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The deed has been done. Up front fees paid to NAPIT, after talking to the very helpful chap on the phone. Laid it out bare, zero quals, mostly self taught from the school of hard knocks. 45 mins on the phone and after some questions ( 3 were trick questions I’m sure, designed to separate the wheat from the chaff at the outset ) and my 1st basic competency course is booked. A day and a half first to let me show them I’m not a bell-end hoping to chance his way through, which includes wiring a power and lighting circuit and testing it in front of an examiner and then they’ll give me rights of passage to fast-track my 18th edition. They said I could probably pass the one day, but I opted for the 3 day with the idea being that 3 times more will sink in and for the extra ~£200 for the extra 2 days I think it would sensible to, and possibly arrogant not to. Ill update after the first day and a half. ? Bonjour!

I won’t defecate in it . Just look and touch the tiles . Perhaps take a selfie so I can prove to the grand children I was there .

Can we visit this bathroom when it’s complete ? I feel it’s become part of my life now and it’s on my bucket list .

Open the tap slower.

We’ll struggle to get Jedward tbh ?

I'll be changing GP soon anyway, so I'm hoping that the new one may have a more enlightened view on treatment. My old GP (he's now left the practice) had seemingly become a bit keen on just prescribing drugs, something that I think may have been driven, in part, by the demands of having to hit short consultation time targets in the practice. There's not much a doctor can find out, or advise on, in the 7 1/2 minute consultation time allowed. The practice we're moving to has a 15 minute consultation time target, which seems a lot more realistic.

Have you noticed that some people's reaction to someone doing something new or creative or different is "wotchawannadothatfor?" Completely off topic but here's a little anecdote... I went up to the counter of a sports supplier a couple of years ago and asked the assistant for a particular piece of equipment. "What's it for?" was the reply. I secretly wanted to say "None of your effing business, mate" but I was polite and told him. Then another character who was leaning against the counter put his oar in and gave me the benefit of his knowledge, telling me that what I was trying to do would never work. I said thank you but I still would like those particular goods...please. However, they insisted on trying to tell me that I didn't know what I was talking about, it would never work, etc. Eventually I had had enough and had secret delight in informing them that if they would like to look inside a magazine that happened to be on the counter, they would find an article by me describing how my team had just set a world record in that particular sport and thanks for the advice but could I please have what I came in for. Needless to say, that shut them up good and proper. Innovators of the world - rise up, and tell these naysayers to get lost!

I regularly find suppliers doing that 'sucking air through their teeth' thing, ooh a self-builder with lots of money to spend, oooh where is my nieve muppet price list!! For example. When I started my self-build 4 years ago, I took my architects drawings into Travis Perkins, I sat down with the branch manager and he gave me the whole blurb about what great deals they could do for a self-builder and to leave a set of drawings with him and he'd get his QS and once he'd priced it up I'd get fantastic trade prices! Four years later I still waiting for him to get back to me, however, I did get a Trade Card, it's quite good for applying filler, I also use it in winter to remove ice from my car windscreen. I've been in the local branch twice in that four years, presented my trade card and enquired about the price of something. I each case the TP price was at least double what I eventually paid elsewhere locally, internet prices are usually best.

Yay... the conservatory / Morning room has been re built... roof going on today, doors and windows in.... old toilet block has been rebuilt, doors and windows in, roof going on today. SO HAPPY.... it's looking more like the old girl again but without the crumbling bricks.... will try and get on to update with photos...

I'm aiming towards passive standards so I would like to think space heating demands are low. Will use UFH on both floors, SunAmp for DHW demands. Not sure how I'm going to power the UFH yet, either ASHP or from one of the newer SunAmp which I believe can do both UFH and DHW. As many solar panels as I can fit in the house/garage roofs, and now the FIT is going I will look at battery storage. I haven't crunched any actual numbers yet - just a plan of attack that I have in mind.

