Organisation and communication

Just over a week ago I was heading off for a long weekend with a bunch of chums to Naples. We agreed to meet at a local car park at 7.15 a.m. Here is a snippet of the conversation...

"Where's David?" asked Mark

"He thought you were picking him up at his house. But he's on his way here now, walking down the hill."

"His house? I said to be at my house! I'll go get him." Off went Mark in his car.

Several minutes later he reappeared.

"Can't find him. I tried my house but he wasn't there."

"No, he said he was walking down the hill, not to your house."

"Oh, I'll get him on the way down the hill!" Off went Mark.

"Where's Mark going, that's the wrong way?" asked three of us simultaneously.

"David will be nearly here anyway"

Just as Mark was out of sight...David appeared.

"Where's Mark?"

"Looking for you. on the wrong hill."

Uneasyhotels

On our visit to Celtic Connections last week, Mrs Blog and I tried out the cost saving facilities of the Easyhotel.

It seems the cost savings are achieved by packing twice as many rooms into the available space as any other hotel chain. If you have ever been in the toilet on a Boeing 737 or Airbus 319 then imagine the same space...

...with a shower and double bed in it, as well as the loo!

Other space saving initiatives included removing the washer from the tap.

If you like wet feet when you pay a nighttime visit to the little room, this is the hotel for you!

Sadly I couldn't find a supplier of dead cats in Sauchiehall Street and was unable to prove a point to the receptionist.

Celtic Connections

We popped off to Glasgow for a much anticipated concert last week. The Blogs are great fans of Celtic music and Celtic Connections seemed destined to fit the bill.

The organisers had decided to invite an orchestra from North West Spain. (I can only surmise that Galicia was once part of Dal Riada). The orchestra brought a small choir with them who sang about seagulls. The song didn't have any words and seemed to be more of a group impersonation of seagulls fighting over a bag of chips on the seafront at Aberdeen.

Still the Galicians seemed to have a ball. One of them thanked us for the "worm welcome"

...and then thanked us for "our enery". Sadly they didn't specify which one. Still a good time had by all!

I love Dutch people!!!

In the Times today there is a report of a Dutchman being arrested in the Netherlands. He was on probation when he caused a disturbance at his ex-wife's house. When he arrived at the police station he pulled out of his pocket a "get out of jail free" card from a monopoly set. Apparently the officers had a laugh and locked him up.

What an end to the year...

Last night Mrs Blog was addressing me in conversation. She stumbled over the choice of calling me "Richard" or "Sweetheart". The result was...

"Retard"

Happy New Year!

Christmas is coming

On Friday (the 14th of December) I asked Mrs Blog if I should open the window on the advent calendar. We had agreed previously that I should open the even numbers.

"No need. I opened it," she replied.

"But it's the 14th - an even number and that should mean I open it."

"Well, you missed out yesterday."

"What?"

Sometimes life in the Bloghouse is a real struggle.

Swimming like a pro...

Recently, on the advice of my doctor, I went back to swimming. Having swum before I was aware of the unpleasantness of chlorinated water getting up my nose, in my eyes and in my ears. So I equipped myself with a Speedo nose clip, Speedo goggles and a cheap pair of ear plugs.

This afternoon I went in to the pool and swam 20 m ...like a pro! Having reached the other end of the pool, I took time to adjust my equipment and managed to shove the ear plug so far in to my right ear that it got wedged. I panicked and tried desperately, and without success, to un-wedge it.

It was so bad that I had to eat humble pie and ask the 12 year old pool attendant with the curly hair to help.

Humiliation doesn't describe it!

News!

As regulars know, I occasionally find something in The Times that needs sharing.

Yesterday they carried the story of a dog that sniffed out explosives in the army. (The dog saw active service in Afghanistan but is now retired). Our four-legged hero had been on the battlefield going ahead of the infantry, which makes his name as hazardous as the explosives he was looking for...

He was called..."Fire"

Is this Wembley?

Mr and Mrs Blog have just had one of those conversations...sitting in two different rooms...

"What time are you seeing the doctor on Wednesday?" she asked.

"Twenty past nine!" I bellowed back.

"It's alright I already have one."

"????"

(She thought I said "Do want some wine")

Don't get old!!!

Some senior moments are worse than others, far worse.

Last weekend I was getting out of a car in the dark and reached for my hat. So far so good. I put it on and then I reached for my gloves. Nothing, they were nowhere. I felt around with my hand, knowing that I had put them on the seat next to me. Nothing. Time to switch the light on! Nothing.

Then I took my hat off...and found my gloves had spent the last five minutes on my head!

 Why is life so difficult?

Online anomalies

I had an idle moment.

Ok...a very idle moment.

I found a video on You Tube entitled "How to fall asleep in two minutes".

It lasts 7 mins 24 seconds!

Back problems

As Mr Blog ages bits that used to work perfectly well suddenly stop doing so. Lately it has been the turn of my back.

The Osteopath suggested treating the problem with ice. So I did.

Having used up all the ice cubes in the tray this morning, I refilled it with water and popped it back in the freezer.

Two hours later the ice cube tray was empty.

Mrs Blog had found it and concluded that the only reason that there was water in the ice cube tray was because the freezer was broken. She diligently removed the ice cube tray, throwing away the contents and left absolutely everything else in the freezer (which she thought wasn't working).

Mission Impossible

Recently Mr and Mrs Blog were on holiday in Barcelona. Being fairly adventurous we tried out the local Metro system which uses a very similar gate-entry system to our very own London Underground.

Mrs Blog struggled a little with gate. First trying the ticket one way, then another, turned it over ...
and realised it was the keycard for room 318, Ibis Hotel.

A journey of discovery

Had a trip to Glasgow on the back roads through the countryside this week. I was trying to get there in good time for a meeting and learned the following,

• Thursday is slow lorries day
• When you overtake the slow lorries you haven't seen the last of them
• Some farmers don't keep their cattle in the fields but let them roam along the road
• I am useless at rounding up stray cattle
• Drivers of slow lorries are even worse at rounding up stray cattle
• The farmer who owns the stray cattle has a lie in on "Slow-Lorry-Thursday"
• After waking the farmer up I was behind the slow lorries again

Family visits

Recently I went to stay with the Yorkshire-blogs. It was one of those "expected visits", by which I mean they were expecting me. I knew this because we had emailed several times to that effect and I was reassured by the replies.

However, on arriving at "Chaos Towers", (home to Eschatology-sister-blog (ESB)), I discovered, unexpectedly, that I was not expected. ESB had decided to go off with Swiss-sister-blog for a day's shopping.

