Hay varios parques en Hartlepool

Spanish class didn't go so well last night. Got to the point where we were talking about what there is and isn't in Hartlepool. One board with "En Hartlepool" at the top and "hay" in the centre, the other also with "En Hartlepool" at the top but with "no hay" in the centre.

We went through various things, supermercardo, farmacia, banco and so on. Went okay until we got to parque. The tutor asks "Hay un parque por aqui?". One student, who always has to be right, says, "There's only one" and names the Burn Valley. Someone else said "No, there's more. What about" and named another. Forget which. Enter the Drew.

I then said, "There's the Burn Valley, Ward Jackson Park..."
"That's not near here!" retorts she-who-must-always-be-right. Loudly. Shouting, in fact.
I shout back "It's in this town!" I point to the words "En Hartlepool". "It's in Hartlepool!"
"But not near here!"
What the f***? She think that beats me?! No! The exercise was about amenities in Hartlepool, she said there was only one park in Hartlepool, she was wrong! The tutor stopped our "discussion" but by this time I was steaming and less than a minute later, I bolted from the class. Didn't return. My mum came out at 8 (the class finishes at half 8) and we went home. Not a great evening.

First Past The Undemocratic Post

Is it really a fair system when an MP can be elected with only 42.5% of the vote? That means, of course, that 57.5% didn't want him but someone else. But our electoral system doesn't work like that. He wins not because he has a majority but simply the highest individual count of votes. They can be the same thing but not always. With an electoral system like this and hope of change blown out of the water, I have to wonder if there will be much point voting in future general elections. Maybe I'll feel differently when the next one comes around but at the moment I don't see myself making the effort. It's four years off, though, so we'll see.

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Why St George's Day should not be a bank holiday

I doubt that anyone from the government is going to read this but for what it's worth, this is my considered opinion as a calendar-minded person.

Whilst it might sound like a good idea for St George's Day to be a holiday, there is one thing that needs to be considered. What is it? The minor religious festival known as Easter, which in the UK has two bank holidays attached to it, Good Friday and Easter Monday. The proximity of St George's Day to these existing bank holidays needs to be considered.

St George's Day is 23 April, two days before the latest possible date for Easter, so in most years it should be clear of Good Friday and Easter Monday by at least a couple of weeks, even a month if Easter is very early. However, in the 50-year period from 2011 to 2060 St George's Day collides with the Good Friday/Easter Monday weekend no less than 17 times. That is, roughly a third of the time. In fact, it does almost work out as every three years when you look at the years where the collisions occur:

2011, 2014, 2017, 2019, 2022, 2025, 2028, 2030, 2033, 2038, 2041, 2044, 2049, 2052, 2055, 2057, 2060

Not exactly every 3 years but not far off. The longest without a collision of St George's Day and the Easter weekend is 5 years, which occurs only twice.

There are also five instances of St George's Day falling in the week after Easter Monday, which would give 3 bank holidays in 3 weeks:

2020, 2031, 2036, 2047, 2058

I think it would be utter foolishness for St George's Day to become a bank holiday in this case, which means the government will probably go for it and adopt it.



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Of all the places to forget

I took a new profile photo yesterday as it was my birthday and updated various site profiles with it. I've even updated one website that had a primary photo of me that must easily have been 5 years old. Would you believe this is the one site I forgot to update? Just done it now. Maybe it's because I haven't blogged much lately. I did mean to blog on my birthday but forgot. Anyway, let's see how bloggy I can be in February. Definitely must try harder. I'm a bit more tweety than I am bloggy. Maybe I should try and feed the tweetiness into the blog a bit more. Something to think about.



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Twelfth Night and Christmas decorations

So when is Twelfth Night really? There are different opinions on this.

According to one opinion it's tonight, the 6th of January. This assumes the first day is the 26th of December and the first night is also on the 26th of December.

According to another opinion it was last night, the 5th of January. This follows the Anglo-Saxon way of timekeeping where night precedes day. The first night was therefore the 25th of December followed by the first day on the 26th of December and the night of the 26th of December was the second night.

I don't suppose it really matters unless one is superstitious about Christmas decorations. They have to be down by Twelfth Night or it's supposed to be bad luck. If you do hold by that, what to do? Down by the 5th or leave it another night until the 6th?

My solution: Since there is doubt over which night is Twelfth Night, take the decorations down on or by the 4th of January. By all opinions, it's before Twelfth Night (being either Tenth or Eleventh Night).

That said, we didn't bother with decorations this year. If we had, they'd have been down by New Year. But some people do like to have them up as long as possible.


