Or a few to be more accurate.
The National bullying help line said it had received calls from people working at No. 10 Downing Street about being bullied by the Prime Minister.
Think for a moment .... these help lines are supposed to be confidential so by admitting someone has called you has breached that trust ?
Imagine if your local hospital put up a notice in public that someone in your office had Aids, surely that would make you all point fingers at each other and speculate?
That's the same as the help line saying they have had calls from people who work at Downing Street, surely the reason to ring them is for total confidentiality, they should refuse to comment and refuse to admit who has called them and why - without sounding judgemental would this encourage you to ring them ?
I can imagine them saying to your company "Yes, we've had several calls from people who say they are bullied at your work" - eyes will be looking at each other and fingers pointing.
Anyway, even more interesting is the new Derby inner ring road is going to be called Lara Croft Way ... I'm fine with this but though perhaps a few more gaming influences could be put into some more ?
How about ........
Wii Way
Xenomorph Street
Supply Drop Street
eLiTe SnIpEr StReT
Sonic Street
Super Mario Highway
Warcraft Way
Pro Tennis Court
Red Faction Rise
Xbox Live Lane
Bioshock Bypass
Banjo and Kazooie Road
and the list goes on - personally I'd like to live on Wii Way.
Sunday 28 February 2010
Saturday 20 February 2010
I cooked it and I tasted it
The question is did I love it ?I've had the lamb shanks in Rosemary and Mint sauce and without trying to sound over the top they were awsome.
After much haggling over the frozen food counter today (which was ironic seeing as our fridge/freezer has gone wrong) we settled (after many arm punches and foot stamps - quite childish I know but I'm only 46) on the Pork shanks this time.
Put these suckers in a pan of hot water for 45 mins to boil in the bag, add to that the Aldi steam in the microwave veg (69p) and some new potatoes (popped in our steamer), we realized we had mad a massive mistake.
We didn't realise how much or how thick and rich the gravy was - a lesson we didn't remember from the lamb shanks, so steamed new potatoes were nowhere near absorbent enough, you need a big pile of fresh mash to soak this up.
The 69p steam in the microwave veg took only 6 mins to cook and they were spot on as well.
So ... the big question ? Did I love it ?
Top marks Aldi, melt in the mouth meat and plenty for one, but a big label is needed on the box to say "By law this must be eaten with a large pile of mash" (although I loved it with my steamed spuds).
10/10 for this one guys, I gotta hankering for some lamb shanks again (with mash !).
MMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Friday 19 February 2010
Daft people shall reign
Funny how driving comes up so much as a topic of general ranting.
We were out locally and the main road our road joins onto is pretty busy including the fact it's a bus route so when people are parked its a bit of a zig zag drive to get down.
It's not made any easier by people who drive like loonies down it at break neck speeds.
Anyway, one end of this road has an almost 90 degree bend with no visibility from either direction, now you have to guess where one daft idiot of a woman decided to stop her lime green open top Nissan Micra ? you guessed it, right on the apex of the bend, to get past I had to go on the opposite side of the road but without knowing if anything was coming.
Fortunately nothing was but while I gave her the evil eye and a few choice words she didn't seem bothered.
A couple of seconds later a white van came past me and I could see in my mirror he had to stop quickly as it was obvious someone else was doing the same, with any luck the woman in the Micra is now off many peoples Xmas card lists.
On it's own that was amazing enough to see but later we came out of our road (which is at the other end of this main road and this has another bend of almost 90 degrees), now we've had people park opposite our road which although it's a traffic offence has so far not caused an accident but even I was amazed to see a woman in a Peugot 206 parked on the apex of this bend, passenger window down and having a chat with a woman who was pushing her push chair.
We squeezed past and just as before watched a van slam his brakes on as he got to the corner then realized he was 0.9 seconds from impact.
They say things come in threes, well we were wondering where the third one was but didn't have to wait too long as there was a three car pile up which closed a major A road only a stones throw from our house, our thoughts were another stupid woman must have parked up to sort her hair out or adjust her glasses thus causing the pile up - having watched the antics earlier I feel this is the most logical and scientific explanation.
Hopefully they didn't go home and use any dangerous appliances ?
