Wittenham

that was a nice trip down memory lane: at 29:57 it passes the flat i lived in when first married. The area had fewer flats on the canal then. I used to regularly cycle/run that route to my job on Gray's Inn road. Sometimes ran the other way [to Limehouse], but too many rocks thrown from bridges or the other side of the canal... Thanks for sharing.

I expect next time he will think twice. He did stay dry, though.

Like most here, it has been a mixed bag for me. But my boating is with a paddle and I have met a fair few fishermen who are not fans of kayak races.... Others are friendly enough. Except for the one that punched my dog when the dog took a sniff of his maggots.

that is helpful, thanks. There was some debate in our group as to whether it spelled DIS or D/S. I was wrong...

out for a [socially distanced...] walk on Sunday, somewhere near Kidlington. I came across some low height metal signposts on angled iron. One angle had D, the other S. Maybe it was a spacer, maybe it was an I between the two. Any suggestions on what they mean?

I have ice skated on it, but did not pay much attention to the locks.

I have seen the same, even when the links were specified [and paid for] to be physically redundant. A surprising number of 'simultaneous outages' for 'allegedly' redundant routing: https://www.silicon.co.uk/networks/broadband/google-offline-fibre-cables-cut-325443

The [public] Internet runs over network infrastructure [fiber optic cables, routers, data centres, etc], If enough of that network infrastructure falls over, **some** of the effects MtB listed might happen, but those businesses do not run over the internet. Instead, they run on private networks, some of which might share infrastructure with the [public] Internet. Also, both those private networks and the internet network are designed to handle a break somewhere and route around it. Clearly, a big enough break and there is nowhere to route to. The Internet [actually, the network protocol that the internet uses] was originally created to handle military requirements so that communication could be maintained even if, say, a big network site was taken out. And I still can't figure out if my batteries are charged sufficiently or not....

That is not how the internet works. Possibly, shop deliveries might be affected, but none of the rest. [I am just excited that there is finally a topic on here that I know something about...].

i learnt of him through the Cowboy Junkies:

perhaps offpiste swimming and camping?

I hope you're right, but some authorities seem to hold a different view: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-46653684 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-39352755 I read somewhere [which prompted this query] that sewage spills do not include the overflow from heavy rain. Fortunately there has not been much of that lately.... oh wait.

thanks, that is what I was looking for. I wasn't planning on drinking any of it, and my searches were turning up results for that. I did the Windsor Triathlon 3 or 4 years in a row back in the 90s. The last year i had - by my standards - a good swim, which meant i was in the thick of the rolling fistfight that passes for a triathlon swim. I got a few mouthfuls down and was seriously ill for the next week. After that, I decided to not race at Windsor again.

as above, some of us do a bit of swimming in the Thames and the like, including all through the winter. A few newspaper stories about Thames "Water" overflow and the like has me wondering if it is possible to get an over the counter kit that will test for - well, i am not sure. Stuff I would not want to be swimming in?

although some are for security patches, to close any recently discovered vulnerabilities.