Well it got really silly then.

The Centre manager came out of the room and hurtled down the hall at a great lick still holding the phone to her ear which was now trailing a broken wire. She’d obviously had more training than either the receptionist or me, because instead of merely looking through the window as we had done, she opened the door. Well, that livened things up a lot, I can tell you. I can only surmise that the fire could now see the sign that says FIRE EXIT and was trying to reach it. Coughing back the tears she turned to us helpful observers and suggested to our fleeing backs that we evacuate.

It was at this point the receptionist blocked our way and sensibly pointed out that we couldn’t leave the building as we hadn’t signed out. Why didn’t we think of that? It’s amazing what you don’t think off when your attention is captivated by pretty yellow flames and black acrid smoke.

Somebody mentioned the fire alarm, and suddenly all of the staff started chanting as one “Fire Alarm, Fire Alarm …. Where’s the b****y Fire Alarm”

As I was standing in front of it, I obligingly pressed it.

I’m not sure what I thought that would do, as everybody already appeared to be quite alarmed anyhow, but I wasn’t expecting a bell. Sprinkler systems would have been handy, automatic call through to the chaps with the big red lorry and yellow helmets might have proven useful, even just all the exit doors flying open whilst the internal doors released and closed ….. but ….. ring a ding ding ???? Anyway it seemed to cheer The Centre Staff up no end as we were now following procedures.

To overcome the problem of roasting our ribs whilst we queued up to sign out, some radically minded individual thought that, perhaps taking the book outside with us would suffice. The Centre Manager became positively joyful at that prospect as she remembered somewhere at the back of her mind that there was another procedure that mentioned doing that.

We were on form now!

With us all (and the book) on the pathway outside the ringing bell was much more tolerable, also it was cooler.

Who has called the Fire Brigade? Asked Mary.

Everyone looked at their feet and shuffled awkwardly. “What does the procedure say about that?” I enquired with a broad grin on my face. The receptionist saved the day by pointing out that the Centre Manager is supposed to do it or at least delegate it.

Mary shifted up into delegating mode and ordered someone called someone to phone the Fire Brigade. It seems everyone didn’t recognise the name somebody as nobody moved, then a totally different somebody obviously not related, pointed out that the procedure said you shouldn’t stop for your belongings ……….. consequently everybody and nobody had a phone on them.

Mary realising she might have dropped the ball on this one started to renter the building to retrieve her phone from the inferno. However she immediately entered the Twilight Zone as she realised she was jammed between two contradicting procedures.

The Fire Brigade had to be phoned

You can’t renter a burning building

………….. what to do? Which procedure to break?

I observed the consternation and could hear the non compliance sheets tumbling in my head until I could bear it no longer.

“I have two phones, would you like me to use one and call them?” I had my helpful hat on, lucky for them. They almost fell at my feet; this was going to save a lot of form filling.

Having done so I headed for my car, as I didn’t want it blocked in by the Fire Chappies.

“Where are you going?” I was hailed.

“Home, I’m having pie and chips for dinner” I responded.

“You can’t leave” I was informed “We have to congregate over there by that lamppost while we check the register”

“Congregate away you fine chaps, if you check the signing in book you’ll see it’s also a signing out book, and I signed out before the alarm sounded.

As I turned to bid them fare well in their lamppost huddle I could see through the window that although the ceiling inside was cloaked in smoke, the fire itself seemed to have had enough and gone home.

Still I could hear the sirens in the distance, so I made sure I went in the opposite direction.

Can’t wait for my next visit on Tuesday to find out what they have in store for me then.

Yesterday morning I left home in Derby to drive to work. As I pulled out onto the busy London Road and accelerated to match the speed of all the other joyful commuters, I heard …. Fwappa Fwappa Fwappa Fwappa ……. Immediately I recognised the sound of a flat tyre. BUGGER! I cheerfully chortled.
Ahead of me was a queue of traffic sitting at temporary traffic lights, I didn’t want to sit in that so I turned off into the first side street I saw. It wasn’t wide but the pavement was, so I pulled up onto it to get completely off the road.

