The grumpy thread

[barefoot]

Anyone else struggling to make 12 ft ladder tall enough to climb over paywalls?

I’m certainly having probs reading the daily telegraph.

[Wack]

  On 10/09/2023 at 00:13, Metal Guru said:

And people will buy £250k cars , £10m paintings , £500 bottles of champagne etc etc. or even invest £500m in a football club.

Whats the problem? They were never going to say “mmm shall I buy  a Picasso or  help 10,000 pensioners with their winter dual bills?”.

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A Picasso is not a gate 

[D.E]

  On 10/09/2023 at 21:06, Wack said:

A Picasso is not a gate 

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[artdjones]

  On 10/09/2023 at 20:12, barefoot said:

Anyone else struggling to make 12 ft ladder tall enough to climb over paywalls?

I’m certainly having probs reading the daily telegraph.

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It was great for me for a few weeks then everyone made the walls 14ft high

[Wack]

  On 07/09/2023 at 17:36, andyberg said:

Me and my wife are going to retire in China in about 10 years. Personally I can't bloody wait. I know it may be hard but we have an apartment in a small town near Guangzhou. I can't wait to leave this country and the ' rat race' . If we can go sooner we will. A colleague at work has just been diagnosed with brain cancer, he had been getting a bit confused on occasion, this gives me more determination. Life is to short, do what you need to do to be happy chap, you won't regret it.

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Watched a few videos about Chinese surveillance cameras and instant fines for jaywalking  plus public shame in the form of your picture and name on an electronic billboard 

It all sounded a bit hunger games to me 

[Wack]

  On 09/09/2023 at 09:06, cort16 said:

My sister has a parrot, which we're reluctantly look after while she's on holiday for 2 weeks. If you're not in the room with it giving it 100% attention it squawks, screeches and makes other god awful noises.

Why would you have one of these as a pet?

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To torture your brother , next time make sure you're unavailable 

In the words of my late mother in law when a relative made a vague reference about coming to see her at some undefined point in the future 

"I'll be out that day" 

 

[Wack]

  On 10/09/2023 at 21:11, D.E said:

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Still not a gate 

[Datsuncog]

Burst myself over a long, hot, sweaty weekend drylining a bedroom with insulated plasterboard, getting the ceiling primed with bluegrit, plus all the electrics and radiators removed and capped off ready for the plasterer to start work in the morning.

Got a call from him this afternoon to say he's hurt his back, so won't be able to come. Maybe later in the week. Maybe.

I guess the prep's now done and all - and I know back pain's a bit of a bastard - but hot damn, I really didn't need further delays to this project.

The flooring's arriving on Thursday; fuck knows where I'm going to put all that, as the garage is full of bathroom and the living room's full of bedroom.

[andyberg]

  On 10/09/2023 at 21:41, Wack said:

Watched a few videos about Chinese surveillance cameras and instant fines for jaywalking  plus public shame in the form of your picture and name on an electronic billboard 

It all sounded a bit hunger games to me 

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Yes I agree. But it's mainly in the big cities. Our town is only about 8,000 people and is relatively rural despite being only about 5 miles from the outskirts of Guangzhou. And we will be in our 60s so we won't be breaking any laws, just bimbling about a bit 😁

[Metal Guru]

  On 10/09/2023 at 21:41, Wack said:

Watched a few videos about Chinese surveillance cameras and instant fines for jaywalking  plus public shame in the form of your picture and name on an electronic billboard 

It all sounded a bit hunger games to me 

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It would have to get a whole lot worse here before I’d consider going to live in China.

[meggersdog]

Went to my best mates funeral on Thursday, the first day we have ever closed the business. Came in to work on Friday to 39 missed calls and a now broken phone. Looking into it the 39 missed calls were from three numbers. We have an answer-phone which two eventually left messages. There is no ringtone or dial tone on the phone so on Friday we missed loads of calls but phoned back. It's a VOIP phone from BT business. Phoned the (probably Indian) call centre and the guy couldn't understand that the phone was broken if I was calling from that phone. Anyway he said he would send an exchange one out for Monday morning. Hasn't arrived obviously.

Came into work this morning and took the back off the phone. The speaker for the ringtone has a volume dial around the speaker itself.Wound it up a bit and now the phone works normally. So the constant phone calls must have vibrated the volume dial down to nothing. The two who eventually left messages are booked in for Thursday and Friday respectfully. They will both find out I was not happy with the constant ringing.

