The Grumble Thread - No energy for a full on rant.

[T42]

Local DIY emporium has exactly 3 models of wall switch and they're all vile.

[rafletcher]

£1814 for a Band E hovel in Ceredigion.  Of which only £41.21 goes to Llandysul Community Council, the tight bastards.
Actually, that was 18/19.  We haven't had this years bill yet.  I wonder if it will go up or down?   

Ours just arrived, £1843 for a band D 2-bed end terrace in Aylesbury Vale. Was a band E when we bought it, but we luckily found out our neighbours were all D in bigger properties (extended) so we appealed and got a reduction. I still think it’s a high banding for what is a modestly extended 2 up 2 down 1840’s farm workers cottage.

[orienteer]

Band E £1784 in LB of Hillingdon, less £99 for over 65s.

[tiermat]

Despite the fears of the locals that turning off the lights would result in an apocalyptic crime wave, I'm of the opinion that burglars don't like stumbling around in pitch darkness, and yes, someone with a torch in your back garden tends to be a bit of a giveaway. Unless you live in a multi-million mansion that makes the effort of planning a robbery worthwhile, the average scrote tends to follow the path of least resistance, trying doors etc on obviously empty houses (which they mostly seem to do during daylight).

I've no idea why the street behind ours has council street lights (a few) anyway as it's a private street. Presumably to control the bear menace.

ISTR a TED talk where the speaker said something along the lines of "If someone breaks into your house during the day, chances are they are after stealing stuffs.  If they break in during the night, chances are they are after you!"

Sleep well, won't you?

[Cudzoziemiec]

Despite the fears of the locals that turning off the lights would result in an apocalyptic crime wave, I'm of the opinion that burglars don't like stumbling around in pitch darkness, and yes, someone with a torch in your back garden tends to be a bit of a giveaway. Unless you live in a multi-million mansion that makes the effort of planning a robbery worthwhile, the average scrote tends to follow the path of least resistance, trying doors etc on obviously empty houses (which they mostly seem to do during daylight).

I've no idea why the street behind ours has council street lights (a few) anyway as it's a private street. Presumably to control the bear menace.

ISTR a TED talk where the speaker said something along the lines of "If someone breaks into your house during the day, chances are they are after stealing stuffs.  If they break in during the night, chances are they are after you!" a ravenous bear!

Sleep well, won't you?

[Cudzoziemiec]

Today my phone went haywire and wiped out all my contacts. Fortunately the names were still there in WhatsApp so I was able to recreate the commonly used ones from that and a bit of deduction from texts. Weird though, and annoying.

[hellymedic]

My 19 year old Miele washing machine is sick so I've tried to book a call-out online with a local firm who manage these things.

Fill in all details on web form & click on 'submit'.

States date format is incorrect. dd/mm/yy

After several attempts at 19/03/19 I give up & leave field blank and resubmit form, which is accepted...

[Pingu]

I'm surprised by how cheap Council Tax is in London! Ours is £2284 for a flat in Glasgow...

Ours include water & sewerage services, thobut.

[rafletcher]

I think we pay £250 a year to Thames Water on top of the council tax.

[hellymedic]

My water is £500 pa.

[T42]

I just paid 293€ for six months, but that includes sewerage.  Fortunately not in the same pipe.

[Kim]

I just paid 293€ for six months, but that includes sewerage.  Fortunately not in the same pipe.

I think that would entitle you to a special Nokia discount.

[essexian]

Right, just had my bill for the new tax year: £1 506, up 4% including a 12.5% increase in the amount paid to the useless Police and Crime Commissioner (a pointless post).

A quick calculation (back of an envelope and without checking a number of things) makes me believe that equates to a 5p ni the pound increase in my basic Income Tax take.

I don't mind paying tax but am a little irritated by the fact that I haven't had a pay increase of more than 1.5% in the last 9 years and indeed in at least 5 of those years, I didn't get any increase. I am quite lucky that I am reasonably well paid but slowly that is being eroded.

[T42]

Right, just had my bill for the new tax year: £1 506, up 4% including a 12.5% increase in the amount paid to the useless Police and Crime Commissioner (a pointless post).

A quick calculation (back of an envelope and without checking a number of things) makes me believe that equates to a 5p ni the pound increase in my basic Income Tax take.

I don't mind paying tax but am a little irritated by the fact that I haven't had a pay increase of more than 1.5% in the last 9 years and indeed in at least 5 of those years, I didn't get any increase. I am quite lucky that I am reasonably well paid but slowly that is being eroded.

