7 September 2009 (Monday) - Photocopying

Up with the lark again. Well,actually, before the lark. I’ve never seen a lark in the morning. Come to that, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a lark at all. I expect they are all in bed until long after I’m at work….

Anyway – up early and on with ironing. I left home a tad later than usual to drop more tat off at the tip. The tip doesn’t open until 8am. And this was how I reminded myself why I leave for work so early in the morning. The rush hour traffic is awful. Far better to get to work early & have a cuppa rather than sitting in queues.

And then to arrange the photocopying of the astro club flyer. I phoned the people in Upmarket, because they did all the photocopying for the Snake Club, and Energize News (whatever happened to that?). They quoted me, and told me that Staples could do it cheaper. I phoned Staples who wanted double the price. So I took my dinner break and went to Upmarket. Oh dear… Perhaps I should have paid twice as much. Their photocopier was a tad temperamental. But nowhere near as temperamental as the shop assistant’s small child sitting in the corner playing “FarmVille” on the PC.

I wanted two hundred double sided copies. Once the photocopier had psyched itself up to actually working (and that took some doing), the thing could only do batches of twenty copies before needing a rest. The task was doubly complicated by the small child periodically wandering over and randomly pressing buttons on the photocopier to find out what they did. Staples could have done the job in minutes. I waited for an hour. It was painful. The shop (which offers photocopying as a service) ran out of paper at one point and had to borrow some. And just as the photocopier was getting up a good head of steam at about copy number 150, the small child finally realised that said photocopier was a serious rival for its mother’s attentions. And so in a pre-emptive strike it comprehensively trashed the device.

I eventually got my copies, and took them round to the astro club committee meeting. Technically I’m not on the committee any more, but as I mentioned a few days ago, I shall keep on sticking my oar in. I got given some more jobs to do at the meeting, so I suppose I wasn’t that unwelcome….

6 September 2009 (Sunday) - Chokey Revisted

Yesterday evening, following a rather physically strenuous day, I thought I’d take it easy. I did something I rarely do - I settled down to watch a film. “Brideshead Revisted” has always been a favourite book of mine. If you’ve never read it, I can thoroughly recommend it. It’s a smashing read, and in the 80s there was a twelve part TV adaptation of it starring Jeremy Irons, Antony Andrews and Lawrence Oliver among others. Recently there was a film made of the book, and I’d been looking forward to seeing this remake for some time.

What a load of tripe!! It had been made by someone who had overheard someone else describing his mate’s friend’s auntie’s cat’s opinion of the book. Some of the names of the characters were there, and some of the locations used in the book were featured. But the film was wrong. Oh so wrong. The lead characters in the book weren’t gay. Sebastian wasn’t camp. Charles wasn’t sniffing after brother and sister at the same time. The sister never went to Venice. And that bit on the cruise ship – what was that all about? And the army scenes? I suppose if (like most of humanity) you’ve never read the book, this rant means nothing. But it wound me up.

This morning I ached somewhat. But as always I had two choices. I could sit and bemoan my lot, or I could get on with it. I carried on with the tidying. Today’s plan was to do something with the two spare PCs I unearthed last week. That was easily done. One wasn’t a PC at all, merely an empty case. And the other when switched on tried (and failed) to boot up Windows ME. I shall take those two up to the tip tomorrow morning before work.

And so to the chokey for a family visit. Together with ‘er indoors ^TM and “Daddies Little Angel ^TM ” I went on a visit. Pausing only briefly for a spot of “Crackwatch” (see Facebook) in McDonalds, we were soon at the prison. I was expecting the place to be really busy today, because it was the weekend. It was actually the quietest I’ve ever seen the place. I turned up as usual and… that place winds me up. I’ve now visited five times, and every time the process has been different. Book in somewhere different, get quizzed differently, search done here or there or anywhere. This time I had an Alsatian sniffing round me.

“Normal Stanley” seemed in good spirits. We fed him up with far too much chocolate and crisps and assorted drinks. He’s got a new inmate on his wing called “Stephanie”. “Stephanie” apparently has a rather epic chest, but was sentenced before the surgeons could remove his/her/its meat & two veg. Since Her Majesty’s Prison Service doesn’t cater for “inbetweenies” someone in authority has declared that choppers trump chesticles, and that “Stephanie” is technically male and so goes to a male prison. However he/she/it gets released from lock up earlier than the other convicts every morning so’s it can shower without attracting undue attention. It’s a funny old world, really. I would have thought that having gone to the trouble to swap your junk for wazzo jugs, “undue attention” would be exactly what you would be after. But what do I know?

And as always the two and a half hours flew by, and again we had to leave him behind. And then home. We’ve now finally emptied the bucket of fish food I bought in March. Eighty quid for the summer’s feeding wasn’t bad. They can rough it on bread until I get back to the Koi shop…

5 September 2009 (Saturday) - Sieve That !!

The morning’s post brought a letter from Ashford district scouts inviting me to their annual bunfight. This is the same lot who gave me a five years service certificate after I’d been there twelve years, and who gave the medal for outstanding service to the bloke who only turns up to take the subs (and only does that when he feels like it). They’d obviously overlooked the fact I’d stopped helping them nearly a year ago.

