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{ Category Archives } invective

Very annoying junk mail

I don’t get a great deal of junk post addressed to Christopher any more, and most of that seems to be from the car dealers that we bought our Mini from, trying to get him to upgrade. Fat chance! I have every intention of running that car into the ground and don’t expect to change […]

Counting the Calories

I have spent the last two nights away on business, staying at a Holiday Inn at a service area a few miles away from a customer’s site. That was slightly more salubrious than it sounds, as it was quite a nice service area, off an A-road not a motorway, but chosen by the company on […]

Oxytocin Levels

Our workplace used to have a pretty good Occupational Health service. There was an on-site nurse who knew the staff, knew our problems, and was able to make sensible recommendations about how to overcome them, or at least to make reasonable adjustments to our work so that we could cope better. She was very helpful […]

More lousy customer service

It feels like I ought to award the IcyJumbo Prize for Appalling Customer Service at least monthly, as there is such a high standard of competition! Today I’ve fallen out with AXA about my home insurance renewal. AXA, or at least someone purporting to be AXA, sent an unsolicited email over the weekend to one […]

More useless customer service

This month’s A Mammoth Undertaking prize for insensitive customer service goes to……. cue drumroll…… BT.com The telephone land-line was, like all our utilities, in Christopher’s name. So this time last year I spoke to BT, explained that he was dead, and got it moved into my name. So far, so good – no dramas, and […]

Arguing with npower

All our utility bills were in Christopher’s name, so when he died one of the  things I had to do was to move them all into my name. Our electricity supplier was npower, and they responded very quickly acknowledging the situation and returning the death certificate. So I’ve been rather narked that all the bills […]

Insulted by my pullover

I bought a new sweater this week – nothing special, just a lightweight cotton/linen mix sleeveless pullover that will do fine to wear for work. And I got it in the  sale which is a bonus. But when I put it on, I noticed that the label said: “US   S; UK   S; DE   S; […]

The five stages of grieving?

I’ve been lent a book by Kubler-Ross and Kessler called “On Grief and Grieving” which is apparently one of the standard texts in Bereavement Counselling. Their basic thesis is that there are five stages of grief Denial Anger Bargaining Depression Acceptance Apparently people are expected to go through all five stages of grief so that […]

Changed waiting rooms

When I first started going to Worcester to get my bag changed, the chemotherapy patients had their own waiting room deep inside the suite that treats both haematology and chemotherapy patients. The two groups of patients both checked in with a single receptionist, and then the haematology patients waited in the main waiting room, whose […]

Write to your MP about the Digital Economy Bill

First, some context about the Bill. It is full of controversial measures. For example it provides for disconnection from the Internet if a content provider simply accuses someone of infringing copyright. Another example is the designation of public Wifi hotspot providers as private subscribers instead of common carriers, which means that they must either inspect […]