Craig Sawyers

First cut the blue wire....

I had no idea she had got so old. You lose track when you listen to her old, but perfect recordings in her heyday that it was many decades ago. RIP Montserrat, a great vocal artist.

A truly great man. I didn't realise that he had coined the term "God Particle" for the Higgs Boson. Also proved the existence of two types of neutrino (there is now known to be three) way back, and confirmed that the weak nuclear force was parity-breaking back in '57. Not mentioned is that Richard Feynman was also in the speculation loop about parity breaking. When the news came out that experimental results showed that was the case, he was at CERN, and apparently jumped on the desk and did a dance of joy. IOW typical Feynman. RIP Leon. Not many of the original godfathers of particle physics left now.

Stone countertops - that sounds like the baker in you writing the specs. Puff pastry, tempered chocolate - all need those cold stone counters

I smell baking bread! Hey - I really needed that video Knucks

Thanks everyone. At times like this the support of the group means so much - you really are a great bunch. Carole's on her way to Copenhagen right now, to support Steve for the next couple of days. I'd be there too, but I've got contractors crawling all over installing a new en-suite bathroom, so I'm kind of stuck here. Damn. Sue was at home with Steve until Sunday, when a bleed (from the lung cancer secondaries) meant she was readmitted. And then it was just a matter of keeping her comfortable and sedated. She has known it was terminal for about four months when they found the extent of the secondaries (lung, bowel and adrenal), and was living with a breathing tube as a result of the tracheotomy and a feeding tube too. But she was a tough cookie, just didn't just give up, and kept her pithy sense of humour right to the last. And yes - as so many here have said - rest in peace Sue. I'll miss you, girl.

I mentioned most of this in Random Shit, but it is more appropriate here. RIP my sister in law Sue, my wife Carole's sister. After a long battle over the last year, first with cirrhosis and partial kidney failure, and then with rapidly developing cancer. She died peacefully under sedation in Denmark holding hands with her husband Steve two hours ago. I've known Sue since she was 16, and she made age 60. Carole is flying out to Denmark early tomorrow to support Steve, who is in pieces.

I used to have this thing for going for a run when there was a thunderstorm - I liked the drenching downpour (yeah OK - weird). I stopped then there was a simultaneous blinding flash and a BANG, and a smell of ozone. It must have struck very very close to me. I got home in a hurry. That was the end of my going running in thunder storms ⚡ ? ?

That really is a thing of beauty, Justin!

Happy belated too! Hope that was a great ribeye.

Happy birthday!!

Happy birthday! Have a great one!!

Jeeze - really? Ready made scrambled eggs? What is next - mircowave ready made toast? Pre-packed water? Hey hold on that one already exists

Yes you are right. But working men in the North East of England at that time did exactly that - work their socks off. So the idea of becoming a professional bike rider would have been laughable. Stan was a painter and decorator. A contemporary of Stan's in North Yorkshire, Brian Trippett said in an interview "I didn’t race in the Tour de France for the same reason. I was asked to twice, in 1959 and 1960. But it would have meant using up all my annual holiday." You get the drift. But now the world is different, and many of the excellent British riders who rode superbly back in the day would have a host of different opportunities now, particularly with the dominance of British riders in track cycling and grand tours. Opportunities have dropped temporarily since the UCI reduced the team size from 9 to 8 in an attempt to reduce the number of crashes. It has actually had no effect in that regard, so lets hope they increase the team size back to 9 and get more pro riders on the grand tours.

Just seen Carole's uncle Stan on the BBC 10pm main news. He's now 87 and is being treated for wet macular degeneration - which is what the news segment was about, and different drug treatments. But back in the day he used to cycle for England, 60-odd years ago. A fiendish climber, he is the typical light weight small built bloke. This was well before professional cycling, but he would have been a dead cert had he been in his early 20's now. He used to do 24 hour endurance races at a weekend while working. When he had kids and got to a normal work life, he didn't cycle again until he retired at just over 60, having not been on a bike for nearly 35 years. Then he got back to 300 miles a week, and in his mid 60's got his hour distance back to greater than 25 miles. His miles have dropped off a lot because of age, and eyesight - but he still gets on his competition bike most days.

Have a truly superb day, you tall geezer!

I have Astronomy Picture of the Day as my Chrome home screen. The phases of the moon was yesterday's APOD. Always fascinating. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html This one is a really weirdly produced one with an almost robot voice and fuzzy movie, but it describes what you would see if you approached the speed of light - if the speed of light was 1 meter per second. It shows how totally wrong sci-fi movie makers are - nature is a very strange place. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111018.html

Have a great day! Happy birthday!

Yup. That's me. A few years ago when I'd completed the LX521's.

Oh bugger. That has really knocked be back. I knew he was not well, but did not know that he was that unwell. RIP and godspeed SL - I built his first active design (published in Wireless World) back in the late 70's, and his last large-scale active design (the LX521), which I love and listen to daily. SL's website, a tour de force of loudspeaker design, is safe though - he handed the keys to that across to Frank Brenner (proprietor of https://www.magiclx521.com/ and an airline pilot) some months ago. I guess that might have been a hint that he was poorly.

It also depends on the threads being cut parallel in the bottom bracket. Not sure how that is done on a carbon frame. Threaded inserts bonded in? In any event, if the threads are not parallel and/or have a linear offset it is a manufacturing fault, and there is no alternative but a replacement frame.

Do you have a friendly machine shop with some metrology gear so the you can get the frame measured? There must be something very screwy around the bottom bracket so it should be easy to measure it.

Similar coronary dish is a specialty of the Auvergne region of France called Truffade. Thin sliced potatoes, duck fat, and lots of Cantal (a local) cheese. Some recipes chuck in cream too. Basic ratio is 4lbs of potatoes and 2lbs of cheese of that particular variety. It is absolutely delicious. And potentially lethal ?

Two or three years ago I bought a ceramic burr grinder. And either use a French press or an Aeropress. I've also got a milk frother. And oh man does that make killer coffee. Good luck on your way to coffee nirvana Dusty! Not as expensive a fixation as audio, but distinctly addictive all the same.

Oh yes - to all three!