Do you want to be more efficient in your kitchen? If your answer is yes then this post is written for you. Here are some tips which can help you in finding right appliances for your kitchen. There are many things which should be considered by a buyer before buying any type of appliances. The most common appliances which are used ion the kitchen are washing machines, table tops, refrigerators, microwave ovens, tumble dryers and dishwashers.If you are planning to buy some appliances then it is a good idea to look for a reputed online store like tiger chef. One should never forget to plan his or her budget. A budget is very helpful in saving some money. It is good idea to spend some time with your wife and kids. They can help you a lot in making the list of your requirements. It is a good idea to do some research. You should spend some time in from of internet. Internet can help you a lot in finding lots of useful information. Never forget to go through the testimonials of the past clients. These testimonials can help you a lot in making a perfect choice. Home appliances you are buying should be very durable so don’t forget to go through the guarantee and warranty of product. 

homeowners should not be afraid to experiment with bold colours when carrying out DIY projects, one interior designer has insisted.

Speaking to the Telegraph newspaper, Jill Scholes said people are often afraid to make mistakes, so shy away from vivid hues.

“They stick to neutrals,” she explained. “But then they end up with a bland interior without any identity.”

“What colour does is instantly define a room – you can walk into a space and feel it has personality.”

However, popery developer Steve Rigby expressed a note of caution.

“I do think colour can cheer you up,” he told the publication. “It’s very personal, though. You have to be sure you can live with it.”

Indeed, experimenting with colour does not mean choosing wacky combinations that will clash with the rest of the home and the furniture.

Designer Caroline Newsome suggested using colours that are opposite one another on the colour wheel.

She said such combinations often found in nature. For example, a blue sky at sunset streaked with orange and pink, or the greens and lilacs of spring flowers.

Posted by Barney Marshall
 

N.B. The information contained in this story is provided by the supplier and does not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of DIY.com” title=”DIY Tips, Project & Advice UK”>lets-do-DIY.com.

Grants to undertake DIY home improvements or pay for professional workers have hit the £1 million mark in Windsor and Maidenhead.

The Royal Borough has made the funding available to over-60s in the last two years, in a bid to make older homeowners more secure and comfortable.

Funding offered by the local authority has been used to complete tasks such as double glazing, wall and loft insulation, rewiring, repairs to roofs and installing energy-efficient solar panels.

Payment for new boilers and replacement kitchens has also come out of the loans.

Cllr Simon Dudley, lead member for adult and community services at the Royal Borough, said: “This loan scheme has proved extremely popular among senior borough homeowners and we have received many positive endorsements from borrowers and their families.

“Its success certainly reinforces our commitment to helping our more senior residents reap the benefits that home improvements can bring as they approach or enjoy retirement.”
 

N.B. The information contained in this story is provided by the supplier and does not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of DIY.com” title=”DIY Tips, Project & Advice UK”>lets-do-DIY.com.

Replacing doors and windows is becoming increasingly common for US homeowners, a new report has indicated.

The study by the National Association of home Builders (NAHB) found that difficult economic conditions have led households to focus on small changes rather than large-scale projects.

Figures from the organisation show that homeowners in America have been more inclined to spend on door replacements and window upgrades rather than total room remodelling.

However, kitchen refurbishment and bathroom renovations are still popular areas for home improvements.

“We expect the rest of 2010 to be a period of stabilisation for remodelling, with the first stages of recovery emerging by the end of the year, followed by a more robust recovery beginning early next year,” explained David Crowe, chief economist of the NAHB.

Last week, the UK-based National home Improvement Council announced that it expects to see a more positive attitude towards DIY home upgrades this autumn.
 

Posted by Thomas Morris 

N.B. The information contained in this story is provided by the supplier and does not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of DIY.com” title=”DIY Tips, Project & Advice UK”>lets-do-DIY.com.

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Throwing yourself off tall buildings is addictive, as Barney Ronay learns tagging along with Britain’s premier jumper

Thirty-six floors up on a tower block roof in the wee hours of a humid Thursday night the eastern fringes of the City of London look very different from the meandering claustrophobia of pavement level. Up here London becomes a series of peaks, an alpine illumination invisible from the daily gridlock. It is beautiful, frightening and unexpectedly quiet. To Dan Witchalls, Britain’s premier base jumper (the acronym stands for “Buildings, Aerials, Spans and Earth”), the skyline also represents a kind of panoramic 3D curriculum vitae. “See that. The stock exchange. Done that,” he says, as he busies himself with some final preparations. “Over there, The Shard. Done that. Wembley Stadium. We did that. Security got us when we landed on the pitch.”

