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1 January 2010
(Friday) - Happy New Year
As
we stampede into a new year (as though we have any choice in the
matter), it is traditional to stop and reflect on what’s happened before
speculating on the future. And, as anyone who knows me will realise that my
life is one for traditions, that’s what I’m going to do. So,
what momentous things have happened to me this year?
And
I’ve done so much this year. Looking back through my blog, I’ve found
outings, trips and events that I’d completely forgotten about. That’s one of
the reasons I blog with monotonous regularity – if I didn’t, I’d not remember
whole swathes of my life. For example, I went to the London Dungeon for my
birthday. I didn’t remember that one until I re-read the entry for last
February. For
some time I’ve been threatening to publish my personal list of “Top
Ten” events of the year. And in doing so, I think I’ve surprised myself:
Bubbling under the top ten were trips to
Port Lympne, Interestingly four of the top events didn’t
feature excessive amounts of beer. I’m afraid none of the camping weekends
made it into the list. Much as I enjoy them, this year’s were all marred in
one way or another. Didgeridoos and bike thefts at Teston,
and continual heavy rain at Similarly, drunken nephews kept the summer
house party from the top ten, and a lack of protagonists kept another
favourite (Rye bonfire parade) out. I must admit that for all that my year does
feature many events that occur every year, I’ve
amazed myself to find that only three of them have made my top ten for the
last year. Having said that, the various kite and beer
festivals have already been provisionally pencilled into the diary for 2010.
And so have quite a few other events too. If any of my loyal readers have any
suggestions for days out for the next few months, please let me know. So, it’s now 2010. Here we go again… |
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2 January 2010
(Saturday) - Watching the Telly
Yesterday we forgot to set the Sky Plus box
to record the second part of the Doctor Who Xmas special. Forgetting to do so
probably speaks volumes about what I thought of the first part. I watched the
second part on the BBC’s website this morning. It was…. well… During the week I had a conversation about
last week’s episode with a good friend of mine. Well, to be precise, a good
friend’s daughter (aged six.) She loved the program because
it was scary and had this baddie who was a man who could fly and that turned
into a skeleton whenever he wanted to eat someone. Which is fine. She loved it. I
didn’t. The trouble with Doctor Who is that having watched it all my life I
tend to forget that it is primarily a children’s program. Things like
continuity, plausibility, plot, etc do not feature in kids TV shows. Take the
most recent Doctor Who two-part story. Having brought the Master back from
the smouldering remains of a cremated corpse, and spent two episodes fighting
him, what actually happened to him in the end? I’m not going to spoil it for
anyone, because I don’t know what actually happened to him in the end. He
just wasn’t there any more. The writers just forgot he was there. I find myself comparing Doctor Who with
other sci-fi such as “Survivors”, “BattleStar
Galactica”, “ Consider last week’s TV adaptation of a favourite
book of mine - “Day of the Triffids”. If you haven’t seen it,
it’s still available on the BBC’s
website. The book is based on two rather nonsensical premises.
Firstly that most of humanity has gone blind and secondly that the world is
filled with twelve foot tall walking carnivorous plants. Both of these
notions were presented in such a way that you could believe them, and so you
can relate to the tale. In Doctor Who, with plot holes big enough
to drive a bus through, a triffid would just start eating blind people, and
the target audience would never question why everyone was blind, or where the
triffids came from. Perhaps this is why I like the “Royle Family” so much. Did you see the Xmas
special? I can *so* relate to that program because I can relate to the people
in it. And (I would contend) this is the reason for the
success of reality TV shows, X-Factor and all that
ilk. They’ve got real people in them. |
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3 January 2010
(Sunday) - New Fence, Old Photos
This long weekend for the New Year’s
holiday has (for me) been pretty much wasted days. What with
the snow and cold, I’ve barely left the house and have spent far too long in
NeverWinter. I loathe and detest sitting round doing nothing, so today I was
determined to go out and do something. If it was only a dull wander round
some garden centres. Last year our front garden fence collapsed.
I’ve been meaning to replace it for some time. Next door’s got iron railings
which look good, but are rather tall for my liking. I’d like shorter ones.
And the length of railing I want is“non-standard”
(nine feet seven inches), so I’d have to have them custom-made I’ve tried
to contact wrought iron suppliers, but they don’t reply. Which
is exactly what next door found when they tried to get bespoke railings.
For all this talk of recession and credit crunch, some people don’t want the
work. I’ve come to the conclusion that since I’m
not a blacksmith, a wooden fence would be easier. I can buy fence panels in
various places, and I can cut them to size. (Oh, how easy it is to
type these words. I expect in the weeks to come I shall regret this foolish
boast.) So, together with ‘er indoors TM , we set off through the
snow to B&Q to have a look at their fencing. Rather disappointing,
really. But they did have a decking balustrade which gave me an idea. Two
balustrades and a bit of rope might look quite fetching. Or rather awful,
depending on your views on rope fencing. Homebase didn’t have much at all in the way
of fencing. To make up for this, they did have a nice lady who was telling
anyone who’d listen that “it’s not as cold already as it used to be
now”. I smiled sweetly and made a hasty retreat before she decided to be
my friend. WyeVale was a disappointment. Some things
never change. And then to Bybrook Barn which had
something that I might be able to cut and hammer into shape. I just need to
persuade one or other of the fruits of my loin to chip in and help with the
donkey work (i.e. do it for me) once it gets warmer. I then spent the afternoon archiving my
photos. Anyone who knows me will realise that I photograph absolutely
everything. And with my current camera, every photo I have takes up about 2Mb
of disk space. So I went through my photos for the last two years. I
didn’t realise that it had been that long since I’d had a cull. I lost count
of the events at which I had a dozen (pretty much) identical
photos. I did some serious deleting, managing to claw back over 2Gb worth of
disk space. I got the last two years of photos onto three compact disks,
which I thought wasn’t bad. I just need to discipline myself to chuck out the
rubbish photos every time I unload my camera from now on…. |
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4 January 2010
(Monday) - A Windfall
I’ve had a revelation. As we come to the
end of the financial year, there’s no council tax to be paid for a couple of
months. Rather than squandering the money on beer, I’m tempted to waste the
money I’ll save on buying something “big”. My current computer is now three years old.
In PC circles, that’s positively antiquated. It is beginning to creak a
little. On booting (which takes ages), the thing always finds
some new hardware which isn’t there. And one more than one occasions it’s
failed to launch the anti-virus software. I’ve recently done some fiddling about with
my computer to try to breathe new life into it. Perhaps most radically was
a “reg clean-up”. I’m reliably informed
that this will make the thing work better. I hope so, but I remain unconvinced.
The only tangible thing I noticed was that the clean-up tried to delete the
anti-virus software. New PCs come with Windows 7. I’m told that
Windows 7 has an XP emulation mode in which I can run NeverWinter Nights,
and (to be honest)running
that game is probably the number one consideration I’ll have for a new PC.
