those who do deserve them, failing to protect skilled wages, following all Brussels laws while other EU countries pick and choose what they follow, the list goes on. Our current government is spineless, no guts to make the tough decisions or fight the right fight, Farage may be a prick but he's a strong willed and determined prick who sticks to his principles. For better or worse sometimes a country needs a strong hand to slap it back into shape.

Finally got into wordpress but its asking me to pay £85 up front before I can start designing my website, is there a way of having a play around in wordpress to see if I like the results before buying the site?

I just downsized my van from a mwb semi high transit to a swb vivaro, I managed to load the vivaro with everything I need whether i'm landscaping, gardening, or doing tree work, which is about half of what was in the transit. Its amazing the amount of crap you hump about "just incase", its made me a better operator as I now keep my reduced equipment in better order as I've no room for spares, and the van is much better laid out and kept tidy as I no longer have the space to open the back doors and chuck everything in at the end of the day. I have a Rover 20" aluminium decked b&s mower in the van, a Bolans mulching mower, a Tanaka tbc230 multi tool, Echo packpack blower, couple of chainsaws, Makita DPC6400 consaw, all my power tools for decking/fencing etc, kango hammer, masonry toolbox etc in the van full time. Plenty of room left for the cement mixer and barrow on landscaping days, chopsaw etc on woodworking days,or my heavy duty strimmers etc on clearance jobs. two stage ladders with large and small step ladders on the roof rack, means I can hit the road on gardening days with out the trailer, just fill the back of the van with ton bags full of cuttings. Anyway that's my setup, it works for me but might not for others.

in my opinion America is nothing but a school yard bully, bending its friends over an oil barrel under the threat of trade cuts, and poking its enemies with hypocrisy. Everyone thinks Obama is some sort of angel because he overcame the racism thing to become American president, but he's still an American president which means his ultimate goal is to control the worlds trade in Americas favour. There are a lot of smart people in America who fear a Trump president, but also a lot of easily lead people which is why Bush got a second term in office. I say let Trump be president, let him build his walls, with his attitude towards the rest of the world and a large portion of his own population, it will only be a matter of time before every other country in the world turns on America and the only wall left will be the one keeping America away from the rest of us as it implodes!

buy a shotgun! if you can't get the bar stewards steeling your tools, you can at least get the thieves your insured with!

I have a little Tanaka multi tool strimmer which has great trigger response for when working near windows, my faithful Rover mowers, and a couple of Boland mulching mowers.

I worked with a kid who had a step counter on his phone, he would tell me how far he walked at the end of each day, he was still fat though.

I voted for UKIP in the last election, not because I agree with his politics, and he may just be more smug than Cameron if that's possible, but because British politics needs a good shake up to get it back to doing what the people want it to do instead of treating us with a "what do they know whats best for them" attitude. This may be controversial but the problem with Britain isn't the imigrants, its the benefit system, that's what needs to change.

my brother-in-law lives just south of Toulouse so we visit every year, Carcassone is a must see but there are a number of amazing medieval towns in the area like Mirepoix (not the vegetables), there are the Garonne and L'Ariege rivers, but i'd take a day trip to the Pyranees, stunning!

very true but these people don't understand the money is in the removal not the wood, I sent the second advertiser a message explaining that no professional tree surgeon will remove them for free, if he's lucky some cowboy might do it but given the confined space and built up area don't be surprised if it goes horribly wrong, no point in asking for their public liability insurance and his home insurance will laugh at him when he askes them to fit the repair bill. I kept it polite and professional, he didn't get back to me.

been trying to download wordpress all afternoon but can't get it to work, will order the vinyl tomorrow and keep working on wordpress. thanks again.

this was inspired by Forest2Furniture's thread, seeing more and more of these adverts on gumtree. https://www.gumtree.com/p/freebies/free-trees-need-cut-down-/1166598787 or this one https://www.gumtree.com/p/freebies/trees-free-to-cut-down-and-take-away-armagh-city/1166133411 they're good for a laugh:thumbup:

thanks for the advice guys, just bought "habitatservices.co.uk" for two years for under a tenner! Just need to get onto wordpress and make the site. I opted for getting the van graphics through thesignbuilder.co.uk. They have templets for most vans and you just add your text, logo, images etc and they cut them out and post them to you, saves on paying a sign writer to stick them on which is the expensive bit. Its a hell of a lot cheaper and I can hold off fitting the web address until the site is up and running. Sounds good, but has anyone used these online vinyl graphic firms before, are they any good?

just bought a newer van and am about to get the graphics done for it, I don't have a web site yet but am looking into getting one. Is it possible to buy a domain name like habitatservices.co.uk for example then get a site made up later? I have been playing about on WIX and with a bit of work its possible to create a decent looking site, but I don't know if firms like WIX let you use your own domain name? Sorry if its a daft question but its something I know nothing about!

ebay will always side with the buyer and all the user instructions won't change that i'm afraid. If you sell on ebay you run the risk of selling to chancers and idiots. Stating "parts or repair" and "no returns" is your only backup. It may cut down your perspective bidders but will keep you safer. A good write up with plenty of photos should counter act this to some extent. Also having been had on ebay before in similar situations, just explain on the listing that YOUthink the saw is in good usable condition but are listing as "parts or repair" to keep yourself right.

i'm capable of topping a few conifers, just thought it was good practice to seek advice before working near dangerous substances etc.

thanks folks, just wanted to be sure before taking it on, will make sure no cuttings land on it, and wear a mask as I have a decent one for when I'm cutting concrete.

no idea what the root system is like as I wanted more info before doing anything, its strange though as there is no root plate bulge visible on the ground? its in a small yard in a newish apartment development so the soil is probably rubbish, it was wind that pushed it over. i'll straighten it up as much as I can without putting too much pressure on it the stake it until winter when I can undermine the root plate and get it back to vertical. thanks for the advice guys.

what do you mean?

a customer of mine has a bottle brush tree about five feet high which had blown over in the winter. its at a fifty degree angle at present but seems healthy. She asked me what can be done to straighten it up again, would it damage the root system too much if I pulled it back to ninety degrees and staked it? Would it be better to stake it at its current angle to stop it going further over and straighten it up in winter when its in shut down mode? Could the tree be dug up and moved to a more sheltered spot in winter? Any advice would be welcome as she is very fond of this tree.