I’ve worked up a bit of a rant this week, you’ll have to bear with me ;o)
1. We live in a technology driven world these days, where everywhere we go and spend, little snippets of data are recorded. In supermarkets they go as far as to monitor what we spend so that we can get vouchers off things that we regularly buy, so why is it that Sainsbury’s can work out that I want a free bottle of Coke Zero, but it can’t tell that I shop every other week, and gives me money off vouchers for spending a certain amount that have to be used within a week?!
2. In the UK the government has an ongoing policy to try and get home insulation up so that we don’t waste so much energy. There are free grants available if you receive certain benefits, or you live in certain areas, and yay, I qualify for one because of the ‘certain area’ I live in. Alas, it’s run by the bureaucracy that is British Gas, and apparently they can only come out during a working day to assess what is needed. Oh, and they can only install it on a working day too. That’s handy…
Don’t worry though, the girl that I spoke to said it didn’t have to be me that was there, anyone could be there while they did it. Excuse me while I rush out and find a complete stranger to do that for me…
Thankfully the new job has the option for me to work from home, so I shall sit there all day (they couldn’t possibly give me an appointment time you understand) and wait for the man with the tape measure to turn up.
3. For those of you that I know have just been on the edge of your seats waiting to hear my latest traffic problems, I have worked out the motorway junction conundrum. No, it is not the fault of the idiot drivers, but, in fact, the idiot council employee that is responsible for light phasing. There are 2 junctions within about 100 yards of each other, both of which I have to pass through to get onto the motorway. Junction #1 has 3 roads with 3 sets of lights, junction #2 has 4 roads with 6 sets of lights.
Now do you think that the idiot light phaser has worked out how not to get people caught under the motorway bridge for 2 cycles of lights before releasing them? Or how to let them in from junction #1 without causing chaos for the people trying to drive through without going to junction #2? I think you can predict the answer to that. Oh, and the idiot council has also not sent out the people with the yellow paint and rulers to put those useful boxes in place, so everyone can actually get caught in an un-releasable loop, excellent…
4. iTunes is driving me nuts – I can play my iPod through my new car’s stereo, but I can’t play a playlist on it, only an artist. If I want to play playlists, I have to put them on a USB, which is fine, I can do that, but it can only play MP3s from a USB, not iTunes’ own AAC format. Argh! So I created an MP3 version of every piece of music I’ve got that wasn’t already an MP3 (way back in the dark ages when PC users had Musicmatch Jukebox to load tunes to our iPods, they were all MP3)
Now I have duplicates of about 75% of the music on my iPod/iTunes, and if I try and play an album now, it plays everything twice. FFS!!! iTunes themselves seems to have recognised the problem with having to create MP3s for anything else to play, but really, they couldn’t figure out a way to only play 1 version of each song?! I tell you, if I’d been testing it, I’d have let them know all about their half-arsed solution.
5. I had to really hunt for a positive thing in my randomly ranty week, so here it is, I’ve discovered that my uncle can be my ‘agent’ at a quilt show, bet he never thought he could get to be a quilt agent when he grew up ;o)
Linking up to:
crap on a crutch…..seems like logic is in short supply world wide. We have much the same problems here as far as traffic is concerned……
Oma Linda
pssssst…are you coming to play Celebrate Oz?????
I think you should probably be running the country!
Lovely randomness – the traffic photo looks like Marrakech every day!
Lovely ranty randomness! There's a set of pedestrian lights near me that only switches the green man on when there's no traffic so you stand while car after car goes past and then, when it's quiet, the man appears and you look like a right wally that can't cross a road by yourself…
The loft insulation man told me I'd have to remove all my stuff and the boards before I could have extra lagging and when I pointed out that someone who was unfit to work wouldn't be able to do that he just shrugged. Helpful!
Hope you find a solution to the iPod thing. And maybe fire off a ranty email to the local traffic department/highways agency?
Compared to your driving experience it sounds like driving in Los Angeles is a breeze!
*peeks out from behind her hands* Is it safe to come out yet??
I hope you are headed out for a BIG drink on Friday… phew, what a week, murphy's law…
Ranting of a professional nature. Impressive.
Very impressive rant, don't get me started!
very good rant! hope you can relax now 🙂
Loved the rant 🙂
A very justified one I'd say. An unfortunately, "typical" was the word that sprang to mind at each point I was reading
I think you could put the world right Katy.
Wait, what's the "agent at a quilt show" comment about?
Are you going pro? Needing the projection of a 007 from the international cartel of quilt thieves? 😉
Ah, thanks for the giggle, as usual :o)
you could bet who ever phases the lights never uses them ,traffic in the pic reminds me of India, wonderful :))
I'm sure you feel better now.
Phew… All better now? Bet that felt good! He he he
hahahahaha
Lovely hearing you rant like that!
I don't expect any of these quandaries to have been fixed; hope the best for the music problem.
Wishing you a wonderful International Women's Day!
http://www.google.nl/imgres?hl=nl&safe=off&sa=X&biw=1081&bih=860&tbm=isch&tbnid=PdrEIePNiSaSEM:&imgrefurl=http://www.10feet.nl/blog/happy-womens-day/&docid=ERMgQewpuExkNM&imgurl=http://www.10feet.nl/blog/wp-content/uploads/womens-day2.bmp&w=443&h=429&ei=KL85UYaaCKWG0AXS4YHYDw&zoom=1&ved=1t:3588,r:46,s:0,i:241&iact=rc&dur=405&page=3&tbnh=185&tbnw=196&start=46&ndsp=25&tx=118&ty=113
ARGhhh sorry
I can't really relate to most of this, why not ditch the tunes and sing to yourself,
Love a good rant, and you made me feel better. Hope today goes/has gone better for you.
Now, if I could rant like that I'd be doing it all of the time. You've just made my day Katy.
Im feeling kind of good now about my 6 minute drive to work straight down one main road, and only having to pass through about 4 sets of lights….
Oh, Katy, please rant on… Your rants are the BEST. Sorry…
You sound suuuuper grouchy this week — I think it must be time for some shopping therapy. 🙂
Oooh, how exciting that you need a quilt agent, though!