Blog
5 September 2008
In my last post I described how I’d been ripped off after receiving an unsolicited reverse charge text message. Three weeks have now passed and I’m no longer out of pocket, so I thought I’d let everyone know what exactly happened...
As planned, I called Tanla Mobile’s London office number and spoke to one of their very helpful employees who explained that they were just a service provider and that the message would have actually been sent by a client of theirs. They took my details (including when I received the message and the number from which the message was sent) and said they’d get their client to call me.
Having heard nothing for a couple of days, I called them again. Tanla Mobile had apparently done their bit and told their client – Music HQ Limited (site currently offline) – to call me, but their client told them they hadn’t been able to get hold of me because I’d not answered and had no voicemail (which isn’t true). So I got a number and email address for Music HQ Media (0870 046 6622 / customer.care@musichqmedia.com) and reluctantly called them myself.
After finding out that the girl I was told to call had left the company that week, I explained my problem to another one of Music HQ’s customer care representatives and was told they’d look into it and call me back within 30 to 60 minutes. Two hours later, having heard nothing, I called them back and got the full story of how this happened...
Basically, Music HQ had purchased a list of mobile numbers from a direct marketing company called Discovery Media Direct where I’d apparently subscribed to something and opted in to my number being sold for marketing purposes.
Music HQ had then “accidentally” sent messages to people from this list instead of their subscribers (who had actually opted in to receiving paid messages, unlike me). When I asked them how many people this had affected, they replied saying something like, “It was a hundred or so but most of those have requested refunds now!”
So on this occasion alone, at least 100 people had received the same message as me, Music HQ had illegally taken £1.50 from their mobile phone bill and then done nothing to try and refund this amount unless the victim of the theft requested it. And I say ‘on this occasion’ because the links I provided in my last post go back to July and September 2007, which seems to suggest this isn’t the first time this has happened, and it probably won’t be the last!
Anyway, they told me I would receive a refund of £2 (including a 50p “goodwill gesture”) by way of a text message sent to my mobile from the Post Office which I would then need to go and collect from any one of their branches. This should’ve arrived with 1-2 working days. So after 3 days, I emailed them and they increased the refund to £3 and I got the message the day after, one week later than originally intended. (As an aside, the Post Office staff were completely puzzled by the message when I showed it to them and they had to call a helpline to figure out how to issue my with the £3!)
Tanla Mobile say that for them to ban Music HQ, even though they’ve admitted to (allegedly accidentally but nevertheless) fraudulently taking money from me, they would need ‘lots’ of complaints to be made to PhonepayPlus who operate on a volume basis before taking action against any company.
In the process of all this, Tanla Mobile has now blocked my number from all their services at my request and Music HQ has requested my number to be removed and blocked from all their services and also from Discovery Media Direct. At least this should never happen to me again, but we’ll see...
Labels: mobile, personal, rant
15 August 2008
As you should already know, I recently got an iPhone and switched to O2 for my mobile contract. I got my first online bill two days ago and noticed it was more than I thought it should be. I’d not exceeded my call or text allowance. Nor had I exceeded my unlimited data usage either. Was I being screwed by some kind of Jesus Phone Tax? Thankfully not...
After drilling down through five pages of my online bill for more details, I found the charge was for a “Premium Text” sent by 81404 to my mobile on 25 July 2008 at 22:03:18. For the pleasure of receiving this message, I had been charged £1.277 + VAT (i.e. £1.50). I’ve never signed up for anything using my mobile, so this was completely unsolicited. I vaguely remember receiving this message and just deleting it because I assumed it was good old free-to-receive-spam. It definitely didn’t say I’d been charged for receiving it.
I’ve just called O2 to get a refund and the customer service representative suggested I could have “mistyped a number” or “accidentally pressed some keys” while the phone was in my pocket. (He even told me that he knows how easy it is to do this because he’s done it himself!) I explained that the iPhone doesn’t have any keys and that it would be pretty much impossible to send a text message to 81404 by accident, so he was a bit stumped for ideas and put me on hold.
When he came back, he told me the name of the company who had sent the message and gave me a number for them so that I could ask for a refund and said that there was nothing more he could do because I’d entered into a contract with this other company! I explained again that I’d not requested the message and that my contract was solely with O2, who were taking the money from my bank account. He replied with the call-centre-classic: “I’m sorry you feel that way.” To which I replied that it wasn’t a case of how I was ‘feeling’ and that it was fact. He eventually admitted that I was right about O2 taking the money from my account (albeit on behalf of this other company) but still said there was nothing more he could do.
After getting off the phone, I did a quick search and found I’m not the only one who has been ripped off by this scam. Here are some links to others in the same boat:
After searching PhonepayPlus, the regulators for products and services that are charged to users’ phone bills or pre-pay accounts, for 81404 I know the number belongs to:
Tanla Mobile Ltd
39 Charing Cross Road
London
WC2H 0AR
Tel: 08719 180 999
customercare@tanlamobile.com
The O2 guy told me it was for a service called SineQuiz which I guess they might operate. Both the PhonepayPlus and Tanla Mobile’s offices are closed right now but I’ll definitely be calling them next week – and I’ll be using Tanla Mobile’s London office number (0207 494 5600) rather than calling their 0871-RIP-U-OFF number!
I can’t believe this is allowed to happen. Can you imagine turning up at someone’s house with a letter and charging them £1.50 for it without giving them the option of refusing it altogether? Mobile technology has failed me. It should not be possible to get charged a premium rate for merely receiving a text message.
Update: 5 September 2008 (14:04)
I eventually managed to find out how this happened and actually got a refund. Read more in my next post here: Reverse Charge SMS: Refund Received
Labels: mobile, personal, rant
29 April 2008
I’ve just realised that almost three months has gone by since my last post. That’s quite simply because I’ve been rather busy and haven’t found the time to write any blog posts... other than the occasional one for Google Blogoscoped, which celebrated five years in the blogosphere yesterday. (Congratulations Philipp!)
One of the many reasons why I’ve been so busy is because I’ve been going to lots of gigs. So here’s a big long post wrapping up all the gigs I’ve been to this month to make up for it.
Scouting For Girls – Tuesday 8th April 2008
I’d seen Scouting For Girls on BBC2’s Something For The Weekend the Sunday before the gig and they seemed like decent lads who were still enjoying their newfound fame, having only been signed for a year or so. Their excitement is quite obvious when they’re performing. In fact, I think the lead singer was more excited to play the Sheffield Octagon gig than usual because they’d had to cancel four gigs the previous week due to him having a sore throat or something. Although still recovering from this, his ability to work the audience – which mainly consisted of teenage girls, some of which were even holding banners they’d presumably made at school by sticking a few A4 pieces of coloured paper together – didn’t suffer one bit.
