I seem to have been running to keep up today!
Firstly, yesterday I had problems with sending Nugget 326 out as an attachment to an email. Some people got the email and the attachment, some people got the email but no attachment, and a few received neither. In the end, I decided to resend the whole thing after removing the password on the PDF. This seemed to solve the problem ... and then someone noticed that there was an error in Nugget that needs to be changed! I’ll be doing that later ... but I won’t be sending the corrected copy out as an attachment.
Secondly, my wife’s car tracker decided to send a warning to the company who installed it, and they contacted us to ask if the car had been stolen. The car was safe on outside our house ... but the tracker had been triggered because the car’s 12v battery was flat. I had to start the car using a newly purchased jump start power pack, and then drive it for at least thirty minutes in order to charge the battery. Sue decided that if we had to do that, we might as well go shopping in Dartford ... which led to my third ‘problem’ of the day.
Parking in Dartford was easy, but with the exception of one ticket machine, there was nowhere to pay. I eventually managed to buy a ticket ... and then we discovered that we could not walk through the shopping centre as usual, but had to walk around the outside to get where we wanted to be. From then on, I seemed to spend a lot of time in queues. I queued outside WHSmith so that I could join the queue inside for the Post Office. We then had to queue outside Poundland ... and then outside Sainsburys. At the latter, we got to the front of the queue to discover that only one person per household was allowed in!
Sue elected to go in to do the shopping, and I waited outside, keeping at least 2m from anyone else. What I found annoying was that the ‘one person per household’ rule only applied to adults. Single adults could take in as many children as they liked ... and they did. Some of the ‘children’ were definitely teenagers who would - in other circumstances - have been identified as adults.
This led to a confrontation at the doors to the supermarket between a man and the security staff. The man was accompanied by a ‘child’ who looked at least eighteen years old, and when the staff tried to stop them going in together, the man became abusive. He was very aggressive, and shouted that the ‘child’ was vulnerable, and could not be left on her own. (To me, she looked vulnerable in the same way a Tiger I tank looks vulnerable to an infantryman who is solely armed with a rifle and hand grenade.) The security staff allowed them in ... and then the ‘vulnerable’ child made a racist comment as she walked past them. (One of the security staff was Asian.) It was just at this point that Sue came out with our shopping, and we missed the end of the confrontation, although judging by what was being said, the police had been called to remove the man and ‘child’.
We finally got home at 2.00pm, having been out for almost three hours. By the time we had eaten lunch, most of the afternoon seemed to have gone, and we spent a couple of hours trying to recuperate.
One thing good did happen. Just before 6.00pm a courier delivered a parcel from Airfix/Humbrol. I had ordered some paint online from them last week, and it took less than a week (including the Bank Holiday weekend) to deliver my order. Great service ... and it means that I can now start work on renovating my collection of 20mm Russian vehicles and artillery.
Firstly, yesterday I had problems with sending Nugget 326 out as an attachment to an email. Some people got the email and the attachment, some people got the email but no attachment, and a few received neither. In the end, I decided to resend the whole thing after removing the password on the PDF. This seemed to solve the problem ... and then someone noticed that there was an error in Nugget that needs to be changed! I’ll be doing that later ... but I won’t be sending the corrected copy out as an attachment.
Secondly, my wife’s car tracker decided to send a warning to the company who installed it, and they contacted us to ask if the car had been stolen. The car was safe on outside our house ... but the tracker had been triggered because the car’s 12v battery was flat. I had to start the car using a newly purchased jump start power pack, and then drive it for at least thirty minutes in order to charge the battery. Sue decided that if we had to do that, we might as well go shopping in Dartford ... which led to my third ‘problem’ of the day.
Parking in Dartford was easy, but with the exception of one ticket machine, there was nowhere to pay. I eventually managed to buy a ticket ... and then we discovered that we could not walk through the shopping centre as usual, but had to walk around the outside to get where we wanted to be. From then on, I seemed to spend a lot of time in queues. I queued outside WHSmith so that I could join the queue inside for the Post Office. We then had to queue outside Poundland ... and then outside Sainsburys. At the latter, we got to the front of the queue to discover that only one person per household was allowed in!
Sue elected to go in to do the shopping, and I waited outside, keeping at least 2m from anyone else. What I found annoying was that the ‘one person per household’ rule only applied to adults. Single adults could take in as many children as they liked ... and they did. Some of the ‘children’ were definitely teenagers who would - in other circumstances - have been identified as adults.
