Cars

Is it that important ?

/ Tony / 2 Comments

I was driving back from picking up a parcel from Argos. The road is a single carriageway and whilst not like a switch-back, there are some tightish bends. The majority of the time, the speed limit it 50mph, but for a stretch of about 2 – 2½ miles, the limit is 40mph. Many people ignore this limit as you would expect. So I was motoring along in 50mph zone when I noticed in my mirror that an Audi was tailgating me. Honestly, he was that close, I could almost smell his aftershave. He kept moving nearer the centre of the road to try and pass, but the traffic on the other side was to busy. Of course, when drivers do that to me, I tend to slow down. So now I’m travelling at 42/43mph and I can see he is getting irritated as he now has to slow down. Soon we get to a stretch of road that is a long bend. It is not tight, and he sees his chance to get past. I’m now up to the correct speed, so he has to go at least 65mph to pass me. Which of course he does.

When you get to the end of the bend, and the road begins to straighten, there is a layby and that is where the mobile speed camera usually sits. Not every day, but most days. Today was one those days. A mile further up the road and my Audi friend is waived into the next layby by the waiting police patrol car. I tried not to laugh.

So is his journey so important that he has to drive in that manner?

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Over the past year or so, I have had the tendency to ‘follow back’ most who followed my blog. But it had got the stage where I was following over 200 sites. Many of these were commercial sites trying to sell me something and many hadn’t posted anything for some time. So this morning, before I went out, I sat down and went through all those that follow me and ‘un-followed’ anyone who had not posted for more than a month. There was one follower that had not posted since 2016! I have an idea that most will not even notice and the majority of those that do notice, will not care. I’m now down to a more reasonable 103.

So if you are one of the above, it’s nothing personal.

Not sure if I enjoyed it …

/ Tony / 1 Comment

Hyundai – York

It was that time of year again, when my car needed a service and it’s MOT. We have been using the same garage since we bought the cars. Minstergate at York was the dealership that we bought both my car and my sons car. They have treated us well over the years and it’s a place we have some trust in. What we tend to do, is to drop both cars off in the morning, then get the ‘Park & Ride’ bus into York for the day. It is something we have done now for 7 years.

Both cars were dropped off at 10:00 and we set off for the 15 minute walk to the ‘Park & Ride’. The company used to give us a lift to the ‘P&R’ but with the virus, that has stopped for the time being. But it was dry and there was a footpath so not an unpleasant short walk. The only hindrance was the occasional cyclist who didn’t seem to care when they passed pedestrians.

The journey into York was okay. People were wearing their face coverings and keeping apart, except for the obvious family groups. We got off the bus and began to wander around the city. The idea was that we would look in a few shops, the go for lunch (we had booked a table at Ask Italian) then look at a few more shops before heading back the the garage.

This is where I began to feel a little uncomfortable!

The shops were mostly fine. Limiting the number of customers when busy, with people keeping their distance. I say ‘mostly’, it was the children that were the problem. They just didn’t seem to care where they walked. Of course there was the odd customer or two that did not seem to grasp how to wear a face covering. But you get them everywhere. The restaurant was good. Table numbers were limited and well spaced. They were all sanitised when a customer left and they seemed to have got the place as pretty well as safe as they could.

Ask Italian – The Grand Assembly Rooms – York

No, the place I felt most uncomfortable was in the streets. The whole idea of ‘social distancing‘ seemed to alien to most people. People would pass you very closely or walk up behind. One person got so close that I could almost feel his breathe on the back of my neck. I could actually hear the person he was talking to on his mobile phone. It was not a nice experience. Although, the place I expected to be the worst, was realistically the safest part of the city centre. That was the outside market. Almost everyone was doing what they should do. Again it was children that seemed to be the issue.

So not the best visit to York I have had. Here’s hoping the next time will be better!

Is it that difficult …

/ Tony / 3 Comments

I’m moaning talking about driving. Not Formula 1, Moto-Cross or one of the myriad of other motor sports, I just mean everyday driving. Commuting to work, taking the kids to school or the weekly Tailgatingshopping expedition. I would like one of those cars that do not have to obey the legitimate speed limit. I don’t mean the emergency vehicles, no the ones I’m ranting ‘talking’ about are  those cars whose driver seem to think that because their car is bigger and more expensive than mine, they should be in front of me. They tailgate so close, just waiting for the opportunity to overtake. Half the time, I will end up catching them when they get to the next traffic lights or junction. Are these people so important that they have to always be the first in the line. I tend to liken it to bullying “Get out of my way, I’m better than you!”

Then there are the ones that have not adjusted their headlights to the correct angle. They always look like they are using full beam. It can be really dazzleSpeed Humpng when they go over a speed hump. While I’m on the side-subject of speed humps, why do some people like to speed-up between humps? I may have griped mentioned about this before, but there seem to be an increasing number of drivers that have an aversion to switching their lights on when it is raining. It can be so difficult to see a dark grey Volvo on a dark grey tarmacked when the light is poor and the rain in falling. Just because they can see others does not mean the opposite is true.