Their young fan-base aside, my main grumble would be that they seem to be one of these bands that likes to play a song, get half way through, stop playing, chat with the audience for a while, and then end the song with a ‘big finish’ a couple of minutes later. This would be fine for one song, and maybe two maximum, but it gets a bit tiresome when it feels like it’s almost every song, probably emphasised by the fact that some of the songs do sound quite similar. Other than that, it was a pretty good gig.
Reverend and The Makers – Friday 11th April 2008
To be honest, the main reason for going to this gig was to be there for the opening night of the venue. Around 10 years ago, everyone at university used to go to The Roxy every Wednesday night. The promise of free entry and free beer before 11pm got the crowds of poor students through its doors without fail. But with deals like those, it wasn’t going to stay open for much longer. Apart from a crazy spell where it was home to St Thomas’s Church for a while, it’s been empty pretty much since then until the Academy Music Group took over in November last year and turned it into the Carling Academy Sheffield. Having watched the outside of the venue being slowly transformed from The Roxy Disco into Carling Academy Sheffield, I was intrigued to see what they’d done with the place.
As it turns out, they’d done a pretty good job on the inside of the venue. From my hazy memories of the place, I think they’ve moved a couple of bars, refitted the balcony and generally given it a lick of paint and freshened up everywhere a bit. I was particularly pleased to see they’ve got a red neon ROXY sign upstairs as a tribute to the venue’s historical signs on each side of the building which were removed as part of the refurbishment.
It’s a shame they’d not given as much attention to the support acts they’d booked for the opening night. The first band didn’t sound too bad when we walked through the doors, but then their Kelly-Osbourne-esque singer started to literally murder the rest of their set with her noise. And the next act was even worse. Consisting of what appeared to be two bouncers, two chav girls drinking alcopops and some guy on the decks, the best thing about their act was their “Radio Head” mascot who had a boom box for a head and did poor robotic-style dancing for some of the songs. I can only imagine that they chose these two terrible acts to make The Reverend seem better by comparison.
Despite what Chris Hill has to say about them, I quite like Reverend and The Makers. They should really be called The Makers and Reverend though because it’s The Makers who provide pretty much all of the talent, playing real instruments and belting out some tight tunes. What helped to keep me amused was the fact that The Reverend looked like my mate Gav who was the bass player in a band I was in years ago. Still, they played all the best tunes from the album and they sounded pretty similar actually – and much better than their live performances I’ve caught on TV – so I wasn’t disappointed.
Towards the end of the gig, I went to get my coat and wait for Suzy and Chris near the doors, only to see the entire audience running towards me. I found out afterwards that The Reverend had grabbed his acoustic guitar and told everyone to follow him through the front doors of the venue, where he was making his way to the fictional Penelope’s venue (which turned out to be outside The Crucible) where he was doing a post-gig acoustic set as advertised on some flyers which were being given out before the gig. I soon gathered what was going on when security were trying to make way for him to get out. Since I was stood in the middle of the door way, I stepped to one side and gave him a pat on the back, telling him he’d played a good gig.
The Fratellis – Sunday 13th April 2008
I was really surprised a few weeks ago to hear that The Fratellis were playing a small venue like The Leadmill and jumped at the chance to get tickets. They could have easily have filled a much bigger venue and on the night The Leadmill was absolutely packed, more than I’d even seen it before.
Bar service is usually pretty slow anyway on gig nights, but given that for this gig they were decanting every single bottle at the bottle bar into plastic glasses, it took us 40 minutes to get a drink, made worse by the fact some idiot staff member had seemingly ordered only half pint (284ml) plastic glasses which the bar staff were then using for 330ml bottles of beer and just throwing the rest of the beer away until some guy pointed out they were ripping everyone off!
Bar problems aside, the gig was fantastic. I’ve heard some of The Fratellis’ live stuff before and was expecting it to sound a bit raw, so I was pleasantly surprised when their sound was really polished. Embarrassingly, it took Suzy and I about half a song to realise it was actually them who’d taken to the stage because the lead singer had wet his hair, instead of having the big curly mop he usually has, and they opened with a new song we’d not heard before. It’s a shame they hadn’t released their new album before the gig (it’s out in June) but if the new tracks they played are anything to go by, it’s going to be a good ’un...
Anyway, check out what you missed and watch the video above or view the rest of the photos and videos on Flickr.
We Are Scientists – Thursday 17th April 2008
I first saw We Are Scientists when they supported Kaiser Chiefs at Sheffield Arena last December. Having bought their album after that gig, it seems I first heard them when I played Burnout on my Xbox, which features one of their track. They’re a really good live band who really try and interact with the audience. This didn’t work too well when they were in Sheffield Arena in front of an audience waiting to see Kaiser Chiefs but worked really well at Sheffield Octagon.
I seem to remember there being some discussion about Yorkshire puddings but I can’t remember much about it as I’d drunk more than I should have done really. But from what I remember about the gig, it was good.
The Kooks – Monday 28th April 2008
For the final gig of the month, we went to see The Kooks again, having really enjoyed seeing them play their V Festival warm-up gig at Doncaster Dome last year. Another gig at The Roxy, but the support act was much better than the last time we were there. Palladium kind of looked and sounded like they’d stepped into 2008 straight from the 1980s, but in a good way; you just don’t hear enough guitar licks and synth sounds like those anymore!
Before going to the gig, I’d been listening to The Kooks’ new album. There are some mixed reviews knocking around but I think it’s pretty good. I reckon it’s quite similar to the first album. There’s a good mix of catchy tunes on there. In keeping with the neon KONK sign on the new album cover, when the curtain dropped there was a massive flashing, buzzing, blue neon KOOKS sign above the stage. Much to my amusement, due to the dodgy neon font they’d used, the sign looked more like it said BOOBS rather than KOOKS though.
Once again, we spotted some banners saying things like “LUKE IS A SEX GOD” and “I ♥ THE KOOKS” and a cleverly timed banner just saying “YES” in response to the lyric, “Do you wanna make love to me?” The audience did’t seem that young at this gig though, so perhaps this is just the latest thing. Maybe I’ll make some for when we go to see some more bands next month...
