Protected: On Pastures
Rests, Returns & Waitresses
Soooo, nearly three weeks without an update, but the good news is that rather than being a layabout, I've been (largely) hard at work on the novel, and I'm getting pretty pleased with the state of things so far. At the moment I have the first 5 issues sewn up, a further four needing a second draft, and the bones of a story arc in place for a second narrative thread. I had a good meeting with the Jonic about developing the site itself, and while I don't think I'm anywhere near ready to launch, the progress is ongoing in a way that it hasn't been for months. A lot of this is down to having the support of a girlfriend who doesn't mind me buggering off to work upstairs of an evening and even kicks my arse a little to make sure I do. That this coincides with her wanting to watch Big Brother is, I am sure, a coincidence.
As well as working hard, Ellen and I both took all of last week off to spend time with our lovely little lady. Over the course of the summer a general lack of funds coupled with a plethora of events such as moving house have conspired to prevent us from doing a lot that is Rosie-centric this summer, so we decided to redress the balance. Rather than spend a week away somewhere (which we will be doing later in the year with a trip to Devon) we decided to take advantage of the many local summery things that are convenient and cheap and have the added advantage of being close enough to mean we could spend the nights in our own beds. And so over a packed week we went to Leeds to Tropical World and a lovely walk through Roundhay Park, to Scarborough for a lovely day at the beach, to Waterworld in York, and one lovely afternoon for Ellen and I in a beer garden whilst Rosie had a day at Nursery. To cap it all we then tested how excellent our daughter is by taking her to her first festival, Moor Music. I reviewed the festival itself for Demon Pigeon here, but it's worth noting that Rosie had a fantastic time and seemed to enjoy sleeping in a tent more than she does in her own bed. So it turns out our daughter is very excellent indeed. But then we already knew that.
Of course the downside to taking a week off work is that you have to return to work itself. But you can't have everything. I may have a password protected post going up over the next day or so, when that happens feel free to email me or hit me up on Twitter if you are so inclined and I'll provide said password.
Last night Ellen and I watched one of the myriad films that is currently clugging up our V+ box (we're verging on having enough to start our very own To Watch Pile) a thoroughly charming little film called Waitress, which I confess I had recorded simply for the presence of a Mr Nathan Fillion, but which surprised me by being in turns warm and dark and funny and sweet. On top of that, I'd say it was the first Rom Com I've seen in as long as I can remember where I honestly didn't see the end coming. Highly recommendable.
Monsters and Resolutions
'Jesus Christ!'
This was the response of the nice lady from the disconnections team at Virgin Media when I recounted my tale of woe to her. As promised, I took the bull by the horns and phoned up to cancel my account with them, armed with the fresh knowledge that the £30 recommend-a-friend discount hadn't gone to my chosen friend either. The woman on the other end, who I imagine cannot have the nicest of jobs working in the disconnection team, was obviously authorised to do more than anyone else I had spoken to previously, and after she had spent a good five minutes apologising for the incompetence of her colleagues, she has now arranged a delivery tomorrow of a shiny V+ box, and my wireless router. Of course I won't entirely believe it until I am recording programmes at my leisure, but there you go. A little bit of persistence and eventually getting through to someone with the sense to do what was promised initially, and I have exactly what I wanted. So that's nice. Thanks again for everyone who sent advice on here and on Facebook, you lovely good good people. And apparently the £30 discount will come through after we've been paying on time for 3 months, so don't worry Jen.
So hopefully this tale will only need to be a trilogy of posts, I'll be very disappointed if I have to return to write a fourth installment. But onto other things. In the last few days I've really started to grasp how cool my phone is, as it seems to be able to play YouTube videos at a rather nice quality, even given a general paucity of connection. Honestly, aside from a few stutters, it's able to play videos when my connection is snot strong enough to even send a tweet. Yesterday I finally got around to watching something that a good many friends have told me about, Zomblogalypse. This is a web series made by some friends of a friend, and as such I wasn't expecting that much from it, in the same way you never really expect a huge amount when someone tells you about their mate's band. But actually this is lo-fi horror heaven, brilliantly scripted and acted, and funny as anything put together by more famous zomcom creators. On the bus home yesterday and the bus to work this morning I managed to cane the whole first series, and can't wait to travel to work tomorrow to get cracking on series 2. I'm also immensely jealous that I didn't come up with it first. Click on the image below to go check it out.
