Head Rambles

I suppose you have all been wondering why I haven’t mentioned the “C” word yet?

Seeing as we are now into December, I suppose I can say it. Christmas. There. I’ve said it.

This is always one of the biggest rants at this time of year. Actually, from September onwards. Everyone is moaning about it so why not a word out of the greatest moaner of them all? Because I’m not bothered.

The four things that bugged me most were in order of irritation..

• The Office Christmas Party
• Jingly music in shops
• Ads on telly
• Decorations going up in late September

The Office Party was something I always dreaded. The subject would usually come up around July [”because we have to book the place”]. Then the rows would start as everyone would want to go somewhere different. The younger crowd always wanted something noisy and dancy. The older crowd [me] just wanted to go and get quietly pissed. And management wanted to go somewhere else [because it was cheaper]. So there would be endless fights and someone would suggest a vote and someone else would veto that.

When the night came, partners weren’t invited [talk about a cheap company!], so the same gang that had been bitching and back-stabbing for the last year all get together and pretended to be friends. And what was the only thing we had in common? Work! So work was the only topic of conversation. Our one night out from the office, and we talk about work!

Of course someone would usually have too much to drink [again, usually me] and would start cracking filthy jokes, grabbing at the secretaries and insulting management. Luckily by the end of the night, everyone was too bladdered to remember anyway.

Actually, there was one year I came up with one of my little party pieces, and they liked it so much that they all wrote it down. They woke in the morning and all wondered why they were carrying a napkin with a rude limerick on it and there were rumours for weeks as to who had come up with it. I kept quiet.

Oh all right! So you want to know what it was? Well, I’m not going to write the whole thing, but it started…

There was a young dude named McGrewder
Who met with a nude and he wooed her
The nude thought it rude
To be wooed in the nude
But McGrewder was shrewder and scr….

No. I’m not going to finish.

Jingly music in shopping centres and supermarkets used to drive me mad. It was supposed to put me in the Christmas spirit. Now the Christmas spirit [as far as shopping centres are concerned] has nothing to do with Peace on Earth. It’s all about trying to make me want to spend ridiculous amounts of money. They estimate that every household in Ireland is going to spend €1,339 this Christmas. On what? Anyway, all the “music” did was drive me insane and give me the urge to kill someone.

It doesn’t bother me any more because I don’t go to shopping centres or supermarkets any more. I do my groceries on the Internet. Brilliant! No parking problems. No wonky trolleys. No queueing. And best of all, no tacky screeching in my ears. The lot just gets delivered straight into my kitchen, so all I have to do is put the stuff away.

Ads on telly don’t bother me any more. What irritated me the most was the Christmassy jingly music, and people screeching on about making the purrrfect Christmas by buying some piece of tat or other.

Now I just use the mute button. Myself and Herself make up our own soundtrack to the now silent ads. I can guarantee we are better than the original. Though we might offend a few people.

Lastly there’s the decorations. These annoyed me when I lived in the city because people insisted on putting their trees up in November. Then they started decorating their houses, and putting tacky santas on the garage roof who shouted Ho Ho Ho when people passed.

Now I live in the country so all I see is the village being decorated. I now tell myself that this isn’t for Christmas [because that would make it commercial]. I tell myself that it’s to cheer us up over the dark winter nights [which is altruism]. And I feel much better. They can put them up in October and take them down in February as far as I’m concerned. I’m happy.

But at this stage you are all shouting that I’m a killjoy.

No I’m not. I like Christmas Day. We are all getting together here this Christmas. I’m looking forward to it.

But when I was a kid, Christmas was twelve days. Yes, that’s where the song comes from! The tree went up on the night of Christmas Eve so when we came down on Christmas morning, it was a very special day.

And the tree stayed up ’till Epiphany and then it all came down again. So we never got bored with it, and most of the needles were still on it.

So I like Christmas. I just don’t like talking about it until the time comes.

I live up a quiet country lane. There are a few houses. Not many. Enough to make it a pleasant little community. We all get on [reasonably] well. The lane doesn’t go anywhere, so it is nice and quiet.

But there is something that is bothering me.

Someone or something keeps dumping a turd outside my gate.

It’s not our Sandy, because it is always outside the gate. It’s not me. I don’t think it’s Herself.

