Ange

Hmm - there's shades of grey involved here. To give a bit more information on our specific example - the boat was poorly presented (dirty, rubbish in the cratch, dirty crocks in the kitchen) and was very poorly marketed by the broker to the extent that the surveyor was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't a hovel! It had been for sale for just over six months - at which time the broker starts charging rent. We knew we were hitting way above our weight with this boat but decided to take a punt with a silly (ie affordable to us) offer. The vendor accepted presumably because financially he had to. Everyone we've spoken to since we bought her has been amazed that we got her at such a low price. Do I feel guilty? Absolutely not because the vendor failed to do her justice when he put her up for sale and, in my view, deserves the loss. You wouldn't put a £2500 car up for sale without cleaning it - how on earth can you expect to achieve the best price for a £35k boat without making at least a bit of effort. The marketing may have been the broker's fault, but I'm assuming the vendor has a chance to vet the literature before it goes out. Our amazing Doug Moore boat was described as "a comfortable looking boat in need of a little TLC". When we had our BSC last year the inspector was blown away by the builder's attention to detail and actually asked if the builder had been able to survive financially. I'm sure there's a lot of time wasters out there taking the mickey, but there's also people like us that take a bit of a punt when it's obvious the boat is worth the asking price but is being marketed/presented very badly. From a moral point of view the last owner of our boat neglected her - we're besotted with her and are spending loads of time and money remedying the damage he did.

Hi Martin My son is very keen on Ubuntu and persuaded me to let him reformat my very slow and ailing laptop and install Ubuntu. I eventually agreed and then moved onto the boat, leaving my main IT support behind in Kent! I gave up due to various failures on that occasion, but I am trying again because I do believe that once I've taken the time to understand how to work it, it will be far better than Windows. My observations so far are that when it works it is much better than Windows - the free Excel/Word equivalent is just as good, it has a host of software to run anything you plug into it (we have a WinTV dongle and I found that Kaffeine was far better than the WinTV software) and I found it much quicker and far less annoying than Windows. I also like the notion that this stuff should be free and that knowledge should be shared. BUT when it does go wrong it can be horribly hard to fix. I did find the Ubuntu forums an amazing resource and fixed quite a few problem using them, but I'm talking to you now via a Windows netbook (the main laptop is still Ubuntu so I haven't given up completely) because I couldn't get our new 3 dongle to work on Ubuntu, plus I haven't been able to fix a few minor but very irritating problems (one of which I posted on here, but no one was able to help me with) I did join the Ubuntu forum that a member kindly posted a link to. I posed my question to the huge number of members, 24 hours later and no response. I bumped the thread (a little afraid that this may be a taboo action on a computer forum) which led to one very well meant response from someone who'd obviously missed the part of my OP where I'd said I was a complete newby to Ubuntu - I did not understand a word of it! We still use the Ubuntu lappy for TV (the screen on the netbook isn't particularly TV watching friendly anyway) but I need to buy a text book and study Ubuntu before I can use it full time. The intention is there ... Best of luck if you do decide to take that route

Speaking of chocolate I've just discovered I didn't eat all the Maltesers last night (Dave bought me a big bag with "to share" written on it - as if!) Life just can't get any better

(I'd have loved to have come up with a witty response, but my mind is blank so a smile will have to do!) What a gent you are!

Isn't Photoshop great (actually he's rather cute - I could put up with him on my boat)

Sadist!!! (wonders if there is such thing as a Carl eating spider ....)

Ye Gods - are you lot trying to give me nightmares Nooo - you're not allowed to splat spiders! I was raised with the rhyme "if you want to live and thrive let a spider run alive". Besides, we've got white walls on the boat and those big ones would make such a mess We saw a massive bee in the Liverpool underground today - I think they must mutate down there! Ahh - I've tried the conkers theory http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php...c=25431&hl= The second one appeared this evening - even bigger than yesterday's, and this time I wasn't quick enough with my spider catcher Dave's just gone to bed and left me on my own with the monster who's in hiding now Thanks for all the replies to my pink wine and malteser inspired thread by the way

Good morning to you The head's far better than I deserve! On the train on our way to Ellesmere Port at the mo Any other boaty spider sightings, or is mine the first?

In my opinion 3 is the only one that is clearly wrong (unless there's only one boater of course). 2 is grammatically correct, but if you find 1 more aesthetically pleasing then sod the pedants, it certainly wouldn't bother me. O Level English Lang & Lit, A Level Eng Lit (only a grade D though, so not too much of a smarty pants on the subject)

that was a bit random wasn't it! I'll wake up tomorrow and worry about what I've posted tonight after the pink wine!

