generalness

This is lining up to be a nice quiet weekend. Yesterday was a bonus day off, when my supervisors signed me off from the ObGyn block on Thursday, and since they had no clinical activity on the Friday, i decided to have a study day, and i did a bit of the pre-work for a tutorial on Monday, and did the laundry and tidied the flat.

Today is a freezing morning, and we are promised some -5 ish frosts over the weekend which will be fun, so some time today i need to top up on screen wash and de-icer to make sure I can get through the weekend in the car. Today should have a leisurely feel - some shopping, gym, about it until late afternoon, when there is rugby to be won - we can't afford to lose the first match, because with Scotland playing Wales tomorrow, an english victory today would only spur the Welsh on, knowing that they was one team less in the contest for the Grand Slam.

Do cashpoints get hungry?

Today a Clydesdale cash point ate my debit card because, according to my bank (HBOS) 'card services' department "The bank which operates that cashpoint was worried about the security of that cashpoint and to avoid a potential fraud it closed down and retained your card"

Ok.....except
1. Why not close the cashpoint before I started my transaction?
2. If there is a skimming device (and I didn't see anything which looked like one) why allow me to put the card in and enter my PIN before shutting down?

These are points I may be raising with HBOS and Clydesdale by letter. For once I even had sufficient funds in my account!

The cashpoint was in a Clydesdale bank wall..... thankfully my bank is now open Saturday's a mile away so I went there to get it sorted over the phone. still takes 7 days for a new card to come (odd given that Play.com can manage next day delivery), but they were able to give me cash based on photo ID and my having a credit card with the same bank.

Fireworks on TV

Given that 4th year starts at 8.30am tomorrow, I decided not to go through to Edinburgh to see the end of festival fireworks this year. http://www.stv.tv/content/out/edinburgh_festival_2008/fireworks/index.html

STV were showing the fireworks at 10.20pm, just an hour and 20 minutes after the fireworks concert started.

However it is awful. The music takes priority over the fireworks, it is split up by the adverts, and talking bits and mini-documentaries about the fireworks, orchestra and music. It is nothing like the real thing, standing in the rain in Edinburgh and unable to hear the music except on a walkman, talking to friends and hearing the loud whooshes and bangs as the fireworks trace across the sky. the TV show is more about the concert than the music sadly........

Guess next year I'll just have to travel through and brave the packed M8 or packed trains.

Should I renew my Passport?

In his book, "Round the World in Eighty days", Michael Palin reflects that in the Jules Verne original, all Fogg needed was a signed picture of Queen Victoria to permit him safe passage around the world and entry to each country he came across.

In similar vein, John Simpson, reflects on an Angolan soldier throwing his blue British (pre EU days) passport into the a muddy river. He reminds the reader that "From the end of the Napoleonic War in 1815 until the First world War, it was the chief distinguishing mark of a British citizen abroad that they did not carry a passport. They went where they wanted, merely announcing themselves at border crossings and being allowed through because they were British"

Simpson also then details how, for the next month he traveled only on the authority of a hastily typed letter by the Honorary Dutch Consul in Luanda. (A Mad World, My Masters)

Sadly things seem a little different now. Even Easyjet demand a passport to travel on their plane - or a photo driving licence (but only a full licence, a provisional will not do, despite requiring the same ID.....), and you also need one to buy alcohol, get into a nightclub, open a bank account, and even collect your post. So it is almost a National ID card anyway.

However, back to the main point. My passport ran out in Jan 2006, having been first obtained for my school French Exchange to Halluin in 1996, at the age of 14. I have managed to survive the past 2 years without it, being now a) too old to be challenged for alcohol; b) not been on a plane since 2003; c) not been abroad since 2005 and d) been with the same bank all along.

I am now considering whether to renew it soon, and thus give my Biometric data. It isn't the biometric data on the passport that worries me, I know where that is, but the government records of it. My one time Summer employers have lost the details of 25 million people, some friends have had the Dept of Health display their personal details to the whole world, the DSA has lost my personal and bank details, and my building society lost an (encrypted) laptop with my details on it.

Having now made that list, I guess handing a few more of my details over won't do me any harm....But the earliest I will need a passport will be Summer 2009 if i choose to do a foreign elective. I'm not planning a foreign holiday in 2008 (nor can I afford one) and if i renew the passport now, then I will lose 15% of it's value before I use it. I hope to have my full driving licence by March, so if I need to fly within the UK this summer (which I might) I can use that as photo ID for BA or Easyjet.

Any suggestions? I mean I survived without a passport for the first 14 years of my life, and only used it 8 or 9 times during the ten years I held a valid one.

Crap week.

This week is very very very crap.....

• No money for the next ten days - I can get food cos that comes from different account (makes it sound like I have loads) but no spending money except VISA.
• People owing money - my sister, an a job I did 2 months ago....
• Doing jobs for people and just getting shouted at in return.
• Feeling lethargic and tired all week.
• Sleeping in 2 days this week and missing morning Uni - had to send grovelling emails in both. cases
• Can't get to sleep properly at night and sleeping poorly.
• Not seeing friends all week due to a combination of 1 & 4.
• It's cold, dark, and raining all week. What happened to the lovely sunshine and clear weather we had las t week.
  

Still only 2 half days in Uni to go, then the weekend. Maybe I can catch up with everything over the weekend and feel better by next Monday?

Rugby

After France surprising New Zealand yesterday, Scotland and Fiji both has spirited poerformances today which were in the end just not quite enough to get through.

Argentina vs South Africa is an interesting tie, as on paper you expect the Springboks to win...but Argentina have had some good performances in this World cup. It also presents me with too problems - which would I like in the final (bearing in mind that at the moment, England still have a chance to reach the final) and also, who to support. I think despite my not supporting Southern hemisphere teams, that in this case I have to support South Africa, since I don't have anything against them, except the fact that they are Southern Hemisphere, whereas I'm not keen on Argentina at all....

Ooooops

I forgot something in the past month. With all the chaos, excitement, painting, interviews and such like, I forgot to pay my VISA bill. My Internet VISA card gets paid by Direct Debit, but my other one doesn't. If you have a student VISA card (limit £500) then you get a text to remind you when to pay, but on the (supposedly) grown up VISA card you don't, so I forgot to pay and get hit with a £12 late payment charge, and interest payments as well as a nice phone call from the bank asking me if I intend to pay at all this month (I imagine that had I said 'No', then i would have been hit with even more charges!). They are also going to send me a letter about paying that VISA by Direct Debit. They won't do text messages on 'adult' VISA accounts because apparently "Computer says No"...........

Tesco & Banks

Why are some companies so difficult to deal with?
Tesco.com is great service - they bring far more than I could carry home from work or the tesco store and they do it for a fairly small charge. All good so far - save time, same cost. However in January they missed the delivery slot twice - once because they came on the wrong day - go figure... But because they bill your card before they leave the shop, they charged me 3 times for the same shopping. I phoned and asked for two of them to be refunded. They said "Yeh sure".

Come February's statement from the bank, no refund. So I call again and sit in a queue for a bit then the guy says "Yes of course we will do it now".

So March's statement comes - no refund.........I phoned again and they said we'll get back to you by Friday - but no call came. So on the next Tuesday I phoned and the call centre said "we'll put you through to the store". The store asked for the details and said they would investigate - they call me back the next day saying they have done the refund.

At last, so why did it take 2 months and 10 phone calls????




Then the bank issue.

I wrote a cheque for £250, but the bank took £750. Phoning customer services resulted in an "Are you sure?" response. So they will get back to me apparently! Arghhh!