Also, I am currently listening to the full Glastonbury set by Radiohead from a few years back, which is every bit as splendid as I remember from watching it on TV, and it's all thanks to my little Android. Cheers little buddy.
Impatience and Virgin
It has now been six days since my missive to Virgin Media, and I have yet to have a response. I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and give them until the end of play tomorrow, and then I am going to call them and tell them to come get their stuff. I did try and get in contact with their twitter team, who seem to be trying to deal with the tidal wave on constant complaints with a calm and helpful manner. It seems they trawl twitter for any mention of them, and then respond accordingly. Rather than wait for them to spot me, I sent the following message to them:
To which they responded:
So now I learn that rather than the two days to resolve things that I was promised on the phone, it could now be as long as 28 days, which would conveniently take me out of my standard 28 period to cancel. And so I sent back:
To which they responded…. Well, they didn't in point of fact.
I don't really think that I'm stretching it too much to say that you are hardly reaching your service level promise of a response within 48 hours if you send a generic automated response within seconds of receiving a complaint form. If that were the case then where I work I would just stick my out of office response on saying 'Hi, I've not read your mail, but I'll get round to it eventually' and I'd never get in trouble for not doing my work. Of course I wouldn't do this, because I'm not a bastard, which is more than I can say for some media companies.
They have until the time I get home tomorrow to respond. Oh, and thanks to everyone who left helpful suggestions on the previous post, rest assured they have been studied and will be held in reserve in case of emergency.
Other than that, the good news is the writers block is gone, thanks in no small part to the Virgin letter. Since then I've put two posts up at Demon Pigeon, one of which went down so badly with my fellow members of staff that I have a nasty feeling I may get a visit in the night and the swift removal of my testes. To be fair though, it's a terrible review of an awful album, but one which I inexplicably love anyway. Oh, and I've lined up an interview with one of the most influential bands of the last 30 years too, so that's nice.
Service please
As I mentioned before, I am really suffering with writers block at the moment. I have managed to write one thing though, a bit of a missive to Virgin Media for the terminally awful piece of shit they call 'service.' I thought I might post it here, just on the off-chance that I can later try and persude them that you dear readers are numbered in the tens of thousands, and that I am what they call in marketing terms 'an arbiter of taste.' This also means I don't have to try and go through it all again, as typing anything seems to fill me with a certain amount of unspecified dread, roughly akin to when you have a hangover and have that guilty feeling that you just can't shake all day. But anyway, what follows is my letter to Virgin. It's not one of the comedy letters you see so often and that can be rather wonderful, mainly because they are easily dismissable, and I want a resolution.
"I am writing to complain about being mis-sold a package on Virgin by one of your sales staff. I initially was looking at a range of options for my new home, amongst which was Virgin. Having entered a few details onto your website I got a follow up call from one of your agents, and discussed the matter further. I had looked at getting the bundle which included Broadband L (which included the wireless router), TV M+, and phone M, as well as the V+ box with associated costs. I ran through the details with him over the phone, and he said that if I could call him back he would be able to get a better deal for me. I looked into it further and decided to call him back.
At this stage he offered me various discounts, including dropping the one off charge for the V+ box. We discussed this in specifics as I explained to him that I was not all that bothered about the HD aspect, as I don't have a HD TV, but I really wanted the V+ aspect. He informed me that the HD box was the V+ box, and so I agreed.
We moved into the house and managed to get everything set up, although was a bit annoyed to find that my router had been downgraded to a non-wireless kind, this was never mentioned. But when I came to try the V+ box I was very upset to find that it actually was just an HD box, without the V+. I immediately phoned your customer services centre and spoke to someone called *******, who was extremely rude, told me there was nothing he could do and that he also couldn't get me a manager to speak to, but that he would get one to call me back within an hour.
