What annoyed you today?

[hevans]

The English

The English
(Flanders & Swan)

Brilliant, hadn't heard that one in years!! Although my fav was the thermodynamics song.

[CML-1591]

The English

The English
(Flanders & Swan)

Brilliant, hadn't heard that one in years!!

WAMT:

The fact I maybe too young to get this, or it's just too late and i'm being stupid aha...

[Hinfrance]

Deer. That's what's annoyed me today. Well, to be honest the damned things annoy me most of the time. Rats with horns.

We'd been nurturing a couple of horse chestnut trees for a few years and planted them out last autumn. Despite being surrounded by a wire mesh fence the deer have reached inside and killed the trees.

The only good thing is that if the local hunters catch the little b*st*rds they do taste quite nice with a red wine and shallot sauce

As for the footie - quote from the LA Times: "The sad truth of the matter is that England's players, with few exceptions, are an arrogant, ignorant and unpleasant lot. They are paid far too much by their Premier League clubs, where their true allegiance lies, and their ability individually and collectively in an England shirt does not match their swagger."

[anglefire]

in it for the fame and fortune, not for the achievement. If you want to know who's to blame: look at the culture that cherishes celebrity, rather than creativity, a work ethic and respect. I blame New Labour.

No it goes back to the days of Thatcher. Not helped by Labour, but started by the Tories.

And it won't get any better, until the old values are returned. And I fear that will be never.

[hevans]

in it for the fame and fortune, not for the achievement. If you want to know who's to blame: look at the culture that cherishes celebrity, rather than creativity, a work ethic and respect. I blame New Labour.

No it goes back to the days of Thatcher. Not helped by Labour, but started by the Tories.

And it won't get any better, until the old values are returned. And I fear that will be never.

Actually, it goes further back than Thatcher, to the early 70's, when the unions insisted that everyone was entitled to a wage whether they worked for it or not. Thatcher's era just levelled the field and spread it from the union membership (it's probably politically incorrect to use the term working classes) to the middle classes.  Sadly, it was always present in the upper classes, who regarded it as their divine right not to have to sully their fingers with work.

So, the class warfare has at least achieved something. All the classes regard it as their right to not have to work for an honest day's pay.

But NuLabor has had nearly an entire generation to reverse the trend, and they're the one's that really brought celebrities into politics, raising them further on their pedestal of vacuity.

And I agree, it won't improve until the old values are returned.

H.

[ABERS]

I find it amusing when the unions are blamed for most things. Not ever having belonged to one, I'm grateful for all the legislation that has been hard fought for by them, not just on their members' behalf but on the working population as a whole.
Reductions in the working week, paid holidays, and most of all redundancy payments.

To my shame like all the non-member union bashers that delight in blaming them for everything, I willingly took all the benefits without standing up to be counted.

[jinky]

I`m with Abers on this. I get heartily sick of the popular sport of union bashing. Funny to see the new coalition now aiming to get rid of "all this health and safety rubbish" based on urban myths of kids wearing goggles for conkers and the like. The reality is that outisde of the Sun and mail headlines a lot has been done to make the owrkplace safer and led to huge reductions in serious accidents / deaths in industries such as construction and most of this was fought for by the unions. Sure on the back of the excellent work done they needed to adapt to modern society a bit better but I forever will blame Thatcher and her cronies for the real rise of greed and selfishness endemic throughout today.

[spinner]

Deer. That's what's annoyed me today. Well, to be honest the damned things annoy me most of the time. Rats with horns.

We'd been nurturing a couple of horse chestnut trees for a few years and planted them out last autumn. Despite being surrounded by a wire mesh fence the deer have reached inside and killed the trees.

The only good thing is that if the local hunters catch the little b*st*rds they do taste quite nice with a red wine and shallot sauce

LOL, reminds me of a friend who lived in the country and left out feed for them all the time. I couldn't convince her that Bambi was a fictional character and that the wolves she despised were actually a more social animal and female wolves more mothering that female deer. Deer are vicious creatures. I've posted several deer shots over the years, they've all been taken from inside, or immediately adjacent a vehicle I'd never approach them on foot.

