The Green Green Grass Of Home

The story of the pensioner getting bollocked by his local council for cutting the grass verge outside his house would be laughable if it wasn't so typical of the attitude of councils in the UK.  

Link to original story

My football club complained recently about the cutting of the grass on the football pitches we use at the weekends.  Basically the grass had not been cut for about a five week period and had grown extremely long.  The council then cut the grass the day before the games were due to take place and just left the overlong cuttings all over the place.  The coaches and parents had to spend over an hour before the game clearing the playing surface to make it safe.

The mindless excuses responses we got from the council were priceless and included this absolute gem!!!

As I thought, Landscape services have confirmed that they are unable to collect grass. 600,000m2 of grass is cut by xxxxx depot staff every 10 working days so there is too much to be disposed of but since most of grass is water it soon naturally dries up. 

Unfortunately on this occasion the grass at xxxx Park happened to be due a cut just before the weekend so didn't have much time to dry out.

I have also, for the first time, been made aware that the staff from the xxxxx depot who do the grass cutting are the same personnel who bury the dead and there has been an increase of those instances over the summer.

Unfortunately, for park users, burials need to take priority over grass cutting.

You couldn't make this stuff up...

On The Buses

Today I are mostly be travellin' by bus...

Yes, the KidMobile broke down again yesterday. Two months after it had been in the garage to get its gearbox fixed the gear linkage snapped and left me unable to go anywhere. Luckily this happened when I was trying to reverse into a parking space on a quiet street. The thought that it could just have easily have happened in the middle of a traffic jam in Aberdeen's rush hour makes my bowels feel a bit watery...

So today I am travelling into town on a double decker which is absolutely jammed to capacity. There is no getting away from the fact the travelling amongst a whole heap of people, crammed in like the beasts that come past in the animal transporters, is a far from pleasant experience : the lack of room, the damp sweaty heat that hangs like a low lying fog, and worst of all the collective body odours of the herd...not pleasant, not pleasant at all!

Safe to say I cannot wait to get the car back. There are a lot of compelling arguments for using public transport more, and my workplace is set to do its bit to encourage us to do this by introducing parking charges etc, but the basic fact is that most people (those with a keen sense of smell especially) do not like travelling like cattle and if they can avoid doing so they will. This is probably not good news for our children's children's children but there it is.

In related news I also have to work out how to get from work to home to Pittodrie tonight for the footie...

Happy Days!

The Bootiful Game

What the hell is wrong with Scottish football?

The national side beating France home and away and rising to 14th in FIFA's world rankings...

Rangers handing Lyon a three goal beating away from home...

Celtic beating AC Milan, repeat AC Milan 2-1 at Parkhead...

Hopefully the Dons will take heart from this and do the business against Dnipro!

This surely cannot be right.

Bring back Bertie Vogts before its too late!

On a serious note the villain of the piece tonight is not Dida for the most ridiculous, sustained bit of cheating acting since Rivaldo. No, it is the wee ned fan who ran on and presented the cheat goalkeeper with the opportunity.

Thank You For Waiting

You have called at a very busy time. You call has been placed in our queuing system and will be answered soon...

Thank you for holding. All of our agents are busy right now, someone will be with you soon...

Hi. Your call will be answered shortly...

Thank you for holding. You call is important to us, someone will be with you very soon...

Still there? Fuck me you're keen...


and on and on and on...

You don't seem to get it do you strange robotic voicemail woman? I am trying to give you money! I am trying to sign up for your overpriced fancy TV service. You know, the one with more pixels than the other one.

If you know it is a busy time why don't you take on some more staff to help rake in the cash? The order via the web thing that you advertise is just a series of web pages with the same phone number at the end of the trail. The order via your blue button on your telly remote doesn't seem to work either. So I'm back to the good old telephone.

Thank you for calling. You've phoned at a very busy time (you prat). Someone will be with you when they can be arsed...

Speccy Speccy Four Eyes

Something strange happened this morning...

I was sitting having a wee ponder about what aspect of my high-flying, non-stop action life I could write a wee blog entry about when an email popped into my inbox. [What's strange about that ya plonker? That's what is supposed to happen...]

