Full Metal Wheelbarrow

I'll bung this under a cut for people who don't watch Bones and don't care or do watch and don't want to read spoilers


( Rant about sex and TV... )

Copy this sentence into your livejournal if you're in a heterosexual marriage/relationship (or if you think you might be someday), and you don't want it "protected" by the bigots who think that gay marriage hurts it somehow.

 The eejits in Arizona want to pass into law that marriage is only between one man and one woman. Gay marriage is already banned in Arizona. I am once again astonished at the stupidity of which humans are capable :-(

Since I don't live in Arizona, I can only whinge about it on livejournal...

Arriva, our local bus company, have sent round a letter, telling us how they're investing seven million quid in Derby's bus services and buying fifty new buses in the next few months.

I think I'd be a tad more impressed if they hadn't just cut back the bus service to my village for the second time in three years....

Rob's been a supporter of Friends of the Earth for some time and thinks they're usually a splendid lot, but there's an article in the current issue of their magazine about which is rather miffed.

An online version of it may be found here .

It announces FoE going into partnership with green electricity company Good Energy, which is all very well, but...

Basically the bit Rob objects to is the part that says "Good Energy is the only 100 per cent renewable electricity supplier in the UK."

This is patently untrue because we have our electricity from another such :- Ecotricity

Now, I'm all for promoting green energy wherever possible, but doing so with untruths will only bring it into disrepute. Given that Good Energy have promised to donate £30 To FoE for every member who switches to their electricity and have a full page ad in the paper version of the magazine, it gives a very bad impression and is the sort of thing FoE would be jumping up and down and screaming about if they caught other people doing. And quite right too.

Promote green energy, yes. But do it honestly.

ETA :- caomhin  has quite rightly pointed out that Good Energy are indeed the only 100% renewable company and the others only offer 100% tariffs

However, in the paper version of the article, FoE claim that "Good Energy is the only UK electricity supplier to offer 100 per cent renewable energy"

That is misleading because it implies there are no other 100% tariffs at all.

I am getting more than a little ticked off with ITV.

First there's the idiocy reported by hooloovoo42  wherein they're missing out episode 2 of Pushing Daisies because they forgot they had some football to show and thus only had space for eight of the nine episodes, and now they seem to be taking Supernatural off for over a month for no reason that they've bothered to share with their viewers. Eejits.

Rob came home this afternoon and decided to call the greenhouse people himself.

Being rather fed up he suggested that if they didn't get it sorted he'd have to contact his credit card company and get the transaction revoked.

They then said they were expecting the parts in a week from today - so goodness only knows why they told me they'd be delivered yesterday, Wishful thinking perhaps? They also said I didn't need to be in for the delivery.

So we're looking at at least another week before we get the rest of the bits, assuming that they know what they're talking about this time. Argle.

Rang the greenhouse people today. The person on the phone was rather numb and vague, but the gist of what she said appears to be that while they had told me that the stuff was being delivered yesterday, no-one had instructed the delivery man to do so. Hmmph.

Allegedly they're going to try to deliver it at the weekend and will be phoning to let me know. In reality, I anticipate having to phone them again on Monday, this time employing my That's Quite Enough, Now Sort It Out voice.

The main problem appears to be that their desire to help far outstrips their ability to do so.

I am somewhat cheered by having found a nice copy of Finn Family Moomintroll at the charity shop. I do like the Moomins.

The weather is apparently going to be ghastly again at the weekend - I may go and cver my seedlings with bubble wrap later on.

You will probably be unsurprised to learn that, having got me to stay in all bloody day, the greenhouse people have utterly failed to turn up with the promised spare parts (or without them for that matter). I am Considerably Displeased.

If I get back from swimming tomorrow (postponed from this morning) and find a fracken note through the door to say they tried to deliver them but I was out I shall be Further Displeased and I may have to give someone a Stern Talking To. I shall be calling them to express my displeasure and disappointment in any case.

Bah! Bah! And thrice Bah!

A few weeks ago we bought a Tefal Quick Cup Kettle from the Tesco website.

Today, I went to Tesco at Ashby-de-la-Zouch and they had a huge stack of them - for ten quid less than we paid.

Now, normally, while I wouldn't be exactly pleased about it, I'd just shrug and think "such is life" and move on.

But, given that I had, shortly before buying the thing, visited this selfsame store and asked if they'd be getting them in and was told no, because the store was too small to stock them, you may not be surprised to learn that I am Somewhat Displeased.

I have emailed Tesco to express (politely) my displeasure. We shall see.

Meanwhile the greenhouse people have been in touch and have promised that we will get not only the missing/incorrect parts replaced but also the parts we need to put the full four roof vents in and a fifty quid refund. The nice lady on the phone also sounded genuinely contrite about the whole thing, which is good - it's always nice when the people resolving your problems actually seem to give a hoot.

...and someone presented you with a ticket, with a place name on it, might you tell them that the bus didn't actually go there and they needed to wait for the next one?

Yes, I should have been paying more attention too, I know, but still.

I got off the wretched bus after it turned back the way it came from. The offending ticket had been punched, and I wasn't going to get into an argument with another bus driver about it, and I was damned if I was going to buy another bloody ticket.

So I walked home. I reckon it was about four miles from the point I got off the bus. Luckily I had a carton of fruit juice to drink on the way. I also had a twelve pack of toilet rolls. It had a handle, but naturally that broke after a mile or so. I had a carrier bag with me, so I stuffed most of the rolls in that and the rest in my rucksack.

It wouldn't have been too bad if  it hadn't been for the wind - I had to take my hat off and stuff it in my rucksack, or I'd have lost it into the canal.

To give some idea of how windy it was, here is a picture of the waves on said canal :-



I was supposed to go to the Allotment Association's AGM this evening, but I'm so tired that I CBA.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go and make a little wax figure, dress it in a teeny bus driver's uniform and stick pins in it.  A lot.