Grand design on just a bathroom ; there’s a thought . Budget 2k ; actual spend 400k @Onoff “ we went a bit over budget but we are happy with the final result “ kevin ‘twat’ mccloud “ would you do another ? “ Everyone on ebuild “ (expletive deleted) no !!!! “ ??????? Its time as you can tell

PMSL, struggling to pick a winner out of those two comments! Made my evening

Just remember red wire live, black neutral.

I think they need to walk in my shoes to know the difference between belief and reality. I try very hard to make belief the core to overcome daily health challenges - it rarely works. I do not blindly follow science either, the placebo/Pavlov dog theory is bunkum in my case. I live every day with many debilitating health conditions. I find what works for me, without drugs wherever possible (sits looking at the 23 pills that make up the morning dose currently), what I do know is that what works for me may not work for everyone and what works for me currently can change without warning. The change in eating habits to the (modified and adapted by me) keto/paleo/lchf system has had a profound effect and I am truly inspired by the new way of eating, it has helped me enormously and I hope to be able to continue it for many years to come. I care not for the opinions of so called experts if something works positively for me I do it if it doesnt I dont. Science is little match for the vagaries of the human body which I feel science has yet to fully understand. I have left my earthly remains for organ donation/research but I think they will be of little use if the rate of progress of the last10 years is anything to go by .....they will be all worn out and past it just like me most days ....so says my bio-medical scientist niece bless her! LOL

I made a point of telling everyone (even the postman) that I was on a tight budget and therefore had to do a lot myself, it brought out the best in most people.

I’ve tried lol. The rip at the back will be covered by the endless quantity of crap that you know 100% will live there. Cut the tiles, stick them on, and crack the FCUK on spongebob. ? Xmas is fast approaching ! ?

Diet and medicine are two fields where very bad science is normal, and belief systems massively outweigh decisions derived from hard data. The power of belief, even subconscious belief, is massive; far more effective than pretty much any drug. We've know this for decades, but considered it to be a nuisance, in that it masks the true results from scientific studies (in lots of fields, not just health). The vast majority of the treatments, deprivations, dietary restrictions etc that some choose to promote are based on belief rather than hard facts, but that doesn't make them any less effective. After all, all the world's religions have been harnessing the power of belief for millennia, very successfully. There was an interesting programme on last night about the placebo effect, that highlighted just how powerful it is. IIRC, their findings, from a group of around 100 people with chronic back pain, was that the placebo effect had a medically significant impact on reducing pain for 45% of the test sample. That's better than pretty much any pain medication available, and there are no side effects. Quite surprisingly, the placebos carried on working even after the people had been told that they had been taking a placebo. Even more interesting was a small section at the end exploring a conditioning process, rather like Pavlov's dogs, where taking a foul drink with a medicine, then just taking the foul drink without the medicine, had the same physiological effect. That indicates something that's far deeper in our subconscious at work, and seems to be a very interesting area of research. I was particularly interested as one of the related studies was on shoulder surgery that I had a few years ago on my left shoulder, that worked like a magic bullet. I have had the same problem with my right shoulder for several years, but have been told the surgery is no longer available. This programme explained why, but, unfortunately, watching the programme hasn't cured my shoulder...

Leave the window in position, just use the rips, no one will notice and every time you notice, tell yourself that only a fool would refit a window to solve that.

I was in Hawick this week and Homebase there is closing down. They have 10-50% off everything - it seems it all has to go. They are not closing til Christmas apparently, but I doubt there will be much left by then.

That was directed at Jeremy, you'll do 8 in a week!

I think that was for @JSHarris. I think @Onoff knows you are all or bugger all .

My experience when I rang NAPIT was pretty positive, they were far and away the most helpful of the Part P accreditation companies I spoke with, so my guess is that they would see this for what it is.

Wine makes everything taste better !!!

Is that the posh name for amyl nitrate then?

Visitors? The very thought sets my pulse racing and panic sets in. Probably down to a combination of embarrassment and social awkwardness.

