Head Rambles

Grandad April 25th, 2008

I was in a bad mood yesterday.  I was also tired, which is a dangerous combination.

I was having a quiet doze in my armchair, thinking pleasant thoughts about murdering politicians when the phone rang.

I looked at the display for the number - UNAVAILABLE.

Now that means only one thing - a cold caller.  They are too damned chicken to display their numbers.  But it gave me a chance to work up a nice head of steam.

I let it ring a few times and answered it.

"What?" I barked.

There was a woman on the other end of the line.  Now, there are accents and there are accents.  There are some Irish accents that grate on my nerves, and some English ones too.  But this woman had the worst American accent I have ever heard.  And her voice was like a nail being dragged across glass.  She had a high screechy voice that set my nerves at breaking point.

She started into her waffle by saying that she was from ABC and DEF and that she was doing some market re……

"Oy!" I shouted.

There was a pause.

"I beg your pardon?" she screeched.

"Fuck off" I said.

There was an even longer pause.

"I just wanted to know if you could spare some time to answ…"

"I said fuck off" I said.

"…answer a few questions?" she screeched.

"I hate cold callers" I replied.  I had to admire her thick skin.

"You hate what?"

"Cold callers."

"Cold callers?"

"Yes.  What you are.  You rang me.  I never gave you permission to ring me.  You are a cold caller."

There was another long pause.  I thought she was going to argue the toss.

"Thank you for taking the call." she said in a far less screechy voice, and hung up.

I know she was only doing her job, but by working for whatever shower it was, she was knowingly promoting the spamming of private telephone lines.

It is spam.  And it’s nice to be able to tell a spammer to fuck off.

• spam
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Grandad April 24th, 2008

That sod Rick O’Shea has memed me.

He knows I hate memes.

He wants me to describe myself in six words.   Hahahaha!

I could go

• brilliant
• insightful
• articulate
• funny
• hilarious
• modest

but I won’t because one or two of those aren’t true [take your pick].

Thinking about it, I could describe just about anyone else, but me.  I could have a field day with Dubya, Harney or Bertie.

Aw shit!

QUIET.  Yes.  Honestly.  I’m a quiet sort of a bloke.  I’m not the gregarious party-going type.  I keep myself to myself.

CONTENTED.  In my own world.  I hate the world they are trying to impose on us though, with their fucking nanny state, their CCTVs, their intrusion into my affairs and the petty laws to protect us from ourselves.

HAPPY.  With a pipe in one hand and a pint in the other, and a good woman at home in the kitchen where she belongs.  What more could I ask for?

WEALTHY.  The above mentioned good woman, a funny dog, a lovely daughter, two fantastic grandchildren and a roof over my head where I love to live.  What more do I need?  Money?  Nah!

HAIRY.  The only places I don’t have hair are my eye-balls and about four inches on the outside of my legs above my ankles.

GRUMPY.  Obviously.  If I’m old, I have to be grumpy.  I have a lot to be grumpy about, with the appalling state of the modern world. It’s mandatory at my age.  But that’s why I started to blog.

That’s six.  I’m not doing any more.  Maybe I’m wrong on them?  Maybe there are other more appropriate words?

And now it’s my turn…..

G’wan Darragh

K8 loves these.

McAWilliams gets one, simply because I was chatting to him earlier.  [The wrong place at the wrong time!]

and

Jefferson, who memed me last week and I haven’t gotten around to it yet…

-oOo-

I have just read over this again.  Jayzus, what a load of bollix!

Six real words -

• Narky
• Grumpy
• Irrascible
• Thirsty
• Intolerant
• Accurate [I can take out an Oriental at 500 yards every time]

There.  That’s better.

• Memes
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Grandad April 24th, 2008

I went down to the pub for a pint last night.

Pullit served me my pint, and I lit up the pipe.

"Were you listening to that shower saying their goodbyes to Bertie?" he asked.

"That shower of hypocritical sycophants? No chance!"

That confused him a bit, as I keep forgetting he doesn’t do the Irish Times crossword, but he got the gist.

"What do you think about the latest thing to cut down drinking?" I asked.

He sighed.  "Another fucking law.  They can stuff it up their arses."

"So you’re not going to install CCTV then?"

"I am in my hole!"

"A good place," I replied.  "Now’s your chance to install one in the ladies jax."

"Hah! I hadn’t thought of that one.  Good thinking, Grandad."

"And what about their sting operation?  Sending kids in to order drinks so they can trap you?"

"Jayzus! Where are they going to find sixteen year old Gardai?  Anyway if some kid came in here dressed in a Garda uniform, I think I’d spot him."

Just then, nine year old Jimmy came in for his granny’s nightly takeaway of a pint of Guinness, so Pullit stabbed out his cigarette and went to serve him.

I feel sorry for the people in the cities, having to put up with all these crazy laws.

