Whoops and coming next week...

 

                                    Nearly famous…

Last month, I tried to order from a shop on Etsy some crystals for myself, and a couple for a friend... But it wouldn’t go through. Here follows a 'typical me' tale...

I contacted the seller, and she was so helpful. The thing is, she is a Vlogger on YouTube and talks about her Etsy shop on her vlogs! The whole time I was imagining her telling the world about my muddle! I'd be famous for all the wrong reasons! *

As the order wouldn’t go through, we banded some options about (I don’t have PayPal, nor do online banking - me old school). As none of the options were instantly possible, I tried again...and I ended up getting a free gift as she thought the 5% voucher comeback code was an issue and offered to send me something for free due to my hassle. I'd only got the comeback code as I hadn't made the order instantly and had been putting things in basket over a few days.

Feeling bad, I ordered extra of something and said not to send it as thought it too kind of her so she made some money back (as it was way more than 5% off otherwise) and then it did work - I think it was as I had signed up for an Etsy account by that point! Plus, I liked some of the new stock that had just been put on website, so ordered another stone too. Felt like that had made up for my issues!

Argh and typical me, eh?

* Thankfully she didn’t mention the turd who put in an order, but I DID see my box waiting to be posted (she vlogged that week saying these were ones to be posted and it fits with when mine was, and I can match the box/crease in the tape to what arrived) so that was quite fun!

COMING NEXT WEEK - Book review and author interview:

                                              The Solstice Baby & Other Stories by J.M.Langan

Another giggle with (or at) Dad one!

 

But it’s in my hand and I can hear it!

 

Soooo, rewind to the other Saturday – Mum and I get back to mine and the smoke alarm on the top landing is beeping intermittently and I realise it needs a new battery. Trip to local supermarket (a FIVER for a battery that I have since seen as £2.50 elsewhere or a pack of TWO for £6, annoying…) anyway – collected a yummy Chinese for dinner and it was worth it, I guess!

Then, I get in from work on the Thursday evening and I can hear beeping! Nooooo, I think to myself, not again. It didn’t sound the same, but I went up to the landing to check. Nope, coming from downstairs. Look up at one in hallway (it’s a smoke/heat alarm and has a flashing light every forty-five seconds to show it is working properly) and it is still flashing as it should, so I was thinking perhaps a spider. Ask Dad to come over as you can’t open this particular type (unlike old-style one upstairs) and I am not sure I will be strong enough to untwist it etc and been dealing with dodgy shoulder...and I want to dust/hoover/test etc and see what happens…

    He arrives, we test. It appears fine, light still flashing as it should… Mmmm. We take it down (well, after a fashion as I had to get on chair to read which way to twist as Dad couldn’t see…) and I dust, still beeping…

    At this point the beeping DOESN’T sound like it is coming from it! I say that to Dad who disagrees and I go upstairs. We hear the beep again and it ISN’T the one upstairs but it doesn’t sound like the location of the beep has moved, yet Dad is standing away from where it had been on the ceiling…

    I say: “It just doesn’t sound like it’s coming from that!”

    He replies: “But it’s in my hand and I can hear it!”

    It had beeped again by then, to which I reply:

    “Yes, I know that but it just doesn’t sound like it’s coming from it…”

    It does it again…he has it up to his ear! I repeat that it doesn’t sound like it is coming from it, and why isn’t he jumping as it’s loud if by his ear?

    He repeats: “But it’s in my hand and I can hear it!”

    I say I know that but perhaps it’s the carbon monoxide alarm – there’s one on the stair well wood alongside landing…

    I go up and listen to that. Nope, nothing. He still has the other one to his ear and still doesn’t jump when it goes off but is stilllll saying that it must be and that he can hear it!

    I THEN remember the OTHER carbon monoxide alarm in the boiler cupboard. Open door, yup…source of beep found much to his confused face as he was stillllllll staring at the smoke alarm like it WAS that!

Hilarious, I did laugh – as did Mum when I phoned to say he was on his way home!

    Anyway, it wouldn’t stop beeping despite a battery change and the one from hallway was fine in cupboard (so all was Ok – best to have two, I learnt that a while ago – that’s another story) and I have ordered a second one as I DID buy a pack of two once upon a shopping trip but I cannot find the spare!

    I have, however, decided that when the hallway one goes I will have a matching one to replace it with...when I find it!

Parents!