Look what just dropped into my in box... https://www.rcplondon.ac.uk/projects/outputs/every-breath-we-take-lifelong-impact-air-pollution The report starkly sets out the dangerous impact air pollution is currently having on our nation’s health. Each year in the UK, around 40,000 deaths are attributable to exposure to outdoor air pollution which plays a role in many of the major health challenges of our day. It has been linked to cancer, asthma, stroke and heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and changes linked to dementia. The health problems resulting from exposure to air pollution have a high cost to people who suffer from illness and premature death, to our health services and to business. In the UK, these costs add up to more than £20 billion every year.

This is the full list of the stores that are closing, Maybe a store near you has a closing down sale. Aberdeen Bridge of Don Aberdeen Portlethen Aylesbury Bedford St Johns Bradford Brentford Bristol Canterbury Cardiff Newport Road Croydon Purley Way Droitwich Dublin Fonthill Dublin Naas Road Dundee East Kilbride Exeter Gateshead Grantham Greenock Hawick Inverness Ipswich Limerick London Merton London New Southgate London Wimbledon Macclesfield Oxford Botley Road Peterborough Pollokshaws Poole Tower Park Robroyston Salisbury Seven Kings Solihull Southampton Hedge End Southend Stirling Swindon Drakes Way Swindon Orbital Warrington Whitby

Whenever I look at wiring, the word "blue-tral" (blue = neutral) immediately jumps to mind. It's something I made up years ago to try and remember the colours for live and neutral. Everything else follows directly from that. Funny how effective memory techniques can be. I still have a mental image of a (steel) army truck blowing up, which I used in A-level chemistry as a way of remembering that metallic elements want to give up electrons. I also remembered F=Bqv (force on an electrically charged particle is magnetic field x charge x velocity) because we were doing Macbeth in English at the time, and "Bqv" reminded me of the character Banquo for some reason. Weird how the brain works...

It is if your kids are in Scouts! I remember viewing a house I was thinking of buying. I asked to look in the garage, however, it was dusk, so dark in the garage. The owner opening a draw in the kitchen and took out a lead with a plug on each end. He proceeded to plug it into two single sockets locate side-by-side. Hey Presto, we had light in the garage!

You're right to get off the long term use of painkillers, but repeated cortisone injections are also a big no-no. They do nothing to help the underlying problem, and in fact can make the damage worse (from memory, repeated use weakens connective tissue). In my opinion, cortisone should only be used once or twice, and only to relieve pain so that rehabilitation exercises can be done. Shoulder rehab is particularly difficult due to the complexity of the joint and the amount of freedom of movement it has. I'd encourage finding a physio who's an expert in shoulder rehab and planning to spend at least several months exercising daily to get back strength and, as importantly, control of your shoulders. I went from being unable to lift a 10kg dumbbell overheard without pain and impingement to doing the same for reps with a 25kg dumbbell without any discomfort at all. Part of it is improved strength of both primary and stabilising muscles, but a lot of it is about control of the scapulae and upper back. As for surgery, ask your doctor for a referral to a surgeon. I can't see why a serious longstanding issue like this is being managed long term by a generalist. Personally, I'd be looking for another GP.

I'm tempted to, once we're settled. I've been putting it off because I didn't want to be out of action for a few weeks, TBH.

Michael Mosley does seem to be well endowed with common sense, and, refreshingly, seems very willing to challenge conventional medical thinking, even to the extent of experimenting on himself. My GP was very keen to refer me to a consultant surgeon the first time around, and I had the shoulder surgery as an outpatient, followed by physio, and it really was incredibly effective - I've never had any medical treatment before that had such an immediate and profound impact. Over the past 6 years or so, all my GP will do for my right shoulder (same symptoms as for the left shoulder that was operated on) is prescribe painkillers (which I've stopped taking - I do not like the idea of taking codeine all the time at all), plus a cortisone injection into the shoulder joint every six months or so. The latter works well for a month or two, but gradually the pain and movement restriction returns. The GP hasn't told me why the surgery is no longer an option, but the programme last night seemed to reveal that it was no longer available on the basis that "placebo surgery" worked just as well. Sadly my GP didn't tell me this, and hasn't offered anything other than continuing long term drug treatments, which frankly annoys me, as I do not like the idea of drug treatments at all.