This led to a confrontation at the doors to the supermarket between a man and the security staff. The man was accompanied by a ‘child’ who looked at least eighteen years old, and when the staff tried to stop them going in together, the man became abusive. He was very aggressive, and shouted that the ‘child’ was vulnerable, and could not be left on her own. (To me, she looked vulnerable in the same way a Tiger I tank looks vulnerable to an infantryman who is solely armed with a rifle and hand grenade.) The security staff allowed them in ... and then the ‘vulnerable’ child made a racist comment as she walked past them. (One of the security staff was Asian.) It was just at this point that Sue came out with our shopping, and we missed the end of the confrontation, although judging by what was being said, the police had been called to remove the man and ‘child’.
We finally got home at 2.00pm, having been out for almost three hours. By the time we had eaten lunch, most of the afternoon seemed to have gone, and we spent a couple of hours trying to recuperate.
One thing good did happen. Just before 6.00pm a courier delivered a parcel from Airfix/Humbrol. I had ordered some paint online from them last week, and it took less than a week (including the Bank Holiday weekend) to deliver my order. Great service ... and it means that I can now start work on renovating my collection of 20mm Russian vehicles and artillery.
Bob,
ReplyDeleteThe same happened to me last week. Not a call from a car tracker company but a battery so flat that I had to actually put the key in the lock and turn it to open the door. I plugged in my wife's charger and four hours later it was still charging (not surprising as my wife's charger only delivers 4 amps and the battery is probably 50 amp hours). I then did what the AA once told me to do, turned on the engine, locked the car with the spare key and left it to run on the front drive for two or three hours. I find it difficult to believe that this is as effective as bombing down the motorway but it saved going out anywhere...
Maybe I should get one of these jump start power packs? We have jump leads but no second car to jump from at the moment. Anyway, things being as they are, the second car would probably also have a flat battery. I was tempted to leave the car inoperable until the lock-down ends but if an emergency arises I prefer to have the choice of using the car rather than waiting for an ambulance.
Your description of your shopping trip left me very happy that we are getting our groceries on line from Sainsbury's. They emailed me a month or so ago to say that they had identified me as an "at risk" customer and that I was part of a priority group. Now that the initial teething problems are over it's working well, but it is a bit fraught when you want to place an order and know that available slots will be posted at some random time and you need to notice them on your PC before the vanish.
Mike Hall,
DeleteThe jump starter power pack cost me £80 from Amazon. It takes about four hours to charge using a USB lead, and can be used up to twenty times to start a car between charges. I chose one that would start a car with up to a 6 litre engine, and in this case my wife’s car (a Lexus 450GSH) started first time.
The power pack comes with a fitted emergency light, and can be used to charge other devices. It is also about the size and weight of a house brick, which makes it easy to store.
Although I am 70, no one seems to think that I am ‘at risk’, so other than being given priority to get into supermarkets at certain times, I am just bumbling along like everyone else. Because we’ve never had home grocery deliveries (other than having our milk delivered), the major supermarkets haven’t given us priority for home deliveries ... hence our regular trips to the shops.
Keep safe and keep well,
Bob
Thanks for the report on the jump starter pack (it sounded a bit odd to have it charging via USB but I guess that it's a reasonable way to go when one thinks it through). I'll really have to get one - the only problem being that a quick look on Amazon suggests that I will suffer from choice overload.
DeleteI once had a Sainsbury's delivery for something I could not find in any of the local supermarkets and having done so seems to have stood me in good stead. Though how they knew my age ...? We still have a milkman and this has also proved a distinct advantage in the current troubles, especially as he also delivers our eggs and orange juice.
Mike Hall,
DeleteI bought the NOCO Boost Plus GB40 (https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B015TKUPIC/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1). I trawled around several consumer sites, and this model seemed to come out well in independent trials.
It does seem that the supermarkets are restricting the number of new home delivery customers that they are taking on. If you have a loyalty card (e.g. a Nectar Card) it will have your age recorded somewhere on the company’s database.
The good old milkman has been a godsend, and we have benefited from having regular doorstep deliveries. We’ve even bought items that we’d normally have bought from a supermarket because the milkman’s reliability has been so good.
All the best,
Bob
Had a similar day yesterday myself. Fortunately without the unpleasantness at the supermarket. ‘She looked vulnerable in the same way a Tiger’ made me smile though 😊
ReplyDeleteMust go and turn my car engine over!
Nundanket,
DeleteI’m glad that I made you smile. I only wish that I could have been there when the police arrived to deal with the man and ‘tank girl’.
All the best,
Bob
I wonder what Tank Girl and papa thought of the old guy with paint stained fingers frowning at them? Strange days.
ReplyDeleteGlad to hear the paints came through. Where I am we rely on postal service and it's taking weeks longer than usual for delivery, even for 'express'.
Adelaide Gamer,
DeleteI think that Tank Girl and the man were actually an item rather than father and daughter as their ages were not that dissimilar. As to the old guy with the paint stained fingers ... well he was resisting the desire to go and assist the security men. Old habits die hard!