 

A different type of TV viewing…

 

A month or so back when I saw my parents, they said they had just finished watching something (Sunboy or something like that) and that it was weird. They said they’d recorded it a while ago...but that it had gone a bit wrong!

     I was like: “What do you mean, gone wrong?”

    Well, due to various things replacing the normal schedule, their Sky box hadn’t stacked the episodes neatly and some were not in the stack. When viewing, as they don’t press ‘Continue’ like I tell them to, Dad hadn’t realised and played them in order of what WAS stacked.

     They watched 1, 2, 4, 7, 5 and the final episode 8 before doing 3, 6 and then 8 again... It was only during the initial batch when they got to episode 8 that things didn’t make sense that they then did 3, 6 having found them! They had thought it a very odd programme doing 1, 2, 4, 7, 5 first…how they got 7 and 5 muddled, whoooo knows?!?!

     I don’t think they really knew what was happening, but said it was a sad story overall… They had got some of the gist of it and watching the final episode again helped.

 

I mean?!!!!!!? Can I trust them with ANYTHING?!

Not quite as I asked!

                                                                    A recent one...

I got an ‘over the door’ towel rail that I wanted to hang off the arm of a kitchen stall so asked Dad to slightly widen the hook when I was over there on Mother's Day as I knew he had the tools needed.

    He asked: “Does it matter if it completely snaps off?”

    I replied: “Yes, as then it wouldn’t hook on…”

He re-appears with it having worked on it, I’m aiming for it to be just slightly over 90 degrees now so still a hook, just wider…

    NOPE – he has COMPLETELY flattened it!!

    “Is this what you wanted?” he asks.

    “No!” comes my blunt reply, followed by, “What part of that now resembles a hook?”

    Ahhhhh!!

Shorts...

                                                                       Some shorts...

“Is it midnight yet?”

On NYE 2022 my parents were round and we had all been playing a game called Rummikub, but finished (we play it three times) before midnight and were starting to get tired. We stacked the tiles up ready to put away and I suggested playing a ‘Yes/No’ guessing game – select a tile without looking and have five goes to guess the number n colour etc.

I took one, gave it to Mum and asked some questions – got some yes, so no responses and then on go 4 I asked “Is it even?” to which she looked entirely blank and paused…At this point I think she doesn’t understand and how can she NOT understand what an even number is. She replies (forgetting her yes and no response) “I think so!”  This was followed by puzzled looks! She then says she needs to show my Dad to check! I shut my eyes. He says “Yes” at which point I twig – it’s a joker, which is technically worth 30…therefore IS even and that is why she hesitated! I really thought she didn’t understand!  

“Pass you your what?”

For many years now, I have not drunk alcohol as it doesn’t agree with me and I have to watch sugar intake too. So, on earlier in the night (same NYE as above) when I said “Please can you pass my Aveeno?” you can imagine my Dad’s face when he misheard me and started looking round for a glass of wine thinking I had asked him to pass me my ‘vino’ ...!! I had only specified Aveeno (hand cream) as there is a Neutrogena one on the bottom base of the coffee table too. 

“Didn’t you just do that?”

Same game as the first tale here – but this was on our pretend Christmas Day as I was unwell on the actual one (stupid Covid)… Dad moved a load of tiles whilst we were wondering what he was doing/why. He then went, “Oh no, it doesn’t work…” stared at his rack of tiles again, only – without pausing his go – then attempted what he had done AGAIN! 

To this, my Mum said, “Didn’t you just do that?” to which he replied he had but he was going to make it work…he didn’t and had to put them all back…again! 

THEN, when his turn came around again, he did it again but had one more tile that could be used and this time actually made it work! How we laughed though!

 

Dad and the app!

Dad and the app...

                                                             

This is an older tale again from summer 2021…

I’m round at my parents and my Dad told me the app he usually uses for prescriptions is telling him to use something in “the play store” instead, but that he: “doesn’t know if it’s genuine...”

I look, tell him, “Yes, it’s the official NHS app, it might be like what I signed up to for my test results for work.”

Back then, I had been entering Covid test results twice a week…but this wasn’t ANYTHING like I signed up for as I just had to give personal details, job title, location etc. To be fair, that website updated requirements a few times and asked further questions to the point I felt like Big Brother was watching me, but it is still N O T H I N G compared to what I then had to do with Dad!!

Here’s how it went:

I download the app, get him to fill in some personal details (he couldn’t even see his NHS number on a letter sent to him as he’d made notes on it – Mum’s already laughing at him) and there’s me telling him, “Not to write down the number, it’s a one-off security text code that he won’t need again, they’ll send a new one...” etc.

