Rant thread

[Bedford Roughyed]

Morrisey.  

[ckn]

Today's rant is because I can't have a proper rant.

I have my windows open at home because it's a lovely day.  There's a police helicopter hovering not too far from us and it's loud enough that it's making it hard to listen to the bleeding-heart lefty James O'Brien show on LBC while I work.

I can't have a rant because I know it's most likely dealing with a serious incident and that's usually followed by the even louder air ambulance.

Neither do I want to shut the windows as the breeze is lovely.

So, my rant is that things are annoying me but they're justifiable and reasonable therefore I can't rant about them.

Hope that makes sense

[Bob8]

On 4/14/2018 at 6:05 PM, Wiltshire Rhino said:

SWINDON F*****G TOWN! 

 

Thank you for listening. 

Having lived in Oxford, I must agree.  Swindon is dreadful.

[Exiled Townie]

I know it's nothing in the great scale of things, but this rankled me - This mornings 8.30am sports report on BBC 1 news, the sports reporter said, "First, rugby " and gave a report on a rugby union game, then he said "And now Superleague", and gave an even quicker report on the Wigan/Cas game.

When did rugby union become 'rugby' and rugby league become 'Superleague' ... bah humbug,  bloomin' BBC etc etc.

Edited April 21, 2018 by Exiled Townie

[ckn]

Thousands of years from now, this will be used as evidence of the start of the fall of humanity.

[Phil]

2 minutes ago, ckn said:

Thousands of years from now, this will be used as evidence of the start of the fall of humanity.

Cretinism 

[Robin Evans]

Another royal to fawn over.

The hysterical level of sychophantic dribbling makes me want to hurl 

Edited April 23, 2018 by Robin Evans

[heartofGold]

3 minutes ago, Robin Evans said:

Another royal to fawn over.

The hysterical level of sychophantic dribbling makes me want to hurl 

Which makes me appreciate this forum so much.  On such occasions I can come here and hide which I will be doing next month to avoid the wedding

[Futtocks]

Well, I think William and Kate are a charming pair of giant bipedal lizards.  

[Shadow]

36 minutes ago, Futtocks said:

Well, I think William and Kate are a charming pair of giant bipedal lizards.  

I for one welcome our new lizard overlord

[Bearman]

13 hours ago, Robin Evans said:

Another royal to fawn over.

The hysterical level of sychophantic dribbling makes me want to hurl 

How many of them are there now?

In my lifetime 3 have died. George, Elazabeth and Margaret.

Liz and Phillip begat 4 and Margaret and Tony begat 2.

They in turn have been breeding and have added 14 between them.

That's  net increase of 17, When is enough enough?

 

[JonM]

13 hours ago, Phil said:

Cretinism 

Bit harsh. I know which side of the mildly eccentric/mental health problem line I think they're on, but they're not really doing any harm, are they?

I'm pleased to report that I phoned up the village GP surgery at 8:00am on Friday last week and was given an appointment for 8:35 that morning.

[Phil]

1 hour ago, JonM said:

Bit harsh. I know which side of the mildly eccentric/mental health problem line I think they're on, but they're not really doing any harm, are they?

 

That’s probably cos I’m harsh John

[tonyXIII]

Vinegar flies. I know they are also partial to wine, but the barstewards are attacking my glass of whisky. I don't want to use fly spray because it could taint the whisky and it's not that effective. I'm thinking flame thrower, but it might seem a bit extreme.

[Shadow]

I called my GPs surgery this morning and asked for a GP to call me back to discuss a change to my pescription dosage.

The receptionist suggested I'd get a callon Friday, my suggestion that I didn't need a telephone appointment just a call back was met with "is it an emergency?" rather than get into a game of "How ill am I today" and being reluctant to discuss my treatment with the receptionist I pointed out I had no way of knowing if it was an emergency as I wasn't medically trained.

10 minutes later the GP called me.

I know it's a cliche but

Jeebus

Save me from B L O O D Y doctors receptionists. Three is an inner circle of hell reserved just for them.

It's not even as if it's a stretched surgery, there's something like 1 GP for every 900 patients which if I recall from CKN's post of the other day is about half the safe working limit.

[ckn]

35 minutes ago, Shadow said:

I called my GPs surgery this morning and asked for a GP to call me back to discuss a change to my pescription dosage.

The receptionist suggested I'd get a callon Friday, my suggestion that I didn't need a telephone appointment just a call back was met with "is it an emergency?" rather than get into a game of "How ill am I today" and being reluctant to discuss my treatment with the receptionist I pointed out I had no way of knowing if it was an emergency as I wasn't medically trained.

10 minutes later the GP called me.

I know it's a cliche but

Jeebus

Save me from B L O O D Y doctors receptionists. Three is an inner circle of hell reserved just for them.

It's not even as if it's a stretched surgery, there's something like 1 GP for every 900 patients which if I recall from CKN's post of the other day is about half the safe working limit.