Anyway, despite the banners that made us feel like we were at a Take That concert, this was an excellent gig. They played all the best songs from both albums and I had a right good sing-a-long!
Again, you can watch the video above or view the rest of the photos and videos on Flickr.
Still to come next month: The Wombats, Joe Lean & The Jing Jang Jong and The Pigeon Detectives.
Labels: music, personal, rant
14 January 2008
For Christmas, Suzy got More Brain Training from Dr Kawashima: How Old is Your Brain for her Nintendo DS. I’ve been playing it a little bit to see whether I’ve managed to maintain my “brain age” of 20, which is the best score you can get and what I achieved on the last version. (I’m currently scoring the same as my real age, so that’s pretty good given that my brain’s probably a bit out of practice.)
Anyway, one of the new games to help train your brain is Word Blend. Several words are played simultaneously through the speaker and you then have to write on the screen what you heard, testing your hearing and spelling abilities. After several failed attempts to write down one of the words I heard the other day, I finally gave up. And what did it say the answer was?
TOMATOE
How can I ever trust Dr Kawashima again?!
Labels: gadgets, personal, rant
6 September 2007
I have to say that the iPod touch is one shiny new sexy gadget I’m going to have to try my hardest to resist. I got my 8GB second generation iPod nano less than a year ago and I’m really happy with it, so I can’t really justify spending £199 on another 8GB player. (I guess I’ll just have to spend £269 on the 16GB version instead...)
But that’s not what I wanted to rant about. This is what I wanted to rant about: iPod touch’s fat little brother...
My iPod nano looks slim and sexy, but the screen is tiny and it can’t play video. Apple understandably had to do something about that, so they made this one a bit wider and shorter. And now it looks like the little fatty of the family!
So, with a bit of photoshopping, I given that fat little iPod nano a quick tummy tuck by moving the Click Wheel. People don’t need to see the Click Wheel in order to use it, so why not make the device smaller by moving it to the back? (There might need to be an option to flip the functionality of the Click Wheel though, as it should probably work the opposite way around with it being on the back, but some people inevitably wouldn’t be able to get the hang of it.)
Now doesn’t that look better? I’m no electronics expert, so I don’t know how difficult this would have been to put in to production, but Apple have proved in the past that virtually anything is possible when it comes to them cramming advanced technology into slick designs. I realise there are probably some issues with the physical size of batteries and memory chips, but they could probably have worked around that by making it a bit deeper.
Update: 7 September 2007 (13:46)
Thanks to the iFixit gang, we can see that it probably is just the battery size that would be a problem. If only I had a few hundred quid spare to buy a couple of these to tinker with... [via Gizmodo]
This design would be a neat first step towards the interface in Apple’s patent for Back-Side Interface for Hand-Held Devices – brought to our attention by Unwired View earlier this year – which consists of an active touchpanel covering the entire reverse side of the iPod that can be used to control the device.
What do you think? Would you buy a fatso iPod nano? Would you buy one of these? Would you like to buy me a 16GB iPod touch?
[Original images from Apple.]
Labels: gadgets, ipod, rant
14 June 2007
Things have been a bit quiet on this blog recently. That’s partly because five weeks ago I finally signed up to Facebook, which is currently the best way to spend all your spare time doing nothing on the Internet. (More accurately, I received an invite to join Facebook from a friend, but since I wanted to use a different email address than the one where I’d received the invite, I had to register an account and then search for the friend who’d sent the invite in the first place... but more on that later.)
Facebook always seems to get mixed reactions; people either love it and can’t get enough of it, hate it because they don’t see the point, or like the idea but find it useless because they don’t have any friends (either on Facebook or in reality). When Chris joined, he described it as being “Friends Reunited done well. Or Friends reunited with Twitter and Flickr added on. And with blogger.” Coco signed up and hated it at first, but soon changed his mind once he’d got a few more friends and found out it had an API. Now he loves it so much that he’s written a Recipe Binder application for Facebook. Generally speaking though, the people who ‘get’ it and use it properly quickly become addicted to it. And I know this because I’ve seen loads of people update their status to things like, “Chris is addicted to Facebook.”
So what’s so good about Facebook then?
Here are five things:
You can tag people in photos, enabling you to view all photos of your friends regardless of who took them. This makes it much more useful than Flickr when it comes to parties and group photos.
Not only can you leave comments for your friends on their walls, but you can use the Wall-to-Wall feature to view your conversation with them in chronological order. The lack of a feature like that on MySpace confused the hell out of me.
When you login, you see your News Feed which shows you what’s happening with all your friends, like who’s been writing on walls, which groups they’ve been joining, what their current status is, whether they’ve uploaded new photos. Again, MySpace had nothing like this. Checking all your friends’ profile pages for new stuff on MySpace is a right ball-ache.
They have a pretty decent mobile version of the site at m.facebook.com which lets you do most things, such as update your status, view profiles, write on walls and accept friend requests.
They recently released a development platform so that anyone can write applications for Facebook. That’s good for Facebook (because they don’t have to bother doing much new development), good for users (because they get loads of useful or otherwise interesting applications) and good for developers (because they get to show off their skills and stuff).
And what’s bad about it?
Here are another five things:
They’re sneaky bastards and ask you for your Gmail/Yahoo/Hotmail account password so that they can send invites to all your contacts. By making this part of the registration process, they’ve been hugely successful in spreading their Facebook love.
If someone sends an invite to an email address other than the one you’ve got registered with Facebook – or the one you want to register with Facebook if you’re a new user – you can’t accept the invitation. When you click the link, you don’t get the option to login. This means you either have to login and search your friend or start messing about with parameters in query strings. While Facebook does allow you to add multiple email addresses to your account, I still got an invite the other day asking me to register even though I’d added that email address, so I don’t know what’s going on there.
There’s no easy way to find out which people you’ve already sent friend requests. The closest you can get is the list of people who can view your profile on the Poke, Message and Friend Request Settings privacy page.
There’s no option to remain signed in on the main site. However, the mobile version does leave you signed in. I guess this is because it was originally aimed at schools and universities where most people would probably be using shared computers. They should at least make this an option now.
They recently released a Developer Platform so that anyone can write applications for Facebook. That’s bad for users because Facebook profiles will probably start to become overly cluttered and messy like most MySpace profiles, especially when some applications have a ‘viral invite system’ which essentially sends invites to all the friends of anyone who adds the application.
Of course, if I’m wrong about any of those points, let me know.
Facebook me!