Then, we get to proving who he was. “Over to you,” he says passing me his tablet as it says to take a photo of photo ID and upload. We pick his renewed driving licence and I take the photos and upload. I had to follow rules about how the photo can be presented etc, etc – bit like a passport in terms of background, all bits visible...

THEN, it says (initially I’m impressed in terms of security) to take a photo of ‘yourself’ to verify it’s you. At this point, he’s already starting to get impatient, “I’m not sure I even want my pills if this is what I have to do…”

I assure him it’s a set up process, a one-off.

So, I take the photo and it whirls in a circle and validates then face matches.

THEN...THEN...it says you now need to take a short video saying some numbers!!!!

“Do what?” he says! “Is this a scam or a joke?”

Mum is now splitting her sides laughing and I am not much better! He is getting realllllly annoyed!! 

Mum then decides it’s time to go outside so that she can’t put him off.

I give him the choice of writing the numbers and holding up paper or saying them. He picks the latter.

Well, the numbers 1 2 5 4 will never be the same again (and I have teased him a lot since) as there we were, standing in their kitchen (much lighter than their lounge) filming him saying 1 2 5 4!! It then checked it and came up with a message that he’d hear in 24 hours if he’d passed!!

Thankfully, the full app and verification came through by the time I left to come home! When I did leave, I left behind a bewildered and slightly exhausted Dad, and a Mum who was still laughing but saying “I’m not going on holiday if that’s all what I have to do to get a double-jabbed certificate!” as Dad had noticed it said he could print one. I think he was more pleased about that than the prescriptions.

I am happy to report that he has since used the app without me there and collected pills, phew! AND, that wasn’t what they had to do to get the required Covid pass certificate to go on holiday.

What a process though!!

 

It could only happen to me!

 

Here is another ‘It could only happen to me’ tale...

One Friday, Mum and I went into a nearby town to do a bit of shopping, and then popped into the Asda after.

I went off to get some yoghurt, leaving Mum to peruse the milk for a good date (they were away on the Weds and she wanted a long life with a date for when they were back). 

I return, to find she is stilllll looking at the milk and now talking to some man (with a grey hat, and with a daughter in a buggy) about the dates of milk. 

Now, it’s important to point out that whilst I am not usually ratty, I reallllllly needed a wee (and OCD with germs me would rather not use a public loo)! So, I said something along the lines of “You still looking at the milk?” which was stating the obvious but a polite way of moving her along and stopping the conversation with the man. It didn’t work... Anyway, a minute or so later we were all on our way around the remaining aisles with the man wishing us a “Good day.” Manners do still exist after all...even if mine were hiding in my want to get home and relieve the pressure on my bladder!

Anyway, fast forward to me dropping Mum home, getting home and running in for a much needed wee and then – and the timing of this still gets me – deciding to walk down the road to check my friend’s letterbox (I had arrived home to a leaflet hanging out of mine) as she was away and due back that day and I didn’t want her to think I had been slacking on my duty.

I COULD have instead opted to unload the shopping first. But, no...off I went. I was going to cut through the garages near her, then round to the door, then back up her alley to do a round trip (my usual route) but something stopped me.

A woman talking to a man...in a grey hat...with shopping (aka milk with a good date)...and a little girl now out of the buggy! No, it couldn’t be?

I decided to cut up the alley instead as this would give me (a) time to decide if I was going mad... or (b) the chance to avoid him as it was surely too odd to see him when I have NEVER before seen him in my life, let alone two minutes from my house...and on the same day!!!!

My plan didn’t work (but I wasn’t going mad) as he said goodbye to who he was chatting to and his little girl mad a beeline for my friend’s grass outside her house and promptly fell on it just as I got there too!

This is how the conversation went:

ME: “Wow, this is too weird. Asda...milk!”

HIM: “Oh yes! Is this your house?”

ME: “No, it’s my friend’s. I’m just checking her letterbox...not that I am telling you she’s away. I don’t live far though.”

HIM: “That’s amazing!”

ME: “Yep, although it’s the sort of off thing that often happens to me. Anyway, as you said earlier – have a good rest of the day.”

HIM: “Bye!”

So, I either looked like some utter stalker weirdo or he believed me...it was the truth after all! Anyway, I haven’t seen him since...I do think a house near there was sold...but it also happens to be the way I walk to the field behind our road/houses...so we shall see! Typical me!