I love my motor, me, even though she's the most ancient, unfashionable, creaky old charabanc you're ever likely to see and she's had no less than ten owners before me. At least I look after her; I'm pretty sure some of those previous guys had little or no idea about maintenance! I've even heard it said that she's the last working model of her type.

She generally gets me and my friends where I want to go (not always on time, but never mind). I tend to avoid major roads, as she tends to get strange looks and I don't want to make anyone crash -- though a few years ago when I was in a rush I had to take her along the M4. Bloody hell, that was one nightmare ride!

Every now and again I've had a go at trying to make her look a bit more fashionable but it's pretty futile, really -- playing pimp-my-ride on something that old is never really going to do much good. Once or twice I've wondered whether to trade her in for something newer and more reliable, but I just couldn't; there's too much of me in her, and some would say, too much of her in me.

I just wish that bloody chamaeleon circuit would fix itself.
(Rise and Fall of the Atomic Cabbage Haven't you heard of suspension of disbelief?, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 15:34, 9 replies)

PDAs
I've tried six or seven different kinds of PDA over the years. I've had Palm Pilots, IPAQs, iPod touches, and Blackberries of all flavours. I even had a Newton once. In my years of needing to be reminded of meetings I reckon I've done a pretty good survey of the state of the art of these things.

So what do I use today, in the bright, sunlit, multi-touch, wireless sync future that we live in? That's right, a Filofax. It's perfect. I can write in it instantly, on any page, at any time, for any purpose. Mix to-do, appointments, doodles and reminders from the wife on the same page? Fine. Take a longer note? Flip to the Notes section. Need to know if I'm free second week of December? Riffle the pages forward until I'm there, takes a second. Forgotten how to get from the station to that random pub I'm meeting in, it's late and I don't want to stand on a street corner fiddling with an expensive mobile while it 'acquires GPS'? Flick to the printed map *while I'm still on the train.*

It's so incredibly easy and fast to use and it never needs charging. It even has a place for cards, receipts and bank notes. I love it. Everyone laughs at me, until I challenge them to tell me, using their phone, what they were doing 10 days ago. Tap tap tap tap tap tap they go, endlessly paging back through some hellish, rigidly divided, digital time-space, like insane prisoners of a binary jail.

Red-Porsche-driving, wine-bar-frequenting cocktards they may have been, but those yuppies were on to something. I love my Filofax and lots of other people must do as well, or they wouldn't still be in selling refills every stationery shop the world.
( Scrumper, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 15:29, 12 replies)

I'm a sucker for older technology
I've already mentioned lego, and my love for it. Only the older stuff though, the newer models suck major league donkey cock. I recently got into Mecanno though, and just got this little beasty:



Of course, do click for bigger!
( jim_bob can herd cats., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 15:02, 10 replies)

Miracle Gro
I've been using a old-fashioned technology for lo these many years - washable menstrual pads. Bought 8 for $30, soak 'em after using and wash in cold water. They're brilliant, and I don't spend $10 every month on plastic and cotton that would just go to the landfill anyway.

Also, the water they soak in? Have you seen the flowers in the front? Got some prize-winners this year. When my neighbors ask, I just tell them it's Miracle-Gro.
(Mma Aasvogel, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 15:01, 11 replies)

Remember the first mobile phones?
The blue ones that were more 'brick shit-house' than 'brick'. There's a tv doctor - not tranny (i think he's on morning tele), who still goes everywhere with his. It had a funny ring-tone and a big blue light when it rang..
(Hudekin ( . )( . ) - cos i can't use photoshop.., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 14:23, 11 replies)

Big Chest
My mother still uses the Electrolux deep freeze that she had when my sister was born. My sister is now 48.
It probably takes about 600w to run it though.
(iuiuiuat, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 14:04, 4 replies)

I use a nifty little thing called a mobile phone.
It's great for calling people when you're not near an ordinary phone, or I can even send text messages on it, if it's not a good time for a conversation! It has a handy clock on the screen, for if I forget to wear my watch.

