Month: September 2017

And on it goes …

/ Tony / 1 Comment

So we are on day four of the new bathroom (weekends don’t count) and it seems (?) to be all going to plan. Well someone’s plan anyway. It does seem to be taking a long time. The guys are just on with the grouting of the tiles at the moment, and I understand that the cleaning of the tiles afterwards is a long job, due to the type of tile we have chosen. At the moment, there is the floor to lay, the toilet and sink to fit, the wall unit and under-sink cupboard to install, the lighting to install and fan to remove and finally before the cleanup, a new radiator to fit. They are supposed to finish by Friday … I’m not too sure about that. The main problem is that we can’t do anything. We have had to shut all three bedroom doors to keep the dust down which means that upstairs is out-of-bounds really. K*** has gone to have her nails done and to see her parents, but I have never been comfortable in leaving workmen alone in the house. Even those that we sort of trust. You hear so many stories of break-ins after work has been done. And they do like their tea/coffee breaks, which may account for the time factor.

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I did a silly thing a few weeks ago. It didn’t seem so silly at the time, but I am really regretting it now. You see when I left work, I had taken a copy of all the user guides, help documents and training manuals that I had written over the years.  I thought they would come in useful. Well about six or seven weeks ago, whilst (do you say ‘while’ or ‘whilst’?) doing a clear out of old stuff on my computer I took the random decision to dump them all. Now normally I would have copied them onto a CD just in case, but on this occasion I just deleted them. I now realise that it was a bad idea, as that kind of thing can come in useful when looking for a job.

I know that they were all in a single folder on the works computer network, and I have emailed a colleague a few times and asked if he could look for them, but he has not got back to me about them. He has been on leave, but I kind of get the feeling that he is not too happy with sending me them. I can’t be sure, but he either does not reply to the email or tactfully avoids the question. I think I may have to accept that for me, they have gone forever which is sad.

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More on the eldest lad’s predicament. After a lot of thought and input from others, he has decided that he cannot afford to keep the current house. His ‘ex’ has said that she would take it on under the same terms that she offered him. Basically, he would come off the mortgage and she would pay him a lump sum that equated to the half money that they had put into the property that could not be reasonably divided up. Thinks like carpets, lighting, appliances and the like. He is really up for this and me and K*** went to look at a new build not too much further away than he is now. It looked nice, but when he mentioned the location to his colleague, who knows the area, he was advised to not even consider it. It was a shame because it would have given him a three bedroom, semi-detached house at an affordable price. No amount of talking last night would change his mind. He is now looking at a new two bedroomed property, in an almost city centre location which, with a little help he could afford. This story could run for a long time.

Going to be a looong day …

/ Tony / Leave a comment

So, today is the day we are getting our new bathroom. R*** went gone off on respite at 9 am, and the fitters arrived a few minutes later. A combination of good planning and timing I think. The estimate is 7 to 10 working days, but from what I can see of the bathroom, 7 days is probably the more nearer timescale.

It comes though, at a time when lots of things seem to be going wrong. Eldest son, is splitting up from his girlfriend, which is a big issue in itself, but that’s compounded by the fact that they are buying a house together. He is on quite a low salary, but feels as we do that he needs to keep the house. Selling it would not realise the finance needed to pay off the mortgage, and would leave him in a financial hole that would be difficult to climb out of. K*** and her sister are with him this morning, talking to a mortgage adviser about his options. It has been a very stressful few days. He was hoping that it could be resolved quite amicably, but that does not seem to be happening. Then to cap it all, whilst he was taking his neighbours to the airport on Saturday, he managed to get himself a speeding ticket. That old adage of “It never rains, but it pours” seems more truer by the day.

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One of the things that annoys me on forums and similar websites, is some peoples lack of gratefulness. I mean when you help someone, surely the proper thing to do is at least acknowledge the helper if not thank them. Recently on one such forum, a member was having a problem. Another member had looked at it and could not help much. I felt I knew what the problem was and thought I knew how to solve it. I posted my views, feeling rather pleased with myself. The member that tried to help gave a virtual ‘pat on the back’ and told me that it looked like I had solved it. The original poster …nothing. I’ve just answered another post for another member. See what happens this time

Where does it come from …

/ Tony / 1 Comment

I don’t get many comments on my posts. This probably down to both the content and frequency of my writing, which I accept. It’s got to be good and often. But over the past couple of months, I noticed an increase in the amount of sp*m hitting my account. I was used to seeing 3 or 4 sp*m comments a month. Askimet seemed to be catching most of the offending content, and it all ended up in my Spam folder. It was a worry, that on one day in August, there was a total of 270 ‘comments’ in my Spam folder. The majority of these actually hit on one day. I deleted them and logged out. Just over a week later, when I decided to write the post about the August Bank Holiday, I again was drawn to the sp*m issue, when I saw that my Spam folder now contained over 300 items. Askimet at work again. How can I stop this?

I did the usual Google search and checked the many WordPress forums with varying amounts of success. One of the more helpful ideas was to enable a certain setting that the poster said worked for her. She advised that users should require all

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commenters to be registered users. This is found in the Discussion settings. I must admit, it seems to work as, since that day, there has been nothing pushed into my Spam folder. I’m not sure why I have not checked this setting before, but I suppose that the amount of junk I was getting before August was so low, that I did not worry about it.

My only worry now is that it might deter the casual reader. We shall have to see.

 

A little annoying …

/ Tony / 3 Comments

I’ve mentioned this before on here. I’m a knitter! I am sometimes tempted to call myself a ‘male knitter, but I do try to avoid that categorisation. I’ve been knitting since around 1965, so since I was around 10 years old. My grandmother taught me how to do the plain Knit stitch and my mother followed it up with cast on, cast off and the Purl stitch. I’m not a big fan of large knitting projects as I get bored with them. I’m currently 9/10s of the way through a sleeveless pullover for me and I’m fed up with it. It’s taken me since just after Christmas and to be honest, I don’t really  like it.  I think I’m gong to pull it all out, but K*** (who is not a knitter, so doesn’t understand) will have a fit! She cannot comprehend how I could do that. I think I will stick to smaller items in future. Hats, scarves and mittens that kind of thing. Things that are finished in a couple of hours/days.

Now that’s not the point of this post. No what is ‘a little annoying ’ is actually more than a little annoying, in fact, it’s very annoying. It’s the periodical stands in some shops and supermarkets

I enjoy reading knitting, and to some extent general crafting, magazines and I actually subscribe to one of the most popular knitting ones. However, I’ve noticed that in many shops, the knitting, sewing, crocheting and crafting magazines, tend to be bundled together next to or in the same place as the more specific ‘Women’s’ magazines. Now I don’t mind the odd looks I get when I pick up a copy of “L*** K***” magazine, but am not keen on the comments I sometime get. Only last month, I was rummaging through the magazines when a shop assistant asked me if I needed some help. I told her the magazine I was looking for but neither of us could find it. I said I was not too sure of the title, and to my shock the girl suggested that I ring my wife and check the title!  Her face was a mixture of horror, disbelief and amusement when I explained that the magazine was for me!

When I returned home, I wrote to the head office (it was a large supermarket chain) to explain my disappointment at this attitude. I did not mention the assistants name as it was not her fault, more the supermarkets policy. I’m still awaiting a reply, but have noticed that the said magazines are now located in a section called “Hobbies and Pastimes”. So a success I think.

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That’s it for now, but just reading this back … I really should try and write some positive posts.