This is a career hazard for the urban base jumper, a pursuit that involves entering tall buildings, usually at night and often illegally, and jumping from the top with just a small sky-diving parachute to ease your fall. A 10-year base veteran, Witchalls has also jumped off Nelson’s column, the Trellick tower and pretty much any central-London object you’ve ever found yourself squinting up at (only the Gherkin seems designed to remain unconquered: “The curve,” he shrugs. “You’d kill yourself trying”). Most recently he has taken a different kind of leap: sideways out of a cultish in-house notoriety into a more mainstream televisual fame. Along with his friend Ian Richardson he was the star of last month’s stunning Channel 4 documentary The Men Who Jump Off Buildings – although it turns out this is a slightly misleading title. Witchalls also jumps off cranes, bridges and cliffs.

It is a misleading title in other ways too. The urban jumper does much more than simply jump. He scouts buildings. He studies security arrangements. He reads the weather (strolling the darkened pavements Witchalls discharges in his wake a trail of small folded bits of paper, his wind tell-tales). He also breaks in: we gained access to our chosen rooftop disguised as Village People-esque builders; later, faced with a potentially catastrophic locked door, Witchalls somehow levered himself through a window 10ft off the ground and roughly the size of a letterbox. And so here we are at last, brooding above the night-time skyscape, only one of us with any thought whatsoever of taking the stairs back down. Up here Witchalls reminds me briefly of another London legend: Spring Heeled Jack, a mythical Victorian prankster-cum-outlaw said to have been seen leaping from roof to roof after dark.

In fact Witchalls is one of elite base jumping’s least shadowy figures and the sport’s most visible public face. Previous portraits have tended to emphasise the contrast between his vertiginous hobby and the amiable normality of his daily life as an Essex roofer; albeit one who prepares for a night of urban freefall by laying his parachute out on the bed in the spare room of the semi he shares with his girlfriend.

In the flesh there is still something quietly unsettling about him. Perhaps this is related to the covert nature of our meeting, which involved a set of illegal-rave style last-minute instructions that ended in the McDonald’s car park next to Canary Wharf. Secrecy is, of course, a necessary part of all this. “Base jumping isn’t illegal,” Witchalls says as we scope out a Docklands office block. “But it does usually involve trespassing. All these buildings are private property. They really don’t want you jumping off them.”

There is also, you feel, an element of theatre. Twenty years on from its initial public emergence in the 1990s base jumping still feels like an act of personal rebellion, aligned in spirit with other extreme activities such as free-running, and even skateboarding and the more pretentious kind of graffiti. It is tempting to muse on the philosophy of base jumping, its rejection of the tyranny of oppressive city architecture, and the urge to reclaim a hunk of privately outsourced urban space.

” I don’t know about that. I just like doing it because it’s fun,” Witchalls shrugs. And in the flesh he seems closer to an elite athlete – the same neat movements and disquieting air of self-possession as a footballer or a gymnast – than a tousle-haired free-thinker. He also appears to be in scandalously good shape, not to say extremely well preserved for a man who must be in his mid- to late-40s (it is hard to be more exact because he ignores the question when asked). What exactly are the qualities required of the top-rung base jumper?

“You need to have good reactions. But above all you just need to keep your nerve,” he says. “You only get one chance. You can’t make mistakes up there. I’ve seen enough injuries. I don’t want to end up banged up in some hospital bed with screws and pins holding me together. “

At this point it is tempting to ask the big question: why do it at all? Base jumping is an absurdly dangerous hobby. The real risk is not so much injury as death; most accidents are bad accidents. The many internet base jumping resources dwell on such technical topics as “entanglement” and “fatal malfunction”. In the last 29 years there have been 147 known deaths. A blog on the sport’s official website warns: “In my short time in this sport I’ve seen two life flight helicopters from the outside, two more from the inside, the back of a police car, several broken bones and a funeral. I’ve also spent three weeks in intensive care and 18 hours in neurosurgery. Are you sure you really want to do this?”

The short answer is of course: no. I don’t want to do this at all. Not only that, as we scope out a landing site, a scrubby patch of grass between lampposts, I’m starting to wish Witchalls had never taken it up in the first place either. “I never planned to become a base jumper,” he says. “I was into sky diving and I had a friend who did this. I came along one time, I watched him do it, but I never once thought it was for me. Eventually he said, ‘Go on, have a go,’ but right up to that moment I really didn’t mean to do it.”