Hmmm - what else? - oh, it can be an alarm clock as well, I think, but that's about it.

The only problem is that at times when I really should be interacting with the people around me (particularly New Year's Eve), it often gets stuck to my ear. This is usually ok, though - because no-one seems to notice any more.

Length, ~8cm

Honestly, you should try one of these little fuckers, they're great!
( blyerkit e k trilby, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 13:57, 1 reply)

Redundant technology?
My car comes with orange lights on the corners which I use to 'indicate' to other road users my intentions of turning.
( snee held his breath since, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 13:54, 9 replies)

Somone posted about that old book
The Book for Boys (or words to that effect). With the aid of that and Mrs Beeton's book, one could rebuild society after the apocalypse.
I wish to add to that proto-library of useful tomes with "The Home Workshop" from 1948, printed on quality paper that hasn't gone yellow over the years. It starts with woodworking etc and various projects are demonstrated by this gentleman.



You can see quite clearly how he has dressed in a casual manner for the task in hand as it would be folly to risk unnecessary wear on one's day-to-day attire. It would be quite prudent to replace your pocket watch and chain for an older one to prevent sawdust and other detritus from marring the finish.

The book features other handy projects such as forming and soldering a tin-plate cake tin, the making of a fold-away ironing board complete with nailed-on asbestos plate and how to make a handy meat-safe out of spare timber.

There is a wealth of mechanical tips also. However, these are best left to the more unrefined fellow.



See his shoddy overall, his boots suited to the labouring classes and his rum approach to smoking without a cigarette holder. He demonstrates how to overhaul the steering rack on a motor-car, lubricating the chassis and engine and how to lay up the vehicle for winter. There are also instructions on how to put on a gas-mask, seal your house from gas attacks and how to install a radio set.

This book has proved priceless for me, as I once built a pair of sawhorses and sharpened some chisels on an oilstone.

Warning: May cause improved diction and the need to speak like a Pathé Newsreel announcer.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 13:47, 6 replies)

For the last 25 years Clive Sinclair has been told consistently that the C5 was the worst invention of all time.
And so he says 'fuck the lot of you' and comes back with something that is basically a bicycle with a deckchair and a hat.



Edit: from the joyful dailymash.co.uk!
(Miraclefish How appropriate, you fight like a cow, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 13:04, 5 replies)

My girlfriend
Owned a Rampant Rabbit.

Hasn't needed it since we met.






(this post may be lies)
( scarpe We Stole Bikes, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 13:00, 4 replies)

My brain
I stubbornly refuse to enter any number into my mobile phones phone list. I prefer to memorise the numbers, to train my aging brain.

(i am 37).
(Robotnik, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 12:53, 3 replies)

My daughter
wanted me to get her one of those controllers for the Wii that you step on which measures your motions and conveys them to the Wii.

"What do you want that for?" I asked.

"So I can play Wii Fit and do the hula hoop and the stepping exercise."

I nodded, got in my car, drove to Wal Mart and bought a plastic hula hoop and a cinder block and told her to stop wasting electricity.
( Wanderer, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 12:50, 4 replies)

My husband.
(JellyBelly JellyBelly, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 12:46, Reply)

Mrs Vagabond and I have been known to
Play chess on an actual chess board, and cards with a deck of cards.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 12:31, 4 replies)

My first push-bike
I bought with my own money was a Raleigh Team out of my mum's catalogue as a student back in 1990. For an extra tenner, I could've got the Raleigh Banana, but it was exactly the same bike except for the decals. I put some serious mileage on that. Never anything long distance that was more than a day out, but still added up to many 1000s of miles. A common trip was the 15 miles or so to The Hare & Hounds pub in Leven in the evening. A couple of mates bought mountain bikes (which were still quite a novelty) about the same time and the racer vs mountain bike arguments were commonplace.

In 1998, when the only original parts were the frame, saddle and handlebars, I was cycling into town when some dozy bint in a Micra pulled out on me and I went clean over her bonnet. My frame actually creased with the force and that was that. It was only fit for the bin. Still, it left a nasty crease in the side of her car and a massive yet satisfying score across the bonnet. Not just a scratch either, a sizeable groove that would need filling.

