THINGS THAT MAKE YOU GO "GRRRR".
TELEPHONE BANKING - ONE SIDE TO EVERY STORY.
"Hello, and welcome to OurBank. Solutions for handling your money at your fingertips. Please input your postcode using the telephone keypad now."
"Please enter your 38 digit customer pin".
"Please enter your 38 digit customer pin".
"Please enter your 38 digit customer pin"
"Thank you. Please enter your password, followed by the alphabet backwards".
"I'm sorry, we did not recognise that"
"I'm sorry, we did not recognise that"
"Just so you know, passwords must contain both upper and lower case letters, 9 prime numbers, and an as yet unspecified number of Celtic runes, not exceeding pi".
"Thank you. You now have 34 options:
“If you wish to speak to us about savings plans, please press 1”
“If you don't wish to speak to us about savings plans, it's 2”.
“If you're not sure whether you wish to speak to us about savings plans, it's 3”.
“You have pressed an incorrect key”.
"I'm sorry, we didn't recognise that. For security reasons, using Morse code, please enter the names of all your primary school teachers. If you are having trouble, please press 14567, or put the phone down".
"I'm sorry you are having trouble. Please take twelve forms of identification to our head office in Borneo, where we will be happy to assist you".
"I'm sorry, we did not recognise that request"
"I'm sorry, we did not recognise that request".
"I'm sorry we.... Hello, and welcome to OurBank"
THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LIFE
My pointless, procrastinatory googling somehow led me to the Wikipedia page for "Death". Which it describes as "...the cessation of all biological functions that sustain a living organism..." . It also says : "Dying" redirects here. For the colouring process, see 'Dyeing'.
That's what I love about Wikipedia. Never discriminates against the people of Essex.
NEW YEARS' HONOURS LIST
How about a special ‘Despicable Capitalist Unscrupulous Exploitative Fat Pig’ award for Amazon – a company that turns over £66 billion, yet treats its employees like inconsequential, scurrying, dark-dwelling gnomes; paying them £8-odd per hour for a 10 hour night shift, wherein they are forced to literally “run” miles with a trolley to meet unattainable, preternaturally human “targets” … while their executive echelons implement a flagitious “Three Strikes And You’re Out” system (their workers get a strike for, say, injuring their back on the job, or being forced to leave ‘early’ after vomiting through exhaustion).
And there was I, foolishly believing that The Statute Of Cambridge and The Workhouse had both been abolished some time ago.
Surely we have to consider the true cost of buying a book for a couple of quid cheaper? I’ll certainly never again buy anything from this rapaciously inhumane gaggle, and I would urge others to do the same.
"RE-WHAT" ?
Thundering loony Sarah Palin has recently been pulled up again for being comically sub-literate in her speechifying about the virtues of guns, bombs and arbitrary death. This reminds me of a while back, when she defended her use of the word "refudiate" (er... what's that now?) by saying "Well, Shakespeare made up words all the time".
Fair enough. So I made one up just for you, Sarah:
"EnormaKuckinFunt".
THE FUTILITY OF ACHIEVING WORDS IN TANGIBLE FORMAT
Dear Acme Printer Company,
I would just like to say ‘Thank You’ for all the hours I have lost throughout my life, meddling with your crap printers.
As an eternal shrine to my neolithically gullible idiocy, I have just built a phallus out of about 50 worthless constipated plastic thimbles, which I believe you call “cartridges”. Now I am left with a printer that, despite being fairly new, refuses to do anything but say “not recognised”. And it now appears to be grinning at me. OK, you smug, squat monstrosity... I hope your “sleek, modern design” lends itself well to being smashed into tiny pieces with a hammer and hand delivered to your company CEO's desk.
Yours sincerely,
Me
TAINTED SEASONS
There’s a real beauty in London’s autumn... a sideways glance upwards to see rust-coloured leaves playing through the window; unleasing a tide of childhood nostalgia ... a whispered hint of winter’s portent in the breeze... that magical scent of someone’s surprised fireplace flickering into life after another fleeting episode in its perennial summer slumber...
This is the town of my birth. The greatest city in the world...
Shame about all the traffic wardens and dogshit.
ART IMITATES STRIFE
Reminiscing with my father about an "avant-garde jazz" gig we went to years ago... we were invited by one of his 'organic' hippy mates, who reminded me of a big ginger goat. Anyway, the basic tenor of our talk was that it's fine, even commendable, to be innovative in the expression of one's inner narrative. But standing there with a sax and deliberately not playing it, just means that you're a bit of a dick. And you deserve an equally avant-garde audience, i.e., one that that doesn't exist.
PS... I can't say I'm overly sorry for the fact that I punctuated one of your "Essence Of Silence" moments with a loud burp.
A SOCIAL EXPERIMENT
Having returned from a lovely holiday in Majorca the other day, I am pleased to note how much a good, solid whack on the head serves to calm over exuberant party kids. I witnessed at least three groups of screaming, strutting teenagers, dripping with Argos gold while completely drunk at 11am. At some point, at least one of them would invariably end up drunkenly slipping on wet marble and hit his head hard. What generally followed was a grimace from the injured party; concerned enquiries from his pack (“Shit, are you OK mate”?) all culminating in a long period of quiet reflection and general silence. Having witnessed this first hand, it is subsequently my considered belief that society would be well served if we could somehow extend this head bashing method of urban pacification on a national basis.