Now to explain the outcome of this story I can only imagine that the challenge of: -
being 15 miles from work.
not wearing my scrabbling around with a dirty wheel suit.
realising that I needed to call AA.
also work then try and guess which of my clients would need putting off

……………….was all simply too much for my forty sixteen year old brain.

I couldn’t find my membership card, I couldn’t tell them exactly where I was, then I found it impossible to work out how many of my appointments needed cancelling.
Eventually I managed to explain to the AA about my punctured clients and explain to work that it was flat, everything had gone flat.

The puzzled mister at The AA said it would take about 45 minutes to get to me. I sat in my car and gazed around me. On the other side of the road was Wickes with a large car park which sported a burger bar. I decided I deserved a polystyrene cup of brown and a bacon butty. I locked the car and strolled across in order to partake of their bounteous fayre.
Whilst grimacing at the warm brown and cheerfully dripping tinned tomato down my shirt my mobile warbled at me. I read the text, it announced that he was on his way and expected to be with me soon.

Looking around to ensure I could see both directions the yellow angel of support could arrive from I noticed with some interest that I had parked my car on the forecourt of Quickfit, who were at this moment opening their large shutter doors and wondering what numpty had abandoned his car right across the access to their workshop.

You could smell the rich aromas of the comestibles on offer as nothing was vacuum packed on polystyrene or wrapped in cling film.

“Hello Mrs. Clapham, how are you today?” We’d got to the front of the queue.
“How was that piece of braising steak last week, did Geoff enjoy it for his tea?” They remembered what you’d spent your money on the previous week.
“To be honest Mr Jacks it was a bit tough, he ate it fine enough, but perhaps I should’ve cooked it longer” Replied my ma ever the one to take the blame.
“Sorry to hear that” He sympathised “Hear, tell you what, try cooking it in a bit more gravy and add quarter of an hour, it’ll be our little secret.” He quickly wrapped a bit of meat in paper and popped into ma’s basket with a wink.

They didn’t need to go on courses to learn about Customer Service in those days, they’d never heard of it, they didn’t need to have done because they never stopped practicing it. It was a way of life to the shopkeeper of the late 50′s.

The rest of my mother’s list was duly dealt with all in one go, then a fish head for the cat was wrapped and handed over without a word and I had a penny lolly popped into my mouth by one of the girls as she was serving the woman behind my mother.
“Billy’ll be around on his bike to drop off your vegetables before five Mrs. Clapham”, and with a hearty “Tara” he’d wish us on our way. All in all we’d done the weekend shop in less than half an hour, and if we had forgotten anything ma would only have to send me down some time in the week with my memorised chant……..
“Me ma says can you let her have a …………” Then I’d soon be home with whatever she’d missed off the list safe in the knowledge its cost would be added to next week’s bill.

Last week I went to a well known supermarket, well when I say went I mean I drove, because it’s two miles away. Quite close really for this day and age.

Having parked my car I had to walk through the gang of miserable supermarket workers at smoker’s corner they were shivering and coughing, a lovely advert for the store, they made the produce they handle look so appetising I thought.
Arriving at the trolley park I remembered I had to insert a coin to release one, I searched through each pocket in turn and drew a blank. So I had to enter the store and stand in the queue at the cigarette and newspaper counter because although this was a Saturday morning the customer service desk had a hand written sign up saying back in five minutes (Five minutes from when?).
Ten minutes later (during which time nobody had returned to the customer service desk) I exited the store in order to release a trolley so I could re-enter the store.
Heading for the eggs I found the bread, going to where the bread used to be I found the sauces and condiments. I decided to peruse the wine aisle and calm down a bit. After a few minutes of reading labels and confusing myself over hints of oak aged smoky blackberries I realised I had a shadow. I was being overtly stared at by what at first appeared to be a poor imitation of a member of The NYPD. With relief I noticed he wasn’t armed, however he was intent on letting me know that so long as I was in the wines, beers and spirits bit of the shop then this store wasn’t big enough for the both of us. I slunk off and left the security guard to securely guard the security of his booze.