• Around the village , Rambles
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Grandad April 23rd, 2008

I’m sure none of you are interested as to how I got myself a web server, but it’s my blog, so I’ll tell you anyway.

It started a couple of weeks ago, as I mentioned before.  I saw this offer on a web site, and it looked geeky.  I always wanted to be a geek, because it’s the next best thing to being a yuppy.

Now, as it happens, that company is owned by my old friend Michele.  I should point out at this stage that Michele is a man [as far as I know] and he gets very touchy when people call him a woman, so there is nothing untoward going on there.  He may fancy me, but I certainly don’t fancy him.

I rang Michele.

"Howya Grandad!  What can I do for you?"

"I want one of those server things you are advertising.  What are they for."

"Putting web sites on," he sighed.

"I’ll take one."

"Are you sure about that?" he asked.  "Do you know anything about setting up servers and maintaining them?"

"Yes," I lied.

Now Michele may be a friend, but he is also a business man.  He demanded money.  I didn’t mind that as I have plenty old credit cards lying around.  I picked one at random, and MaryLou Kawalszki of Florida paid for my server.

I played around with it for a while, looking into various folders and things, but that got boring.  I stuck a web site on it.  That worked a treat.

On Saturday, I had great fun.  I started downloading web sites from the Interweb, and copying them onto my new server.

On Sunday, the server blew up.

I think it may have been the Bank of Ireland web site, or there again, it could have been eBay that caused the problem.  But none of the sites worked and I couldn’t connect to the server to fix it.

I like to lurk on ICQ, and fortunately [for me] Paul, who works with Michele logged on.  So I sent him a message - "HELP!"

He was very nice about it, considering it was half six on a Sunday evening.  He cried for a little while, but eventually he calmed down and he finally got my server running again.  He suggested that I might like to take Google.ie off it and put it back where it belonged.  He also suggested that I might be having memory problems.  I told him it was my age, but he said no, that he meant the server might have memory problems.

So on Monday, I annoyed them all in their office about my server and just to get rid of me, they put in extra memory.  It has been running perfectly ever since.

They are a very nice bunch in Blacknight, though they do tend to get a bit hysterical when I ring them, for some reason.  They need Prozac.

I have just finished uploading Google Earth onto it, and now I’m going to delete all the stuff in the folder called ‘bin’.

There is an awful lot of rubbish in it.

• Internet , work
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Grandad April 23rd, 2008

Serves the fucker right.

He should have been doing about 60 down that stretch of road.

• Rambles
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Grandad April 22nd, 2008

The miracle has happened.

Not only did I receive my copy of the National Disaster Handbook [I am so relieved] but I also got a copy of the government thing on the Lisbon Treaty.

I have been taking some interest in that treaty, and have even gone so far as to try to read the original.  I say ‘try’ because it is the most convoluted and badly written document I have seen in quite a while.  What’s more, it is deliberately confusing.

I have a lot of major reservations.

First and foremost, it is an extremely vague document.  From what I can gather, it is effectively handing the powers that be in Brussels a blank cheque to roll in other legislation without reference to the population.  It is the final signing away of our rights.

The general trend is towards a centralised government that controls all member states.  It is a watering down of local power.  I have no love for the current government, but at least they were put there by the Irish and can be kicked out by the Irish.  It is considerably harder to kick out some nameless faceless crowd in the EU.

When Ireland first joined back in 1973, it was called the EEC - The European Economic Commission.  The idea was to reduce trading barriers between member states and promote economic cooperation.  A laudable aspiration.  But now it has spread its wings into every aspect of control including taxation and law.  This treaty enshrines that even further.

Then there is the fact that it is a constitution.  They can call it a treaty, but that is mere semantics.  If there is a practical difference, then someone please enlighten me.

So far, I have neither seen nor heard a cohesive argument as to why I should vote yes on this.  All we get is vague statements and obfuscation.   We are told [by vested interests] that it will be ‘good for us’ but we are not told why.  Barosso was asked directly in an interview what the treaty would do for Ireland.  His response was that Ireland had done very well out of Europe.  What kind of fucking answer is that?  When he was pushed for an answer, he failed to come up with one.

I will certainly not be putting my name to a document that I don’t understand.  I will not be bullied by a twerp who tries to insult me into voting yes by saying that “we will ruin ourselves and we’ll go under sea and that we’ll succeed in doing what St Patrick didn’t do by bringing the water all over Ireland, and every other nonsense” [Bertie, of course] and that the only people voting no will be “loo-las of every kind and shape who advocated loony-left policies” [Bertie again].

I don’t trust Bertie.  I don’t trust the government.  I don’t trust the treaty.

I have more than a feeling in my water that this ‘treaty’ will be bad for Ireland.

I will be voting a resounding NO.

• Politics
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