Fultons' End

2011-05-31T06:45:00.001Z

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Another one of those days...

2008-03-15T17:52:00.002Z

Yes, it has been more than a while since my last post. Not that anyone out there is keeping tabs, I'm sure (except for you, Poppy, I know you are!)

The day started when I woke up, and then got worse. Of all the things to have to do on an otherwise relaxing and resting Saturday, Work was the thing most able to knacker it up. Once in work, finding that the server, phone system and central heating had been well and truly buggered by a power cut was did not provide the most auspicious start. Then having 2 guys call in sick and having to lug 3 large boxes of merchandise up to the second floor office (lift likewise knackered) left me tired, cold, and generally feeling that the world hates me.

If it was feeling in any way guilty for the way it was treating me, this did not prevent it from pissing down the back of my neck as I left for my first appointment. Apparently I was the only person not to notice the waterfall of gutter-water that stood ready to baptise anyone who passed into the church of swearing madly and growling at strangers.

Still, I managed to get through the long working day and even got to see a shoplifter arrested at Tescos at lunchtime... every cloud etc. The Gentlechav in question was running with his trolley full of un-packed goods towards a car containing a female (I think - the sportswear tends to restrict gender-identification somewhat) and at least 2 offspring.

The arrest, conducted by an off-duty copper (are they ever really off-duty?) right in front of my car was in direct view of all of them, and the woman was subsequently nicked for a public order offense involving the questioning of every officer's parentage and a short scuffle with said off-duty bobby.

Paddy wagon, social services on call and half a can of fanta later I was on my way rejoicing the return of justice. At least the kids had the innate common sense to sit quietly and watch their parents (possibly Mum and Daddy #4?) get arrested in the company of a nice looking WPC (if it us not un-PC to describe a lady officer as such). There is hope left for them yet.

So, wet neck, knackered, still got cold feet and now back off to Tesco 'cos I forgot loo roll and washing powder, but at least the Police here are on the ball.

Evening All.

Arden

Another good day!

2007-12-09T18:32:00.001Z

Today has been a good Sunday - one of the ones where I have actually enjoyed the day rather than simply using it to relax and lie in.

Got up at around 10 - previously almost unheard of on a Sunday - and myself and Mrs Arden took a short trip to a small provintial town we have not been to before, only to find they have a market on in the town square, where we managed to get ostrich burgers and pheasant for the coming week before visiting a luxury chocolate shop (the reason for going in the first place) and getting a last Christmas present for me old mum.

Back at home I cooked a great Sunday roast, ordered my final Christmas pressie online, and am now part way in to a Star Wars marathon brought about by episode two showing.

Some Sundays are started great, some achieve greatness, but this is one of those few which have greatness thrust upon them.

A good day to be alive, methinks.

Love, Arden

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(Rant) Rip Off Britain - Bah Humbug...

2007-12-07T20:25:00.001Z

Now, you know me, I don't like to complain, but I thought as I have come accross three separate rip-off scenarios in the last 48 hours I would share some of my thoughts on the state of the nation at this juncture.

The first occasion was at work, where a recent project has involved me in 'lo-jacking' the company cars. To the less well technically informed, this means installing trackers into the vehicles which report back to our computers in the office with the location of the cars as well as important stuff such as the speed it is travelling and whether the driver is breaking too heavily (scary stuff - but since I am becoming Big Brother myself I am getting a buzz out of the control side of things rather than worrying about who is watching over MY shoulders etc). All in all a highly technical piece of modern engineering, along with fairly complicated software for the office (A4 manual = approx 1.8" thick, ALL English) to be installed on our server and other machines.

Bearing in mind we have a lot of operators in the office, it is kind of important that they can all see where the cars are at any one time within a fairly small (say 15 mile square) area - not too difficult you may think, bearing in mind the size of the manual the software must be rather capable. Great. We were told that to get this solution we would need the software installed on the server and one other computer (the ops director) for control purposes... Brill.

So, the equipment is in the cars, a pack turns up with the software and the manual (so naturally a big pack then) and a nice friendly letter asking the ops director (who passed it on to me) to call the tracker company who would guide me through the installation. I have a friend - hooray!

So I call them and speak to the techy on the other end of a phone line, who logs in to my server and sends the mouse pointer madly accross the screen in a manner which, if you have never experienced this before, is rather disconcerting. The power of t'internet eh, bloody marvelous - in the words of the managing director.

And then the phone call comes in. Apparently, our brand new £20,000 server is not capable of handling their 6 year old software. A little suspect, methinks. If we are to run the application so it can be viewed by all of the operators, we will need to purchase another 9 licenses at £150 each. Now, they had our server spec before we ordered the trackers, they had seen the servers before they priced the job, why should we now pay well over a grand more for the system we ordered?

So far the boss has refused to pay for the system they have installed and knowing his northern influences is not going to open his wallet again until he has the things working as previously described. As he often points out, Yorkshiremen are like Scotsmen with all of the generosity sqeeeeezed out of them.

Next came Royal Mail. I know some very nice people who work for this fine old British institution, and don't wish to cause any offence, but sometimes the red tape trips you up, doesn't it?

We have offices on the first floor of a converted warehouse, while the remainder of the building is occupied by a large chemical testing company. They have a reception behind a glass door downstairs as well as suites throughout the rest of the building. Postie (one of around 15 different posties, that is) has taken to delivering the mail marked for us to the steps in the public area of the building, which I will readily admit is in a non too salubrious area in a rather downtrodden town, so things are going missing.

On calling the Royal Mail to discuss this problem I was informed that they would be happy to deliver our post to our front door (on the 1st floor) on the payment of a £55 "floor fee". Now forgive me - I was led to believe that the SENDER pays the fee and then the mail is delivered to the addressee. The herbert I was speaking to on the other end of the phone was basically telling me that if I didn't pay to receive the mail, it would be left out for the wolves. It took speaking to two managers until I finally got someone who could see sense.

Finally I came home tonight to the paper which is informing people to be wary of taking out loans they cannot afford in the run up to Christmas. There is a firm out there charging 222.7% APR (I have checked - I did not made a typo) for loans. The advert actually states "unemployed welcome" as if these people should be encouraged to take out loans they can't afford to repay.

What can we do about it? If nothing else we must learn from it an move on - without the loan if possible...

Bah, Humbug.
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Northern Monkeys and Southern Hippies.

2007-12-04T12:39:00.001Z

OK - so I drive for a living, or at least get around the UK to various meetings for a living. So, in MY mind at least, I need to drive a car, because quite apart from the dangers inherent in using public transport (disease, chavs etc) I would need to be on said transport (or succumbing to that particularly british obsession: waiting for it) for approximately 19 hours a day to maintain my current level of productivity, which takes up approximately 4-5 hours per day in a car.

But in this day and age, we have to consider the impact this has on our fellow creatures (this impact in the gloriously free days of the 1980's being confined to the brief squeak as a hedgehog dissappeared under a uniroyal) and the environment.

So, I demand an environmentally sensitive vehicle from my kindly providers. Having been born in northern towns during the 60's and 70's, these are not the most sensitive of chaps, and once they have picked themselves up, dusted themselves off and called me a "southern pansy" a few times, address the request semi-seriously.

They point out that the "green" cars are very expensive. I agree, but tentatively point out that the tax and fuel savings in the long term will mediate this. Excellent - 1 point to Arden.

They point out that the increased 'carbon' cost at manufacture outweighs the enviro-benefits of driving. Bugger. Science. I didn't expect this. And 'enviro-benefits' pronounced in Sheffieldish is a rather scary word. 1-1.

