Thursday, July 31, 2003

I am to be the subject of an academic experiment, well part of one anyway, by this young chap


posted by timesnewroman at 7:21 PM  

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Wednesday, July 30, 2003

Benson Mobotu, the son of the late President Mobotu of Zaire, now the Democratic Rpublic of Congo (DRC) has rather coloufully emailed, petitioning my assistance with changing his late father's secreted $billions in a mutually beneficial business proposition. I want to knowhow the fuck he got my address. I do love that flowery prose though.

Jimty is off on annual hols as of today. He phoned me up on my way home to remind me, that and the need to purchase a loaf.

We await our Latvians, one of whom is Gluten intolerant. Mmm, Tesco trips looks promising.
posted by timesnewroman at 4:30 PM  

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Half the week gone already and busying up in time for woodiecamp. Finally concluded menus and emailed them off to the central food co-ordinator and it suddenly struck me that we used to do this in the pre-computer age. God we even cooked on wood fires.....and we did not have menus anything like so sophisticated/pretentious/ethnic as we do nowadays. Jeezuz one's parents would be lost looking at some of this stuff. It's not like its hard to mince n tatties.

I'll be lost tomorrow unable to blog or slowly awaken via the web. The computer is in the spare room and that is being taken up by a young Latvian. Might even get to work early, or better still have a long lie!
posted by timesnewroman at 5:31 AM  

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Saturday, July 26, 2003

Was looking forward to the weekend. The reidboy was coming up with Jo and their son, for his mumsy's surprise birfday bash. I even took Monday coming, off on the expectation that we would have them round for dinner on Sunday, which would inevitably drag on for several bottles of wine and tunes. Got the text late Friday night, goes something like this....Lesson....never have a shot on your son's scooter after spending the afternoon in the pub.....am in casualty....

Phones Saturday to advise that they won't in fact be travelling on account of him suffering much pain. I really shouldn't have laughed particularly when I saw the photo that he sent with accompanying passage...Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent:

"Even with this genuine image of the most feared
member of the Reid Regime, it is doubtful whether all
Scots will be truly convinced that it is the London
exiled, ____ "The Celtic Boy" ______. However,
sporadic gunfire was heard coming from affluent areas
of the capital city when the picture was released.
the reidboy commented to us just before the picture was
taken: 'The rumours surrounding this incident must be
put to rest. This did not happen as a result of going
down a hill on my son's scooter after I had spent the
afternoon in the pub. Oh no, that is not the case, at
all. Never. It's all lies perpetrated by the
infidels'." Reuters

The photo is so bad/good I am genuinely thinking of upgrading the blog to include images!

Oh well that probably means we will be tidying the house in preparation for the arrival of the Latvians, rather than major party mode.

posted by timesnewroman at 12:49 PM  

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Tuesday, July 22, 2003

There I was furious as hell done it again didn't I. Spent about half an hour late last night putting together my post only to lose it all. Here goes again.

Busy few days all in all. Too busy to post.

Friday,

Had a surprise for thewife in the form of 2 tickets to see Sweet Honey in the Rock in Embra. thewife picked me up straight after work and we headed off. I think the Embra thing threw her every bit as much as SHIR but by jove they were worth it absolutely amazing, 5 African American women who sing like they know how to and with some politics involved too. Damn good. I remember seeing the Wedding Present some time ago and though it appalling that despite being good, they played a 45 minute set and that was it no encore no nothing. Sweet Honey played over 2 Hours with a short interval and did 2 curtain calls.

All that and a Buffet Chines which was actually quite good. Only downer on the evening was the lack of roadsigns. Edinburgh get some roads signs up so people know how to leave.

Saturday

Got a phone call form the bank regarding my overdrawn account, see earlier posts. God I phoned them and wrote to them and they still don't talk to themselves.

Went shopping and persuaded thewife that we really did need a video recorder as well as the DVD player, on account of I haven't seen Still Crazy for some time. She finally relented and that was us set up for the night.