What is a colleague announcement?

Having done a couple of laps of the store I decided I could live without whatever it was I’d forgotten that I needed and I headed for the checkout.

What did I find? Half a dozen do-it-yourself checkout machines with a rather harassed looking “member of colleague staff” hurtling between all six machines and frantically cancelling this and verifying that. Clearly I was to become part of the latest drive towards not employing people any more.
Just what this country needs, less people in even less jobs, hooray for corporate greed and increased profits. Let’s not worry about whether there are enough people in gainful employment to actually come into these bloody shops and spend money eh?
I walked up to the vacant robot it displayed a welcome and invited me to start scanning. I immediately envisaged a future where the illiterate and dyslexic would crawl around in supermarket car parks weak with hunger, it was no longer enough to merely have the money to buy food you also had to be able to read instructions in order to pay for it.

I scanned my packet of Wheaty Bangs (beep) and put it in the bag on the rack which was also part of the scales. I then chose a tube of eggs and did the same (no beep!) Something was wrong I was beepless. I put the eggs in the bag and looked at the screen. A notice was asking me if I had brought my own bag? I pressed NO, it then flashed lights for the “colleague assistant” who had to come and calm it down. I now had to remove the two items from the bag as it was worried I was trying to steal them, I put them back in the trolley.
We started again, and this time we got as far as the aerosol spray which sent the robotic colleague off in a fit.
“I have to approve solvents and aerosols” explained the human colleague who merely showed it her magic brooch. How that proved I wasn’t going to drag my heels into the long grass at the back of the car park and partake in a spot of getting high on hair spray confuses the heck out of me.
I then limp wristedly waved my bargain of the day at its all seeing eye. A pack of let’s pretend ham with injected water reduced by 10np which it steadfastly chose to ignore. I could not persuade Davros to even notice it let alone allow me to buy it. Back came the frazzled colleague who had to type in a code and plead with it to let me become the new owner.
I reached into my lucky dip for the next item and came out with a punnet of strawberries the bar code was attached to the cling film lid. Turning it upside down I waved it around over the reader, guess how long the cling film stayed intact? No not even that long. I spent the next couple of minutes scrabbling around on the floor chasing after errant strawberries that were making a break for freedom. Still it reminded me of my childhood which was the last time I’d been out picking strawberries.
A few more easier items and I’d finished, now what? I searched the screen until I found a button marked how do you wish to pay? I pressed that expecting choices but instead it wailed for its keeper, who reset it and pointed out to me that I should have pressed the button marked Finished instead. So I did and then chose my preference of card payment. This time I thought I’d hit the jackpot, all the lights on the tower above it went off. Back she came and announced that my shopping included a bottle of wine which she needed to authorise. To my astonishment a menu of options came up for her to choose from, each of them referred to her interpretation of my age. She pressed the one that said “Customer is clearly old enough” Dag-nabbit she could at least have pretended to have gone through the process of deciding my age.
I returned to my option of paying by card.
Place your card in the reader, it instructed. I searched all around the screen and could see no slot to shove my card in. I called Mrs Colleague back over she sighed at me and pointed out that I was in fact leaning on the card reader.
I entered my PIN and pressed enter, and was about to whip the card out but suddenly I had to deal with a series of Earth shattering descions.
Did I have any coupons? err …. no.
How many savings stamps did I want to buy? ummmm …… none
Did I want cashback? . errrr …. do I? ummm …. no.
Do I have a loyalty card …….. this was endless.
It then spat a receipt at me, I was a couple or so steps away from it when a voice behind me said something. I returned and said pardon?
It’s ok said my own personal colleague you’ve finished now. I asked her who had spoken to me, she said it was the machine so I went back to it.
“What do you want?” I enquired down its nearest orifice.
“It was thanking you for shopping here” I was informed by the young man who had been waiting to use the machine after me.
I peered at it over the top of my specs. I’d just done £60 of shopping, the only words exchanged with a human had been to get me out of trouble, then I’d been thanked by a machine.
What the hell is going on?

