An odd incident

I discovered yesterday, when I was suddenly witness to a slightly strange 'accident' that I have a nasty side, or at least something of a questionable sense of humour on occasion!

I had a few errands to run in town and out I went into the sunny but chilly morning to go about my business. It was quite busy, all the usual day to day goings on, nothing to report when suddenly a few feet ahead of me on the pavement all hell broke loose. Jarred out of my own thoughts by the commotion I was met with a sight that really wasn't funny at all.....but that I just couldn't help but be amused by, albeit I though better I not display my amusement at the time!

On the ground lay an elderly woman, she had it transpired been selling poppies, when some old chap riding one of those three wheeled, electric scooter thingies just drove into her like she wasn't there!

Now I know that's not really funny at all, and it became less funny as time went on and it became apparent she was actually injured quite considerably, but the mere fact that anyone could just drive one of those machines into someone and knock them over, somehow seemed to my apparently warped mind, funny at the time. I mean, you just don't see them as high powered vehicles of destruction do you!! To be honest, the only concern I had ever considered before was for those that choose to ride them on the road among traffic, which always seems tantamount to a suicide mission to me.

The situation only became worse to my strange sense of humour. An excellent first aider had appeared from out of a shop and was ministering to the lady still prone on the floor, so I asked a bystander who seemed to be involved somehow, if anyone had called an ambulance. No he said, instead he had sent someone [insert name here, I forgot the name he said but he said it like I should know whoever it was!] to 'fetch the community police officer'. Hmmmm...this just seemed even funnier, so community police officers carry spine boards and neck braces now do they? Why hadn't he just called an ambulance?

The Community bobby duly arrived.....and promptly called an ambulance, 10 minutes wasted, lady still semi conscious on the floor! Offending 'motorist' still parked up where he had come to a halt, protesting his innocence and completely blocking any access.... and first aider still trying to do her thing among all the commotion of what had now become a rather large audience.

By this time I felt I couldn't be of any help, I was just another person in the way but when I tried to leave the community bobby asked me to stay until he had taken my details as a witness, he had obviously forgotten I had already told him I didn't actually witness the incident.

A few minutes later a paramedic arrived in a car, took one look, when he could finally get to the patient via a circuitous route around the still in the way electric scooter...and called an ambulance! Crowd of rubbernecks still swelling.

Enough...I told the bobby my number and left.....with this surreal scene in my head that somehow I still couldn't help feeling had a funny side, if only because it had been so surreal!

Please, don't get me wrong, there was nothing whatsoever amusing about the poor lady who had been doing her bit on a chilly morning selling poppies, now lying injured on the ground, but the manner in which it had happened and the ensuing chaos were funny as hell.....ok, maybe I'm sick but as I walked away I caught some guy's eye and the look on his face said I wasn't the only one!

Sweet revenge!

As one who has had so much hassle with 'spam calls', we are talking 20 or more calls a day with no one on the other end here, despite registering with the appropriate authorities to have it stopped, I found this little missive that arrived in my inbox more than a little amusing!

I think we should all make a concerted effort! ;o)

GETTING OUR REVENGE ON THE TELESALES PESTS.

Three Little Words That Work!!

1. The three little words:

'Hold On, Please...'

(Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that boiler room sales would grind to a halt.

Then when you eventually hear BT's 'beep-beep-beep' tone,
you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset .... You have efficiently completed your task.

These three little words could help eliminate telephone soliciting.

2. Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?

This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone.

This technique is then used to determine the best time of day for a 'real' salesperson to call back and get someone at home.

What you can do after answering: If you notice there is no one there, is to immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times, as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine that dialled the call and it kicks your number out of their system. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer!!!

3. When you get those 'pre-approved' letters in the mailfor everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope.

Most of these come with postage-prepaid return envelopes, right?

It costs them more than the regular postage 'IF' and when they are returned.

It costs them nothing if you throw them away! In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little, postage-prepaid return envelopes .

Send an advert for your local chimney sweeper to American Express. They might need one!

Send a pizza coupon to HSBC ... in case their canteen packs up. You get the idea.

