Nerver miss a beat

I just have to say I really like the Kaiser Chiefs song, the title of which I've lifted for today's blog. It reminds me so much of high school, the apathy trying to fit in and thinking people were really cool, to cool for school even.
Today was a bit of a blur at work, I felt tired to start with and after being harassed I felt rather frazzled. My mood wasn't improved when I got to the gym to find I left my shorts at home, oops.
I went home had dinner and headed to my house, spent an while stripping some wall paper. I find stripping so dull and frustrating I can only managed to do small chunks at a time. To be honest I felt pretty frustrated the last few times I have gone to do work, everything take so long and there is still so much to do. I have to keep reminding myself of all the work that has been done on the floor, the heating and wiring. Eventually it will be a home rather than just a drain on my time/money/sanity.

Web cafe

I just got back from Birmingham where I was assisting Phil setting up an internet cafe at the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham. It was the third time I have helped out, and it went a log better than last time. There were a few mix ups to start with, for some reason rather than get the laptops together beforehand they were delivered to the site. That meant we had to rely on a windows installation Phil made before hand.
The cafe is funded by one of the stallholders at the event National cancer research. The stalls are all drug companies cancer charities and Universities. This year GlaxosmithKline sponsored so all the laptops had GSK screen savers and backgrounds.

There was also another smaller room of PC for previewing slides unfortunately we couldn't get in until Sunday morning, which meant an early morning call to finish all of the bits off.

We did get treated to a meal and a few drinks at Pizza express Saturday night and I got some cash for helping out which comes in very handy at the moment.

I left around mid day, I then had to drive Jim's Sprinter Van back to Manchester. Its was only the second time I have driven a van of any size the first being on the way down with Phil. It was good on the motorway, not so much fun when I nearly ran out of fuel because I had neglected to pay attention to the fuel gague until the light came on. I don't think trunk driving is for me, I was glad to get in my car and sputter home.

The state I am in

Sometimes everything is wrong. Lately a heck of a lot of things have been getting the better of me, my job and renovating my house have eaten away all my time and energy. I have put on a few kilo because I haven't had (or made) enough time to get to the gym or sleep. I got the Saab back from the garage but its still not right the only thing I can think to do is trade it in. This causes something of cashflow crisis though. Tomorrow I have to pay the plumbers as they have practically finished installing the central heating system tomorrow they just have a few small bits to finish off. That and the money I owe Nick is practically all of my savings exhausted and I still have a kitchen, flooring and decorating to do. Oh might need some furniture as well :S

I got to the house tonight to find two letters from utility companies. First one from Scottish Power, a final bill using estimated gas usage. They estimate I have used a heck of a lot more Gas than the 1 unit I have so I phoned to report that and to pay. After going through 3 levels of automated services I got a message telling me all of the operators were busy after which it hung up. Sigh, the other letter was from British gas telling me they were now suppling me gas only could I confirm the property they were suppling to was a flat in Milton Keynes, sigh. I spent 20 minutes on hold at the end of which the operator told me their computer system was down so could I call back another time. I was pretty enraged by this point, a phone call from Phil basically telling me he couldn't be bothered to get things organised for Saturday did little to improve my mood.

I went round to Martinas for some food and to watch Nip Tuck, my god its depraved and twisted. A murderous teddy bear making agent, cannibalistic newlyweds and self destruction seem to be the main themes. Her brother arrives tomorrow, he doesn't speak English and is apparently wary of meeting too many people so I may or may not get to meet him.

Banks still suck

I needed to pay the plumbers tomorrow and after last times fiasco I thought I better ring up first.
I explained the situation to the call centre worker who dutifully informed me that Alliance and Leicester branches do not hold large cash deposites but that he could arrange me to make a withdrawal from a local post office. This dosnt exactly lend me confidence in the bank in fact I pretty much feel that when I sort out my house I will be moving banks.
If anyone actually has a bank they can reccommend please comment or send me an email.

