What are /r/brum's favorite Products & Services?

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I use the app called nxbus mticket. A 28 day pass that let's me use any travel west midlands bus as many times as I want all day is about 64 quid a month. It's just a pass you keep on your phone and display when needed.

Here's the link for android

I'll throw a shout out for my favourite place to eat in the city, The Warehouse on Allison Street (practically beneath the platforms at Moor Street station). It's a vegetarian place but don't let that put you off if you are a carnivore, the food is delicious. It's currently ranked the third best place to eat in Brum on tripadvisor. You may need to book for an evening meal. It might be an idea to book for a lunchtime meal too actually.

It's also Villa vs Albion this weekend, it's not Villa vs Blues in terms of scale but it's still a pretty big deal for the locals. Albion isn't technically in Birmingham, it's about three miles up the road from Villa and the stadium is a few hundred yards outside of the city limits but like I said, it's still a local derby.

The market will be very busy, if you are coming in by train expect New Street to be rammed too. Network Rail, who are in charge of the station just tweeted that 525,000 people passed through the station last weekend, and that was excluding those who were changing trains.

Unsure whether this is too far for you, but my gun club is in Solihull.

https://sites.google.com/site/solihullrifleandpistolclub/home

Rent of the gun is £2 with unlimited time on the range per session. Pellets are £7 for 500 (both .177 and .22) and the targets are 10p each if you need them. Theres loads of interactive stuff to shoot at anyway, such as tin cans, metal targets and the like.

I'm currently a member and only just started myself. If you want more info just fire me a PM. Pun not intended!

Right, that'll be it then. Bad place to live if you're a fan of anarchist bookshops. Luckily for you citymapper just came to Birmingham, so you'll never have to figure public transport out https://citymapper.com/. It's well worth getting the app.

Trust me, take a little time to head out of the city centre. All of my eco-friendly flag burning mates from uni moved to Stirchley, Kings Heath, Moseley or Balsall Heath. Go to Peach Garden and order the three roast meats, head to Digbeth Dining Club and try to eat a burger whilst being assaulted by loud house music, go to the Butcher's Social and order a kilo of salted caramel chicken wings. It's great here.

I personally use NordVPN, which has a cost, and if they do sell your data to anyone (I'm suspicious the free ones might, but I have no proof) I've not so much as heard a rumour of it.

Using a VPN is childishly simple these days: you download a client and run it on your pc. There's simple instructions to follow if you want say uTorrent to use that connection:

I tend to use it on my laptop when I'm on dodgy WiFi as well.

Found this on Gumtree, not sure if it's exactly what you're after.

90 litre bark chipping hardly used, £5 Gumtree Ad Woodchips

I'm sure you've likely resolved this already as this was posted a while ago, however I thought I would post a few links to get other people started incase they stumble across this thread.

To cut out a load of Jargon, It essentially comes down to what phone you're using.
If you have an Apple iPhone, then you should look into using Apple's built in Apple Pay.
A guide for this with Q&A's can be found here

However if you have an android (non apple) device, then it would be best to check to see if your phones manufacturer has their own app setup. Although Android is created by Google so most android phone's should accept google pay (I believe).
A Link to the Google pay app can be found here (or you can search it in your phone's app store) and the setup process will guide you through adding your bank card securely.

Once you have your card added to either app, it's simply a case of unlocking your screen and holding your phone against a card reader to make a payment :)

You're not likely to get an email.. I've had one in 15 years, and it was someone staying at mine so I'm not sure what they dowloaded. You can wait until you get a letter, though I'd still consider doing it over a VPN (NordVPN or something).

/u/Fineus is right, there's nothing really in Selly Oak itself but there's some stuff around Balsall Heath - which is much closer than Handsworth. The closest place to get some good indian sweets is probably Shereen Kadah on the Moseley Road. Here's a link to how to get there from Selly Oak. It'll take about half an hour to get there if you live near the Bristol Road. It's my local sweet shop. It's my local sweet shop - I rate the gulab jamun highly, I quite like the ras malai, the barfi isn't bad, they have jalebis too but I don't eat those so I don't know if they're any good. Pick up a veggie samosa whilst you're there. The thing is that the items I have listed are more or less all they have so it won't do if you want something different.

If you're wanting a wider selection of treats, it's a similar journey time-wise to get to Sparkbrook and the Stratford road. Half an hour and a couple of buses. Here's a link of how to get to Mushtaq's Sweet Centre. It's pretty good and has a very wide selection of sweets, and it's on a road full of sweet shops so you'll definitely be able to find what you want. There's a bunch of other desi food there too. It's also where me and my family buy sarees, salwar kameez, etc if you ever need any of that.

Also, if the sweets are for Diwali, Happy Diwali! I hope you have a good one.

Hi floorclip, thanks for the response!

As you can see here on Accuweather, this was the night: https://www.accuweather.com/en/gb/birmingham/b5-5/evening-weather-forecast/326966?day=5 . It shows rain with limited visibility. Sadly, I don't have any pictures outdoors of the night as we just ran inside because of the rain to get to Nandos, the arcade etc.