Continuing this blog will be in number two position. It’s been suggested that I leave the PC as
it is for gaming, and buy a NetBook for net
surfing, blogging, etc. Perhaps I’m being thick, but I can’t see the
advantages of this plan. My existing PC isn’t really of a high enough spec
for today’s PC gaming, and it wouldn’t cost that much more than a NetBook to replace the whole PC. In fact, having a (admittedly
very quick)look
round eBay makes me think that a standard base-unit type PC is cheaper than a
comparable laptop or NetBook. OK, so a NetBook
is portable, but do I want a computer which is portable? I have cordless
phones which are portable, and I spend hours trying to find where I left
them. A PC stays where it lives. I can see the advantages of taking a NetBook to the astro club if I
was giving a talk, but the NetBooks I’ve seen on
eBay don’t have sockets to plug into the projector Perhaps I need to do a bit
more research. Or take advice from my loyal readers. Something else I might waste by money on
would be a new digital camera. I got my new phone purely for the camera on
it, but seeing how the phone battery only lasts for a day (at most), the thing’s usually dead when I want to take a photo. I
have a digital camera, but it is old – I bought the thing in 2001. To be
honest, it’s on the way out. There is a tangible delay of a couple of seconds
between pressing the button and it taking a photo. And it eats batteries. If
I leave the batteries in, they go flat within a couple of hours. So I have
taken to leaving the battery compartment open to save the battery power.
Perhaps a new camera might be money well spent. The only trouble is that I don’t know the
first thing about cameras. I know less about new cameras than new PCs, and
that’s saying something. I can’t tell an F-stop from an exposure. And I’m not
going to ask in the shop. Is it just me, or is there really a patronising
arrogance and snobbery about camera salesmen? Another possible waste of saved council tax
money would be sat-nav. Specifically one for my bike. Bike scrat-navs aren’t cheap, and it would save stopping to fiddle
about with maps every time I came to a junction. Last year this cash went towards a new front
door, and the year before it went on Koi. What shall I spend it on this year? I’m not alone in having an unexpected
council tax bung. I wonder what my loyal readers will spend theirs on…. |
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5 January 2010
(Tuesday) - Oh Well...
I have often heard it said that God laughs
when we make plans. Yesterday I was speculating on treating myself to
something expensive on the money saved from not paying council tax for a
couple of months. Today I have spent that money. The ‘er
indoors TM – mobile went for its MOT and
service today. By some strange co-incidence the bill was almost exactly the
same as the amount of bonus money I was expecting to have from two month free
from council tax. Perhaps I won’t be getting that new PC or
camera after all. Talking of cars, the “My Boy TM -
mobile” is up for its MOT in a fortnight, and it’s no secret that
hopes aren’t high. I’ve mentioned before about how quiet (!) he can be, and
I’m sure we all overheard last night’s bellowed telephone conversation in
which he was considering cutting his losses, not bothering with the MOT and
taking the thing directly to the scrap yard. He’s now talking about his next
car. I’m hearing the phrase “Land Rover” more and more.
Almost as much as I’m hearing the phrase “can’t afford”. I suppose the blog won’t be complete unless
I mention the third car in the family fleet. My car is still rather full with
display boards. I’ve spoken with the nice lady at Woodchurch Village Hall who
says that if I can find a suitable space, we can store the boards there. I’m
sure I can find somewhere… |
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6 January 2010
(Wednesday) - Snow
One of the better things I like about my
job is that periodically I get to go to other hospitals to formally inspect
their trainees to see if they are ready to become State Registered. For me,
it’s a day out, and a bit of fun. For the trainees it’s positively nerve
wracking. They spend months building themselves up to these inspections, and
because of this I would not cancel one lightly. But the threat of snow had me
worried. So, having spent much of yesterday checking
the weather forecasts, I had determined from various sources that snow wasn’t
expected until mid day today. No one told the “weather pixies” about
the forecasts, and so it snowed yesterday evening. I got up early today
expecting to find thick snow, but it wasn’t too bad, and so I decided to set
off for Pembury. As I left home the roads were quite
passable, and the snow was but a light dusting. As I drove west, so the roads
became worse. When I finally decided that I’d made a mistake by going ahead
with the inspection today, I was only five miles from my destination, so I
carried on regardless. There are those who laugh about the piddlingly small amounts of snow we have in the A chap representing small businesses was
complaining that so many small businesses are forced to close in the snow.
The reason being the need for the employees to provide child care for their
children. Thousands of employees would happily get to work, and do a day’s
work if not for the local schools having a blanket policy of closing at the
slightest hint of snow. In order to provide a balanced view of the matter,
the radio station had invited the It was suggested that the reason that they
close is that if schools stay open but a small amount of pupils *really*
can’t get in because of the snow, then such non-attendance affects the
school’s position in the league tables. But if the school closes, then the
league table position is unaffected. The boss headmaster wouldn’t deny it,
but got rather angry whilst not denying it. It was sad that such a senior teacher chose
to speak to the nation in the same way that he might chastise a recalcitrant
fourth-former. The radio then interviewed the “Minister
for Talking Rubbish” who said that it was not economical to budget
and prepare for something as infrequent as winter, coming as it does only
once a year. Apparently since the media made such a fuss about MPs wasting
public money on their second homes, duck houses and cleaning their moats, the
government is“understandably” loathe
to waste money on frivolous things such as preparing for snow. I eventually got to my destination, did my
inspection (she passed – they usually do), and then set off home
again. Whilst I’d been inside, it had warmed up a tad outside, and the snow
was becoming slushy. Getting home was far easier than getting there, and on
the way home, all the cars that had skidded into ditches had been reclaimed
either by their owners or by vehicle recovery services. I then spent the afternoon writing up my
report on the inspected trainee, and then spent some time on my work-related
websites here and here. I
have this theory that these web sites might be useful. So far, no one’s told
me they aren’t. Whilst working on them I had the phone
constantly dialling the chokey. Having received a visiting order, the plan
was to book a visit for a forthcoming Sunday. After two hours waiting for the
phone to be answered, I was eventually told that my form was the wrong colour
and that it would not be acceptable for a Sunday. I need it to be blue, not
red. The fact that it was the prison (and not “Norman Stanley” who
sent out the red form is neither here nor there…. |
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7 January 2010
(Thursday) - Still Snowing
Normally I suffer with insomnia. Today I
slept right through till I was woken by the alarm. Not my alarm, I hasten to
add. I didn’t need to be at work until after 11am. So I gently told my
beloved her alarm was ringing. No response. So I gave her a gentle nudge. She
rolled over and pulled the duvet over her head. So I gave her a good shake,
and she bashed me. After a mini fight (I lost) I pointed out
her alarm was still going. She told me that she’s deaf in the mornings and
never hears it. Oh how I laughed. I then totally forgot that I had a dental
appointment this morning, and watched Xmas DVDs and fiddled around in
NeverWinter. Pausing only briefly to scrape the snow off of my car, I then
set off to Tesco for scran. I was going to get
petrol, but the filling station was heaving. I’ve never seen it so busy. I
blame the snow. Whilst getting my sandwich we had a minor
blizzard. The car got covered in snow in only five minutes. I then skidded a
few times in Tesco’s car park. The car park at work was just as icy, and was
rather empty. It’s amazing how people stay at home and the country grinds to
a halt with less than an inch of snow. Some time during the mid afternoon I
remembered I’d forgotten a dental appointment I had booked for this morning.
