This morning I’ve debated a fascinating logical conundrum with the security guard. Nice fella, we’ve had a few chats, with him sharing amusing anecdotes of car park securitydum. I know his name and he knows mine; we’re not friends as such but more than nodding acquaintances.

This morning he’s run out of the security hut with a turn of speed belying his 40-a-day rollup habit and advancing years. This unexpected manoeuvre caused me some consternation due to a high approach speed and partially committed move to dodge the barrier now occupied by my portly yellow jacketed chum.

Sketchy stoppy completed with some panache, I assumed he was desperate to impart some choice missive on how the chefs create their special mayonnaise or some such but no:

Continue reading “CHIP and PIN(g)” →

Here’s a tip; Nokia provide a simple key lock for your phone to prevent unintentional dialling. Use it. Here’s another; program a dummy number in the first phonebook entry for the time you neglect tip#1. And for the serially stupid here’s Tip#3 which must convey the complex nuances of speaking without thinking but can be summarised thus: Shut The Feck Up!

Experience is how the stupid categorise their biggest mistakes. Tonight I am truly experienced having extemporised to my work colleagues much that I know nothing about and a little I probably shouldn’t have shared. This is just pub talk at the end of a day when a thin corporate veneer prevents you from carrying out instinctively violent actions against the guilty. Which today included almost everybody.

So almost expected behaviour. Except for significant additional circumstances.

My boss, separated by half a mile, but connected through a combination of a forename starting with A” and my wanton abandonment of Tips 1, 2 and 3 gleefully listed to the entire exchange on his office speakerphone.

To be fair, he was trying to explain that I had inadvertently conferenced him in. Somewhat less fairly, my phone was buried deep in a suit pocket which prevented me hearing him. Still Nokia Mics are a bloody triumph of miniature engineering. I really wish they weren’t.

Powerful as the English language is, it cannot even begin to adequately portray the depth of the pit into which my stomach plummeted. Not can it properly document the white hot embarrassment felt on my discovery that PubGate” had gone global.

The only fading glimmer of light in this tunnel of cringe was my genetic inability to tell large fibs allied to a pathological hatred of talking behind people’s backs. Or into their phones as was the case here.

I’m kidding myself. It’s not really a glimmer is it?

The instinctive response is to pass the whole episode off as a indiscretion similar to jarring someone’s arm at the coffee machine. However Andy “ my boss “ is an infrequent reader of this blog and I can hear the bugger chuckling. Quite right too “ experience may finally have taught me that mobile phones, beer and ranting at the speed of stupid make very unhappy bedfellows.

I left the pub somewhat chastised and considered allowing a “Strand Suicide” taxi to administer the last rights, but even this small pleasure was denied me.

Normally at this time of night I’d put my phone on charge. But you know what? I don’t think I’ll bother.

I’m not having a good day.

At some previously undocumented point, cycling became my primary means of transport. Since I spend so much time commuting and so little time driving, this should be largely self evident. What’s more interesting is the way my perspective has flipped by switching from four wheels to two.

Twice this week I’ve re-aquainted myself with the joys of motorised travel and its’ not been a pleasant experience. Firstly the tetchy reunion of me and my car keys took far longer than expected as they’d virtually carbonised at the bottom of the key basket. Then in a moment of early onset Alzheimer’s I couldn’t remember how the radio worked. Or the lights. And the ventilation system was just a set of symbols I randomly prodded until the windscreen cleared.

Continue reading “Driving is officially “Hell on Wheels”” →

First on registering at http://www.technorati.com/ I find that 27.2 million blogs await my perusal. Twenty Seven point Two million. Take a moment to consider that – that’s a whole lot of people with too much time on their hands. What did we used to do rather than avoid our families, shun contact with real humans and, essentially, waste our life? Ah. I’m beginning to see 🙂

For amusment, I typed in “pickled hedgehog” and as I sort of suspected, the results were distubing.

Talking of disturbing and pointless, take a look at the ten oddest things to do with a USB port of which only the last is very very odd. The rest are mainly solutions looking for problems or the experiments of a diseased mind. I thought it was great.

But don’t get me started on the “cluetrain” which I’m not going to dignify with a link. I assume cluetrain was chosen as pretentious_bollox.com was already taken 😉

Tonight I caught the early train.

A swift and potentially career limiting exit allied with a spirited pedal to the station bought me just enough time. Time which I spent hastily locking the bike “ engage smug mode: with my frame attached lock “ and dropping the majority of my worldly possession while wrenching the key from my pocket. The remaining small change was enough for me to sprint breathlessly up the platform before ram raiding the train doors messenger style.

So yeah, I caught the early train but so did everyone else. This is the service that runs snail to harrow and then glacial onward to Aylesbury. But as the novelty of a Chiltern Railways’ train leaving on time never fades, it seemed appropriate to give it a go.

Continue reading “Merino wool “ stinky by design.” →

.. with politicians especially our venerable house of lords. Here’s an extract from Hansard.

Lord Quinton asked Her Majesty’s Government:
Whether they will take steps to ensure that bicycle users abide by the Highway Code.

Continue reading “I wonder why the electorate is not enganged…” →

Today, in no particular order, I lost the plot, my sense of humour and my underwear. Considering the circumstances, my mind is probably next. Doubt “ the fifth commuting horseman of the apocalypse “ had been my irritatingly smug riding buddy since I’d left the house this morning. Something was amiss or more precisely missing, but having stopped three times to confirm credit cards, security pass and lock-keys had failed to teleport from the sealed pocket in which I’d imprisoned them only minutes before, I didn’t know what it was.

It was almost a relief then “ on opening the courier bag “ to be confronted by an empty space where previously folded underwear had nestled. OK, I felt traumatised as only a victim of a panterectomy can, but at least the scratchless itch of doubt had finally been relieved.

Continue reading “Pants maketh the man.” →

If only to hear these pearls of wisdom from the staff (stolen from Cycling Plus)

Here is a list of actual announcements that London Tube train drivers have made to their passengers…
1) “Ladies and Gentlemen, I do apologize for the delay to your service.

I know you’re all dying to get home, unless, of course, you happen to be married to my ex-wife, in which case you’ll want to cross over to the Westbound and go in the opposite direction.”

2) “Your delay this evening is caused by the line controller suffering fromE & B syndrome: not knowing his elbow from his backside. I’ll let you know any further information as soon as I’m given any.”

3) “Do you want the good news first or the bad news?

The good news is that last Friday was my birthday and I hit the town and had a great time.
The bad news is that there is a points failure somewhere between Stratford and East Ham, which means we probably won’t reach our destination.”

Continue reading “Sometimes it’d be worth getting the tube.” →