Christmas decorations (a safety thread)

Oh deer. I was out riding on boxing day last year and came across a horse & rider, the horse was
dressed up with antlers and had a green overcoat thing on with bells on, the rider had a santa suit
on and she was singing God KIng Wensleslas at the top of her voice. She was a little embarrased when
she realised I was behind her !!!

We /demand/ a picture!

Sue said:

To save weight, I use a string of 30 red and green flashing LED fairy lights that I bought by mail
order. A Google search shows blue-white ones are easier to get now.

I was planning to do exactly the same thing. The following is the best deal I've found so far:

tinyurl.comw9miOpen ↗

£3.99 + £1.50 p&p, 40 green + red LEDs, multi-mode flash & shimmer with control box, 3 AA batteries.

Any better options anyone?

--
Michael Klontzas 'If everything seems to be coming your way, you're probably in the wrong lane'
(Borstelmann's Rule)

In message <[email hidden]>, Michael Klontzas
<[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

Sue said:

To save weight, I use a string of 30 red and green flashing LED fairy lights that I bought by mail
order. A Google search shows blue-white ones are easier to get now.

I was planning to do exactly the same thing. The following is the best deal I've found so far:

tinyurl.comw9miOpen ↗

£3.99 + £1.50 p&p, 40 green + red LEDs, multi-mode flash & shimmer with control box, 3 AA
batteries.

Any better options anyone?

looks good.

Not so far no, I don't bother with the bike, but decorating the kiddie trailer is fun - I found a
little battery powered xmas tree that might go on top of the flag
--
Chris French, Leeds

chris French said:

I don't bother with the bike, but decorating the kiddie trailer is fun -

Kiddie trailer? Bike? I'll be decorating myself! I am still looking for an interesting response to
SMIDSY. 'But I'm lit up like a Xmas tree!' is perhaps an idea.

Quoted message said:

I found a little battery powered xmas tree that might go on top of the flag

I have a rattling/singing Father Xmas that will go on one of the bar extensions. HoHoHo.

--
Michael Klontzas 'If everything seems to be coming your way, you're probably in the wrong lane'
(Borstelmann's Rule)

Michael Klontzas said:

Kiddie trailer? Bike? I'll be decorating myself! I am still looking for an interesting response to
SMIDSY. 'But I'm lit up like a Xmas tree!' is perhaps an idea.

The more imaginative ones will claim they thought you were Father Christmas but they knew he
didn't exist.

Tony

Tony Raven said:

Michael Klontzas said:

Kiddie trailer? Bike? I'll be decorating myself! I am still looking for an interesting response to
SMIDSY. 'But I'm lit up like a Xmas tree!' is perhaps an idea.

The more imaginative ones will claim they thought you were Father Christmas but they knew he
didn't exist.

Tony

I once saw a bike in central london (not at xmas time) covered in flashing lights (obviously battery
powered). It had led lights EVERYWHERE on it, as did the rider, AND his dog sported not only a
flashing LED collar, but a dog jacket covered in led's all flashing on and off too.

No way either of them could be missed. It was the most bizarre thing I've ever seen wrt cycling.

Some may like to know there are strings of led lights going at IKEA currently (can't recall the
price) - one string is a colour, battery powered (think it was three AA batteries) - in amber,
white, possibly blue, red, green.

My attempts to persuade my better half that his trailer requires fairy lights up the flag pole have
fallen on deaf ears thus far. I'm still trying to convince him the increased visibility of said flag
on trailer will be worth it!

Velvet

In message <[email hidden]>, Danny Colyer <[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

Michael Klontzas said:

tinyurl.comw9miOpen ↗ £3.99 + £1.50 p&p, 40 green + red LEDs, multi-mode flash & shimmer with
control box, 3 AA batteries.

Any better options anyone?

I've just bought a string of 20 red LED's, powered by 2 AA batteries, for GBP1.99 from Wilkinson's.

Oh, better have a look on Monday, i can't remember seeing anything like that last time I looked.

Quoted message said:

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them, but since my 21 month old daughter has taken rather
a shine to them I may have trouble getting them to stay on the bike ...

Wrap her in them ;-0

Quoted message said:

On the bright side, it doesn't involve ebay (since I filter out all e-mails with the word 'ebay'
in the body as a fairly effective spam prevention measure, ordering stuff from there isn't really
an option).

Setting up filters to get spam is tedious.

I've most recently been using K9 to scan incoming mail - it's one of these Bayesian statistics
jobbies, that analyses the words in the emails, and learns as it goes.

It classifies emails as 'Good' or 'spam' , it can mark the spam in the Subject, or with an added
header line, which you can then filter on.

For me it has worked really well and I get few false negatives and even fewer false positives

It's small and free;

<http://keir.net/k9.html>

An alternative which i have also used is PopFile
--
Chris French, Leeds

Michael Klontzas said:

tinyurl.comw9miOpen ↗ £3.99 + £1.50 p&p, 40 green + red LEDs, multi-mode flash & shimmer with
control box, 3 AA batteries.

Any better options anyone?

I've just bought a string of 20 red LED's, powered by 2 AA batteries, for GBP1.99 from Wilkinson's.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them, but since my 21 month old daughter has taken rather a
shine to them I may have trouble getting them to stay on the bike ...