Queue here for your gilet jaune ====>

(Pensions here are "indexed" at 0.3%/annum.)

[ian]

I'd mind less if Surrey didn't complain about the hardships enforced on it by central government while being ideologically aligned with that government.

I've no idea why county and local councils need to be politically inclined, for fuck sake, just do the job. I don't care if you're Labour or Conservative. I do care that you provide the services I'm paying for.

[T42]

In the villages around here the usual practice is for whoever is elected mayor to ask his opponent to serve as deputy, otherwise he immediately has half the community against him.

[Mr Larrington]

I'd mind less if Surrey didn't complain about the hardships enforced on it by central government while being ideologically aligned with that government.

There was a case in Oxfordshire a few years ago.  Man complains about services being cut.  Oxon CC explains that cuts due to central government slashing local government's funding.  Man not impressed with reply even though he is none other than the Rt. Hon. Gammon-Faced Pig-Botherer for Witney And Gammonshire, a Mr Cameron.

[hellymedic]

I'd mind less if Surrey didn't complain about the hardships enforced on it by central government while being ideologically aligned with that government.

There was a case in Oxfordshire a few years ago.  Man complains about services being cut.  Oxon CC explains that cuts due to central government slashing local government's funding.  Man not impressed with reply even though he is none other than the Rt. Hon. Gammon-Faced Pig-Botherer for Witney And Gammonshire, a Mr Cameron.

 

[Beardy]

Some USA Republican fund raising organisation has managed to acquire one of my email addresses and is this spamming me with requests for money. Now normally I’d just unsubscribe and/or delete these emails with a bit of muttering about unscrupulous spammers not respecting the unsubscribe request, but that would be it. However for some reason continuing to receive these emails is really winding me up. I take GREAT exception to being referred to as a ‘fellow conservative’. It really is beyond the pale. 

[Mrs Pingu]

Get all GDPR on their ass.

[tiermat]

Get all GDPR on their ass.

Indeed, articles 17 and 21 are your friends in this case.

[Beardy]

Get all GDPR on their ass.

Indeed, articles 17 and 21 are your friends in this case.

Although more than a little difficult to enforce given their Leftpondian location.

[ian]

Woke up the dread voice of my wife shouting there's no electricity! Flip the bloody circuit breaker say I as I bury my head under the pillow. Where are they? Which one? I get up and do it myself because it's easier than 101 questions. Except it doesn't work. Every time I put the socket ring back on, ker-chink goes the main breaker. So I go around unplugging everything (and seriously, how much many things do we have that are greedy for electricity?), send the wife upstairs to do the same. But still, every time I flip on the ring, ker-chink. I start to see the bill for getting an electrician out on a Sunday, and the thought doesn't please me greatly.

You did unplug your computer, didn't you?

She didn't, the surge protector multiplug thing with the usual modern office cornucopia was still plugged in. Unplugging that made things good. Then I noticed it was sticky. Now the first thing my wife shouted at me this morning wasn't about the electric. It was about the cat being sick, which I pretended to ignore so well (on the grounds I didn't want to clean it up) that I'd actually forgotten. In her office. By my wife's desk. Can you guess where the multiplug is located? Basically, in addition to what was cleaned up, Bad Cat had also emptied the liquid contents of her stomach into an exposed socket on the multiplug.

I also discovered the labels on the RCD panel are lies. The upstairs and downstairs sockets are on the same breaker, the one labelled 'freezer' definitely isn't the freezer because that was off, and the sockets in the kitchen extension seem to be connected to the oven circuit. Neither of us have a clue where the dishwasher is wired in.

I'm going to wire Bad Cat to the mains.

[spesh]

I guess I should be thankful that my cat - when he was alive - avoided anointing anything electronic with his bodily fluids (WRT the DVD recorder, that's only because it was behind the glass door of the TV stand).

He vommed all the jute rugs utterly to DETH, proved that a stainless steel BBQ is not proof against scent marking, and one of these days, I must assemble the tuits and treat/re-paint the bottom of the kitchen radiator (he only stopped spraying that when I parked the food and water bowls in front of it).

[andrewc]

Grrrr.  I've booked a weekend in London in May for my mother & sister.   Aha, Says I.  I'll not book a train journey on the Bank Holiday Monday, that's when they like to do repairs.  So I booked the hotel from Sat 4th to Tue 7th May.  Just gone to book the trains & can't get tickets to Euston.  West Coast Main Line closed all weekend, planned to reopen on the Tuesday.  Looks like it's train to Paddington via Mordor & Reading on the way down.