[cobblers]

  On 11/09/2023 at 13:42, meggersdog said:

Went to my best mates funeral on Thursday, the first day we have ever closed the business. Came in to work on Friday to 39 missed calls and a now broken phone. Looking into it the 39 missed calls were from three numbers. We have an answer-phone which two eventually left messages. There is no ringtone or dial tone on the phone so on Friday we missed loads of calls but phoned back. It's a VOIP phone from BT business. Phoned the (probably Indian) call centre and the guy couldn't understand that the phone was broken if I was calling from that phone. Anyway he said he would send an exchange one out for Monday morning. Hasn't arrived obviously.

Came into work this morning and took the back off the phone. The speaker for the ringtone has a volume dial around the speaker itself.Wound it up a bit and now the phone works normally. So the constant phone calls must have vibrated the volume dial down to nothing. The two who eventually left messages are booked in for Thursday and Friday respectfully. They will both find out I was not happy with the constant ringing.

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If I call someone and they don't answer in ten seconds or so, I think "Oh, they aren't able to take the call, they are busy - I'll try again later" and I'll give it an hour or so before trying again. I do this because I'm not a total cunt!

There's a special place in hell for people that just keep on ringing, and ringing and ringing forever. It makes me so bloody angry! I'll be on the phone and it's constantly beeping away at me, because there's another call coming in, I find it unbelievably distracting.

 

[sierraman]

Why don’t trade adverts include anything about maintenance that’s been done, it’ll include loads of bumf about how quick it will get to sixty, that it has a five speed gearbox and it does 50mpg but fuck all about it having had the belt/clutch/whatever done. I’m assuming it’s because such matters are completely unimportant on a used car. 

[Jazoli]

  On 11/09/2023 at 15:12, sierraman said:

Why don’t trade adverts include anything about maintenance that’s been done, it’ll include loads of bumf about how quick it will get to sixty, that it has a five speed gearbox and it does 50mpg but fuck all about it having had the belt/clutch/whatever done. I’m assuming it’s because such matters are completely unimportant on a used car. 

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Yup no-one gives a fuck apart from us folk, not once has anyone asked me about history and maintenance when I've sold dozens of shitters through FB and Gumtree.

[meggersdog]

  On 11/09/2023 at 14:54, cobblers said:

If I call someone and they don't answer in ten seconds or so, I think "Oh, they aren't able to take the call, they are busy - I'll try again later" and I'll give it an hour or so before trying again. I do this because I'm not a total cunt!

There's a special place in hell for people that just keep on ringing, and ringing and ringing forever. It makes me so bloody angry! I'll be on the phone and it's constantly beeping away at me, because there's another call coming in, I find it unbelievably distracting.

 

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The phone rings about six times before the answerphone kicks in so these twats put the phone down then ring again.

[sierraman]

  On 11/09/2023 at 16:56, Jazoli said:

Yup no-one gives a fuck apart from us folk, not once has anyone asked me about history and maintenance when I've sold dozens of shitters through FB and Gumtree.

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Yet they’ll complain bitterly when it shits itself after their dad sticks the wrong oil in it or it misses a series of services. 

[Jazoli]

  On 11/09/2023 at 17:01, sierraman said:

Yet they’ll complain bitterly when it shits itself after their dad sticks the wrong oil in it or it misses a series of services. 

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I wouldn't know I always block them as they pull off the drive

[sierraman]

  On 11/09/2023 at 17:55, Jazoli said:

I wouldn't know I always block them as they pull off the drive

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Good man! Chuck the burner phone SIM in the canal for good measure. 😂

[EyesWeldedShut]

Did you know that Volvo 940 front discs come in two different depths (offsets) but with the same actual disc dimensions? 
Finding that out, in the dusk, tonight has really made my day.....

 

[edit] - seems ABS cars need a 56mm deep disc, non ABS take 50.3 mm. I have a box here marked ABS but with the 50.3mm deep inner. Whooppee-fuckin-does 

[Remspoor]

  On 10/09/2023 at 20:12, barefoot said:

Anyone else struggling to make 12 ft ladder tall enough to climb over paywalls?

I’m certainly having probs reading the daily telegraph.

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It is not working for the Torygraph for me either. i also tried it on various other newspapers. They did not work either.

I use this extension for Firefox. https://gitlab.com/magnolia1234/bypass-paywalls-firefox-clean I believe there are other for different browsers.

 

[cobblers]

  On 11/09/2023 at 17:57, sierraman said:

Good man! Chuck the burner phone SIM in the canal for good measure. 😂

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A mate of mine I used to build campers for used to get a new sim card for every van we did, and he would take it out of his phone and snap it in half as they drove away, every time!

He was selling them from the workshop behind his house, but as he put it "the people buying these vans are usually idiots who will never leave me alone moaning about total bullshit problems on the 120,000 mile van they've just bought, if they have a real problem then they know where I live and they can get solicitors involved"

[captain_70s]

  On 11/09/2023 at 19:37, EyesWeldedShut said:

Did you know that Volvo 940 front discs come in two different depths (offsets) but with the same actual disc dimensions? 
Finding that out, in the dusk, tonight has really made my day.....

