Queue Warning ... Top Tip

Top Tip: If you ever see me in a shop or post office or anywhere else, don't join the queue behind me.

I got in the 10 Items Only queue at the supermarket. Three items only, so that was good then. Well, except for the family in front with a trolley with MANY items in. I thought they would leave the queue when they were told it was against the queue's rules.

Not a bit of it. That family stood its ground and caused a five minute delay at least.

These slow downs happen to the people in front of me all the time.

DW
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Theft

Someone is richer to the tune of £776.44 as a result of having stolen it from my bank account.

Ostensibly the charge is for services rendered by a hotel in Amsterdam. However, I was in Bangkok at the time. I stayed at that hotel in December last year though!

Got to Dubai to find a chap I was with in Amsterdam also had an attempt on his card but luckily for him the card he had used was out of date so they got nothing from him.

DW
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Raining and Pouring

My laptop computer ceased to be very early on Friday. Don't know why yet but my life depends on it.

Bought it in Dubai and am on my way there now to get it sorted,

DW
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Misery Guts

Leaving for another trip and got to Departures.

I had already drunk the last of my milk but had a pot of yoghurt left.

I confidently strode up to the two girls who were checking liquids and gels and that and asked if I could take the yoghurt through. I'm going to eat it straight away I said. She said, eat it now or dispose, pointing over her shoulder at the very bin I could use.

I cheekily asked if she'd got a spoon and glumly she replied that I should try one of the restaurants.

Lighten up a bit lass.

DW
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The Jackal? Don't think so

This is true: well, I can't verify the assassin part; but the rest is as it happened.

The clown next to me on the plane said he is an assassin on his way to Thailand to carry out a contract killing.

He proceeded to drink around 10 brandies. At one point he stood up and walked away from his seat without taking his headset off. He also tripped over his TV screen as we were sitting in bukhead seats.

At the end of the flight he fell down the aircraft steps but I broke his fall and then he stumbled into the loo in the airport transit area where he spewed his ring!

Hey, teach me the ways of the assassin, Grasshopper!

His greasy long hair and tattoos didn't cut it for me either!

DW
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10 years

Everyone who has been here for a while knows that I spent an excellent five years working at KIMEP in Almaty, Kazakhstan. A former student of mine there has just reminded me that he graduated 10 years ago in May of this year. That also led me to realise that 1998 was my final KIMEP graduation ceremony and I remember it very well and very fondly.

 

DW

Top tip on the stairs

When you are in a bit of a hurry don’t put your cup of coffee on the stairs and then try to balance an orange on top of an apple IMMEDIATELY above that cup of coffee in case the orange IMMEDIATELY AND UNSWERVINGLY drops into your coffee thus splashing coffee all over the stairs.

 

DW

Building site

This is a simulcast because of the business ideas in it.

 

Outside my hotel room this week I have been treated to the spectacle of a building site. Whatever the building is going to be, they finished laying the foundations at the start of the week and they have been working like ants ever since.

 

I watched them delivering and pouring concrete JUST IN TIME. Then watched as they have built things, laid things, moved things by crane. I am also interested in how they are storing things.

 

There are a couple of safety engineers and others with me this week and they are aghast at the way there are no rails, barriers, guards ... like what there would be elsewhere!

 

As Jerome K Jerome said, I love work I could stand and watch it for hours. I always thought that should have said, I could SIT and watch it for hours; but who am I to correct such a genius?

 

I have taken a couple of photos and really hope that I will be on this side of the hotel when I come back next week.

 

QUESTION: what does the K stand for in Jerome K Jerome. First to answer wins a prize.

               

DW

More IT Smartness

A delegate said her laptop's screen had given up the ghost so she brought it in. Nothing outwardy obvious and pressing the expected buttons did nothing.

We looked for the reset button but couldn't find it. I then removed the battery and found water. Oops!

Huge denials of course.

I reckon the chambermaid knocked a bottle of water over the thing and kept shtum.

DW
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Read the Small Print

It pays to read the small print. You know my car was stolen in December. The insurance company paid out: half of what I thought they should.

Today I called the insurers for my unused premiums back. I was told that the small print says I can't have them back. I checked and found it to be true.

So effectively the money they paid out was virtually nothing.

Top tip then: read the small print AND don't use the NIG insurance company.

DW
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He Works for an Airline ...

... So tell him my favourite aeroplane story!

Made the 1050 flight to Manchester today and just across the aisle from me was a BA cabin crew chappie who was obviously being put in place following their many cancellations.

Following a thumping landing the man sitting next to the BA chappie decided it was time to regale the self same BA chappie with his own favourite iffy aeroplane landing. The listener listened politely and might even have been interested, who knows!

DW
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Long haired and the drum roll

It is a world wide phenomenon I suppose that men who play a guitar or the drums or sing in a group often feel the need to sport long hair or wear a woolly hat. Odd that ... A complete lack of individuality and absolute conformity.