I phoned them and made it quite clear that I felt it was their fault that I’d
missed the appointment. They cancel and change my appointment so often, I’m surprised I don’t miss more. They apologised,
and I’ve re-booked for next Thursday. I wonder if I’ll forget that one too? And so to bed feeling under the weather.
I’ve got a headache and feel a bit bleagh!!! I do
hope I’m not sickening for something… |
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8 January 2010
(Friday) - Sledging
Usually I would start off by saying “up
with the lark”, but I think it’s safe to say that any larks have long
since flown south. So I’ll start again. Today I was up with the penguins and
arctic terns, and was doing the ironing before 6am. It’s one way of having
some peace and quiet whilst I watch my Xmas DVDs. Off to work in the car again. In the past
I’ve never driven in the snow. I’ve made a point of walking to work every
time there’s the slightest flurry of snow. And I have gone base over apex on
the ice so many times. So, bearing in mind I’m not getting any younger, I’ve
decided that I shall drive. And if I prang the car, it’s insured and easier
fixed than my aging bones. I had a minor worry when the brakes
shuddered as I came to the end ofBeaver Road. They
were fine on the bypass, but again were shaking and vibrating in Tesco’s car
park. I was about to phone the garage when a colleague told me that’s what
anti-lock brakes do on the ice. They are supposed to do that. That came as a
relief. We spent the morning at work discussing the
vital question. Should we go sledging before or after lunch? We eventually
agreed on “after”, since that would be the option less likely to
have anyone being sick. The hospital grounds don’t feature much in the way of
slopes, but they do have the advantage of being near a hospital, should we
need one for any reason. Three of us spent an enjoyable half an hour vooming down slopes on a range of vehicles. One chap had
“borrowed” his children’s bum board. Another had some water resistant coated
paper (which lasted for less than a minute). I tried some hard plastic
sheeting I’d found in the store cupboard. On my first go my sheet dug into
the ground and I fell off at high speed. So I tried standing on it with my
weight to the back, and I fell off again and rolled down the hill. Eventually
I found that if I sat at the back and hoiked up the
front, it wasn’t too bad a sledge, even if it had bruised my inner thighs. Any of my loyal readers who are paying
attention will realise that this sedate form of exercise rather gives the lie
to the previous paragraph of this blog entry (!) After a few minutes we saw that if we moved
ten yards along the bank there was a lip on the slope from which we could do
sledge jumps. Our lightest colleague (half my body weight) sped
down the slope, and passed gracefully over the snow on said lip, and went a
good six inches into the air. It was quite impressive to watch, somewhat akin
to Eddie the Eagle, albeit on a smaller scale. Our heaviest colleague (a bit
heavier than me) wanted a go. He too sped down the slope, but rather
than passing gracefully over the snow on said lip, he ploughed into the snow
on said lip exposing the tree stump underneath. I suppose it could have been
nasty, but he got away with only ripping his coat, scraping his bum and
filling his pants with snow. Oh, how I laughed. Pants
filled with snow is really funny, all the time it is someone else’s
pants. There was a scary moment when I aimed to
the right of a tree, but as it came closer, so I found myself veering more
and more toward the tree. Eventually I passed it on the left, copping it a
glancing blow as I went. I ended up flat on my back in hysterical laughter.
However my assistants saw my not getting up as being a sign of injury. “Well
bless my soul!! (sic)” exclaimed one
of them at the top of his voice. “He’s dead”. For a moment they
honestly thought I’d died in the impact. That set me off laughing even more. You can see the photos here. All too soon we had to get back to work.
Whilst I was cold, I’d taken the precaution of wearing waterproofs. After
all, I’ve played in the snow before. One of our number
had pants full of snow, and the other had soaked his jeans. Me - I spent a
pleasant afternoon periodically mentioning how warm and dry I was, and asking
where all the puddles on the floor were coming from… I came home to find ‘er indoors TM building a
snowman… |
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9 January 2010
(Saturday) - A Walk in the Snow
I expect my loyal readership is fed up with
hearing about my insomnia, but today I realised something. Wide awake at 4am, and at 6.30am. But when I went back to bed at 7am I
slept like a log until 10am. Perhaps I’m sleeping at the wrong times? I
consulted the font of all knowledge (the Internet). The BBC’s
Science & Nature website features a “sleep profiler” which
told me that my sleep is not well optimised, scoring 16 %. I’m not sure what
it’s scoring 16% of, but I’ve not done that badly in a test since my abortive
attempts at first year “A” level exams. Apparently I am a “lark” which
means I’m an early morning person. (No surprises there!). The cheeky
website dared to suggest I might be overweight, and said I might be snoring
which would disturb my sleep. It also suggested I should see my doctor. He
also would tell me I’m overweight. Perhaps I’ll re-start that diet. I’d
rather do that then mess about with the BBC’s other suggestions of massage,
aromatherapy or acupuncture. The plan for today was to go mob-handed to
Folkestone to finish the decorating, but the snow put paid to that idea.
Local roads were covered in thick ice, and snow was falling more and more.
Rather than sitting inside sulking, we went for a walk in the snow. Through
the park to Great Chart. It was really pretty going through Viccy park, and the birds on the lake at Singleton were
quite comical to watch. The Hooden Horse
in Great Chart must be one of my top two most visited pubs of the last year.
It’s ideally placed for popping in for a pint whilst cycling home on a day’s
cycling trip. But because it’s somewhere we call in on the way home from
somewhere else, we’ve never eaten there. Today I realised that it was at just
the right distance for a walk through the snow. We took nearly an hour to get
there, and the Younger’s winter warmer ale was a treat worth walking for. I
then had the ham, egg and chips, which was brill. And we sat in the warm and
watched the snow outside get deeper and deeper as I polished off a pint of
Directors The Hooden often
has up to five ales on the hand pumps. Today they had two ales and two
ciders. Which was probably for the best – I’m not a cider fan. Had there been
more beer, I would have settled down for the duration. But two pints were an
elegant sufficiency, and we then wandered back through a winter wonderland.
On the way to the pub some smaller kids were tin-traying
down a snowy slope. On the way back some bigger kids were having a go. Being
bigger they had they much more momentum, and one came down with such force
that when he reached the bottom, he kept going and he managed to wedge
himself underneath a nearby bramble bush. I have often mentioned that there is
nothing more amusing than other peoples’ misfortunes, and this episode was
nothing if not amusing. To Asda for bread and milk. Not so much
panic buying as panic-ing because we’d run out. I
popped into Halfords on the way past to see if they had any sledges. No luck.