In time, base jumping became something of a refuge from a pre-jumping past that had involved “clubbing, going out, all the rest of it”. “To be honest it saved me from all that. I was a bit of a party animal. I’ve got mates now who still go out a lot and I find myself saying no, I’m busy. I’ll get up in the middle of the night and do a jump and come back and my girlfriend won’t even know I’ve gone. Sometimes I think there is an element of addiction in it. But I will stop at some point. You have to.”

This will be a poignant moment. There is a sense that Witchalls might be one of the last of the old base breed. All this creeping about, the night-crawling and fence-hopping: it can’t really go on for ever. For a start, base itself is coming out from the underground and becoming quietly managed and formalised, a part of the extreme mainstream. Why break into a building in the middle of the night when you can go on a course and leap under the aegis of an accredited instructor? You can base jump on your stag do now or arrange an away weekend at some officially sanctioned rural platform.

“Yeah, maybe I could become an instructor,” Witchalls shrugs, looking unconvinced. “I’m not sure it’s for me. I wouldn’t want the responsibility if things ever went wrong. I don’t want to tell anyone to base jump. You’ve got to just want to do it.”

This was pretty much how base jumping started out, an underground hobby formalised for the first time in 1978 when a Californian called Carl Boenish made a documentary film of his wife and two friends leaping off a rock in Yosemite national park. Before long Boenish and his friends were jumping off bridges and electricity masts. They coined the guiding acronym. Word began to spread, undimmed by Boenish’s own death in 1984 jumping off a bridge. Some headline moments followed: in 1985 the James bond film A View to a Kill brought base its first big screen appearance, a villainous chase-scene leap from the Eiffel Tower. Five years later the sport made waves in the UK when an Englishman called Russell Powell jumped from the Whispering Gallery inside St Paul’s, a mind-bogglingly short drop. Two years ago Hervé Le Gallou and an unnamed man from Darlington jumped off Burj Khalifa in Dubai, the tallest building in the world (Le Gallou was caught trying to repeat the jump and was detained by police for three months).

It was from these Californian roots that base jumping’s venerated numbering system sprung: you can apply for an official “base number” when you’ve carried out all four genres of jump successfully (ie without dying). Currently around 1,400 base numbers have been allocated. But it really is just men jumping off buildings. Even the sport’s governing acronym, with its “S” for “span” (instead of “B” for “bridge” – narrowly avoiding the furrowed humiliation of “babe jumping”) tells a story. Witchalls can’t recall a single regular female jumper. His girlfriend, a fellow sky-diver, has yet to join him on a base jump. With its Batman-like nocturnal solemnities, it seems that in base the lone male has uncovered an extreme, adrenaline-fuelled form of shed-hiding or allotment-lurking.

It is only 36 floors up on the roof just across from Tower Bridge that this solitary aspect of base jumping becomes clear. After a brief hunched pause during which it seems Witchalls might be saying a prayer or silently psyching himself up – but is in fact simply fiddling with his harness – it is finally time for the man who jumps of buildings to jump off a building. “Come over here and watch,” he says, indicating the outermost six inches of unfenced tower block roof.

I’m crawling towards the ledge just as he calls out, “See you on the ground,” with the air of a man about to pop downstairs for a Pot Noodle. And there he is, off into all that empty air, falling incredibly fast and alarmingly close to the face of the building. After a stomach-ripping second or so of rapid descent his parachute billows and in a gentle, expert parabola he floats away from the jutting brickwork and eases towards the drop zone. Touchdown is witnessed by a group of transfixed night-time strollers. From the rooftop it looks as though they’re clapping.

Ten minutes later, having fumbled through fire exits and over pigeon netting, hard hat inexpertly in place, I find Witchalls sitting on a bench, chute already packed. He seems replete now, and ready for a snatched few hours before the day’s roofing rolls around again. One thing seems sure. He won’t be back on the ground for long. Keep looking up and you might just catch a glimpse.

• Cutting Edge: The Men Who Jump Off Buildings, is on More 4 on 29 August.

