BB8

At last, Big Brother 8 has started. I'm not interested in which neanderthals are on this year's list. I couldn't care less about arguments over who used the last of the Marmite. Nor care I nary a tinker's cuss about which slapper will sleep with which boy band wannabie. No happy reader, it means that I can leave my Celebdaq account running on autopilot for the next two moons. Huzzah.

La$t.fm

I've just read that CBS have bought my beloved Last.fm. The last line in the report raises an eyebrow: "With a strong partner we can add the features we always dreamed about." I assume that means stuff that will weed out legit vs ripped MP3's? Time to baton down the hatches I reckon unless you want a knock on the door sometime in the near future.

A man's job

I arrived home in high spirits on Friday night, a nice long weekend coming and all that. I was greeted at the front door by an agitated spouse (mine) who informed me that the drains were blocked. I had a quick look and by jove, the boss was right. The gulley that collects all the waste from the house (including the shitter, it is a 30's house after all) was overflowing. She said 'You better fix it quickly because I've got a wash on and the water will pour out onto the patio'. This in itself was news to me, I thought we had a few paving slabs out the back, but it appears that this has now turned into a patio.

I got hold of a broom handle and shoved it down the gulley, but the water wouldn't go down. I pulled up the manhole cover, stuck a feather duster handle up the inlet pipe, but there was no shifting the meniscus of debris laden water.

It was at this point that I decided to give up, inform the boss of my decision, crack open a lager and start to enjoy my weekend. The conversation went thus:

'Oh well, there's no shifting it. Not sure what the problem is'.
'Well you better fix it, I'm not having all this water all over the patio.'(see previous comment)
'I'll go to B & Q tomorrow and buy some drain cleaner type stuff'. (I had no intention of doing this, the blockage would sort itself out by the blocked drain faeries over night)
'What if it isn't blocked with gunk, but with something solid?'
'Oh Buddha. So what do you want me to do?'
'I don't know, fix it. Somehow. I don't know anything about drains'.
'Well neither do I, your guess is as good as mine'.
'Stick your hand down the pipe and see if you can pull out what's blocking it'.
'Tell you what, why don't you stick your hand down there?'
'I'm holding the baby'.
'I'll hold the baby'.
'But then I'll have germs on my hands, and I have to feed the baby in a minute'.
'I'll feed him'.
'But you're the man'. The clincher.

Beaten, I put my hand down the drain and pulled out the sprinkler attachment from the end of the hose. Funny how it managed to find it's way down there. I think I had been set up.

Plain wrong

I was walking toward the office yesterday morning and passed a queue of people at a bus stop. There was a guy squeezing a zit on his (I presume) girlfriend's face. Jesus guys, that really isn't allowed. Zit squeezing should be a solitary task done in front of the bathroom mirror. Not whilst waiting for the No 173 on Oxford Street.

Land of the giants

Is it me or are instant coffee granules getting really big?

Happy anniversary

Sorry to all Spurs fans out there, but today is the 20th anniversary of Coventry winning the FA Cup, 3-2 against the mighty Spurs. This week, Keith Houchen's goal (Coventry's second) was voted the best ever cup final goal. Of course it was, but I would say that. View all the goals from the cup run here.

It's the FA Cup final between Chelsea and Man Ure on Saturday. I can't say that I am overly bothered by it; it's a case of who I hate more (MU get the nod I think). However, I haven't missed watching the Cup final live since I first saw one back in 1977 when Man United beat Liverpool 2-1 (Lou Macari got the winner). That is, until this Saturday. It was announced by the boss last night that I am taking my son and heir swimming at 2 o'clock on Saturday. She has some really important things to do, like sleep or drink coffee or whatever new mum's do. Anyway, she thought 'it would be nice' if I took him. He can't even crawl yet and she expects him to swim? And leaving me in charge of a 5 month old, in water, probably with a hangover is not the most sensible thing. Oh well, I'll just have to Sky+ it and pretend it's live. Ho hum

Good luck Sean

Sean's off to Amsterdam to try his hand at his own business. Best of luck fella, I hope this doesn't stop you leaving completely unrelated comments on this blog. If ever you need a shit HTMLer to help out, you know how to get hold of me.

Just remember:
- trams have right of way
- ladies of the night never have a fixed price, you can always haggle
- don't ever buy Durban Poison, it gives you 'the fear'

Hope it goes well matey.

Divine intervention

As I was riding in this morning, the sun came out for the first time in weeks. As usual it was right in my eyes. My visor was particularly dirty and I couldn't see much of the road ahead. I gave it a quick rub, but then realised that it was dirty because of insect bits. After the wipe the visor was smeared with guts and goo and further impeded my vision. I was doing about 70 mph on the M3 at the time so not much chance of pulling up and giving it a bit of a clean. I noticed some moisture on my fairing so used my free hand to try and gather some up and try and shift some of the entrails. No joy, there wasn't enough water. Just after this, a car in front of me squirted water on his windscreen, missed, and I suddenly had a face full of water. Problem solved. Spooky huh?

Out the frying pan

Today our leader, Prime Minister Blair, will announce that he is resigning. Huzzah. The new leader will be in office within 7 weeks. It will be Gordon Brown. Shit.

Lil bitta rockabilly

Song of the week - 'Five-0 Ford' by Reverend Horton Heat. I urge you to listen to it. Recorded in 1994 so not exactly contemporary, but hey-ho.

While you're downloading that, give 'Winona's Big Brown Beaver' - Primus (1995) a go as well. I dare you, I double dare you motherf%£$er.

Answer me this

Why is it that whenever you come across a car with it's windows/top down playing loud music, it's always a song that you have never heard before and never wish to hear again? There must be some sort of good taste monitoring going on in car stereos that immediately skip across good tracks as soon as the volume goes above a certain limit and the windows/top and opened. Or maybe the drivers of said vehicles are just wankers.

Ringtones

There is only one thing more annoying than the Crazy Frog ringtone and that's people who leave their phone's ringtone on the factory setting. For the love of God, use some imagination.

Privacy Act

I was in the WC at work this morning attending to a call of nature, as you do. Moving on... I heard the cleaner come in and she started cleaning the other cubicles. Being a chap who enjoys his privacy, and in these situations, his anonymity, I thought I would delay my exit from cubicle 3 until she cleared off. Next thing there was a knock on the door and she said 'Are you going to be long in there, I need to mop the floor'. I don't even get that sort of interruption at home, the cheeky mare.