Sunday

Lazy day apart form the need to nip out to Tesco's for a few items. I had decided we needed to have some Mexican food, thewife concurred and we proceeded with the preparation of a veritable feast including, nachos, tacos, chilli, guacamole, refried beans, salad, sour cream, pretty much the works and most splendid it was. Washed down with a bucket load of Margueritas and some Santana. Less of the old hippies thank you.

Monday
The Glasgow Fair holiday and it figured. Manuel was going camping this weekend, I queried his madness. It always rains on the Glasgow Fair and this year was no exception, except maybe it rained harder. So nowt else for it but a shot at quantifying the Menus for 100 odd happy campers for 7 days. I got to Tuesday before deciding I really needed a break, so mistakenly we went shopping where I seem to have spent a relatively small fortune buying all manner of weird stuff that I wouldn�t have if I had been working. I hate holiday weekends.

posted by timesnewroman at 7:10 AM  

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Thursday, July 17, 2003

An observation of sorts, but having just returned from the weeks shopping it struck me that I was taking too long to choose which particular anti-perspiramt I should purchase. Detaching myself for that manic really focussed on amission type moment I worked out that there were 210 square feet of shelves dedicated to this particular product! I further counted 60 different types, not brands of the bloody stuff on one shelf unit, 5'x7' give or take the odd inch. Multiply this by the 7 units and you get 420 different kinds of anti-perspirant product give or take a few(Th really popular ones were probably on another shelf and taking up more width. Nevertheless this is quite a choice option. Just how mad is capitalism, to think that a product my parents probably never bought and my grandparents certainly didn't, has this level of do-your-head-in-ness. Bring back the DDR.
posted by timesnewroman at 8:18 PM  

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Wednesday, July 16, 2003

The Bank business...it turns out I should read stuff more closely. What I assumed was my normal current account card being renewed turned out to be a card for the other account that I no longer use and have no balance, if you exclude the � 150 quid or there about I have just spent hence the curious overdraft. Of course when you get a new bank card in the post, you cut up the old one don't you. So rather than the surprise overdraft me account's probably stuffed with loadsa money that I can't actually reach on account of me not having a card, wortking miles from my branch and leaving and returning home long before and after the bank closes. Thank Conrad for Credit Cards. Speaking of Conrad, rumours abound on the comments bit....is it he or not.
posted by timesnewroman at 8:35 PM  

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Tuesday, July 15, 2003

First there was the millenium dome, then the Scottish Parliament Building, pretty as it may be one day if its ever finished, then lets pay for an illegal war in Eyeraq. For christs sake, how much public money to we have to throw away on outrageous spending whilst at the same time we wont pay a decent wage for our public employees. This latest profligate spending is a tad much. Just how many tax payers pounds did it cost to feed Ariel Sharon? We should be told!

With a wee bit of luck this one may well appear in the Guardian letters page.
posted by timesnewroman at 5:46 AM  

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Monday, July 14, 2003

A daily post, whatever next. Its been a wee while since I last visited Mr Tweede. Last time I was round in sunshine world he was decrying my rather hipy length hair. Since then thewife has cut it for me, rather on the short side. Mr Tweede reckons I should not wear a black shirt with a haircut like this.

So there's me home from work to mail from the bank and I'm thinking shit, not already, its a week till payday and I cannot possibly have exceeded the overdraft this month. Surely not, okay when you start to look at it I may have. So I start totting up the figures and realise that they have reduced the overdraft which sort of means that yes I could well be overdrawn, so I start to put finger to keyboard to ask them for food parcels and the like, only to get to the point where I notice that the account number is wrong, its an old account which I dont use any more. I get regular statements saying the balance is � 0.00. I have no chequebook and certainly no guarantee card so what the hell is going on. Do banks make mistakes? Immediate panic over, back on our heads so to speak.


posted by timesnewroman at 9:45 PM  

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Sunday, July 13, 2003

I have been rebuked. the reidboy has written to remind me that I have not posted for some time despite not having understood the previous posts, he still wants me to keep it up. God all you bloody London exiles....I've just realised that 50% of the readership here are Londoners! Anyway I haven't been posting cos there really hasn't been anything other than the banal to post. I mean what's new really, government still sucks, new labour are still liars and work is ticking along nicely.

