Time To Spare
Posted: Wed 13 June, 2018 Filed under: 1BEM, Car Repairs, Customer Services, Cynicism, Domestic, Getting Organised, Time Leave a comment »I’ve written before about my tendency to be horrifically early for things – I like having time to spare, and I’m happy with being where I’m supposed to be, with a book, phone etc., and can happily while away the time.
It also, on occasion, gives me time to sort things out when I’ve sodded them up – which was the case on Sunday.
The car’s air-conditioning has been noticeably weaker this summer, so I’d decided to have it re-gassed, and see if that made a difference. I booked an appointment with Kwik-Fit to get it done on Sunday morning, and turned up (early) to where I thought I had it booked in.
Only… it wasn’t booked in there. Knackers. I couldn’t find the confirmation email (still no idea what happened to that) so ended up having to call their main customer centre to try and find out. Turned out – either through my own stupidity, or some kind of system glitch – that it was actually booked on the other side of town from where I was. Knackers again.
But because I’d been horrendously early, it meant I still had the time to get across to the correct place in time for my appointment – and even had time to spare!
It all worked out fine in the end – but if I’d been punctual for the first one, I’d have been utterly kippered for getting to the proper place on time!
A Different Value of New
Posted: Wed 28 March, 2018 Filed under: 1BEM, Advertising, Cynicism, Sweary, Television, Thoughts Leave a comment »Out of interest, how the hell do the BBC get to promote a show as “Brand New!” when it’s been exhumed from the 80s and 90s (and potentially the 2000s, too)
Yes, I’m referring to the “Brand New… Generation Game“.
What. The. Absolute. Fuck?
Darwin Strikes Again
Posted: Thu 15 March, 2018 Filed under: 1BEM, Cynicism, People, Stupidity, Thoughts Leave a comment »I can’t deny, there’s a certain part of me that is quite happy with Darwinism, and the way idiots seem to find new and exciting ways to take themselves out of the genepool. (And before anyone asks, I’ve been reading the Darwin Awards for years!)
Today’s news carried the story of an American couple where one was killed “as a YouTube prank” because he believed that a thick book would stop a bullet. So he put said book over his chest, and got his partner to shoot him. Yep, you read that right. (It’s also worth noting that the book was only 1.5 inches thick. So, not very.)
Bear in mind, when people are testing firearms, one medium that’s used to fire into is a block of telephone directories. (You can see an example here on YouTube, and there are many others) So a book that’s less than two inches thick? Yeah, no chance.
As it turns out – unsurprisingly – the guy died. His girlfriend – the one he persuaded to make the shot – has now been jailed for six months, although as the story says, the sentence is actually pretty lenient, as it’s obvious that the entire plan was made by the now-deceased, and his partner was just an idiot who believed he knew what he was talking about.
Yes, it’s a sad story, but at the same time it’s also a story of pretty epic stupidity…
Married At First Sight
Posted: Mon 19 February, 2018 Filed under: 1BEM, Cynicism, Domestic, I Don't Understand, People, Television, Thoughts, Valentine's Day Leave a comment »Following on from Valentine’s Day, Channel 4 has a documentary series going about people who have allowed themselves to be paired up by scientists and specialists, signing up to meet on their wedding day. (It turns out that this is actually the third series of it in the UK – and the results on the previous two series haven’t been all that promising!)
They’ve done it with some run-up in order to do all the stuff like declarations of intent to marry, telling family and friends, and make all the preparations. So they get told that they’ve been paired up (and are now ‘engaged’) and then six weeks later they’ll meet for the first time and get married.
Thursday’s episode was the first one, and basically all the set-up and preparations. From there I assume it’ll be about the aftermath, and how they work out once the wedding is done.
Marriage is something that, to be honest, leaves me cold – it really hasn’t ever appealed to me at all, and it’s never been on the list of Things To Do. And so far, there’s never been anyone I’ve been with who’s changed that opinion, or made me think differently about it at all.
