Nice People Thread No. 15, a Cyber Summer

LydiaJ

ukmaggie45 wrote: »

Had a letter from the Tribunal Service on Wednesday to say that they've set aside the Decision and my case will be heard by a different Tribunal. Asked for dates in the next 3 months when I won't be available, though wouldn't be surprised if it takes longer than that for me to reach the top of the list again.

Excellent news. Hoping very much that the new Tribunal will see sense about your case. Sending thoughts and prayers and hugs.

CKhalvashi wrote: »

If you're in the situation, best place to look is usually the first place you probably spent more than 2 seconds when you got in

Well, I certainly hadn't spent any time under the seat in my car! :rotfl:

PasturesNew wrote: »

I heard a gunshot .... so peeked from the window, not expecting to see anything ... and there was nothing. Coming back downstairs I heard another gunshot.... from the direction of the "scummy estate" about 1/4 mile away.

Probably just ferals shooting seagulls or something daft (nobody being murdered) ... but the gun did sound deep/throaty and not an air pistol.

Think I'll shut the curtains and pretend I'm not in

Ooh PN that does sound scary. Hope everything's OK.

I have just had an exciting evening. My church hosts an election debate whenever there's a general election. (At least, they did in 2015, and they did this evening - can't remember whether there was one in 2010 or not.) We had four candidates addressing questions that had been emailed in, including both the two that have any possibility of getting elected. I hadn't emailed any questions in, but I did get picked by the person with the roving mic to comment on the answers the candidates were giving!! Somebody had emailed in a question about supporting families and helping people prevent family breakdown, and one of the candidates said something about widowed parents, so when it was comments time I put my hand up and said how much I disagree with the upcoming changes to widowed parents' allowance (which is a benefit I get based on LNE's NI contributions). The changes won't affect me - I'll remain on the old system - but I don't think future widowed parents should get their help cut off after the first year, and I don't think people who haven't come across bereaved children have any idea how long they go on needing additional support from the surviving parent. Anyway, I got some brief comments from the panel at the time, but afterwards in the "mill about talking to each other or else queue up to talk to a candidate" time, I got a chance to speak to both the possible winners in this marginal constituency. One of them said his party wants to reverse the changes to the WPA anyway, and then spoke passionately about improving funding for children's and adolescent mental health, and the other one was very interested in what I had to say, and ended by saying that if he gets in he would like to meet me to talk more about it!! So I am feeling politically influential tonight.

zagubov

Conrad wrote: »

I've got this new piece of kit, it never freezes up, never needs updates, never leads to me hanging on to 'help' centres in India for hours, never requires a fix or a back-up. If anyone is interest PM me with the reference; #pencil n paper

I had to find a number stored at a database at work. Got into work, fired up the computer, tried to print from the database to the printer. Spent ages trying to print the number from the database, or paste it or a screenshot of it into a document that could print or be converted into a document No joy. The computers and printers seems to have network problems and were’t talking to each other.Searched the building for a printer that recognised my computer. No joy.

Finally realised I was caught in a high-tech groove and just grabbed a pencil, copied it onto a piece of paper, closed the computer down and wondered why I was such a chump it had taken me so long to realise I only had to copy it down ever had to print it in the first place.

Was just trapped as a gear in a machine and hadn’t been able to step back and look at the process from outside and how much of it is necessary.

chris_m wrote: »

For those old enough (or daft enough to like comedy older than themselves) there was a classic bit in The Goon Show February 7th 1957 episode "The Mysterious Punch-up-the-Conker", where Eccles had a piece of paper with the time "writted" on it'

For those who don't remember it and are wonder what the heck I'm on about, there's a 3 minute or so audio clip on this link.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:What_time_is_it_Eccles.ogg

Right in front of me on my bookcase at eye-level is a tattered second-hand copy of one of my favourite books "More Goon Show Scripts". :beer:

There's more here.

michaels

I'd have grabbed my phone and taken a photo, easier and quicker than finding a pen and paper. Always do this for meter readings, things on tv I want to remember etc.

zagubov

michaels wrote: »

I'd have grabbed my phone and taken a photo, easier and quicker than finding a pen and paper. Always do this for meter readings, things on tv I want to remember etc.