Bewildered-Tom-blog and nephew-Tom-blog were in the dark. Worse still, they decided after just thirty minutes in my company, that they would much rather drive 70 miles to go and watch Incredibles 2 at a distant cinema.

I found myself on my own dog-sitting for most of the evening debating with a Tibetan Terrier which of us was to blame!

Memory test

Mrs Blog and I enjoy the odd box set. We recently settled down to watch a couple of episodes of a police drama.

"Was it on Netflix or BBC IPlayer?"

"Don't remember."

"What was it called?"

"Don't remember."

We tried looking on both under the "continue watching" section. The program...

"Unforgotten."

Hard truths

In a meeting at work in Glasgow last week I was having a discussion about personal development with a financial adviser.

"They say you should stretch yourself by doing something that scares you every day," she said.

"I scare myself just by waking up!" I replied.

"...and looking in the mirror?" she added.

I waved a flag of surrender.

Measured responses

Mrs Blog has been suffering with her knees. More accurately it is just one of her knees that is causing a problem. Last Thursday she was showing me both knees and asking if I thought the left one was swollen compared to the right one.

"I'm not sure, have you tried measuring them?" I replied, rather helpfully.

"It's a bit difficult with the ruler," she said.

The value of punctuation

Earlier this week I was at Kinross Services (living the dream).

I spotted a sign on a faulty machine which read

"Out of order management"

...and thought "I could name a few of them!"

Siriously

Since I acquired an Iphone and found it can connect to my car dashboard my eyes have been opened. I can simply speak my commands to the posh English woman in the ether who then executes them...usually.

Yesterday I was showing Mrs Blog how it all worked. The phone was plugged in to the usb connection and we were ready.

"Siri, destination Crail,"I said.

"I cannot provide directions to Trail, Canada."

I tried again, adding Scotland after Crail.

"Searching for directions to Thailand."

"Siri, are you in a bad mood?"

"I am here to help you."


Back to map and compass or ...elocution lessons?

Drug mistakes

Yesterday I was in the kitchen where Mrs Blog keeps her laptop. It is a messy laptop. I noticed that her browser had a couple of open tabs and couldn't help spotting the title on one of them read,

"Rolling Your Joints"

It is hard enough to get Mrs Blog to take an aspirin so I was a little surprised at the idea of her developing a cannabis habit. However, it seems it was the title of a yoga video!

Good News

Yes, at last!!

Our windows no longer need a window cleaner on a daily basis...look!

Spotless!

"Love-lorn Larry" the Long-tailed Tit has either,

1. found a girlfriend! or,
2. got a pair of glasses

(If none of this make sense please check out earlier posts)

A hard week...

After a hard week at work, which included trips to Edinburgh. Inverness and Newcastle, I was looking forward to getting home to relax.

Little did I know!

Mrs Blog, for reasons of her own, decided to test me out by putting four of these....

In one of these...

If it is a while before the next post I hope you will understand!

Strange Veg

After a hard day driving to Carlisle and presenting on the world macro-economic situation i was a little distracted by the time I got home.

Mrs Blog was telling me about tea and I heard,

"...with twenty stone Broccoli."

Apparently I should have heard "Tender Stem Broccoli".

Mr Blog's Stiff Upper Lip

I have a stiff upper lip. To be honest I have always wanted one. Our predecessors had them and they helped them see of the Nazis in the second world war.

Sadly mine wont. It is not that sort of stiff upper lip.

Mine is the result of a mix up with Mrs Blog. She offered to pick up some shopping for me and on my list was gel. Instead of shaving gel I have now got a large tube of turbo-max-strength hair gel...and a stiff upper lip.

Long Tailed Tit

You might remember this fella. He was bashing his brains out on our windows two weeks ago. (See post "Bird Troubles". After two weeks of him not finding a mate he is still pelting our windows constantly, all day, every day! So please...

1. Does anyone have a spare female long tailed tit?
2. A solution to stop this guy needing a head injury assessment? and,
3. The name of a good window cleaner?

PS you can follow this inane drivel automatically be putting your email address in the box below

Coffee Art

I enjoy a good cup of coffee and in particular a flat white or a cortado, both of which come with coffee art. The quality of the art naturally varies according to the experience of the barista. I have seen some truly remarkable tulips and even a pumpkin over the years. Recently, however ever I was treated to a piece of art that left me speechless. It was produced by very experienced Costa-Mike-Blog and at first I thought it was the worst attempt at a tulip I had ever seen. Then he explained...

"It's a jellyfish"

Genius!

Daughter-blog rewrites the Bible

At the same dinner mentioned in the last post Daughter-blog disgraced herself and started a new religion in the same sentence. She was describing what would happen at the Easter Vigil mass that evening and said,

"There'll be a reading from the book of Gemini."

Wherein we discover that Judas was a Scorpio?



(Acknowledgement: Beth=blog)

Feeling very old

Last night I was at dinner in Edinburgh with the blog family and friends. Somehow we found ourselves talking about a pew we used to own and kept as an outdoor bench. I mentioned that in the early days of the Church, (meaning over a thousand years ago), there were no seats in Christian churches except for a handful for the infirm or the elderly.

That prompted a friend of daughter-blog, called "Lara-I-am-not-a-spy-blog" to ask,

"Do you remember those days?"

Happy Easter!

Communication problems

Last week I was in Aberdeen for a meeting with a prospective client. The client, who was from Fraserburgh, wanted to invest money for his grandchildren... or so I thought.

"Ah want to put the barbies in a trust!" he told me.

I looked blankly back.

"The micks! I want to put the micks and the barbies in a trust for the wains!" he told me again.

I carried on looking blank. Nothing in my extensive career in financial planning had prepared me for the investment of "micks and barbies" into anything.

Was this some racist slur against people from Ireland I wondered? Why could he not just give the dolls to his grandchildren without a trust? Why indeed did he have a collection of dolls in the first place? Why did he think I was an expert in dolls?

After several confusing minutes it was explained to me, by a translator, that micks and barbies were in fact money in Fraserburgh.

Bird troubles

For the last fortnight the blog-house has been under attack. Our attacker is a diminutive long-tailed tit. He has taken to headbutting the kitchen window for hours at a time all through the day. Our best efforts to dissuade him have met with no success.

Mystified by this behaviour I went on the interwebtube in search of answers. I have discovered that,

1. Long-tailed tits breed about this time in Scotland
2. The males like to chase off rivals with aggressive displays during the breeding season
3. Long tailed-tits are short-sighted

Conclusion: Our bird-brained buddy is seeing his reflection in the window and is spending all day trying to scare it off.

In case you have the same problem here is what they look like.