Then they drop the bombshell. After three years of being carefully driven by a perfect driver, these cars have the residual value of a tesco value hairdryer, becaused the only people who are interested in buying them are image consious pop stars, who couldn't possibly be seen dead in a second hand car. Whatever happened to recycling, eh?

So I am given the option of driving a normal car, or paying the difference it would cost the company - nearly FOUR THOUSAND POUNDS.

The result - I still drive a regular car but now I feel guilty about it. Such is modern life.

I still believe we should provide free public transport for everyone - as the savings we could make would be fantastic. Think about it:

ALL public transport (busses, trains, river ferries for foot passengers etc) are FREE. How much would this cost? The answer is almost nothing. With free transport comes zero ticketing, no ticket inspectors, vendors, the hugely expensive barriers at stations - a truly massive saving. And considering the UK transport system is currently underwritten and subsidised by the government to the tune of approximately 80% of the ticket prices it could even pay for itself.

We would also increase usage - increasing the demands on the transport network - but here's why that is not necessarily a bad thing: with increased use comes increased productivity. If a train is full (not southern rail full - just at 100% capacity) it becomes cheaper per tax payer to run. Each tax payer on the train is supporting it. And those scrounging dole monkeys who are claiming a fortnightly giro in order to "seek jobs" will no longer need that part of the allowance which allows them to attend rejections - sorry - interviews.

Tourism goes through the roof: "visit Britain - once you get there, travel is free!" More people take jobs because the previously high cost of travelling does not have to be considered when weighing up the salary offered.

Honestly, I was once offered a job in central london, while living just outside the M25. I needed to clear over £5000 per year to pay for the travelling and was pretty much guaranteed to be standing for all of the 20 miles into and out of london.

So I didn't take the job, which for the next few years cost the government dearly as it would have put me in that great 40% tax bracket too... The tax would almost have paid for the ticket, bear in mind.

In my mind, the benefits far outweigh the costs, especially as far more people would leave their cars at home or - better still - not buy them.

Life is getting better/worse (delete as appropriate)

Arden.
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Baby I'm Back!

2007-12-02T19:58:00.001Z

Gosh - what a long time to be away for. To anyone who has, for reasons of their own poor luck, been checking this blog regularly for tasty morsels of chav baiting and life affirming rants, my apologies. I will make every effort to be a little more forthcoming in the future, but will not offer my reasons for being away as it will also give ME away too - something I am not too comfortable with. Needless to say, I am now in the UK, with mobile posting (gotta love blogger, eh?) And an ambition to be back here at the very least weekly. Please berate me for failure to do so.

In response to some of the comments: I do not live in Woking, but did drive through it regularly at the time of writing; I am not an active member of your forum Neil, but do hold it sacred as a lurker and find it an ultimate place of wit and good humour (football strings excepted); Leyton do not know what they missed.

Much has happened in the last few months to give me ammunition for rants and calls to glory, the saddest of which for me was the untimely passing of Fulton, who has gone to take his place at the right hand of the devil dog at last. I had the news from my Mother while I was abroad and arrived home to a smiling family and a new mound at the bottom of the garden, which I have no trouble admitting brought a tear to my eye as well as a wealth of good memories. I don't think I'll be getting another friend like Fulton for quite a while - possibly when I retire...

Missed Old Boys again this year - was really hoping to be there but got back almost a month late. I understand from the pics, blogs and facebook (yes - converted at last) that it went well and Stan/Porl deserves particular congratulations for organising the pub-draining session (really - NO beer left?). To those who have guessed - next year would be good!

OK - have done the pre-post (oxymoron?) read-through and realise that this is lacking a lot, which I will put down to lack of practise and promise to blog again soon.

Honest.

Arden
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RANT - BMW Recall...

2007-03-08T21:15:00.000Z

If they haven't already considered one, they need to. It would appear that every car that leaves the BMW factory has a problem with the lights.

Nearly every one automatically turns on the fog lights when a forward gear is engaged, blinding both truck and sports car drivers. Unfortuantely, I have the good fortune to drive one at work and the other in my personal life.

As if to compound this, it would also appear that the indicators do not funcion at all, leaving other road users, even if not blided by the lights, completely unaware of the drivers intentions.

I would have thought, in this day and age, that a luxury car company (as BMW stlye themselves) would have access to competent electronic engineers, but am quite obviously wrong.

The other possibility is that the drivers of these vehicles are either blind or stupid, and ever wishing to believe the
best of my felloe man, have taken to turning on my full-beam headlights when faced by fog-belit morons. My logic is as follows:

They are obviously seeing life through a haze, and believe they are driving through fog. Therefore, they turn on their fog lights. I see this, and am aware that their vision is in some way impared. As I am also using the road I need to ensure they can see me, and turn on my high-beam to assist their poor vision.

Needless to say, I am none too popular in Woking right now.

Arden

Begorrah it's cold!

2007-02-07T21:06:00.000Z

Cold enough to start me crying, or at least start my eyes watering, during my wander to the train station his evening, and make me remember those cold winter mornings on parade, with my fingers freezing in my gloves despite my smuggled handwarmers. And in later years, of course, lips freeking onto the cold, white metal of my band instrument. And they say that corporal punnishment is illegal...

As I write, there are about thirty of us, commuters, student types and tourists snuggled warmly into what must be the only heated (and open, for that matter) train station waiting room in the UK. It is quite cosy, and the sight of the dew freezing on the rails outside the window seems to warm us even more.

Conversations are started about the weather (surprise, surprise...) and then move on to other things. Normally, I am one of those people who start dialogues out of boredom, or a need for contact with the outside world, but not tonight. For once, I am happy to sit back and earwig on the results of these tentative first steps some of my fellow travellers are taking on the path to a new relationship.

In the last few minutes, I have seen a telephone number change hands between two youths, a photograph being proudly thrust beneath the gaze of a cooing sixty-something, and two gents shaking hands furiously, clapping each other on the back as they find they feel exactly the same way about tonights football game.

It makes me think. This is what people do. This is what they are. We are social animals, we need confirmation fron those around us that what we are doing is acceptable. We need friends.

And we may be on the right road too... Our footballing friends are making plans for a drink on arrival at their destination, which they also share. Maybe this will become regular; best friends have to meet somewhere. Our two lovers-in-waiting both have that twinkle in their eyes that lets me know they are both looking for something more than a hi & bye chat, even if they can't see it themselves. Isn't body language a great thing for those that can speak it?

And as for me, I too have a smile on my face: for once I am in good company and I think that maybe, after all, we are heading in the right direction. Oh, how smug.

Peace... Out

Crazy Mutt (possibly for sale...) and Careful Drivers

2007-01-07T20:17:00.000Z

Fulton is acting up. After years of patiently training him to crap outside, getting him to ignore fireworks, and stopping him from destroying Ikea's latest variation on a theme of "furniture" I have discovered that once a mutt, always a mutt.

He's off his food, which would normally be attributed to a local lady dog being on heat but for the fact that I'm almost certain he is gay, and has taken to chewing the sofa cushions when I'm not in. Anyone with tips to prevent this please let me know before my shotgun license comes through.

On a more positive front, had a great Christmas and New Year, which is much more than I usually even hope for. I am one of those lucky fellows who comes from a broken home, and as a result usually have to enjoy two christmasses, one with my mother and all of my fantastic siblings, and one with my father, stepmother and her assorted relatives, half of whom now speak English.

This year, in addition to the usual, I was also invited to the Doris's parents for the duration. Having had many years of experience in the parental stress and sibling rivalry camp, I managed to accept said invitation with the minimum of guilt, and we headed to the west country and a house which would not be out of place in the TV adaptation of pride and prejudice. Seriously, it's huge. Four storeys of old wood, crumbling plaster, death watch beetle and open fires. And thank the dear lord for those fires: the weight of generations bears down, and the chill of frozen time does nothing for my bones, but somehow when you chop down half of Cornwall's remaining forests and apply the lumber to the grate, it somehow becomes liveable again.

