I’ve had to do not one but two factory restores on my tablet and I still need to manually faff with updating the firmware. I had to root it to solve a known issue in android ICS. When the JB update came available OTA, I couldn’t run the update because my tablet was rooted. The only way to do a stock restore was to flash the official ROM. That kinda sorta worked, but for some godforsaken reason, my lock screen disappeared and was replaced with a promo-type display. There were a few other weird behaviours as well, like the fact that some configuration settings would not stay put, no matter how many times you set them. Unacceptable. A full data wipe/restore did nothing to fix this either. So now I downloading yet another 1gb ROM to see if I can get my baby back into a usable state. Grrr.
Tag: shrill
No more!!!
I bought 4 new smoke detectors, with guaranteed 10-year lithium batteries, yaaay!
My council tax dollars at work
We haven’t had bin pickups since before Christmas because our pickup days fell on the holidays. Last Wednesday, they picked up our green bin but didn’t touch the pile of excess recycling in carrier bags next to it. I put all the bags in the bin and phoned the council to complain. They told me that they had a second crew that was exclusively picking up the extra stuff but i had to leave it next to the bin or they’d miss it. Out I went to empty my green bin. That night, when no crew had come, I put everything back into the bin. The next morning, I phoned the council again to complain and they told me that the second crew actually didn’t come yesterday but was coming today, so I had to put the extra bags next to the bin again. I told the council lady that those bags had done more mileage than a small car, so zhe said that she’d log it as a missed pickup and a bin lorry would come in the next couple of days.
This morning, a bin lorry came and picked up not only our green bin, but also our black bin. Since there are no bin lorries with the capacity to collect both waste and recycling, this means that all the recycling we’ve been moaning about is now going to the tip.
Idiots.
A scary, sobering thought.
Since 1982, there have been at least 62 mass murders. carried out with firearms across the country, with the killings unfolding in 30 states from Massachusetts to Hawaii. Scary fact #1, that’s more than 2 a year. scary fact #2, there have been 12 incidents in 2012 alone!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/nation/us-mass-shootings-2012/
Ubuntu really pissed me off
I’ve been running Ubuntu on my work laptop for several years and it’s been rock solid. I got a distribution upgrade notice yesterday and clicking on the “upgrade” button was, in retrospect, A FUCKING BAD IDEA!!!
I’ve lost two solid days of work trying to get my dual-core laptop with 6gb of RAM in a state slightly more responsive than a very drugged up sloth.
The new Unity desktop is a bloated mess. Several times in the past two days, I have wanted to hurl my laptop out the window. I really don’t like the direction that Ubuntu is going. 10.04LTS was rock solid and peppy. 12.04LTS turned my laptop into a brick. An ugly one at that.
Yet another reason to never deal with Zenith Staybright ever again
On Friday, I got a phone call from Katy at work saying that someone from Zenith would be coming round the following day to take pictures of our patio door. When they first contacted us years ago, their usual sales pitche said that as part of a “special promotion”, we’d get an “additional discount” if we agreed to let them take pictures of the house as a model home for their promo material. Naively at the time, before realizing just how much of a pain in the ass they could be, we said yes. As it turns out, it’s just a “legal” way to let them contact you every 6 months or so to see if they can sell you more shit. My patience and politeness with them is gone. I told the “security confirmation phone call” today that they could come and take a picture if they wanted but I wasn’t interested in a sales pitch and that we didn’t have any money for DIY. Surprisingly, no one showed up at their expected time to come take pictures. Go figure.
So, FYI, stay away from Zenith. The product is OK, but you can find just as good or better without having to deal with the snake oil salesmen from their front office.
And Zenith, if you happen to see this by whatever odd chance, STOP CALLING!!!!! We will never deal with you again.
Why is it so bloody hard to get a mortgage???
When I first contacted ING a couple of months ago, I made it very clear that I was paid by an international organization and did not pay UK income tax. I was assured that, based on income figures alone, it shouldn’t be a problem to get a mortgage. Cut forward to today, when a different person tells me, “oh, there are some notes on your income documents. They’ve been sent for review”
After saying that I’m not overly surprised, seeing as I have unusual fiscal arrangements (yet all perfectly legal and above board!!), I’m now told that “oh, I’ll have to make a note of that, not paying UK income tax is generally a reason for non-approval”.
DAMNIT!
It’s not like I was being deceptive, I told them all of this shit months ago. And now, after weeks of faffing and being jerked around, now they drop this shit on me.
I can pay the fucking mortgage.
Please let me give you my money.
Baseless smear campaign my ass!
From Slashdot:
Canada’s election fraud scandal continues to unfold. Elections Canada just matched the IP address used to set up thousands of voter suppression robocalls to one used by a Conservative Party operative, and a comparison of call records found a perfect match between the illegal calls, and records of non-supporters in the Conservative Party’s CIMS voter tracking database, as well as evidence access logs may have been tampered with. Meanwhile, legal challenges to election results are underway in seven ridings, and an online petition calling for an independent public inquiry into the crisis has amassed over 44,000 signatures. The Conservative Party still maintains their innocence, calling it a baseless smear campaign.
Some people are just natural born twats
We stopped at tesco on our way to Wimpole Hall to pick up some sandwiches. There was an old guy in a convertible driving in front of us that just nonchalantly turned and parked astride the dividing line between two parking spots, basically taking up two spaces so his precious penis extension didn’t get dinged. I wanted to yell at him for being such a prat (I’m grumpy today. I blame the time change) but Katy wouldn’t let me.
So, inconsiderate old fart, whoever you are, may pigeons use your shiny white head for poop target practice.
Sometimes, I really hate people
People, en masse, are whiny and selfish. You give them free wine, and they complain about the lack of choice or where it comes from. You give them free movie tickets, they complain about the fairness of how you’re handing them out. However, if you ask them to participate in the organisation of events, the silence is deafening.