We were out locally and the main road our road joins onto is pretty busy including the fact it's a bus route so when people are parked its a bit of a zig zag drive to get down.
It's not made any easier by people who drive like loonies down it at break neck speeds.
Anyway, one end of this road has an almost 90 degree bend with no visibility from either direction, now you have to guess where one daft idiot of a woman decided to stop her lime green open top Nissan Micra ? you guessed it, right on the apex of the bend, to get past I had to go on the opposite side of the road but without knowing if anything was coming.
Fortunately nothing was but while I gave her the evil eye and a few choice words she didn't seem bothered.
A couple of seconds later a white van came past me and I could see in my mirror he had to stop quickly as it was obvious someone else was doing the same, with any luck the woman in the Micra is now off many peoples Xmas card lists.
On it's own that was amazing enough to see but later we came out of our road (which is at the other end of this main road and this has another bend of almost 90 degrees), now we've had people park opposite our road which although it's a traffic offence has so far not caused an accident but even I was amazed to see a woman in a Peugot 206 parked on the apex of this bend, passenger window down and having a chat with a woman who was pushing her push chair.
We squeezed past and just as before watched a van slam his brakes on as he got to the corner then realized he was 0.9 seconds from impact.
They say things come in threes, well we were wondering where the third one was but didn't have to wait too long as there was a three car pile up which closed a major A road only a stones throw from our house, our thoughts were another stupid woman must have parked up to sort her hair out or adjust her glasses thus causing the pile up - having watched the antics earlier I feel this is the most logical and scientific explanation.
Hopefully they didn't go home and use any dangerous appliances ?
Tuesday 16 February 2010
Complete Crap
Many years ago when I used to travel around and fix computers (normally in the happy days before Windows) there was a town which was a bit tricky to drive through and had some blooming fiddly roads and messing about.
Someone then had a bright idea to sort a lot of problems in one go by carving a dual carriageway through it and making a new ring road as well, effectively forming a link from the M1 in Nottingham to the M6 and shaving a good hour off transit times through several villages etc etc blah blah.
So tonight I leave and drive down towards this town only to find one of the main reasons it really really really fucks me off more than any town I can think of.
Before you click the back button and start writing to the local clergy to have me exorcised for demons I will explain further.
Imagine for a moment the only way from the M1 to the M6 was either going right down to the M6 (at Junction 19), or if your a little further up, taking the M69 from Leicester (either way is fine depending on your point of origin and both motorway routes take you straight from the M1 onto the M6 with no problems at all). The other way is to go right up the M1 until you get to the M62, quite a busy junction and you then cross the Pennines which more than makes up for it on the scenic journey.
Now if your not a fan of country routes these were your options, if you want to go straight over then you were stuck with a tricky crossing through several towns depending on your route and I've known the journey to take 2 or 2.5 hours for the 30 odd miles it takes.
So now your up to speed and you've forgotten the naughty swear words above your perhaps wondering "What's crap?" - the answer is yet to come.
The route over the Pennines is not an easy or comfortable one if your finding this your only option so the A50 was built in its entirety and I quite often trampled muddy fields to service the computers of the engineers who built it.
I'm not even upset that they built the Dual carriageway from the worst material known to man i.e Concrete, if you could only imagine the horrors of the noise you get while driving on it and even worse the noise that any local residents must hear when cars are screaming down it - it really is amazingly bad.
The real issue is not even the A50 through to the final town itself, nope thats fine, it links onto the A500 which takes you either North or South to the M6 so thats fine, what then is my gripe?
It's simple and like all things it's the simple things that matter.
The conundrum is answered when you ask yourself, given that two motorways link by Dual carriageway and are therefore very very busy, and given that the final town is also busy anyway what one thing would you do that would seriously fuck up the road system ?
Amazingly the answer is so simple it's probably bypassed you, now tonight it took me an hour to drive no more than 4 miles through the Ring road of this town, the ring road should be moving at 50mph and normally it is, so to completely fuck this towns road system up some complete and utter twat has built a football stadium right next to the main junction between the A50 and A500.
The words Fucking Wanker don't seem to do my rant justice, I would dearly love him to come to this town and sit in the fucking traffic with the smell of burning clutch pedals around him, cars fighting to get into lanes and the whole road system completely fucked up.