And so it came to pass that a few days before the eve of that great and holy day (the coming of Santa) we found ourselves beneath four eiderdowns and an electric blanket or two at my darling lady's home. (For Blackadder fans - this is NOT a home for the elderly or criminally insane. Please pay attention...)

My (middle) brother, in the meanwhile, was having to arrange collection of himself and his entire christmas shopping (one small cuddly toy - honestly the man has no idea how to shop) from a pub in Coventry, having been involved in an accident on his National Express coach. Apparently the coach driver had been banned one week before hand until the outcome of an investigation following a crash on exactly the same spot.

The local publican, who naturally benefitted from both accidents by having his hostelry full of dazed albanians and single mothers, informed him that the driver had some kind of fit or seizure (although he referred to it as a "spaz attack" - how utterly, beautifully non-pc!) the first time, and naturally was arrested on the spot on this later occasion.

Had I been in the vicinity (anywhere north of Southampton, if I am any judge) my mother would have insisted I collect the little darling, but as I wasn't, my youngest sibling drew the short straw.

Not according to middle bruv, who claimed it for himself. Apparently after twenty miles of number three's driving, he wanted to be back on the eppileptic bus, figuring that his chances of survival woukld be much better with Grand-Mal Gordon behind the wheel.

Now, in the last week or so, we have all learned that National express coaches are safe as houses, especially houses next to police stations in Baghdad or painted with the flag of the union* in an american airforce bombing zone. They are only in danger when faced with obstacles such as that dangerous accident black-spot - the M4-M25 slip road (w-n) and the like. It's good of the company to check that the rest of the fleet are roadworthy, but how do we know whether the drivers are?

And why, you ask, does it have anything to do with me?

At this moment, I am om the upper deck of the NXL561 london-skipton doing 70mph on the M1.

If I don't get there alive, you can have my CD collection and PSP, providing you come to the funeral.

Still, Christmas was good...

Arden.

(*note to chikes and other lower life-forms, this is the British flag. Now all stand for the national anthem...)

Great days start like this...

2006-12-07T13:05:00.000Z

It's a wonderful life for me. This morning started by dropping my car in to my local gang of spanner monkeys for it's annual government checkup - not something I particularly relish after having driven the old girl like a crazed argentinian superhero for the last year.

Having left the greased-up expert with my most prized posession (OK, just my most valuable...) I got all of fifty yards down the road when the heavens well and truly opened on me.

I darted into the Costcutter (these guys should be reported for false advertising, I'm sure) to try and stave off the ravages of the great British weather, and while waiting consumed a good 10 minutes queueing at the counter. Once there, I purchased my chocolate milkshake, and with a spare pound bought a scratchcard. Lo and behold the thing was a winner, Camelot now owed me £100! All I was required to do was queue for another 15 minutes or so (these shops make their money while the rain pours, people will do ANYTHING to stay dry, it seems), and collect my winnings.

It was only arriving at the front of the queue, that Holy Grail of the small shop experience, that I was told that this shop only pays out up to £50, and I would have to go to a post office.

Now, my town decided in the late 90's, that providing an efficient postal service was one of their lowest priorities, somewhere below twinning themselves with a small african village apparently, and abruptley closed the local Post Office. A pack of ferral pensioners and giro-grasping dole munchers roamed the streets bewailing their torment for months.

It didn't bother me much, I had resigned myself to an almost cashless existence years ago. I had reasond that if Blair and all his little demons wanted to know where my hard-earned was going, then they should ask Gordon Brown, after all it all seemed to end up in his bottomless pockets anyway. Since then, I would use my cards instead of cash, and try to keep them guessing.

Right now, however, I was owed filthy lucre, and had no means of getting my hands on it.

Then it occurred to me - in order to prevent the local adorable youths from targetting the old dears returning from the nearest post office on the bus, the powers that be would open a counter or two in a local convenience store (read: toilet shop - try using google or yahoo translator - it works!).

Then it dawned on me - there were two queues in the cost"cutter", and I was about to leave the front of one of them.

Guess what the other one was.

Since joining that yellow brick road, I have had time to write this little blog, and have progressed about as far as an elderly snail with a bad cough and athletes foot.

Still, by the time I get out, it must have stopped raining.

Silver lining? No. My car just failed the MOT.

Bugger.

Arden.

(RANT) The Good Old Days

2006-11-21T04:21:00.000Z

For the first time today I gained an insight into what the older generations mean when they say things along the line on "Things were better in my day. All this were fields etc, ooh me poor feet, I'm 82 you know. Have you seen me worthers?"

It seems to me that they are not actually wanting to go back in time as the person they are right now (three different prescriptions of spectacles and all) but that they actively want to relive it as children.

This may seem perfectly normal, after all when I visit my old school there is nothing I wouldn't give to have my time there again and actively take more of a part in my own life. But consider for a moment, that when these otegenarian coffin dodgers are saying "Kids had some respect in my day" they mean that THEY had more respect. They were the younger generation, and they had all of the fun. More importantly, they did have more respect, but if you ask Arnold or Betty where the respect was, they would say it was for their parents or the older generations.

I would disagree. I think the respect was greater than a one-way thing. Because although they had a greater respect for their elders than they receive from the great unwashed in todays enlightened age, I would submit that their parents and grandparents had more respect for THEM as children too.

In 'their day' an adult would have given them an order, or requested something of them, and they would have done it without question. In fact, the adult would have had enough respect for the child as to be able to turn away and allow the child to carry on. Adults did not experience back-chat or offence like they do today, and things are not getting any better.

Gone are the days when companies tried to make things better for the consumer. Now it is all about the money. Although ages past had their fair share of unscrupulous businessmen, they were largely kept in check by poular opinion. Now, people expect to get ripped off by shops and businesses - they are happy to complain that their local corner shop is charging them 20p more than Tescos for their 4 pints of milk, although they are appalled that the same Tescos, or Asda, or Sainsbury's is ripping off the farmers by 50p to offer this price. What's more, because the shop owners are, generally speaking, of non-caucasian background, this only strengthens the 'bloody foreigners, coming over here and ripping us off' mantra popularised so well by the BNP.

Even Alf Garnet would have voted Labour rather than the BNP, a ragtag collection of largely illiterate racists who claim that this country is going to the dogs at the hands of 'darkies' or 'pakis'. And can you blame the younger, ill-educated pond life from subscribing to this drivel?

We are living in a world rapidly becoming bereft of all forms of respect; young for old; old for young; business for consumer; customer for company; race for race; man for woman; woman for man.

It is, without a doubt, our lack of respect for one another and our otherwise beautiful country which is leading us closer to an all-guns-blazing, smaller cousin to america. Knife and gun crime are increasing, we don't feel safe in our own homes, burglars have to kill us in order to face any sort of real punnishment: how long until we all want guns in our homes? Until we demand to be able to protect ourselves and our families because the government can't.

Give it some thought. Add your own opinions. If you think Britain is doing well, watch how an old lady reacts next time a bunch of be-hooded kids runs past her. Ask yourself - 'is this what I want for me?' Stand up for the country you love, and support the foundation on which it was built: Respect, Honesty, Truth. Nil illegitimus carborundum.

Arden

Coming soon - Arden's Manifesto. A glance inside the mind of the megalomaniac.

What do you think?

2006-11-17T21:26:00.000Z

Today is a great day. The sky was black by 3pm and had opened to swamp North London in a million guttering drains and flooded pavements. Sometimes, when it's not too cold, I really enjoy this weather, although I can understand why a lot of others hate it.