On the otherhand, I find venison quite dry, maybe it's just the cooks.

[hevans]

Funny, Thatcher bashing (although I'd hardly consider my comment as bashing) seems to be more acceptable than union bashing . At least Thatcher was elected by the populous, and the populous had every opportunity to deselect her. The unions weren't.

In the late 70s, early 80s, the unions were too powerful (or thought themselves to be). However in the years before the rise of the unions the management was too powerful (the working conditions were horrendous).  Neither period provided for a happy medium.

What succeeds is not one side or the other "winning", but rather a collaborative atmosphere, where both realise they can't exist without the other and accept that both sides have requirements. The BA strike is a good example of this - the management can't have the unions winning, otherwise they don't believe they can manage the company, and the unions can't let the management win because it would set a precedent. Deadlock, and a situation that is to no-one's benefit. The German's are very effective at this sort of union/management balance. The French not.

If you want to blame someone: it's not the fault of one or the other, but the fault of both failing to instil confidence and trust in the other party.

H.

[spinner]

WAMT?

SMILE or Slideshow Maker In Linux Environment.  I'm using Ubuntu Studio on a purpose built PC for Photo work. It's a duo core CPU with 4 gigs of memory. What's annoying me, is despite those parameters SMILE would just randomly shut off causing me to loose all my work. Now after getting stung by this random shut off  I've started to click the save button every few minutes but I really don't think I should be having to do this. I guess it's another little example of why Linux isn't quite mainstream yet (if ever). 

[spinner]

After 2 hrs. of work I've discovered the program won't render a slideshow with a soundtrack in it! ARRGGGHH

[anglefire]

H, you are right, the unions did have too  much power.

I also think that a lot of what Scargill said at the time of that battle was actually correct - but both he and Thatcher were too stubbon to sort it all out properly and in the end Thatcher starved the Miners into submission.

As ever in this country (probably everywhere) there are too many extremes. Employers had too much power, which the Unions overcame and got some good stuff sorted - as said above - But ended up too powerful. Now the balance is probably back to the employers - but it is more even to be fair.

[Hybridphotog]

Wamt? Vodafone!

Due to my mobile phone usage, DMT and I have figured out that it'd be cheaper to get a contract phone. However, I'm wanting to retain my N95... for now, and so it needs unlocking. And the only way to do that is to contact Vodafone.

So I did... and gave them as much information as they needed (IMEI, make/model numbers, etc).

I got an automated response. No big deal.

Today I got what looks like a scripted response, asking for the information I've already supplied. The nosupportasaurus also informed me that unlocking the phone will cost me £20! Sort of contradictory to what I've read on various forums manned by Vodafone staff... they say that Vodafone stopped charging for unlock codes back in 2008.

One email has been fired back at this 'helpdesk' person, informing him/her of what's already known (no charges required, information already given, etc)... as well as advising him/her about Vodafone loosing customers through bad customer support, and was signed "an unhappy Vodafone customer".

[spinner]

After 2 hrs. of work I've discovered the program won't render a slideshow with a soundtrack in it! ARRGGGHH

After giving up on S.M.I.L.E. until I'd got a response to a forum post, I moved on to Brasero a CD/DVD burning program that I've been using for a couple of years now without issue. Only I'd never tried to burn video before but was put in the position  of helping out wifey's co-worker. She needed her daughter's graduation video formatted to use in her DVD player. Make a long story short, it needed installation of some extra software called GStreamer which I installed. On a hunch I went back to S.M.I.L.E. and sure enough those bit of extra software fixed it. Now I can happily make Slideshows, with music to annoy the in-laws when they visit.  

[Just Dave]

Not annoyed, Sometime I just feel my posts are ignored or is it me. Ooops should be in, What annoyed you today? I honestly feel. Im not wanted here please say and Ill go, if I dont fit in