Another can't stop myself post

If you hated the last post then don't read this one.

Last night Mrs Blog was chatting with her friend Dibdob-blog. I overheard a snippet about someone who was brought up in a remote house halfway up a mountain. Said person came home from school one day to find that their father had removed the front door.

It was too good an opportunity to miss,

"Was he unhinged?" I asked.

Sometimes I can't stop myself...

I was talking to a financial adviser yesterday about the merits or otherwise of property investment. The adviser mentioned that he was pleased with a property he had bought which was a music studio.

Before I could stop myself I asked, "Was that a sound investment?"

A trip to Orkney

Here is what I learned on a business trip to Orkney...

• The views are rubbish in the dark
• There are no taxis at the airport
• There isn't much of an airport at the airport 
• You cannot get a taxi before 6.00 am
• The ferry leaves for Scrabster at 6.30 am
• To catch the ferry, leaving from Kirkwall, you need a taxi before 6.00 am
• Taxis are terrified of the barmaid in the Bothy bar
• When you get to Scrabster there are lots of policemen
• No-one is supposed to know why there are lots of policemen in Scrabster
• Everyone in Scrabster knows why there are lots of policemen there
• Wick is a small airport
• A two hour delay in wick airport feels like a two week delay

Bloody BA!

On a jaunt to London, BA decided to cancel my return flight due to adverse weather. 

They cancelled it more than 24 hours BEFORE the weather! I rang to remonstrate with them. 

They told me that the flight an hour before my cancelled flight was not cancelled! Nor was the one an hour after!

Either they have better forecasters than anyone else on the planet, with pinpoint accuracy of a one hour snow window or...they are hiding something. 

I have complained and will update when I get a reply, assuming it isn't held up by an icy blast or sent to Toronto by mistake.

Swimming

For fear of incurring the murderous wrath of Mrs blog, I nearly didn't write this one! (See previous post)

Mrs B went for a swim last week and on arriving at the pool, was unable to find her swimsuit. She went home to look for it. No joy. 

It turns out ... she was wearing it!!

Near death experience

Last Saturday Mrs blog pulled in to the local garage under the pretext of allowing me to buy a Costa coffee at the express machine. In order to get to the shop door I had to walk in front of the car. She took her chance and drove straight at me.

If I go silent again for an extended period with no blogs, tell the Rozzers!!!

Back smiling again

After BT's attempts to ruin my Christmas I am back smiling. The cause of the change in mood is down to a tweet of a text conversation as follows,

"I am here for you."

"Thanks that means a lot. I have been going through a tough time lately."

"Sorry, who is this?"

"Your Uber driver."

BT ruining my Christmas

One thing I hate about being over 50 is that big organisations seem to start picking on you and then treat you like an idiot when you complain. Regulars will be acquainted with previous bete noirs - Vodafone, Talk Talk, and so on. This time it is the turn of BT.

About 6 weeks ago I changed my TV/Broadband/Phone from Talk Talk to BT. Since then the TV has not worked...at all. Here is the saga so far,

1. I tried the online help instructions on their website...it cut off my broadband
2. I went on to the online chat...three agents cut me off after coming up with the same checks as the online help page (all of which assumes that any fault must be with the broadband even though the TV signal comes through the aerial and NOT the broadband
3. I emailed the CEO...he doesn't know anything about broadband or aerials
4. I eventually had a conversation with Dan (not the CEO)...who thought the problem was the broadband
5. When I asked Dan if I was correct in thinking the signal for the TV came through the aerial and not the broadband he agreed...and promised to send an engineer!!

Yippee I thought, action, success...

The engineer has just left telling me that "The problem is to do with the aerial and he cannot help because....he is a broadband engineer!"

AAAAARGH!!!! 

Brain challenges

I was speaking with a female colleague last week. In the conversation she mentioned that her brother had a health scare and had strongly urged her to be seen by a doctor for possible signs of problems with the brain.

She did. And after exhaustive tests she said she was told ..."There was nothing there"!

It took several minutes before she fathomed why I was lying on the floor laughing.

Rude Awakening

Last week I decided to impose myself on Son- and Daughter-Blog and make use of a bed in their flat in Edinburgh.

I bought Son-blog a pint in his local hostelry by way of a "thank you" for him giving his bed up and sleeping on the floor.

He returned the favour by setting his alarm for 5.00 a.m. with a five minute auto-snooze. Not satisfied with the rude awakening, he had managed to use his new IPhone 8 which, it seems is so high tech, he couldn't work out how to switch the snooze off! 15 snoozes later...

Following the signs

A little over a week ago the Blogs were on their way to Sussex and due to be met by Sussex-George-Nephew-Blog at Gatwick Airport.

There are of course two terminals at Gatwick, North and South. To be certain of avoiding any confusion we had emailed to say we would be landing at the North Terminal. After landing we rang S-G-N-B and said,

"North Terminal"

After what seemed like a couple of weeks waiting we rang again.

"I'm here in the car park" he claimed.

"There are two - which one?"

"The one with the blue pillars."

We looked around and saw pillars in the distance that looked blue. Then they went purple. It seems they were lit by LEDs.

Eventually after much conversation. S-G-N-B fessed up, he was at the South Terminal.

What makes it worse? We actually landed at South Terminal.

Teeth

Son-blog has been suffering from dry, chapped and rough teeth.

I know this because...

he's been brushing them with E45 Cream!

Blog Update

You may have been wondering what has been happening in Blog-world lately. If so read on...

1. Son-blog has been guilty of false-imprisonment
2. Mr Blog has been aging badly
3. A new addition has been made to the wider Blog-clan
4. Microsoft have taken away my paint program and given me Paint 3D

Son-blog managed to be so unaware of the house-guest in his flat, (which he shares with sister-blog), that he locked Beth-blog (friend of sister-blog) inside it. Beth-blog missed her train home to Wales and will probably never come back.

Earlier in the week I was in the gym. Plagued as I am by muscle knots, I take a tennis ball with me which I lie on to release the knots. A gentleman in his early eighties was watching me. Eventually he stopped his 350 kg dead-lifts and wandered over.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

I know he was concerned but being asked by a man of advancing years if you are alright that makes you feel thirty years older than you are.

The Sussex-blogs have taken delivery of a new blog...little Oscar currently 5lbs. On checking with Google I discovered that Oscar-blog weighs exactly the same as,

• A Chihuahua
• A Small bag  
• A Table lamp
• A Cooking pot
• And I kid you not...5lbs of sugar or flour

As for Paint 3D, let me know what you think!

Just did something really good...!