I was gutted and I was nearly in tears when I got home. I loved that bike. After a couple of weeks of mourning, I consigned the bike to a skip.

About 6 years later, I came across this webpage.
www.simonmason.karoo.net/page470.htm

It can't be. Surely. The front forks were pushed back like mine were. Had someone dug it out of the skip, tarted it up and ridden about on it before dumping it on the mud? I emailed the guy. Alas, it wasn't the same bike. I had pink paint splashed under mine after riding through a spillage on the road. Also the frame wasn't big enough. Mine was a whopping 25 inches. Ah well.

A few months later, he emailed me back and asked me if I wanted it as he had bought a better bike. I jumped at the chance and he dropped it off. He didn't want anything for it, but I traded it for a crate of his favourite ale. I was overjoyed.

It needed a bit of work, but not much. I replaced the 10-speed gear cassette with a 12-speed, replaced the various cables and brake blocks and the gear shifters to indexed ones that click into place and it was as near as damnit to my old bike.

I was positively orgasmic. I took it for a spin around the block with a big stupid grin on my face. I had resigned to buying a mountain bike a few years previously, but this went like a rat up a drainpipe and could stop on a sixpence. I did forget how narrow the saddle was and the next day it felt like I'd been kicked up the arse to death.

My son's mates think it's fabulous but that's probably because such road bikes are rare nowadays and they all seem to be in excess of £500 in the shops. I've put many miles on it since, and unless some dozy cow in a Micra doesn't look where she's going, I intend to keep it on the road for many years to come.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 12:22, 18 replies)

I can spell.

(McChinaman banned, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 11:45, 6 replies)

In line with Vagabond's post below...
I've recently started getting back into the older Lego. I just put this baby together:



Ten hours and several nipped fingers it took to put that thing together, and I want more!
( jim_bob can herd cats., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 11:44, 4 replies)

Lego bricks
If you can tell roughly what part of the model they're meant to be, then they're new fangled ones and you don't known you're born, etc.

Also - one plays with one's Lego - NOT Legos.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 11:30, 4 replies)

I still keep my weed...
in a black plastic Kodak film canister.
*shows age*
( blaireau69 , the Cumbrian Travis Bickle., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 11:21, 19 replies)

Yibbo Stickeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Kinder eggs! I remember the days when you had to struggle to open the plastic yellow egg and when you eventually got it open all the pieces would fall out, you'd gather them up and set about the task of build something from the unknown. Nowadays there is an easy open egg and instead a one piece object and maybe a sticker to attach ( if you're Lucky!)....it's just no fun being 39.
( RudieSeventyOne The self styled king of un-originality since, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 11:03, 7 replies)

Can't believe more people don't use older technology.
I still use VHS, don't have a mobile phone, but I use the internet and listen to MP3's, I don't understand why the two can't/don't co-exist, I mean if I watch something on Blu-Ray fine, but what the heck is wrong with watching something on VHS.

Same with Music, MP3's great sure, but how ace is Vinyl and CD's!, just seems to me people cut there nose off to spite there face.

Old technology is awesome.
(Mitchell Gant, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 10:55, 1 reply)

found my old...
..flux capacitor sitting in the attic..

wonder where Marty went.
(wankymcwankwank Eels, tobacconists, hovercraft and bouncy bouncy., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 10:54, 1 reply)

I've just bought a Merkur Razor
I am a man now


www.traditionalshaving.co.uk/mall/productpage.cfm/traditionalshaving/_MER-90500001/268141/Progress-Adjustable-Safety-Razor-Chrome



I'm also bleeding to death at my desk after slicing into my carotid artery this morning.
(penrose your dog's got tits, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 10:46, 6 replies)

Damn you QOTW, damn you to hell.
I've shunned the idea of a Kindle ever since my housemate came back from America with a shiny new one. As she sat and extolled the virtues of it, I would raise one eyebrow thinking to myself,'Silly Septic, books aren't read from screens.'

