Friday 28 February 2014

Fall Arrest

Prevention, restrain, and lastly arrest.

If working at height is not preventable, always use fall restrain before you have to use fall arrest.  Fall protection is for fall protection, not designed for rescue ease.

Thursday 27 February 2014

Disappearing Car Act

The traffic jams in Harrogate is often if not always going into hours.  Normal rush hours usually involves busy morning rush going into the city/town, and evening rush out of the city.  But in Harrogate, it is always busy going in, where have all the cars gone?

Wednesday 26 February 2014

Changeable Traffic

Harrogate traffic is quite changeable.  In a 15 minutes space of time, the traffic goes from moving to jam packed.  It is very hard to gauge when to drive on which route.

Tuesday 25 February 2014

Facebook to buy messaging app WhatsApp for $19bn

Oh great, now I know exactly what I am going to do after my free-year expires.  Find me on Line.

Monday 24 February 2014

When History Does Not Sell, Sell Chocolate


York has been attracting visitors with their rich history, and these days, history doesn't sell, lets sell chocolate!



http://www.visityork.org/chocolate/

Sunday 23 February 2014

Saturday 22 February 2014

Canada v USA always entertaining II

Canada vs USA women's hockey final is again very entertaining.  Canada staged one of the best come back.  Scored 2 goals in the last minutes, narrowly missed another USA goal to the empty net.

The Canadian men's hockey has also defeated Americans in the semi-final.

A good day for the Canadians and many devastated Americans.

Friday 21 February 2014

Tank Clean

Ever since Endee has a leaky fuel tank, I cannot stop worry about all the bike's tank.  Moisture, contaminant in tank will corrode tank, resulting in a leak which can set a running bike with a hot engine on fire.  Sludge forms overtime and clog up fuel systems; this is the apparently why my carburetor flooded..  I really should as for a tank clean more often.

Thursday 20 February 2014

Humble Stitching

Stitching is very humbling.  I had to replace a button on a pair of jeans and stitch up a pair of trousers.

The thought "just get a new pair" had crossed my mind.  For the small defect of a button and something repairable, it is not worth the price of new trousers.  So I feel poor and picked up my needles.

Tuesday 18 February 2014

First Ride of the Year

This is actually the 2nd ride of the year, but since the first ride had only one purpose in obtaining MOT, this ride was more purposeful.

After we discovered my flooded carb, all I had in mind is send little Rome for a carb strip clean.  This morning, it was not raining as forecast, so I hesitated on catching a bus and rode into work.  I went to my room and took the brand new helmet out of the box, and did not bother installing the pinlock visor.  Starting up little Rome with a full cylinder was difficult, but I have plenty of practice.  I rode into work in reasonable time and checked on her during lunch.  There was still a bit of leak.

I rang around to see who can take little Rome in this week for the strip clean.  Startright could not provide me with Suzuki parts and RaceHQ is on holiday, so I rang Genspeed.  Gary can squeeze me in this week, and I rode to York after work.

The ride was long and York ring road was horrible as always.  It was dark and rainy, Wetherby Road is unpleasantly windy as always.  The traffic was slow, and I tried hard to keep moving.  I don't want any fuel landing on a hot idle engine.  When I was filtering on York ring road, I heard this metal rattling noise, and I started to think, where was the noise coming from my bike, then I saw a scooter behind me, which explained the rattling noise!

I dropped off little Rome.  Gary said it is a common fault, and should be able to get her running on Saturday.

Genspeed is 2 miles from town, I missed a bus as I walked out of the trading estate.  I started walking into town and got the next bus, closer to town and probably cheaper.  Then I went to the train station, and my eyes popped out when the ticket to Starbeck was 8 quid!  Surely there is a cheaper way.

Next ride will be coming Saturday when I pick little Rome up and ride into Leeds.  Forecast is good.

Monday 17 February 2014

Flooded Carburetor

Gerry spotted a leak from little Rome, then I immediately checked her out.  It was not oil, it was fuel.  I had a quick look around, it looked like it came from the carb.  Gerry concluded it was a flooded carb, and he made it sounds like the bike will work itself out.  I started to worry about everything.  Carb clean, filter clean, inline filter, etc.  I will ring around tomorrow.

Sunday 16 February 2014

Dodgy Bread Machine

Gerry has a bread machine he has never used.  This weekend I tried it.  It did all the kneading and proofing, but when it tried to bake, it tripped the electric circuit, and it did not blow the fuse, very strange.  I had to reset the circuit as soon as I found out, so the fridge will not defrost.  I will probably not use the machine again...