Lunch was a pretty dull round of bread and cheese just now. Looked for the cookies and jaffa cakes and realised that the chicken and I ate the last ones yesterday.  Rooting around in a cupboard in found chocolate cornflake cakes which were damn close to their sell-by date of 226 July so I took one for the team and started to eat them. :-)

Customer service training need...

Yesterday, being a largely un-kept bank holiday Monday here in Scotland, found me on the phone to APC, a courier company, trying to arrange for the delivery of a package. (APC said they had tried to deliver it on Friday - if they did they must have gone to the wrong address).

The conversation I had with them went like this...

Me "Hi I'd like to arrange the redelivery of a package."

Spanish sounding man "Hood morning, aff you got dee consignment number?"

I read out what I supposed to be the correct number which was on the email they sent in the subjct line.

"No, no. Dat's not eet. Is a seven digit number."

I looked in an earlier email and found one.

"Five zeros five two."

Spanish sounding man, "No, is must be seven digits."

Me (losing the plot and regaining it), "That was seven....never mind. How about 0,0,0,0,0,5,2."

"Ah yes, dats eet. When would you like delivery?"

"This afternoon between 4 and 6 please."

Spanish chap, "I weel ask the manager."

"Thanks"

Piped music and three minutes later,

"We can't deliver it then."

"Why?"

"We're closed."

Sat Nav 2

Hot on the heels of Bossy Miss Google Maps in the last post....

I thought I had cracked how to use the Sat Nav function on my tablet. I was wrong.

Last Sunday I had to get to Anstruther, a small fishing town, for a sea-kayaking trip. Having never been there I thought I would use the tablet to help. The bossy voice began pretty well, telling me when and where to turn.

With fifteen minutes to go before I expected to be in Anstruther she told me to turn right into Kirk Brae and that I had arrived at my destination. I hadn't. I was in a small village called Ceres 15 miles from the sea.

I checked and found that the bossy voice had added an "interim destination"! Having carefully checked I tried again to get to Anstruther. This is what followed...

• I was taken to St Andrews (the wrong direction)
• I was told to turn left on to a road which was called Lamont Drive but was actually called Bridge Street
• It told me to turn right three times on to roads that were clearly in totally the wrong direction (by now I could see the sea)
• It told me that Anstruther, my destination, was a caravan park two miles south of St Andrews
• I argued with the voice
• The voice didn't listen
• I lost my temper with the voice
• I swore repeatedly at the voice which it ignored
• I made it to Anstruther 

Sat Nav 1

 A couple of weeks ago Mrs Blog and I were trying to get to Dalkeith. Knowing the name of  the street I needed to get to but not knowing the town that well I asked Mrs Blog to open up my tablet and check Google Maps. (A reasonable request in my view).

Mrs Blog decided to experiment with different colours, views and scales of the maps without actually intending to. After some unheated and blame-free exchanges between us, Mrs Blog finally got the map up and typed in the destination.

"I'll get the voice thing up as well," she said.

The voice thing turns Google Maps into a superior but tinny sounding woman who bosses you about when you drive.

"At the next roundabout take the last exit and go back the way you have come," she said.

Being in sight of a sign that said "Dalkeith" straight ahead I decided to challenge Mrs Blog on which destination she had typed in. After another calm exchange we decided that sense of smell was probably better than Google Maps.

We managed to find the place we were going to with little bother ten minutes later. Parked up, I checked Google Maps and found that Mrs Blog had tried to take us to Larkhall - a mere three hour drive in the wrong direction.

EE and Orange .....Aaaargh!!!!

I noticed that Orange (Now part of EE) have been billing me some high costs for Mrs Blog's phone. I tried to access my online account to find out why. Since I last logged on they have changed the system and now need me to enter my account number. They helpfully tell me on the site that this is located on my last bill. Since I went paperless three years ago that is not much use. I waited for the chat help box and duly asked for my account number.

I was given a 9 digit number to go in to an 8 digit space. The chat guy cheerfully confirmed it was the correct number.

I tried later with another chat operative. I got the correct 8 digit number and accessed my account. It had all the statements up until Jan 2016 and nothing beyond.

In desperation I phoned the dedicated EE Orange helpline. The auto-voice-menu asked me twice for my phone number and after the usual (your is important) delays spoke to a young lad. He told my bill was £24 less than I knew it to be so I queried if there were any other Orange accounts in my name. He checked and said "no"! I didn't believe him (I am a cynic after too many years with Vodafone). I demanded he check again and he confirmed again there were none.

"I want to make a formal complaint. You are taking more money out of my account than you believe you should be."

"Hang on I need to check with someone."

"With whom and why?!"

"I need to talk to someone who has access to a system that I don't have."

"What is that system?"

"The Orange system."

"Eh? ??You're telling me that you don't have access to the Orange system, so which system have you been checking?"

"The EE one it's the only one I have."

I'm going to Sainsburys to buy alcohol.....!!!

Major breaking world news

Given all the headlines about world leaders today it is reassuring to see that the London Times has kept a sense of proportion. It carried the following headline today,

"Breaking news about flatulent animals..."

The key facts on the subject are,

1. Tapirs are very noisy
2. Orangutans do so without shame
3. Snow leopards muffle the sound with their floofy (sic) bottoms
4. The copperhead snake squeaks and you are likely to miss it until the smell gets to you
5. Hedgehogs' smell worse when they have eaten cat food

...just in case you missed it! :-) 

Blog Xmas

The blog household was added to this Christmas with the welcome figure of Sussex-granny-blog.

Whilst with us she showed a real concern for incoming email and message alerts...

"I heard a beep. I'll just check my phone to see if I have had a message," she said.

"Nope, not mine. Perhaps it was yours?" she said to son-blog.

It wasn't and nor was it mine, Mrs blog's or daughter-blog's.

After a few minutes of quiet contemplation we heard...

"Ah! It's the battery-alert in my hearing aid!"

Bad Day at the Gym

For some people a bad visit to the gym is one which results in muscle stiffness the next day. For others it is missing out on a personal best on the barbell. For me ....

...it was going there with my sports shorts inside out :-( 

The shame is even worse than the twice weekly trip to the bottle bank!

Heading for divorce 2

A while ago now I posted the first divorce warning in what became known as "Tubegate".

It has been added to by Mrs Blog's behaviour over the last 24 hours. Clearly no content with squeezing the toothpaste tube the wrong way she went further, much further,

I should explain that I am a fan of the Times crossword puzzle. In particular I enjoy the "Jumbo Cryptic Crossword" which appears every Saturday. It is a treat in my life to find a couple of hours of peace and quiet in which to solve the two or three clues that I can actually work out among the seventy odd that appear. Every Saturday I download my digital copy of the Times and go straight to the "Mind Games" section, I click on "email these puzzles" and send them to my laptop for printing. The "Jumbo" fits neatly on one side of a piece of A4 paper.