jimty though has plans for CTP along the lines of an incredible hulk theme although I have my doubts as to how a large green tyranosaurus rex is going to fit here. In case the boyreid along with any else for that matter is confused as to what this is about, CTP is not as I joked Colin the Pimp. It is in fact Conrad the Parrot. Conrad is an inflatable parrot that sits on a perch next to my desk. Conrad has a variety of disguises/alter-egos. The first of these was Super Parrot, complete with mask and cape. Over the course of time, Conrad has also been Conrad C Nesbit, Harry Parrot (Harry Potter theme and damned good it was too!), Spiderparrot, which really had to be seen to be believed, Conrad the Best Man(Parrot) just previous to my marrying thewife, Conrad Schumacher (with big red car). Conrad is currently Conrad Cool, Disco Parrot, which he has appeared as before. Someday I may upgrade this site to include pictures and a star may well be born.

I am currently putting a quiz together with nongeekygeek for the YIK. Its to be a multi media affair with Powerpoint and Data Projector and Vid Clips. Looks pretty neat but in the course of this I have discovered I am old. Who are Busted, Pink, Beyonce, Sclub182 ?? and why do kids care about this sort of nonsense. A different sort of Deja Vu.
posted by timesnewroman at 7:42 PM  

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Thursday, July 03, 2003

Bollocks I hate this bloody programme. I did a lengthy post earlier and had to leave it to stop mumsy's telly from only showing programmes with blizzards - it was something to do with the video, anyway it works now and then I had to check out jimstewart's computer cos he was having problems scanning, SCREAMS, why didn't they just leave computers to the geeks! Also noticed that despite having subscribed to BT Broadband for some bizarre reason jimstewart was still connecting via a modem duh!

Anyway I had a lengthy post about the bloody comed Y senior from (not just) na council, who decided to pull the plug on young nongeekygeek's much needed and considerably well put together computer driving school for the YIK on some Bureaucratic Cost reason, despite the fact similar courses have previously costed significantly more (ie more than double) to be delivered less enthusiastically by college lecturers who pretty much turned up for their �20 quid an hour fee thank you. Did msbureaucrat have a look at what was proposed, cost it realistically, look at what it was offering and indeed how it tied in with the other activities offered at the centre. Well I would have thought that was why she got paid the big bucks, but who am I to cast persians.

Last night we were left on tenterhooks by theboss, who asked if we could be around today lunch time for an announcement by the bossboss. Of course this started all sorts of speculation and I am sure by now, half the council think they are about to undergo yet another re-organisation. It turns out though that oor jem is heading upwards with a big step and the reason for any less than cheerfullness on the boss's part is the losing of her which will be felt. Fortunately she'll be back doing 2 days a week which is helpful. Go jem go. PS if your reading this and you stare at the screen long enough, the go jem go will march across it ....honest.

All this and the most fabby fun ever. Follow these simple instructions and read the result CAREFULLY. Go to Google, type in the search window "Weapons of mass destruction" and hit the I'm feeling lucky button" Grins widely.


posted by timesnewroman at 8:44 PM  

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Tuesday, July 01, 2003

A brief rant, of sorts. Why is it I feel no great sense of wonder that the labour benches have rebelled against the great compromise offered by Tone, and voted for theabolition of fox-hunting? Given that I personally abhor the barbaric ritual, and detest the notion of the ruling classes having a fun time to boot. Nope its the sort of collective conscience salving in a way that screams hey look we are really cool and trendy and life loving and right on and we don't do every single thing Tone tells us to. So why the fuck not over the invasion of Eyerack?

I'm really considering renaming this "Where is Manuel" (see the Baghdad Blogger Blog "Where is Raed?") Cos like he hasn't posted for a while. Is it because I is a youf. Or has he been watching Big Brother, or been to Glastonbury or even been on hols. we thinks we should be told and at very least have an R.E.M. review to read and be jealous of.
posted by timesnewroman at 9:33 PM  

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