But a vehicle I would like to drive, is one of those vehicle that have the ‘Highway Maintenance’ sign on the back of their vehicle. I’ve seen the sign on the back of small vans,Highway Maintenance flatbeds, transit vans and even a few cars. I may be totally wrong about them, but most of them seem to be the worse for wear and look like they have not seen a MOT test in years. Most seem to have no regard for the rules of the road and drive like complete idiots (my opinion). They also appear to be able park anywhere they like, regardless of the danger to other road users.

Now the above does not apply to all the users mentioned, but it does in my opinion, apply to a great number of them.

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So that’s motorists out of the way and I spouted  talked about cyclists some time ago, so my next road diatribe discussion may be pedestrians. Possibly the most dangerous aspect of the outdoors experience.

Scary times …

/ Tony / 6 Comments

That has to be the scariest 30 seconds for years.

K**h has a Mini Cooper Countryman car. She has had it since 2016 and loves it. Last week, CarSaturday to be precise I noticed a chip and a crack in the windscreen. It was very low down on the driver side and it was only by accident that I saw it. She phoned the Insurance explained and they said the price taking into account the excess and arranged for the replacement to be done today. She is at my son and his partners house today and left me in charge for when A**ogl**s turn up.. He arrived just before 11:00 and the first thing he told me was that the car needed to be turned around.

Arghhh

The problem is … I have never driven this car … ever. I tried when she got it, but I was not comfortable and found it very i10 Classisdifficult to actually see where I was driving. As a result, I simply haven’t attempted to drive it. So when the engineer said I had to turn it around, I nearly died. My car is a small Hyundai i10 which I have no issue with at all, but these days driving anything else scares me. But … I did it … I managed to reverse it out of the drive, drive it into the small parking area and then reverse park it. All in all it was about 20 yards in total but it was the scariest 20 yards/30 seconds in years.

So am I more confident in driving the Mini? Possibly. Will I drive it again? Maybe. Did I enjoy driving it? No.

Some people …

/ Tony / 2 Comments

I normally park my car in the small parking area across the road from the house. We have a drive and a garage, but like many garages it’s more of a storage area than a place to park a car. So K*** parks her car on the drive and I use the parking area. K*** is out today so the drive is empty. I had a bit of shopping to do and on days like this, I would tend to park on the drive, just unload the shopping.

As I approached our house, I noticed a car parked on the road, but directly across the drive. So I i10 Classisparked in my usual place and got out of the car. I was a bit bemused as to who this mystery caller was so I tapped on the driver side window. The lady wound the glass down and I asked “Can I help you?” To my surprise, her reply was “No, it’s okay, I’m just waiting for a phone call.” A little taken aback, I asked her “Could you please wait somewhere else?” Before I could explain that wanted to use the drive she came back with “I’m not going to be long, and there are no parking restrictions so I can park where I like!” Now I worked in the Parking industry for over twenty years, so I do know a fair bit about the rules and regulations. I politely explained that as there was a dropped kerb on both sides of the road, it was technically an unmarked crossing area and technically  she was breaking the law. She then muttered something about me being childish and proceeded to drive further down the road. Amazingly, her next parking spot was directly opposite a junction. Thankfully she must have received her important call because after a few minutes, she drove off. Strange person.

Road Bullies

/ Tony / Leave a comment

This is going to be a bit of a rant, so if you’re not interested then look away now!

I have a small car. It’s a Hyundai i10 Classic. It has a small engine (1000cc) but it is ideal for short to medium journeys, which is all I do these days. Top speed is 85 miles an hour and that is with the wind behind me. I tend to mostly not exceed the speed limits when driving, but sometimes  I drift over slightly. So it really annoys me when big cars pass me by exceeding the limit. Today was no exception. The road was a single carriage way, with the National Speed Limit (60mph for those not familiar with UK speed limits) and I was motoring along at around 50 – 53 mph. The reason being was that it was a mainly twisty road with many sharp bends. Now I remember my driving instructor telling me that I “… must drive to the conditions of the road …” which basically means that on roads like the one I was on, the 60mph limit is an aspiration not a mandatory fact.

To get to the point, still driving at around 50mph, I had in my rear mirror a large passenger vehicle. A discovery I think, but he was that close to me, that if I had to brake hard he would have completely written my small machine off. He was that close, that I could tell where the sandwich he had on his dashboard, was purchased. He kept pulling towards the centre of the lane as if to pass, then dropping back as he realised there was not enough room. Eventually, he did pass and pull in front of me, only to maintain the same speed as before due to the vehicles in front do the same speed I was doing.

What he was basically trying to tell me and anyone else is that, as he had a bigger, more expensive car then he ought to be in front of the cheaper, smaller car(s). I call that a form of Bullying. It is the same as when you were in the dinner queue at school and the bigger, older kids pushed in front of you. Bullying!

Rant over.

It’s been a while …

/ Tony / Leave a comment

It’s been a few weeks since my last post. No particular reason except laziness really! I tend to post when I have something I want to get off my chest and usually wait until there are a couple of things that rile me. Well there has been some things that have ‘annoyed’ me somewhat, but I’m wanting to break away from the rant style post which may account for the ‘laziness’ I just mentioned. But until then …

I just about survived Christmas, as usual. Saying that, I wasn’t well from Boxing Day to the 29th. I had what I thought was a variation of the Norovirus. I did not have the sickness, but had all the rest. The one thing that seemed to floor me was the lack of energy. On the Friday, I spent the whole day in bed, most of it asleep, which is unusual for me. Lost about 8 pound in weight (sadly not permanent), but by New Years Eve I seemed to be a lot better and by the 2nd I was nearly up to my pre-Christmas weight again!

