Head Rambles

Grandad November 30th, 2007

Last June, I wrote about Bernie.

She’s a nice person but a bit on the weird side.  Whenever I spoke to her, I always felt I was entering a parallel universe.

Mine is a world of peace and quiet; of birdsong and the wind blowing in the trees.

Hers is a world of police raids, the sound of breaking glass and looking up the paper to see how her son did in his last court appearance.

The two worlds rarely overlap.  Thank God.

One of the things about Bernie, was that she couldn’t drive.  She hadn’t the faintest idea how to control a car.  But that didn’t stop her.

She used to arrive here and park her car in the middle of the lane.  She wasn’t sure how to pull into one side, and as for the idea of driving in through an open gate……!!  So I used to have to go out and park her car for her every time she arrived.  And when she was leaving, I’d have to drive the car out onto the lane again, as she was afraid of hitting the gate posts.

One time, she decided to park further up the lane.  I think she was getting a bit embarrassed at asking me to park the car all the time.  Of course, when she did park up there, she took a chunk out of the car by hitting a wall.  This wasn’t noticeable, as there were chunks missing all around the car - a great testament to her driving skills.

When the time came for her to leave, she just drove into a neighbours garden.  I don’t know why she did that, and she probably doesn’t either.  But this left her with a problem.  You see, Bernie couldn’t reverse.  She had never reversed a car in her life and didn’t know how to.  So she called up to the neighbour’s door, and asked him very politely if he could possibly reverse her car out of his garden!  I would love to have seen his face…

Bernie has been driving for the last ten or so years on a provisional licence.  She has done the test on numerous occasions and was laughed out of it each time.  When the government decided to clamp down on this business of endlessly issuing provisional licences, the first person I thought of was Bernie.

I met her yesterday.  She was outside the local shop, still behind the wheel of her car.  I went over to say hello.  After the usual pleasantries, she proudly announced that she had passed her test!  I thought she was having me on, but she then proceeded to reverse very smartly into a very narrow entranceway, turn the car and then park perfectly at the kerb.  I know people who have been driving for years, who couldn’t manoeuvre as smartly as that.

I felt myself entering that parallel universe again.

• On the road
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Grandad November 29th, 2007

I can’t decide which is worse - Mary Harney or Windows Vista.

They are both fat and over bloated.

They use up too many resources.

They both promise and fail to deliver.

Neither of them does what they’re supposed to do.

Anything they come in contact with doesn’t work.

They both insist things must be done their way, even though it’s the wrong way.

They both keep having to patch up their own errors.

They are both too expensive.

On the face of it though, I think Vista looks more attractive.

• Politics , computers
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Grandad November 29th, 2007

And lo, a shadow lay across the land.

And the Evil Beast did continue to lay waste the Health Service, and the people screamed and died.

For The Beast denied everything. It claimed it knew not of any wrongdoing. It claimed it was someone else’s fault. It claimed it was trying to make things better.

But the people knew The Beast was evil. They knew it wanted only power and money.

“Enough” they cried, “for we are dying and we cannot enter our hospitals, for they are understaffed and run down”

But The Beast called forth its army of Orcs and Trolls from the slime-pits, and they did say it was doing a fine job, and that it could continue to terrorise the land.

And the people wept.

• Politics
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Grandad November 28th, 2007

Laptop: You think you’re fucking great.

Me: What?

Laptop: You and your fucking award. You think you’re the dog’s bollix.

Me: What are you on about?

Laptop: It’s only a cheap lump of metal. You’re swanning around like it’s a Nobel Prize. Ya big headded git. Fucking spider me arse!

Me: You’re just jealous because you didn’t get one.

Laptop: Jayzus! You wouldn’t have gotten it without me.

Me: How do you work that out?

Laptop: You honestly think you would win with that turgid crap that you type? No way, baby! The only reason you won is because I take your maudlin bullshit, spruce it up a bit and add a bit of humour. Don’t flatter yourself.

Me: Good. You can help me with the book then.

Laptop: Book? What book?

Me: The one I’m going to write.

Laptop: Oh fuck! Don’t make me laugh! You, write a book? So what is the title of this great work then?

Me: I was thinking of “PMS, I love you”.

Laptop: What the fuck……? What kind of book is this going to be?

Me: A sort of cross between Cecelia Ahern and Kerry Katona?

Laptop: Oh Christ!

Me: It’ll be great. everyone will want to read it.