The reason I am so enamoured is twofold:

Firstly, it allows me to hunker down under a couple of layers of clothing and create a place consisting entirely of my own, personal warmth. It reminds me of winter car journeys as a child when the rain was heavy enough to drown out all other sounds, leaving me able to opt out of parental conversations.

This affords a level of introspection and self-indulgent imagination which I find it hard to replicate on other days. Staring out of the window of a bus or train shows me a different world, bereft of conversation and human conact which I ordinarily crave, it is almost like I have access to a completely new dimension. People bounce off each others umbrellas like pool balls on a particularly slippery table, their brief mumbles of "sorry!" already lost in the heavy air. It's like being a child again, seeing something new. Familiar places lose their defining edges and become foreign, even alien worlds.

The feeling this gives me reminds me so much of my early days and weeks at DYRMS - something which, after my recent visit there for the Old Boys reunion, was fresh in my mind. There is an excitement I feel, and I sincerely hope it is a normal human reaction, when everything is strange and yet you feel safe, like nothing can touch you. I'm happy to admit that I didn't always feel safe at the school, but these certain memories always seem to have a peaceful side to them. My first memory like this is fixed outside the front of the Chapel on the first day I was attending there. In fact, I had got lost, having left the house late, and by mistake ended up near the swimming pool. Eventually my sense of direction was kicked into place, and I found myself alone, outside the building looking up at the towers at the front. With some trepidation, I opened the door to be faced by a thunderous Mr J English, furious that he had be woken from peaceful slumber, by the look of him. And, withou
t a word, he guided me to a pew, firmly pushed me down by a shoulder, and left. The service started immediately. It was almost like the whole school had waited for me, and I didn't feel guilty in the slightest.

The second reason I like this weather is the chance it affords to get to know my fellow travellers. A paradox, it seems, that while people are insular (in every sense of the word) they have to act out an informal undressing dance in order to stand the relative heat of the bus or train. Naturally, this involves a certain amount of contact with one's companions, due to the busses and trains resembling sardine cans rather than efficient modes of transport. In one, short journey tonight I met a stunning young lady called Victoria and an actor called Jason Dors, son of the great Diana. Both complained about the weather without even acknowledging that as a direct consequence they were engaged in converation with a stranger, something which I'm almost certain they would not have been doung otherwise.

I hope I make some sort of sense. Every cloud, etc?

It's only a shame I'm so bloody wet...

Arden

Old Boys Reunion 2006

2006-11-16T13:15:00.000Z

Still here, but only just after last weekend.

Was one of the best Old Boy reunions I have ever been to, with a fair sized turnout and plenty to do.

Some of the lads met up at the Rugby on the Saturday Afternoon, which I missed due to cataracts and a loss of sense of direction (sorry lads - I heard you were great). Soneone called Stan has the photos which can be found at www.dyrms85.com if you care to search. He also has links to just about every Old Boys website except this one. Let's see if we can get reciprocal here...

So - great company, mediochre beer and plenty of time to drink it... this is what great weekends were made of. Apparently, one of our number eventually resurfaced in Spain after boarding a long distance ferry at some point over the weekend, although the truth of this is most definitely in doubt. More likely France with a 2 day hangover. Either way, the parade went off well, and while the band were great, the Old Boys contingent showed the best drill on parade. Since the departure of old Lincoln, things seem to have changed a bit...

Those lads and lasses better learn to march with a straight arm before Grand Day or they will be savaged by an enraged Chelsea Pensioner.

Anyhoo - it's Thursday and I'm only now feeling coherent enough to actually write anything. Will continue later. If I can be bothered.

Don't you just love it?

2006-11-16T13:03:00.000Z

Hello avid readers (Christ, you'd have to be avid to keep coming back for this...)

A great week was ahead of me on Monday, and the results did nothing to disappoint, with the one exception of Fulton getting diarrhoea and shitting on the fireside rug. Thank god it was a fake fur thing, hooray for PETA, guilt and a complete lack of funds.

We (my company, although it sounds strange saying that...) had a result while I was at Old Boys (yes, you may have seen me there but still no clues to who I am, was I in the Brit, the Firkin, the Mogul (only kidding) or drinking Amaretto on the seafront? only time and indigestion will tell.) I found out while there that the business project I had been working on for the last few years has finally been pulled off, and as a result am on track to be on easy street within the next five years.

Then, on Monday, I found out I had won the lottery (how long does it take me to check there tickets?) some time in July or August, and won £121. Not bad considering I can't even remember playing it.

Later that day, I came accross an old pair of trousers and there was a £20 note in the pocket... again, cannot complain.

Now, I am a bit of a skeptic, but am also happy to believe in anything that may work in my favour, and therefore am prepared to accept that 'these things come in threes'. The work stuff doesn't count, as I haven't got any money from it yet. Therefore another win or find must be on the cards.

I am therefore fully committed to the Euromillions on Friday, and expect to be the winner of the £120M jackpot. Should I do so, rest assured, the drinks will be on me.

And the next fireside rug will be real fur.

blog on by...

2006-11-10T04:36:00.000Z

It's been an awfully long time, but I'm blogging on again for the sake of continuing the old corpulent bullshit process... Feedback not required.

For the sake of clarity, I'm a bit drunk right now. Not that this will make things any clearer, you understand, but you may appreciate the spirit in which this is written.

Very recently, things have actually been surprisingly good. The old business plan has worked, and at last we are on the road to financial and professional success. Personally, this will not necessarily be a good thing, as the doris may expect more holidays, but wealth heals many wounds. The proof of the pudding etc...

Anyway - manifesto is on the way soon, Old Boys next weekend, and promise to write again as and when possible.

Luv y'all,

Arden

My boss is an arse

2006-11-03T18:35:00.000Z

The great thing about being self-employed is that when you are feeling sick, you only have to convince yourself that going to work would be a bad idea. Now, I don't want to sound lazy, but this has probably resulted in me having taken more sick and duvet days in the year since I became my own boss than in the rest of my professional life combined. I should sack me right now.

On the bright side, this fortuitous system of employment also means I can catch up during the late night and early hours of the morning, when I seem to work best, and keep Fulton in the manner to which he has become accustomed.

Now that is one spoiled pet. He has now gone off his old favourite, dry biscuit, and insists on real Meaty Chunks. I don't even get real meaty chunks most days, why should my bloody dog? There's no justice. Although, in a round about way, as I am currently spending more time with the lovable mutt, he seems to have stopped shredding the free newspaper quite so often (it was never the post, just the paper, which I have asked many times for them not to deliver. Who wants half a pound of soggy grey paper hardening on the carpet of a friday evening?)

To give him his due, he has been a great little companion today, only getting me up a couple of times to let him out, and not bugging me at all to go for a walk. It's nice to know that even a Dog understands Man Flu, and unlike the doris doesn't just tut, sigh and walk off shaking his head. Best frieds are made of such fine stuff.

Was back to work this afternoon in a 'working from home' (read - 'looking at things on the computer') kind of way. I don't earn anything from doing so, but it makes me feel less guilty.

Perhaps I should take a leaf out of Fulton's book, and stop caring about such things - after all, guilt cannot be bought or sold and as a resukt is entirely worthless.

On with the motley...

Arden

Pass the Beechams...

2006-11-03T00:28:00.000Z

Am full of cold this evening, and hence can't be bothered to write too much. Also, as I have been in bed most of the day, nothing has pissed me off enough to need to rant.

You take the rough with the smooth, i guess.

