So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between August 21st and August 29th:
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between August 4th and August 12th:
I’ve now taken three trips on the new London hire bike(s). It should have been four, but the system was up the spout last night, so my Tour de Commute became a Tour de SlowWanderHomeViaEveryCycleHireDockOnTheWay, including nine minutes from my mobile to the 0845 number, to be told “Our main call centre is really busy at the moment, can I take your details and someone will get back to you. Within twenty four hours. Not a lot of use to me when I’m trying to use a bike to get home last night. As I type this, they have three hours to get back to me.
I am starting to be reminded of how much I used to really enjoy cycling. Despite me being way to large to be comfortable for much longer a ride than the twelvenine minute Tour de Commute, I am already expanding the list of criteria for my next gaff to include “somewhere to keep a bike” (as well as “availability of more than stock ADSL broadband”), so I guess you could say that in my case at least, the bike hire scheme looks like it’s going to work, in terms of getting more people on bikes, and getting people fitter.
There are a couple of lessons to be learned early on, fortunately I have managed to avoid a “stiff” bike, but if you’re about to undock a bike, it’s worth lifting it by the saddle, and giving the peddles a spin. Some of them hardly move, which could be either the dynamo for the lights, or a brake problem. Either way, not worth the hassle (unless you want a mega-workout). Also, the gearing is super low, so don’t expect to be keeping up with the traffic, unless you can get your legs going like an actual Tour de France cyclist sprinting down one of the larger mountains.
Other than that, the bikes are pretty good, for solid lumps of idiot proof metal. You do have to give the bell a decent spin to get any noise out of it when the inevitable happens and Mr and Mrs Dopey Pedestrian just wander off the footpath in front of you.
All we need now if for TFL to have a decent status info somewhere (either on the phone line, on the web, or available as a datafeed for app developers to integrate into their apps) so that when things break, as they did last night, a simple check can say that the system is down, rather than messing around, trying various twitter searches, and calling an 0845 number from your mobile.
Incidentally, if you play with the touch screens on the info point at each docking station, one of the pages gives you a number for if your phone can’t call 0845 numbers, obviously aimed at visiting foreign tourists, but there’s no reason that us natives shouldn’t call 020 8216 6666 instead of 0845 026 3630 is there? 
Well, not entirely. Truth is, I’ve been busy. I’d like to say I’ve been busy finishing the flat, but in actual fact, I’ve been busy having possibly the biggest cowboys in London, who subcontracted the most useless people I’ve ever seen, and then have walked away from the contract, leaving me with an unfinished, damaged kitchen (and scratched up new oak floor), and having to look up how to take someone to court and win. It doesn’t look like a particularly quick or easy process, and I suspect that even with a court judgement, I’ll end up getting sweet FA, but I think it needs to be followed through as a matter of principle.
Still, at least life’s not all bad. I smashed the screen on my ipod touch, and then while attempting to replace it, I destroyed the plastic frame that it is glued to, as the clips in there really are more substantial than I had thought. Wait, did I say life’s not all bad? Well, I did break it by being (not really) a hero – it fell out of my pocket as I was sprinting across the car park to drive the father in law’s car away from the van it was parked next to, which had gone up in flames. To tell the truth, the fire brigade were already in attendance, and it certainly looked like everything was under control, but it’s not everyday you get to shout “give me the key, fuck the insurance” then run away from your father in law and drive his shiny car (and in moving it, it allowed the fire brigade to get the back doors of the van open and probably helped speed up the extinguishing of the fire in the back of the van, possibly, maybe, yeah, so, it wasn’t that big of a deal ;-P
I was hoping to have been able to witter on about the new London hire bikes by now, but due to a combination of me being slow (and dealing with the kitchen nightmare), and not ordering my access key until Friday 30th July (aka launch day), and the fact that the postmen in Whitechapel are less use than a chocolate tea-pot (matching the numbers on the letters and the doors? Optional. Actually leaving a card when they can’t deliver a special delivery item? Optional.), I don’t yet have my key. I do have a bike helmet though, no thanks to the staff in the bike shops I tried (around the Spitalfields area – clearly my lack of skinny jeans and other hipster style clothing marked me out as “not a rider of a fixie”, and thus I wasn’t in the right shop
Bloody hell, that’s the second attempt at that paragraph, and it’s still impossible to read. No worries about me dropping everything to become a famous author then :p
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between July 29th and August 2nd:
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between July 25th and July 27th:
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between July 12th and July 22nd:
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between June 28th and July 9th:
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between June 24th and June 28th:
So, you might have noticed that I’m sometimes a bit lazy, and can’t always be bothered to blog every day, and yet the Interwebs still go on. I read things, and if I find stuff interesting, it is pulled into these here posts auto-magically.
Here’s some stuff I found interesting between June 18th and June 24th:
