The grumpy thread

[reb]

One of the smoke alarms in the vacant flat upstairs has been chirping for about a week. They've been doing viewings so the letting agent definitely knows about it.

It's driving me mad.

If I gave less of a shit about the law I'd be up with my lockpicks and taking the fucking thing down. 

[comfortablynumb]

1 minute ago, Yoss said:

I saw them once, in 1984 on the Powerslave tour, at Southampton Gaumont. Great to see they are still touring. 

Would have been the fourth time for me, they are brilliant live aren't they, just disappointed, I can't afford £300 a ticket, all the cheaper ones went in the blink of an eye

[Yoss]

36 minutes ago, comfortablynumb said:

Would have been the fourth time for me, they are brilliant live aren't they, just disappointed, I can't afford £300 a ticket, all the cheaper ones went in the blink of an eye

Indeed. Bruce is an all round top bloke for many reasons. I love the fact that he carried a Thomas Cook European rail timetable with him on their European Tours in the days when the the European rail network was more interesting than it is now. There's a bit in his autobiography where they had just played somewhere in the south of France and the next night they were playing Venice. Bored with the aftershow party he consulted his timetable and found there was a sleeper train leaving for Venice within the hour so he threw a bag together and left everyone to it. I'd love to be able to be that spontaneous and get some classic French and Italian locos in the book at the same time. 

Earler this year we saw the tribute band High On Maiden at a local venue here in Southampton. I was sceptical but Mrs Yoss talked me in to it. They were excellent, far better than I was expecting. The singer looks nothing like Bruce but he hit all the notes somehow and the band were really tight. They did the whole of Powerslave including Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Made my night. 

[comfortablynumb]

I really enjoyed Bruce's book. I love the way when one of the airlines went bust they threw as many people as they could get into Eddforce 1 and flew them home. What I wouldn't have given to be on that flight!

I can't believe he's around 10 years older than me, but twice as agile.

[High Jetter]

1 hour ago, reb said:

One of the smoke alarms in the vacant flat upstairs has been chirping for about a week. They've been doing viewings so the letting agent definitely knows about it.

It's driving me mad.

If I gave less of a shit about the law I'd be up with my lockpicks and taking the fucking thing down. 

Badger the agents about it, telling them if they don't fix it PDQ you'll be on to the freeholder. Or ask him/her if you can gain access to sort it yourself?

[reb]

7 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Badger the agents about it, telling them if they don't fix it PDQ you'll be on to the freeholder. Or ask him/her if you can gain access to sort it yourself?

That would be the sensible course of action, yes.

Happily it seems the battery has completely died now, so it's gone quiet!

[Yoss]

44 minutes ago, comfortablynumb said:

I really enjoyed Bruce's book. I love the way when one of the airlines went bust they threw as many people as they could get into Eddforce 1 and flew them home. What I wouldn't have given to be on that flight!

I can't believe he's around 10 years older than me, but twice as agile.

He is exactly ten years older than me. We have the same birthday! 

[Volksy]

46 minutes ago, reb said:

That would be the sensible course of action, yes.

Happily it seems the battery has completely died now, so it's gone quiet!

That's not a bonus if you live in a flat. 

I deal with fire issues on a daily basis. 

[reb]

2 hours ago, Volksy said:

That's not a bonus if you live in a flat. 

I deal with fire issues on a daily basis. 

There's at least three smoke alarms up there, only one of them was chirping. I'm sure it'll be fine.

[High Jetter]

5 minutes ago, reb said:

There's at least three smoke alarms up there, only one of them was chirping. I'm sure it'll be fine.

Three? They must be worried. Just sayin...

[Barry Cade]

5 hours ago, reb said:

One of the smoke alarms in the vacant flat upstairs has been chirping for about a week. They've been doing viewings so the letting agent definitely knows about it.

It's driving me mad.

If I gave less of a shit about the law I'd be up with my lockpicks and taking the fucking thing down. 

Mine only ever seem to do that at 3am. Last time I ripped the fucker off the ceiling, getting a shower of plaster and a jolt of 240v. I didn't know they were mains too.  Improved my mood no end.

[High Jetter]

2 minutes ago, Barry Cade said:

Mine only ever seem to do that at 3am. Last time I ripped the fucker off the ceiling, getting a shower of plaster and a jolt of 240v. I didn't know they were mains too.  Improved my mood no end.

Yep, and the bastards aren't alone, if you have flats above or below.

