Friday, January 30, 2004

I get this letter the other day, turns out it's an invoice, from the local housing association ANCHO, who seem to want an estate management charge for the period from October to December of last year, for the sum of �19.00. No further information whatsoever came in the letter. My chosen method for dealing with this was to bin it. thewife however was more curious than I and decided she wanted to phone them for an explanation. Fine I said, but explain to them that they are getting FUCK ALL! She tried, very hard indeed to get through to them, but couldn't. The following day she did manange to get through to an apologetic admin worker on the other side, who explained that the invoice shouldn't have gone out on its own, that there should have been a letter explaining the situation. I found this on their website and basically looks like they can legally charge us �80 a year for this "service." I bought this house about three years ago and have never heard of the buggers before. Certainly have never seen anything of them in the streets and as for maintenance and estate management, they seriously have to be taking the piss.

The local rag had it on the front page as Poll Tax MkII. Seemingly all 200 + of the local owner occupiers are going ballistic. The reason why thewife couldn't get through at first was that they had to take the phones off the hook. I have emailed them with a list of questions, mainly around their competency to fill envelopes let alone manage an estate. I am awaiting the response to this before I involve local councillors, MSPs and MP. Its not the �80 that I am annoyed about. It's the principle of the fucking thing, they provide absolutely fuck all to me and I want an itemised invoice stating what they believe they provide before I laugh at them and bin it.

After that I should perhaps not mention that thewife is downstairs preparing a pheasant. I have never tasted one of those.
posted by timesnewroman at 10:11 AM  

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Thursday, January 29, 2004

Watched part of the BBC2 programme on the 1984 Miner's Strike the other night (It was too depressing and downright harrowing to watch all of it) Was that really 20 years ago. Is that bastard Thatcher still alive? Have I mellowed in my opinion of the police? Yes it was, Unfortunately - but can't be for much longer, I have - but there were people interviewed in the programme I would happily see dead. Still convinced a lot of those police lines during that strike were reinforced by the military.

So Tony Bliar has scored 2 out of 2. Turns out his rebellious backbenchers are fodder and the degree of squeaky cleanness attached to him will be truly proven when the American paint on the weapons of mass destruction has finally dried and they can be shipped off to eyerack.

Pass the sick bag! Heads back in the sand.


posted by timesnewroman at 7:43 AM  

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Monday, January 26, 2004

I am complete. I have become grumpy old man. Bureaucracy gone mad, these old people (older than me) in Bristol have happily resided in their pre-fabricated houses for the past 60 years and now the Council wants to knock down their homes and put them into some soulless, brand spanking new apartment and the old sods don't want to go, because they like them and they like their communities and why can't the council just fuck off and leave them alone. Or perhaps they are looking forward to a bumper payday on account of having sold the land to private developers!

Having lived in prefab from age 2 until aged 4, I believe we were only to happy to leave, but then I wasn't so attached to it.
posted by timesnewroman at 8:54 PM  

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Busy weekend over. Woodies Scottish Forum Annual Meeting and Burns Supper combined. It was rather good, good people, good fun, good food, good entertainment. My address to the Woodies went down well and I learned to knit. Only downer was the traffic jam on the M80 on the way home which added 2 hours onto the journey time grrr. This made us both too tired to go to the pub quiz that we have been promising ourselves we will go to for the past few weeks.

posted by timesnewroman at 6:29 AM  

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Friday, January 23, 2004

Far to busy to Blog much at all this week on account of speechwriting. I can write the speech, the trouble is it has to be funny as well. There isn't really a lot that is funny about the Woodcraft Folk, although Alexei Sayle once described them as The para-military wing of the Co-op. I liked that and I'm going to use it.
posted by timesnewroman at 7:52 AM  

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Tuesday, January 20, 2004

Wheee - weekends are but a small pause between endless periods of work and stufftodointhevening and I am still trying to find the time to read more, play the guitar more, eat more meat and then somebody just kind of slips in the notion that perhaps I could do an address at the Scottish woodies Burns supper this coming weekend and I have a few days to do it only they clash with my own woody group, yik, work and shopping, although we may not have to do much shopping cos we are away for the weekend and if there are any burglars reading this our neighbours with the huge dog are looking after the place whilst we are away and I guess Charlie thinks he has a window of opportunity to entertain but he doesn't.....breathe.
posted by timesnewroman at 11:08 PM  

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Sunday, January 18, 2004

If this is Islam, it sucks!
posted by timesnewroman at 8:10 PM  

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I hate Blogger sometimes. I posted - it returned a server error and lost my post � I hate that. Its gone into the ether and though I can rewrite it, it won�t be the same. It will lack the spontaneity of the original, and probably some of the content as well.