The nosy receptionist has been transformed into that being their job, even for the shy receptionists who don't want to know.  A half-bottomed initiative called "signposting" has non-clinical folk making decisions on where the best place to send ill folk for far too large a portion of the NHS.  Key examples:

- receptionists have to use their lengthy medical school training to decide whether someone is just using British reserve to say "I'm just not feeling well" or if they're actually suffering from a serious medical emergency;

- the 111 service using checklists to decide whether to send a blue-lights-flashing ambulance or send someone with a swollen foot to the pharmacy for ibuprofen;

- A&E receptionists having to assess whether the person asking for urgent help is actually really needing to queue jump or should get put in the queue behind the 18 year old in pyjamas and dressing gown who has a bit of a sore throat.

It's a consequence of cost-cutting.  GPs haven't the capacity to treat everyone equally so they have to get their surgery receptionists to be their gate-keepers.  NHS Direct, the nurse led service was too expensive so Lansley replaced it with minimum wage helldesk operators.  A&E is so busy their clinicians are needed elsewhere, the few hospitals who do have consultant-led triage have remarkably better throughput figures but a £125k+ A&E consultant tends to be a rare thing and often used to save lives at the business end of A&E.

p.s. that low figure of 1:900 probably means that they've got some big drains, such as nursing homes and care homes nearby.  Given GPs get paid per patient, 1:900 would bankrupt a GP surgery if they had 900 fit patients only each.  There's a lovely thing called the Carr-Hill formula that calculates your personal payment to a GP, if you're an older man with multiple health conditions that take up your GP's time then they get a higher annual payment for you, if you're a 25 year old moderately fit woman then you get a much lower rating (higher fitness folk get higher rates because they do daft over-exercise things).  Nursing home patients get a very big premium as they have low survivability and complex health needs,.

[Futtocks]

On 24/04/2018 at 9:13 PM, tonyXIII said:

Vinegar flies. I know they are also partial to wine, but the barstewards are attacking my glass of whisky. I don't want to use fly spray because it could taint the whisky and it's not that effective. I'm thinking flame thrower, but it might seem a bit extreme.

I have the Executioner to hand for such things: http://www.theexecutioner.co.uk/html/about.html

I have heard the following solution, but haven't yet tried it. A small bowl, like a ramekin, of vinegar, with one drop of liquid soap added. The vinegar attracts the flies, while the soap breaks the surface tension, so they drown.

[tonyXIII]

2 hours ago, Futtocks said:

I have the Executioner to hand for such things: http://www.theexecutioner.co.uk/html/about.html

I have heard the following solution, but haven't yet tried it. A small bowl, like a ramekin, of vinegar, with one drop of liquid soap added. The vinegar attracts the flies, while the soap breaks the surface tension, so they drown.

I like the idea of zapping them. It just seems fitting.

I've never heard of the vinegar soap solution. It makes sense, so I'll try it.

Thanks.

 

[Futtocks]

29 minutes ago, tonyXIII said:

I like the idea of zapping them. It just seems fitting.

I've never heard of the vinegar soap solution. It makes sense, so I'll try it.

Thanks.

Let me know if it works. I haven't got the flies visiting my flat yet, but if it works, it could be invaluable.

You probably only need a small amount of soap, so as to avoid masking the tempting (to flies) scent of the vinegar.

[tonyXIII]

On 4/26/2018 at 9:28 PM, Futtocks said:

Let me know if it works. I haven't got the flies visiting my flat yet, but if it works, it could be invaluable.

You probably only need a small amount of soap, so as to avoid masking the tempting (to flies) scent of the vinegar.

Not exactly an unqualified success.

I can't seem to insert photos, but the vinegar/soap trapped a good few while my wife's wine attracted lots. I'll try to post the photos from my laptop tomorrow.

I'll keep the experiment going for a few more days.

 

[Futtocks]

1 hour ago, tonyXIII said:

Not exactly an unqualified success.

I can't seem to insert photos, but the vinegar/soap trapped a good few while my wife's wine attracted lots. I'll try to post the photos from my laptop tomorrow.

I'll keep the experiment going for a few more days.

 

Hmm, maybe try a sweeter trap, with sugar dissolved in warm water (plus soap) and see if there's a difference. Set out that as well as the vinegar one, and see which gets more traffic.

[ckn]

2 hours ago, tonyXIII said:

Not exactly an unqualified success.

I can't seem to insert photos, but the vinegar/soap trapped a good few while my wife's wine attracted lots. I'll try to post the photos from my laptop tomorrow.

I'll keep the experiment going for a few more days.

 

 

40 minutes ago, Futtocks said:

Hmm, maybe try a sweeter trap, with sugar dissolved in warm water (plus soap) and see if there's a difference. Set out that as well as the vinegar one, and see which gets more traffic.

If you have time to spare and a bit of enthusiasm and spare cash, why not try this?  You'd only need a couple of years of post-graduate education to get the basics right.

[Futtocks]

10 minutes ago, ckn said:

If you have time to spare and a bit of enthusiasm and spare cash, why not try this?  You'd only need a couple of years of post-graduate education to get the basics right.

If I had the money, I'd buy one!

[Wiltshire Rhino]

Potholes! 

 

However someone around Swindon is making people smile at them 

[tonyXIII]

Sorry the pics are so big. I guess I need to crop them first. The first shows the vinegar/soap and the second is my wife's wine glass. I'm going to repeat the experiment, altering a couple of things - soap before vinegar so they mix better and I'll put the vinegar/soap mix in a glass vessel rather than the metal one I used.

I am going to murder the damn things.