For years now I have carefully preserved the piece of paper....full size... by my armchair in the lounge. That was until today!!!!

Mrs Bloody Blog got it in her head to fold my crossword in half!! Not even neatly!!!!

Monday may see me at the solicitors.

Mathematics and tips

At a local hotel today I overheard the following conversation while waiting to order a coffee.

"Great that's £2.00 please for the coffee."

"I have a discount card."

"That's 15% off then."

"Can you take it as a tip? You know, take the 15% off for the discount but add it back as tip for yourself?"

"Yeah, no problem. That's £2.30 please!"

Oooops!

Toothpaste tribulations

As regular readers will know, I have been a victim of failing eyesight recently. Whilst bargain hunting in Sainsburys I found an offer for half price Sensodyne toothpaste at £2 and grabbed it. The packaging was unusual, not the usual tube but I thought nothing of it. On closer inspection at home I had bought the "Kids Sensodyne, gentle toothpaste". Hardly worth a mention except...

...last night I went to brush my teeth with the stuff...

...and made the mistake of grabbing the wrong thing...

...I washed my teeth in Dove hand cream and can still taste it this morning!

More from a busy week....

Yesterday (when not dealing with black bricks) I went Edinburgh. On the journey I noticed my washer bottle was in need of replenishing.

At the first opportunity I went into a garage and paid a fiver for a large container of screen wash.

"Where is the water tap?" I asked.

"We don't have one."

I tried another garage a few miles further on. They had no tap either. Suspecting a new post-brexit water tap shortage I formulated a new plan. Into Morrisons and out again toting a huge great bottle of water.

Back at the car I decided to read the instructions to make sure I had the concentration level correct for the - 5 C temperature and read the following,

"Ready to use, no need to dilute." 

Black Brick

Last night at 2.00 a.m. I woke up with a feeling in the pit of my stomach...I had forgotten something. What I had forgotten was now a black brick, a smoking black brick. It wasn't meant to be, it was meant to be a loaf of bread. As I have found out before, when a loaf of bread is overbaked by 5 hours 30 mins it will turn into a black brick.

How did this happen? I was distracted by a programme on television when I had just popped the would-be loaf in the Aga. As a result I completely forgot about it until....

What was the programme that had me so engrossed?

Masterchef.

Chicken Feed

The last post I put up referred to "chicken feed". This may or may not mean something or anything to readers depending on their chicken experiences. For the sake of clarity here is what constitutes chicken feed for the Blogs' chicken...

• Layers pellets
• Corn mix
• Bread
• Rice
• Various fruits
• Jaffa cakes
• Bourbon biscuits
• Abernethy biscuits
• Chocolate chip cookies
• Fairy cakes
• Butterfly cakes

We have a chicken fast heading towards type 2 diabetes running around the garden like a crack addict.

Hissy fit

Am I the only one in this world who is picked on by inanimate objects?

I wouldn't be posting this but in a moment of weakness I promised Mrs Blog that I would. She spotted that the garage was in a little bit of disarray last week. Wondering what could have caused this, she asked me if I knew anything about it.

"Yes," said I, "I was in the garage a couple of days ago trying to get to the leaf blower."

It was leaning on a wall, in front of which, was the garden furniture (safely tucked away after summer). On one of the garden chairs was a heavy sack of chicken feed. Two other garden chairs were expertly balanced one on top of the other. In front of this Tracey Emin-esque work of art was a rake and a box full of black, garden rubbish bags ready to be re-used from last year.

I pulled out one of the garden bags, knowing it would be needed when I started using the leaf blower. Out came three, one of which was full of soggy rotten leaves that managed to fly all over me. I gave up and tackled the furniture picking up the bag of chicken feed. It had a hole in one corner, a bloody big hole, out of which poured a couple of kilos of the stuff. I set it down and went to move the chairs. One of them decided to fall on top of me without warning.

I took my revenge by kicking it and hurting my toe.

Election marketing

If like me, you have had an inbox full of updates about the impact of the Trump election result, you might like this...

Ryanair sent an email advertising a stack of deals, one of which was....

"Comb over to Europe"

Masterchef Audition

Yesterday I went about making an omelette for breakfast as usual. A diagram below of the omelette in question is attached since it will help with the explanation of what happened next.

You can see that I have marked the different parts of the omelette with numbers. This is because the pan was a bit unhelpful and stuck to the omelette in these four places. I tried to loosen the concotion with a spatula but was only partly successful. I realised I had only option - to toss the damn thing.

I did. It didn't work.

Piece 1 ended up in the sink.
Piece 2 wrapped itself around the handle
Piece 3 stayed in the pan
Piece 4 flipped up, hit me and landed on the floor

What did I learn?

• Buy a non-stick pan
• Egg is damned difficult to get off a pan handle
• Mrs Blog thinks I'm "sweet"

Plea for forgiveness

I want to make an apology and appeal for forgiveness.

Yesterday I went to the jet car wash up the road. I loaded the machine with pound coins and set about cleaning off the yew berries and muck that made my car look like a black forest gateau.

After five minutes of concentration I noticed something move out of the corner of my eye. I turned to look at it and it stopped.

"It" was a very large vole.

The reason I need forgiveness is that I inexplicably, with no forethought and no malice intended, pointed the jet wash straight at it.

The result was a very fast moving, very wet, very large vole.

In honour of the poor creature I captured the image below,

Mr Magoo

Yesterday I went to see the optician. I felt my sight was improving for reading but worsening for distance vision.

The optician carried out a series of tests and then agreed with my diagnosis adding that my eyes were "interesting". Today she was proven to be correct.

I made use of a public convenience this morning in the charming small town of Biggar. Having washed my hands I held them under the dryer. Nothing. I wondered if electrical supply might be intermittent, Biggar is a long way from any metropolis. But no the lights were working perfectly. I examined the dryer more closely and discovered it dispensed paper towels.

Should have gone to Specsavers!

Thoughtful Gifts

Last week a team leader (TL) left the project I was working on. It was decided that, because he wasn't a complete plank, that we should have a whip round. With a tidy sum in his paw the organiser went off to buy a present.

It will help to know what the team leader looked like so...

On the final day we huddled around to surprise out TL. And he was suprised ...by the upmarket, gentleman's shaving set!

Pub quiz

Last Thursday I was in a pub in Leeds minding my own business when they started their pub quiz.