It was a lazy Sunday. I finished Irvine Welsh�s Porno, which I bought ages ago and it sort of sat there and did nothing. New years resolution is to read more and I have done so that�s a good start. Yesterday�s Troon trip has me a couple more so I am stocked up.

Speaking of yesterday�s Troon trip. Breakfast was amazing. Duncan�s the Butcher is very good. The pork sausages are fabulous, really fabulous, better than last week�s which were good. The pork and chive are okay but frankly, the chives demean the pork somewhat. It really doesn�t need them. The black pudding is something else. So much tastier than the pre-packed supermarket crap from last week, and the texture was far superior. A really good black pudding.

For dinner I had my very first (ever) Steak, which thewife cooked to perfection. I like steak, trouble is apparently it�s not something we can afford to eat as often as one might like.

posted by timesnewroman at 8:05 PM  

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Saturday, January 17, 2004

I got the fixture list wrong. Which means me and thewife are going to Troon and possibly Ayr on a mission, so I wasn't at the football and any result bar a defeat is bound to have me cast in the role of jinx. It's like lucky pants, nothing bar a Grobellar style bung is going to have influence on the result but anxious people grasp at any ridiculous notion, that is why we have religion. So there we are a draw which is the best home result for a wee while and its my fault cos I'm miles away and me and thewife are on a meat mission. She knows of a butcher by the name of Duncan's in Troon and that's where we are heading. Sausages and proper black pudding and I'll let you know tomorrow just how good. Of course while cavorting the streets of Troon we came across a branch of Shorts the Baker, from Irvine and I had an onion pie, that's a Scotch Pie with onion for the uninitiated and it was extremely tasty and had less grease (gravy as the baker claims) than I remember.

We came across an Oxfam and being Troon, where the good and wealthy burghers pass on their stuff to charities, we came away with a handful of books to fuel another of my new year resolutions, to read more.

Then, having decided we would have a chilli night in (with mince) it was a trip to 3 different supermarkets to try to get a Marguerite mix for Tequila. Could find it nowhere so we settled on some lime cordial, Cointreau, limes and Tequila and I dare say we may sing before the night is over.

I also found a supply of Anchor Liberty Ale and Sierra Nevada so we are pretty much sorted.
posted by timesnewroman at 6:26 PM  

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Thursday, January 15, 2004

� 6.35 in txt messages. That's how much I got billed this month. Mostly cos Killie are doing particularly badly at the moment. I get a txt alert everytime a goal is scored. So thats a fivers worth over the past month (Half Time and Full Time Scores too, we are not THAT awful.) Thing is half the time I already know this, I am sat there watching the opposition scoring and waiting for that vibrating thing in my pocket. Problem is, I saw the ad years ago when I first got the phone and wasn't religously attending games, thought it would be a good thing and signed up. Now I don't know how to stop the bloody thing. I've tried txting them back to cancel it from a polite "unsubscribe" to a slightly more in your face "FUCK OFF". Neither worked. I may have to change my phone and my number.
posted by timesnewroman at 7:04 AM  

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Wednesday, January 14, 2004

Just a brief post since most of my available time has gone cursing omne/wight cable for being unable to send any of the half-dozen emails I wanted to send. I'm getting sorely tempted to go back to BT and Sky. Overall its a bit dearer but clearly the service is better.

Berlusconi huh about to face his comeuppance at last. Fascist git, I hope they hang him in the street.

Discoverieis in Post Vegeterianism #8 Corned Beef. Yummy.
posted by timesnewroman at 7:18 AM  

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Sunday, January 11, 2004

This may seem strange, nay, bizarre that anyone could get excited enough to blog about the merits of meals but a new world is opening up before me.

We had our favourite Americans over for dinner last night and had a jolly good time. They invaded none of our neighbours, didn't dominate the surroundings and were as interested in the wider world as they were in themselves. One of them even had a Cuba Libre made with Havana Club - something which would have been illegal at home, and probably would have invoked some schedule in the Patriot Act that would have seen them under house arrest. Anyway, back to the food, thewife makes a bloody good lasagne, I know this because Manuel said so once. I know this because now I have tasted it as well and Manuel was not just being polite or kidding.