 

[edit] - seems ABS cars need a 56mm deep disc, non ABS take 50.3 mm. I have a box here marked ABS but with the 50.3mm deep inner. Whooppee-fuckin-does 

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Volvo 700/900 brakes. What an absolute shitshow of incompatible parts.

[artdjones]

  On 10/09/2023 at 21:57, Datsuncog said:

Burst myself over a long, hot, sweaty weekend drylining a bedroom with insulated plasterboard, getting the ceiling primed with bluegrit, plus all the electrics and radiators removed and capped off ready for the plasterer to start work in the morning.

Got a call from him this afternoon to say he's hurt his back, so won't be able to come. Maybe later in the week. Maybe.

I guess the prep's now done and all - and I know back pain's a bit of a bastard - but hot damn, I really didn't need further delays to this project.

The flooring's arriving on Thursday; fuck knows where I'm going to put all that, as the garage is full of bathroom and the living room's full of bedroom.

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Bad news. Plastering is a killer for the back, though. When I had my new build plastered back in July 2020 the plasterer told me he'd been off for a couple of weeks 3 times that year already. Luckily there weren't any back related incidents during the two weeks he was working for me.

Hope your man is there in a couple of days. 

[artdjones]

  On 11/09/2023 at 06:29, andyberg said:

Yes I agree. But it's mainly in the big cities. Our town is only about 8,000 people and is relatively rural despite being only about 5 miles from the outskirts of Guangzhou. And we will be in our 60s so we won't be breaking any laws, just bimbling about a bit 😁

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"Show me the man and I'll show you the crime". That was the boast of Beria, Stalin's secret police chief. China is still a totalitarian state, so if you upset the wrong people, even inadvertently.......

[EyesWeldedShut]

  On 11/09/2023 at 20:14, captain_70s said:

Volvo 700/900 brakes. What an absolute shitshow of incompatible parts.

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Well, I'm never too old to learn it seems  in addition:
Despite visually comparing the diameter/thickness of the actual discs I now know to check the dish/depth/offset too.
Start packing up before dark or get the head torch out.
Triple check part numbers cross references.
Never,ever,ever rely on the 'this part fits your vehicle' as the final check before you buy

And for that Schadenfreude moment:

[andyberg]

  On 11/09/2023 at 20:57, artdjones said:

"Show me the man and I'll show you the crime". That was the boast of Beria, Stalin's secret police chief. China is still a totalitarian state, so if you upset the wrong people, even inadvertently.......

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Yes, I go with my eyes wide open. The pluses far outweigh the negatives for me, but I will continue to do my research. One of the main pluses is we can live on my pension without having to worry and without needing to do any kind of paid work. 

Things can change in 10 years, but as it stands right now that's where we will be come retirement.

[JMotor]

Got a small grump.

Trying to sell Nova parts via FB.

Forgot how much of a chew on it is.

 

[EyesWeldedShut]

  On 12/09/2023 at 08:44, andyberg said:

Yes, I go with my eyes wide open. The pluses far outweigh the negatives for me, but I will continue to do my research. One of the main pluses is we can live on my pension without having to worry and without needing to do any kind of paid work. 

Things can change in 10 years, but as it stands right now that's where we will be come retirement.

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I have a mate out in Vietnam - he's been there maybe 8 years now and he says it's a lot like China in some respects - if you toe the line, stick to the places that Westerners hang out then all well and good. Start stirring shit or objecting to a new tax that they've brought in (or a big hike in right to remain visas) then you're out.
No ifs, no buts, no rights - out the country or in the clink.

[andyberg]

  On 12/09/2023 at 14:20, EyesWeldedShut said:

I have a mate out in Vietnam - he's been there maybe 8 years now and he says it's a lot like China in some respects - if you toe the line, stick to the places that Westerners hang out then all well and good. Start stirring shit or objecting to a new tax that they've brought in (or a big hike in right to remain visas) then you're out.
No ifs, no buts, no rights - out the country or in the clink.

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I will be over 65, I have no intention of of objecting to anything, just want a quiet life. We will only be an hour away from Hong Kong and the family we have there. But as I say I will continue to research and keep my eyes open.

[iainrcz]

  On 12/09/2023 at 14:14, JMotor said:

Got a small grump.

Trying to sell Nova parts via FB.

Forgot how much of a chew on it is.

 

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I've been put off selling bits and bobs because you just know the only person to show interest would be an utter cock end.

I will suffix that by saying the couple of transactions I've done on here went perfectly and at no point did I want to stab anyone.