That call never came, so I phoned back, and this time spoke to someone whose name I didn't catch, but they told me that there was no problem, and that you could send me out the V+ box, but not until my account had finished setting up on the system, and that I should phone back the next day.
I called back the next day, and was told that it still wasn't set up, but that I would get a call the next day to confirm sending out my V+box.
Two days later I still had not received a call back, so again I called your centre, only to be told I could not get the V+ box that was promised to me, as I had not paid for it. Eventually I was told that I could purchase one for £100, or by upgrading to the XL TV package.
In summary, I am very disappointed by this service. The box that I do have is completely useless to me (it also has a nice habit of crashing just as I am in the middle of watching something, if only I had V+!) and the V+ box was one of the main reasons I took your service, and was explicitly promised to me as being within the package I was signing up for. I would like you to look back over my account and listen to the various calls to me and from me on ******** , and once you have confirmed this, I would like to be sent both the V+ box, and a wireless router.
If this is not resolved, I will be cancelling my contract immediately and going to one of your competitors.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Paul"
Interestingly, I was promised over the phone that if I sent a letter of complaint I would get a definite response within 48 hours. It turns out that what I would get is an immediate automated response which say's, and I quote:
"Hi Paul,
Thanks for the email you sent to us on *********. We're on the case and a member of our team will get back to you as quickly as possible, usually within 5 days. Don't forget - if there's anything else you'd like to know, just log on to our website. It's at www.virginmedia.com"
How utterly helpful. What's the betting that I don't get a response within 5 days?*
So there you go. The world's most blatant attempt to circumvent writers block. Hopefully it will have worked, and I can write something somebody may actually want to read.
*I actually wrote this two days ago now, so by reckoning, Virgin will get back in contact with in exactly 'when hell freezes over' days time.
Utterly redundant
I have often heard the old line that moving house is one of the most stressful things that you can do, but I've never really understood it. Throughout my life I have moved on a pretty regular basis. In fact I would say the longest I have ever lived in one house would be about four years, and at one point in my childhood I remember that there were 8 moves in two years. The result of this is that I no longer fear the 'dreaded move.' In fact, I rather enjoy it, with the promise of reinvention that it offers each time, the chance to make new a home. Until now.
Ellen and I have been looking for a new house for over a year, off and on, although we've only really been serious about it since January. We're renters, so the stress involved in buying and selling houses is something that doesn't really apply to us, but we soon found ourselves in a market where the landlord is king (or queen) and there are far more people looking for places than there are places themselves. Time and time again we would find a place, only to find that it had already been snapped up by what Daisy Steiner would call 'psychic house hunters.' But then, finally, we found a nice three bedroom place in a not great but not too awful part of Acomb, with a nice big garden to boot. On this occasion we weren't too late, and deciding not to over think things too much, we snapped it up.
Now, it's less than two weeks until we move and the wheels are starting to come off. Our finances are being somewhat tested by the fact that we need to find rent and bond, as well as money for a sofa bed, bookcases and a lot more besides. We went up there on Friday and discovered that the whole house needs repainting, rather than the one small patch of wall that we spotted when we first looked around, and today we have found out that the white goods (fridge, freezer, washing machine etc) that we were assured were part of the property are, in fact, not. So suddenly we are looking at having to find the money for everything we already knew about, as well as at least three rather expensive items and redecorating costs, all in the space of two weeks.*
This is all solvable, of course, but this is more in the way of headaches that I am used to when it comes to moving, and it come on the back of five months of hard slog to even get to this point. I cannot wait to be in the new house, but I just wish things could be simple again, when you just packed up your stuff and moved it. Anyway, grumble over. I was going to talk about the ongoing melee that is the hung parliament, but by the time this gets posted it's likely to be redundant, and I expect we'll see an announcement today or tomorrow, but I have to say one thing. As far as I can see, and as much as I hate the Tories, the Lib Dems have no option but to get into Government with them, either in coalition, or through a general agreement. Why? Because for years the Lib Dems have been talking about Proportional Representation, and this is exactly the kind of result that PR would throw together on a regular basis. This is their only real chance to show the country that the system they advocate would work, and Clegg has to know that the public wouldn't view a Lib/Lab coalition the same way. Cameron won the election, not enough to get a majority, but he is the clear winner and the Lib Dems need to understand that, even if they don't like it. Hell, I don't like it, but Clegg needs to think not just of his supporters and back benchers, but the country as a whole. Pull this off, and he will be seen as the usher of a new era of politics. To his credit, it seems that he thinks the same way, even if he's having trouble convicing the rest of his party.**
*Since typing this, and after about 5 conversations with the estate agents, a compromise deal has been hammered out on the white goods. Which pretty much throws this whole blog post into redundancy, but hey, I'm gonna make you sit there and read it all anyway. I did well at negotiating though, they should put me in charge of the government.