This morning I got to sample the array of delights that is the Scottish breakfast, similar to the English breakfast but superior in that it includes tattie scones. So there it is bacon, eggs, sausages, black pudding, tatie scones, mushrooms and tomatoes and that is a breakfast and a half, Actually it is lunch as well. I was a tad disappointed in the black pudding - thewife reckons we need to go to a proper butcher to get good stuff. The sausages though, were something else, they were really good, really tasty. thewife I am sure is at times bewildered by my wholesale conversion to the cause.

I had chinese sweet and sour chicken tonight and that was good. The chicken was far tastier than yesterday's Burger King effort though.

One complaint though. I keep getting stuff stuck between my teeth which I have never had for like ever.
posted by timesnewroman at 7:48 PM  

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Saturday, January 10, 2004

The Village Curry House, Nelson Street, Glasgow, is a small Halal restaurant and carry out, near, too near, to my work. They do lunchtime specials, where for between � 2.50 and � 2.90 you can get a perfectly adequate portion of curry with rice, nan, chappatis or parratha. When I use the word adequate, that relates solely to the quantity. The veggie curries have always been the best I have ever tasted and today I discovered that the lamb curry is also the best I have ever tasted.
posted by timesnewroman at 1:23 PM  

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Friday, January 09, 2004

I don't know where to start. Yesterday was filled with sadness and love and the realisation of an enormous loss. It was also a celebration of the life of my friend, Manuel and what a fabulous and full life he led. The ceremony was guided by a Humanist and those present considered the person and his very unique contribution to all our lives. I spoke to many people afterwards and realised that the closeness of his friendship, his wisdom, humour and warmth permeated far beyond the circle of friends that we were part of, wider and deeper through every sphere, workplaces far apart, friends from the past and family. He shall be missed by many.

Later in the evening we had some whisky and reminiscence and among many tales was Manuel's love of "slice" a peculiar Scottish Sausage, rectangular and spicy. I said that it was one of the few things that I would be tempted to partake of since becoming a veggie over 15 years ago. Reidski, up from London, had previously fallen to the temptations of meat and urged me on. It was fitting, thewife could not believe it, she ran round to the local shop, bought some came home cooked it and placed it in my hand and I ate it and enjoyed it and the Lamb Curry we had later. There are so many things to try now.
posted by timesnewroman at 7:21 AM  

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Thursday, January 08, 2004

I am drained, physically, mentally and emotionally and that's all I can say.
posted by timesnewroman at 11:28 PM  

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Monday, January 05, 2004

A strange day. I kind of planned to be off today because I thought that extra new year recovery day is a good thing and you can sort of chill and finally do the stuff you intended to over the holidays but never got round to. Instead, ended up having to seek out a radiator for the motor. It broke on the way to the cinema the day I found out about Manuel. We never got to see the Return of the King and I'm not sure if I need to. Maybe its just the moment, thewife will need to see it, I'm sure. She's a follower, I'm a numb arsed bored kind of guy, certainly was at the second one. So anyway I've located said radiator in Kilmarnock and we get there around lunch time which gives us the opportunity to have lunch at Paris Match, a place I love but haven't been to in a while and its just really good food, particularly the pizza, at good prices and comforting. We used to go before every home game and I got out of the habit, of home games, and going for a while, but they still remembered my name after a year or so. That's attention to customers. That, and I love the no football colours, except for Killie, sign.

Then home to have a number of warm, touching, telephone conversations with people I haven't met, but I know I like them, because they knew and liked Manuel and that's why they were calling.

Tomorrow its back to work. I think I'll welcome the routine.
posted by timesnewroman at 11:13 PM  

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Sunday, January 04, 2004

I love blogging. You get to "meet" good people and share stuff with them and it helps. Thanks Occupied Country and Ale-Fan
posted by timesnewroman at 2:52 PM  

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Saturday, January 03, 2004

A very different new year from the normal. We had made plans, but they went by the wayside. We spent the bells with Lady El which was emotional and necessary for all of us. I had a bad cold, courtesy of thewife who was kind enough to share it with me. On new years day we had mumsy round and boy did she eat. Last night we needed to get out and we went to the councillor's party, all the usual suspects were there with the exception of jimstewart who was conspicuous by his absence. Apparently his body had become a temple, for the evening anyway. I suspect he may be supping some ales while his team have their last chance to salvage the remains of the season.

The councillor's party was good as they ever are, and gave us an opportunity to lambast the powermongers. The singing vet sang and I requested The Freedom Come All Ye for reasons of my own and he did it well. They even made me sing, which to my surprise I did. Then we came home. thewife had very clearly enjoyed herself immensely, having consumed alcohol on a scale not seen for some time and judging by her demeanor this afternoon, is unlikely to again for a very long while.
posted by timesnewroman at 12:35 PM  

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