Booked in Advance
Posted: Thu 20 October, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, 2016/17, Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Health, Thoughts Leave a comment »Considering that I’m planning on a quieter year in 2017 without quite so many busy weekends, is it a good or bad thing that I’ve already got two things booked in for September 2017?
And of course, me being me, they’re both on the same weekend.
I suspect I may just be an irredeemable idiot.
Apprentice Thoughts
Posted: Fri 14 October, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, Business, Cynicism, Domestic, People, Television, Thoughts 2 Comments »Once again, the BBC has a series of the Apprentice running. And yet again, every single contestant currently appears to be an inveterate fuckknuckle with all the business skills of a bundle of second-hand scrotum skin.
What I don’t understand about the competitors (more even than being so massively underprepared and underqualified) is what think will happen afterwards. This year, there’s 18 competitors, and that means that 17 are going to lose, and go back to reality.
But anyone who has seen the programme will know that they’re insufferable, incompetent, and in most cases utterly vile human beings who couldn’t truly run a business if their lives depended on it.
So – what happens when they look for new work? Or even just return to the job where they’ve managed to negotiate a break or sabbatical? (Come to think of it, that situation might be even worse, with the added weight of expectations etc.)
I know that if, regardless of whether I were interviewing or being interviewed, any single one of them were in the room, I’d know they’re (at best) useless, gobby, opinionated, and shit at their supposed job; and wouldn’t work with them. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’d do the same.
All told, pretty mind-boggling.
Eating Well For Less
Posted: Mon 22 August, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, Advertising, Brands, Cynicism, Domestic, Finances, Food, Health, Laziness, People, Shopping, Television, Thoughts Leave a comment »Over the last few weeks, I’ve been watching the BBC’s “Eat Well For Less” series. It’s an interesting concept, helping people with their eating habits (and more accurately, their spending on food) by removing all the labelling and branding from food in people’s houses, removing all the prejudices etc. around their food spending. They replace expensive branded stuff with ‘own-brand’ or cheaper alternatives (and in some cases with more expensive, but better/healthier options) and also leaving some things alone. Additionally, they help people with recipes for their favourite meals, rather than buying pre-packaged and so on.
A lot of it is insanely annoying, but the core information is (in my opinion) worth it, for both the families on the programme, and people watching it.
But oh Dear God, those families are fucking pathetic. There’s lots of preconceptions about brands being preferred “because they wouldn’t be so popular if they weren’t the best” and so on, which drives me crackers.
The most recent one tonight, though, drove me crackers. One family member had been diagnosed as coeliac, and had spent six years eating salads he hated. Six. Fucking. Years. How does anyone end up eating stuff they don’t like for six bloody years? There’s no logic in it that I can see – unless they haven’t done any enquiries or research about what’s got gluten in and so on?
In this case they were buying loads of pre-packaged food – and I get that more, because they were so worried about cross-contaminating from their foods to his, and making him ill – but with no thoughts or understanding. I think the peak point for me was buying pre-packaged “gluten-free” rice, not understanding that all rice is gluten-free, in the name of Jesus H Pant-shitting Christ.
So yeah, it’s been an interesting series, but Holy DogEggs, some people are fucking lazy/stupid/pathetic*.
(* Delete as applicable)
Sporting Chronoclasm
Posted: Sun 10 July, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, Cynicism, Sport, Thoughts, Weirdness Leave a comment »Every year it boggles my mind that this weekend seems to be All The Sport – due to some epic scheduling, we always end up having the finals of Wimbledon on the same day as the British Grand Prix.
This year, we’ve also got the finals of Euro 2016, just in case we didn’t have enough bloody sport to contend with already.
Not that I care (in case you hadn’t guessed) as I won’t be watching any of it.
But seriously, how much organisation and planning does it take, to get three major sporting events to all climax/happen on the same damn day?