If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them back their blank application form ... After all, it is their form!

If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you return.

You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! It still costs them, and it is their envelope after all . You are just returning it!!!

The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the post, but folks ..... We need to OVERWHELM them, in order to stop them.

Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail,and best of all they're paying for it ...Twice!

Let's help keep Royal Mail busy. Since the Royal Mail are saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, let's help them so they will not need to increase postage costs again. You get the idea!

If enough people follow these tips, it will work....maybe you'll get very little junk mail anymore.

Just a little bit of toast!

Unusually yesterday morning Fletch asked if I would like some breakfast, I think he had deduced by this time, it was pretty late for breakfast I have to admit, that if he wanted anything he was going to have to make it himself on this occasion, so he headed for the kitchen and the conversation went something like this;

Fletch: Do you want some toast?

Me: Yes please.

Fletch: What do you want on it?

Me: [Trying to make life simple] Anything.

Fletch: No, what do you want?

Me: Anything, really, I don't mind.

Silence....

Three minutes later this is what I got!


One slice with a pickled onion on it and another with a solitary olive sitting atop it!

Yes, very funny Fletch! ;o)

Don't you just love a smart ass!

Maru the cat

You know those days when you can think of absolutely nothing to blog...this is one of them, so instead I give you Maru the Cat, a very amusing Scottish Fold living in Japan who has his own blog and penchant for squishing himself into a tight space!



More here.

Does my bum look big in this?

For JW (you should never dare me) who requested a 'does my bum look big in this' picture of something from the 'freebie wardrobe' I acquired on Wednesday....voila, designer jeans.

Don't say I never do as I am asked! ....and don't answer the question, it was rhetorical, besides which none of me is very big..... unfortunately not even the bits I would like to be!


*Fletch, don't even think about saying it!

A birthday and a big bag!

Yesterday I went to my parents for the day. It's been way too long since I managed to get there, between holidays and hospital appointments (my dad has been a bit poorly) somehow we just hadn't managed to get together for almost two months but finally yesterday we made it at last!

The 5th November is not only Guy Fawkes night but in our family a more important date too, it is my mums birthday and as a consequence there was a small amount of celebrating to be done by way of good food, pretty fireworks courtesy of my brother who I also haven't seen for an age, and much, much gloriously extreme chocolate cake!

It was a lovely day with some serious gossiping, catching up on all things family and much laughter... and there was an added bonus for me too. My sister in law, who has a 'bob or two' and who has a penchant for designer clothing is also, as luck would have it, the same size as me and had been having one of her occasional, 'there's no room left in the wardrobe' turn-outs. This is a good thing because far from it being one of those embarrassing moments when an old aunt presents you with a bag of hideous items that would otherwise 'only go to Oxfam' that you somehow, desperately have to politely decline, my SIL's bags of 'do you want any of these, I don't have room for them' items are like an early Christmas!

.....and as a consequence I left for my long, late night drive home clutching a big bag of almost new, mostly designer gear, worth originally a four figure sum, that all fitted like a glove and that I would have chosen myself if I ever had that kind of money!

Result! :o)

He's the daddy!

For the first time in a very long while I feel a little hopeful about this world and where it might go next!

Do the Shake n Vac....

....and put the freshness back!

Remember that stuff? Shake n Vac, the cure-all for the perfect 80's housewife suffering the unimaginable traumas of pet and tobacco smells lingering in her pristine home! The stuff itself might not be remembered but the ad. campaign that accompanied it is unfortunately hard to forget. It was one of those typically naff ads of the decade that had the annoying ability to ferret it's way into our subconscious and despite our derision of it, we all whistled and hummed the damn tune for months, if not years on end! If you don't remember here's a little reminder;


Anyways, can you believe, that stuff still exists to this day! And how do I know? Because I have some, worse than that I just used it (though I promise you without the dancing or hideous skirt)....and believe me, it hasn't improved with age, the smell is more likely to cause asphyxiation than 'freshness', it's horrible.....but today is the dreaded six monthly flat inspection day and as usual I have been up since the crack of dawn with all things clean, and in theory sweet smelling, in my usual efforts to eradicate every trace of our smoking sins in a no smoking property!