Just to be clear. A powered PoE-switch vs PoE-powered switch are, in some senses, opposites. A powered PoE-switch has a power supply from the mains and can provide PoE to multiple ports. A PoE-powered switch has no external power supply, is powered itself by PoE, and passes PoE through to only a single output port.

Could you get a reputable company in to do the gate in the same finish as the drive? Too soon?

I've done a lot of reading on low carb, ketogenic and even carnivorous diets over the past few years. There's a lot of evidence - well, anecdotes - about people who have cured or drastically reduced the symptoms of immune-system related conditions like eczema, arthritis and colitis by making drastic changes to their diet. Not science, but for anecdotes, see https://meatheals.com. From memory there's a tag list that lets you filter by condition. A bit extreme, for sure, but the guy who runs it is 50, can deadlift a quarter of a ton, holds the world record for rowing 500m for his age group, and 90+% of his diet for the last 5 years has been beef. I'm increasingly of the opinion that diet science has been hijacked by zealots with an agenda. Dig into the recent Lancet article on meat and cancer, for example, and you'll find that it's literally laughable. They can get away with this because there are serious difficulties in doing proper research on diet. Partly it's the difficulty in doing double blind studies when it comes to food, but there's also inertia, special interest groups (farmers, animal rights activists), ethics (difficulty in testing unconventional diets), compliance (who wants to eat what they're told to eat for months or years?). It's little wonder it takes decades for food science to advance.

I think this is mostly bang out of order. Fair enough to suggest they built a cob house out of unicorn phlegm and fairy belly button fluff instead but to criticise their parenting and life choices? When all they’re trying to do is the best for their family in line with what would be considered mainstream best advice? For a start, if you required frequent medical care and potentially urgent medical treatment, the last place you’d choose to live is the countryside, 40 miles from the nearest hospital only to find the immunologist (or whomever) was shit.

With a lot of F'ing and blinding... It took me the best part of half a day to get the unit from where it was dropped at the curbside, on a pallet, up our steep drive, up the steps by our front door and into the hall, where it sat at the bottom of the stairs for a couple of days until I'd recovered enough to attempt stage two, getting it up the stairs on my own. Most of the time was spent rigging up timber frames and a tirfor winch, plus a back up safety rope, using some of my old climbing gear, with a length of rope and a couple of ascenders fitted to it and attached to the load so that I could maintain the tightness on the safety rope. I had to use the tirfor just to get my sack truck up the steps and in through the front door. I have one remaining challenge, which is to get the old 55kg Sunamp PV back down the stairs and crated up ready to ship back to Sunamp. Should be child's play after getting the UniQ 9 up the stairs...

I thought I would update you all on our driveway.......the drive itself is still looking good (keeping everything crossed) however the installers caused a lot of damage to our gates (brand new powder coated aluminium gates ££££'s). The damage was not apparent for a few days as we couldn't walk on the drive. They had spilt resin on the gates (some aggrrgate stuck to it too) and then tried to get it off resulting in great smears of stone and resin all over the gates, its a real mess. Installer brought his own expert to look at it they said it couldn't be removed without damage to the powder coating the only option was gates off and taken away to be completely redone as the resin smears are spread over both sides of both gates its not just one small patch. Installer said get the quote and I will sort it out its my mistake etc etc. You know where I am heading now don't you.......quote at £995 plus vat for rectification and installer disappeared off the face of the earth. This is supposedly a well established family firm from Worcester.........next stop trading standards and local press I think, after 2 years of hell building this house and being ripped off left right and centre this is the last straw. I don't want to be slipping down the rankings for the most cowboys on one build do I!