Tag Archives: Life

Why M&M Direct show the worst of people..in my opinion

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Have a look at the video above.  If you are lucky enough, in this instance, to not live in the UK you might not have seen this series of adverts.  Each evening at 6pm my family watch an episode of The Simpsons on Channel 4. The latest sponsor of the programme is M&M Direct a catalogue company which delivers clothing and the like to your door.  Why I am posting about this and these adverts?  Well they really, really annoy me.

Advertising is like water off a duck’s back to me normally but these adverts are just wrong on many levels and perhaps I am not a ‘normal’ person and the target audience but they put me off ever placing an order with this company.  See if you can sit through the whole video.  See if you can ignore the ear bursting screaming, the fact that often the parents of the ‘kids’ look the same age as them but mainly the fact that these grown men and women (these are not small children doing the screaming) are just an example of the crassness of the UK modern age.  Old enough to have a job and life of their own, old enough to buy their own clothes but no.   Ask yourself did your parents ever buy you anything because you screamed at them all day?  No..thought not.

As I said this idle muse posting is really just because I wanted to share my annoyance with these adverts but there is one other point.  I know for a fact that these ad’s have been rather successful for M&M Direct.  Why you might ask.  They show horrid spoilt people being lazy.  Well I think its because…many people identify with these adverts and see their own lives in them….shudder.

GBS

Visibility wins Peoples Millions Prize

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I got an email in my inbox today that made me smile.  I support several charities and don’t talk about it much but one of the ones I enjoy supporting the most is Visibility a charity that assists those in the West of Scotland who suffer sight loss or blindness in their efforts to live a normal life.  With the small support of myself and many, many others the charity won a prize of more than thirty thousand pounds with the Peoples Millions prize.  This will allow them to do so much more excellent work.

Huzzah!

GBS

Children in Need 2013

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Today is the annual Children in Need event on television and I, along with the rest of the family have done my part.   I enjoy watching the televised event and I do not donate money by phone.  I donate money by hand held boxes, by boxes in shops and by way of Girvan Primary School’s events.  Today’s event was a ‘wear your pyjamas to school’ day which mercifully it stayed dry for.  After what has been a hectic week at work (see the Havelock ESO results over on the Ion Age blog) I finished up a bit early and picked the three offspring up at the school gate.

There are a lot of charities out there…a whole lot.  In fact I have got to the point where I ignore almost all of them as the feeling of guilt at not dropping coins into every hand that reached out was getting me down at a deep level.  This does not make me a bad person.  In fact I am a ruddy good person as all who know me will point out but my resources are limited.  So I choose which I support and Children get some priority in this as does the UK so Children in Need is near top of the list (after Sense).  It is a very worthwhile cause.

So have a look, have a read.  Have a watch if you can.  Give them some money too.  If you live in the UK and you walk home after work, sometimes the child you see in the street needs your help more than you might know.

GBS

Happy Birthday!

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Happy Birthday my darling wife.  Light of my life and inspirer of work and devotion unquestioned.  My adoration of you knows no bounds and your beauty is unsurpassed among all of nature’s creatures.  Is that enough….good, she put the cricket bat down.  🙂

Seriously though today is my good lady’s birthday and I have done my best to please her with gifts, food, attention, flowers and so on.  My last gift is this short display of public affection here on the blog.

Thanks also to everyone who visited today, who phoned, who sent cards and gifts.  Its nice to know friends are thinking of my good lady as she spends a lot of her time caring for children and doing favours for others.

GBS

First Appearance in Print for The Poet

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During the week we took delivery of a special book from my children’s school.  This book, as you can see above, took entries from across the United Kingdom by children who like to write and put them into one volume.  My middle son, The Poet, is really keen to be a bit like his dear dad and to have a room full of books some of which he wrote himself.  He was one of a hundred in the book.  This is the first step as it were to becoming an author. Well done!

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To avoid being a cynic I will point out that I was well aware that the massive seventeen pound price tag for this little book was a money making exercise but to be honest I did not care this time.  Seeing my son so happy about getting his little tale in a book was well worth the money to me.  Encouraging children is a prime part of parenthood and beyond keeping them safe, well fed and properly educated it’s at the top of the list.

GBS

Vodophone…a Customer Satisfaction Epic Fail!

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Today is a good day.  Why you ask…well its simple.  Today I got back the near two hundred pounds that Vodaphone took from my bank account.  Let me tell you a little story.

On the 28th of August I looked at my current account and discovered that two hundred pounds was missing.  Now that is not small change to anyone.  Asking in the bank I was told it was a charge from Vodaphone against my good lady. Which was odd since she no longer had a phone contract with them having cancelled and paid if off a month plus earlier moving to another provider.  I, being a civilised fellow, thought that a quick call to the company would resolve this and get my money back.  But no….