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Fourteen Years Ago Today

It was on this date in 1997 that we left Hartlepool with a massive van of furniture and two cats in pet carriers bound for Northampton. Hard to believe it's 14 years but it is. I was 24, nearly 25; now I'm 38, nearly 39. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that the four years we spent there were four of the best years I've had so far. Well, my kidneys stopping working wasn't much fun but that was only about a month of it (most of August 1999, the eclipse month). Other than that, though, even with moving around Northampton a lot, it was good. :-)

What was particularly good about it? Apart from living near family:

1. The time I spent volunteering at the Gold Street Oxfam shop.

2. Tae Kwon-Do.

Good crowds in both places.


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Six Years Later

I joined blogger.com six years ago this month. Checking my blog archive, I've blogged every year except 2008. That was part of a massive hiatus. When I came back to it(1), I decided to inject order into when I blogged and it actually worked. But I don't think that I will follow that this year. Good as it was, perhaps it's time to try blogging as and when. If that works out as blogging every day, well and good. If it works out differently, then it works out differently. It'll probably vary between the two.

I hope that I can keep this blogging stint going for longer and that the next hiatus(2) will be short. Here's hoping.


(1)I didn't think I would. It was such a long hiatus, this was an abandoned blog. But come back to it I did.

(2)There will surely be one. Check out this blog from 2005. There are gaps in blogging, some big, some small, throughout it.



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5 May 7138 - It's the end of the world!

OK, I don't really think the world is going to end on the 5th of May 7138. That's just when the next great cycle of the Mayan calendar ends. As anyone who hasn't been living under a rock knows, the current cycle ends in December 2012, 23 December 2012 to be precise. Some people do seem to be getting into a bit of a tizzy about it.

I suppose it's understandable considering it's attached to the idea of the end of the world, but consider this:

"The Maya believed that time was cyclic and that at the end of a great cycle of 13 Baktuns, the world would be destroyed - only to be recreated for the next cycle." Mapping Time by E. G. Richards, p. 193

A few things to note:

1. A great cycle of 13 Baktuns is followed by another great cycle. This is how it is with every calendar cycle. They repeat. Regularly. The great cycle of the Mayan calendar is no exception.

2. The idea of the world being recreated seems to have been lost somewhere. The main focus for discussion of this date and the associated "event" is the end of the world. I have yet to come across anyone mention the world also being recreated, even though that is also part of the Mayan belief.

"But Drew, what does it matter if the world is recreated if everyone is dead because the world has been destroyed?"

That brings me onto point 3:

3. This whole kerfuffle arises from the Mayan calendar and Mayan belief. Since the Mayans are no longer around, what does it matter to most people what they believed? Why pick up on this one belief just because it's about the end of the world and the date happens to be in our generation?

I see no reason to believe that the world will end on 23 December 2012. Or 5 May 7138. Or any date anyone cares to name. Will the world end at some point? Apparently the sun is going to go supernova in about 4 billion years. That should do it. In the meantime, "plan as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die tomorrow".

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Time to blow the dust off this

This blog has been sitting idle for too long so let's see if I can get it going again.

First of all, Happy New Year. Can you believe we're in 2011 already? Where do the years go and how do they fly past so quickly? New Year always gets me like this. I'll probably be over it in a couple of days.

Secondly, the Mayan calendar. Yes, the current great cycle ends next year but it will no doubt be as significant as the turn of the millennium. Some people thought that was the end of the world/return of Jesus but we're still here 11 years on. The end of the current great cycle will, I am sure, be a similar anticlimax. Another cycle will begin and end in 5000+ years time and that generation can get its knickers in a twist. :-)

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Bianco's: the letter of complaint

I wrote and posted a letter of complaint to Bianco's addressed to the owner a week ago today. Even giving it two days to get there, there has been no response from anyone there, official or otherwise.

I suspect that it did not actually reach the owner at all but was opened by the staff, perhaps under the impression that they were opening a job application. If so, they probably shat themselves when they saw what it actually was. I imagine this paragraph was especially not well received:

"Given the unprofessional behaviour of the pregnant waitress, it is clear that she is untrained and not qualified for the position. Regardless of her relationship to the person who gave her the job, she should either be properly trained or encouraged to pursue another career opportunity. The kind of behaviour that she demonstrated to us can lose your business customers. No one is that valuable or important that they must be kept even if it means the business ultimately closing down from lack of customers. Therefore, she should be trained so that she doesn't treat customers with rudeness, belligerence and attitude or she shouldn't be there if that is not possible. Alternatively, perhaps it is possible for her to do something where she does not have contact with the paying public, if she really must be part of Bianco's."

