Wish you were here?
I’m having a lovely time on my holiday. Daddy said he will try to tell everyone about it on his Blog later today. Hope you are well. Lots of love, samuel x
Oct.21
Sep.23
Putting the TATE in POTATO?
Who knows – could be worth a fortune one day!
Sep.02
Summer is Over :(
Well, OK, technically I think it is still Summer, but the School holidays are over at least. Where’s it gone? Seems only a few days ago that Heather came home with loads of presents from the kids and other piles of crap. And now it’s all over, she’s back to work, I’m back to stressing that I can’t cope with doing everything, Samuel’s confused and can’t understand where Mummy’s gone again – even though he waves and shouts goodbye for the entirety of (at least) the last half mile to school.
I had plans to update the blog – both by posting and tidying it up generally – through the Summer, but (as you probably know) that’s not happened. I blame most of it on BT/TalkTalk/Orange/Sky… see the long rant posted a few weeks ago to check the details on that one. The good news now, though, is that we have a working landline phone once more (with a new number – email if you not got it – though still no idea who we should be paying for calls ‘cos BT ain’t charging us for them and don’t know who they are being routed by!), a working broadband connection (not the 16MB advertised, but usually somewhere between 9 and 11MB on a good day… and 3-6 the rest of the time!), a new VOIP phone line for any work-related calls etc, and a rewired network.
Have acquired other new things in the Summer too. We’ve got most of Samuel’s Christmas presents already thanks to Boots clearance sale and a couple of boot sales (must do one ourselves to clear space for the new stuff). I’ve managed to get a new bank account with Co-op to stop Nationwide nicking my benefits, though am still pursuing that with them – they’ve so misread the Social Security Administration Act and are talking utter rubbish… just got to make them see that or get a judge to help them! We’re the proud owners of a 4-man tent and have had our first family camping holiday – almost disaster-free but will be sharing more about that in ‘Diary of a Disabled Dad‘. Oh, and a nice new dent in the car, together with a touch of whiplash. Grrrrr…
Other than the hit-and-run crash, though, the Summer’s been great despite the speed at which it has gone. It was great to spend a few days with my Aunt in Devizes, and to see my Dad and Stepmum while we were camping. Samuel got to see them all too, but I think his highlight was seeing Noddy, Fifi, Rupert, Little Princess, Bob, etc all at once at Butlins. Don’t get me started on Butlins right now though – got to write a strong letter to them, and probably then to the DRC and HSE too. Worst disabled access and safety I’ve ever come across.
The next few weeks are likely to be relatively busy still. I’ve got a string of Mystery Shop assignments at the moment (will post more about that separately), have to get the car sorted, and now that the new Phoenix catalogues are available, with the wonderful Christmas range of cards, wrap, etc it’s time for a mailing, phone calls, and trying to book a few parties. I’ve got another hospital appointment this week, too, which I’m really not looking forward to. If I’m lucky they won’t do anything other than chat and ask a few questions (rarely do very much about anything else IME) though there is a possibility that they may stick a long tube somewhere I’d rather they didn’t.
On that note, I’ll sign off for now and go take some more tablets – they’ve been changed now too, and I’ve hardly slept all Summer 🙁 I’m planning on getting a few more entries written now, which will appear over the next few days so feel free to drop by often and check, or sign up to get updates. That reminds me – must look into that side of things properly too. If you want to receive notification of new posts and can’t work out how, drop me an email and I’ll hopefully have worked it out by then myself.
Have fun and stay happy, and remember…
blowing out the other person’s candle won’t make yours shine any brighter
Aug.28
photos
KPICASA_GALLERY
Aug.19
Are you sitting comfortably? Probably not
JustDads.co.uk – news and articles affecting dads and babies
Are you sitting comfortably? Probably notAlmost half of UK kids will grow up without ever hearing a bedtime story, a new survey reports. The study for Silentnight Beds says that an average of 47 per cent of kids listen to music or watch TV rather than having a story from their parents. Dads are the worst culprits, as just 13 per cent regularly read to their children, compared to 46 per cent of mums.
Child Psychologist, Dr Pat Spungin said, “The benefits of bedtime reading from an early age are evident with 38 per cent of children going on to read for themselves before bed – this is a healthy routine to get in to as it will improve their creativity, reading and writing skills, not to mention help them to relax and sleep better.”
Steven Simpson from Silentnight adds, “Bedtime should be an enjoyable experience for people of all ages – for children, its important that they associate their beds with a positive experience from an early age – reading a story and spending some quality time with your children is the perfect way to do this.”
Aug.04
Back Online at last
woohoo! I’m back online after almost 2 months of battles with telcos. Since several people have now asked for the intricate details of our latest battles I’ll share…
Had a nice letter from TalkTalk a while ago reminding me that the phone bill needed paying, so called and agreed to pay the following week. That was all OK, they were quite happy with that… or so they said…. yet took it upon themselves to cut our line off completely that afternoon and refused to do anything about it. Apparently only BT could sort it (not technically true but cost-saving cop-out on their part it transpires). So called BT who agreed to reconnect our line with themselves the following day with the same phone number. At 8am they said. 8am came and went, so called to chase up and get advised it may take until 4pm. Called again at 6pm and they agreed to look into it. Several calls and several days later they decided it hadn’t been connected since I’d not paid a deposit. Pointed out that they’d not asked for one, and at one point had even told me that they didn’t require one, but apparently it was all my fault still. Was given another number to ring in order to pay the deposit and told the line would then be connected next day.