Whilst loading my car I espied a very official metal sign strapped to a lamp post, I walked over and peered up at it. Its opening statement was to welcome me to their car park. Now I don’t know about you, but when a notice starts like that I am instantly reminded of a large Canadian smiling down at a seal cub whilst hiding a very large club behind his back. I read on.
It merrily lead me down the garden path and waffled aimlessly about the following being about the supermarket’s customers’ interests. Yeah, right! It wasn’t so much about my interests but it certainly was interesting.
I read on ……
Apparently I was allowed to park for two and a half hours if I was a customer …. Hmmm … understood, but what if there had been a multi trolley pile up in Home Baking just by the Self Raising Flour? It didn’t seem to allow for this as it categorically shouted that a £50 fine would wing its happy way in my direction.
I read on ……
It informed me I was not allowed to return within 5 hours. What is more they used cameras and number plate recognition to check on me.
I re-read this several times deciding to ignore the bollocky “welcome” and the shite about it being in their customers’ interest I consequently concluded “Fuck ‘em” if they think its a good business model to bully customers and instruct them when they have or haven’t permission to drive to their shop and spend money with them then thank heavens I don’t have any shares in such a flawed concept.
However there was a nagging question at the back of my mind about this which I couldn’t quite put to rest.

I drove out of Stalag IV car park and as I went round the mini roundabout by their petrol station I suddenly realised what was really troubling me about the notice, it was Custard Powder!
I’d forgotten the bloody custard powder, I knew why of course, it was because disposable nappies had evicted custard powder, mainly because tinned bananas had usurped the said nappies in favour of its old haunting grounds which was where cottage cheese had moved on to.
Perhaps the shop had also levied a restriction on how long its produce could stay on the same shelf, whilst not allowing a return within 5 hours?
By now I’d gone round the roundabout three times whilst wondering what to do. I needed the custard powder and so far as common sense indicated there was nothing illegal about buying it, however they had decided that unless I waited five hours ( I suppose as a punishment for having an addled memory) the custard powder was going to cost me £51.65 …. and serve me right! I almost settled on fresh cream instead as it goes very nicely with stewed apples and would be much cheaper at only £50.85, but by now I was getting dizzy and decided to go home instead.
That night I had the stewed apple on its own and promised myself then and there that in future I’d save up for the custard powder as it’s really so much nicer, and hang the expense.

Over the weekend looking at the situations vacant in our area I spotted what seemed a worthwhile use of my free time. Volunteers were needed to take the elderly and infirm shopping one at a time in your own car. I screamed in horror and threw the paper away as far as I could, not far as it transpired, have you ever tried throwing an open newspaper it just has no urgency about it and flaps lethargically to your feet. I pondered about this volunteering opportunity it disguised itself as a pure and altruistic activity, but I suspected that financial folly and bankruptcy lay this way.
I cranked up the internet and whacked off an e-mail to yesterday’s supermarket.

I pointed out to them that I didn’t think they had thought through the true implications of their car park policy and put to them the scenario of my volunteering to take Mrs Ironing-board to do her shopping and then a couple of hours later transporting Mrs Licorice on the same offensive. Why should I be penalised for my generosity in both helping out two OAPs and choosing to patronise their shop? What were they going to do to rectify this mis-justice and persuade me not to go to Tescosons or Liddle ol’ Aldi ?

I requested that they didn’t bother replying with the tired old tosh about it being to the customers’ advantage or any other meaningless platitude which would result in me feeling my intelligence was being insulted. I merely wanted to know what to do about a situation that they had created.
Their response, like a twangy arrow zeroed straight back into my inbox just over a week later.

“Yes” they agreed.
“That was an issue and no mistake Guv!” They conceded.
“And there is a solution”
They then explained that it wasn’t them being unreasonable, you see they had sold their car parks to a company called Euro Car Parks. And if I went to their website I would be able to give them my bank account details and buy a season ticket …. there, problem solved!

BUY! Buy! buy!!! Did I just hear right?
Yes I surely did.

I have to seriously question the thought processes of a management team that value the income of selling its car park over the inconvenience caused to its customers who, whilst having every right to go anywhere else, are only trying to support that business in what is after all its core activity. Bunch of amateurs.