]]> http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/08/base-jumping-is-absurdly-dangerous-%e2%80%93-so-why-do-it/feed/ 0 http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/08/flip-and-volcom-team-in-thrilla-in-manila/ http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/08/flip-and-volcom-team-in-thrilla-in-manila/#comments Sun, 08 Aug 2010 11:04:51 +0000 sales http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/08/flip-and-volcom-team-in-thrilla-in-manila/
Its almost the weekend and we no your itching to run out the office doors at 5, so whatever your plans maybe, hang on in there, but in the meantime, here’s an awesome clip featuring the team from ‘Flip and Volcom’.Watch David, Luan, Louie and Willow in the ‘Thrilla In Manila Tour to the Philippines.]]>

Its almost the weekend and we no your itching to run out the office doors at 5, so whatever your plans maybe, hang on in there, but in the meantime, here’s an awesome clip featuring the team from ‘Flip and Volcom’.Watch David, Luan, Louie and Willow in the ‘Thrilla In Manila Tour to the Philippines.extremepie/News/~4/xRj9hVjRB4w” height=”1″ width=”1″ />

The best pictures from Nettle Warrior 2010, from men in thongs climbing walls to Smurfs taking a mudbath

]]> http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/nettle-warrior-2010-pictures-from-the-race/feed/ 0 http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tough-guy-nettle-warrior-2010/ http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tough-guy-nettle-warrior-2010/#comments Mon, 02 Aug 2010 12:36:11 +0000 sales http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tough-guy-nettle-warrior-2010/
extreme sports Rachel Dixon guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds]]>

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Torture Tunnels, Death Plunge, Stalag Escape … these are just a few of the obstacles tackled by competitors in the Nettle Warrior race. Would ‘wetneck’ Rachel Dixon go the distance?

Gallery: The best pictures from the event

I am crouching beside the Torture Tunnels. Groans escape the entrance hole, punctuated by shouts of pain. A wave of panic washes over me, but I’ve come this far; I can’t give up now. I take a deep breath and drop down into the muddy gap. As I start to drag myself through a narrow concrete pipe, in the pitch-black, a woman screams: she’s just been caught by an electric wire, invisible in the darkness.

This is Nettle Warrior, the summer version of Tough Guy, an endurance event in Perton, Staffordshire. Like the original, which takes place in January, Nettle Warrior involves a gruelling cross-country run and assault course. Unlike Tough Guy, competitors don’t have to deal with sub-zero temperatures. To compensate, they go twice around the assault course instead of once, spend more time submerged in muddy water, and tackle 7ft stinging nettles. Suffice to say, it’s no walk in the park.

The organisers conjure an aura of terror in the build-up: the race is billed as the “most dangerous test of mental and physical pain, fear and endurance” in the world. We had to sign death warrants before competing, were inundated with warnings about hypothermia, tetanus and ‘flesh rippers’, and were emailed tales of past participants’ terrible injuries. The scare tactics worked: I was petrified.

The macho nature of the event is also hyped up. Officials wrote our race numbers on our foreheads in marker pen. On successful completion of the race, Tough Guys are permitted to shout “Yohimbé“, which apparently translates as “My dick’s bigger than yours”. Women are vastly outnumbered by men, and tend to be accompanied by solicitous male partners.

However, as many readers pointed out when I wrote about my training regime, Tough Guy/Nettle Warrior is not really terrifying at all (provided, as tomlozethwaite put it, “you don’t mind heights, fire, water, mud or confined spaces. Or barbed wire. Or nettles”), nor is it an ultra-serious test of fitness. The first clue to this was the gang of guys dressed as Smurfs. And the women dressed as fairies. And the man wearing nothing but a thong … It is a challenging test of endurance, though, and above all it is a lot of fun.

In the moments before the cannon fired to start the race, I was overcome with a kind of grim resignation. The start is staggered, and as a ‘wetneck’ (first-timer), I was at the back of the pack. When I finally crossed the starting line, I half-ran, half-slid down the steep slope and set off through what resembled a minefield (they were actually flares, but created a convincingly smoky warzone effect).

As a very reluctant jogger I had dreaded the cross-country run more than anything else, so I was probably one the few competitors to actively welcome the pits filled with muddy water that greeted us almost immediately. Anything to break up the run. When I emerged, soaking wet and caked in filth, and ran on feeling twice as heavy as usual, I did rethink my enthusiasm somewhat. But with more than 2,500 runners the trail ahead quickly filled up, and soon there were more bottlenecks than clear runs, allowing plenty of chances for a breather.

This quickly emerged as a theme: get wet and muddy; queue for a bit; run when you get the chance. Luckily, the weather was kind – overcast but warm. In January, it must be a different story. As previous competitors had warned me, it’s nearly impossible to get ahead of the pack and finish in a fast time unless you start near the front. For most, though, the challenge is merely to complete the event, not to try to win it. As the founder, Billy Wilson (aka Mr Mouse), said on Sunday: “It’s not a race, it’s an event – it’s for people to come and challenge the Tough Guy course. Everybody here is a winner.”

