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

[Cudzoziemiec]

I think 9am is a default time for the majority of post boxes. It's the time on my nearest box, which I would never cycle to as it's about 50 metres away. I've used it maybe four times in the twelve years I've been here and can't imagine what I might have to post that would be too urgent to wait till tomorrow morning collection and also not require a visit to the PO for weighing, registering or whatever.

[Diver300]

I think 9am is a default time for the majority of post boxes. It's the time on my nearest box, which I would never cycle to as it's about 50 metres away. I've used it maybe four times in the twelve years I've been here and can't imagine what I might have to post that would be too urgent to wait till tomorrow morning collection and also not require a visit to the PO for weighing, registering or whatever.

Online printing of postage is quite easy, and I use it a lot.

If I'm getting something ready during the evening, I can book a collection for the middle of the next day. However, that doesn't always work, and waiting in for a collection can be just as frustrating as waiting in for a delivery.

[Mr Larrington]

Delayed grumble: when booking a Plague booster the other day I noticed that there was a page asking whether you had any needs such as disabled access, car parking ect &, moreover, etc.

Did they mention bike parking?  Why, no!  No, they did not.

My GP's place is lacking in such things too.  The bastards.

[Basil]

Delayed grumble: when booking a Plague booster the other day I noticed that there was a page asking whether you had any needs such as disabled access, car parking ect &, moreover, etc.

Did they mention bike parking?  Why, no!  No, they did not.

My GP's place is lacking in such things too.  The bastards.

I always park right by the surgery door.
One of the doctors grumbled at me for doing that, saying that they'd had a lovely bike rack installed round the back.
I told her that I didn't want to park round the back. I wanted to park round the front, like all the carists do. And if Dai Scumbag wanted to fiddle with my lock, he'd not be hidden from view as he fiddled.

[ian]

This being Surreyshire, there is certainly no bike parking at the GPs.

In other grumbles, I cracked off a chunk of molar on a pomegranate seed. Basically it’s a childhood era filling where they left very little actual tooth to contain the industrial quantity of amalgam. Looking at it, I’m not sure how it survived so many decades. Now I can’t resist poking the jagged remains with my tongue. It feels a lot worse than it looks.

[Mr Larrington]

Zuckerbots, kindly fuck off with your “Suggested for you” feature.  Doubly so if you’re suggesting “Firearms News”.  You thick fucks.

[davelodwig]

Delayed grumble: when booking a Plague booster the other day I noticed that there was a page asking whether you had any needs such as disabled access, car parking ect &, moreover, etc.

Did they mention bike parking?  Why, no!  No, they did not.

My GP's place is lacking in such things too.  The bastards.

I always park right by the surgery door.
One of the doctors grumbled at me for doing that, saying that they'd had a lovely bike rack installed round the back.
I told her that I didn't want to park round the back. I wanted to park round the front, like all the carists do. And if Dai Scumbag wanted to fiddle with my lock, he'd not be hidden from view as he fiddled.

Our surgery has two Sheffield stands that require you to bump the bike up the curb and walk across some grass.

I'll be fucked if I'm doing that with the box bike with the boy in the front, so I just park in a car space put the nurses lock on and chain it to a handy lamp post.

I've only been asked once if I can move it, apparently no wasn't the answer they were expecting.

[Mr Larrington]

Equal quantities of glue and foul cursing will hopefully see it reattached and remaining thus for another seventeen years.

Obviously not enough of one or other ingredient as the bloody thing came loose again on the way to Mr Sainsbury’s House of Toothy Comestibles just now   Requiring me to remove foot from shoe before shoe could be removed from pedal chiz.  At least a session of walking around stuck it down enough not to have to repeat the foot-shoe-pedal comedy on getting home.

More glue, more clamps, more swearing and liberal quantities of d/s tape applied.  Otherwise it’s new shoes time.  Or flat pedals.

Superglue + d/s tape + clamps + cursing seems to have at least permitted a round trip to Mr Sainsbury’s House of Toothy Comestibles without it trying to escape again.  Crosses thumbs, presses fingers coz the cheapest appropriate replacement shoes are a) £60 and iii: Shimano.  TV's NC Boardman does some for £40 but they’re orange enow to attract the attention of ASR helichopters.

