Absolute Guff
I’m not sure who writes the guff the Absolute early morning presenters read out, but surely if the presenters had half a brain cell, they wouldn’t read it verbatim as they must know it’s a crock of shite. Saturday morning after playing “When I Come Around” by Green Day, they were trying to link to the documentary available on their Rayo app, which is about Green Day’s “American Idiot” album. Apparently, according to the guff read out by the presenter, “American Idiot” was the follow up to “Dookie,” despite it coming out ten years later than it. And that it was them returning after the creative lull following the success of “Dookie.” So, they totally ignore the fact that they had the “Insomniac,” “Nimrod,” and “Warning” albums, and re-released “Ker-Plunk,” predecessor to “Dookie,” and then had a greatest hits album called “International Super Hits” out in the time between “Dookie” and “American Idiot.”
Fine, advertise your documentary, and yes, “American Idiot” is a good album, but don’t treat your listeners as if they are the kind of morons your station employs.
At least that poor early morning presenter is gone by 8am. Unfortunately, it does mean it is time to switch off the radio as the morning slot is now presented by the unfunny personality vacuum, which is Jon Richardson, who seems to have roped in a desperately bored Angela Barnes in to share in his misery. Fuck know what Frank Skinner did to get the push, but they really need to bring him back.
Turns out it isn’t just the poor morning presenter they have reading their guff out either. I’ve heard the same rubbish repeated by a whole host of their so-called musically knowledgeable presenters as well.
Cheap Thrills
We were on the train up to London on Saturday morning, as we were making our way to Maidenhead for a FA Cup game. A woman got on the train at Mersham with her toddler son. She spent the rest of the trip up as far as Farringdon ringing everyone in her phone book to tell them she got a family ticket with travelcard to go anywhere in London all day, and it only cost seventeen quid. She definitely seemed more excited by that ticket cost than her son seemed about being taken to see dinosaurs. Especially when we got to Blackfriars, and he could see boats on the river. It was a case, as far as he was concerned, of fuck the dinosaurs, I want to go on a boat.
More Delivery Dismay
The more times I sit in the window of Maccy D’s watching the world go by as I have my unhealthy, un-nutritious breakfast, the more I become sure I will never order anything through any of the fast-food delivery chumpanies. No Uber Eats, no Just Eat, no Deliveroo, they can all do one. There is no regulation over what their drivers do. How anyone gets food which isn’t stone cold is a mystery. Recently I’ve seen orders picked up in an Aldi bag for life, an M&S cold bag which wasn’t done up at all. Not that any of the lazy bastards picking up deliveries bother to zip up their heat bags if they do deign to use them. And Saturday morning I saw a female Just Eat driver come out of Greggs with an open heat bag in her hand, but the items she had picked up from Greggs weren’t in it. she was holding them above the heat bag in the same hand as it as she ambled casually along the pavement in the general direction of where her transport might be. And of course some of the heat bags do have separators in them to keep hot and cold items apart, but most don’t, and I watch drivers put the bags of hot food in and then put the cold drinks in next to them. So the drinks won’t be that cold on arrival, and the food won’t be warm. And don’t get me started on these chumps’ motorised cycles, whizzing along doing twenty-plus miles an hour on the pavement. No, I’m not getting out of your way, fuck off on the road where your motorised vehicle belongs. I still don’t understand how any of these companies make enough money to keep going and how the millions of lazy fuckers using them put up with lukewarm food, or having to reheat everything. Either go and get it yourselves or go and eat it in the restaurant. It’s cheaper, and the food will be warmer and therefore more edible.
Suddenly, White Goods
I got a bit of a surprise going to work this morning, I turned to go down Brighton Road as usual, going down the lush green ‘valley’ bit under the footbridge, between Southgate Drive and the New Moon pub, only to find someone has dumped a fridge-freezer by the side of the road just past the foot bridge. Yes, a full six-foot-high white fridge-freezer placed by the side of the road. Not just dumped in a haphazard style as if pushed off the back of a lorry, or tipped down the bank. No, deliberately placed there. Someone had driven along there, stopped, got out, unloaded the fridge-freezer, and carefully placed it by the side of the road so it’s not blocking too much of the road. It’s not exactly the most inconspicuous of places to stop. It just boggles the mind.