Cheery Bye (sniff)

Arden

Sunset on Summer

2006-11-01T02:19:00.000Z

So that's it then, the end of another summer. OK, it's just turned November, so we've had a good run this year, but even so the changing weather marks a changing temperament in me and a huge number of other people.

Whether it's called the Winter Blues or SAD or any of a number of different trendy pseudonyms, it amounts to the same thing - the going back of the clock heralds a new sense of doom and gloom. Symptoms include a general unwillingness to get out of bed in the morning (and during the early afternoon, if it comes to it) and a lack of motivation towards anything.

Now, I don't mean to sound soft, but I'm sure it didn't used to be like this. Autumn used to be my favourite time of year, with all the changes in the natural world and the arrival of the Chritmas Spirit (brandy). These days I seem to spend most of my time explaining to people that I am, in fact, alright and don't particularly want to talk about it. And I don't suffer particularly badly. It's not like depression, or at least I don't imagine it is, more like a melancholy longing for the days of old.

I remember on this day of the year (still writing on the night of the 31st!) we would all go out trick-or-treating, with a couple of adults to 'keep us company', and most doors would open to us and dispense a small selection of fun sized mars bars and the occasional qualty street, and as a general rule we had to work for our treats. We worked for hours on costumes, trying to get the bed sheets, bandages or witches hats just right in order to impress the neigbours.

Tonight the little menaces who knocked the neigbourhood were all wearing masks and costumes bought ready-made from Tesco or Asda, and expected the same sort of rewards for their 'effort'. I would be surprised if 20% of the doors were opened to them. Perhaps my neigbours, like me, were loath to give a reward to a bunch of urchins in view of the lack of effort - it's basically begging - and too scared that if a kid gets sick they will be accused of poisoning them.

A couple of years ago, I was 'told off' by a parent for handing out individual chocolates instead of wrapped ones, on the basis that they may be contaminated. I told her in that case she shouldn't bring them begging, and to get off my doorstep. For the sake of the kids my language remained very restrained.

The highlight tonight was one lad came around the pub at about half ten wearing a 'ghost' mask and saying 'trick or treat'. Now, I don't know many people who carry sweets to the local, or many reponsible parents who would allow their children out at this time.

When he approached my table, I pointed out that I didn't have any sweets on me, and HE lookes at ME in a funny way. I swear he was expecting money.

It reminds me, it's christmas soon, and i'm sure I will be assaulted on my doorstep by pairs of adolescent boys belting out a poor rendition of 'away in a manger' and expecting a quid for the trouble. In my mind, carol singing is done for charity not because 'dad' won't give you any more drug money.

Thatchers' Britain.

Sleep tight,

Arden

Is this living?

2006-10-30T00:36:00.000Z

The end of another weekend finds me sitting comfortably at home watching 'Two Pints of Lager...' on the TV (have mislaid the remote) and waiting for the girlfriend to get home.

I have eaten half a quiche and some chips. I currently have about half of my pint of water left to drink.

I swear, if the doorbell goes right now I will die of the combined excitement. Sundays have always been my least favourite day of the week, since my school days. Of course, in those days we still had to get up at about half past seven (a one hour lie in... Woo hoo!) and following breakfast had a Church Parade, chapel, cross country, lunch and then an afternoon of wondering whether it was worth wandering into Dover to laugh at the local chikes or sit in the dayroom watching crap telly.

Lunch didn't even have the option of chips, just unidentifyable meat (I swear, the darkets 'Meat' actally had a petrol sheen on it) or chilli/curry (hard to tell apart) and an assortnemt of yellow vegetables. I swear the gravy was actually oxtail soup watered down.

Wasn't Sunday always the worst day for telly? Until the advent of Sky TV, the highlight of the day's viewing for us box-addicts was Highway or Bullseye, depending on the voracity and luminescence of the shell suits on the latter.

And although in this day and age I have the ability to cook a great Sunday roast, with named meat, I got back from my brothers' too late to even consider cooking my own. So another sunday flashes by without my favourite meal of the week.

On the other hand, telly has come on leaps and bounds in the last 20 years, and although at the moment I am watching random northern dross, I have the warm feeling inside which comes from knowing that with a minimum of effort I could sort this out.

So, is my glass half full or half empty?

About now it's almost entirely empty. Ain't thirst a bitch?

What on earth has happened to my eyes...

2006-10-28T16:51:00.000Z

Either the smell emanating from my rear end has melted my corneas, or my brain has swollen and put just the wrong amount of pressure on them. Either way, it's the afternoon of the morning after and I still can't see properly. Light and dark seem to be my most annoying problem, with neither of them being around in the right proportions.

I am of the optimistic opinion that a fried breakfast would do me the world of good, and hence am now off in search of a decent caff in a strange town, someting I'm not too confident about. Whenever I normally have this craving, I default to cooking it myself if I don't already know a reputable greasy spoon. I rarely trust other people's opinions, and it has been known to take many months for me to try out a new caff.

The reason for this is obvious to me, but in case you are still in the dark I will try to enlighten you: choice of Caff is a serious undertaking, made on a very personal level. What tastes fantastic to you, may be awful to me, and vice-versa. The runnyness of the egg, crisp quality of the bacon, pork or pork & beef sausages, solid or merely crunchy fried bread, all variable factors which combine and multiply to make the perfect fried breakfast an exponentially rare item.

At least in my own home I have the choice of how things should be done, and if I do not serve myself a fantastic meal, well, I only have myself to blame.

But I'm not at home, nor would it be polite to cook my own particular brand of meat-based culinary splendour in the kitchen that my brother shares with his super-vegetarian landlord. So I have to face the prospect of a new caff in my stride. I have to face my fear as a man and conquer my doubts.

I will let you know about the black pudding should I ever return.

Arden

Hooray!

2006-10-27T18:40:00.000Z

Oh my firkin God... It's - well, you can see the time of posting for yourself, I can't see the clock - and I'm pished!

Beer festivals are what Friday Night were made for - where else can you win three T-shirts on a tombola for £2 each, win your money back on the next go, and spend the entire evening talking bollocks to a load of similarly pissed arsehloes (anyone needing assistance with the last word should enlist the assistance of a countdown champion).

Hello cruel world - very nice to meet you...

Arden

A day in the life of...

2006-10-27T13:16:00.000Z

Another day comes to a close with the inevitable sigh of fifteen million exhausted office workers. I have a lot to be grateful for, in the light of what my life could have been like.

As a sales man and photographer my life is the ultimate nighmare for astrologers and other tinpot soothsayers: wildly unpredictable at best. For example, this week I have mainly been doing bugger all. Not what even I had predicted at the beginning of the week, but better than working in a call centre, I suppose.

Following the cancellaton of a job at the last minute, I am now on my way up-country to visit my brother for his birthday, something which until yesterday I didn't think would be possible. There is a beer festival in progress too, double whammy!

In addition, the Girlfriend is in Wales on a climbing expedition, so I don't have to have the otherwise obligatory drunken conversation later tonight as she will have zero phone reception. It may sound funny, but it does sometimes get in the way of drinking, especially as she doen't appreciate the noises I make when quaffing pints.

It is for this reason that I have now made the final arrangements to pack the off to a 'health retreat' for the Old Boys weekend, so when I include my own travel and hotel costs, rememberance day is now costing me around £500. Thank God someone is sharing the room with me, otherwise I would be in serious trouble with my bank manager.

Ho hum... That's what life is all about I suppose!

Cheerio,

Arden

Photobucket Online

2006-10-26T17:28:00.000Z

Just placed a new photobucket online - copy and paste this into the browser address or click on the link to the right!

http://s128.photobucket.com/albums/p200/ardenlong/

Catch you soon,

Arden

Tinge of Regret

2006-10-26T16:41:00.000Z

This snap of the skies over north london is one of my favourites of the past few years - very calm and peaceful.