I'm pretty sure I succeeded in my eradication but I suspect the heinous perfume offered up by the iconic Shake n Vac dust is probably as much an irritation for any one's alveoli as cigarette smoke and not much sweeter smelling! Did our parents really think this stuff was pleasant way back when?

...and as usual on these occasions, Hammy is in hiding in the bottom of the wardrobe and the darkness has again fooled her little nocturnal body clock resulting in much scuffling and noise making....I think perhaps she needs a little more training in the principles of a 'covert mission'!


*Oh and... GO OBAMA!!

The global economic models explained!

Probably not very politically correct but very funny! ;o)

SOCIALISM
You have 2 cows.
You give one to your neighbour.

COMMUNISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and gives you some milk.

FASCISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and sells you some milk.

NAZISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and shoots you.

BUREAUCRATISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then throws the milk away...

TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell one and buy a bull.
Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows.
You sell them and retire on the income.

SURREALISM
You have two giraffes.
The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.

AN AMERICAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows.
Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has dropped dead.

VENTURE CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters
of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a
debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all
four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows.
The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to
a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who
sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company.
The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on
one more. You sell one cow to buy a new president of the United States, leaving
you with nine cows.
No balance sheet provided with the release.
The public then buys your bull.

A FRENCH CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You go on strike, organise a riot, and block the roads....
because you want three cows.

A JAPANESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk.
You then create a clever cow cartoon image called 'Cowkimon' and market it worldwide.

A GERMAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You re-engineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month,
and
milk themselves.

AN ITALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows, but you don't know where they are.
You decide to have lunch.

A RUSSIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You count them and learn you have five cows.
You count them again and learn you have 42 cows.
You count them again and learn you have 2 cows.
You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka.

A SWISS CORPORATION
You have 5000 cows. None of them belong to you.
You charge the owners for storing them.

A CHINESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You have 300 people milking them.
You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine
productivity.
You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.

AN INDIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You worship them.

A BRITISH CORPORATION
You have two cows.
Both are mad.

AN IRAQI CORPORATION
Everyone thinks you have lots of cows.
You tell them that you have none.
No-one believes you, so they bomb the **** out of you and invade your
country.
You still have no cows, but at least now you are part of a democracy....

AN AUSTRALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
Business seems pretty good.
You close the office and go for a few beers to celebrate.

A NEW ZEALAND CORPORATION
You have two cows.
The one on the left looks very attractive.

Jingle freakin' bells!

It's that time of year again!

With the sound of Jingle Bells barely seeming to have stopped ringing in my ears from last years manic festive 'push', suddenly Christmas seems to be looming somewhere too close up ahead again already.

Or at least that's what the retail marketing gurus would have us believe in their now annual routine of terrified scrambling for dominance in the market share stakes and desperation to pressure us all into a life of guilt and inadequacy if we don't fall victim to their clever blackmail psychology, and spend a kings ransom on crap our loved ones probably never wanted in the first place and will likely be on eBay by boxing day anyway!

Too many years living the 'joys' of Christmas in retail of course means that none of this palaver surprises me but it never ceases to annoy me and to some degree sadden me. An enforced trip to Tesco yesterday bought it all back, which was a bad idea on any level on a Saturday and saw reduced Halloween merchandise (why do they sell that stuff? Experience tells me most of it will be sold at a loss the day after Halloween, or not sold at all and loiter in the bowels of the nations retail stockrooms gathering dust until the next Halloween non event) fighting for supremacy in the aisles already with all those things we absolutely must have to put the jingle in our Christmas bells!

Too soon, too soon was the cry.

Guys, yes, it's you lot in marketing I'm talking too....do any of you remember when Christmas was Christmas? When it was actually about joy, love and peace, even for those without a religious bent, when children got a few well considered gifts and were happy with them, when families got together around a real tree adorned with baubles and trinkets saved sentimentally from one year to the next, when tinseled lights twinkled in gaudy colours that had been lovingly placed in the annual excited tree decorating ritual were the festive decorative norm instead of designer plastic monstrosities embedded with microchip multi-function fibre optics and when Christmas started in December, not in the middle of the bloody summer!