K*** and me had a trip out to the Designer Outlet at York on Friday. R*** was on respite and was due home that day, so K*** wanted to get out whilst we could. The weather was terrible. One minute it was raining, and the next it was foggy. K*** was driving as I had driven to Harrogate on Wednesday and wanted a rest from it. You know I lost count of the number of cars/vans/lorries that did not have any lights on. Many didn’t even have sidelights switched on. It’s no exaggeration to say that most of them were grey vehicles. So that’s a grey vehicle on a grey road on a grey day! I was told by my driving instructor that those types of day need headlights. I saw one police-car on the whole 25 minute journey and he was at the side of the road eating some food. What cay I say to that?

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K*** (or more accurately, me) has been having issues with her email. She does all her stuff on her iPad which suits her as she has not been much of a fan of my laptops. So ever since the latest update the iPad Mail App has been playing up. Emails have not been showing up when they arrive (as they did before) and I have tried to get it sorted. The problem is that I’m not an Apple expert so I have had to hit Google a lot. The problem was exasperated by the fact that her email client is Sky.com or the be more precise Yahoo! It did used to be Gmail until a couple of years ago and it’s not been the same since. Don’t get me wrong, when Yahoo works, it is very good, but when it doesn’t work there is noting worse. It seems to be a little better now, but she now has to refresh the app and wait until the emails appear now instead of them being there when she opened the app. It also does not help that she never deletes any emails. Still, Yahoo tells us that she space for another 54 million emails, so ‘she’ is not too worried. I may have to do a clear out for her at some point.

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So, in the spirit of blog posts to come (hopefully). Happy New Year

Some good, some not so …

/ Tony / Leave a comment

I took the car in for service and MOT on Friday. All passed without any problems. Tyres might need a check before Christmas but other than that, all was goo. Eldest lads car went in at same time. His, not so good! He needs new tyres again. That will be the second lot in three years. Driving style, road quality and luck are the most likely culprits,or so the service department said.

As I was off for the full day, K*** thought it would be a good time to go into York whilst we waited. So we did the ‘Park & Ride’ which was a first for us. The garage dropped us off and promised to pick us up and it cost £2.80 each for a return ticket. A bargain, I thought.

We had a nice lunch, and then did a tour of the shops. That is were the ‘not so good’ came in for me. I’m still looking for a couple of pairs of lounge/jogging pants (mainly lounge as opposed to jogging) and we started to look in the obvious sports type shops. Ridiculously expensive for both the brand names and the unknown and nothing in my size. I was now starting to get a bit fed up. We then went into one of the major well know high street stores. I won’t ‘name and shame’ because they are all the same really. Found a pair that were exactly my size, and I totted off into the changing rooms to try them on. As usual, the size on the label bore no resemblance to real life. I asked the assistant if there was a manger available and I explained to her the problem. You see I have an inside leg measurement of 29”. The pants I picked up said they were a 29” leg. I asked if she would measure the pants. She reluctantly agreed and to her amazement they actually measured 34”. Apologies followed and she went looking for more styles. Five more 29” pants were measured, with the sizes ranging for 31” to an amazing 36”. To make those fit, I would need armholes instead of a waist band. This size problem seems to be an issue in many stores, and I’m of the opinion that the leg size is just an estimate or possibly an opinion.

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Well today is Bank Holiday Monday or as it is now called the Bank Holiday Weekend. In fact Bank Holiday now start around 15:30 on the Thursday before and lasts to around 08:00 Tuesday morning!

This weekend saw the annual Leeds music festival, more commonly known as “Leeds Fest”. It’s held in Bramham Park, which is literally just over the road from where we live in Bramham village. Apart from the traffic disruption as thousands of people descend on the park, it has little effect in my opinion. There is the noise issue, but if the wind is in the right direction we hear very little. We hear more noise from the A1 (the road I mentioned earlier) which seems to have a continuous drone with the amount of traffic.

Because of the location, Bramham is allocated a number of weekend VIP tickets and residents can take up the tickets with a donation to the various causes in Bramham. These tickets are at a extremely discounted price and go very quickly.

I’ve been the festival twice, in previous years and seen fantastic acts such as Sea Sick Steve, Madness and the first year I went, Ed Sheeran was a new and upcoming musician.

The line-up this year was not to my particular taste, and there was no-one I was particularly interested in watching. Maybe next year.

Quick update on the car issue…

/ Tony / 4 Comments

As I mentioned, the car was going in to have the ‘knocking’ noise looked at. Knowing my luck, I was expecting it to be expensive.

It had to be in the garage for 10:30 and we got it there for just after 10:00. It was booked in and we were told to go have a complimentary coffee, and they would let us know what was happening. I could see my car from where we were sitting, and by 10:45, it still had’n’t moved. Then around 11:00 I saw it being driven down to the service area. “Not long now” I said to K***.