Asda had sold out of sledges at Xmas, and B&Q were closed. I wonder why. Whilst having a warming cuppa, the phone
rang. “Norman Stanley” informed me that HMP Slade is also having
problems with the snow. The wardens either can’t get in, or can’t get out
quick enough. Yesterday’s visiting session was entertaining. Because of the
snow, only five inmates had visitors. Twenty wardens supervised the visits.
And today, having been given lunch, tea is planned for three hours later so
they can all be banged up by 4pm. He’s not best chuffed. I apologised for our
not decorating today, and offered him a full refund (!) He seemed happy with
that. And so to NeverWinter for the evening. I
seem to be aching rather a lot, and my rollerblading injury is playing up. I
blame yesterday’s sledging… |
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10 January 2010
(Sunday) - Dull
Something which never fails to amaze me is
how the general public are so gullible as to lap up the horror stories touted
by the media. Take today’s scaremongering, for example. Following four days
of snow, the threat of global warming is now (apparently) but
a distant memory, and the world is now in the grip of a mini
ice-age which will last for about thirty years. Glaciers are due
to roll ever more southward, or so we are reliably informed. I say “apparently”, because up
until four days ago, conventional wisdom had the world warming, and the North
Pole being free of
ice within the not too distant future. I suspect this sort of
rubbish sells newspapers to the normal people. Meanwhile in my world, after four days
of (relatively) heavy snow, the temperature has risen
slightly and what was snow and ice is now six inches of slush. Which makes going anywhere rather tricky. So having stayed
in my pit most of the morning, I wasted most of the day alternating between
NeverWinter and BattleStar Galactica. If there is something I absolutely loathe,
hate and despise, it’s sitting around doing nothing. I made a point of going
up to the corner shop, if only to get out of the house for five minutes. I
got two books of stamps to send in to the chokey. One for today’s letter and
one for next week’s letter. Whilst up the shop there were a few flurries of snow.
I mentioned to the girl behind the counter (the big sister of an ex-cub)
that these flakes of snow would give the old ‘uns
something to whinge about. She laughed, and said that for the last four days
she’s had a never-ending stream of old biddies complaining about the weather.
And complaining in such a way that they thought that she could do something
about it. I then realised that the old bat in the queue behind me had a face
like a slapped bum. She had clearly been planning to gripe about the snow, and
we’d pre-empted her. Yesterday “Daddies Little Angel TM ”
had built two snowmen, one in the front garden, and one in the back. Both
were very ambitiously tall, and this morning I saw that both had collapsed
overnight. She’ll go mental when she finds out… |
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11 January 2010
(Monday) - Enough of the Snow, Now !!!
After four days of snow, yesterday I
decided that I’d had enough of the stuff. So I personally have stopped the
snow. Yes – me. I did it. I ordered a sledge from eBay last night, and since
I clicked on the “Buy It Now”, not a single flake of snow has fallen. Mind you, it’s still rather icy outside.
Icy on the pavements – the roads are now pretty much clear. Or, that is the
middle of the roads are clear. I skidded a bit
whilst parking this evening, and so decided to go out with a shovel and break
up the ice I’ve parked on. After all, there’s quite a river of water running
down the guttering. I’ve smashed up the ice around my car, and if the flow of
meltwater continues, in the morning, driving off should be a tad easier than
parking was. I was tempted to have a go at shifting the
ice on the pavement outside my house, but in the end the spectre of liability
put me off doing so. I contented myself with breaking up the ice on the front
garden path leading to the front door. Apparently under the Occupiers
Liability Act 1984 I am obliged to attempt to keep my property free of ice.
There are those who would argue that it is shame that the council doesn’t
meet their legal obligations in shifting the ice, but there’s so much of it,
and only so many council operatives. And as the snow recedes into slush, so the
arguing starts. Reading the news, I see that there are those who didn’t get
to their various places of work last week for all sorts of reasons. Some
really couldn’t get to work as buses and trains were cancelled. Some really
couldn’t get to work as roads were impassable. And some saw the snow as being
reason enough to stay at home. (After all, that’s about the only thing
many people would seem to have learned from their time at school.) And what penalties are there for who didn’t
turn up at work? It
would seem that employment law forbids them being deducted a day’s
leave or a day’s wages. So effectively they’ve acquired extra leave. Hmm….
One of our people was snow-bound for three days last week. I think I should
be given three days extra holiday…. |
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12 January 2010
(Tuesday) - Stuff
The year’s diary dates for the astro club were published last night, so this prompted me
to have a look at the Kite Calendar. I’ve updated my diary dates
accordingly. I see the local branch of CAMRA has also put up the dates of
local beer festivals, but I had most of those already. There is a beer
festival in Wittersham on Sunday 21 February (there’s
something familiar about that date?). A shame Wittersham
isn’t the easiest of places to get to, and I had rather planned to go on a
pub crawl on Monday 22 February. I’ll see which of “the usual suspects”
are available on which of those two dates and make a decision later. It still seems odd not going to cubs on a
Tuesday. For the thirteen years from late 1995 to September 2008, every
Tuesday would have seen me at the scout hut. It’s now over a year since I
packed up with the cubs, and yesterday I had a chat with the leader at my old
pack. I’m glad I jacked it all in when I did. The place has had one or two
problems recently. The scout leader has gone, leaving the same few people
doing everything, and the place nearly closed toward the end of last year.
Because of one nasty little child. I can distinctly remember “Dennis”.
I can remember looking at his surly expression and recognising trouble. Last
year he had been deliberately awkward for several months,
and after one evening when he had physically assaulted half the children in
the cub pack, the leaders decided that they had put up with him for long
enough. And they told this nasty brat’s parents that the child would be
excluded from all cub activities for a month.“Dennis”’s parents weren’t
happy, and formally complained through official channels. Head Office instigated a formal
investigation which found there were faults on all sides (apparently).
Whilst his victims had suffered rather nasty assaults, “Dennis” had
suffered the threat of missing a month’s scouting activities. And what no one had realised was that those
children who had been bitten, kicked and generally attacked had suffered
nothing when compared to the threat of being banned from cubs for a month for
being a naughty boy. Furthermore, (somehow) those children who had
been assaulted were in some way responsible for the little darling’s
potential exclusion. The suggestion of the appointed
investigator was one which was intended to be fair to all parties. He
suggested the cub pack be shut down, and after a while re-opened to all who
wanted to join. Including “Dennis” and his victims. “Dennis”’s parents were
horrified at this suggestion and immediately withdrew their complaint. Not
out of any sense of common decency, but because there was a pack holiday
coming up, and the reason they didn’t want the place closed was because they
wanted to send their uncontrollable brat on a very cheap weekend away.