I do that myself now, far too much. My phone's full of electricity meter readings and photos of bills, forms, and classroom whiteboards full of students' experimental results.

With the new A levels needing evidence of practical work, students are encouraged to take photos of their experiments as when the exam board inspector comes in, their record books have photos with dates.

Actually the freakonomics podcast I was listening to while walking the dog tonight mentioned that Microsoft's biggest mistake was not getting into the phone business. I imagine that desktops and laptops might go the way of CRT tellies eventually.

zagubov

michaels wrote: »

I'd have grabbed my phone and taken a photo, easier and quicker than finding a pen and paper. Always do this for meter readings, things on tv I want to remember etc.

Back in the 70s my dad had visited the US and came back with a land camera that developed instant pictures like in the Hey Ya video. Probably the SX-70. He was involved in an accident soon after and immediately got out and took photos of the cars involved and all the witnesses and got their contact details so they couldn't deny witnessing it.

Immediately had command of the whole accident scene and it made it very easy to show how he was in the right.

CKhalvashi

michaels wrote: »

I'd have grabbed my phone and taken a photo, easier and quicker than finding a pen and paper. Always do this for meter readings, things on tv I want to remember etc.

That, and mileage readings at the end of a business trip (I always 'zero' the 'trip B' meter at the start, and 'trip A' whenever I fill up, so I can monitor the MPG (getting about 650 miles from about £60 of fuel at the moment, averaging about 53mpg)

Do the same with work receipts and email them to an email address set up for storing them, which saves me losing them.

Pyxis

I'm the opposite in some ways.

If I get a bit of info on an email that's too long to jot down, I print it out. If I don't, it won't get done, as the original email becomes out of sight, out of mind.
I also print out delivery info/receipts of everything I buy online. I don't buy a huge amount, but if I don't print out the details and leave them on my hall table, I'm likely to forget what I've ordered!

I'm getting through reams of paper.

However, in my defence, when the info is out of date, which might be only a few days, I use the paper as a jotter. I jot a lot!

Am performing outdoors with my AmDram group later today. A nearby town is having an outdoor festival, and ours will be one of several acts doing short performances around the main shopping street. A couple of days ago, the forecast was for showers around the time of our performances, but, luckily, that seems to have changed to dry now! Phew!

vivatifosi

CKhalvashi wrote: »

That, and mileage readings at the end of a business trip (I always 'zero' the 'trip B' meter at the start, and 'trip A' whenever I fill up, so I can monitor the MPG (getting about 650 miles from about £60 of fuel at the moment, averaging about 53mpg)

Do the same with work receipts and email them to an email address set up for storing them, which saves me losing them.

That's a really good idea with the A and B trips. Might have a go at that. Thanks.

CKhalvashi

vivatifosi wrote: »

That's a really good idea with the A and B trips. Might have a go at that. Thanks.

Never had a problem with it being accepted by the accountant, as in coordination with my diary it should be accepted by HMRC, just a note if you're doing it for claimed mileage.

PasturesNew

In the car I've got a little £land Memo Board I write things down when I can. Sometimes I can't... e.g. if you're passing a sign that says "Xmas Fayre, Saturday ....." can't do that if I'm driving. But if I still remember when I park (often don't/forgotten by then), I can jot it down. I then bring that into the house if I want to write things into my diary.

I have an A5 diary beside me here, with a pencil - and if I spot something interesting on the telly I'll jot it down in there, or if I spot something online. e.g. there's a food festival today... although now it's the day I've decided I won't go as it was just 40 stalls down the closed High Street and there's no parking and it was rubbish.

But it's nice to have a system.

For me, taking photos with my photo-phone is far too hard, tiresome, awkward and long-winded ... and, outside, you can't see the screen, so have no idea if what you snapped is in shot, wobbly or what.

I'm off to the launderette now as I wrote launderette in my little diary that sits beside me... see, it works.