Just after 11:45, K*** went to see if they could tell us how long it was going to be. We both thought, that they would have a look and come and tell what it was, when they could do it and more importantly how much it was going to cost. The answer she got was, I thought just the bog-standard ‘they’re working on it now’ answer.

Another 45 min later, and K*** was up and asking the question again. After about 5 minutes, I went to see where she was.

Found her talking to the Service Manager, who had the job sheet for my car (saw the registration, so that’s how I knew). She was nodding and almost smiling, so I thought it can’t be that bad then. The manager explained that it was one of the ‘suspension’ rods had broken, and that was causing the noise. I stood there, waiting for the bad news. It never came. There was no charge. It was covered. I bought a 5 year extended warranty when I bought the car, but stuff like this is never covered. Never covered! I drove home with a smile on my face that is still lingering!

 

New Lappy – Still getting there

/ Tony / Leave a comment

It’s taking a while to get my new machine up to something like I had on my old machine. There are a couple of issues I still need to sort out and some that I don’t think will get sorted.

Those of you who are a bit ‘techy’ will understand the next bit. My hard drive has two visible partitions. One called C: (OS) and the other is D: (Data). Both are roughly the same size, but all new programs and documents and files etc are using the ‘C’ partition and nothing seems to be using the other partition. I had the idea that programs would go to ‘C’ and documents and other files would go to ‘D’. I had a similar issue on R***’s laptop and solved it by using a partition manager that I downloaded from the internet to shrink one and stretch the other. I thought I could do the same on this machine, but it is proving a little more difficult. I’m probably going to have to ask on one of the help websites for some advice.

Another big issue that raised its head this morning was with my anti-virus software. For years I have used AVG as my anti-virus and it has served me well. I therefore thought I would stick with what I know and duly installed AVG. All was fine until I needed to do a restart of my machine. The system that informed me that AVG could run because a certain file was missing. I had probably been deleted when I uninstalled some pre-installed software that I did not need. Trying to reinstall AVG gave me the same error message. I tried the AVG forums, but there was so many ‘answers’ that it was impossible to decipher which route to take. I did the usual Googling for the best (free) program, and it came up with Avast free at the top, with AVG languishing in third place. Well I’ve done a couple of ‘bullet biting’ exercises this week, so I thought one more wouldn’t go amiss. So now I have to get used to using Avast

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I’m having a bit of an issue with the car also. A couple or more weeks ago, I noticed that there was a banging noise as I was driving. Couldn’t work out where the noise was coming from, but I only really notice it when driving on road surfaces that are not well maintained. I have a slight suspicion that it could be the shock absorbers or something to do with the suspension that’s the problem, which could be expensive. It is going to the garage on Wednesday so all will be revealed then.

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On a final note. Anyone have an idea why, the word count at the bottom of my writing in Word 2016 says one thing and and the proper word count says something different? It is only accurate after the document has been saved!

Back home …..

/ Tony / Leave a comment

Well, back home. Yesterday in fact. It was a pretty uneventful day. The weather, whilst not bad, was not as good as it had been. It was going home weather. We stopped off at a gift centre for a look around. My god, these place do depress me at times. Here we are at the start of November and the place was full of Christmas decorations and gift ideas. I don’t know about you, but I think it is far too early. Some of these places have had Christmas stuff for sale since mid-October! Most stores have been planning for the Christmas period from around the end of May. Takes all the symbolism out of the occasion if you ask me. I remember when I was young, there was a department store in the centre of Leeds called “Lewis’s”. On the top floor, at Christmas time, there was Santa’s Grotto and Santa used to arrive on the 1st Wednesday in December, with the Grotto opening the following Friday. Christmas time started in December not November or October. How times have changed.

I digress. I was going to start this post by talking about what I call the “Twat Gap”. How big should the Twat Gap be? Should its size depend on certain conditions? Should there be a minimum size? Maybe a maximum size? What about penalties for abusing the Twat Gap. Now I know some of you will be wondering what a Twat Gap is. Well, you know when you’re driving, you leave a space between the front of your car and the back of the car in front. That is the Twat Gap! Why is it called the Twat Gap? It’s because it does not matter how small that gap is, some twat will try and squeeze into it when they overtake. The Twat Gap!

A little bit more ranting …

/ Tony / Leave a comment

     I’ve just spent the past half hour posting replies to comments on our local online newspaper. I use the term ‘newspaper’ lightly in this case. I have stopped buying and even reading, physical editions of the press. To me it seems a little one way. With a hard copy, or paper copy if you prefer, the only way to have your voice heard is to write to the editor. He or she, then may or may not publish your letter/email when ever they see fit. With the online version, I can post or reply to a comment and it appears almost instantaneously. That is providing it complies within the terms and conditions. This to me, seems to be a far more interactive way of expressing ones feelings. I have to admit though, it can lead to my comments being ridiculed and attacked by some of the other people that contribute to the site. Like many online newspapers, there are a large number of people with right-wing tendencies, that seem to take delight in posting negative political and almost racist comments. I occasionally try and redress the balance.