[maxxo]

the smoke alarms at both my parents house and grandparents house are connected to the intruder alarm

never had to change a battery or had a momen't bother from them

that's the way i like them

and yes they do work

[High Jetter]

8 minutes ago, maxxo said:

the smoke alarms at both my parents house and grandparents house are connected to the intruder alarm

Why? Not saying it's bad

[Mrcento]

48 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Three? They must be worried. Just sayin...

That's just the regs in Scotland for flats these days, they all have to have at least 3 alarms all interconnected, usually 2 smoke alarms (1 mains powered with battery backup, 1 battery) and 1 heat alarm in the kitchen.

Been like that for about 5 years.

Mine are annoying for a different reason, 1 keeps losing sync, which causes the main one to freak out it hasn't got a response from 1 on the self test it does every 90 seconds or so and starts lighting up half the hallway like a disco brothel with a red flashing light.

[maxxo]

18 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Why? Not saying it's bad

parents house, no idea system is from 1993 but it works really well, makes a different sound etc and easy to shut them up as well

grandparents house i did it intentionally as they kept removing the batteries from them and i wanted to prevent it

i guess it's a hardwired system and it's a fair chunk more reliable than battery operated ones

[Popsicle]

Well todays been a bloody expensive day. £1350 to fix the cheap and cheerful Qashqai that we picked up last summer! Thats more than double what we paid for the fucking heap, then add the £2.5k+ that has been lavished on the turd over the past 14 months and we're over £4.5k into a 10 plate Qashqai. Oh joy.....

Personally I wanted to scrap the thing or offer it up on here cheap, but Mrs P and eldest daughter had other ideas.

To date its had:

Cambelt, tensioner, waterpump, AC regas (1st time), aircon compressor, AC regas (2nd time), coolant radiator, battery, tracking, four tyres, both front droplinks (1st time), wishbones, ball joints (1st time), NS & OS driveshaft, NSF caliper, front pads, front discs, wiper blades, rear pads, rear discs, crankshaft pulley, gearbox oil change, OSF caliper, wheel bearing, AC regas (3rd time) with some seals replaced, gearbox, clutch, flywheel, droplinks (2nd time), ball joints (2nd time), AC regas again (4th time) and 3 services.

Now I fully understand the implications of running an old car and some of the above is routine maintenance, but it really needs putting out of its (and my wallets) misery. We don't even need the car, everybody else has something else to be driving, there just seems to be some strange allure to keeping the thing going which nobody can explain to me and I really don't understand.

I also had my first dealings with Xenon headlights today, a headlight out on the newly purchased Elgrand, £32 for a D2R bulb and £66 for a second hand ballast that didn't work and having to remove the front bumper to find that out.

[Pieman]

Take it to Buxton and banger race it and tell the family it was pinched.

[Popsicle]

47 minutes ago, Pieman said:

Take it to Buxton and banger race it and tell the family it was pinched.

I'm sure it would breakdown in some new and extravagant way enroute and Buxtons only an hour away.

[Lord Sterling]

Flu; just fuck off, it's been 16 bloody days already. I don't need to be coughing my guts up.

Because I suffer from Asthma, when I get ill, the first thing to go are my Airways which fill up with phlegm causing me to wheeze like a bagpipes, this in turn causes a reaction to it causing me to try and cough it up.

I sometimes cough so much that for a few seconds I barely know I exist or have any idea of the real world as I come back to normality.

The actual influenza has passed but it's left me with the after effects as in my airwaves are battered and the coughing still persists. I have taken a covid test last week when I was deep in flu and tested negative thankfully. 

Tried to go back to work despite feeling fairly Ok the day before, I literally struggled at work. So now I'll taking a couple of extra days holiday off to give me a good few more days to recover.

The last time I had this was when I actually had covid in 2020 but that really battered me, it was 50 times worse than what I have now and took a good few months to get over. I've occasionally had influenza symptoms since then but they've usually just been lazy ones that didn't do much apart from some very mild symptoms. 

[jakebullet]

Noticed sidelight out at back of disco. So gave it a gentle thump to see if it's a dodgy connection or another bulb has blown. Bulb again, and I now need a new light cos the bloody thing's cracked.

[reb]

13 hours ago, Mrcento said:

 

Been like that for about 5 years.

That would explain why upstairs, mine, and my brother's alarms have all got dead batteries within a month of eachother, all probably installed at the same time.

