Christmas Tree

Did High Street last year from Stavely, a nice 78k ride, was tough climbing up I must say. TNF at Grizedale is Waaaaaaayyyy overated IMO. Mind you, most trail centres are, give me natural MTBing any day. Im sure theres mountain bikers and then theres mountain bikers!!! As cat bells is no Jacks rack to the walkers.

I always love to see the proper fell walkers around the lakes and always feel quite envious. Last year I even planned to do sca fell this year but other things just crop up, particularly with a family in tow. However having googled a few images of jack's rake today...... I can say without hesitation that you are all fucking loopy.

Very Nice but a brief description would be nice

300 Not the sort of film I would normally watch but thoroughly enjoyed it. 8/10

Its a gorgeous place, but the biking there is shite. Never done it so I'll leave the finer judgement to you. There was however lots of serious looking Mountain bikers there! One of the trails is featured on You Tube (below) and quite frankly I could only do it with stableisers.

Excuses excuses The world and all its conspiracies will keep on turning if you take an afternoon for yourself. I've tried 3 types from seed this year and all currently coming along in the conservatory in one of those plastic house things. Went for tigerellas, sungold and money makers. I know it saves a lot of time buying the plants but it has been fun growing stuff from seed and having the successes and failures along the way.

Put my beans in last week and came back to find them killed off by the frost. Live and Learn

where are you?

Daaaahling, was the Montrachet to die for? Tweedies is bog standard anyway. Still haven't got round to contacting your friends btw MF, not had time, hopefully will later in the year. Features in the coveted Michelin recommended good pud food guide Camra pub of the year Is there actually any subject that you dont talk complete bollocks about. I was there at Easter so I'm talking from recent personal experience. It's OK but not special, better than the Lamb Inn which is rubbish, but nowhere near as good as the Swan Hotel up the road. All opinions at the end of the day but its difficult to see how it deserves your pompous description. You're clearly feeling rattled btw, perhaps you need another break dear, as the last one doesn't seem to have worked. So in a few hours its moved from BOG STANDARD to OK Now see you could have just said that in the first place rather than trying to be a little smarty pants.

Saw this and thought of you Why not use it as your avatar

Daaaahling, was the Montrachet to die for? Tweedies is bog standard anyway. Still haven't got round to contacting your friends btw MF, not had time, hopefully will later in the year. Features in the coveted Michelin recommended good pud food guide Camra pub of the year Is there actually any subject that you dont talk complete bollocks about.

Just back from a lovely week in the lakes, as usual staying in a canny little caravan on the Haven site in Grange over sands. Day 1 Tarn Hows Park at the top and take the waterfall route down to Yew tree farm for delicious Herdwick lamb baguettes. This has been a family favourite for the last few years and the delicious food at the bottom is worth the trek down and the strenuos hike back up to the top. Imagine the look on our faces when we got to the bottom only to find the farm had now closed its tea rooms!!! Day 2 Grizedale Forrest Quite simply a beautiful location to walk or mountain bike. Get there early and enjoy a delicious early morning fry up from the visitor centre before setting off. Day 3 South Lakes Wild Animal Park If you like Zoos this is a really nice little zoo. First time we've being and it was excellent value for money. Particularly good fun to Hand feed the Giraffes from the aerial walkway. Day 4 Grasmere and shopping Found a simply divine eatery in Grasmere called Tweedies based at the Dale Lodge Hotel. A little more than you would normally pay for pub grub but honestly it was outstanding. They also run an event in September called the Grasmere Guzzler over 3 days. The rooms look quite nice too and I can vouch for the real ale. Overall a lovely little break away and good weather to boot.

We must be fair to everyone – even the rich Prosperity masked deep social divisions. As the cuts bite, the fractures will widen unless the pain is shared http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/c...icle7125822.ece This does seem to be the way we are headed and its hard to know how this will play out 20 or 30 years down the line. The parties will only get closer and closer, politically and voting will be reduced to a sort of x factor politics, if not already. Labour and Conservatives have moved too close to the centre and I cant really see either party moving back to old stomping grounds. Im also unsure whether this makes governments better or worse ie the fact that we are not reeling policies from the left to the right, more tinkering on the edges. With regard to the defecit and planned cuts etc.... a commentator on the above article left this little story which I found amusing.