Suddenly these people realised just what cheap babysitting they were getting
from the unpaid volunteers. He stayed excluded for that month, but he’s
back there now, as disagreeable as ever. But the saddest part of the whole
sorry tale is that those people who run scouting on a national basis wonder
why people like me don’t want to volunteer to help any more... |
|
13 January 2010
(Wednesday) - More Stuff
Last night saw the launch of the second
series of “Survivors”. Regular readers may recall I’ve mentioned
this program in the past. I loved the original series made thirty years ago,
but wasn’t overly impressed with the first season of the modern remake. Last
February I blogged “I hear there’s a second season being made – I shall
see what that pans out like before I dismiss it out of hand”. Well, I’ve
seen the first episode of the second season, and I honestly think I’m ready
to dismiss it out of hand. I won’t give the plot away (yet) in
case any of any of my loyal readers are yet to see the episode. I suppose I
will watch the next one, but after last night’s drivel, I won’t be too concerned
if I miss it. Our DVD players are playing up. The one
which records stuff off of the Sky Plus box would seem to have a stuffed up
menu screen, and the one which in multi-region only opens up occasionally. I
was planning to have had a look in Comet and Curry’s tonight after work, if
we hadn’t been snow-bound. Normally the staff in there look
at me as though I’m something the cat dragged in, but if I go in my work
clothes (shirt & tie) they generally can’t kiss my butt quick
enough. Whilst I can get a cheapo bog-standard DVD cheaply enough, I’m after
something that records, does multi regions… I wonder if a trip to Tottenham
Court Road might be a good idea. And then something to power the thing with.
As we freeze in a climate totally stuffed by over-use of fossil fuels,
salvation is at hand. The problems of nuclear fusion have
been solved. Within ten years we’ll have cheap clean energy. Let’s
hope so. Whilst I’m on the subject of scientific
breakthroughs, science has announced that having a fat ass is good
for you. One lives and learns. “Daddies Little Angel TM ”
‘s clay head exploded today. The kiln was to blame, but we are reliably
informed that it wasn’t personal. Fragments have been salvaged, and a repair
operation is underway. I wonder what the National Gallery do when this
happens. Today’s photo is one that has recently
appeared on Facebook. I have no idea where the photo was taken. I originally
thought The first fruit of my loin was much more
manageable in those days. |
|
14 January 2010
(Thursday) - Photos, Clay Heads, Guinea Pigs
I have obtained a photograph of the
fragments of the clay head mentioned in yesterday’s blog. The thing does look
somewhat beyond repair. Who’d be an art student? It has been suggested that yesterday’s
photo was taken in Ramsgate. “My Boy TM ” was about that size when
we had a family day out to Ramsgate. I remember the day vividly; he used to
get travel sick, and on the way home from Ramsgate he absolutely filled his
grandfather’s new car with wall-to-wall vomiting. At the time his digestive
system was akin to Doctor Who’s tardis – he
could (and often did) generate several times his own body
volume in vom. Happy days. I don’t remember his auntie being along on
that day though, and it was from her that I got the photo. Another of her
photos from the late eighties has come to light. Me on the beach at Meanwhile back on the ranch, it’s been just
another day. Half the night wide awake, half the day falling asleep. Some
things never change. I slipped out of work early to go to the dentist. As he
was rooting about inside my cake hole, the dentist was reminiscing about the
horrific wisdom tooth extraction I’d had a month or so ago. Having regaled
his dental nurse with the tale of how traumatic the extraction was, he then
turned to me and asked if I remembered the episode. Funnily enough, I did
recall something about having a wisdom tooth out. I wonder how many people
find that such a trivial event slips their mind. Then I checked my emails. Over five hundred
spam, including sixty four purporting to be from HM revenue & customs. I
suppose enough people must fall for these scams to make it worth the crooks’
while to send them out. And the guinea pigs would seem to be
scrapping. “Daddies Little Angel TM” has identified
one as being the bullying, troublemaking guinea pig. However her theory fell
at the first hurdle when I noticed that the alleged protagonist had a lump
bitten out of its chuff. I’ve consulted the source
of all knowledge, and the Internet says that guinea pigs do this. If
we give them separate food bowls and separate places to hide, then chances
are they will stop scrapping. Apparently the family’s guinea pigs are at the
teenage stage. We’ve been there before… |
|
15 January 2010
(Friday) - Old Jumpers, Flat Batteries, Sushi
For many years me
and a certain blue and white striped rugby shirt were inseparable. Yesterday
I threatened the return of my favourite jumper. Disaster – I can’t find the
thing anywhere. The last time I can remember wearing it was on a particularly memorable booze up in Folkestone where it
attracted the unwanted advances of a rather fit bird. It’s possible that I
chucked the thing out, but I doubt it somehow. It’s my favourite jummy, even if I haven’t worn it for years. During my search for it I found two other
jumpers from the same era, two pairs of jeans (jeans!! – I haven’t worn
jeans for over ten years!), five sets of pyjamas I never knew I had, and
more pairs of shorts than I could count (i.e. over seven). I found
half a dozen sets of flashing luminous rabbit ears, and I
unearthed I loved that jumper. I wonder what happened
to it? I might just have to get a new one, but ebay has let me down, having nothing remotely similar for
sale. “My Boy TM ” ‘s car had a flat
battery, so could he jump start from my car? Of course he could. Whilst
trying to get out of the house, the door bounced back and hit me full in the
face. Just where I’d had that tooth out. Oh, it did hurt. And carried on
hurting all day. So I have made a new house rule. Something
rather obvious, really. Doors in the house must be openable. I couldn’t believe
the amount of rubbish we had blocking up all the doors. I filled two bin bags
of clutter. If anything valuable has gone well, quite frankly, I don’t care. There was a minor hold up in the jump
starting whilst we struggled to get the bonnet of my car open, and I did
wonder if my car would start afterwards, but in the end all was well. Thank
heavens! I left home rather earlier than usual on a
late shift to have a look at DVD players. The staff in
Curry’s ignored me totally. I gave them fifteen minutes then walked
out. Pissy World weren’t much better. But “Dave”
in Comet was quite helpful. I forgot to ask about multi-region DVD players
though. I’ll go back tomorrow – if they don’t have multi-region ones I’ll go
to Tottenham Court Road. They will have. Earlier in the week the burning issue at
work was chicken sushi. Yes – I know – sushi isn’t chicken, it’s fish. I thought that too, but Wikipedia says that
sushi is traditionally (but not exclusively) fish. Before I joined the
vocal majority in declaring chicken sushi to be lame, I thought I’d better
try the stuff. I have tasted worse. If any of my loyal
readers are tempted by the thought off chicken sushi, you can buy it in Tesco
for two quid. *You* can buy it. I won’t be doing so again… |
|
16 January 2010
(Saturday) - New Telly
To the post office to collect a parcel.
Again I nearly crashed on the way down The chap behind the counter wanted to see
identification before he would give me my parcel. I showed him my passport.
He studied it intently, but never once looked at me. I wonder how that served
to prove my bona fido? Bearing in mind the total lack of any parking in the
area, I asked him where we were supposed to park. He described the location
of three public car parks, all within twenty minutes walk. That was helpful
of him. Still, I’ve got my sledge. All I need now
is more snow. Or then again, perhaps not. I’ll quite happily wait until next
winter. Yesterday I mentioned that I went looking
at DVD players. I had another look again today. Currys
again totally ignored me. Which turned out to be their
loss. So we went back to Comet. Multi-region DVDs don’t seem to be
their thing, but they were doing a deal on their tellys.