The post and courier services in the UK are slower than normal, but after an initial delivery desert, things are beginning to shake down into something a bit more predictable.
Keep safe and keep well,
Bob
An interesting day indeed Bob. If I were you I would take advantage of the time slot for ladies and gentlemen of a certain age! Not too bad here in Rochester, my wife goes early once a week and does a full shop. It's funny how quickly we are all getting used to this, but there are the few who just seem unable to grasp the rules.
ReplyDeleteMy Son in law lost his job on the drays (Shepeard and Neame) 4 weeks ago when the pubs were ordered to close, but immediately got himself a job with Tesco's as a home delivery driver, at least until the pubs reopen. He was saying that an estimated 5 million gallons of beer will be lost, going stale in the barrels and that when he gets back to work all of those full barrels will need lifting from the cellars back to street level, no easy job.
Take care Bob, stay safe.
'Lee,
DeleteWe usually do go to the shops during 'oldies hour', but the need to drive the car to recharge the battery required a reason for us to make a journey, and I had lots of stuff waiting to be posted, so we made a decision to kill several birds with one stone.
Its good news about your son-in-law. Lots of supermarkets seem to be taking on temporary workers to fill the gaps that have opened up, and this will certainly help some families cope with the lockdown. As to the beer ... well, as a former beer drinker, that is a terrible waste. All one can hope is that it will not just be tipped away but used for something useful.
Keep safe and keep well,
Bob
Glad to see other people using Humbrol/Airfix paints!
ReplyDeleteSimon
Simon,
DeleteI use them and cheap acrylic paints from THE WORKS.
I used to use Games Workshop/Citadel paint until they closed their local branch. I then moved over to Airfix/Humbrol paints, which I could buy in branches of Hobbycraft. This is the first time that I’ve bought paint directly from Airfix/Humbrol ... and I’d certainly do it again,
All the best,
Bob
From today's Telegraph -
ReplyDelete"The company famed for its Airfix models and train sets is enjoying rising demand, with “customers buying at rates they are more likely to buy at Christmas”, according to chief executive Lyndon Davies.
“They are going for models as such as Spitfires and Messerschermitt 109s, Harriers and Vulcans,” he added. “Sales of our Humbrol paints are going bananas because people have the time to paint the models.”
The top-selling train set is the £200 “Hornby Hamper” which contains trains, track, power systems, model buildings and people, as well as kit to build landscapes and greenery.
Hornby, which is slowly recovering under new management after years of losses, is benefiting from people “thinking of happier times”, Mr Davies said.
He added: “I am not surprised. In the 2008 crash in another business I kept investing because I was told people would turn inward and seeking things that made them comfortable.”
Hornby’s manufacturing is mainly in China, along with India and Vietnam. Mr Davies said inventory was increased at the start of the year to deal with the Chinese New Year shutdowns. As this was prior to the outbreak causing lockdowns there, Hornby has being relatively unaffected by supply problems.
Regular contact with operations China - along with hard-hit Italy - also meant Hornby was “ahead of the curve” in understanding the likely impact of the disease.
Hornby has about 130 UK staff, 25 of whom have been furloughed, mostly in public-facing roles, though some are being brought back to work in distribution to help fulfil orders. "
Nigel Drury,
DeleteI’m not surprised that people (mostly men) are rediscovering the joys of modelling.
As Airfix//Humbrol is based in the UK - even if their production isn’t - they are well placed to meet the sudden rise in demand ... and most of what they seem to be selling tends to be higher-priced items. The ‘Hornby Hamper’ sounds like an excellent idea, and should give purchasers lots of happy hours for a reasonable amount of money.
All the best,
Bob
I remember when I used to swear by the little pots of Humbrol enamels. If you put the lid back on firmly and gave them a good stir when necessary they could last for years (decades in one or two cases). My guess though is that you are buying the acrylics?
DeleteMike Hall,
DeleteI’ve found that as long as the top of the paint pot is properly sealed after it has been used, the paint seems to ‘keep’ quite well. With acrylics, I’ve found that dripping some clean water onto the top surface of the paint before the top is screwed down helps ensure that the paint will not usually dry out before it is used again.
All the best,
Bob
Some days are like that.
ReplyDeleteMy wife's fancy car goes through batteries, all those on board computers plus an electronic anti-rust system. We use my little car as a booster pack. 6 yr old battery still goes strong.
Ross Mac,
DeleteI seem to have more days like this as I get older.
Modern cars are so much more reliant on electronic devices than they were even just a few years ago ... and checking that your battery is fully charged is something that you have to do regularly.
My first car - an Austin A40 Farina - required basic tools to keep going, and could be push started if the battery was flat. Now, if anything goes wrong, I look under the bonnet ... then close it again and call the mechanic,
All the best,
Bob