A little waffle, a little whinge...

Where does the time go? More than halfway through the year already and it seems Christmas has only just gone by. Before we know it Summer will be over, the nights will descend on us at 4pm and we’ll be ordering the turkey and Christmas pud once more! But let’s not dwell. Far better to make the most of this current spell of warm weather. It’s been with us for nearly two weeks now, almost like a proper summer. My only concern with this is that it almost certainly won’t last until September when we have our holidays.

Hey, we have a celebrity in the family. My nephew recently appeared on The sky at night with Patrick Moore. I had hoped to include a link to the BBC I-player but that particular episode of the program is no longer available. Still, here’s a still of the famous Dr Chris North taken from the said program (Chris is the one in the middle):

They were discussing ‘Herschel’, a new infra-red astro-telescope that’s sending back some amazing photographs. Fascinating if you’re into that stuff. Personally, I was just pleased to see that someone in the family finally got some smarts. I’ll ask for his autograph when next we meet. If anybody wants one, I’ll be selling them for a tenner. Okay, okay, as I know you, a fiver, but that’s my final offer.

Tomorrow (Saturday) we’re off to my sister’s for a family bash. It was supposed to be at my brother, Derry’s house but his son has had a pretty nasty accident whilst white water rafting in South America. It was a scary few days as he injured his spine and there were fears that he might be paralysed. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case and he’s on the mend now. There’s a long way to go, however, and the recovery period will be long and painful so it was decided that a change of venue was in order. I’ve booked a day off work and some extra sunshine for the occasion so it should be a good day.

On the work front, I had my picture taken today. Well, not just me, several of us. Apparently, we scored a hundred percent success rate on delivery of some items of tracked mail and this, it would seem, is cause for celebration. Rumour has it that the photo will appear in a future issue of the company journal. That’s all very well but I’ve never understood the idea of targets in a company such as Royal Mail. Their target for delivering first class mail on time, for instance, varies. It can be anywhere from 93 to 97 percent, depending on the time of year. But I don’t get it, I mean, surely the target should be 100 percent all the time. If you reach a set target of 95 percent that isn’t a reason to celebrate it’s a reason to ask questions as to why the other 5 percent didn’t get delivered on time. And when you consider the huge volumes of mail we handle every day, 5 percent is a whole lot of late letters and packages.

Still, never mind, if this government has its way we’ll be sold off pretty soon. They’re already claiming we’re losing money once more. You just watch, they’ll hammer the company into the ground and sell it off cheap to some big company with even less interest in providing a service than the government has been. And who’ll take a bet with me that whichever company wins the deal and buys up Royal Mail at a snip will be one of those who made a significant ‘donation’ to political funds somewhere along the way? Whatever happens, you can bet your boots that the government will take its lump and the buyer will get the deal of the decade while the service gets steadily worse. That’s how it worked when they sold off British Gas, British Telecomms and British Rail. And we all know how much their service has improved since the sell off don’t we?

Personally, after thirty plus years I’ve finally given up on the job. I’m merely biding my time for the best opportunity to take my leave. It’s sad to watch a company change so much for the worse over the years but it seems the idea of providing a service is quite old fashioned these days. And it’s hard to have any sympathy for a firm that worries about what colour trainers or shorts I’m wearing when they’d be better advised to check out why all our customers are deserting us for other courier services. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the postmen and women can only deliver the mail if the work is there. It’s up to these big money earning executives to bring in the work. We’re just the monkeys who cart it all around the streets for peanuts.

(Ooh, all that just because the boss wanted to take my picture!)

Okay, sorry for the rant, I’m alright now. A change of tack then…

When I get up for work of a morning I always find a note from Reet. General stuff like: set the alarm for 9 o’clock, don’t forget to get paper, water in fridge, you haven’t done any lunch for work…

Reet insists I never read them, although this doesn’t stop her from writing the damn things. But I do read them, sort of. It’s just, well, sometimes there’s a whole page of the stuff and it’s 5.30 in the morning and it’s still dark out and I’m getting ready for work…

So I give it a cursory glance, set the alarm and ignore the rest. And the system works despite her doubts about my reading ability, it works.

But she also leaves herself a list as well. The latest one read:

Wash hair – going to chiropodist today.

I read it once, blinked, then read it again. Finally I couldn’t leave without altering it to:

Wash feet – going to chiropodist today.

The daft thing was, she didn’t even notice - so even she doesn’t read the notes she leaves!

But why does she need a list for everything? That’s my question. I mean, I know she’s getting a bit older and a little more senile but for Gawd’s sake, does she really need reminding to do the ironing? There’s a bloody great pile of it sitting on the sofa in the living room, the ironing board is set up with the iron perched upright on the end like a little begging dog. How could she possibly miss it?

And I do understand the need for lists, I really do. But here we are, six weeks away from going on holiday and already it’s, “Have you made a list yet? You’ve only got a few weeks.”

I’m learning though. I will make a list these days, whereas, in the past, I’ve made the fatal mistake of insisting I didn’t need one, only to discover, usually when it’s too late, that I’ve forgotten my passport or something equally as important. So yes, I do make a list for some things. So far though my holiday list is still formulating but in my head I’ve made a start:

Brandy

Camera

Hat(s)

And on that note I’ll take my leave. Have a good weekend all.

Toodle – Pip. x