     Work took an interesting turn on Friday. Our service manager called in at the end of the day, and asked to have a private word with me. The way things are going in the Council at the moment, it made me a little apprehensive. However, and I’m not supposed to say anything yet, she explained that that there might be an opportunity coming up in the next couple of weeks and that she wanted me to consider it carefully. Without going into any detail, it is an area that I did not think I have any experience in. I downloaded lots of information, and I may be doing myself down too much. I may just have enough limited knowledge to pass this off. If I get my head down and start reading all this information, who knows what may happen. Just hope I don’t tread on anybody’s toes!!

     The new car is living up to expectations. Now I’ve had it a couple of months, it’s getting more and more difficult to remember the old one. The mileage is better, although I’m not getting the 60mpg that i was led to believe. It’s more 48mpg, which is better than the 42mpg I was getting with the Ford, so it is an improvement, and with the low tax band, I will be saving. It still looks strange to see my car and S****’s car side by side in the car park. Especially as they have consecutive number plates!

     On a completely different track, I’m starting an online course on Monday 25th. I saw an article in the Guardian online, that explained a little about these ‘free’ courses. It is an organisation called Futurelearn and the quote from it’s website says:

“At FutureLearn, we want to inspire learning for life. We offer a diverse selection of free, high quality online courses from some of the world’s leading universities and other outstanding cultural institutions.”

     I’ve signed up for a course about King Richard III. It is not something I know much about, but the discovery of his remains and the recent television drama about The White Queen, stirred my interest somewhat. It is free, so I have nothing to lose, and it may just benefit me should I attempt to go on Mastermind !!!! I’ve also signed up for a course in programming apps for smart phones, but that does not start until February 2014.

     A couple of post’s back, I mentioned a story idea that I had been planning. Well it is now into it’s fourth chapter, and the story will start to take a different direction. I will not say any more, but I may put an excerpt on here sometime. In fact, I have considered posting the whole story as weekly chapters, but I’ve not decided yet.

One week later (or maybe a bit longer……..)

/ Tony / Leave a comment

Well I’ve had the new car for just over a week, and it seems to be fine. Acceleration is not as good as the Ford, and handling at 70 mph needs full attention, but I’m quickly getting used to that. What will take a time is what I’ve been told is my ‘heavy clutch foot’. Occasionally, I will come off the clutch too quickly and stall. It has been a small problem, since I learned drive. I even managed to do it on my driving test. I thought i had failed, but I “…responded to the problem, quickly and correctly, so it’s just a minor fault…” or so the tester explained. The comments I have got from people range from “dinky” and “nippy” to “smart” and “economical” and I prefer the latter two. The audio/entertainment system is great. Great as in 500% better that the radio cassette player I had in the other car. It has a USB port, and can play MP3 tracks. So haring along the country lanes, with the window down and Bruno Mars belting out, is quite a new experience.

Long, hard day yesterday. I was decorating the bathroom. Now when I say ‘decorating’ I really mean refreshing the current decoration, as we’ve kept it the same colour scheme. I bought, what I thought was a decent paint-pad tray, but it turned out to be so bad, that I binned it rather than try and clean it (note to self … the stuff from the £ shop works just as well.) Ended up using an old pad for the ceiling, and a largish brush for the walls, so it took a bit longer than expected, but it’s all done now. Saying that, I need to do the ceiling and door frame in the en-suite, when the lighting has been sorted out. Deep joy!

Work continues as only work can continue! The bitching, the back-biting and the internal politics are as ripe as ever. I try not to get embroiled in it all, as I’m not sure who’s side I need to be on yet! And of course, there has to be sides so people have someone to blame when things don’t go right for them! I thought the last review was tough, but this one has yet to get going properly and it ready shows signs of it being a bad experience. At the last team meeting, the Service Manager could give us no “ ……new information on where things stand at the moment…… ” and promised to tell us as soon as she know anything. I took that to mean, tells us “ .. what we need to know, when they think we need to know it …… “. Politics !!!

So what’s new …..

/ Tony / Leave a comment

      Well, after a lot of persuasion from Mrs H, I’m getting a new car. Yes my trusty and slightly rusty old Ford Ka is being consigned to the “part-exchangesphere”. On Wednesday I will take ownership of a brand spanking new Hyundai i10. To be more accurate, both S**** and I are getting new cars. Both getting the same model just different colours.

      My Ford has done a great job over the past eight years, but with S**** needing transport on a regular basis, it has had an effect on my work time. I’ve not had a flexi day for over a year. I just seem to get a little time built up and then S**** has a 9:00 start and the time is used up. It has also had an effect on the mileage. I had been thinking about a new car for a couple of month and what finally convinced me was what is happening at work.

      One of the things that has happened over the past couple of years is a move to asking staff to take early retirement, or ‘Early Leavers Initiative (ELI)’ as it had been called. I had looked into this and was working on the notion that I could retire at 60, with not too much of a loss of pension. I had put the application in and received my quote and we were coming around to the idea, and of course I would not need a car then. I just needed to wait for confirmation from the service head. But…… a couple of weeks ago, my manager dropped a bombshell! It appears that certain staff would are classed as essential, and are not eligible for early ELI and this includes ICT staff which is the area I now work. Hence I would have to work until 65 or 66, (I’m not sure what the government has decided) and hence I would still need a car.