Called, paid, and told to wait 3 days. Argued. Waited.
Called, chased, told computers not working but they would call me back once they were. Waited.
Waited.
Called to see how much longer computers take to fix. Had been working again for a while. Hmmm…..
And so it went on. Then transpired TalkTalk had not closed the account properly so BT could not connect, then the order had not been completed properly so BT could not connect. A new order was made. Then they couldn’t connect cos I’d not paid the deposit. But I did pay the deposit and they changed the order and,… no, silly me, all my fault still. BT done nothing wrong. Incidentally, did you realise how expensive it is to call a company that only gives you freefone contact numbers when you can only use a mobile phone? Or that BT has a new ordering system that only a handful of its staff can use, resulting in queue times of not less than an hour. Ever. Eventually offered a £20 credit to cover the inconvenience of having to call them at my expense daily to find out what excuse they have next.
Oh, and another thing, it is not possible to have your call placed straight to the top of the call queue, no matter what other lies customer service reps may tell you.
Five weeks later the line was connected, but with a different number. Another hour and a half on hold to get to the right team and another £20 credit offered to cover cost of telling people BT are incompetent and changed our number after equaly-incompent TalkTalk disconnected us.
Just the broadband to get fixed now then, cos OrangeHome won’t recognise the phone number and so still can’t get online. A quick call and it’s all sorted and will be working again in 7 days. Great!
7 days later and still no broadband. Strangely the phone number that was provided with the broadband package has also stopped working. Call OrangeHome….
OrangeHome had called our non-working phone line and emailed our inaccesible mailbox to let us know the direct debit had failed (therein lies another tale about how Sky applied for a Direct Debit in error, which bounced, got a charge put on the account which Nationwide agreed to waive but then didn’t, causing other DDs to bounce and more charges, all of which are claimed illegally from my account under the Social Security Administration Act, in which the ‘inalienability’ clauses make it illegal to deduct any form of charge from benefits. Nationwide claim they do not have to obey this law cos it says in their member rules that they can take money. Suggested I setup a society that will sell alcohol to children and steal cars, since it would be legal provided our rules said so… they run off a tad confused and worried and not replied as yet). Since they had not been paid they had cancelled the account and wanted £50 for the remainder of the year and would then setup a new account and still take more money every month.
Needless to say I declined their kind offer and am waiting for them to now collect their equipment, storage of which is now being charged at £10 a week until such time as they arrange a mutually convenient time to collect said item.
I still can’t believe I did what I did next. I phoned Sky. Yes Sky. Despite having ballsed up my DDs and caused so much trouble already, and despite charging a £4 “invoice admin charge” on my account every time they send me a “statement” – thus another unenforcable charge and purely as a result of their own incompetence – I called and ordered Sky broadband.
For the first time ever Sky have done a great job and I’m now online once more – though they told me we could get 16MB broadband when the line can only support 6.3MB max, so waiting for them to fix that bit and refund us the difference between the two packages… and the £4 invoice charge for the invoices they don’t send, and the DD failure charges that the bank applied when they tried to take money they shouldn’t have….
Wow, you still here? Thought you’d have got bored and gone elsewhere by now lol I feel better for getting that off my chest though.
It does mean that phone numbers have changed – email me for the new ones.
I need a lie down after all that, and then will try to let you know about life generally. And Billy. Can’t forget Billy. That’s more than my life’s worth right now….
Jun.20
File conversions
Ever received a file in a format that you can’t open? There are a number of websites now that enable you to convert files from one format to another. Two in particular stand out:
Hope you find them useful. They can be used to convert text documents/pdfs, music, video, webpages,…. Best way to find out what they can do is probably to just explore the free sites yourself!
Jun.18
Site Updates
I’m updating a few bits of backend code and adding a newsletter system… so for those of you that have complained about the lack of emails recently, please register your details on the site and I’ll make sure you get to hear from me more often! (the newsletter script isn’t in place yet so you can’t signup specifically for the newsletter as yet, but if you register your address I’ll let you know once it’s working)
There are lots more photos online now too, though there are still occasional problems displaying them – working on this one still…
Have several posts lined up for the next couple of weeks, so there should be a lot of new content showing in the next few days (at last I hear you cry!)
Although there have been loads of hits/visitors to the site recently there have been very few comments and ratings added – please take time to click on the stars or leave a comment if you can…. it encourages me to post more lol
Jun.18
Pop goes the weasel?
Ever wondered what the words to this nursery rhyme are all about?
Half a pound of tuppenny rice,
Half a pound of treacle.
That’s the way the money goes,
Pop! goes the weasel.
Up and down the City road,
In and out the Eagle,
That’s the way the money goes,
Pop! goes the weasel.
‘weasel’ refers to the cockney rhyming slang ‘weasel and stoat’, meaning coat, and ‘pop’ is slang for ‘pawn; so the line ‘pop goes the weasel’ could equally be ‘go pawn your coat’! After all that rice and treacle, not to mention a swift half down at the Eagle on City Road in North London, finances were obviously a little tight!
Jun.18
Humpty Dumpty
Contrary to popular opinion, Humpty Dumpty was not an egg, but a cannon, used in the English Civil War.
‘Humpty Dumpty’ sat on the wall besides St Mary’s Church until a Parliamentary cannon destroyed part of the wall, causing ‘Humpty Dumpty’ to fall. The “Kings Men” (aka Royalists, Cavaliers) attempted to put the cannon back on another part of the wall but, due to the weight, they could not “put Humpty together again”