This email was from Friends Reunited, you know the site that everyone signed up to a few years ago, making its owners millionaires in the process. The site that put you back in contact with people you knew from school but had lost touch with. The site that let you to swap emails with said lost contacts, thus enabling you to realise why you hadn't bothered to keep in touch with them in the intervening years... You know, that one.

Anyhoo, the email was from Friends Reunited in conjunction with Optical Express, the opticians. They have clubbed together to bring me an offer I might like...

Now, I do wear glasses and have done since about primary 5. These days specs are pretty cool. There are lots of different designer styles from which to choose to help you obtain the right 'look'. Even the kids have wide range of styles to choose from.

Not in my day.

When I went to school the choice for boys, unless your parents were loaded, was National Health spectacle frames in brown "horn rimmed", or black. Neither of these choices made the young TK look cool. This problem became compounded when as part of the day to day rough and tumble of the Scottish Education system both spectacle legs became broken and had to be repaired with tape until it was time to get new ones (an annual occurrence). This was not a good look. At all. Ever.

Wearing specs at school in the 70's was most definitely not cool. The taunts of "Speccy Four Eyes" and "Speccy Speccy Spazz Face" were never too far away. These days there are no doubt rules to protect the occularly challenged from the slightest chance of ridicule, back in the pre-PC days you were fair game, even for the teachers.

Now Friends Reunited (all about schooldays) and Optical Express (all about glasses) are teaming up to send me emails because they think I might be interested...

Is this random, or is there a special section on the FR site where 'normal' kids can nominate speccy kids that they remember in order to drive a targetted marketing campaign?

I think we should be told...

Last Day Today, Hooray!

Finally.

The end of my ever so exciting notice period.

I am working through my "gettingthefuckouttahere" checklist and have ticked off most of the entries...

A couple of hours from now and this place won't see me for dust!!

I have the contact details for the people I want to stay in touch with so its just a case of handing back the phone, the laptop, the blackberry, the securid card, the id card, the parkit permit, etc etc etc. Maybe in return I can get my soul back!

Strange Malaise

I've really been struggling to 'get going' this past couple of weeks and need to give myself a good shake before starting my new job.

I was on three months notice with my current employer which I negotiated down to two. These have been the longest two months of my life!

I mistakenly thought that having been here for around ten years, and being on a such a long notice period, that the company would be keen to ensure that I handed over everything I was working on and did a brain dump of all the handy stuff that I have picked up over the years. Sadly no. No contact, no deliverables, no real interest from above.

I am therefore feeling slightly miffed and more than a little bit bored...

Still, this is the final week, I have had my 'exit interview' (big joke), so I am just going to concentrate on cleaning up my workspace, making sure I have transferred all my personal files off my work laptop, etc etc etc

I then have a week off to chill and get my head together (whilst I am trying to clear some of the debris from my overstuffed garage) before taking up my new post with a clear head and an annoyingly positive attitude!

That's the plan anyways...

Toute Suite

Hat tip to Scary Duck for his brilliantly composed letter of complaint to the company supposed to be supplying his new sofa...

I especially like how he has tagged his blog entry.

Link : Scary Duck's complaint

The Pecking Order

Only a week and half left at my current employer so I am currently in "knowledge transfer" mode - tell a bunch of people a bunch of stuff that you know that they are not going to remember and then walk off into the sunset.

My decision to leave for pastures new was completely vindicated today when I was witness to the following telephone exchange between my line manager and his boss :

(5 minutes into conference call)

MLM : Yes, and we really need to agree how to move forward on this key issue. What do you think about...
HB : Sorry, we are going to have to talk about this some other time. I have to feed the goat.

"Feed the goat" isn't a euphemism by the way, he really was going to feed his goat.

If MLM is further down the pecking order than a pet goat, where the fuck does that leave me?

Justice?

I have to admit my complete lack of understanding of the Scottish legal system.

This week the trial of a convicted murderer and rapist was thrown out due to lack of evidence. Forensic evidence linked the accused, both victims and his vehicle at the time. The key element in the dismissal of this case appears to be the failure of the prosecution to present any evidence showing a forensic link between the accused and the ligatures used to murder the two young women.