Whos money (Banks Suck)

I had a pretty hectic day yesterday quiet a few things went a bit pear shaped both at work and personally. I got especially pissed off with Alliance and Leicester. I needed to get a lump of cash (£1000) to Nick to pay for various materials for the house.
I walked into Bramhall branch had to wait for what seemed like an age. It was the usual story only one teller working with several other staff standing around generally ignoring the growing queue. My money is in a savings account linked to my main account so firstly I asked to move the money between my accounts. I was told the only way I could do this was to use the internet or the phone banking. I responded I expected a teller to be able to do this and I needed to withdraw said cash so I didnt see much point leaving the queue only to rejoin it to get the money. She kept on telling me that she couldn't help. She then went on to tell me my account had a £250 daily withdrawal limit. At this point I basically hit the roof and demanded either my money or I would close my account and come back with a baliff to collect it. She offered to make an exception, I thought exception, how is that, this is a bank its my money I am perfectly entitled to withdraw it.

I walked out with my money, paid Nick and drafted a letter of complaint, I'll let you know how it goes.

In Bruges

Friday night I fixed a PC for the cousin of an ex customer. Her old laptop was so slow it took over an hour to copy her photos to my memory stick (usb 1.0 slow slow slow) and 4 minutes to copy them onto her new laptop! After that amusement I headed to Wilmlsow with Russell. He headed back to university on Saturday so it was the last chance to meet up. Its a little strange going meeting up someone after several years gap, but we had a nice chat he looked around the house. We met Phil in the Rectory he had been for a meal with his parents and was already drunk by the time we arrived. We had a long chat about women, Russell seemed to know half of the girls in there but hadn't capitalised on it. I drove so got to watch thm both get more and more drunk until the conversation headed so far south it was time to leave.

Saturday, I spent the morning getting a new website for work up and running. Well the infrastructure anyway. The web designer needs to do the rest. It went pretty well though I feel a lot more confident about the new strategy, I just hope its successful so I can secure my job. Saturday afternoon Martina cycled round and helped me strip some paper from the living room ceiling. Bruce popped in just as we were finishing up, he and I chatted about how to route cables.

I got home in time to find Jono showing off his new chainsaw, yes Jono bought a chainsaw, not just a little one either a Makita petrol chainsaw, its a beast. I am kind of scared what he will do with it!

I went for dinner at Martina's, she made plum pie and I piked salad leaves from her garden. We ate the plum pie with smarties ice cream, yum! Neither of us have any money so we stayed in and watched TV, Saturday night tv is rubbish, no good films no decent shows boo!

Today has been a good day, after the endless rains of summer today was sunny hot and rain free. I tried to amend some issues with the web server then headed to the house. Nick was repairing the crushed flags so I decided to strip some more paper. I have discovered that stripping wallpaper is a truly thankless task. You scrap and scrap and very slowly clear patches, Nick told me he hates it so much that usually he just smashes off the plaster and starts again from fresh. Unfortunately I can't quiet run to that sort of expense. I managed to clear two walls in the master bedroom though Ill have to go over them again with the steamer. I was getting fed up of stripping and with the good weather I decided to put up my new light.

This evening I went for a jog which made me feel good so I celebrated by eating chocolate and drinking beer while watching In Bruges. In Bruges is a film about two contract killers hiding out in Bruges, set against the beauty of Bruges Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson evaluate their lives as contract killers while meeting prostitutes, Canadians and Dwarfs.

Phil and I drank Stella Artois "Triple filtered smooth lager". It was actually very nice, at 4% not as strong as normal Stella but a lot more tastey and only £3 for 4 cans at Tesco, Bargain.

A secret tour

I had the day off today kind of, somehow I managed to be roped into going to not one but two meetings which ate up the majority of the day. Both meeting were fruitful so it was a pretty good, even if I should have been working on my house.
Talking of which a kitchen designer arrived this morning, he is going to draw up a plan of the kitchen including thinking about the best place to put the door.
This evening I went with Bruce on a British Computer Society arranged tour of Hack Green. It is amazing to see what Nuclear weapons look like, and what the government had planned for Britain in the event of a Nuclear war.
The guys running the tour let out all sorts of facts including that a number of Russians have visited Hack Green and told the owners that they had planned not to invade the UK but simply bomb it out of existence as we were (are) effectively an aircraft carrier for the US. Also the 4 minute warning plans involved dissolving the government leaving the country to be governed by regional seats (of which Hack Green would be one) and closing supermarkets and petrol stations taking the good into government control, scary stuff. All in all it was a fascinating place to visit for anyone with an interest in defence.