[Mr Larrington]

By asking me for meter readings only a month after my last lot EDF are clearly trying to force me down the smart meter road, the sneaky toerags.  Also this means putting on trousers, and shoes, and doing battle with teh Horble Spiky Bush ov Doom that lives in front of the gas meter cupboard and has grown alarmingly since being lovingly pruned with a chainsaw earlier this year 

[Cudzoziemiec]

Ah, maybe that's why I've had eight emails in three days asking for my electricity meter reading. And they don't need it till the 22nd. But they've also marked the meter "permanently incapacitated" or something similar, as en-smartening it would require de-anbarizing the entire street.

[rafletcher]

I doubt it's that Machiavellian, I've been reading the meter monthly for at least 7 years, and I've only been pestered for Smartness for the last couple. And to be fair, once I got the 'tuits to tell them to cease and desist their blandishments they did forthwith.

[rafletcher]

Water pressure was noticeably down when I filled the kettle this morning. Faceache has its uses, a post on the village page elicited the information that there was a burst water main in the adjacent village of Aston Clinton. Again. Thames Water (well, their nominated contractors) have conspicuously failed to fully repair the previous burst (it’s still weeping through the road surface) about 100 yards away from the current one. It’s a good thing that road is no longer the main A41!!

[MattH]

Every year we have to do a "riskmaster" driver thing at work, which is my company's way of mitigating driver risk by having a third part check things like our driving licences, insurance and MOT (if using our own cars) and doing a set of tests every year a bit like the modern theory test.

The theory test bits are always rubbish. This year I was asked what LPG stood for. Not quite sure how that relates to my ability to drive. But having selected the correct answer it helpfully told me that LPG is becoming more available and may help to bring down the cost of my motoring. Probably true a decade ago.

Then it showed a normal with flow cycle lane sign (blue rectangle, picture of bike on the left and a solid white line next to it) and asked what it mean. Options were "No entry for cyclists", "Contra flow cycle lane", "cycle route ahead" and "cycle race". None of which are correct. It expected "cycle route ahead" which is the red triangle cycle sign. I guessed that, but it is just wrong. My company pays a fortune for this shit.

[T42]

Zefal's el cheapo mudguard set provides 5 mm Allen-head bolts, with one washer and one plain nut per bolt.  I'd have preferred a couple of washers and a locking nut but you don't get what you don't pay for. 6 mm bolts would have been better, too, a closer match to the holes most bikes have.

As it happens I have exactly zero 5 mm lock nuts in the workshop, just a couple of 6es and a bunch of 4s.  Rats.

[Jurek]

Today, in Sainos, in search for my breakfast grapefruit for tomorrow, there were only two examples available.
One, about the size of a tennis ball.
The other as soft as a stress ball.

[The Family Cyclist]

Forgot to change the dog back to GMT so no extra hour in bed

[TheLurker]

Canine Mean Time

[T42]

Forgot to change the dog back to GMT so no extra hour in bed

Remembered to sleep in but just realized I haven't reset all the misbegotten clocks & timers.

[phantasmagoriana]

Forgot to change the dog back to GMT so no extra hour in bed

Ditto, but with cats.

[Flite]

The cat and I usually get up about 6am.
Last night I remembered to put my alarm clock back an hour.
The cat put her's forward an hour, so I was woken at 5am!
She was been out, got soaked, dried her feet on my lap and is fast asleep under the table.
Lucky beast.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Ob GMT, BST and local time:

https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/features/bristol-smallest-plaque-connection-clocks-going-back/

[Mrs Pingu]

Pumpkin actually didn't wake me up super early, which was nice.

[hellymedic]

The automatic analogue wall clocks seem to have gone wild without actually reverting to GMT.
Hope they revert tonight!

[hbunnet]

The automatic analogue wall clocks seem to have gone wild without actually reverting to GMT.
Hope they revert tonight!

Yes, we found that also on two clocks. I've just checked 15:45 and one has changed and the North facing one has not.

[Basil]

Ah, OK. I was wondering why ours didn't change overnight.  It always has done before.
I waited till about lunchtime and then sorted it by simply taking out the battery and putting it back in again. Forcing a reset.