Double 0 Soul

..after all that^ hard work, i needed a break so we headed to Castellammare del Golfo in northern Sicily.. considered the jewel of the north-west, a bit like Barrow-in-Furness. I nearly missed the plane because security didn't like the look of my fishing tackle.. a small pouch filled with lead shot and scissors.. I picked up a Fiat Panda Hybrid in the airport..the driving in Sicily is just insanity, much like Mario Kart, the only way to get around is to drive like an Italian, never stop, never give an inch, push in at every opportunity, shouting shit and gesticulating wildly while throwing banana skins and tortoise shells at other road users.. they know you're a tourist if you're indicating so i stopped using my indicators on day 2 and pushed in at every opportunity they soon accepted me as one of their own Luckily, when they're not behind the wheel of a car, the people are lovely, we rented a house on a dirt track in the middle of nowhere, my sat-nav freaked out and couldn't locate the house, outside the capital, nobody speaks a word of English and my italian is considered 'offensive' at best but after 30 mins of driving around the dirt tracks i had to go to someone's house to ask directions.. i had a phone number but the guy who owned our house didn't speak english so i couldn't call him and explain where we were because i had no fkin clue where we were?!.. ..The guy who came to the door lived in Milan (originally from Sicily and spoke a little english) and was staying at his holiday home with his family, wearing nothing more than Speedos and flip-flops, he called the house owner who came to our rescue on his dirt bike. Our house, nestled between the sea and the mountains.. with my hire-car... it's been 37ºC and 30ºC at night ..down the dirt track ..to the sea ..this is where we spent our days snorkeling with the beach babes The food / restaurant culture is incredible, albeit.. very expensive.. there are no fast food outlets or burger chains.. even the supermarket was deli quality food but priced accordingly. Over here.. if you don't want to pay Waitrose prices, you go to Tesco but over there, you didn't have that option, we ate at some shitholes just to save money towards some of the most fasntastic restaurants i've ever eaten at, one place was serving €290 steaks, we had burgers .. but the most incredible burgers i've ever eaten, dripping with fatty parma-ham, we ate in a forest overlooking the sea and a walled courtyard in Scopello (Ssee last photo) The restaurants open 8.30 till 2am.. most folks come out to eat at 10.30, crowds of peeps queue for tables.. i'm not proud to say that we spent £1150 just on evening meals in one week Messina was the local brew.. it's far, far, far superior on draught ..kid caught a baby gekko Cactus fruit was growing by the side of the road The first night we drove into the local town for pizza, (8mins away) it looks beautiful ...but look how densely populated this place is.. it reminded me of the favellas in Brazil but these buildings are mostly ancient, pre-car so the streets were narrow with no footpaths, always one way and heading in the opposite direction to where i wanted to go.. restaurants would just drag tables and chairs out onto the street and put a metal barrier across the top of the street blocking your way ..trying to negotiate this madness was a pain (getting parked was a fkin nightmare) but 1000s of peeps were out in the streets, from babies to grandparents enjoying each others company instead of sitting in the house typing shit into the internet.. i mean, contributing to forums This was the local town during siesta.. ..my teenager on the rare occasion he wasn't eating gellato ..it seems even Sicilians have love for Yorkshires finest square tubed mountain bikes ..this was Scopello, just around the coast ..on the morning we left, the wind woke me up at 7.30am, blowing a sun shield outside the house.. i had to get up and take it down, odd? .. it started to rain .. hot rain, this wasn't forcast? wtf.. by the time i got to the airport, it was beautiful blue skies again, then i heard the news about the billionaires in the sunken yaught when we got back to the UK.. we were staying just to the left of Palermo, the yacht sank just to the right of Palermo.. half an hour around the coastal road ..anyway, nice to see you all again!

Get comfy.. i've got a long overdue photo-dump We moved into our house 5yrs ago and the bathroom was already fked! I've been bodging the electrics to keep shit working Being an 1880era terrace house, there was never a bathroom, toilet would have been at the end of the garden (now a bike shed) and washing facilities would have been a tin bath in front of the coal fire.. so our bathroom would have been a back bedroom.. It looked like this.. .. there was a false wall to house the electric shower but designed by fkin idiots so one would open the door onto the sink which you would shimmy around before you could close it *face palm* I chalked out my plans full scale on the floor at work ..and started building the cabinets ..bought a lovely hand made concrete basin ..and some wood from https://www.albiontimber.co.uk/ We're not posh enough to have en-suite so much to the families disgust.. i bought a camping toilet from Amazon and put it in the outside loo ..I started building the cabinets in ..took a break for Pakistani mango season ...droooool! ..i didn't do any of the plumbing or tiling, i just planned it all out to the nth degree and bought all the stuff (well you know what i'm like, i spent months doing this ).. turned out the tiler was some kind of tiling god! Now it looks like this.. ..had the shower tray imported from Ireland I wanted the windowsil to drain the water back to the shower tray so rather than taper the fluted pink tiles i made a wooden plinth and cast a silicone mould ..then made a concrete windowsil instead ..turned out pretty well I bought this mid-century Italian medicine cabinet from https://vintarama.com/en-gb in Germany These are the plinths i made from the Ash i bought from Albion ..bits and bobs from Ferm Living ..and Zone Denmark ..i've built a hidden cupboard into the cabinets ..push the door and it clicks open Stacey Solomen can fk off with her scatter cushions.. i've missed my vocation in life as a bathroom designer!

