To have or not to have. That is the question.

So.  Tomorrow we have the opportunity to vote on whether we, the people of Bristol, would like a mayor or not.  David Cameron and George Osborne have rushed down here to tell us to vote yes.  This instantly makes me think no.  I have watched the shenanigans with Boris and Ken.  This also makes me think no.  We have no idea whether a mayor would be good or bad, but  it is a step in an unknown direction, which also tempts me to think no.

But Bristol City Council has been consistently rubbish for the last, oh I don't know, millennium so maybe I should think yes.  Maybe anything is better than what we have now.  Look, we should have had a leaflet telling us about this election but have we had one?  Er, no.  But a lot of people in north Somerset and south Gloucestershire have had one.  They haven't got a vote on this, but Bristol City Council  (in its usual fashion) has cut corners and opted for the cheaper Royal Mail option which is to deliver the leaflet to ALL people with a BS postcode rather than selected postcodes actually within the city.

This is just indicative of what Bristol City Council is like.  There is never a majority so all decisions are compromises.  They have utterly failed on transport, schools, etc, etc.  Surely anything is better than what we have now.

But that is not a good basis on which to decide whether you want someone with vast power to rule over us for FOUR  years.  And so far no-one even knows what candidates there might be to vote for, which makes it even less appealing.

Okay, so that seems to be me decided.  Anyone want to change my opinion?

Novel ways of training staff

I just had to laugh when I saw this:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-17834506

What does it say about Ikea?

Bits and bobs

Apologies to those who were expecting more...

Daughter has norovirus and is upstairs finally asleep, having been up till gone two sat in the bathroom. I know. I was there. I am so hoping this is the same one that I had on 30th March, and not a new strain that I shall succumb to. I have never felt so ill in all my life. It was worse than childbirth. I couldn't move. I lost 8lbs overnight.

And how do I remember exactly what date it was? Why, it was the day after the 2 year warranty on the microwave ran out. I'd thought something wasn't quite right for a few days previous but didn't have time to investigate. And then when I was ill and younger son said microwave didn't seem to be working I was past caring. So it was about 4 days later that I finally tracked down the receipt only to find that I'd missed out by days. I wasn't impressed given that this was a Miele, which I thought would have been a lot more reliable. After all the Sanyo microwave that I'd had previously, bought from Argos for less than half the price, had lasted 5½ years before it expired. But fortunately the supervisor in the customer care department sanctioned an under the warranty free repair. Turned out to be a customer serviceable part, anyway. A "wave guide" which had got damaged and was turning the microwaves back instead of letting them through.

I am getting cross

D'you remember, back in the day, when you used to get junk mail by the ton, and then fortunately recycling arrived and you merely glanced at it before sending it on its way? You'd moan about the waste of printing it, but at least you felt that by recycling it you weren't compounding the problem.

And if you've ever had a fax machine then you know all about personalised sweatshirts for your staff, how many people would like to buy your business (if only), how reasonable car leasing schemes are, etc, etc. But then you found a way to receive your faxes via PC so you weren't paying for the paper to print this junk. You could just glance and delete.

Well I'm now getting really pissed off with junk phone calls. For a long time we've had caller display (admittedly initially so we'd didn't accidentally answer mad ex-wife, but hey). We never answer anything starting 08. In fact we don't answer area codes we don't recognise, working on the principle that they can always leave a message if it's that important. (It's especially important that you DON'T answer HMRC without prior warning of what they might ask you!)

We have one account with two phone lines - one is just a phone, and the other one (whilst being a second phone) is also the fax line and it carries broadband. You have to answer it quick if you want to use the phone option as the fax cuts in after 2 rings. If I HAVE to give a phone number to someone that I'm not sure of, I give them that number. They soon revert to writing if they really want to get in touch with me.

About 18 months ago we changed from BT to TalkTalk. I know, dubious whether that was a good move or not but BT had become SO unreliable. They were especially bad at broadband speed which would suddenly drop and it would then take an hour or more talking to Delhi to get it uprated again. I got to knowing all the phone numbers to bypass the bottom tiers of monkeys but it was so exasperating.
Now TalkTalk is forever ringing me to persuade me to upgrade to broadband on my phone line. Hello, I have broadband, I have it through you, does your left hand even know where your right hand is? It seems the concept of one account, two lines is a bit much for them.

But the phone calls that really piss me off at the moment are the mis-selling PPI ones. Usually they've used an 0845 number so we've ignored it, googled whophonesme,and added it to the list of numbers not to answer. This is quite a long list by now.

But they've recently started to use a new tactic. They've bought/rented phone numbers all over the country. I've always answered local numbers on the basis that it's someone who I might actually want to talk to, even if it's only because they're answering an advert of mine in Trade-It, but these bastards are now ringing using local numbers. And they are really annoying me.

Okay, rant over, I'm sure I need the exercise getting up to look at the phone to see if I want to answer it or not.

Babies galore!

Following on from DG's excellent list of Leap Day facts, including a link to Raenell's site celebrating Leap Day babies - it would seem the current stock of Leap Day quads (ie. one) has just doubled.

Did you notice that - four babies, four links - clever, eh? Mind you, I've never embedded links before so they might not work.

Please tell me this is not for real

Card through the door today from local estate agent bearing the phrase "Sale your home for £xxxx". Sale? SALE? Please tell me this is local idiot who can't proof-read. Please say it's not entered the English language.

Useful skills for the 21st century?

Daughter went on bushcraft day yesterday. Learnt how to light fire without matches, build a shelter using a tarp (yes, I know how to do these, I've duplicated enough Ray Mears programmes in my time) and how to skin a squirrel.

That's right, squirrel. Already dead, I hasten to add. They also cooked it, but weren't allowed to eat it due to Health & Safety. I think that's probably just as well