To Sevenoaks to help with a garden project. Over the last few weeks various diggings in Bryan’s garden have uncovered all sorts of rocks and boulders. Not content with leaving them all where they were, he dug them out and piled them in a corner of the garden. Today’s job was basically to dig a great big hole to bury all these rocks and boulders in. I’m told it’s called a soak-away; the idea is to stop the garden getting waterlogged. I’m sure “project management” know what they are doing. It sounds odd to me, but I just did the digging. All the stuff that got dug out got sieved, and the loose stuff was used as topsoil. The stones and rocks went back in the hole at the end. The expression “sieve that” was used rather a lot during the day. It’s amazing how much sieving compacted rock takes to turn it into useable topsoil. It’s a whole lot easier when you see it on “Ground Force”.

Yes – I know. Seems a lot of fiddling around to me as well. And I was the one in the hole digging. I usually find it best not to offer opinions when someone comes up with such hare-brained schemes. Other than pointing out the relative merits of a fish pond (having dug a pond sized hole) I kept quiet. But there was some dinner and a couple of beers in it for me, so I wasn’t going to rock the boat. The only mishap was when we realised we’d left the home made bread in the oven for an hour too long. I suggested we turned the oven off, denied all knowledge of the thing, and if anyone asked we would say it was “uncut toast”. In the end it turned out that the loaf was perfect, so we got away with that one.

And now after the day’s exertions, I can hardly move…

4 September 2009 (Friday) - Clearing Out

For once I wasn’t woken by “Bear Ruckus” at 5.45am. I did think that was due to last night’s practicing closing the front door quietly. But the womenfolk of the house were complaining about his racket, so I must have slept thought it.

After a bit of brekky I carried on with the chucking out of rubbish. I’ve got this utterly unreasonable ambition to be able to get all my books onto shelves - rather than having them in tottering stacks in various places all over the house. And so I’ve decided that in order to make sufficient shelf space, some of the older books must go. The mildewed falling apart Enid Blytons are history. As are the astronomy books from the seventies which are now hopelessly out of date. And I’m also getting shot of reference stuff I never use - the D.I.Y books, the gardening rubbish, it’s all gone. After all, who needs reference books when you’ve got the internet? And anything by Peter Hamilton has gone too. Great big books that I never finish.

‘er indoors ^TM had a veritable hoard of books littering my shelves. She’s not looked at any of them for years. I know that because it’s not been possible for her to get to the book shelves for years because of all the other tat which was in the way. I wondered if I should ask her, or whether I should just ding them. She would never know… In the end my innate cowardice got the better of me, and she has graciously allowed me to relocate her dust covered collection to a shelf downstairs that I’d forgotten about. That’s freed up some space.

Whilst doing all this, I took the opportunity to see what books we actually have got. It’s only when you have a good clear out that you realise what’s there. We had (at least) two copies of over a dozen books between us. I’ve finally got all the Adrian Mole books back together again. To say nothing of the myriad Viz books which were all over the place.

And the software I’ve dinged out – all the old versions of Serif PagePlus. Why did I keep them? And so many manky old disks which ran on Windows 95 & 98. Several versions of Encarta from the mid-90s. And how many copies of “Worms” does anyone need? And then there are the CDs. It must be over ten yeas since anyone’s played “The Smurfs Go Pop”. Or any of the other dust-encrusted CDs which sit below the Smurfs CDs. And ordnance survey maps. An OS map of Ashford so old it hasn’t got the Ashford to Maidstone motorway section. Four OS maps of Hastings. All now gone.

Whilst at the tip I had to exercise iron self control. One of the normal people was throwing away a huge water feature; purely because the pump was broken. He said I was welcome to it…. It was close, but I said no.

3 September 2009 (Thursday) - Stuff

One of my pet hates is needing a wazz in the night. I really should just get up and go to the cludgee. But I don’t. I lay there in pain for an hour or so before finally getting up. Why do I do this? Rather than laying there trying to sleep, I could be to the loo & back and asleep in less than a minute. Is it just me who does this? And just as I was nodding off, “My Boy ^TM ” stormed out of the house on an early shift. He’s currently got a cob-on because he maintains he doesn’t make “bear ruckus” in the mornings. But that didn’t stop him borrowing 40p. 40p – he must be skint.

I’ve counted up the astro club’s money. Last Friday we didn’t do teas or coffees. Only “constellation lottery” at a pound a go, and the raffle at 50p per ticket. So how on earth did we take X pounds and sixty two pence that night? Where did those sixty two pence come from? Oh well, I’ve phoned the bank to get the appropriate paperwork sent through. I wonder how long it will take to get the signatory handed over? It took several weeks when the new secretary took over earlier in the year. And I’m still getting monthly statements for the snake club even though I stood down from that over ten years ago. Ten years!! The snake club’s dead and buried – it croaked with the meeting where I stood down in favour of a rather fierce looking woman. I wish I could remember her name – she was pleasant enough, but just looked fierce. The other signatory is on my Facebook list. Perhaps we should do something with that money – it’s about a hundred quid. Over the years I’ve taken advice on what we legally can do with the assets of a defunct club, and most people advice leaving it alone. It seems a waste of a hundred quid. Surely there must be a pet rescue type place we could give it to? If we were allowed to.