Didn't know that when someone in a group says something funny or witty on stage they STILL earn the right to one of those little drum rolls! Saw this in Bangkok and Pattaya.

DW
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T5 Day 2

Woke really early and saw on the LHR departures board on the telly that my 0630 fight has been cancelled. I looked for options and found a couple. I ate breakfast and left the hotel at around 0530. Even though it was only about 0545 when I got to T5 the customer services queue was already 100 metres long. I would like to be on the 0740 flight. Oink, oink; airborne pork!!!???

0811 and after two and a half hours in a queue to find another flight I was booked onto the flight I missed yesterday ... The 1050.

Noticed 11 customer service desks not open ... That's more than were open!!

Above the desks is a notice saying:

Welcome to our new home

I was ready make a quip about it saying:

Welcome to YOUR new home!

The BA man appreciated my attitude ... Non threatening and non angry and he gave me TWO refreshments vouchers!! 5 quid each.

In the security queue now at around 0830.

What a palaver.

Two more WCs: one with lock broken and the other where the door doesn't meet the jamb so the lock can't do its job even if it wanted to.

I used one the refreshment vouchers at Pret a manger.

DW
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Heathrow Terminal 5: my first impressions

I got to T5 at about 0745 on Sunday morning just over one week after it opened to passengers.

Queues are still delineated by those cheap movable ribbon affairs
I spent a total of around 30 minutes queuing for passport control and security.
Just before passport control they have fenced off an open area with hideous plywood block board painted white
They are taking photos of Brits at passport control and when someone taller or shorter than average turn up, the immigration officer reaches out and manually adjusts the position of the cam ... Even in Thailand they have cameras at passport control that can be adjusted much more sensibly than that
A WC I visited is already leaking and the seat is cracked
It already looks as if it is going to be too full too quickly ... Room for expansion of passengers?
There are no bins near the cash machines so the unwanted receipts will end up on the floor
There seem to be far fewer cash machines than in other parts of the airport
All of the artists' impressions I have seen of T5 before show a very large open plan space whereas the reality is far removed from that

To cap it all my flight to Manchester was cancelled and my luggage has gone missing again. So I am at a hotel for the night.

DW
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Airbus A380

Just arrived at Heathrow from Bangkok and on the way from Terminal 4 to Terminal 5 I saw my first Airbus A380, in Singapore Airines Livery. Not sure whether it's the first ever commercial A380 as I read somewhere that three have been delivered so far. I have to say it doesn't look as long as I thought it would.

DW
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Opposite

I know I won't be the first to spot the possible irony in this but I hadn't seen this book until about eight hours ago:

This is what you see on the front cover of a book by Paul Arden:

Whatever you think think the opposite: Paul Arden author of the world's best selling book.

Does that mean it's the worst selling book then? Or that we are meant to believe it is the worst selling book?
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Beijing here we come!

I am more than delighted to tell the world that my daughter Fran has just qualified to represent Britain in her swimming event at the Beijing Paralympics.

I will keep you fully informed at all stages of course.

DW
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Snake in the Grass

We just went for a lovely walk, Tar and me, during which we met a fellow Brit. Just before we met the Brit, however, we came across the smallest snake I have ever seen: no bigger than a pencil in all respects.

 

Of course, that tiny snake was like T Rex to a petite Thai lady so we had to turn round and go back the way we came ... that’s when we met the Brit. We were just beginning to walk around the very nicely landscaped lake at the back of the houses here in Min Buri. Never mind, we then went off in a different direction and had a different but equally lovely walk in the gloaming, as they say in Scotland!

 

We finished our walk by sitting and chatting at the tuk tuk stop: the stop just outside the estate where the larger style tuk tuks stop to take one to the main road and the shops and beyond, around 2 kilometres away. I walked that road last week and whilst that’s not very far, it is when done in 30 degree heat even though it was late afternoon when I did it!

 

So now you know!

 

DW

Baggage problems

I saw on the strap line on BBC World News this morning that an EU Minister has written to the UK’s Foreign Secretary David Milliband to complain about the loss of his luggage as a result of travelling through Heathrow Terminal 5. I will watch this story with interest and if I remember I will also write to David Milliband and ask whether he got involved. If he did, will h get involved in my case too?

 

If Milliband does get involved it will show the world how much of a club these people live in and how little we count for.

 

DW

Dating top tips

Gentlemen, when trying to woo a lady by mail, the following two genuine examples are best avoided

 

·         I don’t have a job, I don’t have any money and I am on benefits but I would like to get to know you ...

·         (Having enclosed a photograph of himself, this gent said) Don’t let the tattoos and scars put you off ...

 

Honestly, I have read these in genuine love letters!

 

DW