A young couple were sat at the table next to me and paid their pound each to take part. First question:

"When is Burns night celebrated?"

They thought about it and thought about it until one of them said,

"I've got it!"

"When is it?"

"November the 5th!"

Ho hum.

Wonders of the wine bar

It has been too long since my last blog. Thankfully Yates' Wine Bar in Leeds came to my rescue last week.

In search of a glass of wine (or two) myself and a colleague popped in to their establishment, and after checking the prices, decided to order a bottle of red. The young barman (pictured below) was wearing what could only be described as fashion-statement oversized glasses.

He wandered off and then wandered back before wandering off again. He repeated this process several times and appeared to be patrolling the length of the bar. No-one else was waiting to be served so we knew we had his undivided attention. After several minutes he came back and said,

"Do you know where they keep corkscrews in wine bars?"

It seems it was his first day. We suggested that behind the bar was probably his best bet and off he went again. Several minutes later we called him back and asked if we could have a glass of wine while we were waiting for the corkscrew to be found.

"Have it on the house," he said. We warmed to him at this point.

He turned around grabbed an open bottle and a measure and... found three corkscrews at the same time. We got our free glass while he opened our bottle. As he pulled the cork from the bottle I said,

"You should have gone to Specsavers!"

He replied,  "I did"

Parking problems

Over the years I have, I freely admit, transgressed parking bye-laws. I have been done for parking on single yellow lines, out-staying my welcome, parking across the white lines of a parking bay and even for having a flat tyre which seemed to upset  Edinburgh Council's finest traffic brains. My accumulated knowledge of parking misdemeanours means I am pretty clued up on the subject ... or so I thought.

I parked in Leeds a couple of weeks ago. Having booked online and paid for the full day I was confident that my car was violation-free. It came as a surprise, when at 5.15, I returned to find a ticket stuck on the window. Eager to see what I had done wrong I ripped open the envelope. The wording was...

"The driver was seen walking away from the car park, leaving his car on the premises."

Call me old-fashioned but I thought that was the whole bloody point of a car park!!

Seemingly, having paid for the day's parking I should have sat in the car from 8.00 till 5.00!!

Important information update

I work from home. Sometimes this can beneficial, I choose my hours, fit work around other things in my life and so on. At other times it can be quite challenging. If a courier turns up and knocks on the door and rings the bell in the middle of a conference call, it can be awkward. Occasionally Mrs Blog bursts in to my office to tell me the latest bit of news, as she did this morning.

"I can't speak, I am on the phone!" I hissed muting the microphone with my chest.

"Oops. sorry!" said Mrs Blog.

Ten minutes later I finished the call and went looking for Mrs Blog to find out what was so important and so urgent that she needed to interrupt my work.

"I wanted to tell you that I've moved the potatoes," she said.

Lobstergate

For many years now Mrs Blog has wanted to try lobster to see what all the fuss is about. As neither one of us knows the first thing about preparing, cooking or smashing apart a lobster, her wish has remained unfulfilled ... until now.

Last weekend she discovered a pre-prepared lobster that you simply pop into a pot of boiling water for five minutes and bob's your uncle!

We decided that Valentine's day was the day to enjoy this little treat. As dinner-time approached, the anticipation reached fever pitch. Mrs Blog took off the wrapping and things went downhill, it smelled really fishy. Fearing a bout of shellfish-induced, food poisoning we proceeded cautiously.

Having boiled it thoroughly we set about trying to get at it. I attacked the claws with a nutcracker and soon there was nothing left of them that looked remotely edible.

Mrs Blog tried to pull off the inedible bits and then delegated the job to me. I went for it with all a bloke can muster and pulled all sorts of bits with gusto. Soon we were left with a bit of shell and a suspicious looking lump of lobster meat. After a health and safety meeting we decided it too was inedible.

After all the anticipation, preparation and effort, all that was left to eat was the wedge of lemon we were going to squeeze over it!

I'm a fire-starter

Night before last I was busy in the kitchen making a sweet chilli dipping sauce. Somehow I spilled a big load of sugar on the hotplate of the Aga. No problem - I simply mopped it up with a piece of kitchen towel.

This led to a series of important discoveries,

1. Spilling sugar on an Aga creates a nasty smell
2. My curry did not mask the smell of the burning sugar
3. You cannot concentrate on cooking when there is smoke billowing in the kitchen
4. Despite there being no naked flames on the Aga hotplate it can still cause a kitchen towel to spontaneously combust
5. A plastic recycling bag isn't best place to put a piece of paper that is going to burst into flames

Hunger games and hairstyles

A week or so ago Daughter-blog was staying with us. One morning she wandered into the dining room with her hair tied up in massive curlers. A little like this...

Having recently seen the last film in the Hunger Games series I mentioned that she looked a bit like Effie Trinket. (For non-Hunger Games fans see below)

She was not totally bowled over by the comment. A short while later she said she was going back up stairs to finish her hair.

Son-blog offered the following support, "May the odds be ever in your favour!"

Blog Christmas

Christmas in the Blog-house was peppered with mis-speaking. Here are some samples...

"We can have Christmas rolls on sausage eve." (Mrs Blog)

"Oh, lovely! Spam hand lotion!" (Grandma-snoop-blog referring to a spa hand lotion)

"There's an Agatha Crispie on tonight." (Mrs Blog)

So we are looking forward to a nappy-new-hear....

Five a day?

Mrs Blog has been on a mission for sometime to make sure I get my five-a-day of fruit and veg. She is deaf to my pleas that bread, cheese and chocolate, (being non-meat) should count towards the five a day total.

Last week she served up broccoli,which I can just about cope with, but had a surplus of it after serving. Not the food recycling bin for us, we have chickens! Mrs Blog was convinced that chickens like to get their five-a-day and so she scattered the left over broccoli on the grass for them.

A week later and the scattered broccoli is still there. Not only do chickens not like it, nor do any other animals that roam the blog garden. Foxes, squirrels, rabbits, (to say nothing of birds that have no issues eating the less pleasant parts of roadkill), all turning their noses up.

I'd like to think this evidence would be enough to let me off this element of my "five a day" plan but I suspect Mrs Blog will have other ideas.

When tea and bread taste funny

This morning I had two slices of bread (a homemade loaf of which I was particularly proud) liberally spread with butter. Instead of the yummy flavour of bread and butter, all I could taste was flavours that hinted of the dishwasher.

My first thought was that I had mixed the flour etc in a bowl which had not been washed properly.

Then I sipped my tea and it too tasted of the same foulness.

Perhaps the dishwasher is faulty I thought. Or perhaps I was coming down with a cold and it was affecting my sense of taste?