I would like to be able to get out more and take more pictures like this, but it is of course dependant on free time, which is as rare as hen's teeth these days.

I will eventually upload a few albums and hyperlink to them. Hopefully you will enjoy!

Bravery in Numbers?

2006-10-25T23:50:00.000Z

My journey through my town's high street on the way to the train station this evening was accompanied with the usual awe inspiring incidents all urban travellers expect in these enlivened times.

From the baseball becapped, hoodie wearing 8 & 9 year old youths patrolling outside the cinema requesting cigarettes (unless they genuinely are homing for some homosexual company, that is) to the dog-on-a-string job/soap dodgers who appear to make up around 70% of the adult population of my fine 'manor' there is something to suit every travel writers' taste.

And providing you don't mind being asked for change, or want to use a cashpoint at any stage, I feel relatively safe. (Relatively - I have seen 'Saving Private Ryan' and war footage from Iraq, and would marginally prefer to be in England at the moment.)

Tonights entertainment came in the deightful form of a neon-bedecked Vauxhall Astra, which in line with the manufacturer's request had all of the badges removed, the better to absolve them of any responsibility for the drivers' actions.

With the bass rumbling loud enough to shake windows in Huddersfield, and packed to the rafters with aproximately 20 burbery clad 'youts', this chav-mobile toured the street from one end to the other at least three times during my short journey, in order - apparently - to allow the passenger to show off his jewellery and shout "farkin wan'ahh" at every other male in sight. Including me. I smiled politely, after all I had no idea what he was saying.

Fortunately we have thoughtfully been provided with speed bumps by our thoughtul local council, and as a result of which the 'wheelz' the mob were travelling in was require to slow to a crawl to negotiate them. (They also had to slow for strewn cigarette papers and the like, due to the 1mm clearance afforded by the tasteful and modestly applied body-kit. This, of course resulted in the car violently accellerating around 20 yards, sneezing violently and the braking viciously before the next sleeping policeman.

I have been informed that the sneeze was possibly a 'dump valve', which cheered me up no end.

The entertainment began when a simlarly clad, gold bedraggled pedestrian shouted something like 'yeahwellcummonenyoufarkincahnts', at which the Astra came to an abrupt standstill.

Amid sceams from a woman I must imaginitively call Sharon, as I don't actually know her name, sounding something like 'leevitkeveesnotfarkinwurfit', the gentleman approached the car, leaving Sharon and be-pushchaired baby defended only by her coarse and unintelligible language to engage the travellers in some form of dialogue.

The frantic scrap which ensued was notable for its hilarity as well as its brevity. The driver, having made the decision to remain within his vehicle, forced the occupants to exit via the passenger door, in order to correct the pedestrian in the noble art of fisticuffs.

I would submit that he had already read the manual, or possibly written it, and discarded it as it was not violent enough. Safe to say, when one man starts to exit from the front seat of a 2 door coupe, and another has his head from the rear passenger seat out of the door, slamming ones entire body weight onto the still opening door may be the best method of preventing pesronal injury.

A doctor may comment on a badly bruised, possibly broken lower leg and almost certain concussion. I as a layman would simply say 'Bloody hell Trev, that must have hurt!'

The driver at this point was rather stuck on the horns of a dilemma.

His passenger and at least one other compadre were obviuosly wounded, and unable to leave the vehicle, and at this point the only other point of exit for himself or the remaining 17 people was his door. To which our Bruce Lee impressionist was rapidly approaching.

The result: he floored it. Bad mistake. On reaching the speed bump 4 yards in front, he must have been approaching 20 miles per hour, and the only thing louder than the combination of bass and broken/wide exhaust was his front 'spoiler' being ripped from what would seemingly be its sellotape moorings and travelling under two pairs of wheels.

I am, honestly, the world's biggest fan of poetic justice right now, and certain to enjoy this rosy glow long after the 4 pints of best has worn off.

Night peeps,

Arden

It's about time

2006-10-25T14:47:00.000Z

Have just added my first picture to the site. It took me a while to work out how, coming as I do from the 'I'm a Man, I don't need to read the f**king Manual' school of thought. Thank the dear Lord for Blogger - they have actually made this supremely easy, so it has only taken a couple of weeks for me to get to this stage.

I will add a few more, but nothing that will give too much away. This is, after all an anonymous blog for reasons entirely my own, and therefore you won't find any pictures of me. Believe me, you should feel relieved about this.

Will write again sometime soon.

Arden

Relaxing Moods...

2006-10-25T14:38:00.000Z

A good one for you...

2006-10-25T13:20:00.000Z

I have just spent the most incredible evening reliving the most formative and exciting years of my life. Fortune, a quick search on Yahoo and a few almost discernable clicks of the mouse landed me on the website of a fellow Old Boy from my school, Neil Argue.

Despite having never met the man myself (he left the school in the mid eighties, before I even started) it would seem that we both have something invaluable in common; we share a common history divided only by years.

Now, people who didn't have the fortune (either good or bad, depending on your point of view) to attend a boarding school would probably have no idea of the impact a common background can have.

In this day and age, finding someone you can have a degree of trust in is a very unusual occurrence, and finding that they also have a (sometimes slightly twisted) sense of honour and integrity is almost impossible.

The way in which we approach people is dictated by our expectations of them. With the recent changes in our culture and the society that makes up most of our immediate contact with the outside world, you can be forgiven for thinking that we are living in some lesser hell, surrounded by the demons of our nightmares. The common Chav, lesser spotted hodded mugger, very spotted fast food 'server' (in my day a server was a piece of silverware, not a job description) and the rest of the pond-scum generation exists as a blemish on the obese arse of society, like a boil waiting to burst forth and infect another projeny.

And yet, I have an uneasy suspition that this stranger, Neil, shares some of the values I continue to hold dear; politeness; gentlemanly conduct; truth; fortitude. All of which are considered to be a laughable weakness by the aforementioned dregs, but to my mind just some of the virtues which combine to make a real Man.

So what exactly do Neil and I have in common? We had an upbringing. We both came from Military famlies, as Army Brats. We both arrived bright eyed and willing to have a man made of us at the Duke of Yorks Royal Military School, and by God that's exctly what the school did.

The strange thing is, although the DYRMS teachers coloured our lives and added a modicum of order to an otherwise chaotic existence, it was the other boys I learned from. Being younger than Neil, he became to me the sixth formers he feared in his early years. They were all huge, domineering and most definitely unforgiving, especially if you walked on the grass.

But at the same time, it was two of these burly monsters who walked/ran/dragged me from the junior science block an estimated half mile to the music centre (and the same back, for them) on my second day in the school because I was lost and scared.

I never got their names, but on the off chance that you ever escorted a tiny, bedraggled youth accross the school on this, or a similar mission, I thank and salute you.

Of course, they weren't all nice, some were positively psychopathic and others exuded an air of apathy bordering on dead, yet they stood up for their own, as we all learned to do.

The boy in your dorm you hated would become an immediate ally should you, or he, face a third party trouble from within the rest of your house. And this new enemy would be on your side in any competition with another house. Even your hated enemy in the school would be a friend in need should an outside influence threaten us.

And so, Neil, I thank you profusely for teaching the men who taught me. For never being there, because you had already trained your replacement. For being a man before, and after men. We can only hope that I maintained this standard, and that those who came after us have kept up your fine work.

for those unfamiliar, I believe Neil's site is at www.dyrms86.com - enjoy.

A Good Day to be alive...

2006-10-22T14:57:00.000Z

Hello and welcome to another beautiful day. This morning I rose before eight o'clock with my better half in order to go mushrooming with my father.