A rather fit sales bird spouted drivel about plasma LEDs and hertzes and refresh rates. I looked on in bewilderment as
she demonstrated the difference between auto focus and hands free, blu-ray and HD, cheese & onion and salt &
vinegar. They all looked the same to me. There was absolutely no difference
whatsoever between the Sony Megapixel or the Satsuma
Castanet that I could see. They all looked good. I had saved up some money to put some iron
railings in the front garden. But I don’t want them really. It will be much
easier to load and unload the car for camping trips without a fence in the
way. So I squandered the money I’d put aside on a new telly. It’s got… well,
I could copy what it says in the manual, but were I to do so, then people
might start talking technical at me. Let’s just say that it’s forty inches
across and the numbers 1080 appear in the specifications which I am told is a
good thing. Plumbing the thing in was quite a laugh.
Being somewhat taller than the old telly we needed to move the Sky Plus box
and the existing DVD players all up a shelf. And then the new telly flatly
refused to find the signal from any of the peripheral devices (technical
term!!). And just as I was swearing *really* badly, SpongeBob appeared on
the screen, and all was fine. Now to fight the children to be allowed to
watch the thing. However the original problem remains – we
don’t have a multi-region DVD that works easily. Having misplaced the handset
for the DVD player that can do region one DVDs (woops!). I think we’ll
carry on pressing the “skip” button until I’m on holiday in a few
weeks time, then I’ll go to Tottenham Court Road. |
|
17 January 2010
(Monday) - Last Time at the Chokey
It would seem I stuffed up yesterday –
whilst there had been talk of carrying on decorating at the seaside for some
time, because I was due to be working in the morning I’d said that if others
were to make a start, I’d come along later. Because no one said anything,
everything to do with decorating rather slipped my mind. Woops – my bad! There’s always next weekend, or weekends
following…. ‘er
indoors TM had advertised the old telly on FreeCycle last night and we had six people wanting it in
as many minutes. I’ve moaned about FreeCycle in the
past. I suppose that it serves a useful way of not wasting stuff, but the
thing strikes me as little more than a cheapskate’s charter. Perhaps I’m just
getting old and cynical? Up early, and off to Hythe to deliver the
old telly to its new home. As luck would have it, an old friend was after a
new telly and so it didn’t go through FreeCycle
after all. On the way there, I had a major disagreement with the scrat nav. I
decided to take the way I thought was quicker. And I maintain my way would
have been faster if Hospital Hill was where I thought it was, rather than
where it actually is. Yesterday I mentioned about going to
Tottenham Court Road to get a DVD player. It was suggested I tried Richer
Sounds. By one of life’s many co-incidences, there is a branch of Richer Sounds
only five minutes away from the chokey. We were going visiting today, so we
popped into the shop whilst passing. I wish I’d gone there ages ago. Whilst
their tellys weren’t any cheaper that Comet or
Curry’s, the chap behind the counter was so friendly and helpful. I got my
multi-region DVD, and I shall go back there whenever I need anything else. And then to the chokey for prison visit
#10. Something of a bittersweet visit, bearing in mind this was my last trip
to the place. (I hope!!) “Norman Stanley” looked well and I
gave him the details of the final version of my never-fail patented escape
plan. I’ve been working on this plan for a year, and this week it comes to
fruition. If he keeps his trap shut and his nose clean and his head down, he
might get a neck ache, but on Friday they will let him out. It’s been suggested that I shouldn’t blog
about his release as there are (so I’m told) those that may use any
snippets I write against him. Whilst this could possibly be true, I’m going
to hope for the best in humanity and take the line that those who don’t know
feel that any mate of mine is a mate of theirs (albeit vicariously).
After all, would anyone seriously be reading my blog just on the off-chance
of me being dumb enough to write something nasty or incriminating about the
bloke? And then home to plumb in my new DVD
player. I think it’s fair to say it plumbed in a lot easier than the telly
did. It doesn’t use a scart lead,
instead it’s got an HDMI cable. This apparently can take double the amount of
whatever it is that scart leads take. I asked the
man in Richer Sounds if perhaps I need to get one for my Sky Plus box, but
apparently I need to upgrade to Sky HD for that. I expect that will be more money, and will
be the subject of a blog entry for another time… |
|
18 January 2010
(Monday) - Watching Telly, Computer Games, Stuff...
Today was a late start, so I had some time
to waste this morning. This new telly is going to take some getting used to.
I’ve got accustomed to watching DVDs on my PC screen, and as a special treat
on the old telly (when no one else was around). The screen on the new
telly is two and a half times the size of the old telly, and over four times
the size of my PC screen. I was rather pleased with it as I scoffed jam on
toast this morning whilst watching season two of BattleStar
Galactica. I’m still not sure if I can tell the
difference between scart-ed telly and HDMI-ed telly, but then again I wonder if anyone really can.
And now I’ve put all the cables the right way round, we can record stuff off
of the Sky Plus again. Which is a result. DVD
recorders aren’t cheap. Once I’d then mucked about in NeverWinter
for a while, I had a look in YoVille. In NeverWinter you get to explore a
medieval fantasy environment. You meet elves and gnomes, wizards and bards.
You can choose to be a fighter, a paladin, a rogue, a ranger or a druid, a
sorcerer or a wizard. There are quests to do, dragons and goblins to slay,
and wrongs to right. You get to wield swords and battle axes, you can cast
spells, even enchant animals to do your bidding, and you can accrue huge
amounts of gold. YoVille is different. You just randomly
wander around town either fighting with people or kissing them. On reflection
I suppose YoVille is probably more like real life than NeverWinter. You don’t
get to cyber-snog people in NeverWinter. I then posted off my fifty second letter to
HMP Slade. The last one – I hope he gets it before he’s released. Over the
last year I’ve sent up a letter every Monday. Or that is every Monday except
those Mondays when I was away camping. On those occasions the letter went up
on the Tuesday. And I have been really anorak-y and worked out some
statistics. My average letter length was 8.8 pages, and I wrote a total of
just over 175,000 words. OK, I cheated a bit – I just edited my blog into a
letter and added some swear words. I also sent up thirty five rude word
crosswords to the chokey. Each with an average of twenty clues. That’s seven
hundred clues. I’m reliably informed he attempted about a dozen clues, but
got them all wrong. It feels odd not writing a crossword this
evening. What with all the stuff I bought over the
weekend, I had quite a lot of cardboard boxes cluttering up the house, so I
loaded them (and the broken DVD players) into the car and set off for
the tip. Even though it’s eighteen months since I got rid of my old Espace, I
still seem to think I have it’s luggage storage
capacity. Especially when doing tip runs. The tip was the same as ever – full of
people who cannot park, and people who cannot bring themselves to actually
put into the skip that which they have just taken to the skip. One particular
twit had loaded his car full of tat. Not bags of tat, but loose tat, and was
carrying each item one at a time from his car to the skip. I’ve mentioned
before that I shouldn’t go to the tip – it just winds me up. As Sainsburys was
then on my way to work I thought I’d get lunch from there. I don’t deny it
was a tasty enough lunch. But one which would have been half the price in
Tesco. I know where I’m going tomorrow… |
|
19 January 2010
(Tuesday) - Saving Money
Now that I have an HD telly, it has been
suggested that upgrade my Sky TV package. More expense(!) Well, it would seem perhaps not. I have
been getting my telephone from BT, my Internet from Having said that, I’ve been with Flushed with success I phoned Kieran
at I still can’t believe it. I phoned them up,
and said “gis it cheaper!!” And both
said “Oh, go on then”. And did! Which is for the
best.