So it seems that i'm a judge :0 Almost as many as the contestants.. If y'all think too many judges will spoil the broth, i don't mind stepping down, i'd never heard of this brand till 10mins ago. I'll quite enjoy the judging process but i might not be around too often so could i judge this blind? .. ie- avoid the thread entirely and @MJF9 just email a front and back shot of each pair at the end.. i could be completely unbiased?

These were my old Silverstone 47s before Doc_H turned them into sexy hot-pants Non of the wear is down to me.. they looked like this when i bought them from Yahoo sometime around 2013

Sorry for the slow response @rbeck.. it's been at least 6mths since my last confession Sure, the frame is a Mid-90s Pace RC200, They were made in Yorkshire, very light, very rigid, very quick The forks are Pace RC31, Flight saddle and Syncros post It's been through a series of incarnations but i think i'm finally done tinkering with it.. It's got Pace Renthal bars, Pauls levers, Pauls Thumbies (with Dura-Ace shifters) Pauls Klampers and Onza grips X-Lite L168 with Ringle Slamma Cooks Bros Racing crank (which @beautiful_FrEaK proxied for me) Pace rings, Syncros Ti BB, Suntour XC Pros, XTR M952 front and rear, CK hubs and Ultradynamicos

It's grim January weather outside.. what better time for a shorts thread? I've had a bit of a love/hate relationship with shorts over the years.. back in my salad days, when i was skating and riding a lot i was never out of cargo/combat shorts, my shins were battered from pedal damage but at that age, i didn't really mind, i looked at them as battle scars.. come my 30s my shins were bumpy and the 'battle scars' had turned into broken veins, i became a bit self conscious of how battered my legs looked and kept them covered up, the only time i wore shorts was to do the decorating or the beach/swimming .. this made shit worse because my legs were always super-white.. then came a good 18yrs of total denim obsession where i would only ever wear jeans no matter what.. if it was 30° i'd be wearing jeans.. if it was -10 i'd be wearing jeans.. i'm over that now and rather than being perma-denimclad.. i just wears whatevers appropriate to my environment/activity.. if it's cold i'm wearing down and if it's hot.. i'm wearing shorts and my legs.. albeit a little scared look a lot less battered nowadays.. I digress.. 'Shorts' Back in the 90s i had quite a few pairs..a pair of Stussy shorts from their 'Superfly Gear' season in a washed out camo were my favourite.. they lasted me for years, i was never out of them, eventually they fell to pieces.. i was that attached to them i saved the top button .. i'll try and dig it out.. when we went to South America, i just bought a few pairs of ex-army cargo pants from JayJays the army surplus joint and got them hemmed into shorts at Terrace Tailors .. I don't know about you guys but i don't think repro cuts work for shorts.. perfect as jeans because the loose thigh comes in at the knee but cut them down at or above the knee and they're too wide and drape like a skirt.. when my kid was a toddler and i had dad knees i cut some SC-47s down and they just looked comical, i gave them a cuff.. that didn't work either so rather than pay for a hem.. i just binned them.. it's the same with OG spec chinos, the top block is too deep and if you balance it by going past the knee as Cabourn does they look even worse.. whispering grass-esque.. it throws out all your proportions and makes you look shorter than you actually are... Ugh! I like the Supreme Work shorts, they've been a staple summer release for decades, they just look like simple chino shorts but the boxy cut and midweight material is an absolute winner .. i don't think they've changed at all since the late 90s.. this was their 2015 line up I've got a few pairs or their more conservative colours (khaki, navy and grey) which i've bought vintage and cheaply. The only giveaway to the brand is the small box logo on the back pocket.. anyway, don't take my warped perspective as gospel.. what do you guys think/wear when the weather is too hot for jeans? I can probably dig some more vintage shorts out the wardrobe.. let's see how the thread goes.

With a 3rd lockdown looming we're all spending a lot more time at home so lets see the things around the house you love.. It doesn't have to be anything expensive, if you love it, post it, i'll get things rolling.. Model 1227 c1938 Anglepoise (Herbert Terry & Sons) British lamp design at its best, original everything even down to the grommets, it's just had a sympathetic re-wire. It's sat on top of my mid-century wallnut and teak sideboard by Gunther Hoffstead for Uniflex Some geometric origami made by a local artist ...he was loosing his sight, couldn't paint so made origami I couldn't decide which side i preferred so i mounted it in a frame with glass on both sides, i can turn it around when i get bored Phlegm's Fight or Flight Kid Acne canvas The original at Park Hill There are numerous prints from this but only one canvas Mandy Payne's 'Everything of Value has Been Removed' I own some of her work, as does Alexei Sayle As you might have gathered, all the stuff i collect reflects the city in which i live, there will be a lot more to come if the thread takes off...