First spotted this evening while we were watching Ashes to Ashes. He appeared just above the window - by the time I'd found my spider catcher he'd positioned himself in a groove in the window frame so the spider catcher couldn't get him. I waited, spider catcher on my lap at the ready. Part way through Friday Night with Wossy he parachuted down in front of the laptop screen that is our TV at the moment, changed his mind very quickly and ascended to the flat piece of wall (well side of boat) above. Gotcha! Said spider has been humanely trapped and deposited on towpath. The one thing I love about the winter is no spiders and windows can be opened with no bugs flying in and dive bombing you. Never mind - not complaining honestly. Looking forward to the baby ducks - we've had lots of boisterous duck on duck activity around our boat so where are they? Love pink wine & maltesers by the way - an amazing combination Edited to add: the pink wine turned year to yeat in the title - and I can't edit that!!!

We only have two things in our windows - our licence and our CWDF sticker. We've met quite a few forum members because of the stickers so they serve a good purpose, very different to just declaring an affiliation (ye gods I remember the Kevin and Tracey sun visors on the Ford Capris - you're not from Essex are you!)

Ahem - objection m'lud!! There have been a few occasions where myself and the other lady have stood with gates wide open while our menfolk are so busy nattering they didn't notice! One occasion I remember particularly was when we'd set a pair of locks on Hearbreak Hill and stood with gates open waiting for the men to stop chatting and bring the boats in. We had to shout over to them when a boat appeared from the Macclesfield (I think) and headed straight for one of our locks! I have to admit to times when Dave has been a bit tardy leaving the lock as he's been busy inspecting the masonry for mason's marks, or is nowhere in sight as he's magnet fishing off the back of the boat!

We're planning to go take the train down there on Saturday. Anyone fancy meeting up for a beer?

Our boat was up for around £38k, can't remember exactly how much - the OH has a much better memory but he's snoring now so I'd best not disturb him! Our budget was £27k max but we really fancied the boat, so Dave made a silly offer of £24k, thinking we'd be rebuffed straight away. The broker was really sniffy about the offer, saying something along the lines of "have you actually SEEN the boat" but Dave insisted he put the offer to the vendor. We were bowled over when the vendor came back and said he couldn't accept less than £28k! We got her for £27k in the end, with the broker stepping in and offering to bridge the final £500 gap by sacrificing commission. It's definitely worth making what may seem like a silly offer - the worst they can do is say no and you might strike lucky like we did - we still can't believe our luck.

Ah - you won't be passing us then, thought you might be coming from the Wigan end! Have fun

Thanks for all the suggestions folks - I'll go through them with Dave this evening. There's plenty there to keep us occupied for the weekend!

Enjoy - Skipton's a great place to visit - we spent a week there in the summer. Where are you heading from? Just wondering cos you'll probably pass us on your way

We're expecting to be in the area at that time and would love to join in if circumstances permit - keep us posted with further details please (we're not locals but feel an affinity to the L&L having bought a Doug Moore boat and subsequently spent a fair amount of time on the L&L when we decided to take her home and get to know the area)

Twould be a lovely idea if we had a week rather than a weekend! Seriously we're really looking forward to doing the Anderton Lift one day - we've visited it three times by car - it's so frustrating how little you can see from the bridge or towpath. Nice cafe though

Well the weather's looking pretty rubbish for Easter (surprise surprise) so our choice between whether to go boating or hiking has turned into what we can do indoors (unless the forecast, which seems to change every day, gets better). I know - I can hear the cries of "fair weather boaters" but we've just spent our first winter aboard and have had to travel for water/pump out in some very inclement weather - there's no way we're boating in the rain unless our water tank's dry or our pump out's full! We're based near Chorley at the mo - we've got lots of industrial towns on our doorstep - can anyone recommend good museums - particularly ones that involve canal history / anything driven by steam / anything driven by waterwheels? I'm planning to do a fair amount of googling tomorrow, but local knowledge can find some rare gems. We have the use of a car at the mo so we're looking at say a 20-30 mile radius. Thanks folks

Where abouts are you? We're in Lancashire at the mo and just have a steady downpour of rain. I dearly hope snow is not on the horizon! Tis a bugger - we were debating whether to go boating or hiking this weekend - I've now got to do some internet research on indoor stuff instead - bah! On the positive side isn't having a good moan about the weather one of the joys of being British

I think we'll have to agree to disagree over both issues (has that phrase ever been heard before on this forum )