I didn’t want to muck about changing phone and Internet. These things are
usually best left alone. This is probably why I’ve been paying so much. I
just set the accounts up all those years ago and just went with them. I
wonder what other savings I can make on the household accounts?
At this point I found myself stopping and taking stock of what had happened. I started off looking at getting Sky HD.
Somewhere along the line I lost sight of what I was doing and I got cheaper
phone and faster Internet before I ran out of time and had to go to work. The current plan (now) is to look at
the Sky HD multi-room deal. The HD is ten quid a month more. But seeing as
I’m saving twenty five quid a month on phone and Internet (and if the kids
want Sky TV in their bedrooms they can pay for it), I’m still quids in. All I have to do is come up with two Sky
Plus boxes. Should I upgrade to Sky HD, I’m hoping I can use the existing box
for one of the fruits of my loin, but the other fruit will need a box. So can
I ask if any of my loyal readers have a Sky Plus box kicking around that they
don’t want? I doubt anyone has one, but it doesn’t hurt to ask… |
|
20 January 2010
(Wednesday) - Stuff
Another late shift. As I’ve mentioned
before, I seem not to get the insomnia when I’m doing lates.
Which is a good thing – I’ve had four decent nights’ sleep. I’d been told that the girls were leaving
early this morning because the most recent fruit of my loin had to be on a
coach at 8am. So I slept in and I went downstairs at 8.05am to find both
girls still there. They disappeared whilst I was in the bathroom, and I see
from Facebook that the coach was caught. Thank heavens for small mercies. I got an email from the astro
club. Last weekend they (we) sent a delegation to the Southern Area
Group of Astronomical Societies’ meeting. It would seem that whilst still
relatively young, our club is one of the biggest and most successful
astronomy clubs in the south of I’ve agreed to do this – after all,
speakers are the life blood of any society of this sort. But I must admit I’m
a tad nervous about it. Which is very unlike me.
Public speaking never bothers me. I suppose the thing is that whilst I’m no
longer on the committee of our astro club, I’ve
been there from the start, everyone there knows me, and knows what I’m like.
And so even if they are not amused, they tolerate me shouting “Your Anus!!”
when discussing the seventh planet from the sun. I wonder how this might go
down with another group. I wonder if they have “normal people” at
their club in Wadhurst. I hope not. I then phoned Sky about setting up the Sky
HD & the multi-room set up. Whilst the girl (Samantha) on the
other end of the phone was pleasant enough, it was painfully obvious she had
been programmed to work from a script. My plan to scrounge up a second hand
Sky Plus box from mates and bodge them into one of the kids’ bedrooms
confused her. So much so that when she tried to work out the best deal, the
line went dead. I phoned back and this time spoke with “Donald”
who seemed to understand my plan. He says that they will only plumb in boxes
they provide. The new HD box would be £49. Fair enough. But a second Sky Plus
box from them would be two hundred quid. Stuff that!! “Daddies Little
Angel TM ” says she can live without a Sky Plus box
in her bedroom (there’s no room for it anyway!), so the mission now is
to get all the stuff on the Sky Plus box watched before we relocate that box
in the attic room. It has been said that I am a creature of
habit. And never more so then when having a cuppa. I’m rather fussy about the
mugs from which I’ll drink my tea and coffee. Which is odd,
considering I’ll drink beer from any receptacle. But tea and coffee is
different. At home it has to be out of my Dalek mug. Whilst camping, my
Starbucks mug. And at work, it’s the SpongeBob one. Disaster!! Today I
dropped my SpongeBob mug. I went thirsty….. |
|
21 January 2010
(Thursday) - Some Ranting
I have often commented on how much I like
Radio Four. But last night they were talking rubbish.
As I drove home, there was a discussion about “the unique way in which the
BBC is funded”. This got me thinking (and ranting!) ITV and Channel 4 are paid for by the
adverts and so are free. I like that. If I want the free satellite channels,
then I get a FreeView box. My mother has done that,
and she’s very happy with it. Me – I want a thousand channels of rubbish, and
I’m prepared to pay forty quid a month to do so. But (and here is the crux
of my rant) if I don’t want satellite TV, then fine, I don’t have to have
it. I don’t have the option not to have the
BBC. I must buy the TV licence which funds the BBC. The licence costs me
twelve quid each month. And I have to pay this – I get fined if I don’t. Last night the BBC were
trying to justify the compulsory nature of the licence fee. And not making a
very good job of it. In the past they have claimed that if people weren’t
forced to pay the licence fee, then the BBC wouldn’t be able to afford to run
Radio Three, because no one listens to it. Surely that isn’t a justification
for extorting twelve quid out of me every month. If anything, it’s a valid
reason for closing down Radio Three with immediate effect. The idiot being interviewed last night
claimed that the management at the BBC were very happy to replace the licence
fee with a subscription. After all, loads of people pay nearly forty quid
every month to Sky TV. Surely they wouldn’t begrudge a payment of twelve quid
a month to the Beeb. I don’t see that argument. For my forty
quid to Sky I get several hundred TV channels, and a hundred radio channels.