And it is always beautifully placed. It is not to one side or the other. It is always bang in the middle. It is placed very strategically so that anyone coming in out of the gate is bound to step in it.

There is a lot of space around here. We are in the countryside after all. So why dump just there? It happens every two or three days. Other people have commented on it too, so it’s not me being paranoid.

I go out and open the gate, and there it is, smiling at me. It is always of the Mr Whippy variety [If you don’t know what a Mr Whippy is - its a type of ice-cream cone. Use your imagination]. So the perpetrator is obviously healthy enough and is getting enough fibre.

I presume it’s a dog. It could be a fox or a badger, but I’m not an expert in animal poo. I’d put my money on a dog. [That’s an expression. I hate greyhound racing]. But why don’t they crap at home? Why not anywhere else on the lane? Or in someone’s garden? No. It has to be outside my gate.

Do I take it as an insult? “I’ll show that old codger what I think of him!”

Or do I take it as a compliment? “I like Grandad. I’ll leave him a little token of affection”

I’m not really very well up on the thought processes of dogs, apart from our Sandy. She is very discreet. She will always head down to the far end of the garden and very carefully check that no one is watching before doing her business. She is a very modest lass.

I could put up a sign, I suppose. “Please do not crap here, or if you must then please do it to one side or the other but not in the middle”. But Dogs aren’t really very good at reading. Apart from our Sandy of course.

There again, it mightn’t be an animal at all. It might be human. Now that is a scary thought. I don’t want to go down that road of thought.

I might step in something.

Well, it has been a busy Saturday and a lot has been happening.

My two friends Ron and Dick have more or less moved in to help me. Herself is making the cheese on toast to keep us fed.

Ron and Dick did some forum posting about my plight and there has been a very kind response. I didn’t know so many people cared and I am touched and flattered. Thank you all.

Ron’s good friend Michele sent us some figures that proved that I have not been lying all along. Apparently Michele has been keeping records of how fast I connect to the Internet. Why she should do this just for me, I don’t know. Ron will explain no doubt. Thank you Michele anyway. You sound like a nice girl.

So we wrote a rather gruff letter to the company and enclosed the figures. We explained that they couldn’t possibly be telling the truth and that they should get things fixed straight away. Or else…….

We didn’t get a reply.

Dick apparently knows of another case like mine. They complained of a bad connection and our foreign friend came out to them and apparently they [our foreign friends] used exactly the same technique as they tried on me. The gentleman who lived there was at work at the time, and his wife believed them. She told them to take the equipment away, if it was no good. I believe he wasn’t too happy when he came home that evening and found he had no broadband.

Now, this morning an interesting thing happened.

Ron and Dick are still here. We made a night of it. Herself is getting a bit cheesed off with the cheese on toast making, and is begining to complain about all the empty beer cans.

Anyway, Ron and Dick were running some tests.

They ran one at around half eleven. There were sharp intakes of breath.

Dick told me I was getting 1meg down but nothing at all up. I was tempted to say that I am used to getting nothing up, but we’ll keep the talk technical here. Anyway, he said this was very bad. He said it looked like it was all over.

But then he ran another test and nearly passed out.

We revived him, and he told us that the signal was excellent. Well, not perfect but more than adeqate. He said it was 1.5 meg down and 1.2 meg up whatever that means.

So Ron and Dick are jumping for joy. I said it mightn’t last. They said it didn’t matter, because it proved that I could get a decent signal even after all the messing around that the company did, and that all their excuses had fallen flat.

So maybe they have fixed the fault at last?

Or maybe they undid whatever it was they did in the first place?

Or maybe they are beaming a special signal just to me?

Or maybe the CIA intevened because they didn’t want to lose track of me?

Or maybe they did read yesterdays mail?

We’ll have to wait ’till tomorrow when I can phone the company and find out what is going on……

Footnote to the above:

I have just received an invoice for next month’s service. Oh! Sweet irony!!

I’ve been having a little bit of trouble with my Internet connection. It has been grand for a long time, but it started to get a bit hairy this week. I asked my friend Ron about it and he suggested I phone the company.

So I rang them. I went through all the usual automatic switchboard rubbish and the piped music but finally got to speak to someone.

I told him my problem.

He did some tweaky things at his end and came up with the diagnosis [it’s wonderful what they can do with computers these days].

“Your aerial is faulty, and we’ll have to come out and fix it” says he.

