Happy Family (by alaric)

...from Charlee's Flickr

Driveway mess (by alaric)

Last Sunday, it rained a lot. Since we live in a valley, this has its risks; our house is next to the stream, and our driveway and the stream run parallel for quite some distance before meeting the road, which comes down the hill on one side and goes back up the hill the other side. So lots of water, laden with mud and leaves and twigs and stones, came rushing down the roads to run into the stream, but due to the way the road is laid out, lots of it comes along our driveway before diving into the stream.

Now, we try and prevent this by having a hump of gravel along the end of the drive, directing the deluge down a ditch into the stream, but on Sunday, this was overrun with the sheer volume, and so the drive was a real mess.

I started clearing it up (click it to look at the large version and see just how much rubbish there is along the drive):

I was soon joined by Barbara, and between us, we shifted about six barrowloads of mud, leaves, and twigs, then collected the gravel and stones (which had been deposited closer to the start of the drive) and used them to build up the hump to try and stop it happening again...

Carphone Warehouse (by alaric)

...appear to be incompetent.

About a year ago, we moved house. I wrote them a letter with my new address, and asking to change the bank account my direct debits come from, since Sarah and I consolidated all of our direct debits to come from the one account that our pay goes into, to simplify our joint finances.

Some time later, the mobile phone stopped working, because apparently I'd not been paying the bill. A little prodding revealed that they'd been sending the bills to my aunt (who lives next door), since they had the address somewhat wrong, and appeared to have not performed the direct debit change; I'd stopped putting money into my old account, so the DDs had been failing.

So I wrote them a grumpy letter, and they apologised profusely, and said they'd send me a new direct debit form to fill in.

Which never arrived.

Instead, nasty letters and phonecalls from a debt collection agency started to appear.

I spoke on the phone to CPW, who said they'd send me a direct debit form. Which never arrived.

I spoke on the phone again to them, and they said I could set up the DD over the phone, which I did.

Then a letter came bearing the mysterious message "We have no direct debit details for your account", which I rang them about; apparently this is SECRET CODE for "We tried to send the DD to your bank and they rejected it". They suggested I rang the bank, who said they'd had a DD come in for my account, but with some of the fields not filled on, so they rejected it. I spoke to CPW again, who said they'd do no such thing, but consented to send it again.

The debt collectors then threatened us with bailiffs.

So I went to a CPW shop in a nearby town, and they looked in their databases, and said that my DD should be working now, but it'd be a while before the next monthly billing run, so I should pay off the outstanding balance with my debit card in order to stop the bailiffs, which I did. They said I should have no more problems.

But the debt collectors keep ringing me demanding payment.

So I told them CPW said they shouldn't be ringing me any more.

They apologised, and said that CPW had neglected to tell them this, and suggested I write to CPW pointing this out, which I did.

CPW have not replied.

And tonight, at 8pm, I get called again by the debt collectors, and this time they're being nasty and saying that unless I pay up TODAY they're going to Take Further Action and Harm My Credit File. I explain the history, but they have none of it. So I say I'm not going to pay anything until I've spoken to CPW first. They say that they're very busy right now and if I hang up to ring CPW then try to ring them back I'll be in a very long queue and they close at 9pm so I might not get through, and if I don't pay today, I'm in trouble. The woman also suggests that if I just pay up then I can pursue CPW for a refund if what I'm saying is correct.

sigh

I don't like the principle of people ringing me up saying I owe them money, and when I disagree, threatening me with Trouble if I don't pay, and saying that if I really don't owe, then I can claim the money back. Since it seems to have taken CPW some trouble to understand that I paid them off, I don't fancy being out of pocket until they get their act together, if they ever do.

Anyway, I dug out a number for CPW and rang them, and went around their voice menu system, unable to find a human being, and it's now just turning 9pm, so apparently I'm in trouble.

I think I need to visit the Citizens Advice Bureau...

Marble runs (by alaric)

We were in a pound shop once that was selling marble runs for a pound each. We picked up three boxes, and they've sat around for ages, until this evening when we had a play.

Two sets combined:

Three sets combined:

But it looked too wobbly, so we tried again:

If they still do them, we want to go back and spend twenty pounds and get enough to make a marble run that fills the room...

.Mac silliness (by alaric)

.Mac is a suite of online tools Apple sells to go with their Mac computers. I use the thing purely because it lets my desktop and my laptop both synch various useful bits of data - bookmarks, mail accounts, stored passwords, address book entries, and my calendar.

However, sometimes the synch messes up, as the picture above suggests. When I confirmed the above change, my address book was reduced to a few contacts, plus pages of ones called "No Name" that had no details in them.

Luckily, I had a backup...