Why am I not surprised ? Well this town used to make pottery, and obviously toilets are included in this list so to who ever put the football stadium next to Stoke On Trent's main roads your a shit and deserve to burn in the hell you made for yourself - I swear that no hell is worse than the one you made for everyone who was just going about their business and had to endure this on a regular basis.
May the fleas of a thousand camels infest you and may your spirit never know peace but sit in a ghostly car for ever trapped in the fucking nightmare you created.
What a bastard !
Sunday 14 February 2010
It's a funny old world
Well lots has gone on in the last few weeks, the local council decided that despite more snow it would simply be easier to not bother putting any grit on the roads and let people take care of themselves in hedges and ditches.
Anyway we've then had the Chip and Pin credit card verification cracked (no surprise really, if people can crack Xbox and Play station protection then this must be a doddle), we've had the mad vicar Angus MacLeay preach that women should be silent in church (if questions can be answered by their husbands) and that they should submit to their partners in "everything".
Fortunately he's not within striking distance of my wife otherwise his next sermon would be delivered through a Stephen Hawkins style wheelchair computer with someone providing sign language subtitles for the deaf (and of course submissive women).
Randomly changing subject back to UK roads I noticed in the last month the massive number of people with broken headlights, I counted 1 in 20 the other night (yes it was a dull trip home), one chap had no side lights, no headlights and one fog light ..... mmmmm a song comes to mind ... "I can see clearly now ... ".
Even better through was the chap behind me yesterday in a Fiat Punto that was only 30 minutes away from the scrap heap, smashed head lights on both sides (nice touch) and only the passenger windscreen wiper working, it was amusing seeing him in the rain with only his empty passenger seat getting a good view.
That's the thing with the UK, the Police only seem to bother when they need to get their quota up and if anything you see more people than ever driving while on mobile phones or with cars that are on deaths door with defects and parts falling off.
I blame it clearly on the fact the police don't have guns, I'm sure life would be a lot simpler if they could shoot offenders then ask questions later.
Although this might be an issue for passing motorists etc in reality it would help in reducing over crowding in prisons.
On the positive side though, Nasa have just added a large window to the space station so as long as it doesn't blow out and suck the astronauts out then that will be fine and the UK is now home to the largest spider crab it's ever seen (in Birmingham Sea life).
It's not all doom and gloom so as long as we can keep sliding down the roads (in cars with clapped out brakes), drive with no lights, steering or windscreen wipers make sure you remember we've got a lovely big spider crab.
Anyway we've then had the Chip and Pin credit card verification cracked (no surprise really, if people can crack Xbox and Play station protection then this must be a doddle), we've had the mad vicar Angus MacLeay preach that women should be silent in church (if questions can be answered by their husbands) and that they should submit to their partners in "everything".
Fortunately he's not within striking distance of my wife otherwise his next sermon would be delivered through a Stephen Hawkins style wheelchair computer with someone providing sign language subtitles for the deaf (and of course submissive women).
Randomly changing subject back to UK roads I noticed in the last month the massive number of people with broken headlights, I counted 1 in 20 the other night (yes it was a dull trip home), one chap had no side lights, no headlights and one fog light ..... mmmmm a song comes to mind ... "I can see clearly now ... ".
Even better through was the chap behind me yesterday in a Fiat Punto that was only 30 minutes away from the scrap heap, smashed head lights on both sides (nice touch) and only the passenger windscreen wiper working, it was amusing seeing him in the rain with only his empty passenger seat getting a good view.
That's the thing with the UK, the Police only seem to bother when they need to get their quota up and if anything you see more people than ever driving while on mobile phones or with cars that are on deaths door with defects and parts falling off.
I blame it clearly on the fact the police don't have guns, I'm sure life would be a lot simpler if they could shoot offenders then ask questions later.
Although this might be an issue for passing motorists etc in reality it would help in reducing over crowding in prisons.
On the positive side though, Nasa have just added a large window to the space station so as long as it doesn't blow out and suck the astronauts out then that will be fine and the UK is now home to the largest spider crab it's ever seen (in Birmingham Sea life).
It's not all doom and gloom so as long as we can keep sliding down the roads (in cars with clapped out brakes), drive with no lights, steering or windscreen wipers make sure you remember we've got a lovely big spider crab.
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