      So Mrs H had been looking for a small car for me (I don’t anything large, it’s just to get me to and from work) with the view to giving S**** my old one. But things are starting to go wrong and we both thought that if we could get a good deal, then he should have a new car also. We got a reasonable deal, and so I’m getting a Red one and his is Black.

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      So what else? Work is still a bit of a worry. Although I won’t get to retire early, it still concerns me as to where I will fit, in the new structure. My manager tells me I have nothing to worry about, and her manager says more or less the same, but with more enthusiasm, but I just don’t know. There are people a lot more qualified than me, and that is the big worry.

      R*** continues to do well at his college. Of course there are good days, okay days and bad days. This weekend has been ‘good days’, but who knows what will happen tomorrow. It can feel like you’re living on a knife edge.

      Because of the success he has had with the local drama group, S**** has been approached, to work with a group that take drama into schools. They quite keen on having him on board, and he is equally as keen about the idea. His worry, I think is the financial aspect. It is not a full time job, and he would be self-employed. We are under the impression, that he wants to move out of the family home and into his own place, with his girlfriend. He does not know how he can do this, without a full time job. We’ve told him we would support him if needed, but he is still in two minds about it. He has another workshop style interview to do at the beginning of October, so we will see what happens then.

——————————————————————–

      I think that’s about it for now, although, as soon as this is posted, I’ll think of something I wanted to add.

So what was all the fuss about ……

/ Tony / Leave a comment

I shall reveal all. For the past few days, Mrs H, S**** and his girlfriend, A****, have been at a family get together in Northumberland. The occasion, the Mother-In-Law’s 80th birthday. Lots of people being very nice to each other. That is the last I shall say about it. So what was the fuss that I The old carmentioned? Well, we have a new family car, and it is another Volvo. The one on the right (the green one) is a Volvo C30, and I may have mentioned in passing, that I did not like driving it. I found it very uncomfortable to drive and even just sitting in the passenger seat gave me problems. I think it was because the seats seemed to be rather low down, compared to my Ford Ka. The new one on the left (the red one) is The new carthe new Volvo V40. This is a completely different car. Nothing in drivers place is the same as before, which was a bit daunting, but at least it was a lot more comfortable. But I’m waffling, you want an explanation of the ‘fuss.’

So, on Monday, Mrs H drove all the way to the place we were all staying in. A good 2 ½ hours’ drive. The reason Mrs H drove, was because I had only driven the beast once before, a total of 8 miles. Now, R*** was on respite until Thursday, and was due home at around 5pm. Here’s the crux, Mrs H was staying on until the Saturday! S****, A**** and me had to be home to meet R*** when his taxi dropped him off. Which meant ……. I had to drive home!!! A trip of over 150 miles, with just 8 miles experience (of this car) under my belt. So you can possibly see my dilemma and concern. To add more to the issue, S**** asked if they could go to the nearest town to pick up a present! My head was spinning all Thursday morning. When the time came, I had a few deep breaths and just went for it. I had no problems at all!! Well apart from not being able to find the Air-Con, until we were half way home. I think I will get used to this car a lot quicker than the last one. I have a bit of a niggle with the clutch, but I’ve been told that it is just because it is different. I have even managed to reverse the car up the drive, which Mrs H has not done yet.

Expensive car week ….. final episode

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    One of the things I stressed, when I called them last night, was that I would need to go out between 12:45 and 13:15. I needed to pick S**** up from work. So guess what time the engineer arrived …… 12:50! I had just got R*** into that back seat, when the van turned up. The engineer asked how long would I be, and I explained that it would 20 minutes at the most. He smiled and said that would be fine. I picked S**** up and was back home for just gone 13:05. The job was all done and finished for 13:35 and he apologised for the mix up with the appointments and call back. He said it was a new system that they were still getting used to at the office.

    So, now I’m in a quandary. The engineer that fixed the damn car was so understanding and professional, that it does not seem right to make a complaint. At the end of the day, nobody was put out (well apart from S**** having to walk to his rehearsal) and the windscreen is all good now, I think I can shelve the complaint.

Expensive car week ….. update

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    Just a brief one at the moment. At 08:00 this morning, I got a phone call from guess who? Yep! AutoGlass! To arrange an appointment to repair/replace my damaged windscreen….16 hours late! Using my best ‘inner calm’ techniques I carefully explained that I had recalled later in the day as I had not heard anything after 5 hours. “Oh yes,” she said. “The call has been duplicated. I will cancel one of them. Thank you.” The call ended, just like that. No apologies, no explanation, nothing. Seems very strange that at 7:45 last night there was no call and then this morning, there is a duplicated call! I just hope that someone turns up now. Watch this space.

    Oh, and by the way, the first drive in the new car went as well as could be expected. It might not take as long to get used to this one as last time.