On the evening of the 28th my wife made half a dozen calls to their call centre and I kid you not the workers there not only did not help her but they all ‘accidentally’ hung up on her during the calls.  Eventually finding a decent chap we were told that they simply did not know why they took the money as we had no account!  Don’t worry we will sort it out they said.  Time passed, time passed.  We phoned back and tried again the next week and were promised a speedy solution and a return of the funds.  Well that was the 31st of August and here we are on the 9th of September.  That is, in the age of Paypal and instant communications, nearly two weeks to get a resolution.  Just not good enough.  Not at all!

I had to cancel plans, cut down my expenditure.  No one suffered but I feel strongly enough about this to say that they just ‘stole’ the money and then sat on it.

Well done Vodaphone you moved me to make a blog post like this something I avoid normally.  You will never get my custom again.

GBS

A Present from Vegas and Boston USA

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Give them Dice and Gummy Lobsters!

The Syme family got a gift in the mail this morning all the way from sunny Las Vegas by way of Boston Harbour and then back to England.  Within its cardboard walls the package contained three bags of bright red (the kind of red that only American candy customers get as those ‘e’ numbers are banned in the EU) Gummy Lobsters along with three silver metal dice.  Each of these dice filled with delicious Salt Water Taffy (something else that you cannot get with any ease in the UK).  Very kind to send these things in three’s it means that the three little Symes will not have to duel to the death over a share.

It always makes me smile when I get a gift like this.  It proves that people are good and that trying to be nice to everyone makes the world a nicer place.  Makes up for the potentially near fatal car crash I nearly had this afternoon with a primate who had both eyes on his phone and no hands on his steering wheel but…that is enough about that.

So.  Thanks Uncle Steve and Aunt Lesley!  Kisses from us all.  Expect a wee pressie from Girvan later this week or next.

GBS

Getting Ready for School…less affordable now?

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The summer holidays are over and the rain continues to fall in Scotland (well it was actually a good seven weeks all in for weather this year) and my three are going back to the land of education.  Aside from this being the first time for the youngest, The Warrior, it also means the need to buy yet more school uniforms and supplies.  So off I went and bought what was needed.  I looked for bargains, for special offers, for value and then bought it three times over.  I got all that was needed and it took most of a day to do it.

Well what can I say.  Despite looking for the best offers and making a killer saving on the older two boy’s shoes the cost was more than last year.  I know there is a third child now but its more than that.  The cost of everything was up.  I ain’t moaning, I am just saying as the song goes.  I am glad I don’t have to do this more than once a year (but items do need replaced regularly!).  Above you can see most of the pile, not all of it but it gives you an idea spread out more than six feet across.

Is the new gear for school starting less affordable now.  My opinion is that despite the claims of major retailers it really is.  I won’t say how much I spent but it has left a sizeable hole in my pocket.  What do you do if you have four, five or more children…share shoes or hope the government aids you is all I can say.

Moan over…back to the positive once more! 

GBS

Commonwealth Games – Glasgow 2014 – Irn Bru

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Brand New but Vintage Bru!

I have not been posting much here or on other forums and for that and the hundreds of you who read these items every day I am sorry.  But fear not the reason for this will be revealed in all of its awesomeness on Monday 19th August.  Just you wait…fans of 15mm especially.

Moving on from that good luck to Scotland in this evening’s football match against England at Wembley.  Victory will go to the Tartan Army I am sure (errr….maybe not) but its the first time that Scotland have played ‘The Auld Enemy’ since 1999 and I remember that match well.  I also now realise I am since that match a father of three, married, a home owner, a successful author and car driver among other things…it sure does creep up on you eh.  I will post a comment after the match and let you all know what happened.

Lastly the above image is of a brand new design of Irn-Bru can of fizzy drink which has been produced in celebration of Glasgow’s hosting of the 2014 Commonwealth Games.  We may not have been big enough to get the Olympics but this is just as good as it is actually near enough to visit.  The can has a vintage design on it and it looks and tastes very nice too.

All in all its a great week…and the kids go back to school on Monday too. 🙂

GBS

Parliamo Glasgow – Stanley Baxter

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While live is mighty fine by the sea in sunny Girvan, Ayrshire I do sometimes miss the city of my birth; Glasgow.  Following a recent conversation with a friend who has never been to the city and in trying to explain to them that when I was a ‘wean’ the dialect spoken there was often impenetrable not only to non-english native speakers but also the majority of the other residents of Britain!   While I speak reasonable ‘Glasgow’ I am long out of practise (except for creating Joccian dialect in Flintloque!) so I directed myself and friend to YouTube and Stanley Baxter.

Long, long ago the great Scottish comedian Stanley Baxter did a series of sketches, quite hard to get these days it seems, where he acted out typical scenes of the city and then after delivering the lines in ‘Glasgow’ he would then switch to a proper RP English accent to give a translation in the style of a travel programme.  Have a look and enjoy…even if you have to run it back a couple of times!

Oh and yes all Scottish people can speak proper English when they want, but what would be the fun in that.   Differences and diversity make Britain the great nation it is today.

GBS