Tag Archives: internet shopping

Day 9

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I’m writing this in the early hours of Day 10. I sat at the computer with several hours of Day 9 remaining and started writing other things.

This is how useless my brain has become. I’ve mislaid a camera, failed to read anything except the internet, and have not written any poetry, despite a number of looming deadlines. On the other hand, I have cooked, snoozed, frittered and researched an article about the recipients of some London School Attendance Medals. Whether this is a good use of my time, I’m not sure. Writing and relaxation are good, but focus is what gets things done.

When I’m eating my ham sandwiches tomorrow (gammon, redcurrant jelly, stuffing, mayonnaise and seeded brown bread), I will probably think that the time spent making them was worth the effort. Same goes for the research. However, when I see another deadline sliding by I may wonder if I should have used my time differently.

This weekend I finally bought a new card for my camera. I tend to use them for storage, rather than clogging up the computer with images, but I’m nearly out of space and keep having to delete things to make more room on the card I use for work.

I’ve also invested in a case to keep them all safe and tidy. It’s taken me about three years to get round to doing that. Fortunately, as I’ve waited, the choice has increased and the price has stayed much the same. It has worked out well.

In a hundred years time when my descendants, if any, look at this to get an idea of what great-grandfather’s life was like, this isn’t going to be one of the more memorable days.

Tootlepedal is building up an impressive cycling mileage, Charlie is writing another book, as is Laurie, Derrick is writing his memoires and giving us daily photographs of the New Forest, and I am spending three years over a decision to buy a plastic box.

LA is asking big questions, Helen is altering her garden, Lavinia is feeding cats and making music, and I am showing far too much enthusiasm for sandwiches.

The photo is from 5 years ago – January 2017. Those were the days when we used to go out, and when we didn’t live in fear of a stranger coughing near us. It’s probably time to start adjusting my way of thinking, though it is a lot cheaper staying at home and eating home made soup.

 

The Blotted Copybook

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Oh dear.

I watched TV, I ate the curry that Julia had made. I watched The Great British Sewing Bee. Then, having listed the jobs I needed to do, I fell asleep. When I awoke it was too late to finish the shopping and when it arrives there will be no bread. More annoyingly, because I have failed to make it to the minimum order level, I will have to pay a £4 surcharge.

The moral is clear – order earlier. The secondary moral is that it doesn’t matter. We can buy bread seperately and £4 isn’t enough to worry about, It’s annoying but it won’t break me.

It wasn’t the only blot on my copybook, I failed to post a second time, as I intended. Then, having dragged myself from my sleep at 1 am I proceeded to make sandwiches and after that,  foolishly, sat down for a few minutes at the computer. Over an hour passed. I am closer to completing some submissions (everything seems to be dragging at the moment) but I am also late to bed, which will mean more sleep-based problems tomorrow.

Dream sequence of a clock, hands turning quickly…

Fourteen hours later. I am in trouble for passing the boss a phone call which I could have handled.

Stephen Hawking 50p

“I’ve already had a dozen like it,” I said, “and if I hadn’t passed it over to you I’d have ben rude to him.”

“I was rude to him.”

“Yes,” I said, “but I’m paid to be polite and I have reached breaking point.”

I then had another dozen, but that one pass saved my manners and the day passed off without incident. It was close though. I don’t know why people think a coin from the 1980s is of any value, or why a 50p that you can pull out of your change would be worth £6,000.  If you could pull a £6,000 coin out of your change, do they think I’d be sitting in the windowless middle room of a shop answering their calls.

I don’t mind the enquiries, it’s sensible for people to ring up after seeing yet another outrageously inaccurate story in the press. It’s the ones that clearly don’t believe me that get on my nerves. I once offered a woman a selection of coins for £2.50 each. She didn’t buy them. But she did want me to buy hers for £3,000, and left the shop chuntering about me knowing nothing.

Again, did she think I’d be standing there serving her if I could buy five coins for £12.50 and turn them into £15,000.  If I could make that sort of money every day I’d stay at home and employ a butler to go down to the shop and insult customers.

1973 50p

Sunday Morning

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It’s mid-day on Sunday and, as usual, or morning has not been marked by a frantic rush. We had porridge with blackberries as a healthy breakfast. It would have been porridge with blueberries but I seem to have hit the wrong button whilst shopping. That may be a good thing, but it might be a bad thing. To some people it may even be a matter of indifference, though to my mind there’s something wrong with people who keep calm in the face of provocation by their internet shopping. I suppose it’s a test of personality.

When your shopping goes wrong do you

(a) curse the evils of modern technology?

(b) welcome the opportunity for new experiences?

(c) blame the Government?

I usually go with (a). None of the new experiences I’ve had from internet shopping – frozen spinach, plastic cheese, sour blackberries – have actually enhanced my life.

There’s no point blaming the Government, or any Government, because with rare exceptions they aren’t really in charge of what is happening. They just talk about how bad the last lot were and shove their snouts deeper into the trough.

