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Bear in mind im a live aboard.i set sail in the boat heading for the boat yard to get some diesel a journey of 3 mile or so..when i got there i realised i hadnt got the money out of my little tea pot to pay for the diesel..so i set sail back to the mooring..moored up..went inside the boat ..got my money ..came out of the front door ..walked to the back of the boat started the engine again and headed back to the boatyard..it was only when i was mooring up at the boat yard again that i realised what id done..

Not boaty, but... Need to replace fluorescent light in kitchen, one of the old ones with a big heavy inductive ballast and a metal case. Turn light off at wall, leave other light in room on so I can see (it's winter). Stand on chair in middle of kitchen, remove tube and cover. No volts between live and neutral, check -- previous owner was a bit of a bodger, best to make sure. Use electricians screwdriver to unscrew cables from terminal block, then big screwdriver to remove screws holding it to ceiling -- remove one screw, hold that end of fitting up with one hand while removing other screw. As second screw comes loose (and drops to floor) heavy fitting starts to drop -- quick, drop screwdriver on floor and grab fitting with other hand, Am now holding it overhead with both arms, hmm, it's quite heavy, let's lower it down gently. Mains cable (short) pulls through hole in fitting as I lower it, bare end touches metal case <WAAAAAH> push it back up quick, bloody cable's still live. OK, don't panic, let's screw it back to ceiling and go and turn power off at fusebox. Look down at screwdriver lying on floor, along with screws. Look up at heavy fitting, arms are starting to tremble under strain. No I can't let go and drop it, bloody thing will fall right on my head and it weighs a ton. I know, wife is upstairs. 'CAN YOU COME DOWN FOR A MINUTE?" "Why?" "I NEED YOU TO TURN THE POWER OFF" "Why?" "JUST COME AND TURN THE BLOODY POWER OFF!!!" Walks into kitchen. Looks up at me. Looks down at screws and screwdriver on floor. Laughs. Runs out and turns power off. Bodger previous owner had put light switch in the neutral...

If you look at https://kirkleescousins.co.uk/shoddy-and-mungo/, shoddy is generally pure wool, while mungo can contain some cotton and/or linen. Both shoddy and mungo were basically woollen waste, with the colour of the waste being one of the problems in its future use. The same problem was found in the cotton waste industry, where recycled cotton was used to produce condenser cotton. Uncoloured materials were best, and the cotton condenser industry produced low counts of yarn, often used for sheeting. The breaking up processes in both the wool, worsted and cotton waste industries reduced the staple length, the length of individual fibres, so waste materials were not usually found in high quality fine products. However, condenser cotton did produce good mule-spun yarn, with the action of the mule helping to ensure a very clean product. There were a range of different waste cottons, some ending up on boats. Rope manufacturers, such as Mansley's next to the canal at Leigh, would take beam ends, basically the warp ends left on a beam when removed from a loom after the cloth had been woven. Quite long lengths of yarn could remain on a beam, and this would be used to make cotton rope. Collieries were the main market as cotton rope did not create static sparks when used underground. Canal companies were another major market. White rope was made when the beam ends were uncoloured to make the best quality rope. However, some canal companies asked for a few threads of a specific colour to be added so that it was possible to identify their rope, and prevent it being stolen. I was engineer at the Helmshore Textile Museums, where we spun condenser yarn. The photos show the scutcher, one of the later preparation machines, and the mules on the first day they worked after being idle for several years. The mules, although built for condenser cotton, were more like those used in the woollen trade.

This berrichon came floating by during our trip of 1968. She was motorised and adapted for leisure use. Note the strings from the wheelhouse to the bow rudder, an arrangement beyond my personal understanding (We inherited a bow rudder on our later vessel Secunda and I never got the hang of it at all). Also seen on that trip were the railway sidings for the cement works at Beffes, next door to Marseilles-les-Aubigny. Ten years later, with Secunda as a hotel-barge, we were based beside these sidings, under the auspices of the hire-boat company Loire Line. Thinking it would be nice to have a bar for the Loire Line clients, Jim Clarke, the manager, pulled from the water one of the remaining wooden berrichons, which would otherwise be taken away for scrap. and sawed her in half to make the bar. It all ended badly as the only clients were the railway workers, who came in several times each day for a 'canon' as they were known, ie a tiny glass of vin ordinaire at the government-regulated price of, if I remember, 80 centimes in old money.