Being on a late shift meant I had a bit of time before work this morning. Firstly to the council tip to get rid of the rubbish I packed up yesterday. For once the tip was relatively painless. Unlike my next call – Sainsbury’s. It has to be said that they place seems to attract a better class of customer than Tesco. However the staff did seem a tad “special”. Especially the one with the really spazzy beard.

And then to the craft shop in Bybrook Barn. The plan was to get a stamp for Astrobash so we can stamp people’s hands. Because that’s what happens at this sort of thing, or so I am told. I got a stamp – I think it does the trick.

Whilst in the craft shop, a young girl was dragged in by her grandparents who were obviously trying to interest her in painting. She showed utter contempt for all the paint sets, and then looked at the gallery of pictures on the wall (obviously painted by people not as talented as they might be) “Oh look” she said totally straight faced. “That’s nice. Paint your own disaster”. I just dissolved in fits of giggles whist Grandma gave me evils….

2 September 2009 (Wednesday) - Tidying Up

Thanks to my early morning alarm earthquake, I was up and ironing by 6am. Well, I needed to get up as I was on an early shift.

We had the auditors in at work today today. I wouldn’t mind, but it was a day of disruption to tell us what we already knew. Still, I took an extended tea break and vanished off visiting friends on the ward. I’m not breaking any confidences when I tell my loyal readers that she’s come home now.

Seeing how the camping season is over, last night Martin helped me take the top box off of my car. And since the car is now low enough to get into the tip, I have commenced a serious tidy up of the house. I say “tidy up” – I am just going to throw things away. Anything I’ve not actively used for a year is going to the tip. Oh, the rubbish I found. Two old computer cases. No components in them, just the cases. Network cards a foot long. Installation CDs for hardware I’ve long since thrown away. A knacked SkyBox. I’ve filled the car with rubbish for the tip.

And once I’ve emptied the car tomorrow, I have loads more to take up to the skip. I’ve discs of software that is antiquated and needs chucking. I’ve loads of software that has been superseded so many times that need to go. I have so many books that I’ve never read, and have no intention of reading. And the music CDs. We just hoard so much old rubbish. I have a watch in a box that was knacked and broken before I left Hastings. I have been saving this watch with a view to eventually getting it fixed for some twenty five years. It’s never getting fixed, is it? So why do I keep it? And I have so much else like that. It’s all going.

And then the stuff I’ve found. Two PCs which look functional – I’ll spark them up and see if they work. And photos – I found photos of a trip to Chessington World of Adventure. I can remember some of the rides there. I don’t remember being at he back of a log flume, though. But I’ve obviously paid to buy the photo.

And then I revamped the astro club’s flyer. The plan is that it can be given out at Challock Goose Fair to advertise both the club and the one-day Astrobash event in October. You can see the flyer here.The idea is that the two sheets on the website are printed on either side of a sheet of A4, and the whole thing is then a three fold flyer. I’d be grateful for any comments or suggestions. I can’t help but think it looks a bit busy. I’ve also got to put the finishing touches to the astro club accounts and arrange the change of signatory with the bank. And whilst in theory that would be the end of my involvement with the committee, in practice I suspect little will change. I certainly intend sticking my oar in until I get told to clear off….

1 September 2009 (Tuesday) - Wasting Money

September already… I’ve been blogging here for three months already. Averaging just under a thousand hits per month with regular followers in America (North & South), Canada and all over Europe, I’m amazed how popular my musings seem to be.

My side hurts – it got bashed yesterday whilst clearing away at BatCamp. At first I thought I’d popped a rib, but it’s just bruised. I’ll live. For a while longer….

Work was dull today, but I got to pop in to see one of my most loyal readers who is currently resident at my place of work. In the past I have been criticised for not using my blog to give health updates on people’s assorted maladies and infirmities. It’s easily overlooked that in my line of work I have access to very confidential information, and so I always find it easier to keep my trap shut. But bearing in mind that one of the blogs linking off of here gives more details that I will, I don’t think I’m breaking too many confidences this time.

Next week will see me having worked at the same place for twenty five years. Twenty five years. I would have got less if I’d torched the place. But it seems that the “long service policy” means I get a bung. I get three hundred quid.

Let me qualify that. I get three hundred quid to spend in Argos. That’s not vouchers (which I would flog on eBay for cash). I tell the finance department what I want from Argos up to a maximum of three hundred quid and they get it for me. However, if what I want is more than three hundred quid, then tough! I can’t make up the difference myself. So, I am now scouring argos dot com to find something on which to squander this money. My first thoughts were a new telly. Three hundred ain’t enough. Then I thought about a Wii. But I want something for me – not something I’ll never be allowed on because everyone else is using it. Maybe a scrat nav?

I have absolutely no idea what I want from Argos. I would like to be able to add money to the three hundred to get something I want. There are lots of things in their catalogue that I wouldn’t mind having which cost more than three hundred quid. But three hundred or under…. I think I’m going to end up wasting this money on rubbish.