The Clan of the Cave Bague

The engineer came on Thursday and the washing machine is now in working order. Im not sure if I should write to Watchdog or lodge a complaint to Comet After Sales Service themselves or to just leave it alone.

I think it is absolutely disgusting for us to have to rely on friends/neighbours and to have to use laundry services in the interim period because of the, lets be honest, inadequacy of after sales care of comet.

-Debbie

The simple fact is, I started a nice new shiny job on the 12th of January. I now work for the esteemed Navyblue Design as Senior Systems Architect. It has been, to put it bluntly, an education. Very very busy, very creative. I seem to be surrounded by people with real vision, and as a result I’m feeling a little inadequate Still, I am at least able to bring my own brand of geekery to the procedings and it’s all going well.

There are downsides though – no time to play videogames except at the weekend. Still, when we have the rest of our team built, that situation will rapidly improve. It’s proving to be quite a shock to the system, going back into a busy responsible job after my five month hiatus, but I’m enjoying the challenge.

Oh! And I have a nice shiny mac on my desktop

It has been 26 days since we phoned Comet After Sales service about our washing machine. After promising us that we would have a working machine on Monday then they have let us down. They have booked an engineer on Thursday (provisionally – they still have to confirm that) and if there is a engineer available before then due to a cancellation they will “Fit us in”.

Obviously, we are not pleased.

- Debbie.

The first week of John’s new job is over now and he is very tired but says he has enjoyed it a great deal. Its been really strange but nice as Ive had some time with Harmony and a couple of hours on my own in the house. The walks up and down the road have been refreshing. I think that the organisation of three kids before 8am has gone well as they havent been late once this week.

Some lovely clothes arrived the other day for me (from cloud-9-experience-co.uk) and we have picked up a new set of school uniform for the boys (the uniform they have been wearing is showing signs of wear and they still smell a bit smoky).

The washing machine saga continues – apparently if the parts are in then it will be fixed Monday or replaced the same day.

We have relied mainly on friends to keep up with the huge volume of washing that three kids make possible. Looking forward to catching up with it and managing to keep it at a sane level.

I have just ordered a book for the children from amazon called Fire Diary which looks interesting – Ill give it a read first and see if it will help them work through stuff with us.

Well, I best go and get some housework done.

- Debbie.

Isn’t Sky Digital great? Isn’t it though. It’s such a good idea! In the days of terrestrial only TV, things were pretty clear cut. You paid the license fee and you got BBC1 and 2, both funded by the license, which showed no advertisements whatsoever, and you also had ITV and Channel 4 which showed adverts every 15 minutes or so.

But not with Sky – oh no. First of all, you pay to view it. Then they advertise fuck out of you every 8 bloody minutes. Not only that, but they CRANK the volume of the adverts so you have to leap out of your chair and fumble for the remote to turn it down. What’s more, they have pay-per-view events where you have to pay a premium and they STILL advertise at you! It’s sickening. So, basically, you subscribe to 95 channels of SHITE just so they can show adverts.

Now, is it just me or is there something fundamentally wrong with that? If the television channels are raking it in from advertising (and given that 6 minutes out of every ten is advertising, they must be!) why the fuck do they need to charge me for the privilege of watching it, eh?

And the drivel they show! When Badgers Attack! When kitchen appliances run Amok! World’s most dangerous Aquarium Scenery! Get a fucking grip! And what about all this “Temptation Island” bollocks? Who thought that one up? “Hey, I know! Why don’t we get lots of young couples, seperate them and seduce them so we can show the video footage to their grief stricken partners!” I mean, for fuck’s sake! How sick is that? It’s like Jeremy Bastardface Beadle, isn’t it? Bloke comes home to find his decapitated wife hanging gutted in the kitchen – but it’s OK! Cos it was only a FUCKING JOKE! Bastards!

One thing guaranteed to have me spitting my dummy, at the moment, is the new Soap the BBC are showing. “River City” – it’s a kind of Haggis-eating Eastenders. But with one minor differance. They’ve taken the cast of Prisioner: Cell Block H, kept them in a leper colony until they’ve all become hideously deformed, and then taught them to speak Shortbread-tin Scots. Jesus! What a bunch of gruesome bastards! I very nearly boaked on my mealy pudding supper when it came on last night. I would normally have switched off before it started but I was too fucking depressed to move after watching Eastenders.

Here’s what happened: Ok, so Trevor the mad scots wife beater has been fucking with Sam Mitchell’s mind and chucked her. He’s also be fucking with Little Mo’s mind and got little Mo and Billy Mitchell fighting about it. Sharon has asked Tom to marry her but Tom – the big strapping firefighter – doesn’t want to because he has a FUCKING BRAIN TUMOUR all of a sudden! So, instead of telling Shazzer that he’s terminally ill he decides to make things easier for her by laughing in her face and giving her the elbow. I mean for fuck’s sake! As if life wasn’t grim enough as it is!

Ok, so here’s what you do for the best cashews *ever*. Right, you’ll want some raw cashews (from the baking section of tesco), vegetable oil, some freshly ground black pepper, and some salt.

Beside the cooker, lay out a pan with a sieve over it, and two plates with a couple of sheets of kitchen roll on them. you’ll need to lay them out first cos the cooky bit only takes a few moments.

Get the heaviest pan you can find and heat about an inch of oil on a medium setting. Let it get hot and then chuck in the cashews. The fat will go opaque really quickly. Let the cashews sizzle for a couple of minutes until they turn golden – watch it though, as soon as they go golden you have about ten seconds to get them off the heat before they overcook. Empty the contents of the pan into the sieve so the oil drains into the pan underneath. Shoogle the cashews about for a few seconds to get most of the oil off and then turn them onto the first of the paper lined plates. Grind some pepper over the top of them (to taste) and then do the same with the salt. Tip the seasoned caashews onto the second plate to take off the rest of the oil and then bung em in a bowl. Leave them to cool a wee while, but scoff them while still warm.

Gaaaaaaaaaah

….and thank God for that. We made it – I’m off to have “We Survived 2003″ T-shirts made. Anyway, a new start this year. Start my new job in a few weeks, we’re back in our newly refitted house, and I’ve just built an enormous curry for New Years Day lunch. I’m frighteningly organised today – the chicken is marinaded and sitting in the fridge; the sauce is made up; I’ve even pre-prepared the naan dough so it’s just ready to be slapped into the oven (Debbie won’t let me have a tandoor. Note to self: must nag harder). We saw the first casualty of the New Year celebrations this morning – a bloke who lives along the end of the street (in his forties) staggering along the road at 10am wearing one shoe and one trainer and guzling a can of beer. Dear God.