I left for a few years mainly initially because of the website changes, I couldn't find my way around so easily, but that seems to have improved, but also boredom and getting fed up with the bickering at the time. I then left boaty life almost, for over 4 years to care for my mother. She has now passed and I'm back on board in all senses, though not as involved as I used to be. There are still a good many names I remember, and a few i miss.

I'm not sure how serious your post was, but if you don't want the boat to rock you could find somewhere shallow and then put in sufficient ballast for the boat to sit on the bottom. Tam

The advantage of serial hybrid with a diesel genset is that the diesel engine can be run on biofuel until a viable alternative low carbon power source is available. I agree, that may not be hydrogen, but I'm also sceptical about the viability of installing a supercharger at every water point.

Not quite stupidity of the day but a long time ago I got married. OH HELL, she's seen what I've written. Ouch! That hurt! Put that poker down, you'll frighten the dog.

Heavily raining. Started engine, fitted tiller extension, ran up to untie front end, ran back to let go back rope, pushed back end out before stepping onto counter. So far ok. About to select astern to reverse out from mooring when I spotted cat smiling at me from towpath. Swore, leapt ashore, scooped up cat, ran to the front end as back had drifted too far for further heroic straddling. Climbed onto gunnel and edged my way back with struggling cat. Employed one free hand to alternatively fumble for hand rail, and then wipe the blood out of my eyes inflicted by cat enthusiastically wind milling his razor sharp scythes at me. Due to restricted eye sight and concentrating on restricting the squirming cat who was displaying not only a deep hatred for me but also a remarkable similarity to a dozen eels, I reached the engine 'ole where the hand rail finishes. Imagine my blind (literally) panic when I realised I was holding on to nothing. I reached out frantically to clutch onto a handhold and with short lived glee encountered boat pole. Couple walking by on towpath applauded my skills at tightrope'ish, cat juggling and enquired if there would be an encore? Laughing heartily through gritted teeth I achieved the counter while alternatively waving cat and then boat pole above my head, thus equilibrium was maintained. I peeled the cat off me like Velcro and unceremoniously projected him towards his bed opposite the stove ......... in which was casually watching me, our own cat. Upon arrival of the doppelgänger levels of activity and noise were accelerated to levels mere imagination would never have anticipated. After about 2 minutes of identical cats screaming at each other and bouncing of hanging plates I stopped in a bridge hole and ordered one of them to go ashore toot sweet and without ceremony. I never knew which one it was that slinked off without a backward glance, but the one that remained glowered at me all the way to Hemel Hempstead.

I've set off before now with the ropes untied, the engine running and no tiller extension in place.

Unless like many marinas it's a short pontoon only half the length of the boat. However then it makes more sense to moor bow in ?

I tend to agree with this and wonder if NABO are fighting the wrong fight. The bigger concern for me is will there be a system where you can cruise a small or big area and have confidence you can get back to your home moorings. In regard of the T&Cs, although I admit to not being very 'legal aware', Alan mentioned previously you have to look at the 'intent' which as far as I can see is to prevent boats with 'ghost' home moorings hogging the visitor mooring in a small area. To my mind CaRT can't manage the current CCer's use of visitor moorings in a small area so how will they do same for boat with a 'home' mooring. We have a very distinctive boat in our area which regularly overstays, sometimes for months, on visitor moorings in a very small area yet two club members with home moorings received CaRT overstay emails when in fact they were logged in the same 'place' on both the outward and return cruise to Rochdale summit.

More than a builders firm, they have a boating connection as makers of Belle Portable stoves.

Yes . It was a brief stop. They had driven up after work, planning on not using the car until 2 days later while it charged on the site. Dont get me wrong tesla type cars are the future, our friends are over planners, if there had been a local supercharger all would have been well. The infrastructure in rural australia is marginal for many things. However this is the biggest alpine tourist resort, with year round tourism.

It seems to me doing the ropes , operating a canal boat, going through a lock without moving a muscle might be a bit tricky.

I once had a Godin upright solid fuel stove which was good in that you loaded it from the top and could get a lot of coal in. However on one occasion I was a bit too over zealous, not helped by the fact that the vent got stuck in the open position and and consequently the fire and stove became unbelievably hot. Alarmed by seeing the fire roaring away and the fact I wanted to get to bed, I decided to douse the fire a little with water, and poured a jug full over it. Not surprisingly there was a huge amount of steam but it did the job and I was able to go to bed, only to find the next morning that the flue had become blocked as the doused coal had turned to cement. I had to spend the day with a hammer and chisel chipping away at it.