But I do still find it an interesting concept, and the whole arranged-marriage type thing, of seeing how people handle that and so on. Whether I continue watching the programme or not is a different matter, but for now it’s at least vaguely interesting. We’ll see.
Lightly Battered
Posted: Mon 28 August, 2017 Filed under: 1BEM, Domestic, Food, Health, London, People, Stupidity, Thoughts, Travel, Walking Leave a comment »On Thursday, I walked with friends to the National Burger Day event, and slightly broke myself along the way.
The walk (from Euston to Canada Square) should be about 5 miles. However, it’s not a location I’ve walked to before, and I hadn’t prepared properly for doing so, so I made a couple of mistakes. We were going in generally the correct direction, just by a less-direct route than it could/should have been.
Additionally, it was a bloody warm day, I hadn’t got any water with me, and (as it turned out) my walking boots were pretty much dead, so I ended up knackered, hot, sore, and (by the end) pretty dehydrated. Which also added to the mistakes in the route-finding and map-reading. All told, that walk ended up being just under 8 miles. So yes, definitely not my finest day, by a long chalk.
When we eventually got to the pub we’d planned to stop at, I was – not to put too fine a point on it – fucked. I drank two and a half litres of water just while we sat there. That’s never a good sign. (Also, it turns out that my hands swell when I’m dehydrated, which is kind of odd, but good to know for future reference)
We still did the event, and it was OK – but there wasn’t anything that massively stood out for me, to be honest. As a result, I think there’s going to be some changes for me going forwards, but that’s going to be a post for another day, when I’ve thought about it some more. Change is afoot, to be sure.
When we were done, we decided to get the Tube back to Euston, and home. Much more sensible. And once I got home, taking off the boots and finding just how twatted my feet were was… interesting, and not entirely pleasant.
I’d say I’ll use it as a learning experience, and never do the same thing again, but we all know that’s not true, and that at some point in the future I’ll do something equally stupid. Or more so.
Under The Knife
Posted: Fri 4 August, 2017 Filed under: 1BEM, People, Television, Thoughts Leave a comment »This could almost be a PIDU post – but it’s not, and I don’t quite know why myself. But anyway…
Over the last few weeks, I’ve been watching Botched, a programme about Plastic Surgery, and primarily fixing the bad jobs that’ve already been done on people. It’s a ‘reality’ series, and kind of annoying, but also weirdly interesting. I find it fascinating to see the things that people have had done to themselves, the things that they feel insecure about, and what they put themselves through in order to feel better.
Personally, I don’t get that whole surgical self-improvement thing – I’m far more of an “accept what you are/have” person, which seems to result in a lot less stress. Then again, I’ve never been pretty, so I don’t have that innate vanity that sees Just One Thing that’s wrong. I don’t feel the need to “fix” things, so it’s all just a bit… alien to me.
The people who do want work done (and in the greatest number of cases, it’s definitely ‘want’ rather than ‘need’) are of interest to me, looking at the mindsets that are so obsessed with that One Thing that needs ‘fixing’, that if they fix that, then everything will be fine (while also never actually addressing the underlying insecurities that are driving the desire for surgery in the first place) and wondering why they only look at fixing the physical, rather than the mental and emotional issues that cause them to focus on these things.
More than anything, I think I feel sad for a lot of the people, to have lives that are so focused on something like that, and to be so desperate to get it fixed.
Anyway, it’s a rotten reality programme, but it still interests me for the people involved. Which, I suppose, is the whole point of reality programming.
Bad Headline
Posted: Wed 2 August, 2017 Filed under: 1BEM, Charm School, Cynicism, Domestic, Media, News, People, Thoughts Leave a comment »One of my free local papers had an interesting front-page headline this week. It does seem a bit specific (and somewhat prophetic) though – I mean, if they already know that someone else will die within the week, wouldn’t you think they’d add in more guards, or make the area a bit safer during that time?
(And yes, I know what they meant to say – but it’s not what it actually says! Or at least it’s rather more open to interpretation, anyway)