This question of the week made me do a bit of research. I downloaded kindle for the PC, and now I want want want one. All the lovely books you can get. I must have one, but can you get one in Indonesia? Can you fuck.

Now everytime I go to Amazon, the picture of it sits there, mocking me.

Damn you QOTW, damn you to hell.
( The Awful Puppy Bakery is still bored, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 10:35, 10 replies)

On a serious note.
I would like to offer my sympathies to all American b3tards on this the anniversary of one of the darkest hours in your countries history.
(Tugnut I got them all..., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 10:08, 8 replies)

The good old days
I was looking at some old Time magazines and there was a wonderful advert for ASBESTOS "the material for a new generation"

There was a large photo of a man standing in front of a big mound of lovely fluffy asbestos, and joyfully throwing handfuls of this wonder material up in the air. Below there were diagrams of schools and furniture etc all made out of lovely lovely asbestos.

There ware also lots of adverts for Cigarettes. If I remember rightly Kensington’s aid digestion, and there was another that had been medically proven to ward off sore throats.

Although I stopped smoking 11 years ago, I still can’t shake my 20 a day asbestos habit.
( Ring Of Fire A petty, drooling belming butthurt retard., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 9:43, 9 replies)

I've just bought..
...about 20 cookbooks from various years and by various authors on Amazon...

I get free delivery cause I bought some other stuff at the same time..

but yes.. I use cookbooks - mainly for inspiration as I'm never going to actually let a book decide how many hoohas or chillies goes in my dinner.

my fave this far is a book consisting entirely of things to do with salmon.. so many ideas in there that I'd never have thought of. Any thing to break the monotony of eating the same 10 dishes over and over..
(wankymcwankwank Eels, tobacconists, hovercraft and bouncy bouncy., Tue 9 Nov 2010, 9:40, 2 replies)

My mate drives a 1969 Triumph Vitesse.
He chopped the roof off himself and put in a soft-top, and it's impossible to just get in it and drive off without him first just having to quickly adjust something technical. It's absolutely bloody awesome and more dangerous than Mrs Vagabond after an office party.

Sadly with the arrival of Mate Jnr, I would think that increasingly the peoplewagon they've just swapped Mrs Mate's Mazda MX5 for will be used rather more, but it's a sight to behold, and it has a beautiful, beautiful sound.

Cruising 'round Bristle with the top down, shades on, playing tunes out of "The General" - his 1985 double-cassette player that now has it's handle wired with a coathanger, the batteries kept in with duct tape, and the cassette tray held in with a paperclip? Yeah, baby.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 9:38, 1 reply)

I was live on Channel 4. I did not swear.
I was drunk, the tickets were free, don’t judge me (*).

I went to a Big Brother Eviction night (2006, the one where they put that annoying bitch Nikki back into the house to rekindle her showmance with eventual winner Pete) with a mate who worked with the boyfriend of one of the production team. We stood in the cage, behind Davina (you can see me very, very clearly on many of the bits that Davina does to camera); I wanted to see what a live TV show was like and it was actually quite impressive watching the evening’s events unfold.

But the bit that will stay with me, amongst all the cameras and lights and technical equipment is the doors into the house. When the contestants are released back into the wild to be lauded on the cover of Hello and Chav Monthly, they appear from behind the doors at the top of the stairs to a fanfare of boos and cheers and general alcopop induced hysteria.

And those doors are opened by two blokes on either side pulling on a couple of ropes. No fancy electronics, no remote control robots. Just ropes. I assume that’s because on a live TV schedule, there’s no room for anything to go wrong and ropes are more reliable, but it seemed incongruous amongst all the high tech chicanery.


(*) Okay, do judge me. There's really no excuse for that kind of thing. At least it's not like I admitted I once went and saw Barry Manilow in concert. Oh, hang on...
(Rakky (forgot her password) The muffin maverick, Tue 9 Nov 2010, 9:36, 5 replies)