Yeah I saw the proto-facist cunt last night....he's blaming the electorate for the faults of the electoral system....he fuckin hates people,full stop, What a cunt....nothing to do with any of the 3 parties being too useless to elect then Tarzan? But as has been said many times, PR would probably make coalitions the norm rather than the exception. As quite a few expressed on QT last night, the Lib Dems will probably get a good kicking at the next election making a clear winner more likely. The big problem is that all three main parties are so close these days that there really isnt much of a choice. aint that the truth....but it didnt stop Hezza glowering at the audience as if theyd just planted a bomb in the hotel he was staying in...did you see the look of contempt on his fuckin face? I did but I think he's great. He's one of the old style politicians before spin who can debate there point really well and usually honestly and bluntly. A spade is a spade and they just get on with it without worrying about the spin like the current lot. There used to be quite a few on both sides such as Tony benn who just got it on!!!! Old Skool

Gardman Polytunnel Gardman have brought out a great steel framed polytunnel for £99. We got ours from Clays, washington but its also in highly gate morpeth. Its 3 metres long by 2 metres wide and about 7ft tall with a strong polythene cover over a very sturdy steel frame. A great buy at the price to allow for lots of toms, peppers etc. P.S. The picture definitely does not do it justice.

You usually buy them as 1 year or 2 year crowns and while they say that you can take some stalks when the plant is two, you are best waiting til its three years old and then basically take as many as you like. We bought 20 crowns off ebay for about £20 I think but they were much better, bigger and healthier than the ones in the Garden centres. We have decided to leave it this year and just start next year. They last for about 20- 25 years so its worth the wait. (especially if you've got a patch of land you can leave untouched for 20 years).

Debating The Miners Strike http://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.com...ers-strike.html

Yeah I saw the proto-facist cunt last night....he's blaming the electorate for the faults of the electoral system....he fuckin hates people,full stop, What a cunt....nothing to do with any of the 3 parties being too useless to elect then Tarzan? But as has been said many times, PR would probably make coalitions the norm rather than the exception. As quite a few expressed on QT last night, the Lib Dems will probably get a good kicking at the next election making a clear winner more likely. The big problem is that all three main parties are so close these days that there really isnt much of a choice.

Just watched this weeks question time which I thought was excellent. The angry new statesman man was well, angry. Simon Hughes, who I normally think of as an utter fruitloop, seemed to talk quite a bit of sense and Heseltine he was just simply brilliant as usual. He just tells it how it is. Basically telling the audience to stop whinging about the hung parliament cos it was their fault for voting that way.

David Cameron faces Tory revolt over 55 per cent rule The Times Based on this story it does seem a bit of a daft idea. As I said earlier if a government cant get its laws through parliament there seems little point in the government remaining. It sounds as though its going to get knocked back in parliament anyway. However, if Labour has put it in place in Scotland there must be some merit / reason for it which I cant seem to see.

The big problem with the arguments from libs and labs in this thread is your argument comes from a bias of evil Thatcherite Tories wanting to introduce policies to take everyones first born. They actually don't have any evil policies. There might be a few that are not everyones first choice, but none that are terribly evil ffs. I'm sure clegg and his mps have looked at the joint manifestos and thought while there are some differences, there are a whole host of things that they do agree on, even if the idea of how to achieve them are different. Haven't heard too many in this thread congratulating the Tories on restoring the retail pension link. You all have mass leazes mag syndrome. You should start concentrating on the policies not the hysteria.

Having been away all week I'm not quite upto speed with this little gem of legislation. Surely if all the parties decided to get together they could just vote down every law / bill so it would be a dead government anyway. Be interested to hear the "for" view when I get home. Also Renton taking the high ground about tradition etc , I'm sure when Blair got in he changed quite a few century old traditions pretty much straight away. Think one of them was something to do with reducing prime ministers questions and instead favouring his presedential style q&a sessions with the media.

Believe me, I truly want to be proved wrong. No offense, but I think you have to be a litte bit more sympathetic towards a total lack of trust towards the Tories up here after what went on the last time. Especially when our new PM let slip the North East's economy was 'unsustainable' and then didn't bother to come anywhere near here during the whole campaign. Hardly installs confidence does it? I'm not a stubborn twat though, I'm just a cynical bastard who would take a lot of convincing. A hell of a lot of convincing. how many on here actually know much about the decline of industry during the 80's ( not that I'm claiming too). But didn't they start with trying to modernise the coal mining industry but were fought tooth and nail by the unions? Was it just the nasty Tories or the fact that coal and shipbuilding was so much cheaper elsewhere. Maybe a good discussion which deserves it's own thread. Anyway off into the zoo so bye bye

I said earlier I wish them the best and i agree some of the bitterness towards the coalition is a bit strong. Not sure about your second sentence like. People expect it more than being happy about it. Poetic licence