**For fuck's sake. Just as I'm entering this, Brown goes on the news and announces joint talks with Lib Dems as well as his intention to step down. It's too soon to make any sense of this really, although I am torn between being really happy on an instinctual level, (not least with the idea of seeing Cameron's face right now) and thinking it's a terrible terrible idea to get into bed with Labour, for all the reasons outlined above.
A week off.
Since I have been so utterly terrible at updating this year, I could very well have not bothered and you would nary have noticed a thing, but I just wanted to say that I am not going to be around at all next week. Instead, I shall be celebrating my birthday (31! How the bloody hell did that happen?) in Amsterdam with my lovely Ellen. And I cannot wait.
Amsterdam is one place that I have always wanted to visit, for reasons that will be spectacularly obvious to anyone who knows me well. A city full of art, culture, canals (hey, I'm a sucker for canals) and liberalism that wears itself pretty proudly on its sleeve, and in its cafes. I have always hugely admired the Dutch, largely because their liberalism has never really been questioned or attacked, and as a result they have blossomed into a cultural heaven. So a huge amount of thanks go to Ellen for the idea, the tickets and the hotel.
I have to say though, there are two things about the trip that give me pause. Firstly (and by far the most importantly) this will be the longest we've spent away from Rosie, and while I have total confidence that she will be absolutely fine with her Auntie Ruth for the week, I fear that we will fare less well. We shall just have to get through it by having a wonderful time.
Secondly, having gotten my lovely HTC Hero and remained obsessed with it ever since, I am going to have to leave it behind, along with all Internet, lest we become bankrupted by roaming charges. This will be the longest I have gone without the 'net for years now, and I'm quite interested to see how I handle my withdrawal.
But of course nothing will compare to being on a glorious holiday with the woman I love, drinking, smoking and immersing ourselves in the mass of culture that is Amsterdam. In the meantime, if you could all continue to leave suggestions for charities in the comments, there have been some excellent ones already, but I want more before I make my decision.
Potentially Stupid
It's been a pretty big year so far, all told. I don't really need to go into it, I'm sure you're well aware. However, Year of Health has recently lost Ellen as a contributor, and to be honest has not been updated nearly enough. One of the issues is that it's not the most wildly exciting topic to write about, and now that Ellen's not doing it any more, I am now left with the prospect of having two entirely seperate blogs. And since Demon Pigeon started, I already have less to write about here, with all the music and film talk migrating over there.
So, one of the things I really need to do if redefine this place. And one of the first things I am going to do is ask you, my loyal readership, for your opinion. Firstly, what do you think I should do with this place? I have had a blog far too long to get rid of it now, and yet I find it very hard to find things that would be interesting enough to share with you, my dewar and loyal readers, who are far too discerning and intelligent a breed to fob off with half formed thoughts and gibberish. See what I did there? I paid you a compliment, now answer my question.
But before you do, I do have a second question, and this one is much more important. I am debating with myself the merits of taking on a further stupid project (not another website, don't worry) this time in relation to Year of Health. It's something that ties in really well with what I am already doing, and will give me added impetus now that the initial stages are complete (I think it's safe to say I am a non-smoker now.) But what I have in mind will also require the selection of a charity to do it for.
