gareth.halfacree.co.uk

RIP, Black Cat.

I’ve just been to collect our second cat, Black Cat, who has been hit by a car and killed.

Although Black Cat wasn’t strictly speaking our cat, we’ve come to love him - and especially his habit of climbing on our laps and cuddling us while purring like a Kawasaki.  He turned up one day unannounced, eating Zumi’s food.  Despite trying our best to get rid of him, he stayed.

Eventually we bought him a collar and put a message for his owners - if any - to call.  Sadly, the only person who called was a motorist who saw Black Cat get knocked down on Thornton Road.

We shall miss him dearly.  God speed, Black Cat.

Today I broke with my recent habit of spending the weekend slobbing around, and actually did something: a day trip to Shipley Glen.

What a nice day it was too - a ride on the oldest extant tramway in the UK, a walk culminating in a Geocache find, a visit to a small wildlife centre, and finally a wonderful meal in the Old Glen House.

The pub is worth an especial mention: although it was fairly expensive at £17 a head, we had a more than passable bottle of bubbly to wash down our mains.  I had a lovely Ploughman’s Platter with some wonderful cheeses, and Ceri enjoyed her Bangers & Mash immensely.  What was perhaps the most impressive was the free bread as an appetiser - tandoori bread.  I kid you not - freshly baked wholemeal bread (still warm, although that may have been a microwave-aided temperature) flavoured with tandoori spices and served with a small side salad and mango chutney.

Heaven.

Add to the wonderful food and more than drinkable plonk free WiFi - ESSID ‘glen’, no password, no captive portal nonsense - and attentive staff, and it’s a place I wouldn’t hesitate to eat again.  Highly recommended.

Davenport Lyons, the by-now infamous lawfirm situated, sadly, here in the UK, is continuing its campaign of sending threatening letters alleging possibly copyright infringing actions and demanding money.  You may remember a post I made in which I drafted a response asking to see the evidence the firm allegedly has under the auspices of the Data Protection Act.  Although I’m not a lawyer - thank god, I never could eat a whole baby - I do have more than a passing interesting in the law and my rights therein.  Accordingly, the letter was drafted as best I could.

Since that time, many individuals both on bit-tech and another forum called Slyck have downloaded and sent off the letter along with the required payment.  Since then, most - as I predicted - have not heard back.  However, some of the very earliest letters have had a reply - here’s an example from bit-tech member nw104hh:

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My nice shiny new door!

Still no progress on the roof, but I’m pleased to say that this Monday saw the friendly chaps from Leading Edge Joinery fitting my shiny new door.  A wonderful job they did too - they even transferred the old cat flap, and did such a good job cleaning it that I honestly thought they had replaced it with a new one!  Who knew the centre part was supposed to be transparent?

The chaps even tidied up after themselves - to the extent that I don’t think our front step has ever looked so clean.  It was almost a pleasure to hand the cheque over on completion of the job.  Almost.

It’s heartening to see that some workmen still take pride in customer service, unlike certain other companies - naming no names.

Well, it’s now the 6th of September and my roof is still leaking. Considering that this is a problem I reported on the 18th of August, I’m ever-so-slightly incredulous - doubly so when you consider that Roofing Group UK’s website mentions “customer service” as a primary reason you should consider using their services.

What a joke.

Last night there was some pretty heavy rain, and the affected side of the room is once again soaked.  Slightly more worrying were several grating noises - not dissimilar to the sound of slates shifting.

I’ve penned the following e-mail to admin@roofinggroupuk.com, but to be honest I’m not expecting an easy resolution on this one.

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