Expensive car week part two ……

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    Well the lady at AutoGlass said that someone would be in touch, to make an appointment within two hours, but it may be a little longer, if they were busy. That was at about ten minutes to two. Every time the phone went, I rushed to answer it, but alas, no AutoGlass. It got to about half past six, and I thought “Nobody is going to ring now. I wonder what has happened.” I logged onto the website to find a contact number and was very surprised to see they had a ‘call-back’ facility. I requested a call back in thirty minutes, which would give me time to prepare what I was going to say, without getting annoyed. True to their word, thirty minutes later they called. I explained what had happened and what I had been told. I could hear the tap tap tap of a computer keyboard as the person I was talking to checked the records.

    “I have checked the system,” he said “and there is nothing logged.” He explained that the engineers go through the logs, in order, but that there was nothing there. He told me that he would log all the details and get me sorted. After about five minutes, the appointment was set for tomorrow and he was ready to take the £75.00 excess.

    As you can imagine, I am not very happy about this. Least of all, because I will have to take S**** to work in K***’s new car, which I have yet to drive. It will be fun! I am trying to convince myself, that ‘It will be fun!’

    It is my intention to make a complaint (as soon as the work has been done) to both AutoGlass and the insurance company. I think I’m justified.

Expensive car week …..

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    All told, todays post title says a lot. Not that there’s been major work, it’s just been a bit expensive! But, the car is 13, nearly 14 years old, so I have to expect the odd extra bill to pay. I just thought it would be spread out a bit more. I blame speed humps!

    First thing I noticed yesterday, was that the offside front tyre was worn down on the inside. Last time it cost me over £80.00 to get Kwik Fit to replace it. They said it needed rebalancing, and I believed them. This time I shopped around and managed to get it for just over £40.00. Of course, I opted out of the rebalancing, as I don’t think it made a difference. So it’s going to ATS Euromaster on Wednesday for a replacement.

    Then today, S**** came back from work with the news that the windscreen was cracked. Not just a chip, a full blown crack on the passenger side. Now that’s a £70.00 excess on my insurance, but at least it does not affect the no claims bonus. At the moment (15:00 – 13/07/2013) I’m sat waiting for a phone call from AutoGlass to tell me when they can get round to do it.

As I said earlier …… I blame Speed Humps!!
 

Car insurance rip off

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     Yesterday, my renewal notice came. It was only slightly less than last years quote. So, I thought, it’s back to getting a quote via one the comparison websites. Logged onto the first one, retrieved my details and amazingly, the lowest price, came in at £150.00 less than my renewal quote. After a bit of changing about to add business cover for me, and lower some the excess, the best price was now £110.00 less. That’s the one for me, or so I thought.

     This morning, I got an reminder email from one of the other comparison sites. I updated my details on that, and retrieved the quotes. Now this is were it gets silly. The company that offered me the lowest price from the first comparison site, were now offering me the same policy for £50.00 less than they quoted me before. Unbelievable! But wait, that’s not the strangest thing about all this. The company that I am currently with, quoted me on the second comparison site at £150.00 less than the renewal quote, for exactly the same cover.

So where am I now…

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I suppose that is not such a good title for a post, but then I’ve never been good with post titles. So…where am I now. Well work wise, things are moving on quite well. There still some issues with my previous position, but they are few and far between now. I have yet to get a permanent desk. Where I’m sitting at the moment is quite a good position. The person who will be a kind of mentor to me sits quite close by, and it is all together a good siting for a base. I do need a desk I can call my base, or ‘My Desk’ if you will. It makes me feel more of a permanent fixture in the team. Team, now there’s a word which I have not been able to bandy around for a while.

Mrs H problems with her arm, seem to have settled down now much more. Her arm is still very stiff at times, but the scar seems to be fading a little. Of course she can’t see that, and to her it looks horrendous. But it is nowhere near as bad as she thinks it looks.

R*** has got his placement at the college we want him to go to. It is a 50 week placement, with 2 weeks at home over Christmas. It will be 5 days a week, and we have even got the respite of 3 days per month at the same place. He has had one visit and there does not seem to be any issue with him. His one to one support worker thinks it will be great for him. Especially with the activities they are planning. I think the funding is only for 1 year, so we will probably have to go through the same stress next year !!!

The village play S**** was in last month went down very well. So well in fact, that they are taking it to another drama group to perform. It is something that some of the group have been looking at for a some time. Many of them though, just want it to be a ‘Panto’ group, with a few diehards that do something in the summer. S**** thinks that they could do lot more. He has got his name down at a quite famous Leeds drama society. They are doing a pantomime in January, and he is hoping for some kind of role in that. Fingers crossed, but he should hear something early September.

My car has been a bit unwell. It has been making a loud noise for a week or so. Someone said,that it sounds “…like a tank trying to fly…”. I did not think it sounded that bad, but then I was inside. It was only when S**** went to pick someone up last week that I really heard what it sounded like. I ummed and erred for a couple of days, but when the headlight failed, I thought I would call in the repair shop and have it looked at. I was expecting it to be a big bill, but it still came as a shock when he quoted the price. “The full exhaust needs replacing, it will take about 2 hours, and it will be £395.45.” In the end, the job took nearer 5 hours, but they charged me the quoted price, so I cannot complain about that. So I’m a bit lighter in the bank balance now. Mind you, I’ve had the car 7 years, and apart from MOT and servicing, this is the first major repair it has needed, so I think it is doing quite well. Of course, I’m now doing 100 miles a week more than before, which I suppose doesn’t help.