A pound to a penny says that they don’t even use that income to put sawdust on the floors for bored little boys to make pictures in with their feet.

I was finishing off my painting of a futuristic city when I suddenly realised that everyone else in the room was quietly creating archetypal masterpieces.

People were painstakingly brush stroking away at the likes of a water droplet teetering on the edge of a leaf, another was conjuring an abstract creation of a plant as it metamofoseefosisised into an endless pit of emotional transfiguration. Another worked on the head of a rose laying resplendent upon a velvet cushion, each petal an orchestral symphony of balanced perfection ……….. then, alone in the corner was me, the oldest one there, painting a space rocket whilst making all the necessary sound affects that accompanies such a joyous act.

I’m going to miss that class, not sure it’s reciprocated.

I’ve decided to place them on a different Blog and put a link to them as they are rather lengthy and can be dipped into as wished. If I placed them here and a stranger stumbled across them they’d probably give up before they got to my shorter wafflings.

Have a visit, don’t try to kill them all in one go, you can always return and pick up where you left off as each experience is titled.

I hope you enjoy……..

http://zenataomm.blogspot.com/2010/05/my-angels-of-mercy-they-made-me-what-i.html

Sure I said, I hadn’t really heard much of what she’d said, I didn’t need to, I’d heard my favourite word “FREE” so I knew I’d like it.

We toddled along at the appointed hour and chose a couple of seats in the middle of the room. Everyone was very welcoming and I have to say pleased yet slightly puzzled to see us.
Very soon the film was cranked into action and then just as quickly stopped when somebody shouted out something in Hindi. Everybody turned and looked at us, the only two faces surrounded by 60 Asians.
The lights came back on and one of the elders gently approached and asked how good our grasp of their language was.
I had to sadly confess that I have always learnt my languages in alphabetical order and had only just started Greek. They then offered to run the film with the English subtitles on especialy for us, which; as that cut off the bottom third of the screen wouldn’t be a nuisance at all. We thanked them and felt the biggest pair of inconsiderate, awkward sods ever.

The film must have been running for as long as about three minutes when we both realised that it was a period drama set in the times of The British Colonial Rule of India (The Raj). It accurately told the true tale of how we (The Brits) exploited the impoverished villagers and despite years of drought and starvation still insisted that they pay a high percentage of their harvest as a tax to pay for the upkeep of our army in their country.
The beautiful and generous Indian natives slaved day and night to try and keep body and soul together only interrupted by spontaneously bursting into song and dance every 20 minutes whilst the ugly snarling upper classed twits in the encampment went out on hunting raids blasting the local big eyed furry critters to smithereens or constantly played cricket.
Doff and I looked at each other through the corners of our eyes and muttered …..
“Oh my gawd!”
We slowly slumped into our seats.

Two extracts from the film that went down particularly well with the audience were ……..
“We must send the evil white devils back to the West…” and “The selfish English thieves will steal the food from our babies mouths…”
Lots of cheering for those two, and the one that got a lot of them on their feet was when Captain Ponsonby Fortescue Wetfart kicked the servant who was polishing his footwear in the teeth and screaming at the top of his voice gently advised him that…..
“The darkies will feel the humilation of being trampled into the dirt by our riding boots!”

Which was nice.

From my position near the floor I had spotted a table with a cloth covering which went nearly to the floor. I whispered to Doff that as soon as the film ended we should scuttle under it and wait for everyone to depart before venturing out. She agreed.
However, suddenly the film ended and the lights went up.

Our guests swooped on us from every side and interrogated us as to what we thought of the film.
We said it was lovely and so colourful but had seemed to end suddenly without a conclusion, however it had been fun and we really needed to be getting home now as our curtains needed painting. They were having none of this and told us that this was only an intermission as it was actually a three hour film.
We were their guests and now they would feed us.
Four different families returned and piled our laps up with various plates of popcorn, Bombay mix and Bourbon biscuits. I made the mistake of emptying one of my plates which was immediately replaced by two more, the Bombay Mix was gaining on me.
My trying to balance all these plates and several plastic cups of squash was suddenly hindered by the lights going out and the remaining hour and a half of “How the Brits screwed up our Grandparents” was cheerfully loosened on us.