Today’s blog post was brought to you by the number 5...
Labels: facebook, personal, rant
27 May 2007
A few months ago I was invited on an outing to see some cricket. Since I’m not into cricket, I declined the offer. Then someone explained that “watching cricket” actually just involves lots of drinking, so I obviously accepted.
It’s now 19:00 on a Sunday evening. We’ve been awake for around twelve hours and have been drinking alcoholic beverages for approximately eight of those, some since before 9:00! It’s been raining all day too, which means we’ve seen no cricket whatsoever (except for some old highlights they showed on TV). Are we bothered? Not really. We’ve had fun, cricket or not.
Here are some points for discussion though:
Why does HotPhil keep interrupting me? (Just because he’s already written his post perhaps?)
Why didn’t they put a few more carriages on our train from Sheffield to Leeds when they knew it was going to be packed like it is every year because everyone’s going to watch the cricket?
Why didn’t they build a roof over the stadium when they knew that they were building it in the North of England where it will obviously rain whenever a test match is scheduled?
Why did Chris Hill go home so early? (Cos he was hammered, perhaps?)
Why does Coco Smiley McRiley keep denying his Scottish heritage?
Is live blogging actually a good idea when you’ve been drinking all day?
Labels: personal, rant
22 April 2007
On Friday night, we visited Sheffield’s Under the Boardwalk. As far as live music venues go, UTB (as it is sometimes called) is quite a strange place. Most venues usually start off empty when the first band is playing and then get gradually busier as the night goes on. UTB is the complete opposite. We arrived just before 9PM and there were quite a few people there. Around an hour and a half and two bands later, the place had almost emptied. Maybe the audience hated the first two bands. Or perhaps they’d gone upstairs to The Boardwalk. Either way, I’d recommend that anyone thinking of playing there should try to get an early spot rather than a headlining one!
We’d gone to support Bolton’s Out Of The Gray embark on their UK tour, as I mentioned back in February. For an unsigned band to take time out from their day jobs and invest their own cash to go on a national tour for several weeks takes guts. Yarky (lead guitar) said in a recent interview:
I think we’ll be spending the best part of a thousand pounds on petrol and accommodation for the tour, then there’s the initial outlay on merchandise, and there’s really no guarantee of making any of it back. It’s hard for people to understand that when you’re doing this as an unsigned band you’re generally losing money hand over fist – everyone wants to come in for free or get a free copy of the album, and sometimes you just have to learn to say ‘no’.
I agree entirely. In this digital day where unsigned bands dominate MySpace, everyone wants free music downloads. And whilst it’s much easier for unsigned bands to get noticed, it’s still difficult for them to make any money – or just break even. At the time of writing this, Out Of The Gray’s MySpace profile has received 158,659 views, has 53,331 friends and they’ve had 6,711 comments – most of which are from ‘fans’ saying how much they love their music and can’t wait to see them live. Yet when I purchased and downloaded their latest tracks from their online store last week, I was their first customer, and I think I was one of only two people to buy their CD at the gig (which I guess wasn’t too bad given most of the audience had already left). Why more people can’t put their money where their mouth is and do more to support these unsigned bands, I don’t know...
Anyway, here’s a quick review of the bands we saw that night:
-
Frame 3-13 – myspace.com/frame313
For three young lads from Swansea who describe themselves as being the love child of Placebo and Jamiroquai, these looked and sounded pretty good. Their funky indie music is sufficiently different to most of the droning same-same indie stuff out there, although they would clearly benefit from their lead singer/guitarist learning how to play a few more solos (each one sounded pretty similar from where I was standing) and toning down his obviously-rehearsed-stage-antics – i.e. “At this part of the song, I must drop to my knees in front of the bass player and bend over backwards whilst still playing guitar!” Overall, not bad though.
-
The Smokestacks – myspace.com/thesmokestacks
If you were to go off first appearances, you’d think these were a bunch of weirdos. After a couple of songs into the set, you’d realise these weirdos make great music. Not afraid to have fun on stage by throwing in the odd bit of comedy barbershop quartet style singing, their incredibly tight funky beats, crazy synth sounds and unique look helped them to own the stage.
-
Out Of The Gray – myspace.com/outofthegray
Definitely the most professional looking of the four bands – with laminated passes, spare guitars and communicating with the sound engineer over the monitor levels – Out Of The Gray were almost a complete contrast in style to the previous two bands. Strong acoustic guitar playing, powerful vocals and meaningful songs make them easy listening and an excellent live band, although maybe a little mismatched with the other acts playing that night. Personally, I think their performance would have been almost perfect if there was a bit more movement and interaction between the band members on stage, particularly from the bassist who looked a little lost at the back and almost bored.
-
Strategic Intent – myspace.com/strategicintent
I’m not sure whether this band was a bit deflated because the audience was pretty non-existent but they seemed to be just another pretty average indie/rock band. Maybe they perked up a bit later but we left before they’d finished their 2nd song and pretty much halved the number of people in the audience... sorry lads!
So despite being the small, strange venue that it is, we’ll probably go back to Under the Boardwalk from time-to-time to see if there are any more talented bands out there.
Labels: music, personal, rant
1 April 2007
(Times are approximate...)
07:00 Got my Google Calendar SMS reminder to buy tickets for Glastonbury Festival
07:50 Got out of bed and had a shower
08:20 Checked my emails and the GlastonburyFestivals.co.uk website to see what I should be doing
08:40 Visited the Seetickets.com website only to get redirected to busy.seetickets.com by their load-balancing software
08:50 Setup two laptops and distributed the URLs and phone numbers to Suzy and Jo
09:00 Started to reload the web pages and constantly redial the phone numbers
09:05 Noticed that even busy.seetickets.com wasn’t able to cope with the number of visitors
09:10 Started thinking of ways to buy tickets via back-door methods, including doing reverse lookups and trying different aliases for the seetickets.com domain and server (some of which even worked!)
10:30 Found lots of blogs with posts by smug bastards saying they’d secured tickets after 30 minutes of trying, including one that claimed he’d got a more direct link to the order page from eFestivals.co.uk
10:31 Cursed all those smug bastards for a while
10:40 Registered on the Festival Forums to find that goddamn link and alternative phone numbers! (Turns out it was just another alias which I’d not tried, so felt a little pleased that I was on the right track!)
10:45 Standard (non-coach package) tickets SOLD OUT but not really bovvered cos we wanted coach tickets anyway!
