According to the Marks and Spencers site, I have an INCORRECT BROWSER. I think I should be offended, but how *can* I be at such a polite 'Stop using smartarse software' notice.
Why Don't You Just Switch Off Your Internet And Go And Do Something More Boring Instead?
OK, I've already given you the pretentious impressionistic explanation of The Lost Month Of Hydragenic. The reality is actually much more prosaic. Running through the mundane details in my own head last week, I was pleased with how they sounded. I'm going to take the opportunity to repeat them here, because occasionally it's nice to shamelessly brag about itemise one's achievements (however uninteresting).
Hold on to your seats, because in the past six weeks or so I've:
- Commissioned and monitored the installation of our new bathroom
- Chosen (though not yet purchased) additional shelving & storage for said bathroom
- Organised the replacement of an apparently faulty bath tap
- Had the dodgy wiring by the boiler replaced (which has scared the bejaysus out of me for the past four years)
- Caught up on two years' worth of personal admin filing
- Cleared the Annoying Overflowing Gutter and consequently inadvertently dealt with the Leaky Lounge Window
- Eaten at that nice-looking restaurant in Greenwich that I've been meaning to check out for months
- Reorganised the bookshelves in the spare room and disposed of approximately one hundred books
- Finally got round to seeing LOTR: ROTK
- Cancelled the now unnecessary payment protection insurance on my credit card (been paying it off in full every month for several years, so nothing to protect)
- Organised competitive quotes for household insurance (tip for UK readers: Marks & Spencer do an unlimited cover policy that means you can kiss goodbye to endless hours of working out the value of everything you own on a room-by-room basis)
- Had the car tyres replaced
- Organised the replacement of a second apparently faulty bath tap
- Phoned London Electricity about getting a "customer isolation switch", so we can get our old-style fuse box replaced with new-style circuit-breakers
- Reviewed all of the paperwork relating to our endowment and decided to claim compensation for mis-selling
- Spoken to a financial adviser about changing mortgage provider and mortgage basis, to compensate for dodgy endowment
- Stopped wolfing down copious quantities of cheap and nasty chocolate from the local off-license and restricted my input to a few daily squares of delicious 70% cocoa Green & Black stuff instead
- Organised repair of bullethole-style chip in car windscreen
- Very belatedly got the whole five-daily-portions-of-fruit-and-veg thing back on track after Christmas
- Organised the replacement of a third apparently faulty bath tap
- Booked the car in for a thorough inspection of its electrical system, following one flat battery too many
- Halved consumption of builder-strength tea from around two pints per day to just one, augmented by lots of healthy spice teas instead
- Worked out the process for switching our electricity supplier to nPower Juice
- Made several long-overdue PayPal donations, notably to Movable Type and SnapGallery
- Caught up with lots of website admin stuff
- Debated the whole "apparently faulty bath tap" issue with supplier ("Your hot-water cylinder!" "No, your tap!" "Your CYLINDER!" "No, your TAP!" etc.) and eventually agreed on the compromise of changing the mechanism from ceramic gate-valve to traditional washer and screw
- Finished an old book, started and finished a new one, started a further new one
- Started pricing up options and choosing test-drive models for a new car (maybe a little prematurely but last time it took far longer than I expected)
- Made contact with a couple of old friends with whom I should never have lost touch in the first place
[For anyone who fails to get the reference in this post's title, it's to a long-running (but now defunct) BBC children's TV show called Why Don't You Just Switch Off Your Television Set And Go Out And Do Something Less Boring Instead? I always liked the apparently self-defeating logic of a TV show that was about making a positive choice to do else something instead of watching TV. Surely anyone who was likely to watch it wouldn't have been watching, if you see what I mean?]
[PPS - I know that everyone's doing these bullet-point "what I've been up to" posts right now. All I can say is that I started drafting this one last Wednesday. Yes - ironically, the day after the Zeitgest post.]
[PPPS - I might have overstated the chocolate position. Can we call it dramatic license?]
Posted by Hg on Monday 15 March 2004 at 21:13.
Received 7 comments so far.
Comments
Ah yes, you'll be needing MarkoSoft's Internet Instorer to be able to access the M&S residence-page.
It is a mightily impressive list indeed Sir.
I'll be doing the car and mortgage thing later in the year (around July), any tips?
And yes I remember watching that TV show and thinking the same thing "Right, I will then. *click*"
Wasn't it much more fun switching things off when TV tubes took a while to 'collapse'... BEEEOOOoooooooo
Caroline - bear in mind that this is approximately six weeks' worth.
Gordon - no specific tips yet. This reminds me that the financial adviser hasn't come back with proposals, must chase.
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