Ebay and people that dont pay

I got sooooo mad when people win an auction and then just disappear into the ether. It costs money to submit something and you dont always get it back if someone doesnt pay you. Its infuriating. Its worse with people who have hardly any feedback because they can always re-register as someone else and it wont affect them. I deliberatley dont cancel bids from people with no ratings because you have to start somewhere, and I have been caught out 4 times now by people just not paying.
On another note, we went into town and had dinner out yesterday. Barbecue chicken melt sandwich for me and chicken, leek and ham pie for him indoors. Mooched about the shops and bought some cheap horror novels and found a pub with the same name as our local so went in it, and then had to go in some more pubs so they didn't feel left out.
Watched "Seed of Chucky" last night. A bit of an odd film really. Looking forward to "Final Destination 3".
Had breakfast (well, it was 12.30 pm but thats breakfast time for me on a Sunday) in Morrisons of all places. Scranbled eggs on toast. Very nice, although we had to wait a bit. Wiled away the time looking at pictures of Pamela Anderson and Kid Rock getting married. If you havent seen them, dont bother. Its scary. He looks like some bloke in your local that won a few quid on the horses and bought a lot of gold jewellery, and she looks like an air-brushed picture.

Day trip

Yesterday we went to town on a mini pub crawl. Again I emptied Oxfam of cheap horror novels. Then we ate in the Old Orleans Bar and Grill, who give you crayons to scribble on the table cloth with while you wait for your food. I had a cocktail called and Alligator. There was no actual alligator in it. I dont think so anyway.
Its so HOT here at the moment. I don't do hot weather. I dont do warm weather. And I am not so keen on daylight either.
As I type there is a man in my attic mending my faulty header tank ball cock. If its hot down here, it must be volcanic up there.
AND we are off to rehearse with my band in a bit. In a box like room with no air con.

Up with the lark...

Or rather an assortment of sparrows, blackbirds and so on. And I wasn't up with them - I met them from the wrong end. Yes, DC79 had another gig.
Hindley. The place with the stairs. Where we have to take the PA UP the stairs. And back down again. It was a great night as ever.
Except the going home part. Good bits included a chicken burger, free Jack Daniels and congrats for me doing a good sound job. The bad bit was the run around after it was finished. Dropping people off, lifting things, getting a headache and leaving Bolton in daylight. It was 5.30am before we got to bed.
I woke up at 11am (well, a cat stood on me) and I let him indoors sleep in. We took the stupid van back to the hire place , I read an entire Shaun Hutson book,and at tea time we had a bbq in the garden. All home made marinated things and very, very nice. I fell asleep on a blanket on the lawn in the sun and the cats loved us being outside in the garden and rolled about on everything in site.
Absolutely knackered now!

Music

I forgot how much I like the Bad Seeds and Nick Cave. I have remembered today.
"Past the square, past the bridge,past the mills, past the stacks On a gathering storm comes a tall handsome man In a dusty black coat with...."
Any takers?
Its on my new mp3 player . The pink one, natch.

The Chinese Theme

Carrying on from last nights Chinese meal, here is a photo I took in 2004 when we went round Manchester Art Gallery. It was a modern take on traditional Chinese clothing. I liked the colours. Despite the fact I have looked at this photo on countless occaisions, I have only just noticed that there must have been a mirror on the other side of the glass.....

One drink always leads to another

Saturday afternoon. "Lets go into Manchester and mooch round the shops" (that was him indoors). "Ok, but let's get the bus so we can both have a drink" (that was me). That was also mistake number one. Waiting for the bus him indoors casually mentions "Oh, I texted Dee and him and Magda are coming out as well." That was mistake number two. We are now intending to go for one drink with friends who aren't driving either.
We got to town at 2 ish and had a Subway. The foot long chipotle cheese steak thing (which we shared - we didn't have one each). Then we went for a drink. Dee and Magda turn up around 3.30pm.
At 6.30 we decide to go for an all you can eat Chinese buffet. No, this is not "one drink".
I drank Jack Daniels and later on "Old Tom", which I had to have a half of because they refuse to serve it in pints because its so strong. Its like a treacly dark bitter. It was declared "Ok" (Magda), "Not great" (him indoors) and "I am not drinking that" (Dee).
Having popped out for one drink for an hour or so at 1.30pm, its now 9.45pm and I have learnt another Polish swear word (Magda is Polish), and been informed that it is possible to take Viagra and then fall asleep...
We got the bus part of the way home until we realised it was heading off to Oldham and we don't live there. Walked the rest of the way. It was throwing it down and we got soaking. Then we did that thing that you ALWAYS do when you are not 100% clear headed. We turned the telly on and "Trading Places" (the Eddie Murphy film) was on, and we watched it all the way through, even though we knew whole bits of it verbatim. There must be a Karmic law that says if you come in from the pub and there is a film just starting that you have seen billions of times before , you STILL have to watch it, making sure you go "oh that bit where he/she does/says that really funny thing is on in a second" etc etc.
We went BACK to Manchester today, and I cleaned Oxfam out of pulp horror novels and bought a Bill Bailey DVD.
This time we DROVE.

Car Saga

Where I work, the building is being turned into flats. Actually they are called "pods". THey are a little bit smaller than your average caravan. The ground floor is being kept as businesses. If you look here you will see pictures from last year of them knocking things down.
Anyway, we now park in the car park round the back. Everyone, tenants of the flats, owners of the buildings and the businesses. On Monday they were spraying some kind of polymer resin type stuff all over the place. Guess what? It went all over everyone's cars. Now, I have a Citroen Saxo. My boss however has a Jaguar XKR. There are Bentleys and BMWs and Mercs and all sorts in that car park.
The builders admitted liability and I await a paint job because the stuff wont come off. However, as it was all over my windscreen and I couldnt see to drive, they said they would get it off. Which they did. With a RAZOR BLADE. Guess who now needs new windows??
Its the sheer stupidity that gets me. Why on earth did they not say "shift your cars" OR put sheets over the cars?
NOW they are being sued from all sides, forking out for loads of work for everyone's cars and you know what? They are spraying AGAIN on Friday!
Does no one have common sense anymore????
I am SO CROSS.

Tan

As any of those of you who actually KNOW me in real life know, I am as pale as a bottle of milk. I have been using Johnsons Holiday skin lotion for 3 weeks now. And I am paler than when I started. WHY??? I know real sun can't touch me through the spf factor 9999999 for albino babies I use, but you would think a bit of self tan would manage it. Not so. Discuss.

Blogger templates

Please can someone tell me how to get a list of things on the LEFT hand side of the page and not the right? As you can see from the dots, I have been editing this thing, and I can't work out how to put things on the LEFT. I want to keep the stuff on the right AND have stuff on the left as well (because I am greedy :-) ) but it just makes everything go weird when I try.

World Cup distemper

Well we are out.
We had a bbq planned to celebrate after the game but we had it anyway.
Pictorial evidence from the man with the world's biggest glass of beer (and no, I don't know what was going on with his hair here either)
A sad day.