The slaloms, a punishing series of hill runs, are infamous in Tough Guy circles, so I was relieved to run up and down them with ease … or so I thought. In actual fact, they were just the warm-up hills. I defy anyone to tackle the real slaloms with anything approaching ease. Imagine a sheer hillside. Now picture yourself climbing up and running down it, again … and again … and again. I think there were around a dozen slaloms in all, though it’s hard to be sure – by the end I was a little delirious.

The rest of the run was a breeze in comparison: crawling under nets and jumping over giant hay bales were nothing next to those hills. That is, until we reached the mud slaloms. Similar to the hill slaloms, these involved sliding down a muddy bank into pond full of filth, clambering out again – with great difficulty if, like me, you’re somewhat vertically challenged – moving down the bank, and repeating. And repeating. And repeating. It was at this point that the utter pointlessness of the whole endeavour hit home to everyone, and people reacted in one of two ways. They either embraced the futility, as I did, and doggedly ploughed on – or they cheated. In fact, from this moment onwards the cheating – mainly skipping obstacles – was rife. Not that I’m bitter …

On a more positive note, this was also the point that the legendary Tough Guy spirit was revealed and everyone started helping everyone else, offering leg-ups out of ponds or holding out a helping hand from the bank. The whole race was notable for its camaraderie and cheerful, ‘we’re all mugs together’ atmosphere.

Slaloms over and nearly two hours in, I finally hit the assault course. Obstacles came thick and fast: the Colditz Walls, the Behemoth, the Dead Leg Swamp, the Stalag Escape … The indoor climbing training I had done came into its own as I tackled the intimidatingly named A-frames, cargo nets and rope crossings. The only hairy moment came when a particularly tall man chose the same roped route as me, stretching the two ropes so far apart that I almost lost my grip and fell headlong into the waiting nettles.

My favourite obstacle was, contrary to its disturbing name, the Death Plunge. This involved walking the plank, plunging into the lake below, and swimming to shore – tremendous fun. The obstacle I had most feared, the Underwater Tunnels, had been replaced this year with some simple log ducking, which was both a relief and a letdown.

I was thankful for my small stature on several occasions. The aforementioned Torture Tunnels were agony for the legions of large, muscular men dragging themselves on their bellies through a very confined space, but relatively easy for anyone who could fit through on their hands and knees (I even managed to avoid the electric shocks). Ditto the crawls through tyres and under barbed wire.

A lake-based log carry and a rafting challenge are unique to the summer event. Some competitors were shivering thanks to the prolonged immersion in the cold water, but I’d taken up kayaking as part of my training and become accustomed to it, which was a big help.

On my second circuit of the assault course the runners thinned dramatically, leading me to conclude that either a) a lot of people had dropped out, b) a lot of people had skipped the second lap, or c) I was very slow. I think it was probably a combination of all three.

I didn’t have much time to worry about it as I slogged my way towards the end, leaping up and over the Anaconda as I went. There was just time for one more crippling hill climb, one more slide in the mud, and one more soaking in filth before I rounded the corner and made a break for the finish line. The relief was immense, but so was the sense of achievement. Yohimbé!

My top tips for Nettle Warrior

Train harder than you need to. I had no ambitions beyond completing the event without injury, but I trained hard: boxing, climbing, kayaking, running, cycling, strength training, yoga, team sports … This made the event itself pretty easy, and dramatically sped up my recovery.

Work on your balance, grip and core strength. You’ll need them all for the assault course.

Enter with a friend or a group. I was on my own, thinking that I wouldn’t want to hold someone back, or be held back myself. In actual fact, the bottlenecks mean it’s easier to stay together than to go it alone. Unless you’re ultra-competitive, it’s more of a fun challenge than a race, and most things are more fun with two.

Plan ahead. If you do want to compete with the frontrunners, pay extra for a better start position. Failing that, get fit enough to sprint the first section of the run to overtake the crowds. By the time you get to the slaloms, it’s too late.

Wear gloves. This was a piece of last-minute advice kindly emailed to me by reader Chris Pile. I opted for fingerless cycling gloves and they were invaluable. Otherwise, as Chris pointed out, “The wet ropes will rip up your bare hands.” Ouch.

Take a supporter. Supporters can get close to the action, so they can ply you with jelly babies and sports drinks when you need them, and take lots of embarrassing pictures.

Have fun! Nettle Warrior allows you to be a kid again: you get wet and muddy, feel unfathomably proud of yourself, and go to bed tired but happy. What could be better?

