The Wise Men of Three

On Friday afternoon my unreliable mobile phone, SuzieSamsung, decided to 'pull a sickie'.  The screen started flashing rapidly then went completely black, as she did the equivalent of "Aaaah, I feel so ill!" and pretended to pass out.  I was taken in at first and solicitously recharged her battery, but she remained unresponsive.  A good night's sleep did nothing to restore her either, so on Saturday I ventured into the East, {Hull, to be precise} seeking counsel from the Wise Men of 3.

My beloved optimistically dropped me off outside St Stephen's shopping centre, saying he'd drive round the block and pick me up when I'd finished.  Feeling rather like Captain Oates, I reminded him "I am just going inside, but may be some time".

 Picture  © Copyright PaulGlazzard and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

He told me afterwards that he'd made five circuits of the city in increasingly wide circles, since he had no way to contact me to find out how much longer I was going to be.

It was time well spent.  The wonderful young men in the 3-Store couldn't have been more helpful.  They discovered that, although the light was off, there was definitely someone at home - Suzie was hiding behind the sofa with the curtains drawn, while her boss {me} tried to peer in at the window.  They advised me that I could either get rid of her now by giving her 6 months' wages in lieu of notice, or send her to a private clinic to be treated.  I decided that sacking her was the best option.

Now, of course, I had to find a replacement.  No problem.  The Wise Men introduced me to some suitably qualified candidates, then repossessed all my files from Suzie and passed them on to her successor.  This involved quite a bit of fiddly techy stuff, which I watched in awe.  We are not worthy.   

Anyway, I now have Miss Sonia Sony.  She is taller and slimmer than Suzie, and seems rather like James Bond's Miss Moneypenny.  She has advised me on energy saving measures, and has even managed to find some of the photos that Suzie hid.  Miss Sonia has arranged them where I can see them, in date order, and assures me that I could even view them on my television screen, should I wish.  Never mind about gold, frankincense and myrrh, I have google, facebook and mail.  Not to mention a pretty carrier bag.

Make do and mend

Having invested in excess of £7 in a new watch battery last week, I was rather annoyed when my watch stopped again after only one day.  I think it is now an ex-watch, possibly killed by the strong magnetic clasp on my bracelet.   I'm not going to stop wearing the bracelet and I only wear a watch for work, so I decided to buy a cheap replacement from Boyes's.   {I love this shop.  For the benefit of non-northern readers, it's a mini department store, where you can buy pretty much anything.}

 Picture © Copyright John S Turner and licensed for reuse under this CreativeCommons Licence 

I found a rather attractive watch for just £5, only to discover when I got it home that that it didn't work.  I assumed that it had been in the shop so long that the battery had gone flat, but I certainly wasn't prepared to pay out another £7 to find out.  I already had a brand new battery in my old watch - how hard could it be to swap it into the new one?

I could see the groove where I had to lever the back off, but couldn't get to it without first removing the strap.  Those little posts are quite hard to find when they spring off onto the bathroom floor.  {The only room in my house with a decent light.}  The back resisted all attempts to move it using, in turn, a 1p coin, a steak knife, a screwdriver and a pair of scissors.  What on Earth do watch-menders use?   Ah, of course... eyebrow tweezers.  This same implement enabled me to easily remove the back of my old watch as well, and swap the batteries.  Wonderful!  This was going to be easy after all!

After checking that my new watch was working, I tried to replace the back.  As soon as one side clicked into place, the opposite side popped out!  I held it in both hands and applied pressure as evenly as I could... neither side went in.   I put it on the counter and leant my whole weight on it... still no luck.   It couldn't be that difficult, what do watch-menders use?   Ah, of course... a rolling pin.  Held vertically, the round end of my rolling pin exactly covered the round back of the watch, and gentle pressure did the trick.  A bit more poking with the tweezers and I managed to get the strap back on.  Admittedly it's the wrong way round now, but I can live with that.  The holes that the little posts go into didn't appear to be very deep, but it seems to be holding.  At the moment.

The following day I proudly wore my new watch to work.  As I took my gloves off, the front cover dropped out.  I have stuck it back with sellotape, until I can find some glue.  At least it should stop the strap falling off.

Location, location

It is said that women can't read maps and men can't ask for directions.  Not true.  The real problem, in my experience, is communicating instructions, especially when geography {a cruel and devious science} is involved.  This morning I gave my beloved a lift to the market, where he was helping at a charity stall.  Now, I don't like parking at the best of times, but when the market's being set up it's full of large van men and council stewards, and they were all watching me.  So it didn't help my composure when my companion told me to 'park in front of that red van'.  To me, 'in front of' when referring to a vehicle means the pointy bit with the headlights on it.  However, this particular vehicle was sticking out at right angles to the stalls and if I'd parked in front of it I'd have undoubtedly caused great distress to its owner, to say nothing of blocking the road.  Since I was approaching the van sideways on, my only practical options were to park before it or after it, and since, 'in front of' clearly means 'before', as in, "Is this a red van that I see before me?" I attempted to pull in before I reached it.  Apparently though, if you're the type of person who likes to approach life more cautiously, you have a mental image of sneaking up on obstacles from behind, so 'in front of' means 'the other side from where you are now'.  But after I'd swerved and got to the other side of it there was no room to park anyway, so I had to turn round in a very confined space {accompanied by much shaking of heads and in-drawing of breath from the spectators} and go back to where I'd wanted to stop in the first place.

'Where's your stall?' I asked.  'Over there,' he replied, 'behind that white van'.  This was better.  Although we were coming at it from the side, the white van was parallel to the stalls and had its back to us.  Sadly, the fact that there was an empty stall close to the rear end of the van lulled me into a false sense of complacency.  'No, not here', he said.  'Over there'.  He pointed to the next line of stalls which, given our direction of travel could, I suppose, have been described as 'behind the van', but from the van driver's point of view would have been on the left-hand side.  This, I admit, would have been a clumsy description, and we would have actually hit the van before I'd worked out where I was supposed to be going.

The solution is, I believe, to revert to the practice of our ancient ancestors and refer to all positions according to global directions.  I'd have had no problem at all with 'park to the south of the van'.  Except, of course, there wasn't room.