Night Owls Nook

[Timbo]

This is a public announcement...Normal service may be resumed on Monday...owing to making a bit of a discovery this week.

So while whip is out for the next couple of days I will be 'off air' but not 'off forum'.

[grendel]

well here I am at silly o clock - now awake, I was woken up at 2.30 to take my daughter to the walk in minor injury unit (we no longer have an A&E in Canterbury) as she had leg cramps and thought it might be a DVT (and only on her first days training for her new job as a 111 telephone operator) took me until I got home to wake up properly. All well though.

[MauriceMynah]

On 10/7/2016 at 11:38 PM, Timbo said:

Normal service may be resumed on Monday.

That point alone could do with a bit of clarification, or even moderating!

[grendel]

43 minutes ago, MauriceMynah said:

That point alone could do with a bit of clarification, or even moderating!

I think he may have meant Abnormal Service MM

[BroadScot]

4 hours ago, MauriceMynah said:

That point alone could do with a bit of clarification, or even moderating!

I couldn't possibly moderate a chap who works with a 3" tool every day at work. Could I Tim? Anyway, I like his choice of music on his radio station, it has lots of get up and go !

Iain

[Poppy]

3 hours ago, BroadScot said:

I couldn't possibly moderate a chap who works with a 3" tool every day at work. Could I Tim? Anyway, I like his choice of music on his radio station, it has lots of get up and go !

Iain

Seems she knows him too 

[Timbo]

Now to keep you all amused, and as halloween is fast approaching, not to mention giving Iain something to moderate...I present the true story of Franken...er trowel, yes Frankentrowel!

Over twenty years ago I had to undergo an operation. An operation to an area of anatomy that would make grown men wince at the mere thought. Turns out that the mohel did not do the job correctly on the eighth day (go look it up) and it all had to be done over again...but now I'm twenty nine years old. 

On the day of the operation, transport was going to be a problem as my wife only had her provisional license and the hospital was some miles away from our village. So what we did was...I drove to the hospital and after I'd had the operation my wife would drive us home, after all it was a 'day operation' and although I might be a bit sore and woozy I could sit in the front passenger seat and supervise couldn't I?

So the pre-med was administered and I was wheeled into the surgical waiting room on a bed. In a bed at the side of me was a very attractive blonde woman being given very special attention by both a surgeon and anaesthetist. The blonde was having her wisdom teeth out...fancy that, who'd have thought?
"Oh we will save them and put them in a jar for you gorgeous!" said the surgeon to the blonde.
"I hope you're not going to put mine in a bloody jar!" I quipped across the room.
"Oh ignore him he's away with the fairies!" the surgeon said to the woman.
"Speak for yourself you mincing mountebank..." I tried to reply but fell asleep.

I woke up from the operation in a corridor, fully dressed, sat in a wheelchair with a huge pair of padded incontinence pants on underneath my jeans. In the distance I could hear the voice of my first wife, a theatre nurse, demanding to know where the hell I was. Apparently the day surgery unit had closed for the day and they had just wheeled me out and left me in a corridor. I could hear the wife's voice swiftly pass warp factor eight and thought I'd better let her know where I was, so I called out. I was in a mess, I couldn't stand, I felt sick, I kept falling asleep...but the hospital was closed for the day so my wife wheeled me to the car and dragged me into the passenger seat.

I was shaken awake by the wife hours later. Apparently she had decided, as I had fallen asleep, to pull into a shopping center and do the weekly shop, go for something to eat, do I bit of shoe shopping while leaving the car lights on as well as the emergency lights. The battery was now flat and the car would not start. Groggily I climbed out of the car, noticing that the bulge in the front of my jeans was considerably larger, and started to walk to a nearby car discount shop to purchase a new battery. I carried the battery back to the car, fitted it, climbed back into the car with some difficulty...and then passed out.

Back at home, I was bursting for the loo. But getting out of the car was extremely difficult. I felt hot, I was breaking out in sweat, I felt dizzy but I made my way indoors and into the loo. Slowly the trousers came down as I started to take out the layers of backing and yards of bandages to reveal that the mountebanks had done to me.

"Love? Love? Will you come here a minute?"
"What do you want?"
"Have a look at this will ya?"
"What's the matter with you?"
"Is it supposed to be this long and black?" I asked as I passed out.

I came too with my Mrs slapping my face.
"Come on we've got to get to a telephone" said the wife dragging me to my feet.
At the time we didn't have a phone, so I pulled my trousers back up as best I could... but I could no longer fasten them...and we headed down the village to the local school where my Mum was the caretaker. The kids had all gone home thank God, but the headmistress let us in, called my mother and telephoned the doctors surgery.

