mr_hippo

Styling loosely based on the 1938 Delahaye 135MS Figoni & Falaschi Aerodynamique Coupé - possibly the Holden Efijy

I'll forgo my turn to the first one who posts a picture.

Jowett Javelin with non standard paintwork

'

An Armstrong Siddley perhaps - maybe about 1955

Correct but which model?

The car in the foreground is a .........?

Heinkel bubble car

It took three and a half hours in the immigration line to get through.

My record is 9 hours 40 minutes at Jeddah - start of Ramadan 1989.

Current set up is 53/35 12,13,14,15,16,19,21,23

If any one has any advice on a better setup would be appreciated.

Pete

Are you sure that it is 53/35 and not the more usual 53/39? You can get 12 - 25 blocks but you may have to change the rear mech and chain.

Changing to a 12-25 block will drop your bottom gear from 44.7" to 41.2 (53/39) or from 40.1 to 36.9 (53/35)

An expensive solution would be to get a triple but this would also mean a new BB and changer and would only put your bottom gear down to 34.4"

How far is the hill from your house? Are there any similar hills in your neighbourhood that could be part of your training rides?

AS Greg LeMond once said "Cycling doesn't become easier, we just get faster!"

Personally, I don't give a 5h1t.

u must b a are--ole then

You could not be more wrong! Have you ever lived with an alcoholic? Have you ever lost everything you ever worked for? Been rehoused in a very bad part of town? Walked on eggshells for years? Been physically and mentally abused by an alcoholic?

^ Glad that you are OK but please replace your helmet! We cyclists are built tough. I had my first crash with a motor vehicle in May - bike was a write-off and I had a small graze on my right elbow and right knee. I turned 60 last weekend and try to get out every day - weather permitting.

I rarely cycle with a group these days; on my own, I can set off when I want to, go as fast as I want and stop and have a rest when I want to. I have cycled with a group a few tines here in Bangkok so I thought I would lend my support to the 'Car Free Day'

There were 6 meeting points in Bangkok and all groups met at the Thai-Japanese Stadium. I started at Railway Park. There must have been a few hundred there! I think the Thais operate on the 'ish' clock! We were due to set off at 0700(ish) which turned out to be about 8:40! It was just over 9 kms to the Thai Japanese Stadium where we met up with the other groups.

Mr Hippo meets a young cyclist.

General shot of the sales area

Final practice of young unicyclists.

Practise over, now for a ride around the stadium.

Cyclists on the field arranged as a map of Thailand and photographed by a tethered balloon.

I decided not to participate in the procession around the area but to go home the long way round at my pace!

Personally, I don't give a 5h1t.

I don't find it to bad riding around early morning any time before 11am. After that in Patong it starts getting busy. As long as you keep a eye out for the Tuk tuk's it's ok.

I ride nearly every day in Bangkok, my daily distance is from about 25kms to 75kms - weather permitting; I don't ride in the rain nor do I ride after a very heavy overnight storm. I, too, prefer the early morning and am normally out at first light until about 11am - less traffic and not too hot.

Have you looked at this site? Some of my rides are here.

For United fans all over the world, The Munich Air Disaster went farther than England in the news and I find it strange that you don't see that reason. Maybe many of the kids the world over today don't realise why they support United but, their parents and grandparents will....!

sorry rus, not sure i buy that. that's fifty years ago....

I was 9 at the time of the Munich air disaster. I posted the following a few months ago but it will give you a flavour of those far off days:-

"Let me take you back about 50 years – few households had TV and if you had a TV and a car, you were considered super-rich. If you were not living within a few miles of the team you supported then your visits to that ground would be few and far between. I lived about 10 miles from Anfield/Goodison and it meant taking two buses to Green Lane tram depot, Liverpool and the ‘Football Special’ bus to the match and if you were fortunate you would see a few of the players on the same bus! I must say here that Dad & I have always been United fans; we only got to see United when they played at Goodison! Most of the time, people went to watch their local amateur teams play; attendances of 6-8000 at non-league matches were quite common.