Readers will be pleased to know that Mr Bog doesn't have to fork out for a new dishwasher or prepare for a bout of man-flu. Mrs Blog had bought a new type of butter which had found its way into the butter dish (I couldn't read the label properly without my glasses) - garlic butter!

If I had warned her in time we would not have had garlic omelette, garlic mushrooms and garlic bacon for breakfast.

Nearly lost the wife...

Mrs Blog works at a local emporium from which she likes to be collected after work by yours truly.

Yesterday evening I duly set off to pick her up outside the shop and waited patiently for her to appear.

After a few minutes I saw her cross the road and head towards our car.

She grabbed the door handle and pulled open the door saying,

"Hello Darling. How was your day?"

I didn't hear her say these words though. Is Mr Blog going deaf in his dotage? I hear you ask. No, I am not. Mrs Blog was trying to get in the wrong car and make off with a complete stranger!

Cheese humour

Met daughter-blog earlier this week and picked up some cheese jokes that are crying out for a wider audience.

I was in sainsburys and went past the cheese counter. The guy there threw a lump of cheddar at me. I thought "That's not very mature!"

Just after that a ball of cheese exploded. There was de-brie everywhere.

A piece of cheese looked in the mirror and said "Hallo, me"!!

Communication problems

Mrs Blog was out shopping today. Not any old shopping though, this was Christmas shopping.

"Would you like to see what I have bought?" asked Mrs Blog when she returned.

"OK" said I, (I know the right answer in these situations).

"Right, but you musn't look!"

Is it me????

Scientific discoveries

You may have seen on the web(and possibly in real life) that if you take a large bottle of coke and shake it up, then take the top off, it will behave like a missile. Brown froth gushes out of the opening and the bottle goes haphazardly in the opposite direction.

Today I discovered, quite by chance, that there is an alternative method. I happened upon it when I left my cold cup of coffee in the microwave to heat up for a little too long. By adding a teaspoon of sugar to the scalding hot coffee, you get a brown gushy fluid all over the kitchen floor. It seemed not to have the strength to move the coffee cup, which is mildly disappointing.

Sadly this experiment leaves you with absolutely none of the coffee in the cup afterwards.

Heading for divorce

That's it! The line has been crossed. After nearly 27 years Mr and Mrs Blog are heading for separation. The reason is "unreasonable behaviour" by Mrs Blog.

Mrs Blog had sore teeth. I identified that this was probably curable by using a special toothpaste which I have been using for over five years.

"Why not try my sensitive toothpaste?" I suggested (foolishly as it turned out).

That night after Mrs Blog was in bed asleep I went to brush my teeth and found this...

Yes. Mrs Blog mauled my tube, going for the strangulation method of squeezing out the paste rather than the civilised "end-squeeze"!!

It's all over!

Struggling to be funny

As regulars know I like to find humour where I can. Today, Mrs Blog,texted me to say,

"Can you pick up 6 aaa batteries and 12 aa batteries?"

I saw an opportunity and replied,

"So, you want 42 a's then?"

Quick as a flash,

"No. 6 aaa and 12 aa batteries!!"

Missing Persons

Earlier this week I was at the gym, or more correctly the changing room having just been to the gym. I have provided a detailed diagram so you will know exactly where I was.

The changing room is at 3, the gym at 2 and the swimming pool is at 1. (I haven't drawn the swimming pool because I ran out of space)Wh.

While I was getting dressed one of the attendants popped his head round the door and asked me if two men had just walked in. As they hadn't I replied "no". 

It seems that two guys walked from the swimming pool (2) and never made it to the gym (1) and as they were not where I was (3) and there was no other unlocked door they could have gone through, they have been deemed missing.

I have, rather helpfully, provided a "fotofit" picture based on the descriptions I was given.

Strange things

Been a weird few days in the Blog household.

Mrs Blog wondered if Stuart Lancaster played for Australia. Then she observed that the insoles she bought were more comfortable when she put the left one in her left shoe and....

Tonight she complained that I was spoiling things after she asked me to stuff a pumpkin into a pair of fish net tights. (Don't ask!!!)

Day of failures

Today was a particularly bad day in the blog household.

Mrs Blog had a filling.

Mr Blog went to the gym and ran on the treadmill for several minutes before realising that his shorts were inside out. (The flapping pockets and waist tapes should have been a warning).

Finally on a Skype call with son-blog (currently studying at St Andrews University, a leading educational establishment), he asked if Swansea was in Yorkshire! What is he studying? Geography!!

Mistaken Identity

Today I received an email from Pinterest - the app that lets you post pictures.

It told me that I had a "twin". Apparently when someone else "pins" several pictures which you have "pinned" they match you up. The email told me to click on the button to find out whom they had unearthed. "Son-blog, daughter-blog or Mrs Blog" I thought. But no!

My twin is a leather bag shop!

Poo problems

Just been out to bring in the washing before it rains. (Living in Scotland, bringing in the washing can keep you pretty fit so I am hopeful for a gold letterbox before long).

As regulars will know I had a gannet-poo problem a week or two ago. Today it was the turn of a garden bird. I cannot say what type of bird but, based on the evidence it wasn't a crow or probably a pigeon. My money is on the sparrow which has been displaying attitude all summer (after all we know they take out Robins with archery sets).

In a moment of irony it had chosen to poo only on my pants making it essential that I tell Mrs Blog asap before she draws her own conclusions!

Gathlick

Dropped son-blog off at St Andrews yesterday and went for a coffee. On the way we met a lady who took a shine to his beard. She was in her fifties/sixties/seventies, (I think), and was wearing a vest -type top showing off her chest tattoos.

She told us, through the impediment of only having two teeth, that there had been a "Gathlick".

I apologised for not understanding. She repeated that there had been a "Gathlick". Could she have meant Catholic, I wondered?

Seemingly not, the Gathlick was at the leisure centre.

After more attempts than was decent we worked out it was a gas leak!

Life!!!

I haven't blogged for a while and I cannot work out if there has been too little going on in my life or too much (so much so that I haven't had time to write the blog).

Here is a summary of what you have missed...

Mrs Blog "We are going to have burgers with pozzarella". (No typo!)

Daughter Blog "Dad your aftershave smells nice!" (I wasn't wearing any. It was my hair wax she was smelling).

Daughter Blog "My favourite TV quiz was Masterchair".

Chickens eat pretzels

Gannet poo smells of fish

Gannet poo smells so strong you can smell it up-wind 500 metres away

Gannets poo on sea kayaks.

Misnamed vehicles

Just back from a tortuous drive along a single carriageway road in the Highlands. I am left with a question,
"Why do makers of campervans call them "Swift"????"