The only doctors open was two villages away and we had no transport. An ambulance was called but we were told it would take two hours to get there. My wife had realised what was wrong with me and realised we did not have two hours to wait. So Uncle Albert was called home from work and he made the three quarter hour journey in twenty minutes. You see what my wife had realised, and did not tell me at the time, was that the surgeon had mistakenly cut the artery and my er..trowel...was filling rapidly with blood.  By the time Uncle Albert arrived I was almost delirious... and the trowel? We are talking shovel proportions now. Swiftly I was bundled into Uncle Albert's car and we drove to the doctors surgery.

Pulling up outside the surgery Uncle Albert dragged me from the car. My trousers were dragging on the floor...and so was the trowel as I was dragged once more this time into the doctor's waiting room. The waiting room was full of women waiting for the 'Well Woman' clinic. I could hear gasps and shrieks as I was now carried by Uncle Albert to see the doctor.

"How fast can you drive?" the GP asked Uncle Albert.
"What?" 
"He will be dead before the ambulance gets here how fast can you drive?"The rest of the evening is a blur. I can remember lots of lights. I can remember Uncle Albert screaming 'I've seen better jobs done with a broken bottle in Abu Dhabi'.

 

 

[Timbo]

So Frankentrowel? Well I was patched up with huge metal deep sutures. The bruising took several months to go away. The swelling...several weeks. But on a shopping trip with my Mum to Sainsbury's supermarket I needed the loo. In the gents were three urinals. I took Trap One to the left, another chap was in Trap 2 in the middle and in Trap 3 to the right...was a trowel watcher! The trowel watcher leaned in for a look at the chap in Trap 2 who swiftly left. The Towel Watcher sidled up to Trap 2 and leaned over for a look at me. Black bruising, three times the normal size with a ring of steel stitches the Trowel Aficionado was confronted by Frankentrowel. With a yelp he ran for it!
"What did you do to that chap?" asked Mum £He shot out of there like a cut cat!"

But gentlemen...the story does not end there. Oh no! My being dragged through the Well Woman clinic is remembered, and whenever I visit the village the older women will turn to their friends grasp their forearms then touch one knee and whisper 'and it's black' as I pass by.

[grendel]

talking of archaeology as we are, I bet thats the stem of the myth that black men have bigger trowels, me - I just have size 14 feet, right off to do some gardening.

[BroadScot]

How do I moderate a archaelogical trowel?  Reply to the Jorvic Trust in York !

Iain

[Vaughan]

In California I believe your trowel is known as a clam digger.

[Timbo]

So I'm back from a quick trip to Iain's neck of the woods! Very busy day today as some twonk from the housing association let herself into Uncle Albert's housing complex and hammered on his door demanding to know if 'he is in charge of money' as his rent is late. Now there is a rather large note stuck in the front of Uncle Albert's file at the Housing Association...I know 'cos I wrote it and insisted they put it in the file...which reads  DO NOT CONTACT WITHOUT SPEAKING TO HIS SON OR OTHER ATTORNEY FIRST!

The reason for this is quite simple. Since the stupid woman's visit at 5PM, after their offices have shut, I have now received 32 phone calls from Uncle Albert who has gone from wondering who the woman was to thinking he's going to be evicted for non payment of rent to thinking he's going to get his legs broken by some thugs.

Of course I rang the housing association and gave them both barrels on their answer phone system...and I've also rang them after everyone of Uncle Albert's phone calls to me.

Now Uncle Albert does not owe them any money btw...he paid his rent as normal by direct debit, but the housing association paid the money back into his account three days later for some reason only known to themselves.

Edited to add the housing association removed the live in warden from the complex, although the residents still pay for one, and have just made their part time, one afternoon a week, warden redundant.

[quo vadis]

Bless them 

[TheQ]

Having worked on the odd archaeological excavation, many years ago, I remember them occasionally saying this trowel is worn out I need a new one. sSince many on the digs were of the physically active 18 to 25 age group I now wonder what they were meaning.....

[BroadScot]

Sorry to read your woes Tim. I am quite sure you used your finest vocabulary on the phone ! Somehow, I have a feeling it would not be very subtle ! More to the point !

Iain

[grendel]

I regularly get bills from my electricity demanding immediate payment, this is generally just 2 days before the next payment is due to go into their account.

After many years where from month to month I didnt know how much they were going to take out by direct debit (always a random amount more than was owed- one time they decided to take nearly £700 when I was still in credit) and every december claiming back the £500 overpaid (while every year getting the excuse that they were allowing for winter usage) usage in advance and by several hundreds of pounds per customer - add up the interest they are getting on our money - before it is even due....

So I now pay by standing order monthly. quarterly I get a bill always saying I am about 1 payment short, always that 2 days before the payment is due. when I phone them, they try and force me to pay by direct debit (with all the profit they make by overcharging I am not surprised). My only consolation is that while I worked for them I got a staff discount of £50 per year, my last laugh was that they carried on applying it for 5 years after they sold off the part of the business I worked in - then was made redundant from that offshoot. all the while still getting the staff discount - they did not try claiming it back.