Grab yourself a camera and go for a stroll around your neighbourhood, within a 30min radius of home will be just fine, lets see the streets you walk everyday, the places you shop, the bus stops, no need for landmarks, the more mundane the better...as the thread suggests...? Here in Sheffield we have one of the largest poverty gaps in the UK, the city boomed during to the industrial revolution, imploded during the Thatcher government >further decline brought on by the outsourcing of the 90's. You can draw a line through my city, the rich/poor divide. I work in one of the most deprived areas but live in the West which borders our beloved Peak District, The Victorian houses built by steel barons trying to escape the cities pollution, Outside of London S10 is still considered to be one of the most affluent districts in the UK but we live in a typically working-class Victorian terrace house c1870 it's pretty much all we could afford in the area. These are the previously mentioned terraces albeit, ours is tucked away up a lane. ..Along the next street we go, Steve Beckett of Warp Records fame used to live up here, and Richard Hawley just a couple more streets away. ..the allotments at the end of the street Sheffield is the greenest city in Europe/has more trees per person or it did until Amey started cutting the f**kers down, Looking over S10. Follow the river Porter up to Lady Cannings Plantation, for all your MTB needs Down to the park, typical Sheffield weather Just a stones throw from the working-class terraces, overlooking the park are the middle-class Victorian villas . . Heading up towards Ranmoor where red brick turns to olde'world stone This is the route i cycle to work . . Through the Botanical Gardens (like a mini Kew) . ... i pop out at our local row of shops JoJo's, find their vintage goodies on Insta Past local muralist and print maker extraordinaire Phlegm, lots of his work dotted around the city. . . . ...and back home. Go to it super-peeps and don't be afraid to photo-bomb.

Ive been researching SugarCane's M-Series on and off for years..it's 99% complete but still a bit of a work in progress.. First up are the 'MP' codes, from what i can gather they originated around the late 80's, there used to be some bits of helpful info on 90's era Japanese blog sites, Geocities and such, sadly nowadays its all been lost or archived... MP-597 XX replica, redline denim, offset loop, what look like a boxy 50,s cut. MP-603 Circa 90/91, white/silver line, off set loop but look more like a '47' cut MP-604 101Z 'Cane's' Riders released from around 1990/91 MP-619 Lee 101, Pinkline, 'Union Made Cane's' button None of the MP models have a patch. Production of the MP codes ends before 1992. I have seen an article in 'Made in Japan' magazine referring to the 1991 release of the M41001 but that was retrospective having been published in 1998, there must have been a few years crossover period. Next up the early 90,s product codes M41072 1922-1936 replica M41028 Late 1800's Repro, No back yoke M41030 Late 30,s 501XX using a 13oz white line denim These came into production in the early 90,s and gained a cloth patch around 1997, There is also a M41030 with standard 'Toyo&CoSPL' fly M41001 Early 90's Laurel leaf model, late 40,s silhouette, 50,s details, pink-line denim M41001 1997 cloth patch model, both of these pairs are a 50's repro/details but their silhouette is more 47-esque, most unlike the wide/boxy, exaggerated SC-55's M41027 40,s Repro 101-B 14oz denim M41057 WWII 101-B M41051 1936 101 Cowboy Hair on Hide M41101 Mid 30,s 101 Cowboy M41058 11MW M41059 1947 11MW For comparison here's a deadstock pair belonging to Mr. Takahashi of Junky who also reproduced this pair. Another comparison of the pinkline denim types through the generations Worth noting that the M41001 & M41030 are 1" undersized comparred to the SC-47's and shrink 'from tagged' M41001 Tagged 32 SC-1947 Tagged 32 Other notable mentions M40333 Bell Bottoms M41151 Painter Pants M41117/M41099 Lot 117 + Lot 99 Ranch Pants, 10oz, buckle back, wide leg M41102 Lot 102 Engineer Pants, 10oz buckle back, wide leg M41104 Lot 104 Tool Pocket, 10oz wide leg M41106 Lot 106 Union Made Logger Pants, 10oz wide leg M41025 Beams x Oriental Enterprises XX. M41001-esque, 'Beams' tab & buttons, no arcs, no patch. Next up are the 91-97 M-Series Denim Jackets M11026 WWII 13oz denim (M11317 506XX Cloth Patch +pocket flap +donut buttons) M11001 Type2 without patch/outer stitch M11027 with patch M11028 Type 3 All of the above lots started life circa early 90,s and gained a cloth patch before the end of production in 1997 M11317 213 blouse M11002 (M11327 Blanket Lined) 101-J M11141 11MJ M11142 11MJZ Scovill zipper I hope this helps with the search... If you need anymore info, let me know and i'll see what i can dig up.