A couple of years ago a 16 year old boy was found guilty of murdering his girlfriend when he was just 14 in a "savage knife attack". There was no forensic evidence linking the boy to the crime, nor any witnesses placing him at the scene.

I just don't get how this works...

Offshore Europe Traffic Chaos

It took me an hour longer than normal to drive to work this morning.

Yep, Offshore Europe is back. You can't get a hotel room in Aberdeen for love nor money and traffic chaos reigns once more.

Having sat for ages in a traffic jam that was moving as slowly as a snail with a limp it cheered me up no end to see that Grumpyans friendly boys in blue were doing their bit to ease the situation - by having a bunch of bobbies on the beach esplanade with hand held speed cameras busting all the harassed commuters trying desperately not to be late to work... Bastards.

Aberdeen is pretty mental when Offshore Europe is on but there is no denying that it brings in a lot of money, even the girls who ply their trade outside my lovely office traditionally make a bundle - perhaps they could invest in some more clothing, they are going to catch their death standing about by the roadside, at night, with no simmet on...

Anyway, with things being quiet here, I will probably visit OE this afternoon. There's nothing quite like wandering aimlessly round a huge, crowded, exhibition hall looking at bits of equipment that you have no idea about and gathering huge amounts of free tat that will be binned once safely home...

ho hum...

Pay Attention At The Back

Loved this brief story in today's Daily Record:

Our Prize Pupil Left In 2003

A pupil was given a prize for turning up to every lesson for a year - despite having left school four years earlier.

Education chiefs praised Stuart Fox as a model pupil and sent him a special pen and a pass allowing him to go swimming at the local pool free for a year.

But the red-faced officials were then told Stuart had moved.

Falkirk Council dish out the Present And Correct awards annually to pupils with perfect attendance.

Stuart had gone to Graeme High School in Falkirk but had moved to America with his family in 2003 when his father got a new job there.

Somehow, he had not been removed from the school roll.

And because teachers had not marked him absent, Stuart was automatically nominated for the award.

So the council education director Julia Swan wrote a letter congratulating him for his 100 percent attendance in the 2006-07 year, enclosing the pen and telling him about his grand prize of a year's free swimming.

It was only when the people who live in Stuart's old house in Polmont returned the letter that they realised the mistake.

Crikey. Dishing out an attendance prize to someone who left the country three years previously!

How easy must it be to bunk off from that school?

Obviously no requirement to dodge Wee Donny the bunking man like there was in my day...

What's Going On?

The shooting of 11 year old Rhys Jones, allegedly by another youngster, in Liverpool last week has shocked the UK.

In its own way the story below (taken from This Is Local London via Fark) is just as disturbing.

Body lay in High Street for 13 hours
By Sara Nelson

The body of a man apparently lay in Orpington High Street for 13 hours before a passerby realised he was dead this weekend.

The man, thought to be in his mid-to-late-30s, was found on the ground outside the Job Centre at 5.05pm on Saturday.

But bystanders said he had been lying there since 4am that morning.

Ambulance crews informed police, who are treating the incident as a sudden death.

Police believe they know who he is and are informing his next-of-kin.

Mother-of-three Hayley Hind was passing by when the police were called.

She said: "We had stopped for a cup-of-tea at the Silver Lounge and the police were just arriving.

"We asked the waitress what was going on and she told us and said people were saying he'd been there since 4am.

"Apparently he had been just lying there, not moving, while people were setting up their market stalls just feet away from him.

"The police were very good, they tried to shield everyone from the scene, but I am disgusted that he was left there for so long - more than 12 hours.

"A little bit of public spirit would not have gone amiss, you know, somebody stopping to say: 'Are you alright, mate?'

"Even if people thought he was just drunk or asleep it must have been unusual that he hadn't been moving at all to top up his alcohol levels or answer the call of nature.

"It's just so sad that he was left there for so long, there seems to be no compassion for anybody these days."

The 42-year-old, of Joyce Green, Dartford, added: "How dare they just walk past him."


I'm not sure if things are actually getting dramtically worse or if its just that one absolutely horrendous incident skews your vision of what is going on for a period of time.

