Robert, can you lend me some money

[hillbilly-joe]

  My wife me to buy her one of these 




http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/photo/2011-09/20/c_131149163.htm

[diaper head]

My wife me to buy her one of these 

dude  are you havin a stroke or just hittin the moonshine a little too hard? 

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#6 is nice but i prefer osaka castle.



 however, if i could, i would go for this one over all  the others combined.
http://www.wayfaring.info/2007/04/29/the-castle-residence-of-the-tokugawa-shoguns/

this is the castle built by leyasu tokugawa.  the most important figure in all of japan's history.
without him, we not have any of the cool samurai stories that we enjoy today.   all the cool stuff that happened in japan's history was set in motion by this one guy.  that mean's  his influence was world wide, spanning (so far) over 400 years.  without him, world war 2 probably never would have happened.

[reb]

would she get a little smile on her face if you got her a 'White Castle'? does she know what one is?

that would be a lot more in line with my budget....

i notice it's been roughly 24 hours, and Robert has not come runnin' with no geetus yet. perhaps he's looking at the spread he might be able to get for a loan?

[hillbilly-joe]

would she get a little smile on her face if you got her a 'White Castle'? does she know what one is?

that would be a lot more in line with my budget....

i notice it's been roughly 24 hours, and Robert has not come runnin' with no geetus yet. perhaps he's looking at the spread he might be able to get for a loan?

I never ate at a "White Castle". Are the burgers any good?

I think Robert is out of town at the moment.  And I do play the loto 6, maybe some day I'll...   

[zagatron1]

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This is more my speed. Got a nice yard though.

[robert]

A castle, huh? Well the problem is castles aren't portable.

You should talk to your wife about getting one of these - much more usable for the modern family. Plus she can pull it with her own bike (is she has one).

[hillbilly-joe]

A castle, huh? Well the problem is castles aren't portable.

You should talk to your wife about getting one of these - much more usable for the modern family. Plus she can pull it with her own bike (is she has one).

That is cool

[reb]

....but his mattress is hangin' out ON THE GROUND! ick. i doan wanna sleep on the bare ground...too many critters like the 98.6....some bite, too.

white castles...joe, i never ate one neither. the natives told me they called them 'sliders'. didn't whet my appetite....but the troops in af-gee and iraq wanted some, and i recall that the company sent a bunch over.

[pictoratus]

....but his mattress is hangin' out ON THE GROUND! ick. i doan wanna sleep on the bare ground...too many critters like the 98.6....some bite, too.

  Never slept on the ground, reb? Used to do it all the time when I was a lot younger. Ran around in the woods and everywhere else barefooted when I was a kid, too but I guess my feet were tougher then from being used to it.

Not a bad idea for a portable 'house'. But I still think I'd prefer sleeping out in the open.

[diaper head]

a bicycle trailer is how i haul groceries and supplies back to my apt here in the big city



i put a metal floor in it, and a few other little mods to allow it to carry wayyyy more weight than it was originally designed too. so far the biggest things i have brought home with it are a couch, and another time, 4 kitchen chairs. usually it's just groceries for the 4 of us, plus the doggies. not bad to pull for a mile or two every week or so.  i have a second one i modded into a push cart of much smaller size. i use it to carry my tools, work boots, and lunch as i travel by bus/subway/streetcar.

but looking at that sleeper trailer, i couldn't imaging having to pull that kinda weight behind my bike.
it would be like pulling a parachute, especially on a windy day.  i'd want to pull it with a mtb, to take advantage of the granny gears on steep hills. oh, and disc brakes for sure.

[reb]

naw, pic, i have...too many times to count....and had critters in with me.  the most memorable was a porcupine in the catskill mountains, who tried to bite through the tent wall.

my back was tougher back then, like your feet. now, i sleep in a decent bed, and i roll out very slow.

around here, if you ride a bicycle, you may have someone try to make you wreck by coming as close as they can to you. i can't imagine pulling a dang trailer on a bicycle. i recall seeing some 'long range bike riders' loaded with panniers and glob all over the thing...them lycra shorts (which would get me arrested for pubic indecency or maybe just public disgust). i think, 'can you NOT afford even a small car? what about a mule, instead? perhaps walking with a back pack?'. (this would be my choice...frankly, i miss back packing. i do not have one member of this august assemblage i refer to as my body that would not complain loudly were i to try to go back to my misspent youth)

bicycles kind of make me think of my college bicycle...a schwinn varsity.  yellow. i sold it when i left college. i miss it sometimes, but....back to 'being run off the road' and i don't miss it so much.

i think i will go and take another pain pill. all this talk of exercise is making my back hurt.