The story progressed with the upper class sons of Harrow and Eton treating the Indian villagers with disdain and condemning their chance to survive to the mere outcome of a cricket game.
The starving yet plucky Indians facing disaster and hunger did the only logical thing open to them; they sang and danced their way to destiny.

Our guests joined in with them which luckily deprived us of sight of the screen and consequent vision of the arseholes we are descended from.

The film ended with a crescendo of cheering as the villagers beat The English at cricket and won the right not to pay their tax for three years. The Army in turn were booted out and had to go and defend a dust pit in Africa or something.

The lights came up and everybody was in high dudgeon. I went round the room, shook everybody’s hand and apologised profusely for my fellow Englishmen’s behaviour in their country and assured them that I was not personally related to any of them, as all my family were descended from abusers of small hairy mammals.

Doff and I then invited them all to come out into the car park and give us both a bloody good kicking. Unfortunately they declined as I for one would have felt better if they had of done, instead they filled our pockets with popcorn and biscuits and promised to invite us to the next one they show ………. GULP!

“Good morning, may I have an appointment for tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow’s Good Friday!”

“That’s the one.”

“We don’t open on a Good Friday”

“Really? Why not?”

“errrr … It’s Good Friday”

“I think we ascertained that. Historically aren’t people ill on a Good Friday?”

“It’s a bank holiday, doctors don’t work”

“Doctors really ought to give it a try …..85% of the world does. What you’re saying is I can catch a bus or a taxi to B&Q and buy a rawl plug, or Tesco for a box of cocktail sticks however expecting a doctor to be at his desk is a wish too far ….. what about Monday?”

“Well that’s a bank holiday too, doctors like to enjoy the same benefits as everybody else.”

“And I’m sure everybody else would like to enjoy the benefits of a doctor’s salary at £110K as well, but we can’t, because this is the real world…………Tuesday then?”

“He’s phoning in on Tuesday.”

“Is he really? If you go outside your building and look up on the wall to the right of the door, you’ll see a sign proudly proclaiming that you have 10 doctors at that practice. Don’t bother me with the one that has suddenly discovered the convenience of the telephone. I’ll have an appointment with one of the other nine that still see the efficiency of attending and seeing their patients face to face.”

“What?”

“Please may I have an appointment with one of the doctors who will be in the surgery on Tuesday, thank you.”

“I just told you the one doctor on duty on Tuesday will only be phoning in.”

“I am intrigued to know his motives however I’m nervous to ask you, so can I have one on Wednesday in the morning?”

“No, we’re very busy most of Wednesday.”

“You don’t say!….. you mean after being closed from Friday straight through until Wednesday you unexpectedly find yourselves packed out? How inconsiderate of the sick, you’d think they would plan their illnesses better, what with you only having ten doctors and all.
Tell you what, here’s a mad idea, instead of me guessing when you have a slot how about you tell me?”

“Wednesday 15.20.”

“It’s a date! Incidentally I’m on Earth, which part of the Horse’s Head Nebulae are you on?”

Click

To myself … “Obviously the arse!”

A 12 year old and his slightly older brother clambered out, very polite, they smilingly enquired if I was driving on my own insurance. Only their on board whizz box had told them that the female owner only had insurance for owner driver and nobody else was named.

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask why they had assumed that Doff didn’t sport a beard. However I’ve seen the TV programs where they follow traffic cops around and know that my comment would be received as joyfully as …..
“ain’t youse twatters got nuffin better to do than hassle scrotes like me?”
And seeing as I’ve never seen the attraction in wearing a Burberry cap sideways whilst running like my hair is on fire shortly before hiding in someone else’s wheely bin I bit my tongue and merely answered in the affirmative.
He asked me the registration of my car so he could check my insurance details.
Now I don’t know about you, but I can remember the number plates of all of my Father’s cars when I was a child and even the registrations of my first three motorbikes. Ask me what the hall wallpaper looks like or how many ears Doff has and I falter somewhat, so the chances of me reciting the number of my current car were on a par with winning the lottery!