Saturday 15 February 2014

Kitchen Apparently is not for Living

I got a telling off for doing my living in the kitchen.  Nevermind, I will do my living in my room.

Friday 14 February 2014

Canada v USA always entertaining

I caught a glimpse of the Women's ice hockey game.  It was very fast tempo and highly entertaining.  I don't anything less when Canada v USA in sports.

Thursday 13 February 2014

Sochi Gay Olympians

Allegedly there are only 6 openly gay athletes, and they are all women.  Where are the men?

Wednesday 12 February 2014

Here Comes the Snow

When I was walking home, I thought, where was the snow in the forecast.  Then I looked up, there it was.  They are good to look at, not so good to deal with the next day.

Tuesday 11 February 2014

Minority Awareness is not a Privilege day

Mark mentioned about the library has a LGBT awareness/day and started ranting about 'why do they have a special day/months to dedicate to, where is the 'normal/ordinary' day?'.

Neil joined in, and moments later turned into the discussion about race.  Neil had a colleague, who was very bad at his work, and the employer gave him special treatment and afraid of firing him.

The ordinary people has no idea what prejudices minority faces, and they have no idea it is a privilege not having to deal with the prejudices and offensive remarks from these ignorant ordinary people.

There are still a lot of education works to do on these ordinary people. 

Monday 10 February 2014

Broken Wrist

Austin was diagnosed as having a broken wrist, instead of a broken arm as he had originally thought.  In many ways, broken wrist is much worse than broken arm!

I take extra care to the fragile little bones in my wrist when I play tennis.  I have no doubt some of they are damaged, but lets hope I will never break my wrists, or any other bones.

I hope Austin gets well soon.

Sunday 9 February 2014

New Gear for New Season!

Perhaps I spend the most money this time of the year, my MOT, tax and insurance are all due this month.  Also this time of the year, motorcycle gear is often cheaper on ebay, as the actual season has not started.  I have got a new Shoei, a new pair of trousers.  I just need to get rid of my old gear and I will be sorted!

Saturday 8 February 2014

Frown Lines

I was looking out the dark window of the train, and saw my frown lines.  I must do something about it!

Friday 7 February 2014

Everything is "Bad for You"

When people just started going on about, "xxx is bad for you", their ignorance winds me up.

Why do people only read the headline and never read the body of the text, or try to hear more sides of the stories.

These people tends to be those refuses to put salt, sugar, oil, whatever xxx above, however their diet will probably have higher than normal salt, sugar, oil, xxx intake, as they are ignorant in general regarding what they eat.

A:  "Sugar is worse for you than fat."
Actual fact: it is only worse because they are hidden in many food, esp those "fat-free" versions.

A:  "I don't put salt in any food."
Actual fact: A often eats sausage sandwich in morning with sauce, ham sandwich for lunch.

B:  "Sugar and salt are worst for you."
Actual fact: one will actually die if either of these are excluded in diet.

Thursday 6 February 2014

Insanity

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein

Such as using the same user name and password to try to login a system, and failed every time.

Wednesday 5 February 2014

Pillows Required

I have been having bad sleeps, and I have concluded it was down to the horrible pillows.  I really must replace them.

Tuesday 4 February 2014

Biscuit Disappearing Act

Emma offered me a digestive before the meeting.  I asked if she wanted to see a 'biscuit disappearing act'.  She was puzzled, but I continued anyway.  I put the whole biscuit in my mouth, and ate it.

Ian complimented it being one of the sexiest thing he has seen.  And Emma tried, but failed.

Digestive is a good size for this act.  Others biscuits are too small to impress.  And I have plenty of practice on the Digestives for decades.  I am quite happy with my performance.

Monday 3 February 2014

Fat Gene

My dad always said my mother has the fat gene.  I might well have the fat gene.  Recent genetic has shown genetics has a part to play in various issues including exercises, up to 20% of the population will not improve their cardiovascular  performance.  In my experience, I experience slight and short-lived increase.  I am less worried about my fitness test, as I doubt my fitness has dropped much since last year.

Sunday 2 February 2014

Yoyo Upgrades Downgrades

The new lift software is proven problematic.  I was speaking with the tech support, and I had to downgrade and upgrade the software 3 times, and there is still an outstanding bug!

Saturday 1 February 2014

AUD is Finally Coming Down

After many years of awfully expensive Australian Dollar, it is finally coming down.  While this is happening, the GBP is doing well, I may swap them around.

I just wanted to check what is causing the shift, and there is an Australian News agent with a page dedicated to Australian Dollar!

http://www.news.com.au/finance/markets/australian-dollar