Grandad June 30th, 2007
Got up early this morning.
Found a woman in the garden.
Let Sandy out.
Sandy went over and lay down beside her. She must be OK [I trust Sandy's judgement].
Invited the woman in for a cup of coffee. We had a very pleasant chat. She dried off a bit as it’s pissing rain.
She left.
Just as well I cut the lawns yesterday and the garden is looking very well at the moment. I would have been embarrassed if she had seen it the day before.
Grandad June 29th, 2007
A friend just sent me an e-mail.
He did it to wind me up, because it’s Friday and because he likes winding me up.
He sent me a news item…….
A High Court judge in Belfast is due to rule today on a GBP£100m (USD$196 million) compensation bid by 5,000 serving and former police officers who have claimed post traumatic stress suffered during years of violence in Northern Ireland.
Could someone please tell me what is going on here?
These people applied for a job in the police service. They presumably knew it was the police they were joining. Maybe they were all Enid Blyton fans and thought the police were all like Mr Plod?
It must have been quite a shock to them to find that there was a little bit of violence involved. Is it this shock they are claiming for?
The majority of the people in Northern Ireland never expected the violence either. But they weren’t allowed to go off duty. They weren’t being paid either. Maybe they should all bring an action against the police for not stopping the violence? after all, the police are going to have £100 million to share around.
Personally, I am bringing an action against the British Government for not shutting the politicians up. I am suffering from post-traumatic disorder. My nerves are in shreds. If I ever hear Gerry Adams talk about “the realidy of the sityeaashun” again, I shall scream.
Grandad June 28th, 2007
This is the weirdest thing.
I think I have fixed my Interweb connection!
I don’t know what I did exactly, but I found my way into my wireless thingy [that little blue box with loads of cables out the back and lovely flashy lights on the front and two strange looking sticks at the back]. It has loads of interesting screens inside. Ron would kill me if he found out I’d got in.
Actually, when I say they are interesting, they aren’t really. There are no games in there [I looked] or anything fancy like that. But there are loads of places where you can change selections and type in random numbers. So that’s what I did. I typed in random numbers, and made some different selections.
It did some strange things. At one stage, the garage door opened [and it's not even a remote garage door]. Another time I managed to switch channels on the television by pressing the backspace key. I also think I may have killed my next door neighbour [he has a pacemaker] as I heard some strange screams from in there.
I cut myself off from the Interweb a few times, but it’s back now. And here is the strange thing -
It’s going like the clappers!
What is even more strange, is that during all the shenanigans and tests, I wasn’t even using that box.
Maybe my ISP was lying all along and they have just fixed the fault? Coincidence?
Anyway, I have added a few functions to my keyboard now.
I’ll never get the hang of this computer and Interweb thing.
Grandad June 27th, 2007
I had a phone call from my doctor yesterday.
A phone call from the doctor is a bit like seeing two policemen on your doorstep, or getting a telegram [though that doesn't happen much these days]. All sorts of thoughts flash through your mind.
Had I forgotten to pay a bill?
Did he finally get the results of the blood test he took five years ago?
Was I to be nominated for ‘Hypochondriac of the Year”?
Had I run over his dog again?
So I called down to the surgery.
Doc and I get on very well. We have the same warped sense of humour. He can even accurately predict which of my bits is likely to fall off next. I’d go for a pint with him, but it’s hard to be chatty with a bloke who has had his finger up your arse [unless you are homosexual, which I'm not].
“What’s up, Doc” says I in my best Bugs Bunny style.
“I’m concerned.” says he “I think it is time we changed your medication. I’m worried about some side-effects”
“Oh?” says I, not knowing what else to say.
“I was up by the lakes over the weekend and I saw you taking pot shots at the tourists again.”
“Ah!” says I “You think maybe my medication isn’t calming me enough? Should I be on something stronger?”
“No. It’s not that. I couldn’t help but notice that you missed a couple of times, which isn’t like you. I think the medication might be making your hands shake a bit.”
I was very relieved. I thought he was going to tell me that the tablets might turn my pee green or something nasty like that.
So he has put me on a different lot. He says it will take a few weeks to completely remove that twitch in the hand.
Just in time for the height of the tourist season.
I told you he’s a nice bloke.
Grandad June 26th, 2007
I wrote a wee post a couple of days ago [I can’t get it up, but I can get it down].
I phoned my Service Provider yesterday. Of course I got onto a bloke who could only speak Estonian. I explained that my downloads were perfect, but that I couldn’t upload anything. After a lot of “could you repeat that please” he sent me some instructions for some tests and told me to e-mail him back the results.
Of course the tests he sent me were to test my download. W*nk*r. I sent them back with a terse reminder that it was my upload I was worried about.
He never replied.
I rang back before lunch and got onto a very nice bloke. I’ll call him Tim [which isn't his real name!]. This was something new to me. Tim sounded like he knew what he was talking about. He was friendly. He was helpful. He could talk the talk. But best of all – he was Irish. [I presume he still is?].
Tim was a bit baffled by my problem. He did mention that they hadn’t any reports of problems [which was favourite in my betting list, if you remember]. He didn’t mention trees or earthquakes or even sunspots.
He told me to try several things that all sounded sensible, like connecting my PC directly to the aerial. But none of them made any difference. In all we were on the phone for three-quarters of an hour. Then he said he’d have to go into a huddle with the Second Line of Defence. I knew I was getting somewhere. He said he’d ring be back at half one.
Sigh.
At half one, on the dot, he rang me. After I picked myself up off the floor, he explained that the technical lads were baffled and had to think some more, and that he was only ringing me because he said he would. He said he would ring back when he had something to report.
Half an hour later, he rang back. We did some fierce jiggery pokery to allow the Second Line run some tests. He said he was buggering off for an hour and would ring me back. I suppose everyone is entitled to a lunch break.
So, for an hour, I sat there watching strangers attack my PC [because I had to switch off a firewall or something]. I presume every f*cker in the Eastern Bloc now has my credit card numbers. Not to mention my medical records, bank account details and the size of my willy.
An hour later, Tim rang back. They were stumped. They had run their tests, and apparently I have a perfect connection. He even sent me a little graph thingy to prove it.
It looked like they spent the hour playing around with MS Paint, but I doubt it.
They had shown me theirs so I showed them mine. And mine was bigger than theirs.
So the long and the short of it is that I won my bet [at Evens] that there is nothing wrong at their end. But I lost the war.
I don’t know where to turn now. My PC is OK. I tweaked my MTU on their instructions [it didn't hurt]. I proved that there is nothing wrong at my end. And they proved that there is nothing wrong at their end.
But I still can’t upload.
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