Vodafone go for world record

Yet again Vodafone have qualified for a blog. This time it was a different conversation but teh same Vodafone logic...

"My phone is getting no signal"

(after checking)

"The mast is being repaired and will take six days to fix." (repeated three times in a Dutch accent despite it not being a recording but a real person).

"I would like to access my messages please by dialing my mobile number from a landline But I cannot remember the PIN."

"No problem. We can send you a new PIN."

"Great! Do you want my email address?"

"No for security we can only send it to you as a text."

"A text? What to the mobile number that isn't working cos you're fixing the mast?"

"Yes"

Rude awakening

In my life many things have cause me to be woken in the night including,

• Polish workers arguing in the street on Tuesday this week at 4.00 a.m.
• Fire alarms in hotels (three times)
• Trains braking suddenly (Caledonian Sleeper)

But I had never thought to be woken as I was last night at 1.30 a.m. by a sound of a wall being slapped. Not once but again and again! Through the blear I discerned Mrs Blog was repeatedly slapping the walls with her hands. 

Mystified, I asked the obvious question, to which she replied, 

"I'm scaring the mice away"!

Lost glasses and lost chicken

Last week started badly. Mrs BLog went out at about 10.00 to ensure that Custard and Mustard (our chickens) were safely asleep in their coop. They weren't. That is, Mustard was and Custard wasn't. The Blog family were turfed out into the cold night air to look for Custard who did not want to be found. Son-blog went to search the park nearby, daughter-blog went up and down the A72 calling. I went for the prickly bushes.

After a few heart-stopping moments I found Custard hiding in a bush below the kitchen window.Clearly unaware of the trouble she had caused nor how close she wato being part of a recipe for Korma.

The following day I could not find my glasses. Regulars will know that this has happened before and they have always turned up eventually. Once in a snowdrift and once in the lawnmower blades.

They duly turned up later in the week when daughter blog found Custard back in the bush trying to hatch them.

She misspoke

Mrs Blog was commenting on the environment over dinner. She said she was keen to minimise her Carbon-Fibre. ????

Borders Life

This week is a big festival week in our home town in Scotland. That means that there is a fair bit of drinking most nights this week.

Hats off to the members of a local organisation of gentlemen who kicked the week off with their dinner on Monday night. A bunch of gents, well dressed and with perfect manners who set the bar for this year's festival. One of their number went back to the hotel where the dinner was held the next morning and asked,

"Did I leave my shoes here last night?"

Great marketing

It has been a bit quiet on the blogging front lately! To end this drought I thought I would share one of the best bits of marketing in the world of Outdoor Camping stores. An enterprising firm published a poster with the following Shakespeare-inspired legend...

"Now is the winter of our discount tents"!

Animal kindness

The other day in the Blog-shire Mustard the chicken was a bit off colour. She had hidden in the coop all day and I wondered if she was broody and needed to be yanked out of it. When I opened the rear door to the coop she made purring sounds. I deduced she was either unwell or had a career ahead as an animal impersonator.

Overcome with a fit of animal-oriented compassion I stroked the poor bird. She stopped purring and starting cooing instead. Encouraged by the thought that she was responding to the affection I stroked her some more. She reacted by dropping an egg out of her rear end!

Am Dram

Mr Blog has become a thespian.

He is appearing in "Shakespeare at Traquair" in Hamlet. One of the cast who plays the ghost had a spot of bother with his costume on the opening night. It appears the arms on his jacket were sewn on back to front!

If you know any tragedian actors with backward facing arms please let me know!!

Age related memory loss

Went to visit eschatology-sister-blog yesterday. She isn't getting any younger and faces the same memory problems we all suffer in mid-life. She had completely forgotten that I was coming so I thought I would honour the occasion with a drawing of her mind...

And now for Sony

As mentioned in the last post Mrs Blog has a phone problem.

Sony Xperia have a website and I was directed to it to log my phone for a repair service. Sadly the website would not let me book a repair. It gave the message "Service unavailable for your device". I wrote back to the person who had emailed and someone else wrote back saying to give them a call.

I did!

Here it goes....

"Have you tried to use our website?"

"Yes it didn't work so I was told to call you."

"No problem. I will get the repair booked in for you." Many minutes later and listening to music while on hold.

"I don't seem to be able to book your phone for repair on our website."

"What can I do?"

"We will send you an email in the next day or so telling what to do."

"But my phone is under warranty. Can't you just get it repaired?"

"No, our website doesn't seem to be working. If you need any more help after this call you can visit our website."

"The one that isn't working?" (Started to giggle).

"If you need any more hlep please visit our website for support."

"The website that doesn't work for you or me?" (giggling quite a bit at this point).

"For any further help pase visit our website. Would you like to complete our telephone customer satisfaction survey after this call?"

"Oh yes please!!" (laughing now)

One can only assume that Orange/EE and Sony are sharing their valuable insights into how to deal with customers

NB: On the survey you are asked how many times you have contacted Sony Xperia to resolve the problem - I discovered that you cannot answer "5" as it only allows once, twice or more than three times!

Orange challenge Vodafone

I have had a rant or two at Vodafone over the years but Orange (now EE) are trying very hard to outdo them for sheer idiocy.

Mrs Blog's phone has developed a fault. I rang Orange and they started off by asking if I wanted to buy "Back-dated" insurance to cover this. As the phone is under warranty till January 2016 that seemed unnecessary.

After ages talking to people at Orange on their "help-line" I was referred to the phone manufacturer Sony (More on them in the next post). Apparently I had to send my phone back to Sony for repair and in the 10-14 days it was gone I would have to buy Mrs Blog a new Orange handset.

Not happy, but faced with no alternative, I set off to the Orange/EE store in Galashiels. The girl there told me she needed to know the SIM card size before she could help me select a suitable handset. As the phone was with Mrs Blog I was unable to comply.

"Never mind," she said. "Try Carphone Warehouse up the street, they know loads about Orange phones and they guarantee to give you the right handset."

Looking like a wally

Last Friday I headed up to Glencoe for a weekend of hill walking. Being in Scotland and given that we are nearly into summer I knew that the weather would be near freezing with real possibilities of snow, hail and sleet.

Half way there I realised I had left my fleece-lined Berghaus jacket at home. Not wanting to miss out on the walking with my chums I needed a solution. The good old Green Welly Stop stocks most items of outdoor kit so I dived in there. On offer was a range of £140 waterproof jackets and a £2.50 plastic poncho.

I learned that the poncho tends to flap about your face in strong winds and does next to nothing to keep  you dry in the process!

And I looked like a total wally!