The Duchess Wows Them In A £38 TopShop Dress
This is another story from the Standard. Here’s the intro.
The Duchess of Cambridge has got great legs and she’s not afraid to show
them. Nor is she afraid of a hefty spring breeze. This morning, attending a
tour of the studios at which the Harry Potter films were created, she wore a
thigh skimming polka-dot dress from high-street retailer Topshop.
One of the pictures on the site, shows Lady Verulam meeting the Duke and Duchess. I suspect, that her father in-law was the guy who gave me my first real job at Enfield Rolling Mills. As the company was my father’s biggest client, he just phoned up the Earl and asked if they had a suitable job for a sixteen-year-old. My father was a great believer in the old maxim, that if you don’t ask nicely, you don’t get!
Venezuela’s New Sports Minister
The Times carries a centre page spread of Venezuela’s new Sports Minister, who is an Olympic fencer, with her sports equipment placed strategically.
The photo is here, but I suspect it’ll be everywhere. This other page in Spanish doesn’t need translation.
Just imagine the fuss if one of our high-level female politicians did the same. But then the only top sports people, who have made government in recent years have been Christopher Chataway and Sebastian Coe.
Ed Miliband Says He’ll Switch The Lights Off
Well not directly, but he has just said on BBC Breakfast, that he will break the link between power generation and distribution and bring in a tough new regulator to force prices down, when wholesale prices come down.
It’s all motherhood and apple pie, and might appeal to voters, but it would have the effect of stopping major power companies investing in the generating capacity we need.
So the lights will inevitably go out!
The only way to avoid building generating capacity is to find ways to insulate our poor housing stock and force consumers to actually do it!
But then the British public is addicted to using as much energy as possible.
It Looks Like Crunchies May Now Have Added Gluten
I never trust American food companies not to add gluten to products.
When Cadbury was British, you could trust that Crunchies were gluten-free and I’ve ate many without any reaction.
However, this message has just turned up on the UK-Coeliac Yahoo group.
I just had one of those Cadbury Crunchies from a pack of three, and am now in pain and looking 9 months pregnant.
I checked the ingredients first, and it just said “Contains Milk”… Lying Kraft/Mondelez/Cadbury B^&/4£ds!…
I went to Cadbury.com and it went to “Mondelez” which is apparently the new name that Kraft are hiding behind.
It is very telling that the text on the very top of the page is the current Nasdaq share price, and when I searched for “gluten” on their website it came back with “no results found”.
Cadbury used to be very good about gluten, but it is clear that these evil devils couldn’t give a toss about the poisons they put in their products or the people eating them.
Avoid…
I will do what the lady says at the bottom and won’t touch any more Cadbury products again.
So the Americans have ruined a classic British brand.
I’ve Got Catkins
The hornbeam outside my house has got catkins.
I’ve Got Catkins
At last we’re beginning to see flowers on the trees.
A Real Pub Sign
I like to see a real pub sign.
A Real Pub Sign
This one is on the Cat and the Canary at Canary Wharf.
Aren’t Brains Wonderful!
For the first time, since I had my stroke in Hong Kong, I’ve switched back to the way I used to live my life twenty years ago.
I’ve gone back to wearing short-sleeved shirts, with a jumper over the top if it’s chilly. For years I wore a simple windcheater type jacket with a large pocket, but no-one makes one now. If I needed to carry more, then I carried by Dunhill briefcase loosely in my left hand.
It’s as though my brain has switched back and put me into this lifestyle that works for me.
It’s so practical. For example, I don’t use a dish-washer, as the previous tenants gave it a good fucking and I do the job so much better. So I just take off the jumper and get started.
I just went to get my newspaper. Coming back, if I’m not reading the front page, I fold it up and hold it in my left hand.
All I need to do, is get my eyesight and left hand working correctly and I’m a new man.