Slack Data
Posted: Fri 10 June, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, Customer Services, Cynicism, Domestic, Driving, Laziness, People, Privacy, SatNav, Security, Stupidity, Thoughts, Travel Leave a comment »In the car I hired last weekend, it had a load of built-in tech – Ford’s Sync system – that was quite interesting, not least for the fact that it worked really nicely and easily. Connecting my phone to the car was a doddle, the satnav worked well (and better than my usual stand-alone device in several ways) and it all just seemed pretty easy.
However. It’s obvious that it was designed for a standard “family car” scenario, rather than a vehicle that would be hired to many different users. Which makes sense, but leads to an interesting longer-term problem…
Basically, people are lazy – and don’t think about their data. So the convenience of connecting one’s phone to the car system for hands-free calls etc is great, as is the simple download of the phone’s address book to the system. But if you then don’t delete it when you take the car back to the hire place, it’s all available to the next user. The same applies to the satnav system – ‘recent destinations’ is a goldmine of activity, right down to house number and location. (And I suspect, with a bit of work, one could connect the destination to a phone number in that downloaded phonebook)
It just interests me, how little people care (or understand) about their information. I cleared down the whole car system before I returned it, which took less than five minutes all told. So it’s not much work, but it’s still work, which most people don’t seem willing to undertake.
I’ve suggested to the hire company that it should perhaps be part of the car sanitising process when it’s returned (or before it’s hired back out, whichever) although I realise that makes it more hassle for them, and there’s a lot of different setups in the various cars.
Of course, it’d be better if people cleaned up after themselves – or the car tech had a “forget everything” button/process (although that would still be too much effort for most people) that did the job. But that won’t happen until people realise how important this shit can be, and sadly that tends to only happen by negative paths/occurrences/events, and will always be learned too late.
Second Thoughts
Posted: Thu 21 April, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, Charity, Cynicism, Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), London, Stupidity 1 Comment »As I wrote a while back, I’ve signed up to the NSPCC’s “Climb the Gherkin” challenge in about eight weeks’ time. It involves walking (or, if you’re a lunatic, running) up the 38 flights of stairs inside the Gherkin in London to get to the top.
It’s fair to say, I’m having some doubts and second thoughts about the wisdom of it. It’s a lot of steps…
I’ve looked it up – because I’m an idiot – and now know that it’s over 1,000 steps to the top, and that’s making it all a bit real. There’s a lot of me to lift up that many steps, and really not many places where you can get to train or prepare for something like that.
I’ll still go, and I’m sure I’ll complete the challenge. It’s just that it might destroy me along the way…
Security Stupidity
Posted: Thu 24 March, 2016 Filed under: 1BEM, Design, Laziness, Milton Keynes, People, Security, Stupidity, Thoughts Leave a comment »Every so often, I’ll see a scenario that just leaves me utterly gobsmacked. Sadly, they’re usually based around security of some sort – for whatever reason, it’s something I’m generally pretty tuned in to, and aware of.
Yesterday’s one was an absolute blinder – and caused by a complete lack of thought/awareness.
While I was walking at lunchtime, the person in front of me was paying a bill over the phone. Using hands-free, so it was all done out loud. (I don’t quite get why some people use hands-free for conversations on mobiles while walking – particularly when they’re still holding the mouthpiece to their mouths anyway. People be weird)
That wasn’t so bad – he was entering the card details using the keypad, so in that aspect it was fairly secure. Not how I’d have chosen to do it, but hey, I’m not one to judge.
The bit where it all went tits up, though, was that the payment line then reads the numbers back to the user, as a confirmation. “If this is correct, press 1“.
It’s a scenario where the developers etc. have thought about how to confirm the card data, and it makes sense to read it back. They’ve just not seen the real-world situations where people then do these things in public, on hands-free speakers. But it meant that – were I a bad person – I’d have all of that guy’s card information (it even read back the CV2 validation number) which I could have made use of.
And in case anyone’s wondering, I did tap him on the shoulder when he’d finished the call, and explained that he really should get that card changed ASAP. If I could hear it, or if he does that on a regular basis, then the card is compromised, and it’s only fair to make him aware of it.
It’s up to him, of course – but the fact I told him his card number, expiry date, and CV2 (correctly – I really do need to get out more) certainly seemed to focus his mind somewhat…