Nigel Bridgman-Elliot

Maybe you could limit the amount of time an outsider can benefit from the handouts, maybe after 6 months if they have found no work by then, expel/export them out of the islands and back to the UK mainland ? Perhaps a reduction in council tax for every spare bedroom you rent out ? Carrots and sticks..

Perhaps we could find some better looking fake rock, after all they manage to do it in the movies, perhaps something like these; http://www.rockandwater.com/catalog.html http://www.artificialrock.com.au http://www.globalthemingproducts.com/gallery/Fgallery2-2.JPG

> Actually, the windfarm will be 50% owned by Shetland (or Shetlanders) > and will therefore contribute 50% of it's profits to Shetland. But its not like the money is going into peoples pockets, its going to some organisation which then decides how its going to spend, or not spend the profits. (Going on the large slice sitting in the bank accounts doing nothing in particular, except risking being lost if whichever bank its in goes under..) If its such a good idea, why do they not own 100% of it ? > I don't think it's unreasonable for the people of Shetland to ask for, > say 50%, off their power bills in return for hosting this scheme. I'd say that was a fair suggestion. > Stop a moment. Think about the surface area of the Earth. Think > about a 7 metre sea level rise (think area). Think about a borehole. > Reconsider that statement No need to reconsider, it all depends on how deep and how wide your borehole is.. The channel tunnel generated some 8 million cubic meters of spoil for example. Also one might consider underground could be a suitable location for many other things, perhaps industrial buildings, railways.. > Offering cheap electricity to Shetlanders will encourage over usage, > not conservation If the method of generating the electric is sustainable and doesn't really harm the environment, then what does it matter if more people use more electric ?

Perhaps clad them in local stone, or fake concrete stone, then they wouldn't need painting every year. A picture I took of an example of fake concrete rock over hundred years old in Kent: http://www.nanos.org.uk/downloads/rock2.jpg Its the kind of thing I had in mind for my own home, any exposed bits, make it look natural.

Sea level rise does concern me, whether its caused by global warming or something else. (History shows us its not an uncommon feature to happen..) If I understood what I read correctly, perhaps one of the reasons the wind farm isn't so welcomed by certain people is because all the power generated is being sold off elsewhere and the local people aren't benefiting from it directly ? If so, then perhaps if it was setup so that they did in fact get the option to buy the electric as cheaply as its made, assuming its cheaper than the current system, that might go some way to making people happy.. Personally, I've always wondered with sea level rises, if you did a lot of geothermal bore hole digging, could't you use the spoil to increase the height of the land ?

> Why is it so hard for people to get a job and accomodation > BEFORE landing in Shetland? We are planning to move only after we have got ourselves a reliable income via something like telework, and enough money saved to buy land and build a home. > Why worry about finding a place to live or a job when you can go to > the local council and walk into a free fully furnished house in front of > all the other Shetlanders that have been on lists for months.... Its the same story the country over, neighbours of mine who have lived and worked here most of their lives will never get a chance to live in local council housing when the housing list stands at something like 80,000 and some 3,000 a year priority cases get the lions share of anything going. In the same borough as me this: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1780948.ece Meanwhile, your see former UK soldiers living on the streets in appalling conditions, even churches letting people sleep in tents in the graveyards to help. I could go on.. I could mention how the council with their attitude of helping, and insisting on raising the living standards for those renting, actually helped rents double! yeah that really helped us..

I'm always amazed the width of doorways being so small, at least when I moved from down south to up north the doorways got wider! When I did my last building I made sure it had 5ft wide doors for ease of access, and in my new home design, I'm looking at 10ft wide doors so I can drive something like a bradshaw electric vehicle for moving furniture around! What is the sewage problem ? > I can't really understand why the waiting list has grown to the size > it is when the population seems to be decreasing If I've understand correctly looking at the stats it appears more single person dwellings are in demand than before, its not clear if this is due to people leaving their parents homes, or relationship breakups. (Down here in London/South East its due to relationship breakups.) So perhaps one solution is to force everyone with a spare bedroom to fill it

