Excessive Sportitude
Posted: Wed 26 June, 2024 Filed under: Cynicism, Domestic, Sport, Television Leave a comment »At the moment, things on TV seem to have gone sports-mad, and as someone that’s not into any of it, it’s *really* tedious.
Obviously there’s the Euro kickyball tournament, which appears to have been at least two matches every day for the last couple of weeks, with still another fortnight-ish to go (although the frequency of matches drops once the initial stages are done with)
Last week there was [a tennis tournament] that took over another channel – and this week there’s [a different one], followed next week by Fucking Wimbledon (to use its full title)
As if that weren’t enough, last week also involved televised coverage of horse-racing, for some fuckforsaken reason. I assume that’s just in case people felt there wasn’t enough sport on.
And the weekends seem to be full of bloody Grand Prix excitement tedium.
Then we’ve still got the Olympic and Paralympic Games to come (although at least they contain a wider range of things, some of which may even be watchable)
And of course then we’ll be back to the normal Kickyball schedule as well.
The only other alternative seems to be all the bullshit being spouted about the upcoming General Election. (Which would be far more interesting if we introduced Guillotines, in my opinion)
I’m sick and fucking tired of it all.
Finally Finished
Posted: Mon 26 February, 2024 Filed under: Cynicism, Domestic, Getting Organised 2 Comments »*Ages* ago (well before I moved) I bought a load of laundry pods because they were on a very good offer. (Reduced price and increased loyalty/rewards points, I think – might’ve been a multipack deal in there too) I might even have taken advantage of that offer twice – although that was mainly through forgetting I’d done it once already. Regardless, I then didn’t get round to using them.
When I moved, I realised I still had them, so decided to use them up before going back to the methods I prefer (liquid/gel rather than pods or powder) Somewhere along the line I also discovered I’d been using the pods incorrectly – turns out they’re supposed to go into the washing machine *first*, then the laundry on top , whereas I’d been using them in the same way as the liquid/gel methods. Live and learn, and all that.
Anyway, this is all a roundabout way of acknowledging that I’ve finally – *finally!* – just used the last of those sodding pods.
The next couple of laundry loads will be a comparison exercise – do I really notice the difference?
But for now I can’t deny, I’m just happy to be at the end of the pods.
Humbug
Posted: Mon 25 December, 2023 Filed under: Cynicism, Domestic, Festering Season 1 Comment »
And at last, Christmas Day is upon us.
That means that at least we’ll be getting rid of adverts for perfumes, excessive food, trite festive bullshit, and other horrors.
In return, we’ll now be seeing ones for holidays, diets, and stopping smoking. (I assume)
And we’ll be back to this old garbage in eight months or so.
In the meantime, may this bring to you and yours whatever works for you.
Festerous Advertising
Posted: Thu 2 November, 2023 Filed under: Advertising, Cynicism, Festering Season Leave a comment »“It gets earlier every year!”
We’ve entered November, and it seems like all the advertisers have gone “Fucking hell, Christmas is coming!“, so it’s all turned into a retail frenzy of fuckery. They’ve already thawed out Mariah Carey and Michael Bublé (Or “Mickey Bubbles” as I tend to call him) in ads, as well as a couple of other “celebrity-laden” ones where I know the faces and couldn’t give two shits about any of their names.
So by the time we’re on November 2nd I’m already sick of the entire bloody thing.
Bah Humbug indeed.
MOT Thoughts
Posted: Thu 21 September, 2023 Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Domestic, Driving, KwikFit 4 Comments »Following on from getting the car’s MOT Test done this week, I had a look back on the history of my car’s MOT tests (that’s just a link to the service, not to my specific vehicle) Something I find interesting on it all is the inconsistency of what’s reported as faults.
I’ve noticed it before – but even when using the same MOT Test Centre, they don’t seem to check the same things every year.
As an example – last year I had advisory warnings about corrosion to the rear doors, and to some suspension components. This year? Neither of those problems was mentioned at all – and I know I haven’t had any work done to sort them out!
It’s not just this test centre, either – the same was true when I was using the Kia dealership down in Milton Keynes, and I know was true with the Saab (an exhaust back box that was blowing one year and not the next, for example) and I thus assume for the Ford as well. (I didn’t really check/track then)
Obviously it’s meant more for looking at current serious faults that would make a vehicle dangerous – although in that case I don’t quite get why misaligned windscreen washers or headlights result in a failure rather than a “needs fixing” – but the lack of consistency on the historical ones just leaves me with a bit of a feeling of “This is all just subjective and/or guesswork, isn’t it?“
Finance Trials – Follow Up
Posted: Tue 22 August, 2023 Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Domestic, Finances 3 Comments »Following on from my complaint to the Financial Ombudsman about [Company A]’s fuckery, I got a response this morning from them.
Well, I say a response. More of an acknowledgement. With this in it…
We try to resolve complaints as quickly as we can. But there’s currently a very high demand for our service – so it might take around four months before a case handler gets in touch with you and starts looking into your complaint.
(That’s their emphasis on the timescale, not mine)
So on current evidence I’ll be lucky to hear anything at all before 2024…
Laid Waste
Posted: Thu 17 August, 2023 Filed under: Cynicism, Domestic, Green 4 Comments »One of the (admittedly silly) things I’m generally proud of is how comparatively little non-recyclable waste I generate here. When it comes to my bin-collection days, I’m usually quite surprised by how full the bins of my neighbours are in comparison.
Now admittedly the other households usually have more people in, and I take that into account – but all the same, those bins are filled to the brim most fortnights.
Mine seems to generally work out as one bag per fortnight, so I generally (unless it’s been stupidly warm, in which case I’d rather be rid) actually only put that bin out every other fortnight – and even then, it’s nowhere near full. I could probably get away with only putting it out every six weeks, to be honest.
On the other hand, I’d be considerably more stuffed if I forgot to put the recycling stuff out for collection. (I base that on knowledge, I messed up one day and missed it when the collection came far earlier than usual, and it was a pain in the bits to catch up!)
I know that, all things considered, it means precisely cock-all. But I’m still happy that I’m not landfilling much stuff at all. (Obviously most of my carbon footprint is taken up with idiot drives, rather than the waste I generate)