Now, this may sound like an odd thing to do. Perhaps you would think me a bit nerdy, boring or uncool.

I look at it another way. I got to spend this morning in the company of two people who are very dear to me, getting exercise in beautiful forests just outside London, in fantastic weather (well, it's not the azores but for October, eh?). All told, I am a very happy man right now.

Have returned home, I now have a joint of pork roasting in the oven for me, the little woman, my father and stepmum, and will shortl be enjoying nothing short of a culinary miracle (my roasts have become very good recently, if I do say so myself). And later, I get to go down the pub with a numberof my best friends and enjoy some proper beer courtesy of my local's beer festival.

Could it get any better? Depends entirely on whether my darling girlfriend will consent to a threesome with Christina Aguilerra tonight. I continue to hold out hope for this.

Good Night, for now.

Arden

New Links

2006-10-21T12:43:00.000Z

I have just updated the links on the Blog. Now you can access both my school's unofficial Old Boy's website, and chavscum.co.uk

Compare and contrast - perhaps this is why I hate the hooded bastards as much as I do, but this country was built for something or someone much better than them, yet they seem to have inherited it.

Is it too late to write RANT at the beginning of the title?

This isn't real;y a rant, more a statement on the condition the country is in. Perhaps as mature individuals we can do something about it. I have been willing to give it my best shot for ages now, but the government still won't legalise flamethrowers for civilian use. Why not? you can buy knives and guns for civilian use (although not legally, but you try findind a modern town where you can't buy either within a matter of hours) and yet as soon as you try to find what is - in effect - an extra large rat remover (to remove these extra large rats from our streets) even the gangsters aren't interested.

Ho hum - there will soon, i predict, be gangs of vigilante stlye Hoodie Bashers out on the streets adding to the carnage. I just hope we'll be able to provide these troops with the support they need, and which isn't coming from the government (sound familiar?). A bit like Naafi and SSAFA I suppose. We should start a group called the Rebel British Legion to help out (supplying new baseball bats etc) but would only get closed down. Let's hope someone has some ideas soon, otherwise the country I love will surely go to the rats forever.

Arden

RANT - Ain't that just Great..?

2006-10-21T12:35:00.000Z

I just thought, for the purposes of clarity, that from now on I would start each title with the word RANT if that is what it contains so that any readers can easily skim over the general bad tempered arrogance at will, rather than combing every post for a hint of reasonable thought-dumpage.

I reasonably expect nearly every post to start with this one, small word. Why? You ask incredulously. Because it would appear that at least 95% of this world is only here to piss me off, that's why.

Take this evening, for instance. After my Tesco incident (see below) I thought I had had my share of idiots for the week. Not so at all.

I don't often take the train as it brings me into perilously close contact with those members of society we would all rather avoid. The class acts who crack open their first can of spesh half an hour before leaving their bed (albeit after mid-day, so Major Lee, my first year German teacher may well have approved).

At the same time, I had made plans to meet up with my best mate just outside of london, my house is at one station and his local is at the other, so even Douglas Bader would have considered it a convenient walk.

The happy result is that tonight I spent the best part of 20 minutes in the company of a first capital connect ticket inspector who was absolutely convinved that I have nothing better to do on a Friday night than defraud his Government funded (therefore public funded and in effect my own money) company of the princely sum of £4.40. The evidence for this, he assured me on many occasions, was my lack of ticket (correct me if I'm wrong, but evidence is something that has to be there, not missing).

I have my reasons for not possessing a ticket, the most pressing of which was the abject failure of the antiquated machine in my departure station to accept what appeared to me to be a perfectly acceptable £10 note.

Now, a few years ago there used to be, on every station, a small red machine at which you could purchase what British Rail called a "permit to travel", and what we would call a "student ticket". The idea was that if you had one of these, and were stopped by a ticket inspector, you handed it over and he would give you the correct ticket. BR expected customers to insert as near to the ticket price as possible, but as students we knew that as long as you had one of these permits, the inspector could not issue a penalty fare. As the late night trains from campus to home were rarely patrolled, we could usually travel the 6 miles home for 5p.

Unfortunately, in their infinite wisdom, the powers that be decided that this was not in the interest of the company to allow genuine customers who wish to pay their prices to do so, instead they would remove these lovely little student ticket outlets, and fine the paying public £20 on top of their ticket price as a penalty for not having the exact £10 that the machine wants, down to the serial number.

Now, the fact that I left the train at my destination and fairly hurried to his position, asking for a return ticket (with a please as well) should have given the game away. I had not expected, nor can I yet understand what happened next.

Having asked for a ticket, I was asked why I hadn't bought one at my starting point. I explained my problem with the machine, and expectd this to be it. He then told me that there is no problem with the machine, and it is working fine. I agreed, the machine had indeed acknowleged the buttons had indeed worked and the machine had even asked me for the money, but wouldn't accept my tenner.

"In that case, I'm going to have to issue a penalty notice" the idiot informed me. In case he was hard of hearing, or a little slow, I repeated myself. It would appear, therefore, that this particular cretin was more than a little slow... Maybe he was even in reverse.

And this is where the paradox came into play: I was willing to pay, but only had a tenner to pay for a £4.40 return journey. The inspector refused to give me a return ticket, insisting I had to pay full single fare (£3.80) plus £20 penalty, plus another full single if I want to return home.

I tried to explain the situation again, but at this point it dawned on me that nothing was going to get through to this chap.

It also became obvious that this particular cretin was the only inspector present at this station, and with the exception of a cleaner on platform 3 (shock, horror!) was probably the only staff member full stop. So I decided to leave. The inspector tried to stop me. But, being unable by law to physically restrain me, this was fairly pointless. In effect, he was telling me that I had to pay a penalty of £20, but he had no way to stop me walking off. Ironic, eh? And in addition, by the time I go home there will be no ticket inspectors at either station or on the train, as it is too dangerous to employ staff on the trains at night, so I'm not going to buy another ticket then either.

The pub beckoned

And my final thought?

In this day and age the extra £4.40 in my pocket was not enough to by two pints in the pub when I eventually got there. Thatchers britain is staring to have a rosy tint in my rear view specs.

DYRMS OBA Rememberance Reunion

2006-10-18T19:07:00.000Z

Yay! My plans to go to Old Boys this year are working... I have only to pay for the other half to spend an excruciatingly exensive time in a five star retreat to be able to go.

See you there, if you are going. Of course, you have no idea who I am but what the hell...

Arden

Ye Gods - Spam already...

2006-10-18T18:16:00.000Z

I only started this Blog yesterday, and already I have received my first spam comment. Damn, I didn't expect it to be that quick. I wonder how these people expect to get a response from anyone - most sensible bloggers have enough PC knowledge to know that the sort of message this particular tw*t posted is not worth the time it took to set up the computer program...

Ho hum...

Was very nearly arrested at Tesco about half an hour ago. Stopped on my way home to get the usual - loaf of bread, milk, scowl from adolescent bitch on till etc, and on my way into the store my bag set off the alarm. Nice chap asked me what was in the bag, I told him it was the usual, asked if he wanted to have a look in the bag and he gently declined. All good so far.

I looked for the stuff I needed, paid, got my scowl and made for the exit. On leaving, the alarms again went off. It was, to be fair, expected. I showed the gentleman the contents of my shopping bags, told him about the alarm on entering the store and expected that to be it.

Not so. The guard refused to contact his colleague on the entrance gates, and insisted on searching my bag. Not that I'm an unreasonable man, but I would like to be asked politely before someone rummages through my personals. Instead, the man started grabbing at things within my bag. I took each item off him, waved it in front of the security rails proving it not to be stolen, and finally came to my deodourant. Sorry to put you off your dinner, but after a long day at work, I'm not always the most pleasantly fragrant fellow on the bus, if you get my drift. He asked me where the deodourant came from. I told him it was from my bag, but had been brought from Tesco.

