Well, despite my rant the other week about England’s dismal performance, there’s still the matter of the FA cup. I’m currently typing this, while the Horsham V Swansea match is playing on Sky Sports.

Now, as I said, I don’t really follow footbal. I have, however, thoroughly enjoyed this match. I love it when the big broadcasters, such as Sky and BBC broadcast live from these grounds. They position the microphones in order to pick up the crowd ambience, yet due to the fact there’s not much of a crowd, you get to hear every individual commentary, for instance, when Horsham went to take their penalty (which they scored), you got to hear:-

“MISSS IIIIIIIIIIIITTTTT. MISS IT, YOU F***ING C**T”

Whoever took it, didn’t. and, with 1 minute to go, it looks like it’s going to a replay.

Technorati Tags: bbc, football, goal, horsham, horsham v swansea, penalty, sky sports, swansea

Well, right now, I feel like either driving a bullet through somebody else’s skull, or driving a bullet directly through mine. You won’t be a million miles off thinking that work has a LOT to do with the way I’m feeling at the minute.

I’d better shut up now about work, I can feel my blood pressure rising, and I want to be able to drink this can of beer without feeling my chest implode…

Speaking about beer, I almost paid way over the odds for my favourite drink. I had just left work after THE DAY OF HELL, and headed straight to the establishment of very fine ales, known as the supermarket.

The stocks were plentiful…

… of course, this is always a good sign. What’s even better is that they’re doing 3 of these for £20, which means that I stacked my trolley high. Well, if you count three a high number, anyway.

I happily trot to the tills with my three happy crates, along with a few other bits and pieces. … well, when I say trot, I mean limp, and when I say happily, I mean with a face so glum it would appear that I’d lost a fiver, and found a TB infected penny.

I begin to load my wares onto the conveyor. Normally, if I get a shedload of booze in, I simply just put one box on, and explain to whoever is serving me that I have three. Just in case they can’t see then in the trolley.

So, while I continue to load the shopping, the woman behind the counter begins to help me pack. Normally, they ask you if you want help with the packing, but my face of thunder must have made her take pity on me. Either that, or it was because I didn’t have that much stuff, and it was quiet, so I assume she didn’t have anything better to do. The last thing to go on, was my one crate. I mention to the trolley dolly, that I have three. As the packing was being done for me, I watch the little till display. It’s lucky I did. She puts in multiple items for my crate. 2… 3… 4… wait, did that just say four?

I ask her… “Did you just put four in there?”
“No, only three”, she replies, as if I was accusing her of robbing me blind.

The price came to something OTT, like £45. OK, I’d bought a few expensive items, such as the beer, washing powder, razor blades, etc. but £45?? Shurely shome mishtake?

Out comes my badly printed receipt. Her printer head was clearly on the way out, as it was barely readable, but yes, it clearly said 4. Well, I was not impressed.

“You’ll have to go to Customer Services, they’ll refund you.”

Great. This was 10:30 at night, and the desk was empty. It was looking unlikely that I’d be getting a refund, though I wasn’t leaving until I got one.

Eventually, someone noticed me standing there like a miserable sack of crabs in a black coat. I explained the situation with about as mush enthusiasm as a slowly deflating bouncy castle. I handed over my receipt, she scanned it. It wouldn’t scan. The print was so bad, the barcode reader couldn’t understand it. At this point, I was looking at spending the night in the camping equipment aisle. Actually, some of those tents and sleeping bags are probably quite comfortable, though I’m not sure how much tannoy-piped 1980s cock-rock I’d be able to take.

Speaking of cock-rock, I’m currently listening to “Burning Bridges” by the legendary Status Quo, which I think is one of the greatest songs of all time. This is, of course, the song which was re-written and re-recorded for Manchester United’s 1994 cup final single “Come On You Reds”, which, as we all know, is truly an abysmal record. That statement is coming from someone who received a copy of “Superman” by Black Lace from eBay yesterday.

Now, I’ll sit back and wait for the flood of venomous comments from tone-deaf and lyrically challenged Man Ure fans, just like I did when I made a post, accusing Carol Vorderman of getting her sums wrong. It quickly made it onto a TV forum. The comment expletive filter got some hammering that night. I think I kept them, some of them were really funny and well written. Turned out *I* was wrong after all. Whoopsy.

That reminds me, I never did apologise to her for making that faux pas. Sorry Carol. Love you lots. XxX.

Oh, and I got my refund.

Technorati Tags: beer, carol vorderman, Depressed, man u, Music, records, status quo, supermarket, work

Well, it’s taken 4 attempts to get round and write a post, and I’ve decided to do this one when I’m so tired, I’m finding it difficult to string logical sentences together. So, this is going to be a howler.

Well, my foot is still hurting lots. Thanks to all of you for your concern, and even more thanks to those who weren’t concerned. Imagine the hilarity when I came back to work to hear *all* of the jokes and jibes! Quite a few people found it ironic, however, that the injury was caused by a joke book, when I’m the one who’s usually causing injury by telling them, however, MS was the one who raised the schadenfrauder bar to a whole new level, making some kind of remark such as “awww, broke yer toenail?” every time I hobbled helplessly past.

Things didn’t get any better, as I got profoundly beaten by Richard, with a score of 4-0. I blame the fact my concentration was somewhere else, thanks to my ankle. Clearly, I’ll be using this as an excuse for the next six months every time I lose at something.

Anyway, bed!

Technorati Tags: ankle, hurt, pain, pool, sleepy, spence, tired, work

Pfft. Illusions shattered, like so many half-shiny pennies.

Barry Scott, the spokesperson for Cillit Bang, the non-fictional house cleaning product, is actually a fictional character. The advertisements have been a constant source of entertainment and parody since they first appeared on our screens several years ago.

Sadly, “Barry Scott” is played by Neil Burgess, an actor who has appeared in a few other shows too.

Oh well. Next, they’ll be telling me wrestling isn’t real…

Technorati Tags: advertisement, barry scott, cillit bang, television

One of the things that really pissed me off with Windows Vista during my time using it, is that the system beep is infinitely more annoying than it is under other versions of Windows.

Applications such as XNews, the news reader, and Aggregator, my RSS reader of choice, would beep every time I read an article. Of course, I could turn down the volume on the lappy, but this gets annoying especially when I want to listen to some tunes.

A quick Google search, however, reveals the solution. I can’t claim this as one of my own solutions, therefore I’ll link to the site I got it from.

Anyway. Go into the Device Manager. Under Vista, this is a bit different. Go into the Control Panel, select Classic View on the left, then click the System icon, and Device Manager is on the left. (of course, you can right-click Computer, go to Properties and select Device manager from there)

Once you’re in there, click on View, select “Show Hidden Devices”. You’ll now get another couple of options. Select “Non Plug and Play Devices”. In there, you’ll see “Beep”.

Double click this, select the “Driver” tab. Under “Current Status”, click Stop to disable it straight away, and to disable it all together, select “Disabled” under the Startup section. No more annoying beep!!

Technorati Tags: annoying, beep, bleep, disable, system, windows vista