Over to you

I’m really interested to hear how my experience of Nettle Warrior tallied with that of other competitors. Did you compete in this year’s event? How was it for you? Perhaps you’ve done it in past years, or maybe you’ve braved the January version?

I’m also looking for a new fitness challenge, preferably one that combines pain with fun, rather than anything deadly serious – think Total Wipeout or Gladiators, not the Marathon des Sables. Any suggestions will be gratefully received.

]]> http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tough-guy-nettle-warrior-2010/feed/ 0 http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tv-review-the-men-who-jump-off-buildings-and-californication/ http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tv-review-the-men-who-jump-off-buildings-and-californication/#comments Mon, 02 Aug 2010 12:36:10 +0000 sales http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tv-review-the-men-who-jump-off-buildings-and-californication/
extreme sports Documentary Sam Wollaston guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds]]>

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If you are going to become a base jumper, it’s best to become a very good one

To most of us a building might be a thing of beauty, or a monstrous carbuncle and an excuse to meddle. Or something to be indifferent about – just somewhere with an inside to live in or work in. For Dan Witchalls, a building is a potential launching pad, because he is one of The Men Who Jump off Buildings (Channel 4).

He gets up in the middle of the night, leaving the warmth of his nice Danish girlfriend and sneaks out of the house. He has various ways of getting into places: subterfuge; climbing; disguises; sometimes simply paying off a resident or taking a room if it’s a hotel. Once inside, he works his way to the top, out on to the roof, and then he leaps off, freefalling for a few seconds, before opening his parachute. It’s called base jumping and it makes no sense at all but is somehow absolutely beautiful – as is this film.

Dan, like a lot of adrenaline loons, isn’t the best at putting the experience into words. He admits it can be hard getting out of bed in the middle of the night, but says: “If I do get up, and go out and do the jump, I’m glad.”

“Why?” asks his mum.

“Because I am.”

“But why?”

“Because it’s what I do.”

Brilliant, thanks Dan. His poor mum: are there any words a mother wants to to hear less than: “Mum, I’ve taken up base jumping”? It’s like: “Mum, check out my powerful new motorbike” only 10,000 times worse because base jumping is basically Russian roulette disguised as extreme sport.

Dan has a friend, Ian Richardson, who is better at explaining things, such as the close bond base-jumping buddies form. “You share incredibly intense moments, things that you don’t experience in normal friendships,” he says. Together they’ve jumped off some of London’s best known landmarks – Centrepoint, the Shell building, Trellick Tower, Wembley Stadium. Nelson’s column is my favourite. “I see no ships,” one of them says, standing next to the great man, before making the plunge. It’s nice to have something swooping down from the sky in Trafalgar Square, now they’ve got rid of the pigeons. (Do not feed the base jumpers.) Then they run off giggling like naughty schoolboys to avoid being apprehended by the law.

Ian’s problem is that, while he might be better at the words than Dan, he is less good at the jumping. One day his parachute opens the wrong way around, and he comes down facing the building, bashing his head into it all the way down, like a woodpecker on fast rewind. That was in Benidorm; I guess high-rise resorts are a base jumper’s dream holiday destination.

He gets away with that one, with a lot of broken bones – which is luckier than Dan’s first partner, who was killed. Base-jumping partnerships don’t last long. Ian spends a lot of time mending, and then Dan takes him on holiday again, to Switzerland, to jump off cliffs (note to self: if a man called Dan with a pack on his back and a cheeky grin ever asks me on holiday with him, I’m busy).

Cliffs can be tricky, because they don’t always go straight down, so you have to fly outwards, too. And guess what, Ian gets it wrong for the second time, ends up a bag of broken bones all over again, alive but only just. Ian! Think about it, man: do you think there might be a lesson to be learned here? You’re just not very good at it, and base jumping is not a good thing to be not very good at. Stop it, now, before it’s too late. Please.

In a road-rage incident between a driver of a Porsche and the rider of a bicycle, the correct person to side with is the cyclist, obviously, regardless of what actually happened. A Porsche driver is a cock, fact. So why am I on his side in Californication (Fiver)? Because he’s David Duchovny’s character Hank Moody. And although caustic Hank – a writer who’s dried up up there, but not down there, if you know what I’m saying – is a bit of a cock, there’s also something immensely attractive about him. The ladies certainly seem to think so, and fall over each other trying to get into bed with him, even though he sometimes nods off on the job.

If you haven’t got into Californication, now starting its third series, you should give it a whirl. It’s sharp, funny, sexy, wicked and the characters – especially Hank – have proper depth. Plus it’s made a lot of good people – Christian groups etc – very cross. What’s not to like?