Dad & I used to see Prescot Cables home games when we had Harry Grisedale playing for us. Who’s he? He was possibly the best inside forward who never turned pro. United, Arsenal and other top teams wanted to sign him but he always refused. His dad had been disabled in the Great War and Harry looked after him and would not leave him.

WWII ended barely a decade earlier, sweet rationing had just stopped and we were all part of Macmillan’s ‘You’ve never had it so good’ society and a new European football competition had just started with all those exotic places that kids of my day could only dream about – two weeks holiday in Spain? No chance, you had a few days in Blackpool or Rhyl, if you were very lucky! United were not the first Div 1 champions to qualify but were the first to play; Chelsea qualified the year before but the FA refused them permission to play.

Most football supporters wanted an English team to do well – no matter what their affiliations were. We could beat Johnny Foreigner at the game that we invented!

Some of the best players of their generation died at Munich and also the hopes of English football fans. The whole country was in mourning. I can vividly remember walking to school the day after we heard about the disaster and there seemed to be more people than normal at the school gates. Most mums had brought their kids to school and a few of the dads were there; it was definitely a very bleak, gloomy atmosphere."

You must also remember that British TV was still in its infancy and the only football that was broadcast was the FA Cup Final and possibly the odd international. Match Of The Day did not start untill 1964 and most clubs were against it because they feared falling gates. Midweek results would be in the national press in the 'Stop Press' but only if the reporter phoned the result in before the paper 'went to bed'. You would be able to read the report on Wednesday's match in Friday's paper!

I met my wife outside a pawn brokers. She was picking her teeth then she went in and bought them!

Did you sweet talk her with the line:

"Your teeth are like stars. They come out at night."

THen I followed up with the lines:-

"You cheeks remind me of petals - bicycle petals."

"Your eyes remind me of pools - cesspools!"

She has everything a man could wish for - hairy chest, rippling muscles and a beer belly.

I met my wife outside a pawn brokers. She was picking her teeth then she went in and bought them!

I am always amused by these scam posts, Someone always seems to mention the level of education of the Thais and they infer that Mr Farang has attained a higher level but he still gets scammed! Have you ever studied people's faces? Look at the posters for the Bangkok elections - one exudes pure evil! People look at onzestan and myself and see 'nice, pleasent chappie' and look at others and see 'victim'. and 'walking ATM'.

Some people have mentioned moto-cy taxi drivers as being of a low educational standard. Some people have academic minds whilst others have practical minds. Give Joe Soap some wood and some tools and he'll make you a great rocking chair; give me the same and I'll make you a big pile of sawdust! Give me a grammar problem or a maths problem and I can solve it whereas Joe probably can't, does that make me better than Joe?

"Are scams motivated by racism?", the OP asks. People are 'scammed' by people anywhere in the world. Is greed the motivating factor? Yes but it is on both sides! I have already told you that I once sold double glazing , I have also sold fitted kitchens for a short time. About 70% of my sales were the same combination - 'pink jazz' doors and 'lava dust' worktops, why? I had door samples and worktop samples in my sales kit - my samples were a bit scruffy apart from one which was highly polished in a cardboard 'outer'. I used to pull my samples out one at a time and say "Do you like this one?" but when I got to the one in the cardboard outer, I pulled it half out and said, "Oops, you can't have this one, it's a special order!", of course, they wanted it because of greed - they were getting something that was special! It was just a standard 'pink jazz'!

One of the 'Thai' contestants. Natalie Glebova, is the wife of Paradorn Srichaphan.

It is the Thai hierarchy which created the infrastructure in Thailand and has set the low wage scales that exploits the working classes for reasons of keeping living conditions less expensive for themselves and they become more prosperous on the backs of the working classes. Foreigners are not guilty of instigating this set up but many (not all) have taken the opportunity of jumping onto the bandwagon. Once in they are partnering in the exploitation of low paid workers with the hierarchy. Have actually seen evidence of this myself. I am sure if the living expenditure in Thailand were similar to the home countries most ex-pats wouldn’t be choosing Thailand and some neighbouring countries to reside in.