[myglaren]

Mine are mains and interconnected with a battery backup.

Haven't needed to renew the batteries and they have been in for about fifteen years.  Perhaps they are rechargeable batteries.

Should test them, haven't in about five years.  Never go off now my son has his own house, he was always setting the kitchen one off.

[chadders]

Ours are the same. 

The batteries in them aren't rechargeable but seem to last 10 to 15 years, I guess as they're only used when we have power cuts.

[HillmanImp]

Volvos started pissing oil out of it from somewhere at the front. Decided to check the PCV and give it a clean but by the time I'd removed all the silly American emissions stuff, my back was so sore I could barely carry on. After several sit downs, I managed to get it done but a 1hr job turned into about 4hrs and my back is still aching now. No chance of me even attempting to look at where the oil leak is coming from. It's gonna have to go to a garage and I'll have to pay someone to look at it with all the money I don't have.

[somewhatfoolish]

21 hours ago, Mrcento said:

That's just the regs in Scotland for flats these days, they all have to have at least 3 alarms all interconnected, usually 2 smoke alarms (1 mains powered with battery backup, 1 battery) and 1 heat alarm in the kitchen.

Been like that for about 5 years.

Mine are annoying for a different reason, 1 keeps losing sync, which causes the main one to freak out it hasn't got a response from 1 on the self test it does every 90 seconds or so and starts lighting up half the hallway like a disco brothel with a red flashing light.

There's no "have"; the govt were going to make it mandatory, but bottled it at the last minute after receiving criticism from all quarters. As a result all the propaganda telling people it would be mandatory had already been paid for and broadcast, so the "worried well" were predisposed to be preyed upon by con artists flogging £150 of fire alarms for £500, and they were duly fleeced. It's not mandatory and insurers mostly do not care whether you have fire alarms, never mind if they're interconnected(policies do vary so check your own). The fire alarms most people already had in their houses are fine, do the job and there's no reason to replace them before their 10th birthday and I'm still sceptical of the value of the interconnectivity in 99% of homes; the biggest problem is morons not replacing batteries when they go flat.

[Volksy]

4 hours ago, HillmanImp said:

Volvos started pissing oil out of it from somewhere at the front. Decided to check the PCV and give it a clean but by the time I'd removed all the silly American emissions stuff, my back was so sore I could barely carry on. After several sit downs, I managed to get it done but a 1hr job turned into about 4hrs and my back is still aching now. No chance of me even attempting to look at where the oil leak is coming from. It's gonna have to go to a garage and I'll have to pay someone to look at it with all the money I don't have.

Think mine is feeling sympathetic to yours, 

Drove over to Mother Volks today, sitting in traffic I noticed the temp had shot up, pulled over as soon as I could and popped the bonnet. It was fine yesterday when I drove back from work. No coolant in it now. 

Seems the radiator has sprung a leak and drained overnight. Theres a wet shadow on the fins about halfway down. Luckily I have a 5 liter container of water in the boot. so waited for it to cool a bit then poured that in. It was enough to get it to the nearest filling station so I could top it up.

On getting to the BP, the only water available on the forecourt is from the tyre inflator and it was premixed screen wash you had to pay for.

Took my container inside and the lady behind the till was most reluctant to fill it up and just kept gesturing to the aforementioned screen wash..

Finally she did and I drove the car back home. Don't think there is any damage caused, and a new radiator has been ordered. It's from Autodoc so will probably take three months to arrive. 

With the paint incident yesterday, I'm hoping there's not a third thing to go wrong on the cards. 

[Mrcento]

48 minutes ago, somewhatfoolish said:

There's no "have"; the govt were going to make it mandatory, but bottled it at the last minute after receiving criticism from all quarters.

Nope, it has been the law for a few years. I thought it was longer ago than it was (Mine were fitted about 6 years ago and it all seemed like a last minute rush locally to get the houses compliant to the incoming legislation) but came into force officially in February 2022.

https://www.mygov.scot/home-fire-safety

[somewhatfoolish]

Ponder the last time bottom inspectors knocked on your door to inspect your fire alarm. A lot of people were panicked into spending money they need not have on fire alarms that didn't make them safer. The only sector it meaningfully applies to is rentals and even then Jesus making a comeback is more likely than anyone inspecting the fire alarms.

This little gem from the govt says it all.

[sheffcortinacentre]

Keep saying it but since COVID the world has gone mad & humans especially  males are de-evolving