Mayhem returns to the cities streets

First up I have to tell you that my wife gave me a row this week. She went to catch up with the blog on Monday to see if there was anything that I was sharing with the world but not with her and, lo and behold, found that all I had blogged about was my bloody iPhone (as she affectionately calls it).

I'm going to be very general here and use some stereotyping. Women love mobile phones. There can't be too many gadgets that my wife craves more than I do but the phone is definitely up there. She even quite likes the house phone (though she'd probably deny it) where you would have to nag me before I'd use it to call the fire brigade during a fire and even then they'd have to ask very specific questions or I'd somehow relay the message wrongly (So I'm told). Some women even like the iPhone. Sleek lines and a look that makes you not too ashamed to carry it about in the handbag. The thing is, it appears to me, that women like phones for precisely the purpose for which they were originally designed, a phone.

In a woman's world it would appear that a great phone must be able to do two things: Phone and text (so they can send friends a text to say 'call me' and their friends can text back 'OK' before they call). If a phone has a camera it's considered high spec and if it has an MP3 well....That must be what they mean by ultra mobiles.

There appears to be little or no recognition for the fact that many of today's phones rival the PC in everything but memory capacity. It's my SatNav, my newspaper, my Internet, my email. It has train times and a dictionary and encyclopedia and thesaurus. It's a calculator, spirit level, ruler, unit converter, for gods sake it can even translate several languages. Mine has games, TV (live and recorded), notes, still camera, video camera and oh by the way....Great phone, text and about 300 mp3s. At the moment I'm spending a considerable amount of time hacking into it so that it can maybe even do more and will have a way cooler screen. Anyway I can hardly break the computer when I'm spending all my time trying to screw up the phone. Enough said....

So on this blog I wont mention the phone.

This blogs title may give you the clue that today all of the schools where I live returned after their summer break. Some started yesterday but today was the biggy. Like most of those kids, I assume, I wish their holidays lasted longer. I can put up with small crowds of them hanging around the park drinking cider and looking bored. It's so much better than hordes of them packed in to a school and looking dangerous.

My real reason for wishing their holidays lasted longer however is the trouble they cause on my journey to work. Parents on the school run must be the biggest scourge to normal traffic known. Forget roadworks and speed cameras and traffic lights. They fade into insignificance when dealing with the distracted lane control of a parent trying to stop three kids in the back seat fighting. The 4x4s and people carriers parked three abreast with their hazards blinking whilst half the city comes to a standstill to watch the kiddie winks disembark.

Today I was behind the slowest Suzuki ever made. Quite a nice one as well but way slow. Trundling along at between 24-26 miles per hour in a 30 zone at rush hour. Not bothered by the traffic snarling up behind, let's face it, completely unaware that there was traffic behind. I swear I heard a green light trying to speed them up. 'Come on, it said, I can't stay green forever you know. If you could just get up to thirty you'd make it before I changed. Look it's more than my jobs worth, it continued, but as it's you I'll hang on for another couple of seconds but you better hurry. Nope! OK then I'm afraid I'll have to turn red and hold all the other motorists up for another five minutes'. And so five or six of us who would have made not only that light but the next six waited till the Suzuki was ready to move slowly on.

To be fair work wasn't worth the rushing for this morning anyway. There's a delay in a system that I'm about to deliver training for so I've went from frantic rush to casual, Suzuki like, saunter for a week until things catch up. Doesn't mean they don't appreciate my being on time though parents.

I'm sure I also told you that I've been offered a half price service for my car. I've also been told that they'll change one of my other wheels that has started to oxidise but they still haven't caved in to the front wheel. My tack now has been to enquire about the cost of the front wheel and whether (out of warranty now) they will still honour their original offer of paying half that cost. If the answer to that is yea then I'm going to try and trade the value of my half a service against the wheel. I've probably got no chance but I'll keep pushing them. I can live with it if they end up giving in because they think I'm an arse.

Aside from that there isn't much to tell. There are berries on the trees and the maples are even beginning to shed a bit so I think autumn is fast approaching. Unfortunately the garden is still growing so last week was spent cutting grass and trimming the hedge. Hopefully only one or two more goes at that before it gives up for winter.

Anyway, stuff to do... Need to go and play with my phone. It will be the subject of another update within the next few days once I've finished what I'm messing around with so I'll apologise in advance.

In the meantime

Don't quit quitting you quitters

T