I also attached a penny to the letter to compensate them for the menu, even though I didn't have to give them anything at all. People shouldn't say stupid things like "These cost us money!" in relation to menus in front of me.

If the staff did read it, then it will certainly have been binned and the owner will be none the wiser. No matter. The negative review is still up and will stay there. I stand by every word of it and by every word of the letter, which ended like this:

"Having said all of this, I am aware that it is possible that the pregnant waitress may have a close relationship to you and that that is how she is working there at all. It is therefore likely that she will not be trained properly, not moved to another area of responsibility or not moved on. After all, this is Hartlepool. Nothing changes here. I know this. But I have to make my feelings made clear. It should be clear by now that I do not patronise establishments that employ staff that cannot get orders right and employ rude and belligerent staff. Therefore, I do not patronise Bianco's."

Now let us conclude the matter of the dire customer service at Bianco's Deli, Navigation Point, Hartlepool. Let there be no more said on it. The end.

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Bianco's Deli

My mum and I went to Bianco's Deli at Navigation Point on Hartlepool Marina for lunch today. We decided to have the steak fajitas. They didn't have any steak so it would have to be chicken. No problem. Ordered them, sat down and waited. And waited. And waited. And waited whilst people who came in long after us were served in 5 minutes. Seriously.

Finally, our order was ready. It must have been easily over half an hour later. What I collected wasn't chicken fajitas. One was a chicken pesto panini and the other was supposed to be a chicken fajita panini. Our order had taken so long that I was just glad to have anything at all. I had the chicken pesto panini. My mum brought the chicken fajita panini to the attention of a passing pregnant waitress. As a representative of Bianco's, what she did or didn't do next was extremely important.

She blew it. My mum expressed dissatisfaction at not receiving what she was expecting and was told that that was how Bianco's did the chicken fajita. She further said that if we wanted it in a wrap that we should have said when ordering. And that was it. She didn't offer to have it redone as a wrap. She effectively told us to read the small print on the menu. and did bugger all about the chicken fajita panini. So we were left with what we did not order.

My mum left most of her panini, understandably. It wasn't what she wanted. When the pregnant waitress came to clear the table, she had the unmitigated gall to ask my mum if she wanted it wrapping to take home to have for her tea! She was told clearly that it was not wanted for lunch so why would it be wanted for tea? At that we got more of the "read the menu" crap from the pregnant waitress. All we got from her was rudeness, beligerence and attitude. She has obviously never been trained in customer service. But it didn't stop there.

The pregnant waitress also had the gall to bring us a menu to take away "for the next time" that we visit. She must be terminally stupid if she thinks that we will ever visit again after this. But the real point of giving us the menu was the unspoken message of "read the small print, you thick bastards!". The menu was promptly torn up and left for her to dispose of.

She was clearing it up as I was leaving. "There was no need for that! I was only trying to be polite! These cost us money!" she said in a voice loud enough for everybody in the restaurant to hear.

No, dear, you were not trying to be polite. In fact, you wouldn't know polite if it came up to you and gave you a big kiss. As above, you were giving us an unspoken message which was far from polite. As for the cost of the menu, I have a penny in my pocket which is worth more than that one menu. Besides, the menu was freely given for us to do with as we wished. We wished to tear it up.

In my opinion, Bianco's Deli is not worth a second visit. It's not even worth a first visit if you've never been. Points: -10.


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Was it really a good idea?

I bought a hair trimmer today. I'm not questioning the soundness of that. It'll save me money. My haircuts are done more with clippers than scissors, so buying a hair trimmer and doing it myself makes sense. No, what I'm wondering is whether it was a good idea trying it out the night before I go away for the weekend. Fortunately I don't think I've made a mess of it so I don't look like a prat. But doing it the night before going away for the weekend probably wasn't a good idea in retrospect.

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Not very bloggy this month

This doesn't seem to have been a very bloggy month for me so far. Not sure why. I have found another venue for my political ramblings, so they won't be inflicted on readers of this blog. I must try and get back into the swing of blogging. I've actually had trouble keeping up with other things, so it's not just this blog. But I am trying to get back on track.

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I've not blogged much lately

Not that I haven't had things to say but they've mostly been related to the current political situation and I was unsure about making my blog too political. There again, it's my blog. I'm answerable to no one for its content but me. I don't have an editor dictating what I can or can't say so perhaps I should just get back on track and say what's on my mind.

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Less than 60 seats to declare

A hung parliament is looking likely:

Conservatives: 285

Labour: 232

Liberal Democrats: 50

Other: 27


And I probably shouldn't have stayed up as long as I did...