Why does snow make people silly

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It’s the silly drivers that really get my back up. I drove my son, who’s not been driving too long, to Wetherby this morning. The side roads in the village were, as expected, about 4 inches deep with the snow. The main road, which is a bus route was much better, but still tricky as the cleared snow had packed down before the salt had time to do its job. Once up on the access road things were a little better, but that’s when you met up with the stupid people. It is only about 4 miles to Wetherby, but in that space of time I saw a Private Hire car, a white van, a mini-bus and two other cars and not one had their headlights on. Amazing. Coming back I saw another white van, same again, no lights only this time, the driver had only cleared the driver’s side of the windscreen. The passenger side was still covered in snow.

It’s not only drivers that are bewildering sometimes. The number of pedestrians that were walking in the road, rather than on the pavement was astonishing. Everyone of them were wearing either Wellington’s or other kinds of boots. I had to ask myself why. Why put yourself in danger, walking  on the road, where vehicles could be slipping and sliding, when you could simply walk on the pavement. Are you worried that your boots might get wet? Do you think it safer?

Top 10 Driving hates

/ Tony / 1 Comment

I enjoy driving, and consider myself an average driver. I’m not the best driver in the world and certainly not the worst, so the word ‘average’ is probably the best description I can offer. Like most people I hate the way some other motorists drive, and I would like to share my Top Ten moans.

  1. Drivers who will not move out of lane one, on the motorway, when I am trying to join;
  2. Those who move into lane one when approaching  the joining lane of the motorway;
  3. Drivers who drive in lane two or three under the speed limit, when lane one and two are free;
  4. Heavy goods vehicle drivers, who wait until they get to an incline and then try to overtake, usually going at the same speed as the vehicle they are trying to overtake;
  5. Drivers who pass you, then pull in front of you and immediately slow down;
  6. Vehicles that have ‘Baby on Board’ signs in the back of their car, but don’t have a baby on board;
  7. Non Volvo drivers that have their headlights on all the time – just buy a Volvo !!!!!;
  8. Vehicles that have a faulty headlight and use full beam to compensate;
  9. Drivers that have their front fog lights on when it’s not foggy;
    and finally
  10. Drivers of grey vehicles, who drive on grey roads on grey days with no lights on.

Theses are in no particular order, because they should all be at number one, depending on the circumstances. I do have a lot more driving hates, but the list would go on forever.

What are yours?

Weekend comes early ….

/ Tony / 1 Comment

   A couple of days off straddling the weekend, comes as a welcome break. Although more decorating is on the cards. This Dining room time its the dining room, and  aDining rooms you may be able to see, the colours are very strong to say the least. another problem, is the amount of furniture in this room. Against the other wall in here, is a drinks cabinet and a sideboard. Both of these will need to be moved, when I come to do that side of the room. This room poses many problems.

   I’m often quite amazed at the so called driving skills of some people. Three incidents, over the past three days have left me quite angry. On Tuesday, when I was turning right into the village, some half-wit decided to cut me up, by undertaking me on the turn. Tonight, the same idiot, passed me and another two cars, on the access road. We were doing at least 60 mph, when the clown decided to pass all three of us. He must have been doing at least 80mph. This morning, whilst travelling in the centre lane on the M1, I had left a two vehicle space, between me and the Mazda in front. This gap was then filled by another idiot, in one of those hybrid eco cars, who then proceeded to slow down quickly. I nearly had his battery in the front of my car, had I not had my wits about me. How on earth did these fools manage to pass any form of driving test ??? Or did they ? I read somewhere, that at anyone time, 17% of the vehicles on the road are either untaxed, unlicensed, or have uninsured or unqualified/banned drivers. Apparently that is a very conservative number.

A good deal ..

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   I got the car service and MOT done today. No major problems, except one with the rear suspension. Apparently ‘one of the bushes on one of the suspension arms had too much movement’ which partly failed the MOT. All gibberish to me, but it was a similar thing with the front suspension last year. It appears that this is one of the things with the Ford KA, but speed humps accentuate the problem even more. Still, they ( K & M Motors, Nowell Lane, Leeds) did a good job, and I’m satisfied. At £190.00 for a full service and MOT seems like a good deal to me. Looks like I’ll get a better deal with the insurance, if I go with ESure too. That means that the tax will be the only thing I paying through the nose for.

   I was supposed to be doing a User Acceptance Test (UAT) on the upgrade to our system tomorrow. However, due to a slight communication breakdown (don’t you just love that phrase), our IT department were blissfully unaware, that the software house needs to do some configuration work first. The UAT has been put back until the 6th. It is crazy really. No-one else has to go through this fuss with an upgrade.

   Most people are beginning to get to grips with the change to our email system. Saying that, quite a few did not migrate last week as expected. They all claim, that they did not get the ‘upgrade email’ from IT, but I have my doubts about that. IT knows which office everyone works from, and the migration was office based. I have a very strong suspicion, that the ones who did not migrate, did either failed to do the online training (which was compulsory) or failed to action the upgrade email. Of course, everyone denies this !!!!