He confirmed that it was from Tesco - a tad unnecessary, I thought.

He asked for a receipt. It was at this point that I pointed out that I had brought it about three weeks ago, and didn't have the receipt. The fact that the can was obviously half empty didn't even tickly this idiot's logic circuit, and at this point I wasn't eny more amused. I pointed out that the can was obviously used, at which he accused me of using it before failing to make a pucrhase.

Now, on one shoulder I have the ghost of the devil, telling me to continue to wind this idiot up.

On the other, kicking the angel off his perch, is my little barack-room lawyer.

I asked if he had been following me through the store. He replied no.

I asked if he had been asked to stop me by in store security. He said no.

I asked if he had been instructed to do so by someone watching on CCTV. He said no.

I asked if I was outside the store. He said Yes (it was by about 1 metre, but still...)

I then told him that if he had no proof that I had taken the can without paying, then it didn't matter whether I had stolen it or not. The onus is on him to prove that the item was stolen, not on me to prove I had bought it legally. To back this up, I asked him to show me the receipt for his shoes, when he couldn't I accused him of lifting from Clarks (should have sed Matalan, but wasn't quite quick enough) unless he could prove otherwise.

It was at this point that the 'entry' guard was summoned by Mr Quick, and duly appeared from the checkout area. As soon as he came into view, he was gesturing to the moron to let me go, and I think even the staff in the Petrol Station heard this one. I turned to leave, taking my deodourant from his hand as I did so.

I felt quite pleased with myself, until I realised that this is exactly the sort of stuff these little chav Bas*ards do every day. They know the law better than I do (sometimed better than Clive Anderson does...) and get away with nicking all sorts of stuff simply because they have the balls to try and get away with it.

Should I be pleased with myself? Is this the right way to behave? I stole NOTHING, yet was accused of exactly that, even though the man had no rights to stop me. I could have had three whole chicken in my bag, and it wouldn't make any difference.

Sometimes I feel I am surrounded on all sides by idiots and reprobates, whose only cause of existence is to make my life hell. Someone pass me the chlorine - I'm off to the gene pool...

Early Beginnings...

2006-10-17T14:25:00.000Z

Does anyone else look back at their school days and with they could have done things differently? I don't mean the studying, or putting the extra effort in that my father screamed at me to do every time a school report arrived. I'll explain:

Every year (I can assure you, it felt like every term) I would be handed my school report by my (very) trusting teacher and told to take it home to my parents. Schools in those days didn't have to send out reports by post, which is indicative of those pleasant days when small children could be trusted to do what they were told.

My father would then scour the white bundle of foolscap looking for anywhere I was wanting. He was not a cruel man, and still isn't, but he was keen to instill a sense of discipline, and as a result didn't even glance at the 'Attainment' side of the mark, but only the 'effort' score. Now, with hindsight, his admonishments were well founded, but based on what logic? As an Army man, perhaps he was trying to get me to assault the machine-gun nest single handedly, the 'effort' rather than call in the air-support (the achievents attained here by the use of Inteligence, we can only hope).

This tirade of fatherly abuse was regular, even if by the age of about 9 I was only interested in what i had 'got' and not how much effort it had taken. Bearing in mind I was an A grade student in nearly every subject at this age, I resented being bo**ocked out for an E in effort for Maths when I had waltzed through the coursework with an A+.

He should have been more concerned about the double A in Art, for this was to be my shining moment, and also the reason why my primary school started to send reports home by mail rather than in the grubby hands of the pupils.

My girlfriend at the time was also, as you could expect, 9 years old and therefore very suggestible. Her father was the headmaster. A plan weaved it's way into the darker corners of my tiny mind: I would get her to steal a blank report paper for me. She did. I was persuasive, even then (although these days being persuasive with 9 year old girls is probably not the right way to go).

On the day the report papers were handed out, in their sealed brown envelopes, I already had a substitute paper, just waiting to be written on. This is where the artwork came in - the forgery. Pretending to have left the report in school, I sat up late into the night changing my grades and tweaking the comments made by my teacher to more closely resemble what I thought they should have said. Fortunately I only had one teacher, and as I had a steady hand, and my parents had no handwriting to compare with, I produced a passable report. I took this to school with me, had the balls to ask the secretary for another brown envelope (they all has OHMS printed on the front, so I couldn't use one from home!) and gave my new report, complete with forged signatures to my waiting parents.

I got presents, and a small cake.

The next year, my report was glowing, to say the least, once I had finished making the 'adjustments' to the teachers handiwork. My parents were enthralled with the 10 A's, 3 B's and one C (I marked myself down for German, otherwise they were going to try to send me to a summer school for 'excelling students').

I got presents, including a Bike. I had outgrown cake.

The following year was my last one in primary school, and I decided to go out with a bang. I had A's or A+ for every subject, according to my erroneous longhand, and my effort was to be seen to be believed.

This was where I went wrong. You see, although I was an A grade student, all the prizes the school gave out were for effort and improvement, and very hard to win if you were at the top of your game already. As a result, I was nowhere to be seen when the list of prizewinners was sent out.

My father was much agrieved. How could his son have improved so much over the last three years and have put in all of this gargantuan efforet, and yet not win a single prize?

I had no explanation for this.

He wrote to the headmaster and asked what was going on.

I did not get any presents that year. The school started to send reports out by post.

I wish I could have maintained the high levels of that heady, bike earning work without going over the top too soon. Who knows, maybe I would have got that Commodore 64 three years earlier...

Blogging on - at last

2006-10-17T14:03:00.000Z

Thank God.
At last I have a new Blog lined up. After the last one I thought I should have a little while away from the screaming hoardes, intent on stealing if not my soul then at very least my thunder.

I'm still here, and hope to carry on for at least a little while!

For those of you who have simply stumbled accross this little rantblog, I owe you an introduction. For those who have managed to track me down, the little red/black cross in the top right-hand corner of your screen will allow you to access all the historical information about me that you could want.

What am I going to be doing here?
The same as always. Ranting about those little things that have pi**ed me off so much, if I didn't get them down here I would have to go out chav-baiting again, and what with the increasing (again) cost of petrol it could quite put me out of pocket.

It's all about ME
Well, that's what a Blog is all about, surely? OK, seriously then, I am a thirty-something ex-public-schoolboy with all of the problems you would associate with other men of the same background. I am an assertive, arrogant tw*t who is ashamed of his homophobia and afraid of his mother. I am also not stupid enough to put my real name on a Blog like this.

If you thought I was really called Arden Long then you MUST be American, and therefore as a responsible adult must ask you to leave this website immediately. I don't wish to appear rude, and I genuinely love America (the beautiful country) and respect (some of) the people who live there, but as a race Americans are very suggestible, and I can't be held responsible for you should you decide to follow any of my advice and kill 'innocent' chavs, gangs or small countries. After all, look what happened when the 'president' suggested there were weopons of mass destruction in Iraq.

All you need to know about me
I consider myself to be a nice guy. I hate arrogance (except in myself), Chavs (see wikipedia if you need help with this one), most politicians and anyone who touches my car without permission.

FYI - the politicians I don't mind are Boris Johnson (who could hate a face like that!) and John Prescott, because not one, single Labour Party Political Broadcast has EVER managed to make the Labour party look as bad as he has. May his work continue forever.

Like all right thinking men who are willing to work for a living and pay my own way, I am fairly right wing. This means that the arguments on this Blog will probably be fun. At least for me.

On with the show...