I shrugged my elbows and told him it was a blue S type Jag, “did that help?” ……….. it seemed it did! He nattered into his chattering brooch and almost immediately the return reply informed him how many Bri Nylon socks I owned, how hopeless I am with women and why, what my favourite internet sites are, and Yes I was insured with Swiftsure, but No it didn’t cover me to drive other vehicles .
Gulp

It seemed I was back in the hands of the “Boys in Blue” yet again, not so serious as 2009 but it was becoming a habit.

We were about to destroy a forest in order to complete the paperwork that was going to result in a shed load of points being deposited on my licence not to mention their purloining oodles of my Gold Splonders. I started to think to myself how much I wished we had come on the bike now, after all I was only viewing a machine, it was on e-Bay I couldn’t take it home with me when it struck me….

The Bike!!!!…. that’s insured!!!…. “Try my bike insurance” I casually pleaded from my begging position in the gravel.

“What’s its registration and which company?” The policeman enquired.
My mind wondered up the staircase imagining all sorts of wallpaper …….
“Errrrr …. silver ….. ummmm …. Harley Davidson” I proudly recalled.

Further mutterings with the tiny voice on his shoulder confirmed that I was indeed covered on that policy to drive all vehicles. …. that was a close one!

I sighed a heave of relief, then realising I’d done that the wrong way round I heaved a sigh of relief, we swopped addresses for Christmas cards and all went our way.

So caution to all UK drivers, that old benefit the insurance companies used to give us whereby we could drive vehicles not owned by us but with the owner’s permission and they’d cover us 3rd party is now something else they want us to pay for.

Thieving Gets!!!!

So imagine my unfettled enthusiasm and deep joy this morning whilst chipping old sealant off the bath to suddenly have my concentration shattered by bagpipes. At first I thought it was my psychosis reminding me I hadn’t taken this morning’s medication, but no, indeed I could hear Amazing Grace amazingly gracing my vicinity.

At first I denied the temptation to go and investigate, for the audible evidence could only suggest that a demented Scotsman must be outside wrestling with a sheep’s bladder attached to a forest of tubes.

However after 20 minutes the satisfaction and reward of chipping old sealant was now heavily polluted by the uncalled for offerings of Hamish Mac Frozen and his squid of many colours. I went to investigate.

Outside, three doors down and standing in the middle of the road where any old random skidding van could have wiped him out (where oh where?) was a six foot two man in full Scottish Grenadier uniform, kilt and bearskin, he must have looked a picture on the bus earlier.
Now I’m not one to jump to conclusions so I scanned the horizon first before making my mind up, but no, all the evidence seemed to point to him as being the culprit.
My neighbour joined me.
“Is there a funeral he asked”
“Could be his, if I’d been on night shift” I replied.

This is all in the name of saving the planet. When I was a child a dustbin man came into your back garden, hoisted your bin on his shoulder carried it outside and dumped it in the back of his wagon. This was then taken to a field full of seagulls who picked over it and what was left was burnt and turned into the soil. It seems ash is a great fertiliser and is popular amongst farmer types.
However this produced too much Co2 so now we put everything into one of three bins which are emptied separately into one of three different lorries the paper and plastics are then driven to the other end of the country or in some cases it seems China may even have a part to play. I bet that doesn’t create Co2 or cost money do you?

Talking of expense, part of my Council job description clearly states that I have to wash my metal, glass and plastic rubbish before disposing of it. Good job hot water and soap are free, that’s all I can say! Wouldn’t it be ironic if heating water created Co2, I guess it doesn’t. Still it’ll be cheaper from now on as the paper labels on the jam jars have flaked off and seized up the pump on our dishwasher so that’s not an option any more; do you expect the council will pay to have it mended? Yes so do I.

Whilst I am waiting for that I can’t help asking myself …….
“What the fuck am I doing standing at the sink washing my rubbish?”