Laptop: Yeah! And everyone will want barbed wire shoved up their hole!

Me: Do you have to be so coarse all the time?

Laptop: Me? Coarse? You’ll have to think a lot coarser than that if you want to write like Kerry Katona. And you are going to have to dumb things down a hell of a lot. If that’s possible.

Me: Are you saying I’m dumb?

Laptop: Listen, Kid. You are dumb. But compared to those two, you are fucking Einstein.

Me: So what are we going to do about it?

Laptop: You just fuck off to bed. I’ll have the first ten chapters ready when you get up tomorrow.

Me: Thanks.

Laptop: Don’t mention it, Old Sport.

• The Book , computers
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Grandad November 27th, 2007

For some reason, a lot of people are asking my advice about pipe smoking.

Am I becoming the iconic pipe smoker?

Anyway, I’m delighted, as I hate cigarettes. They are unhealthy, messy and they smell foul.

Really there is nothing to smoking a pipe.  There are those who will try to build up a mystique around it as if it were some Masonic Rite.  They will list out the amazing amount of equipment you will need like a pipe for each day of the week [and the materials they must be made of], and the reamers and the knives and the cleaning equipment.  They will whisper the rituals of ‘letting pipes breathe between smokes’ and will clean their bowls [nearly put an extra 'e' in there!] with whiskey or honey.

B*ll*x.

All you need is a pipe, some tobacco and something to light it with.

The only tricky thing about smoking a pipe is the start.  It is an art of experience. 

So how do you go about it?

My advice would be to get a relatively cheap pipe to start with.  There is no point in lashing out a fortune on something that’s going to end up at the back of a drawer.  If you like it, you can move on to something more expensive.

Then there is the tobacco.  Again there is a lot of crap about this.  It is down to personal taste.  There are ’standard’ tobaccos, aromatic tobaccos and flavoured tobaccos, and all sorts of variations in between.  I would recommend starting with something standard and mild.

For a long time, I smoked Benson & Hedges Mellow Virginia which is a fairly mild one.  Nowadays, I tend to smoke Condor, for two reasons - I like it, and most shops sell it.

Lighting your first pipe is the trickiest bit.  The chances are you will have packed the tobacco too tight or too loose [this is where experience comes in].  Too tight, and you can’t draw on it properly; too loose and it just goes out.

Try not to inhale.  This is difficult if you are a cigarette smoker, but you’ll soon get out of the habit.

There are loads of advantages to pipe smoking.  It is more relaxing, for some reason.  You will be more socially acceptable. It is cheaper.  It is cleaner [you're not dropping ash everywhere, and there are no butts to litter the ground]. 

There are some disadvantages.  You have to carry a pipe, tobacco and a lighter or matches instead of just a pack of fags.  It is also more difficult to bum a smoke!  you have to clean the pipe regularly [but, in fact that is part of the pleasure and ritual].

I now smoke one of Elie’s pipes.  It’s a great yoke.  The smoke has to travel three times the length of the stem and then through a paper filter so it cools the smoke beautifully and takes the majority of the sh*t out.

So, go on.

Give it a try.

• Smoking
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Grandad November 26th, 2007

I woke early this morning.

That happens quite often.  It comes with age.  And it meant I could get some work done.

So I fired up my trusty Remington and waited for the usual clatter of spam arriving in my in-tray. 

Nothing happened.

I went to visit my favourite porn news site.

Nothing happened.

My Interweb connection is deceased.  It is no more.  It is an extinct link.

I rang my broadband company.  I went through the usual - press 1 for this and 2 for that, several times.

Eventually, I got a recorded voice saying that my area was suffering from a ’slight degradation in service’.  What?  A degradation is a degrading,  a lowering in standard, not quite up to par.  Saying my service is slightly degraded is like saying that the Titanic is floating a little low in the water, or that the sun is a little less bright at midnight.

My connection is suffering from a ’slight degradation in service for three four five six seven eight hours now.  So much for getting my work done.  I managed to get some work done here, but it’s funny how cut off I feel.

If the service doesn’t come back soon, I’m going to have to put this in an envelope and post it to the website. 

And then I’ll go and slightly degrade all the windows in their office.

…..

Oh!  It’s back!!

Guess what the first thing is to arrive in my in-tray?

Yup!

An Invoice from my broadband supplier.

So that’s why they fixed it so promptly…

• Internet
• Comments(13)