HALLELUJAH - THE CHURCH OF NON
-BELIEF
After a recent debate, I’ve decided that staunch atheists get on my nerves almost as much as religious zealots. Just because you spent a couple of hours reading about The Big Bang while your wife was on her mate’s hen night, doesn’t entitle you to wear that smug “all knowing” grin; and blast everyone with your self indulgent, practiced trumpeting about the ‘real’ nuances of human existence. If you were alive a few hundred years ago, you’d say with absolute certainty that the world was flat. So what if religion presupposes the duality of good and evil? In my experience, some people who believe in little goblins are less arrogant than those who denigrate all forms of spirituality based on their limited physical perception of the universe. In essence, doesn’t that make their atheism a ‘belief system’ in the same way as a religion? In my book (which has three pages and large print), there is no true disparity between following a religion, and vehemently enforcing an assertion that said religion is definitely nonsense.
LEFT OR RIGHT ?
While we are all quite rightly fuming over the transparent and outrageously corrupt attempts by the NEC to subvert democracy, maybe we can spare a thought for our American cousins, who have been lovingly presented with a straight pick between these two:
In the deranged corner, we have Donald Trump - wearer of egregious coiffured weasel's bottoms on his head ... a hominid throwback with a seemingly permanent expression that makes him look as if he's constantly struggling to digest third helpings of spotted dick and custard... a racist, philistinic bedlamite, whose very name is synonymous with a toilet visit in the London vernacular...
And in the crazy corner, weighing in at 300lbs... we have Hillary Clinton, authoress of the little-known pamphlet "Why Bombs Get Me Hot", pathological liar ... fascist, shifty little rat-eyed purveyor of "Death To Eye-Ran" rhetoric ... and someone who almost certainly couldn't be trusted around your pets, let alone leading a country with the biggest destructive arsenal on the planet...
God help you in 'The Land Of The Not-So Free' ...
Indeed, God help us all. Chocs away...
PASSPORTS
The day I have to get my passport photo taken, also happens to be after the day after I got three quarters of an hours’ sleep the night before, and have a spot resembling a blushing baboon's behind on my forehead. Oh well, I guess that's my likeness for the next ten years.
But the whole passport application experience has left me wondering whether it might be preferable simply to never leave the country again, rather than have to fill out a 300-page form and send it, together with my great-great grandfather’s toenail clippings, and a cheque for a grand, to someone who will simply send it back again two years later, telling me my application has failed because my signature isn’t heterosexual enough.
Airlines.... AIRLINES ???
How an airline like Ryan Air can have the balls to proudly display the iconography of a country like Ireland on its aircraft … while simultaneously bastardising and subverting everything good associated with this proud country and culture… is beyond me.
The tri colour displayed on its hull. A harp on its tail…
I associate Ireland with hospitality. Warmth. Creativity. Humour. Passion.
In fairness, Ryan Air clearly has a sense of humour… maybe 1 out of 4 ain’t bad,
“Mr Hennessy, thank you for booking your flight with us”.
“This is ticketless flight. You will need to check in yourself online”.
£10 charge…
“Have you checked in for the return flight”?
£10 charge
“Please ensure your hand luggage is no larger than a pair of Primark Y-fronts and weighs no more than 250 grams... Alternatively, you may check a rucksack into the hold, which will cost you a grand, you mug”.
“Excess weight will be charged at the rate of £10 per second for every second the weight remains in excess of the weight we have established”.
Note to Michael O’Leary or whatever the sodding CEO’s name is … if you must
insist on linking your shoddy piece of shit airline with Ireland, may I suggest
losing the Irish flag and harp, and just having a massive cartoon of an evil
leprechaun wearing a strap-on.
"WE USED TO SELL IT TOO, YOU KNOW?"
On my way back from a very brief visit to an old mate, decided to stop at a corner shop for a bottle of vino (after the day I've had, it's kinda doctor's orders).
VERY dodgy. It's 'Montepulciano' apparently, but the words on the label are a dead giveaway:
"Deep ruby in colour, the grapes are grown on the hillly (three "L's") side of the Abruzzo region, producing a wine which has all the poetry and art of Italia"
Bollocks.
You know what, you're a bunch of Albanian jokers in that shop. It tastes like old plums and microwave-melted jaffa cakes and 'odor eaters', mixed with formaldehyde... Any amount of smiling, and faux-warmly greeting me with "Hello my friend" ain't cutting the mustard either mate, you and I both know that your frowning, tubby, perennial christmas-jumper-wearing wife had a hand in making this horrendous vinegar, while swearing at you loudly in a stinking basement, as your brother-in-law printed the label.
Anyway, it's just gone down the feckin' sink, so cheers for helping me waste the thicker end ot a tenner. My intention was to save a glass or two for my ma for tomorrow, but I'd just end up getting soundly beaten with a broomstick if I tried to foist this horrendous brew on her.
WAYS IN WHICH TO SPEND YOUR FREE TIME, VOLUME ONE:
I was about to call my phone company, but then decided instead to repeatedly smash myself over the head with a frozen leg of lamb wrapped in a pillow case.
“Welcome to Virgin media. We now have 53 options for you. If you would like to discuss using your phone in outer space, press 1. If you would like to spend the rest of your life listening to this shite, none of which applies to you, press 2. If you want to discuss tariff options, change your tariff, or if you fell asleep with your girlfriend’s tit in your mouth when you were 16, press 30. If you are unsure why you exist, press G”.
“If you would like to talk to us about anything else… which we know is why you called in the SODDING first place… put the phone down and recalibrate your expectations immediately”.
"And just so you know, websites exist. So please go on a random one, and piss about for the rest of the day without achieving what you called us for in the first place".
I need some pleasant, straightforward common sense today. So am going to turn the hoover on instead, and the two of us can have one of our traditional chats.