Tim I feel your pain with companies not reading their notes on the particular job in hand, and thus failing massively.

[Timbo]

So I'm up at the crack of dawn to make sure I get through to this housing association and make sure Uncle Albert is fully paid up but...

"I can't talk to you about your father's rent."
"Why? I am his duly appointed registered attorney with copies of the document given to you for your records."
"The computer says no! but if you would like to make a payment?"
"How much?"
"I can't tell you that!"
"So you want me to hand over my card details for you to take an amount you won't tell me?"
"Err...yes!"
"Err NO!"

A Whole morning...and the amount? £40 service charge for a warden service they no longer provide! Makes you proud to be British.
 

[grendel]

typical quoting the data protection act without checking first, as per my last paragraph above.

 

[grendel]

did you manage to extract an apology?

 

[Timbo]

58 minutes ago, grendel said:

did you manage to extract an apology?

 

No but...I've been waiting for my door to be replaced and miraculously the workmen turned up this morning to tell me this is now being done well ahead of schedule next week. The instruction to sort my flat out given fifteen minutes after I got off the phone this morning. 

[ranworthbreeze]

1 hour ago, grendel said:

did you manage to extract an apology?

 

Hi Grendel,

Nobody says sorry anymore, be it a bank, insurance company or the idiots that just damaged your boat, car etc.

Re direct debits, I always opt for standing orders that way you have control rather than a company just taking cash when it is convenient to them.

Regards

Alan

[quo vadis]

2 hours ago, Timbo said:

So I'm up at the crack of dawn to make sure I get through to this housing association and make sure Uncle Albert is fully paid up but...

"I can't talk to you about your father's rent."
"Why? I am his duly appointed registered attorney with copies of the document given to you for your records."
"The computer says no! but if you would like to make a payment?"
"How much?"
"I can't tell you that!"
"So you want me to hand over my card details for you to take an amount you won't tell me?"
"Err...yes!"
"Err NO!"

A Whole morning...and the amount? £40 service charge for a warden service they no longer provide! Makes you proud to be British.
 

So you think you have it sorted Timbo 

we will see 

[Timbo]

NBN-NOC NEWSFLASH ESCAPED GORILLA

Broads Authority Camel Protection Unit Ranger Humph Littleton informs the NBN-NOC Newsroom that the Broads Authority would welcome any escaped gorillas to Broadland.
"We've already renamed the Broads in anticipation of the large numbers of primates wishing to take holidays birdwatching, basket weaving and paddleboarding innit Guv! 'The Broads Not a National farting Camel and Big Monkey Park' signs are being printed as I speak!" says Ranger Humph.

Sources close to the Broads Authority dismiss ideas they will be launching a replica of the African Queen.
"Why on earth would we want any more boats on a waterway? We are already doing our damndest to point out that the Broads may be man made, but the rivers are 'natural' so we can dispense with those foolish enough to disagree with me. By the way...any news on my Knighthood? I've heard there could be one going spare when they take that Green bloke's away!"

Local businesses are also looking forward to the prospect of adding Gorilla's to the Broads. Reginald Molesponger from CooDee's Norfolk Emporium says
"Can'' wair for monkeys on thur broads. We've ariddy bought extra tocks f bananas and pg tips!"

This is Reginald Doseyget reporting for NBN-NOC News. More on our next bulletin! 

[Timbo]

NBN-NOC NEWSFLASH ESCAPED GORILLA RECAPTURED

Escaped Gorilla Rodney Kumbuka has been recaptured. NBN-NOC reporter Reginald Doseyget has this EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW.

"So Mr Kumbuka how does it feel to be recaptured and returned to London Zoo?"
"Me name is Rodders mate! Recaptured, then, squire? No! Struth! I came hammer and tack on me own volition!"
"And why did you choose to come back...Rodders?"
"I'm bleedin well not impressed wiv the direction the chuffin' Broads Auffority is takin'. Relentlessly pursuin', to the bloomin' exclusion of evryfink else, National Park status is simply not on! Oi! There is no moorin' for me banana boat. The bins are overflowin', right, rubbish evrywhere and they keep weretin' me toll brass on renamin' the chuffin' place. National Park ain't tha far oray from a zoo yer know geezer!"
"So you won't be returning to the Broads then?"
"I didn't say that did I, isit? No mate I'll be writin' ter Andrea Leadsom.., init? see if we can cop sumfink done about it! Struth! Now if yer don't mind they shot me in the chuffin' arris wiv a tranquiliser and I fancy some kip I do!"

"Reginald Doseyget, London Zoo, for NBN-NOC News"

 

[BroadScot]

Sorry not staying up these nights to enjoy your amazing radio station Timbo, but Psoriatic Arthritis, is playing hell with me. Keep up the good work, next time spear that gorilla with your infamous trowel !

Iain