But perhaps you don't remember, perhaps when you took your oath of allegiance to the mighty marketing dollar you chose conveniently to forget....or maybe in your unending struggle to pull the wool over our eyes, that's us, the minions you want to reel in, you just simply began to fall for your own crap!

I promise you guys just one thing this Christmas, however hard you try, I will not be so much as looking at a Christmas card for a while yet!

Humbug!

Daisy the curly cat

For those among you who like myself have something of a 'penchant' for all things feline, if you haven't met Daisy the curly cat yet I suggest you do!

Daisy is a Devon Rex who lives in Florida with her brother Harley and she is one of a kind. Daisy updates every day and never fails to brighten my morning and make me smile or laugh out loud....really if you are a cat person you have to go see for yourself what Daisy gets up to. Just to whet your appetite here is Daisy in her 'love bug' outfit!


And for those of you concerned about any welfare issues, I promise you Daisy is a very happy cat and one of the best cared for, lovely natured felines you could wish to meet and her human knows all there is to know about caring for cats :o)

Busy is good!

Well, whilst the level of work gemmak designs has bought thus far to my door might not be likely to keep me in diamonds anytime soon, it is keeping me busy, very busy...and that's a good thing! Yes, I mean it.

I might have a stiff neck and shoulders from sitting hunched over my laptop for much more time than even my normal excesses, I might not have the ironing pile under the same degree of control as is the norm and I might not be 'twittering' at my normal level but I like it, it's kinda nice!

I am too busy to worry about the usual 'worry stuff' that too often hovers about in my head, I feel like I have some small degree of purpose, instead of drifting around aimlessly day in and day out, I am doing stuff that mostly that I enjoy and best of all, a very rare occurrence in gemmak's-ville..... I have slept right through the last two nights!!!! Yipeeee.

Busy is good! All I have to do now is maintain it somehow....oh, and try to catch up with my ever growing email mountain!

OCD for cats!

Busy, busy, busy....no time for a real post right now so just a 'cheaty' post today!

Gotta love it tho....

Brand and Ross - Some perspective please?

What's with all this ridiculous hoo ha over Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand then?

The media are obviously suffering a slow news week to be making so much of this story and the 10000 of the good and the righteous, who apparently contacted the 'powers that be' to complain about the incident, must have little of importance in their lives if they can get so hot under the collar over what is in reality little more than a prank that overstepped the mark.....albeit arguably not in a very kind way.

I'm not a fan of Brand, though I will admit to being rather amused by Ross and I can perhaps understand why Andrew Sachs and his granddaughter might feel slightly affronted but hell fire, have people lost all sense of humour and perspective? The stunt might have been a little over zealous and somewhat ill considered but it was hardly a hanging offence now was it?!

These guys, like them or not, are at the top of their game, they are in a branch of the industry that has always pushed the boundaries and always will, it's how the 'art', for want of a better word, evolves and it's not too many years since the pious and petty were creating a similar commotion about Monty Python and like (the link is not lost on me, Python, Cleese, Sachs, see where I'm at here?!!!) and look what happened there!

Ok, if it is felt appropriate then an apology might be in order but to sack the pair of them would be utter codswallop!! Hammers and nuts come to mind.....and even more so given that the whole issue lost any credibility when this morning it would appear Sachs granddaughter has seen fit to talk to The Sun!

She must be feeling "totally and utterly exposed and betrayed" then!

I rest my case.

One thing is for sure...most of us had never heard of Georgina Baillie (that's the granddaughter if you were still in any doubt) before all this, but we certainly have now...funny that isn't it? What is it they say about any publicity being better than no publicity?

If the BBC, long time British establishement benchmark of common sense, reason and forward thinking, capitulate in the face of pressure to sack these guys they will go way down in my estimation. An apology? yes, a severe reprimand? maybe but sacking?..... let's get just a little perspective here shall we chaps!!