10:46 More frequent reloading of the coach ticket sales web page and constant redialling of all the phone numbers we could find
11:10 Web page loaded, details entered, checked and double-checked (although slightly shocked by the fact that the coach departs on the Wednesday and returns on the Monday!)
11:15 FOUR TICKETS PURCHASED! I’M GOING TO GLASTONBURY!!!
22:43 Still waiting for the email confirmation, which may take up to 24 hours apparently... although that still doesn’t stop the paranoia that something went wrong with the transaction and we’ve not actually got the tickets!
Update: 2 April 2007 (18:10)
Don’t panic... I received my confirmation email at around 08:29 this morning!
Having read a few forums, blogs and all these comments on the BBC website, it seems that some people got through in minutes without any problems whilst others had several PCs and phones going for hours (like us) and yet still didn’t manage to get tickets. With 400,000 people having pre-registered their details and most probably having several PCs and phone lines trying to get through to bag one of the 137,500 tickets, it’s no surprise that phone lines were jammed and the websites couldn’t cope!
So could this have been handled more efficiently? Should they have had more phone lines open? Should they have had more web servers? Would a lottery be a better, fairer way to allocate the tickets?
Personally, I think that what happened today was a lottery anyway. Whether or not you’ve managed to get Glastonbury tickets was mainly down to luck, and I think the wide variety of circumstances under which people were successful in getting their tickets proves this. Unfortunately, everyone who didn’t get tickets will say the system failed and it was unfair – but that will always be the case no matter how they are allocated.
Labels: music, personal, rant
13 March 2007
I heard a radio advert this morning telling my that if I blow my car tyres up to the correct pressure, I’ll be helping to reduce global warming. At least, I think that’s what the point was. It was early. Anyway, the ad finished by saying something along the lines of:
Search the web for [act on co2] for more information.
It seems that this is the latest campaign from the UK Government to help educate people about ways in which we can prevent global warming. (I think.) And since they were restricted to a 30-second advert, someone had the bright idea of telling people to search the web to find out more. What a great idea!
So let’s take a look at the results returned by the four most popular search engines...
Google – www.google.com/search?q=act+on+co2
Yahoo – search.yahoo.com/search?p=act+on+co2
Windows Live – search.live.com/results.aspx?q=act+on+co2
Ask – www.ask.com/web?q=act+on+co2
Whilst some of the information you find when searching for [act on co2] on any search engine could potentially be useful, I think it’s obvious that the UK government intended people to use Google and find the Department for Transport’s website.
Why didn’t they just grab ActOnCO2.com (which is available) or another similar domain? Or just tell people “to google” for [act on co2] instead?
(Maybe they wanted to avoid parody sites being setup using similar domains like what happened when they launched their Preparing for Emergencies campaign a few years ago...)
Labels: ask, google, microsoft, personal, rant, yahoo
8 March 2007
(This was going to be one big post containing a few things I kept meaning to blog about because I couldn’t be bothered to write separate posts, but once I started writing I realised they were long enough to be posts on their own... so get ready whilst I open the post flood gates!)
Last month, I took Suzy to see Shakespeare’s romantic comedy “As You Like It” at the Crucible for Valentine’s Day. The play was alright; the usual minimal sets were used and there was some decent acting by young actors. (We didn’t understand all parts of the play though due to all that crazy Shakespeare language.) However, the main thing I took away from the evening was the realisation that young people today don’t have the same flair for language as the older generations.
This struck me when we were making our way to out seats and decided that rather than disturb the several elderly people already sitting on our row, we’d walk down the row behind and step over the backs of our seats. Upon doing this, the gentlemen sitting next to Suzy said:
Your kindness is only exceeded by your athletic ability.
Now that’s miles betterer than how da kids spk 2day innit.
D’ya get me?
Labels: personal, rant, theatre
6 February 2007
Seriously. WTF is going on with the music industry these days? A few years ago I decided to ‘go straight’ and stop copying CDs from my mates and give up downloading music ‘for free’ from the Internet completely. I decided that if I wanted a CD, I would buy it. And I’ve been doing that successfully for quite a few years now. But then the digital age forced itself upon us...
Last year, I bought myself an 8GB iPod nano and ripped all my CDs to it – all of which were originals and legally mine. I actually don’t know whether ripping CDs like that is legal or not, and nor do I care, but it’s not immoral and that’s what counts (your honour).
For one of my Christmas presents, I got an iTunes Music Voucher to buy some tracks that are only available through iTunes. I purchased and downloaded them without any problems but was slightly peeved that I had to “authorise” my computer to play them. I figured that I could probably live with that though and burnt a copy to CD just in case I should ever wish to play the songs I’ve purchased on another player.
And that was my first experience of Digital Rights Management. It wasn’t too bad. I’d heard so many people moaning about it but really didn’t understand what all the fuss was about. It seemed fair enough to me. Until tonight...
When I got my new phone in December, part of my contract gives me £5 worth of free downloads each month. The great thing about the 3 Music Store is that when you purchase and download tracks to your mobile, you can also download them to your PC at no extra cost. That’s good because I don’t want to listen to music on my mobile; I have an iPod for that purpose. The problem? The tracks you download to your PC are DRM-protected WMA files. From the 3 Music Store FAQ:
Is the service compatible with iPod?
No. However, you can transfer your 3MusicPlayer tracks to any mp3 player which supports WMA format. Some third party applications exist for converting WMAs to mp3s but these are not supported or endorsed by 3.
Just to confirm: even though I have just spent ninety-nine British pence sterling on one three-minute long music track (ignore the fact that it was actually free) they’re trying to tell me that I can’t play it on the device of my choice? No problem. I’ll just burn it to a CD and rip it into an unencrypted format so I can play it on my iPod. (Again, I don’t know whether that’s legal but it’s definitely not immoral... is it?)
Anyway, here’s where the music industry, the record companies, Microsoft, 3 and DRM all get together and screw me over. The first time I tried to burn the CD, it failed. I was trying to use some old blank CDs and figured I was trying to burn too fast. So I tried again at a slower speed. Still no luck. So I tried again in my other CD drive. That didn’t work either. Having finally found some better quality CDs, I thought I’d give it one more try with an old disc in the 2nd drive on the slowest speed possible. Surely that would work, right? Nope! Because I’m only allowed to try and burn the tracks to a CD three times!!!
What sort of craziness is that? Even though I legally purchased and downloaded that music, and was only trying to listen to it on my preferred music device, I am now only able to listen to it either through the crappy, tinny stereo speakers on my mobile phone or through my PC speakers. I honestly feel like I’ve been put into a virtual prison for a crime that I didn’t commit!