What does the BBC offer? Nine TV channels, seven of which are not
available without some sort of set-top box. And twelve radio channels, of
which only radios one, two, four and five would seem to be used by anyone. All of which I get with my Sky subscription
anyway. The presenter wittered on about the BBC
being an “Institution”. I wouldn’t say that it is an institution that
I can’t afford, just that it’s an institution I would rather someone else
funded. A colleague and I have been talking
about Talking of excessive amounts of beer,
following one or two email exchanges, I’ve decided to relocate the pub crawl
planned for Feb 22nd to Maidstone rather than And talking of pubs, in the past I have
been a firm advocate of. Beer
in the Evening - a wonderful website, where you can review pubs,
find good pubs, plan pub crawls… Well, to be honest it used to be a
wonderful web site. Now you can still review pubs, but a lot of the reviews
are so obviously publicans bigging
up their own pubs and slating the opposition. And there are a lot of people
trolling the web site for no other reason than that they can. The option to
add new pubs is no longer there – pubs that were suggested over two years ago
haven’t been added. The website has a forum, and in that forum
the website’s owner has implied that he intends to do nothing more with the
web site. Why should he go to the trouble of actually expending effort on it
when the advertising revenue he’s getting from it is more than adequate? I can see his point. He’s not doing it for
fun – he’s doing it for financial gain. And so he wants maximum profit for
minimum effort, and he’s getting just that. The strength of Beer in the Evening has
been its pub reviewers. I’ve reviewed close on two hundred pubs over the
years. Whilst I enjoy doing so, my written reviews have contributed to the
site’s profitability. And from the comments on the Beer in the Evening forum,
whilst my contributions are welcome, I as a contributor feel that I have been
treated with not a small amount of contempt. Today I got an email from another regular
Beer in the Evening contributor. It would seen that twenty of so of the more
regular contributors have defected to another website. Pubs Galore is very
similar to Beer in the Evening in concept. It doesn’t (yet) have
as exhaustive a pub listing, but with management that is keen to have the site
evolving, it will only be a matter of time…. |
|
22 January 2010
(Friday) - On the Beer
Last November I started preparing something
for the astro club. I’ve agreed to talk about the
planet Saturn in March, and so I started getting my talk ready. I
rediscovered the thing today. It’s nowhere as near to ready as I thought it
was. Less time in NeverWinter, and more time getting on with PowerPoint might
be a plan. Similarly the people in Wadhurst
have politely intimated they’d like me to talk for about double the length of
time I was intending to witter on for. I’ll beef up my “Ice Giants”
presentation as much as I can, and if the worst happens, I’ll just shout “Uranus!!”
a few times. I know it’s immature, but I do find the name of that planet to
be oh-so funny. An early start at work meant I had an early
start today. Having lain awake for over an hour, I started on the ironing at
5am. But an early start means an early finish, and then (for no adequately
explained reason) I set off to the pub for a celebration. You can’t beat a good booze up with old mates… |
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23 January 2010
(Saturday) - Mother, Computers, Fish
I’ve mentioned before that on August 19th last
year I went to Tesco. I bought milk, mustard and muesli. Crisps and jam. Bananas, milk and prawns. And a magazine (presumably Viz). I know this because I keep a tally of
everything I buy with my credit card so that when the bill comes in, there
aren’t any nasty surprises from purchases I’ve forgotten about. Like new tellys (!) August 19th’s little batch of
groceries came to £16.20, and has never appeared on my credit card bill. This
morning’s post brought the latest bill, and it still hasn’t appeared. I’ve
decided to wipe it off of my tally of as yet unpaid stuff. That’s another
£16.20 I can squander foolishly. The morning’s post also brought the
agreement for my new phone tariff and the new card for my Sky HD. I suppose
I’d better give some thought to where I want all the cables to go. To Tesco to get a birthday pressie for the parents. We had this plan to get them a
digital photo frame as a joint present, and have spent the last month looking
at them in various shops and outlets and on-line. I suppose it’s a sign of
the times that the best digital frame we could find (and at the best price)
was in Tesco. We got then a memory card as well. A nice memory card that set
off the security alarm as we left the shop. And also didn’t work when we
tried to load it up, so back to Tesco’s we went. Mum seemed pleased with the frame – we’ve
pre-loaded over a hundred photos onto it, but it has the capacity for a lot more.I just hope they can make full use of it. Ideally
they would be able to download piccies from their
digital camera onto the thing, but that might be a tad ambitious. It’s my long-term plan to get mother
on-line. A couple of years ago I suggested I got her a computer and got her
on-line, but she wasn’t keen on the idea. I tried suggesting it again today.
Maybe a small tablet thingy with a cheapo internet contract might make a nice
present? I then spent a little time with the fish
tank in the living room. First of all I spent half an hour excavating my way
to the thing. We tend to clutter the house so much, and I had a major job
just to be able to get to the fish tank. I cleaned it up as best I could, but
it looks a bit sparse with only three fish in it. I might visit “Fish R Us”
tomorrow… Posted by Manky Badger at 7:23 PM 0
comments |
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24 January 2010
(Sunday) - McBreakfast, More Fish, Games
I wasn’t up as early as I sometimes am (6.30am
today), and together with my house guest we set off to McDonalds for some
McBreakfast. Something we’ve often done in the
past, but haven’t done much recently. Bearing in mind how busy the place
normally is, it was rather eerie to find the car park with only three cars.
And those were not so much parked as just abandoned wherever the drivers felt
like stopping. I do like a sausage and egg McMuffin with McPorridge, and
once that was scoffed, we went back home. I made a start on clearing out the
junk in the living room. The verbals from Sky asked
me to make sure that the engineer (who’s scheduled for tomorrow) can
actually get to where he needs to be. After a couple of hours of shifting
boxes around, I hope he can get close enough now. I mentioned yesterday that I needed to
stock up the fish tank, so we had a look in “Pets At Home”. The fish
were nice, but I thought they were a tad pricey. Pausing only briefly in
Staples for some card, we had a look at the fish in Bybrook
Barn. It pays to shop around - a Neon in one
shop was £1.50. In another it was 85p. So we bought our fish from Bybrook Barn, and if we didn’t actually get twice as many
fish for the same money, it wasn’t far off. Home again, and whilst the fish sat in
their bags in the tank whilst temperatures equilibrated, I played “Escape”, the
latest silly game on Facebook. And then I kept out of the way whilst the
girls carried on the tidying of the living room I’d started earlier. A
sculpture came to light – one that would look good in the garden, so I set
off to B&Q for varnish. It has to be said that heir staff weren’t as
helpful as they might have been today. When I asked where the varnish was
they told me it was in the varnish section. I explained that the varnish
section was filled with woodstain, but no varnish.
I was told “it’s on a shelf somewhere”. There’s nothing like customer
service. And then to YoVille, where I seem to be
spending more and more time kissing Lisa’s mother… |
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25 January 2010 (Monday) - Stuff
One of my (many) failings is that I
am a very “do it now!!!” person. If something needs doing, I crack on
and do the entire project as quickly as possible. It was less than two weeks ago
that I made the decision that our multi-region DVD player was knacked. Five
days later it was replaced, and was playing through a new telly too. Six days ago I speculated about making some
changes to my internet and phone bill to subsidise getting Sky HD. Today I
had the Sky HD fitted, and to be quite honest, SpongeBob SquarePants does
look much clearer in HD. I can’t see much difference with the Internet speed either. For all that the speed checker says it’s three times faster than it was a week ago, I’m now wondering if “internet speed” is one of those phrases which means something very esoteric in I.T. circles, but doesn’t have any bearing whatsoever on how fast the computer does internet-related things. I found awebsite |
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January 2010 (Tuesday) - At Work
And
then a discussion. What colour was Bagpuss? I could
have sworn he was ginger. I was wrong… |
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January 2010 (Wednesday) - Games
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January 2010 (Thursday) - Waiting for the Postman
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January 2010 (Friday) - A Busy Day
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January 2010 (Saturday) - The Late, Late Xmas Party
Andy
did a stand-up routine (he should do more of those), we had pass the parcel, it was great fun. Must do it more often… |
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January 2010 (Sunday) - Eating Too Much
By
now I was peckish again, and so had a jacket spud with pasta for lunch. |