Unfortunately there were no other colours (I'd have liked a string of mixed colours), there is no
steady mode and only one flashing mode (all 20 lights flash simultaneously, at a faster rate than I
like to see). On the bright side, it doesn't involve ebay (since I filter out all e-mails with the
word 'ebay' in the body as a fairly effective spam prevention measure, ordering stuff from there
isn't really an option).

--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
speedy5.freeserve.co.ukdannyOpen ↗ "He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine

Michael Klontzas said:

tinyurl.comw9miOpen ↗ £3.99 + £1.50 p&p, 40 green + red LEDs, multi-mode flash & shimmer with
control box, 3 AA batteries.

Any better options anyone?

I've just bought a string of 20 red LED's, powered by 2 AA batteries, for GBP1.99 from Wilkinson's.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them, but since my 21 month old daughter has taken rather a
shine to them I may have trouble getting them to stay on the bike ...

Unfortunately there were no other colours (I'd have liked a string of mixed colours), there is no
steady mode and only one flashing mode (all 20 lights flash simultaneously, at a faster rate than I
like to see). On the bright side, it doesn't involve ebay (since I filter out all e-mails with the
word 'ebay' in the body as a fairly effective spam prevention measure, ordering stuff from there
isn't really an option).

--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
speedy5.freeserve.co.ukdannyOpen ↗ "He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine

chris French said:

I've most recently been using K9 to scan incoming mail keir.netk9.htmlOpen ↗

Thanks for the suggestion. I took a look, but I've got Mailwasher working so well now I think I'll
be better off just sticking with that: mailwasher.netmailwasher.netOpen ↗

I also plan to stop using my juggler.net address at the end of the year, which I think will reduce
the amount of spam considerably.

--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
speedy5.freeserve.co.ukdannyOpen ↗ "He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine

chris French said:

I've most recently been using K9 to scan incoming mail keir.netk9.htmlOpen ↗

Thanks for the suggestion. I took a look, but I've got Mailwasher working so well now I think I'll
be better off just sticking with that: mailwasher.netmailwasher.netOpen ↗

I also plan to stop using my juggler.net address at the end of the year, which I think will reduce
the amount of spam considerably.

--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
speedy5.freeserve.co.ukdannyOpen ↗ "He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine

Danny Colyer said:

I also plan to stop using my juggler.net address at the end of the year, which I think will reduce
the amount of spam considerably.

Most of my spam at the moment is coming from Maplin, though they do have an unregister feature. They
have my addres-for-using-on-shopping-sites rather than one of my throwaway addresses. I'm using
Spam-Assassin with baysian, and its learning quite nicely now and getting better. The auto-whitelist
feature works really well and seems to prevent false positives from shopping sites that I want
things like order confirmations from. Also triggers on many of Maplin's mails unless its outweighed
by all the other checks.

Got my pretty bright white and red LEDs from Maplin anyway, and a 10 year old 555 chip I had hanging
around which doesn't seem to work, oh well. May just build a transistor oscilator instead as its not
much more complicated, though the idea of a 2:1 mark:space ratio on the 555 seemed good. The LED
would be on mostly, but wink off.

One of the bright LEDs, with clip-on diffuser, heatshrinked to the end of the flag pole should
work well. I also have loads of red,yellow,orange 3mm LEDs from a previous project which Lindsay
plans to run up her flag pole, with a decade counter to drive them perhaps, though that may be a
bit excessive I think. She's also taken a shine to a digital noise (flicker) circuit I did for a
panto prop one year. What could be useful would be a clear flag pole with 4mm or greater
internal diameter.

Anyone know off hand the external diameter for a flag pole for an ICE?

- Richard

--
_/_/_/ _/_/_/ _/_/_/ Richard dot Corfield at ntlworld dot com _/ _/ _/ _/ _/_/ _/ _/ Time is a
one way street, _/ _/ _/_/ _/_/_/ Except in the Twighlight Zone.

Danny Colyer said:

I also plan to stop using my juggler.net address at the end of the year, which I think will reduce
the amount of spam considerably.

Most of my spam at the moment is coming from Maplin, though they do have an unregister feature. They
have my addres-for-using-on-shopping-sites rather than one of my throwaway addresses. I'm using
Spam-Assassin with baysian, and its learning quite nicely now and getting better. The auto-whitelist
feature works really well and seems to prevent false positives from shopping sites that I want
things like order confirmations from. Also triggers on many of Maplin's mails unless its outweighed
by all the other checks.

Got my pretty bright white and red LEDs from Maplin anyway, and a 10 year old 555 chip I had hanging
around which doesn't seem to work, oh well. May just build a transistor oscilator instead as its not
much more complicated, though the idea of a 2:1 mark:space ratio on the 555 seemed good. The LED
would be on mostly, but wink off.

One of the bright LEDs, with clip-on diffuser, heatshrinked to the end of the flag pole should
work well. I also have loads of red,yellow,orange 3mm LEDs from a previous project which Lindsay
plans to run up her flag pole, with a decade counter to drive them perhaps, though that may be a
bit excessive I think. She's also taken a shine to a digital noise (flicker) circuit I did for a
panto prop one year. What could be useful would be a clear flag pole with 4mm or greater
internal diameter.

Anyone know off hand the external diameter for a flag pole for an ICE?

- Richard

--
_/_/_/ _/_/_/ _/_/_/ Richard dot Corfield at ntlworld dot com _/ _/ _/ _/ _/_/ _/ _/ Time is a
one way street, _/ _/ _/_/ _/_/_/ Except in the Twighlight Zone.