[diaper head]

i had that very thing happen to me.  it's why i walk funny now. of course, if i could drive here i would.  but the licensing and insurance here are prohibitive.  this spring i bought a 96 volvo 850 wagon.  then i found out it would cost me 6k to insure for a year.  so i attempted to trade the car for a yamaha fj100.
the insuranxce  on the bike was just half as high, and they make you pay for a whole year. i make good $$ when i work.   but i refuse to pay those prices.

[reb]

dh, that's nuts.  why so high? molsons? moose loose on the roads? i don't get it...french candadians frenching each other in traffic? only the rich can drive, or the rich and the uninsured? what happens if they catch you uninsured? they give you three hots and a cot, or like here, they fine you so much you can't pay it, then try to catch you later to suspend your sentence?  perhaps they could at least mess up the syntax....

agree. if i could bike most places, i would. 6k....i think governments should pay for the insurance just like hellthcare. for that matter, they should provide clean, safe, efficient public transportation, like we have in the u.s.. (harhar) make 'em all get insurance to spread the risk, except for the illegal american immigrunts pouring across the border. (more har har)

i swear, the more i hear about other countries, the more i think there is no place with any logic in government or operations. i still think we should pull drunk drivers from the cars here, shoot them on the roadside, and let the poor rifle their pockets for change so as to cut welfare costs....

[diaper head]

driving costs here are high because of (as i see it)  3 reasons:

1) here in toronto, folks don't feel like they're getting value from their gov unless they are paying a phenomenally high tax burden.

2)some fool had the idea that privatizing gov services, like the dmv, would be a good idea.

3) insurance companies spend alot of $$ on political action committees to lobby governments into making laws that force people into buying services they don't actually need.

as for public transportation here....
it's better than any of the dozen or so states i have been to/lived in, but as public transportation it still sucks to depend on it.  yeah, i can get across town to work using it, but it's so agonizingly slow it takes  2.5 hrs.  it's very crowded, and they always want to cut service and raise the fairs.  my current monthly pass costs $121+13% tax.

i don't get it...french candadians frenching each other in traffic?

hahaha   french canadians are the only group i know of here that is actually less popular than americans.

[reb]

dh, one of the things i was involved in over the years was 'contracting out' (privatizing government services). i don't think it was true in all cases, but it was true in many i watched that the private company would 'buy in' (lowball costs), then get cost increases by 'hook or crook' or by contacting their congress 'person' (read that as 'thief'). lots of times, the government people would just fold up under pressure from politicians. made me sick to watch.

to me, the principle is supposed to be...a government service is 'just that' because it serves all the people in a logical and unemotional 'without favorites' fashion. when you have a 'for profit' company doing the work, they are interested in a goal other than 'support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic'. the epitome (imo) of that privatizing initiative was the blackwater scandal. i had been listening to the 'blahblah' re: 'contractors on the battlefield'-big debate....and thinking 'idiots. we've done this before. we don't let them make decisions; we don't let them conduct combat. that's the same as hiring mercenaries.' then we get that....whatever...i can't think of a polite term...'circle jerk' is the nicest one i can think of. you know 'fubar'?

things here (if you haven't noticed) are so dang crooked, there are apparently no further principles in government except re-election telling any lie you can think up. i just read an article about the governor of north carolina wanting to suspend elections for two years (national elections). the face masks are coming off.

the 'car thing'...if you don't live in a major city here, and you need to travel for 'work' and don't have a vehicle...well, i think you know.   i forget how long ago you lived down here....the couple times i visited our queen worshipping neighbors to the north, i thought the land was pretty, and reasonably civilized...but i wouldn't give you a plug nickle for their winters.