I've always wanted to see one of those. I suppose you can get them in doubles and triples too ? (I've only seen a triple normal rainbow once.) I pondered once it would be nice to have a rainbow making machine, though enquiries suggest I'd need planning permission and it might be illlegally a hazard to planes

http://www.3dgameman.com/forums//archive/index.php/t-2094.html > Dyanmat rocks! you can find similar products out there, http://www.avforums.com/forums/sounds-cards-mics-headsets-computer-speakers/200700-budget-pc-sound-proofing.html > I have used 'Laminate Floor Underlay' in my PC. > > It is the 'expensive' £3/m² type that has the foil back and is made > of an inert heavy density felt type of foam. My own experience is I found an old PC thrown out which had a thick piece of heavy dense felt type foam on the inside of it. (Specifically on the side panel that you take off.) So I carefully peeled it off and put it on my own PC, of which I noticed a reduction in noise level, which I assume was from the dampening effect which stopped the side of the case behaving like a drum. Though, in my efforts to find the ultimate solution, I was once asking for some thick foam and someone suggested a brick wall would work best, and as a PC vendor was giving away some free bricks on Christmas day... http://www.nanos.org.uk/me/pictures/tnroom06.jpg Two servers sit behind here and are much quieter due to the wall! As for sound card issues: http://alive.singnet.com.sg/tech/via.htm > The Sound Blaster Live! Drivers were not to PCI specifications If a specific fan is noisy, a regrease can work wonders! (Shame you cannot get PC fans with nipples to more easily regrease them, as I hate having to every year or two redo my fans.) To fit larger fans its sometimes necessary to take a hacksaw or do a spot of panel beating to get them to fit. Another thing I found that can work well in practice depending on how well your case is designed in the first place is to tape up and block the side air vents, forcing the air to come in from the front and out the back. I have tried also big heat sink graphics cards, but find they get so hot, I need an extra fan to help cool the case anyhow A friend of mine solves the problem by having his PC fitted under his floorboards!

I wonder if you can get underfloor heating which uses hot air ? (Like the Romans did..) I've spoken to a lot of people who have had water underfloor heating fail after 20 years, so don't want to go that route myself! (The best I've seen to deal with building plumbing flooding issues is a place I once saw which had drainways built under all the plumbing runs, slow gentle slopes on the basis that it would leak at some point and they didn't want their building ruined or its contents!)

All windows updates done ? Also, not so long ago at least under XP there was I seem to recal a windows update which broke onboard AC97 sound and you need to get the latest sound drivers after that to make it work again. Is it the CPU fan thats loud, or the PSU fan, or another one ? (It might just be there is a DVD/CD in the drive and thats making the noise..) A real sound card would be better, though that can cause issues with hard disk corruption if your unlucky

I hear there can be issues with them icing up, though I've not investigated it much to find out the root cause. My own limited experience with AC units does show the cheap Chinese ones are so badly designed they can end up leaking all over the place! (Unlike the German models no longer available which work flawlessly..) I'm quite keen on air heating on the basis that it avoids having heating pipes/radiators running around just waiting to leak one day! But I do hear it can be hard to control the humidity correctly. (Too low and plastics dry out!)

I thought 100% mortgages ended a little while ago ? About the day before we went to look at a £15k house in London (Shhh!), even so, the payments/cost would have been higher than the rent we are paying at the moment. Then of course the rent here went up to match what it would have cost to buy it..

Are the midges down to any particular habitat ? (I used to live in an area full of them, but returning 20 years later to visit, not one to be seen..) Do you get them on all the islands, or just some ?

Creating your own new social group is something not to forget, you may well find there are others who have an interest in starting something. Otherwise we'll all sit around waiting for someone else to start a group I'm also a practical teetotaller, though do go to pubs with friends, but only drink cola (Which is awfully expensive!), and don't smoke either. Thats one reason why I like to peek at peoples forum profiles online to see if they have included any hobbies/interests.

Your scored -1.5 on Moral Order and 1 on Moral Rules. The following categories best match your score (multiple responses are possible): System: Socialism Ideology: Social Democratism Party: Democratic Party Presidents: Jimmy Carter 04' Election: John Kerry 08' Election: Barrack Obama Of the 486,051 respondents (5,905 on Facebook): 9% are close to you. 37% are more conservative. 24% are more liberal. 23% are more socialist. 8% are more authoritarian.