The eyesight is pretty good now and I can even take my glasses off, whilst watching films and sporting events. But as my eyes get less dry from the better weather, they seem to be improving.
As to my left hand, it seems to work very well, but its measurement of temperature is bad. I’m still typing mostly one-handed, but then it was always thus!
I notice too, when I put on a shirt, it isn’t the left hand that’s a problem, it’s the right. It could be just down to dry skin. I know for instance, that my nails aren’t back to their best. Incidentally, whilst living in Suffolk after the stroke in 2010, by the autumn they were tip-top. So let’s put their state down to the cold and very dry weather of the last few months.
But I think my brain and its superb memory will pull me through. Although last night, I got annoyed when I couldn’t remember the name of the Adiran Lyne film, when Glenn Close boiled the bunny. But we have the Internet to solve those problems. It was, of course, Ben Hur! I can remember vividly sitting with Adrian Lyne by a pool in the South of France, watching our respective wives swimming.
One memory that thinks, I’m on the right track, is that my nails taste and feel exactly the same, as when I was a child, when I was a terrible nail-biter. I have this great desire, which I’m resisting, to bite them again.
I just don’t think I’m in any way unique, it’s just that I let my brain do its best!
Santander Make A Mistake
Paul Lewis, the BBC’s respected personal finance expert, has just flagged up this story on BBC Breakfast. Although, it’s not a big financial failure like PPI, it could have been inconvenient for some former Abbey customers. This is the first three paragraphs of the story.
Santander, the country’s second biggest mortgage provider, says 30,000 of its customers may be due compensation, after errors made in 2008.
All were former Abbey customers, who were put on standard variable rate (SVR) mortgages after coming off fixed-rate deals.
But they were not told clearly enough that they could have transferred their accounts elsewhere.
He also flagged up that there is no central way to notify customers that there might be a problem with their bank or insurance company’s systems and said there was a business opportunity.
He’s right on that last point!
What is needed is a site, where you register with just e-mail address and short post code, like N14 or IP4. You then enter your bank, insurance company, supermarket, broadband and energy suppliers, phone and mobile companies and perhaps your make of car.
Then when anything turns up like this Santander problem or the Virgin broadband failure, the site would send you an automatic e-mail.
All warnings would of course be available for any registered member to view.
Unlike the price comparison sites, the site would never sell or give your details to any third party.
Paul Lewis said it was a business opportunity! It certainly is!
Man Attacked By Rogue Beach Hut
The title of this post is my take on this story.
It’s definitely something that could end up on Have I Got News for You.
How Not To Deal With Deceased Customers
Virgin Media is called over the coals in this article on the BBC web site, where they messed up over the account of someone who’d died.
When C died, I didn’t have anything similar although dealing with some organisations was more difficult than others. I actually had a letter published in The Times about it.
I was widowed last year, and it is only now that I’m starting to get my life together. The response of the various government and local authority departments in handling all the paperwork involved has been very patchy.
Registrars: excellent, very sympathetic and efficient; Work and Pensions: bereavement allowance came through with a few hiccups, but not too difficult; Premium Bonds: system worked but could have been better; council tax: this was reduced automatically on signing a form by St Edmundsbury — totally painless; DVLA: its online systems worked well; winter fuel payment: found difficult to claim and missed it for last year.
The private sector wasn’t that much better, with some companies having people whose sole job appeared to be to deal with bereavement faring much better than those that didn’t. Some wanted death certificates, some accepted faxed copies and others took my word.
We need a lot more joined-up thinking in this important area, as, with nearly a million deaths in the UK every year, it would surely help the bereavement process for those left behind if every company, organisation, government department and authority were automatically notified. After all, if St Edmundsbury can do it here in supposedly sleepy Suffolk, then surely everyone else can.
The best private company was undoubtedly Carphone Warehouse, who had a dedicated person dealing with the accounts of customers who’d died. They even sent me a refund, which I spent on a good bottle of wine.
The Anonymous Widower 