I just went off on a 200 word tangent about politicians. It’s clearly going to be one of those posts where much is written but not so much is posted.

I can’t help wondering if this makes it a stronger post and thinking of an article I once read about composing haibun.

It recommended editing until you managed to remove the subject of the haibun, leaving the reader with a feeling about the unspoken subject – the ultimate ‘show don’t tell’ technique. At least I think that was what it said. And I think it was about haibun. I really ought to make notes.

It’s a bit bit like homeopathic medicine where you dilute the cure so much it is no longer there. I’m on surer ground there because that was on Wikipedia.

There’s a big gap on Wikipedia when it comes to discussion on composing haibun. This is ironic when you consider a gap was what I was researching.

close up of eyeglasses on book

Photo by ugurlu photographer on Pexels.com

For details of the afternoon, check here.

Wednesday Again

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Today I got up late, as I don’t see any point in having a day off and flinging myself out of bed at dawn, or any time approximating to dawn. The benefit of having two days off together (as I did this week due to a rearrangement of our days in the shop) is that you can work into the early hours of the morning, pretending to be creative. I say ‘pretending’ because I’m not sure I do my best work when I’m half asleep.

I read for the first hour of waking, then went downstairs.

I had written four haibun last night and, after replying to comments on the blog and reading a few other blogs I got down to work.

All four needed considerable tightening up, and that’s what they got.

Then, at 12.00 I decided to have lunch, as I hadn’t actually had breakfast. Sourdough toast, tinned plum tomatoes, fried mushrooms and scrambled eggs, in case a future reader is interested. It’s not exciting or healthy, but it’s what we had in the fridge. A bit like my writing, which is what happens to be kicking around in my head when I sit at the keyboard.

That turned into a short spell of watching TV and a rather longer one of napping. I don’t know why I needed a nap, perhaps because I could.That led on to doing the washing up and doing a bit more writing. After that there was more TV, a discussion of shopping lists, a meal of stir-fried vegetables, the on-line shopping order and this blog post. Actually there was a previous blog post but it developed in a way I couldn’t be bothered to complete, so it is now resting in drafts.

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Light and Shade

TESCO have increased the delivery charge – I am now paying them £4.50 to pick and deliver my groceries, where it used to cost £3. That’s £75 a year, though if I had to drive to the shop every week I suppose it would cost me about that in car running costs and time.

That’s it for now. The post is drawing to a natural close, midnight is approaching and I need to do my sandwiches for tomorrow.

It’s tempting to ramble on a bit to try for 500 words, but I’m going to stop now. Three hundred and eighty nine will have to do. (If I’d written 389, it would only have been 385 and I wouldn’t have been able to add this sentence and top it up to 412). I just noticed, on  adding a title to the second photo, that the word count went up. Strange…

 

Dancing in the Rain

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“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass…It’s about learning to dance in the rain.”
― Vivian Greene

We’ve had rain today, and plenty of it. Compared to yesterday, which was like a misplaced June day, we have had November come early.

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I’ve churned out more paperwork, sent out more newsletters, pressed a small amount of juice as a demonstration (though the washing up afterwards was still full scale), added some apple pictures to our new webpage (I live on the edge, don’t I?) and arranged a refund from ASDA. I’ve also developed a hatred of internet shopping. Actually, that’s not true; I’ve reinforced my hatred of internet shopping.

Two weeks ago I ordered some air fresheners with the cafe shopping. I didn’t want them but some other centre-users appear to have more sensitive noses than I do. At no time did the internet site inform me that they came without refills. Last week I ten had to order refills – they fit all Air Wick fresheners according to the internet. All except mine…

Anyway, because I’d left it four days I couldn’t do it via the web and had to ring them. I spent 13 minutes waiting to be connected to someone who couldn’t hear me because we had a poor connection. The customer service desk at ASDA Newark failed to live up to its name when nobody picked up the phone. Finally I got someone at my third attempt. They proved to be efficient but overly friendly. I know it seems harsh, but I can do without it.

Group dynamics have been interesting today, with a new member of the group joining us from a local school. He doesn’t have learning difficulties, more family issues< and although he like the farm, having been here before, he was finding the group a bit wearing, particularly as he wants to get on and get some work done. The others mostly accepted him, but one of them didn’t like someone else being the centre of attention. Cue tears.

That’s how it goes. Most of the progress we make is by taking people out of their comfort zone and this is one way to do it.

At least it diverted attention from last week’s big news – that Social Services expects four of the others to share a taxi. When the original two were joined by a third last year they didn’t like it. Now that they’ve been joined by a fourth, they are all complaining about him. Well, they were last week. This week they were distracted by someone new.

So we’ve all had to adjust, as I’ve had to admit that internet shopping is here to stay, and it does beat going out after work to shop. I’m sure I can get used to it, and if it isn’t quite as romantic as dancing in the rain, I can still adapt to modern ways at my age.