Archive for July, 2009
Devaluing the Irish people
Grandad July 5th, 2009
The government has finally admitted that they have a long term solution to the financial crisis, and have revealed it in all its glory.
During the boom years, prices soared and wages did their best to keep up with them. Ireland became an uncompetitive country.
This was no great problem to the Irish, as high wages meant we were able to pay high prices. However, when it came to overseas trade, it was a different story. Prices here were astronomical to someone who wasn’t on an Irish wage. Irish goods were too expensive to buy.
One simple tried and tested solution is to revalue the currency to bring our cost levels on a par with everyone else. That option is no longer open to us though since we joined the Euro.
The government strategy is quite simple.
First of all, you do not encourage the banks to lend to business. Starved of their cash flow, business start going to the wall, or at best, start cutting wages. This of course leads to massive unemployment, which is now increasing at 3,000 a week.
Next, you let the unemployed stew, and do fuck all to alleviate the situation.
Finally you feck off for three months holiday and let the situation simmer.
What will happen, of course is that employers are going to drop their wages, knowing that the fear of unemployment will ensure meek compliance. Also, the unemployed will eventually accept any wages to get off the dole queues.
This will work, and wages will drop across the board. From that point of view, Ireland should become competitive once more.
However [and it’s a big ‘however’], the government seem to have overlooked a small point or two.
They are assuming that prices will drop at the same rate as wages. Hah! How many business owners are going to see the drop in wages and salaries as a nice way to increase the profit margins? A lot.
They are also assuming that if there are price cuts that they will be across the board.
If there is an average drop in income of [say] 10%, then prices also have to drop across the board by 10%, otherwise I can see a future of endless disputes.
So there you have it.
Not only are the government not doing anything to stop unemployment, they are actually encouraging it.
And what else are they doing?
They are helping themselves to three months holidays on full pay, in the middle of the biggest crisis this country has ever faced.
Hell and Heaven
Grandad July 4th, 2009
For the life of me, I cannot understand peoples’ fascination with cities.
Cities are noisy, dirty, smelly places. They are hard on the senses and on the feet. They are full of unnecessary noise, traffic and worst of all, people.
The bigger the city, the worse it is. People sing the praises of London and New York, and state that it is their life’s ambition to go there. My idea of hell would be to spend eternity in New York.
I love the tranquillity of the mountains. They are ever changing and easy on the eye and the foot. The only sounds are the call of the skylark and the distant bark of a deer. A day in the mountains relaxes the mind and the senses and fills the lungs with fresh air.
Of course, I do occasionally have to make some purchases, and that requires a trip to the shops.
I was down in the village yesterday. I called in to the greengrocer and had to tie Sandy outside. This caused a bit of consternation as a little girl couldn’t leave the shop as there was a huge fierce dog outside. I had to reassure her that Sandy is a big pussy, unless of course she hears a non-Irish accent.
After that, I had to call into the butcher’s. They don’t have anywhere to tie a dog outside, so the butcher held Sandy outside while I rummaged the shelves. We then did our transaction on the doorstep and had a bit of a chat.
It was a lovely day so I called in for a coffee. They know Sandy well there and she is always welcome. I have my particular taste in coffee, which they also know. It is known in the shop as a ‘Grandad’, of course.
As I sat there in the sunshine, supping my coffee and puffing on the pipe, people passed by on the pavement. Some just greeted me, and some stopped for a chat. It was very pleasant.
There was some traffic , of course. The odd car or tractor trundled past but there were no sirens or car horns. It was a tranquil village going about its daily business.
I tried to imagine myself sitting at a pavement café in London or New York.
I banished the thought immediately.
It was much too unpleasant.
You can keep your cities, thanks.
An offer of a job
Grandad July 3rd, 2009
I received an offer of a job yesterday!!
Our company offers you an excellent possibility to earn quickly.
It is a good chance to earn easily 2.000 – 5.000 EUR in a month,
and it will not take more than 1 hour a day. For this you should
have one or several bank accounts. More accounts you have more will
be your gain.The procedure is following. We make a transfer on your account,
usually it is around 5.000 – 8.000 EUR. As soon as money comes, you
withdraw it in cash. For your service you take 20 percent of the amount
received. Then you send the rest of the money back by Western Union.
For example, we make a transaction of 5.000 EUR to your account,
you go to the bank and collect the total amount. Then you take 1.000 EUR
as your remuneration and send 4.000 EUR back to our receiver via
Western Union Money Transfer Service. Western Union fee is paid by receiver.Our company is located in Estonia. We need only bank details
which are necessary to make the transaction of funds on your account.
We don’t ask you any supplementary data and there is no risk for your
privacy. You run the only one risk of becoming undesirable client
for the bank.You can email all your questions to the address job@taxvac.com
Looks good, doesn’t it.
They send me their money, and I send it back to them again, and I get paid for it.
Hang on…..
They have a system where they shift their own money out and back again and for each shift they lose 20%? That seems like an excellent way of losing money? Are they incredibly bad at mathematics? Are they just plain stupid? Are they looking for the job of Irish Minister for Finance?
Or are they going to post me a [dud] cheque, and I send my money back by Western Union, so that they gain my money and lose a dud cheque?
I am going to reply to them and accept their offer.
I will send them some of my details.
I will also insist that they send me their money by Western Union first.
Hah!
A week in the life
Grandad July 2nd, 2009
Things have been a bit chaotic here in Head Rambles Manor of late.
You may have noticed a passing mention of computers going belly up? That was just part of it.
For some reason, every time I start a day, which I seem to be doing now on a daily basis, something conspires to thwart my efforts at a quiet life.
I actually managed to allocate myself a quiet afternoon the other day. No sooner had I sat down than the place was invaded by a K8, two grandchildren, an idiotic dog and a kitten.
Actually, the kitten was fun. It decided that it didn’t like guinea pigs for some reason, and did its damndest to attack our Minnie. For the sake of peace and quiet, our Minnie was in her cage, so the kitten climbed on top and tried to take swipes at her through the bars. Minnie, being a very wise guinea pig, just ignored the kitten which didn’t help matters, and just made it all the more determined.
I forgot I had left the trapdoor on the top of the cage open, and the daft kitten went and fell into the cage.
I have never seen a kitten move so fast.
The fucking thing shot out like a scalded cat [even though it was quite cool in the cage] and decided that guinea pigs were enormous dangerous creatures to be avoided at all costs. Minnie, of course just carried on munching whatever she was munching and never turned a hair. I like her attitude. She takes after me.
I have also been busy with the business of shutting down the business, whenever I can get on line.
I have decided that the best tactic, that involves the maximum profit and the least hassle is to send bills out to everyone, and wait for the responses. So far it’s quite good. One punter paid a couple of grand and he was just a name I plucked out of the phone book. As soon as I get all the cheques in, I will just switch off the servers. I honestly couldn’t be bothered with all the nightmares of shifting them to other servers. Too messy. They’ll thank me in the end when they stop getting any spam.
On top of all that, I have had the usual routine stuff, like gardening, games with the dog and hunting the odd American.
So you see, I haven’t had that much time for updating this thing.
But then, no one reads it anyway.
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