Also, how can I gather evidence of them hanging up? Would this be presentable against them? From what I know the reason a lot of phone brands (Samsung, Google etc.) removed call recording was due to it not being allowed by UK law.

I have already posted in pepipoo as advised by yourself and others :)

Looks like you can get them on Amazon too

Which side of Brum? If you're heading north into Staffs, then my local club's route library may be of interest: http://www.walsall-cycling.co.uk/routes_library.html - I guess most of the local clubs will have something similar?

This guide is quite good, and second-hand copies are dirt cheap; as it's now 20 years old(!), some of the maps are a bit out of date, and some bits of the routes are busier than when they were drawn up, but once you're in the lanes you're in the lanes. (Ignore the 'tours' in the title - there's nothing longer than a day ride in there) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Philips-Cycle-Tours-Around-Birmingham/dp/0540082023

Hazelwell Park in the Stirchley hinterlands beyond Kings Heath may be ideal for your purpose.

From the ancient oak tree on the upper east side you can look westwardly down to the River Rea, and across it to see the sun setting over the venerable Cadbury factory (weather permitting).

It is close to Stirchley Trading Estate, and still has the remains of cricket wicket.

There is a convenient BMX track nestled in the south east corner.

Midlands Today covered this tonight, from the 15:30 Mark (if you're reading this before Friday at 7pm anyway ;) )

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m00111g5/midlands-today-evening-news-28102021

bacchus is like a medieval tavern/game of thrones pub bar. nothing else like it - classy too

geocaching is like a treasure hunt kind of thing, and you can get a app on your phone and do it through there , can be a bit of a novel and interesting way to find new places or explore random bits....for example

and they are geeky but will give you something to do

http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC1KCZZ_how-high

http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC3CER7_walkover

There's a women's walking football at Solihull Football Centre. They play Mondays and Fridays. They play before us on Mondays and look a friendly bunch. https://bookwhen.com/mpsports#focus=ev-soc2-20200727110000

Further to my last, if you want to shave a few more quid off, consider getting this credit card, if they'll accept you; 5% cashback on a significant outlay is not to be sneezed at, and both Chiltern and hotels.com accept AmEx. Just be heedful of the advice to pay it off in full each month to avoid being stuck with interest charges.

I've uploaded 4 routes here and I'll get some more routes uploaded for you when I find my OS maps, moving loads of stuff around in the house so they're a bit lost at the moment.

You can download the GPX file and then import it into an app like OS Maps/Komoot/Viewranger and use it from that, or if you prefer physical maps you can upload the GPX file here and then write down the gridrefs and follow them on your OS map. The maps needed for these routes are Worcester & Droitwich Spa (204) + Wolverhampton & Dudley (219).

It's also worth checking out the named routes that a lot of my routes pass through - Wychavon Way, Monarch's Way, John Corbett Way etc. as they're all really nice.

It's on a crossroads that's known locally as, believe it or not, The Fighting Cocks, after a pub that used to be on the corner. It's got it's own bus stop and everything.

www.freecycle.org

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You can get some pretty decent stuff off there for free if you're able to collect it. There's also some complete trash, but just sift through till you find something suitable for the short term.

I've actually got one I could sell to you if you want. I can't solve the damn thing and I refuse to Google it.

https://smile.amazon.co.uk/dp/B084MJYN1T/

Let me know if you want to buy it.

In case you can't find anyone I suggest Youtube. Get GCSE Maths and English revision guides and workbooks to keep track of stuff you need to cover. You don't have to buy them just ask around, a lot of ex GSCE student have them laying around. Go through each page/topic anything you don't understand look it up on YouTube. The quality of some of the educational stuff on YouTube is unreal. And you will stay motivated just by how easy it is to understand their explanations.

You can get some off Amazon for under £4, delivered tomorrow.

It is a well established axiom that the best book in the entire world which which to learn computer programming is The C Programming Language, written by the creators of the C Language and UNIX: https://www.amazon.co.uk/C-Programming-Language-2nd/dp/0131103628/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=c+programming+language&qid=1597310701&sr=8-1

Most modern programming languages are derived from C e.g: C#, C++, Java, Javascript, PHP, Perl etc. Therefore, by learning C, you are also learning 90% of every other modern programming language. Plus, C will teach you the correct coding habits, and help you understand what actually takes place when a program runs much better than a higher level language such as Java (because, Java is an interpreted runtime language, whereas C is compiled; thus, you are required to do a little bit more work e.g., memory management).

However, if you are a genuine noob, in the most extreme and explicit description of a noob, then I would recommend starting with the Pythong language, as it's very much more English like than C is: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Learning-Python-Mark-Lutz/dp/1449355730/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=python+o%27reilly&qid=1597310902&sr=8-1

My treat for getting out and running is podcasts. Pocket Casts downloads them automatically, meaning I can just put on some headphones and go. There's a directory of popular shows in various categories. Try a few and see what you like. Many BBC Radio shows are available, including comedies like The News Quiz.