But which one? I do have a few favourite causes that I could do it for, NSPCC, Oxfam, Amnesty etc. But to be honest the money I raise will probably be not very high, and certainly for these sorts of organisations nothing to write home about. If I am going to do this (and I must stress I haven't decided to do it yet) I would like it to be for a smaller organisation that would really benefit from the tawdry and pitiful amount that I will be raising. I was really inspired by what Gray did with Twitterthon, doing it all for a small organisation that most of the people who donated had never had any cause to donate to. The problem is that I have no real personal ties to any such organisation.
So here's what I would like. If you could recommend a charity to me, along with the reason that you think it's worthy of support, and whoever does the best job of convincing me will be the winner. Not particularly democratic, maybe, but that's how I roll baby. Ideally I am looking for something small, and maybe a bit out there. But I leave it in your capable hands.
Um, anyone still there?
So it's official, I am utterly shit.
Having promised not to let my extracurricular activities preclude me from updating this place, the truth is that Year of Health and Demon Pigeon (not to mention the fallout of that business at the tail end of last year) have been keeping me pretty busy of late. Incidentally, both sites are now live, and I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the results, both in terms of the lifestyle change that Year Of Health has enacted within me, and in how Demon Pigeon has turned out, given it's my first foray into the wider world of 'doing the internet' properly. If you haven't done so yet, do go check them out.
But enough of the digital pimping, what else is new with me? Well, I'm in a new job, so that's nice. Things are going pretty well at the moment, although I'm bloody knackered by the end of the day. Ellen got me the complete Buffy box set for Christmas, and to my pleasant surprise she's really enjoying watching it with me at the minute, and we're not even up to the bit in season two when it all gets really bloody good. You know the one, where the person does the thing? Yeah, you know. Don't pretend you don’t.
I saw Avatar twice at the cinema, both times in 3d. The first time I was staggered by the sheer beauty of it, and the second time I realised that under all that brightly coloured 3d fauna there lay at the heart of it a distinctly average film. I'm going to be interviewing one of my all time favourite bands, and even if it is going to be via email that's pretty bloody cool. Oh, and I've become a Gleek.
So I just wanted to pop by and let you all know that I'm still here, which I am, and that I fully intend to update this more often, well aware as I am that I owe you good people a lot of Cross Blogination posts. The fact that it's my turn as well should spur me on a bit.
So how are all of you?
A new one just begun
So first of all, a very happy new year to you all. Last night was a pretty low key affair, seeing as Ellen was working until 10 at night and then started at 8 this morning, so we made do with a bottle of wine and the car crash of entertainment that was Jools Holland's Hootenanny, but we still managed to salvage a lovely night out of it.
But of course this being the first day of a new year, you'll be expecting resolutions, and lots of them. Well, there is one big one, and a few smaller ones. But the main one is a project that starts today, which I would like to officially unveil for you! Year of Health is a joint project my me and Ellen to get fit over the course of a full year. I wont go into any more detail than that for now, but please feel free to visit the site and give us much needed encouragement.
Other than that the big aims are to get Demon Pigeon launched this month (provisional logo artwork is very cool) and to launch the main Blood On The Motorway site by the end of the year. I will also be gutted if I haven't passed my driving test and moved house this year.
All in all I'm feeling pretty positive about the year ahead, or at least I would be if I didn't need a cigarette so badly. I hope that wherever you are reading this your hangover isn't too bad, and I hope all my readers have a very happy 2010.
Archives
Categories
Listening To
Blogroll
- Ariane Sherine
- Between the Hammer and the Anvil
- Diary Of A Ledger (Cross Blogination partner in crime)
- Do Some Damage
- Glass Onion
- Jay Stringer
- Jennie Park
- Miss Smidge
- My Name is Mommy
- Quite Random
- the electric interfunt
- The Enemies of Reason
- The No Show
- The Secret Little Portobello Mushroom
- [last year's girl]
Recent Comments
- Paul on Protected: On Pastures
- Si on Protected: On Pastures
- last year's girl on Rests, Returns & Waitresses
- Paul on Rests, Returns & Waitresses
- Joe on Rests, Returns & Waitresses