For example, last year I decided to have a brick wall built around the grounds of my house. My Thai wife said, pay no more than 250 baht per day because that is the going rate. Why that’s the going rate, who knows?

I never take notice of that and prefer to use my own judgment by always paying what I think the job is worth, labour involved, hours worked etc. Now than: it should not be up to me, just an average not very well off resident arsehol_e as Naam may put it, to access the cost of labour but determined by proper Government imposed minimum wage regulations in all industries not only for the employees of large companies. So the burden of responsibility for a fair days pay for a fair day`s work must full on the Thai powers that be who do not enforce any proper employment system leaving the desperate and vulnerable open to exploitation by anyone or company with greater wealth.

I suppose you are the type of person who tips 50 Baht for a 200 Baht meal. If the going rate is 250Baht/day, why are you paying more? Do you give a workman more than the bill in your home country or pay the garage more for servicing your car?

When I started work over 40 years ago, the average wage was less than £10/week. Yes, wages were low but so were prices but then the unions caused the wage spiral - wages up>prices up>wages up and so on!

One of my contracts in Saudi was 'married status' and we 'employed' a yardboy - a Bangldeshi called Sultan. He worked full time for the maintenance company but he and a few of his co-workers mooonlighted as yardboys and houseboys for extra money. I can't remember how much we paid him but, for argument's sake, let's say 10 Riyal. "I've paid Sultan' said my ex-wife, "I gave him 20 Riyal!" Her reasoning was that 10 Riyal was 'nothing to us' - it was a lot for Sultan. Within days, all yardboys and housboys were demanding 20 Riyal. Can you see where this is leading? You start giving them 300 Baht/day and then that becomes the going rate until the nrxt farang decides to pay more!

same joke a couple months ago was a hillary joke.

20 years ago, it was a Thatcher joke! Some jokes do get recycled.

In the autumn of '57, Dad came home from work and said "Peter, get your shoes and coat on, you're coming out with me." "Where to, Dad?" He never told me but I went to a posh house about a mile away. Well. compared to our house, it was posh! Mum had 6 kids in 8 years so you can imaginw what the house was like. We went in and I was given a glass of lemonade and a packet of crisps - we normally got things like that on high days and holidays!

A few minutes later, the front door opened and a group of men walked in, one of them said "Hello, Mum." It was Billy Foulkes and a few of his team mates. I had a kick-about in the back garden with Billy, Duncan Edwards, Tommy Taylor and a few more! I did get their autographs, what happened to them? About a week after I got married, I went to pick a few things up and Mum said "You don't live here anymore so I threw them out!" All of my childhood 'treasures' had gone!

I have not been to a match for years - why? It's down to cost, prices kept going up & up and I decided that enough was enough!

After the convention, Sarah Palin arrived back in Alaska and was being driven in a chauffeured limo. When the car hits a cow that has escaped from a local farm.” Go and check to see if the animal is dead”. The chauffeur returns with the bad news "Yes" he replies. "Right you hit it you go and tell the farmer." Five hours later he returns, blind drunk and with a silly grin on his face. "What happened to you?", she asked.” When I got there the farmer opened his finest malt whisky, his wife gave me a traditional Sunday dinner and the 21 year old daughter showed me the hay loft.” ” Why, what did you tell them?" "I knocked on the door and when it was answered, I said to them I am Sarah Palin’s chauffeur and I have killed the cow".

Worldwide, there are people who scam and there are people willing to be scammed! I had a break from nursing a few years back and I sold double glazing. We had a price list and were paid commission on a sliding scale. We knew what we could go down to and still earn some money. For example, a front door and frame (incl fitting) listed at about £1700 and we could go down to about £700 and still get £50 commission. I have sold a number of doors at list price; before I could offer a discount, the customer said "We'll take it!" Was wrong in taking those orders?

Was the OP ripped off or did he rip himself off? Did he not see 'free sample' on the box before it was put in the bag? If you buy a television, for example, you are not given the display model but a new boxed one. So do you just take that home or do you check it in the store to ensure that the remote control, etc. are in the box?