Whatever it is one thing is for sure, Great Britain is not looking that great at the moment...

Scotland, South Africa, And The Torn Faced Old Git

Took the wee fella to Pittodrie to see some international football action last night, Scotland v South Africa.

We entered the back of the stand and tried to find our seats. We quickly identified that we were sitting in the back row and were at the end of the row.

I checked the seat number for the vacant seat at the end of the row.

"This will be where we are sitting wee man, yep, this seat is number 11" I said, checking the seat number.

"Aye, and this is number 10" piped up the elderly gentleman who together with his grandson were occupying the adjacent two seats.

"Good" I replied politely and with a smile "That will be my seat then"

The elderly gent torn faced old git then came out with what is an unfortunately common opening gambit in these parts, "Ah dinnae think so!"

Sighing, but still managing to force a smile, I produced my tickets and showed him, "Here's my tickets. As you can see I have Row Y seats ten and eleven".

Still torn faced he produces his crumpled tickets from his pocket and, with the air of someone explaining a simple fact to a retarded child, waved them under my nose saying "Well look, I have Row Y, seats nine and te....uh....er....eight........move along son"

Shuffles along to next seat, no word of apology, spends the whole game pretending we don't exist. Twat!

As for the game, it was probably the most tedious 90 minutes of football I have ever watched. South Africa moved the ball about well without really threatening to score whilst Scotland were hopeless except for the one moment of inspiration when they scored.

Out of all the football he has watched the wee fella says he still prefers watching Dumbarton. Poor bugger.

That's A Lotto Money

Brilliant quote in The Scotsman today in the story about an East Kilbride woman who has scooped the £35.4 million in the Euromillions lottery to become the UK's biggest National Lottery winner.

The lady in question works in the Admin department at the Royal Mail sorting office in Springburn, Glasgow.

This quote is from one of her co-workers:

"As far as we know she bought the winning ticket after leaving work on Friday night. The win couldn't have happened to a nicer person - she's the life and soul of the admin department in the sorting office.

Camelot sent a car to pick her up once she had made the call to them, and not long after the news spread that she had won.

Nobody knows what she will do yet with her winnings, but she'll be sadly missed if she decides not to come back to work."

Hmmm, difficult choice...

35 million quid in your hip pocket. Do you buy a big house somewhere in exotic climes and spend all day lying about being fed chocolate covered strawberries by the scantily clad sex objects of your choice or continue to wallow in the mindless drudgery of the 9-5 life...

Tough call.

Movin' On

After just over 8 years working for A Major Engineering Company I have decided to move to pastures new. This morning I submitted my letter of resignation and now I just need to see how much of my 3 month notice period they want me to work.

Latterly at my current employer the IT function has been completely reorganised on four occasions over the past four or five years. The latest reorganisation, to provide a global service, is being managed from overseas. Four email pronouncements in seven months is not a great way to manage change on this scale, especially when the latest announcement (in a bizarre attempt to raise morale) stated that people should not worry as we had now achieved 60% of the targetted job cuts (do the maths). As my department didn't feature on the newly issued organisation charts I decided it was probably time to start seeing what alternatives were available.

I found a position that seemed interesting, applied, interviewed, and accepted.

So it comes to pass that, after a greater number of years than I care to think about working in the Oil & Gas industry, I find myself relishing a new challenge in the world of academia. I will soon be starting a job within the IT Directorate of the local University, a venerable establishment that has been in existence for over 500 years. I am sure that there will be lots of challenges ahead but all contact to date has been extremely positive and I have a feeling that it is going to be a good place to work.

Snot Right!

This story from the BBC shows what a politically correct cul de sac we have got ourselves into in this country. Un-bloody-believable...

'Offensive' SN07 car plate banned

Car licence plates which bear the sequence SN07 were banned from the streets of Edinburgh because they are "offensive", it has emerged.

The plate had been due to follow on from the SN56 registration in March.

Licensing officials at the Driver and Vehicle License Agency (DVLA) changed the plate to TN07 to avoid it being similar to the word 'snot'.

The change means that cars registered in the capital are the only ones in Scotland not to begin with an S.

A DVLA spokesperson said the decision to change the plates was taken to avoid offending car buyers in the capital.