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M&Ms and the general election

M&M's really are the best chocolate for an election night:

Red M&Ms: Labour
Orange M&Ms: Liberal Democrats
Blue M&Ms: Conservatives
Yellow M&Ms: SNP
Green M&Ms: Greens or Plaid Cymru
Brown M&Ms are the new grey: Other parties

:-)

This is so obvious that someone has probably come up with this already.

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Seems I'm not the only one

There was quite a queue at our local polling station at 07:00 (GMT+1). And that was with drizzling rain. I was all done less than ten minutes later. Now it's just a matter of waiting. Whatever happens I think it's going to interesting, more so than usual.

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Koala exits stage left, enter the Lynx

Ubuntu 10.04, aka Lucid Lynx, was released yesterday. I checked the update manager about 19:00 and yes, it was available. Upgrade now or not? Hmmm... I decided to click the upgrade button. I was informed that it would take about an hour and a half. Well, that's not long. Might as well, right? Five and a half hours later... At least I know for next time. And now I have a Lucid Lynx.

One quirky thing I didn't like was the Minimise/Maximise/Close buttons being on the left instead of the right but that can be fixed by changing the theme. Otherwise it looks pretty good so far.

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Of court cases and manifestos

The SNP have lost their case against the Beeb. I didn't think that it was likely to succeed. They never had a valid point. They just don't belong in the leaders' debates and if they're really honest with themselves, they know it. It was all just an attempt to grab headlines. Quite pathetic. I shall be watching to see how many MPs they actually get. I suspect not that many. The same goes for Plaid(1).


I downloaded the manifestos of the three main parties this evening to see what they have to say for themselves. I've read the Liberal Democrat manifesto and whilst it does sound good "fine words butter no parsnips". And let's be honest, the odds of them forming the next government are pretty slim. But there again, they could have a key role in a hung parliament so maybe some of what they want to do could happen. In the fullness of time. When resources allow.


I shall have a look at the other two manifestos tomorrow to see what they have come up with. Not that any of the manifestos will change my mind about how to vote but I'd still like to see what their fine words are.


(1)Plaid Cymru, the Welsh national party.

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It gets more ridiculous

The SNP have proceeded with legal action today and now UKIP want their leader to be included in the leaders' debates. Sure, why not? In fact, let's invite every registered party with at least one candidate standing in the election. There's only about 50 of them. But it would be fair and fairness is what the SNP wants. Or, in order to have a debate that might actually be worth watching, we could limit it to only certain leaders. How about only leaders of parties represented in the last Parliament whose parties are fielding enough candidates to achieve an absolute majority? Let's see, who would that be? Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Conservatives... no, that's it. Just those three. Sounds good to me.


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What's his point?

Alex Salmond, the leader of the SNP(1), is still kicking up a big fuss about the SNP not being represented in the leaders' debates. There's a good reason it's only Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives. They're the only ones with any realistic chance of governing after 06 May. Not only can the SNP not achieve an absolute majority(2) but Salmond isn't even standing, so he's never going to be Prime Minister. I wonder if he realises how stupid he looks right now? Even more so now that he's pursuing legal action over the matter. Perhaps he just wants to make sure he goes down in political history. He will now, but as a complete and utter prat.


(1)Scottish National Party

(2)There are only 59 constituencies in Scotland. An absolute majority requires 326.

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Brush up thy Shakespeare

For 'tis the anniversary of the Bard's birth. And his death. And it's also St George's Day, so today is a very English day. Cream tea anyone? Cream tea whilst reading a sonnet? :-) Unfortunately, over here we don't do much for either day. Shame. I shall just have to do my own thing. I'm sure I've got a copy of Shakespeare somewhere...

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Not much of an effort

Just over two weeks before all is revealed in the general election and then we shall know for certain. I can't say that I have seen much canvassing in this town, however. Do the candidates here not care? Or do they all believe that the last MP will be the next MP so there is no point in canvassing? Oh, we did get a leaflet from UKIP through the door. But that's the extent of it so far. With just over a fortnight to go, though, you'd think they'd be making a bit more of an effort. But then what do I know? I'm just one of the electorate. I just haul my bones out of bed whatever the weather and go vote.

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You think these things only happen to other people

When I was at the office this afternoon, I had to print some colour sales tickets. The office has two printers, one for colour print jobs, the other for black and white. I made the mistake of not checking which printer was receiving the print job and they went to the wrong one. Tickets that were meant to be colour were printed in black and white. Fifteen pages of them. Redid the print job and sent them to the correct printer.

I read stories like this on the Internet a lot and laugh at them. Now I has a fail.

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Is it really that long?