Fair enough.

Yesterday they called out.

It was lashing rain and I felt a bit sorry for them, but they set to work anyway.

They found the problem straight away.

“Trees have grown into the line of the signal.”

So I got out my binoculars and showed them the mast in the distance. It was a bit misty but we could see it. There were no trees in the way!

They cursed [in Polish, I think].

They beavered away, running up and down ladders and in and out of the house and muttering about technical thingys. They got more and more annoyed looking. They didn’t seem to be doing much apart from making a mess of my floor. They rang their office a few times. They tried different aerials. They tried moving the aerial around a bit. They rang their office a few more times.

They eventually came up to me with big smiles on their faces and gave me the good news….

“We are sorry but the signal is not available in your area. We are going to remove all the equipment.”

I turned purple. Herself grabbed the phone in case the doctor might be necessary. The dog had a fit and bit the leg off the table.

“But I have had good service for a long time and it has only just failed, and you are not removing my equipment.”

“Yes” says he, “But the signal is not available”. Here was one of these “I’ve found my story and I’m sticking to it” chaps.

I demanded to speak to an engineer on the phone.

When I spoke to him, the engineer said the same thing.

“We are sorry but the signal is not available in your area.”

I was dangerously near a heart attack at this stage.

I restrained myself and patiently explained that I had great service up to this week and it had only just failed.

He tried to persuade me that it had been failing since September.

“Tuesday” says I.

So he sighed and asked to speak to one of the lads again.

They muttered in a huddle and said they would try again.

They faffed around a bit and did all the things they had done before. Then I realised that they were on the phone to the engineer again. I grabbed the phone.

“What the flip [or words to that effect] is going on?” says I.

He gave me a lot of bullsh*t and said that the lads were going to restore the system and leave.

“It’s fixed” says the lads.

I tested the signal on my PC. It was exactly the same as before they arrived.

“It’s not ****** fixed. It’s the ******* same ******** service as I had before you ********* came” says I.

They left anyway.

I phoned the office and raised merry hell. When I get going, I am a sight to behold. I am used as an example in most anger management schools [what not to say…].

I finally got it out of a manager…………..

They had “upgraded the system to enhance the service for existing and future customers, and this had degraded my signal so that it was no longer viable”.

“That doesn’t make sense. I am an existing customer and my service hasn’t been enhanced!”

“Sorry about that” says he, “but some of our remoter customers will lose service”.

Says I “But the upgrade took place last Thursday, and my service was grand ’till Tuesday.”

“No” says he, “you had very bad service since Thursday”. There was really no getting through to this bloke.

At this stage, the steam coming out my ears could have driven Poolbeg Power Station. Herself was trying to insert a Prozac drip-feed into my arm.

“Let me get this straight” says I. “I have a contract with you people. I have been getting a great service up ’till Tuesday with no complaints whatsoever. Now you ‘upgraded’ the service on the 16th to improve it. Since then I have been continuing the good service for an additional five days after your tweaking, but you say that a signal is no longer available in my area?”

“That’s right” says he. “You never had a good signal. And as a result of the upgrade it is degraded below the level of viability.”

“Would you like to talk about this on the radio?” says I, playing one of my trump cards.

There was a long silence. “Leave it with me” says he. “I’ll see what I can do”.

To be continued…………….

This is not a rant. This is not a ramble. This is just a little piece about my grandson, Sean.

Sean is five and a half now. He is a beautiful child. He is very happy and he brightens up our lives. He has made us all into better people. We have learned what love really is. Sean has Cerebral Palsy.

His mammy wrote a letter on his behalf, because he can only speak with his eyes, and he can’t hold a pen. That letter has been published on the Jack and Jill website. You should read it, because it shows real love and understanding. It also explains why I have a link to Jack and Jill on this blog.

Last night I ordered some toys for him on the Internet. I ordered them off a site called Thinking Toys. This is no ordinary toy shop because they also cater for children with very special needs.

There was a slight glitch in the order process, so I phoned Aine who runs the business. She couldn’t have been nicer or more helpful. I sent her a fax showing what I had ordered and she rang me back within minutes to say she was dealing with it straight away.

It isn’t often you get service like that.

So, in spite of all my moaning, I do think there are good people out there.

And it’s only fair that I write about them sometimes.