She added: "It is our policy that any registration mark that can be construed as being offensive to people will be suppressed.

"In this case, the SN07 marks would have been too similar to the word 'snot' and, as that could possibly offend some buyers, they were replaced with new TN07 registrations."

Loungeing About

Entry to the airport lounge is usually The Holy Grail for business travellers. This is why possession or a silver or gold airline card is so prized - you can gain access to these palaces even if your company has booked you on a cheapy flight.

Once inside the lounge you can rest your weary, suit clad ass, on a comfortable seat rather than the thinly disguised park benches that are the domain of the plebians outside the access controlled doors.   There is unlimited free bevvy (if you are not driving at the other end), soft drinks if you are, cakes, crisps, cheese *nd biscuits, and sandwiches, to scoff on. You can also win cheap brownie points by taking home some of the free magazines to "her indoors".

For half an hour or so these places are the business traveller's equivalent of Las Vegas.

However, when your flight is delayed the attraction soon wears off.

In reality there is only so much Diet Coke you can drink, so many emails you can answer on your Blackberry before your thumbs feel like they are going to drop off, and then you are left to soak up the ambience.

You are surrounded by lots of similarly fed up travellers who have a variety of strategies for dealing with the delays.

Some people spend the whole time making phone calls that seem to be designed to make the casual eavesdropper believe that they are in the presence of some business demi god.

I was once stuck at a table next to a group of reps who were engrossed in playing a game of "who would you rather shag, Tracey from Accounts or Fat Angie from packing?" Ad nauseum until some clown upped the ante and included the sole female in the gathering as one of the choices...  The conversation petered out after that.

Today I was sitting opposite a hefty lady who had removed her shoes and seemed to be paying far too much close attention to her feet than was necessary in a public place. Then to top it all she fished a small plastic bag, containing ice cubes, from down the back of her trousers and poured the melt water into an empty drinks glass before returning the bag to her trousers. Bizarro.

One good distraction was a 4th of July from Davie Nix, keyboard player with the fab band Driveblind. Dave wants everyone to vote for his pal who is a Star Wars nut who wants to play at a convention. Go to the following link and vote for Darth Elvis. http://www.celebrationeurope.com/cantina/poll/index.htm I'm sure Wixy would appreciate your voting for his pal.

Some other good news was that one of the boys from the kids football team that I coach has been selected for Aberdeen FC's development squad.  Well done to him!

Still no sign of the flight boarding but thumbs now almost terminal so going to sign off.

Happy landings.

Terror Threat - Critical

Can't ignore the happenings at Glasgow Airport over the weekend. I am sure that most of the Scottish population shared the same feelings of shock and horror that I felt watching the images of the burning jeep in the airport entrance way.

Today's revelations that one of the men in the car was working as a doctor at a Paisley hospital is even more confusing/disappointing. I would have hoped that anyone clever enough to become a medic would have had enough intelligence not to get suckered in by all of this religious extremism crap.

This attack, coupled with the failed car bombs in London, are really making me look forward to my business trip to the capital on Wednesday (the 4th of July no less)! I have got enough to worry about getting up at 4am not to return home until after 10pm, without having to worry about some misguided fool jumping on my tube train with a rucksack full of tin tacks and semtex.

The thing is that you can't let these sick bastards win. We have to carry on as normally as possible. I'll be making the trip, but I will be bricking it!

Single Track Scotland

Watched "How We Made Britain" on the Beeb last night with David Dimbleby. This week's programme focussed on Scotland and there were plenty of camera shots of our beautiful countryside and Dimbleby driving his Land Rover along a single track road.

The trouble was that everywhere he went, he travelled along a single track road. Up to the highlands - single track road; across to Aberdeen - single track road; down to Glasgow - single track road.

The apogee of this was towards the end of the programme when the focus switched from Glasgow to Edinburgh. Did the intrepid David take on the nightmare that is the M8, with its multiple lanes of traffic all travelling at around 5 mph? No. It was that bloody single track road again!

No wonder some of our less enlightened neighbours have a skewed view of Scotland! This kind of poetic license on behalf of the BBC does us no favours!