Tell me, is it really worth trying to play fair by supporting musicians through purchasing their music in this digital age when the record companies are punishing the innocent like this?
Labels: gadgets, ipod, microsoft, mobile, music, personal, rant
12 November 2006
I finally took the plunge and installed Windows Internet Explorer 7 this evening. (Why they changed the name from Microsoft Internet Explorer to Windows Internet Explorer, I have no idea. Nor do I care really; it was just an observation...)
Despite how other people reported that they needed to reboot as many as three times (or more) following installation, I only had to reboot once. In fact, the installation was quite painless really. My biggest issue was the time it took to download the update and finally install it. It was probably going on for 20 or 30 minutes. By comparison, Firefox 2 took seconds to download and another few seconds to install. I guess that’s the price Microsoft has to pay when it integrates the web browser with the operating system so tightly. Whatever the reason, it’s one point to Firefox.
I’ve only tried using it for a couple of hours now and there are some quite things that are already annoying me. The first and most obvious change that’s causing a problem is the interface. I’ve read numerous other reports about how bad everyone thinks this is too – so how the heck did it ever get passed usability testing? Microsoft, please don’t make me think. And if you absolutely must include some snazzy new navigation, please provide me with a “classic” option to change it back to what I know. Firefox didn’t change their interface between versions, so they get another point.
One of the first things I did was activate the Menu Bar (File, Edit, View, etc.) only to find that it sticks it under the Address Bar! Fortunately, I’d already read this post on Anthony’s blog so I knew how to stop it doing that. That makes things a little bit better but it’s still getting on my nerves. Why they decided to stop users from moving their toolbars around like they’ve always been able to, I’ll never know. As far as I’m concerned, an essential feature has been removed. Another point to Firefox.
It seems Internet Explorer now has tabbed browser, eh? Personally, I can take or leave tabbed browsing. I still don’t fully understand the difference between using tabs in a browser and using buttons in your task bar. But thousands of people rant and rave about how good they are, so I guess they must be right. What really confuses me is why there’s no option to “Open in New Tab” when you right-click a link. (And that “Open” option has always been pointless; why would anyone not just left-click?) Of course, Firefox already has that option. Yet another point to Firefox.
After trying out a few of my websites in it, I realised that there were a couple of small changes I needed to make. When I followed my shortcut to the FTP site, it opened in IE7 rather than Windows Explorer. I then had to find the “Open FTP site in Windows Explorer” option, as the page suggested. (Why couldn’t they just give me a link to click that would do that instead of making me go hunting around for it?) So that was pretty annoying... and it was even more annoying when I realised that it does this every time! Minus one point to Internet Explorer.
One thing I do quite like though is the ClearType feature. I do find it strange how they make text appear clearer by actually making it more blurred though. Either way, it seems to work. But at least you can switch it off if you don’t like it. At last – one point to Internet Explorer!
And at the end of that round, Firefox has 4 points but Internet Explorer has zero!
Ever since around 1999, my default browser has always been Internet Explorer. And before that, I think it was Netscape 4. I guess I just never got around to switching to Firefox. I didn’t really have a good reason to do so either. However, with IE7 being so different to IE6, I’m now being forced to make a change.
Should I switch to Windows Internet Explorer 7 or Mozilla Firefox 2...?
Update: 14 November 2006 (21:58)
After switching between the two quite a bit tonight, I’ve just made a decision and changed my default browser to Firefox 2. I’ve also deleted any shortcuts to Internet Explorer as I know that my mouse would automatically go for the little blue “e” icon without even thinking about it...
If Firefox 2 annoys me too much in the next week, I may even try Opera 9 and see how I cope with that – IE7 was irritating me too much though after just two days!
(And I’ve already benefited from the spell check feature of Firefox 2 just whilst typing this – and yet I’ve not seen one single benefit of using IE7 in two days!)
Labels: development, firefox, microsoft, personal, rant
26 October 2006
For the past few weeks, we’ve been getting calls to our home phone from the same two numbers:
- 01709 763840
- 01709 842700
They’ve called on a daily basis each weekday, sometimes several times a day, but never leave a message. When we call them back, it’s just a recorded message saying that we’ve received a call from a telemarketing company (they don’t say who exactly) and that they were going to tell us about some products that we may be interested in.
Well, today I googled the numbers (note to the lawyers: I googled using Google) and found out that (i) I could buy the numbers on eBay and (ii) someone else who’d also been hounded by one of the numbers was told by BT that it was a “power dialler” that automatically dials numbers from its database and puts them through to a call centre operator when you answer. Obviously, if a call centre operator isn’t available, it could result in silent call.
We’d already registered with the Telephone Preference Service but this apparently doesn’t necessarily stop these types of calls. Instead, you’re supposed to register your number on the Silent Callgard Service* database, which you can do by visiting their website at www.silentguard.co.uk or by calling 0870 444 3969. It’s a service that’s supported by the TPS but Ofcom apparently aren’t so keen on it because it doesn’t eliminate the problem at the source; instead, it simply masks it from the person registering their details, and if you don’t file a complaint with them, they can’t carry out an investigation. So, it seems you should also register a complaint with Ofcom too, just for good measure.
I’ve no idea whether this will stop these annoying calls – or whether it’s already too late for us – but this is the type of useful information I think is worth passing on.
Update: 26 October 2006 (20:46)
Well, what a coincidence! I just received a call from one of the numbers whilst I was actually at home to take the call! It turned out to be a company called Ace European Group who run an outbound call centre. It’s true that they were trying to sell me something; it’s not true that it was something I was interested in. They’d apparently got my number from Burtons (since I have a store card there) and, as such, I was “eligible” to give them my money for something. Anyway, maybe the calls will stop now that I’ve managed to tell them to remove my details from their database. Hopefully the information above will be useful for somebody else though...
* Note: This is also rather inconsistently known as Silentcall-gard, SilentcallGard and Silent CallGard.
Labels: personal, rant
24 July 2006
Here we go again. Last time it was Walkers that got on my wick. This time it’s Cadbury. Why? Firstly because their Cadbury Boost bars are substandard and secondly because they didn’t even bother to read my complaint properly. Here’s what I sent them via their website last Wednesday:
Dear Cadbury,
Every single time I purchase one of your delicious Cadbury Boost bars, I carefully tear open the wrapper to discover that it’s stuck to my Boost because all the caramel goodness has leaked out of the base of the bar! I then have to spend a good few minutes trying to scrape the caramel off the wrapper with my teeth so that I don’t waste any. This always happens regardless of where I’ve purchased my Boost.