Underground.. You wouldn't even need to dig a hole to hide it in, just cover it and plant stuff on top, then it would just look like another hill.. A few trees would be nice, but something a little nicer perhaps than Leylandi, what grows well there, produces useful wood and roots only go down so far so as not to cause issues with buildings underneath ? If it needs to be air cooled (sea cooled perhaps ?) perhaps underground but with a court yard open to the elements, similar to this: http://picasaweb.google.com/dariuscc/PrzemyslPoland#5094747672940109602

Perhaps combine the cables with a water supply channel of some sort, like they lay power cables by the side of canals to keep them cool. I'm often suprised how frequent buried cables get dug up, not to mention the down time whilst its done, the associated hassle of all the connected elements, eg. road blocks, noise. Costs up front is all about reducing costs further down the line in the future, its often a false economy to only look at costs in the way that many do, without realising that by spending a few percent you get a fair easier to work with product than something built just to be penny pinching. The service tunnel would also answer the issue I believe raised about what happens afterwards, in years to come when you need to disturb the landscape to remove the cables if they are just buried. Making an effort to please the majority is what it should be about, otherwise, whats the point in producing something that only a few are going to benefit from..

So we might at least agree that putting the cabling out of sight would be a better step in keeping the neighbours happy Perhaps we shall start to see developers who do give a monkeys soon emerging in the market place. After all, we've all seen Secret Millionaires on television manage to get their consciences working again and start to think of people at the bottom. Maybe an oppertunity for some cooperative approaches, though I have to say, getting a large number of people to put a hand in their pocket and work hard together on a project is perhaps being too idealistic.. I at least give a monkeys, and intend to grow from small to big, lets see if I can manage it

Depends whether your client wants an uncluttered landscape or not, being that most clients do not live on the land they develop, its rarely an issue. But, making your neighbours happy should be more taken notice of, as I certainly think that such an approach is the best way to win friends and influence people..

Usually money isn't really the issue if you look closely, its often down to a case of how much less profit do you want to make.. It can be an affordable route to take (And often cheaper long term once you factor long term maintence issues into it.) if so desired. If the desire is not to annoy lots of people with overhead wiring, then it would be a solution that could be offered.

If no one else offers a CNC service on the Islands, perhaps you might consider investing money in equipment to establish such a business. I was listening to someone the other day mention how they spent £2k on their own equipment and then earned £5k a year doing bits here and there for people. (As such, I've wondered about doing the same myself here in London, though I'm just a beginner and don't know my way around such machines!) I wonder how much demand there would be for such services in the area ?

I'd also like to add to that list a few things I've found really useful, though not all of them free: Desktop Resetter for keeping your icons where they should be after a crash! http://www.desktility.com (If anyone knows of a free version which does the same thing, I'd be interested to know, but so far I've yet to find a free version which works, so I paid for one which does!) Hotcorners, nicely puts your monitor to sleep when you want to without wearing out your on/off button. http://www.southbaypc.com PC Inspector File Recovery for when things go a little pear shaped and you need to try and get your data back. http://www.pcinspector.de/default.htm?Language=1

Burying cables always strikes me as a poor design approach, much better to install them in tunnels (Perhaps cut & cover approach.) then you can more easily service them, replace them/etc. without having to go around digging up the countryside again. Its certainly an approach I plan to use in my building design, with everything in man sized Jefferies tubes, as it makes just so much sense than burying services in the walls, floors and ceilings! Perhaps a ridiculous solution might be to make the wind turbines invisible.. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12961080 http://projects.tachilab.org/rpt/movie.php

You can produce electricity from geothermal as well as heat, a working system has existed for sometime in Southampton in the UK for example. I imagine an Island wide scheme wouldn't be out of the picture, you'd need roughly a dozen such plants/holes to provide enough electric for everyone, and plenty of spare heat left over for industry to use. (Which from my understanding is you can also use it to cool as well.)