]]> http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/tv-review-the-men-who-jump-off-buildings-and-californication/feed/ 0 http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/freeze-festival/ http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/freeze-festival/#comments Mon, 02 Aug 2010 12:36:04 +0000 sales http://www.twopper.co.uk/2010/08/02/freeze-festival/
Freeze Festival is back once again this year for the third year running. Taking place at London’s Battersea Power Station on October 29th – 31st.Its an amazing snow sports and music festival featuring the best skiers and snowboarders who compete on a specially erected 32m high, 100m long real snow ramp. Riders including Olympic medalists [...]]]>

Freeze Festival is back once again this year for the third year running. Taking place at London’s Battersea Power Station on October 29th – 31st.Its an amazing snow sports and music festival featuring the best skiers and snowboarders who compete on a specially erected 32m high, 100m long real snow ramp. Riders including Olympic medalists Danny Kass, Peetu Piiroinen and Scotty Lago compete in the extremepie/News/~4/BVmJfj37Xk8″ height=”1″ width=”1″ />

Keep your eyes peeled out for the Globe X G Shock Collection coming soon to extremepie.com.Globe are doing this awesome collaboration with G Shock watches where you can get your hands on the G-Shock DW5600GLB-7 Watch in a classic white body and white casing with contrasting black screen and gold detail, with a High-Top Shoe and Cap. The Limited edition G-Shock x Globe Collaboration is being extremepie/News/~4/YEXKtnP3anU” height=”1″ width=”1″ />

Are you looking for some information regarding restaurant equipment and supplies? In this post you will find some basic information about the supplies which are used in restaurant and kitchen. Supplies in the kitchen are used for food preparation as well as preservation. Most common equipments used in the kitchen are cutlery, food processors, dishwashers and refrigerators. High quality supplies play an important role in the functionality of the business. Electrical units and utensils used in the business should be of high quality. Business owner should never compromise with the quality of the products.

One should be very careful while shopping for these supplies. It is a difficult task to buy high quality units. It needs lots of research and hard work. One should spend some time on the internet as internet shopping is getting more and more popular. There are several things which should be considered by a restaurant owner. One should never forget to plan a budget in advance. Budget is always helpful while shopping. You should know all your requirements. I would recommend you to spend some time with your staff members. They can help a lot in making the list of all the restaurant equipment needed in the restaurant. 

appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/how-to-design-a-kitchen-15.jpg” title=”how-to-design-a-kitchen-15.jpg”>appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/how-to-design-a-kitchen-15.jpg” alt=”how-to-design-a-kitchen-15.jpg” />When you shop for kitchen supplies and kitchen equipment appliances then you must be careful not to end up paying more. At TigerChef  you will find great prices and service.

Here are some tips to buy quality equipments at an affordable price.

Bulk purchase – This might seem to be quite unreasonable at times. However, it helps you to save a lot of money. You can avail huge discounts as a part of your bulk purchase.

Buy equipments with NSF sticker – NFS or National Sanitation Foundation is a certification that certifies kitchen equipments for their food preparation safety and efficacy. The blue sticker on these supplies indicates that they are suitable for kitchen purpose.

Research before investing on a brand – If you are thinking of investing a huge amount of money on branded kitchen equipments, it is good to collect important information regarding the manufacturers. Look for a reputed and reliable supplier who has immense experience. These suppliers provide you quality product and warranty on the products.

Buy quality products – When purchasing kitchen equipments, don’t concentrate on the offers and discount schemes. Rather ensure the quality of the product. Remember never to sacrifice the quality of the products for savings.

Compare used with new equipments – If you are planning to save money, it is good to buy second-hand or used equipments. There are many suppliers who deal with companies that offer second-hand supplies. So inspect the items thoroughly for their quality.

It’s always advisable to follow certain tips to shop for kitchen supplies and kitchen equipment so that you don’t compromise on their quality.

appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/energy-star-appliances.jpg” title=”energy-star-appliances.jpg”>appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/energy-star-appliances.jpg” alt=”energy-star-appliances.jpg” />Home appliances play a vital role in adding that extra beauty to the home and they add a different level of comfortness in life. With the onset of technology, there have been many kinds of improvements in the home appliances and their products. Starting from the television, radio, microwave oven, iron box, washing machine, dishwasher, drier, and toaster and there are many more products to be named. Refrigerator plays a vital role among all these home appliances. Most of these products run on electricity and one should be careful enough to save electricity thereby reducing the usage of these appliances. Refrigerators are considered to be brainchild of technology. It is mainly used to store the food items to avoid the attack of any kinds of pathogenic bacteria. Food items become unpalatable when infected with these micro organisms which might result in food poisoning. Hence, it is important to place the food items inside the refrigerator as they keep the food items safe. There are many kinds of refrigerators available in today’s market with various features installed. The double door refrigerators are the most popular ones offering enormous amount of space to stuff all the items.

appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/pizza-oven-combo.jpg” title=”pizza-oven-combo.jpg” mce_href=”http://homeappliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/pizza-oven-combo.jpg”>appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/pizza-oven-combo.jpg” alt=”pizza-oven-combo.jpg” mce_src=”http://homeappliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/pizza-oven-combo.jpg” />Cooking can be a hectic job after a tiresome day at the office. The innovation brought in the kitchen equipment led to the rise ofovens/N~30″ mce_href=”http://www.ajmadison.com/b.php/Wall+ovens/N~30″> microwave ovens. Cooking is made lot faster and tastier which will save time and money. The fundamental process involved is dielectric heating. It passes non-ionizing microwave radiations at a frequency range of 2.45 GHz. These radiations are observed by the food molecules. They are treated as the normal heat energy by the surface molecules present in the food item. It is scientifically proven that cooking in microwave oven is better due to the better reach of heat waves than the conventional system. ovens with lesser frequency range and higher penetration levels will yield better results.

Choosing the right kind of microwave oven is a daunting task. The factors to be considered are the power levels and the defrosting levels. The amount of microwave radiation inside the appliance will be quite normal and standard in all the ovens. The latest ovens come with an inbuilt inverter which can help in cooking even when the power is off. People choose this kind of ovens for their ideal cooking.

appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/country-kitchen-cabinets-018-p.jpg” title=”country-kitchen-cabinets-018-p.jpg”>appliancesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/country-kitchen-cabinets-018-p.jpg” alt=”country-kitchen-cabinets-018-p.jpg” />Do you feel bored to look at your kitchen? You might not be happy if it does not have any life and does not look attractive anymore. It’s the same feeling for every human being. Here are some simple and effective tips for you to redecorate your kitchen.

• Use painting colors that will create an illusion of space in the kitchen.

• Use the cabinet styles and try to accommodate all the appliances that are handy in it. This will leave a lot of space in the kitchen. Try to have glass doors for the cabinets which will give ultra modern look and avoid the feeling of congestion or over dumped.

• Choose the color of wall painting and the cabinet colors to be the same. So that nothing will look to be odd.

• Employ diagonal patterns on the floors and employ shiny work surfaces.

• Do not place any items over the refrigerator and remove all clutter.

·        Place adequate number of windows for ventilation. An exhaust fan is very essential. Have a window placed opposite to the window that will fetch more of natural light in to the kitchen.

The above said tips will definitely help you to bring ethnic beauty to your kitchen.

Since I’ve decided to race in a few legs of the Scottish Cross Country Series this year I suppose I should think about some sort of bike” target=”_blank”>mountain bike training….

Of course, rather than getting out and doing some exercise I thought it would be far more productive to spend a good couple of hours sitting on my ass researching bike training programmes – far more useful doncha think? Well, the guys over at bike Radar have put up some good tips which I thought I’d post here as they cover not only the practicalities of training – what, when and how long on the mountain bike – but also an interesting article on how to get motivated to actually go through with it, something which I stuggle with more than the training itself.

Check out the motivation article here: http://www.bikeradar.com/mtb/fitness/article/training-get-fit-for-mountain-biking-part-1-25335

To be fair, many of the tips from the mountain biking pros are pretty common sense, but it’s always good to be reminded, and just reading it gave me a bit of a motivation boost so it’s worth a look.

So, once you’ve got your motivation – what to do with it? The second part of the bike Radar article details some handy tips and a few little games that you can play with your mates when out on the bike just to get you working. The programme they’ve listed at the end looks pretty decent too so I’m gonna have a go at it over the next month in preparation for the Contin leg of the Scottish Cross Country Series on the 25th of April. Have a look here for the programme itself: http://www.bikeradar.com/mtb/fitness/article/training-get-fit-for-mountain-biking-part-2-25374

I’d love to hear of any other training programmes that people have found useful for their mountain bike fitness. I tend to get bored pretty easily so I’ll no doubt be tired of the bike Radar one within a fortnight!

Technorati Tags: mountain, bike” rel=”tag”> bike, biking, training, programme

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