Is there something inherently wrong with the design of the Boost bar that makes it impossible for the bar to contain its caramel filling? Is this a known issue? Have you got anybody in your company working on a more sturdy Boost design?
I look forward to your comments.
Kind regards,
Tony Ruscoe
On Friday morning, I received my reply by post:
Dear Mr Ruscoe,
I am very concerned that you had cause to contact us about Cadbury Boost, but would thank you for taking the time and trouble to bring this matter to our attention.
Great care is taken during the manufacturing and packing of Cadbury confectionery to ensure that our products leave us in perfect condition. It is quite clear that on this occasion you have purchased a product that is below the high quality you would associate with Cadbury.
We would like you always to enjoy Cadbury confectionery at its best. I hope you will use the attached refund for £1.50.
Thank you once again for taking the trouble to contact us. If I can be of further assistance please do not hesitate to contact me on our freephone careline 0800 818181.
Your sincerely
[Signature]
Consumer Relations Department
It would appear that they’re not that concerned about the Boost design being flawed then. Despite me saying that it happens “every single time ... regardless of where I’ve purchased my Boost” they still seem to think that “this occasion” is a one-off! (Still, at least they could be bothered to send me compensation, which is more than Gary Lineker did last time.)
Has anyone else experienced this problem with Cadbury Boost bars or is it just me?
Labels: food, personal, rant
12 July 2006
Attn: Everyone
Please read and digest this list of Common Errors in English compiled by Paul Brians, Professor of English at Washington State University.
Paul’s managed to include just about all the incorrect usages of words and phrases that really get on my nerves. (I disagree with him in some cases, but I'll forgive him for those since he’s done such a good job with the rest!)
In particular, please pay attention to the following errors:
alot – you wouldn’t write “alittle” so you shouldn’t write “alot”
apostrophes – no need to explain this one; see also the Apostrophe Protection Society
could of/should of/would of – you would never write “would’f” instead of “would’ve” and yet people still write “would of”
home page – when used to refer to an entire website when the phrase refers to a single page – i.e. the “home page” of a particular website
it’s/its – this one’s especially for Riley who’s having problems getting to grips with this at the moment!
logon – as used incorrectly by thick TV presenters who say, “Logon to our website at www...” when all they really want me to do is visit their website; if they really wanted me to “logon” they should also have provided me with a user name and password or something!
Another peeve of mine, similar to the “logon” example, is when those ridiculous T.V. adverts for insurance or loans tell me to “click on” their website. They say things like, for example, “Just click on www dot we can help you get into debt dot com for more information!” Why do I need to “click on” your website? Why can’t I just “visit” it like I do other websites?
And finally, taken from the Common Errors in English website (the emphasis being mine):
But isn’t one person’s mistake another’s standard usage?
Often enough, but if your standard usage causes other people to consider you stupid or ignorant, you may want to consider changing it.
Absolutely! I couldn’t agree more!
[Via Google Operating System Blog]
Labels: personal, rant
17 May 2006
Following a brief conversation with Chris the other day, I thought I’d make a short post about what could possibly be the most misinterpreted rule for webmasters... evar!
Don’t use "click here" as link text
– Quality Web Tips, W3C, 2001
47. Don’t use "Click here" as link text
– The Big Website “Don’t!” List, Philipp Lenssen, 4th March 2004
Don’t use "click here" or other non-descriptive link text.
– Top Ten Web Design Mistakes of 2005, Jakob Nielsen, 3rd October 2005
The W3C website also suggests that it’s not strictly correct to use ‘click here’ because “not everyone will be clicking” and continues to give the following advice:
When calling the user to action, use brief but meaningful link text that:
- provides some information when read out of context
- explains what the link offers
- doesn’t talk about mechanics
- is not a verb phrase
In an ideal world, that would be excellent advice. However, when webmasters are faced with the prospect of – let’s say – “challenged” visitors using their websites, things need to be much more obvious. Take the following examples:
- Click here to read my blog.
- Click here to read my blog.
- Click here to read my blog.
- Read my blog.
The first two examples are obviously the worst of the bunch because they don’t even link the main call to action (i.e. ‘read my blog’). According to the advice from the sites referenced above, only the last example would be acceptable. My problem with that link is that I’ve seen users respond with something similar to: “I want to read your blog, but how do I do that?” For a complete beginner, it’s not always obvious that the underlined text is a link and that they can perform the action by clicking it. (This isn’t helped by websites that don’t have underlined links or have underlined text that isn’t linked!)
I think that for any website that could be used by complete novices to the Internet, my preference would be to use the third example above. And I think it’s fair to say that it probably wouldn’t offend the more savvy users either. (Sure, not everyone will be clicking, but not everyone will be walking across the road when those American crossing signs say “WALK” or “DONT WALK” – yet those people have learnt to know what it means...)
In conclusion, if you know what you’re doing and why you’re doing it, using ‘click here’ in your link text is fine by me.
P.S. It’s also fine to start a sentence with ‘Because’, ‘And’ or ‘But’ regardless of what your English teacher may have told you!
Labels: development, personal, rant
8 May 2006
I’ve been developing websites for several years now. In the early days, I was just playing with static HTML (see my early efforts if you fancy a laugh) but around six years ago I read a copy of Active Server Pages for Dummies, learnt how to develop dynamic, e-commerce websites and never looked back.
Writing websites powered by clever code is great, but something you should never do is compromise the security of your website or server. I can understand why Google occasionally has problems with security because their websites can be incredibly complex, but other companies should be aware of the risks involved with hiring developers who write sloppy code that could put the privacy of their customer details at risk.
A few years ago, I ordered some wine from a well known wine merchant’s website. After ordering, I noticed that my receipt simply contained my order number in the query string at the end of the URL, something like this:
https://www.example.com/checkout/printreceipt.asp?OrderNo=100000000845572
As an experiment, I simply changed the OrderNo parameter and discovered that I could view the details for every order in their database – which included the personal details of all their customers. Not only that, but I could also use the same technique to change the delivery address for any order in their system without even being logged in!