Have I really not blogged for four days? I've been a bit busy lately with a spreadsheet for displaying which parties are running in which constituencies. It's more of a database than a spreadsheet, I suppose. Getting it done has taken up a lot of my time. Well, 650 constituencies and over 40 political parties standing plus independents. Not that every constituency has 40 candidates standing. I think the most I've recorded is 10, but I still have to keep track of each party even if they only have one candidate standing. Only 54 left to do.

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Keep up with the news much?

" With a UK general election looming (most commentators are predicting a 6 May vote), leading cultural institutions have joined together to try to stave off predicted government cuts to the arts. " (emphasis mine)

This was published online today, 14 April. I can only assume that this article, which is from the April 2010 issue of The Art Newspaper, was written before 06 April. That was the day that Gordon Brown confirmed the worst kept secret in Britain, namely that the general election will take place on 06 May. Since then nobody needs to predict the date of the election. Perhaps cutting out the parenthetical note would have been a good idea. Leaving it in makes the article writer look like he or she doesn't keep up with the news at all.

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Funny how time just runs away

Funny how time just runs away from you. You're engaged doing something and suddenly realise the time and there are things that you still haven't done. I was watching videos on YouTube when I realised it was 10pm and I still hadn't posted the calendar for Iyyar on a forum that I help run. Just done that.

Funny thing is, I don't often watch videos on YouTube. And I certainly didn't intend to watch them for as long as I did tonight. But then I saw a series of ten videos and watched each one in the series. They were only about three minutes each but that adds up. And they weren't the only videos that I watched. Oh, well. It's not like I do it often. But now I'm playing catch up. Just about caught up, though.

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The dissolution of Parliament

Today was the day of the dissolution of Parliament. From today we officially have no Parliament until it reconvenes on 18 May. All MPs are now out of a job and no longer MPs. Not sure why we do it this way. Seems a little strange to suspend the government for over 3 weeks before the next one is elected. And then the next one won't convene until the second week after the election this year. Oh, well. I am sure that we will survive until Parliament reconvenes.

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This Drew went to mow

If there's one thing I don't like about spring and summer, it's having to get the mower out regularly to keep the grass down. It had its first outing of the year today. Fortunately it doesn't take long. I think it's more the idea that it *has* to be done and I'm the one that has to do it. And I'm a natural procrastinator. I shall try to be good this year, though, and do it in a timely fashion. It does only take less than half an hour. Should be a snap to do it regularly.

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Stupid is as stupid tweets

Twitter should come with a warning: "Your page is public by default. You have to take action to make it private. If public, *anyone* can read it." Perhaps then people like Stuart MacLennan might not get caught out tweeting inappropriate things and being kicked out of the Labour Party. Bang go his chances of being a prospective parliamentary candidate for the Labour Party.

Seriously, why do people tweet stupid things that get them into trouble? Like the man who threatened to bomb Robin Hood Airport. He appears before Doncaster magistrates next month because of it.

Perhaps part of the trouble is the instantness of Twitter. As soon as people have had a thought, they type it and send it. Then the solids hit the air conditioning because what they typed reached a completely new level of stupid. Yes, I think that warning would be a really good idea.

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Maybe there's a good reason

A forum that I frequent has a folder for international news stories yet the calling of the election hasn't qualified for a post(1). Maybe the election has to take place first to qualify for any attention. I guess this election is really only interesting from an internal perspective but even so, it has been called and I would have thought that that would have registered on their radar. The calling of Canada's general election in 2008 certainly qualified for a post, so why not ours? Is it because Canada is nearer to the US? It just seems curious that the date was confirmed on Tuesday and here we are at Friday and not so much as a sniff of a mention. What's up with that?


(1)It's run by an American, therefore international means non-U.S.

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If it's not one thing, it's another

OK, the telephone and upstairs Internet are working as they should be, but the television is now not working. We could not get video or audio this afternoon. Disconnected the DVR and still nothing. Even with only the aerial going into the back of the television, nothing. So my mum rang the helpline and he had us retune the television, which didn't work. It didn't pick up any channels at all. Check the aerial is in the television, he asked us. My mum did, I did. I found that the end that goes into the back of the television was not as tight as it should be. Decidedly wonky. So it looks like we need a new coaxial cable. We'll have to get that tomorrow. In the meantime, it's DVDs for entertainment.

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Back on the desktop!

I actually have Internet access on the desktop again! And it only took the laptop dying for it to happen... And it really is dead. When I boot the laptop I get the message "No OS found". It's supposed to have two - Windows Vista and Ubuntu 9.10. It isn't finding either one. Fortunately we were able to get an electrician to come out this morning and fix the extension, so this post comes to you courtesy of the desktop. :-) What a joy to have my mouse, keyboard and monitor back! Bliss!

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