I notified the website in question – which incidentally claimed to be “totally committed to protecting your privacy” – and received my first response over one week later. “The fault was created by our old web design agency and unfortunately no one picked up on it,” explained their Online Marketing Manager, “our new agency have promised to have a secure fix in place by Friday night and it is our number one priority.” During this time, customers’ details were freely available to anyone with a bit of simple web programming knowledge and they didn’t even send me a free bottle of wine for notifying them directly instead of running to Watchdog!
Today I stumbled across another e-commerce site with several serious security flaws. I’d usually email the company whose website it was to give them some friendly advice, but I shan’t be doing that in this case because the website belongs to a competitor who ripped off the layout, graphics, content and code from one of my websites and has kindly ignored our ‘Cease and Desist’ letters!
Instead, just to ease my conscience a little bit, here are just a few tips for making sure that your website is safer than theirs.
- Don’t rely on client-side validation – most browsers allow you to switch off client-side scripting, so make sure your website handles this gracefully.
- Don’t save any uploaded files to your webspace – not even if they’re saved to folders with randomly generated names, and especially not if your users can upload scripts which can be executed – i.e. ASP, PHP, CGI, etc.
- Don’t store your customer database on your webspace – but if you absolutely have to do this, I’d suggest password protection and a random filename.
- Validate user input server-side – especially if you’re using parameters passed in via the query string or form fields to create SQL queries on the fly, otherwise your visitors could use SQL Injection to update or delete the entire contents of your database.
- Secure any admin areas properly – make sure they’re password protected so that only authorized people can access them, don’t just assume that people will never guess the URL!
I know that we can all make mistakes, but many smaller companies are hiring cheap, freelance developers who don’t care about whether their code is secure because the customer doesn’t know how to test it; by the time a security flaw is revealed, the developer’s already been paid and the company could be left with an expensive problem on their hands – especially if a malicious visitor has deleted the entire contents of their database or modified the website.
So, my final question is this: Would it be wrong of me to switch off client-side scripting in my browser, upload an ASP file to their webspace that, when executed, lists every file and folder in the root of the website, then proceed to download a copy of their files, including their customer database and confidential PDFs regarding their budgets?
(Surely that’s not wrong, is it? Not when you consider what I could have done...)
Anyway, here endeth the lesson. Any questions (or answers)?
Labels: development, personal, rant
19 April 2006
On the surface of it, Chip and PIN is a good idea. For starters, I find that it’s much easier to use the same four-digit PIN than it is to make my signature look the same each time I pay for something. I believe that it also has some added security implications, which is great news for us and bad news for fraudsters...
So what’s my problem then?
Well, I don’t have any problems with the concept of Chip and PIN, as such. I do, however, have issues quite specifically with the Ingenico 3300 PIN Pad terminals.
For some reason, whenever I try to use any of my Chip and PIN enabled credit or debit cards in these terminals, they refuse them almost without exception. Without fail, no matter which till I would choose at ASDA each week, my credit card would always get rejected. (This was back in the days when they’d just swipe the card and let you sign for it, but that’s not allowed anymore.) I’ve even replaced all my cards in the past and tried to pay with brand new ones without any success.
Recently at Somerfield, where they were using the same Ingenico terminals, I was faced with one of those embarrassing situations where I’d packed my shopping bags and I was then told that my card wasn’t accepted. If it was my card at fault then that would be fair enough – but when the problem lies with their faulty equipment, that just makes me mad.
I emailed Ingenico yesterday to tell them about the issue. The first email that I sent to the email address on their website bounced back (which made me even madder) but here’s how they replied when I eventually found a working email address (the emphasis being mine):
Thank you for your query below.
We do carry out rigorous tests on our terminals and these are carried out to industry standards. We are not aware of this fault being a widely experienced one.
We can only apologise and suggest that you contact your bank and advise them of the problems you have been experiencing with your cards.
Kind regards
...
What is that supposed to mean? Are they saying that they’re not aware of the fault at all, or are they saying that they are aware of the fault, but they’re just not aware that the fault is a widely experienced one?!?
Maybe Ingenico’s terminals aren’t faulty. Maybe the supermarkets aren’t looking after them properly. Maybe my cards are bent or dirty. But when every other shop I visit accepts them without any problems, I fail to see why I should be made to look like a fool at the supermarket checkout.
Anyway, regardless of Ingenico’s intentionally ambiguous response, what should be done about this? Perhaps supermarkets should authorize your payment card as soon as you enter the store before you even start shopping; they could have a “Checkin” as well as a “Checkout”. If they did this, I wouldn’t waste my time carefully selecting items from their shelves, loading them onto the conveyor belt and packing them into carrier bags only to be told that I can’t take them because my card their equipment is faulty!
If anyone else has ever experienced any problems with the Ingenico (or other) Chip and PIN terminals, I’d be interested to know. (Which is sad, I know, but I really would actually be interested...)
Labels: personal, rant
10 April 2006
Being male, I realise that I shouldn’t admit to liking Ikea. I should probably even have a stack of excuses already prepared just in case the missus suggests we go there, especially if the suggested day is a Sunday or – God forbid – a Bank Holiday. In fact, I even know someone who suggests that he and the wife should go to Ikea just to gain some bonus “husband points” when he’s running low on them.
Anyway, I like Ikea, and since we needed some bits for the house (a blind for the bathroom, a light for the bedroom, etc.) I suggested we went there yesterday. It’s not as bad as everyone makes out. I mean, you get a free pencil each time you visit, maybe even two or three if you’re lucky! The furniture is also cheaper than most other places, so you actually save quite a bit of money. Also, the 10 meatballs meal (usually £3.25) was on a buy one get one free offer yesterday. This meant you could buy 20 meatballs for £3.25 – that’s fifty whole English pence cheaper than the 15 meatballs meal (£3.75)! Naturally, I had two meals to myself, whereas Suzy preferred to pay 50p more for less food... I know, I don’t understand women’s logic either.
After eating some of that Ikea Dime bar cake stuff – which is more accurately known as ALMONDY Almond Cake with DAIM® – we decided to buy a couple of them from their Swedish shop. The sign said they were £2.75 each. We bought two. But when we got to the checkout, we were only charged £5.00! It turns out there was a special (secret) combo offer that nobody knew about – not even the checkout operator!
And just when you think it couldn’t possibly get any better, we got home to find that they hadn’t even charged us for that “Lunch and Brunch” recipe book that we didn’t really need! If only they hadn’t charged us for the rest of the stuff we didn’t need either...
Now, if Ikea gave out Nectar points, I’d be there every weekend!!!
Labels: food, personal, rant, restaurants
