The Gus Gorman road to riches

In Superman III Gus Gorman hit upon the genius idea of transfering all the half cents that were lost in the system, when people's salaries were rounded down the nearest whole cent, to his own bank account. Of course, this scam having appeared in a Superman film no one was stupid enough to try it for real. It would be just too obvious and people would know they are being stiffed. Until now. Only now the small quantities of salami slicing (as web literate types know this sort of crime) are deemed to be small change and today's Gus Gormans will take you for anything up to £1-80 at a time if my experiences today are anything to go by.

The first experience was the air machine at a petrol station. Now despite vending in 20p increments, the machine only accepts 20p, 50p, £1, and £2 coins. And it doesn't give change. Hmmmmm. So either I have the right money (a 20p coin) or I can choose to pay up to £2 for my 3 minutes of air. Gus Gorman take a bow.

Fast forward to 10 minutes later. Tyres inflated to the correct pressure I deftly manoeuvre the pigs & bees mobile into a city centre parking space and go to get a pay and display ticket. The minimum tariff is a hefty 70p. Only the machine doesn't give change, so the minimum tariff is really £1 for most people (based on the number of motorists wandering up and down the pavement with pound coins in their outstretched hands). Now if they (in this case Kirklees Council) said it was a pound I could live with it. Granted I would probably be living with it like a chronic Tourettes sufferer, but it's there in black and white and that's the price. But the Council has seen Superman III and they are sticking it to the motorist like old Gus stuck it to the man.

Could this trend catch on? Could we send out invoices rounded up to the nearest £500 and claim that our accounting system only accepts thousands or half thousands? I doubt it.

bloody students

Imran Khan, politician and former cricket star, is also the Chancellor of Bradford University. Following his imprisonment during the current state of emergency in Pakistan the university has started a campaign for his release. Now, this is admirable behaviour. Most of us are happy to tut-tut-and-don't-get-involved when we learn of injustice on the other side of the road let alone the far side of the world. So off toddled the local news team to get a few sound bites from the students of Bradford University. Now here is where it all starts to go a bit Pete Tong. You see, of the half dozen or so people interviewed on camera, only one could muster comments beyond 'It's so unfair' or 'He's our Chancellor' and "I like Imran Khan, he's really popular here'. Only one actually gave an example of Khan's philanthropy and the injstuce of his imprisonment (and one of those interviewed was the Dean). I suspect had you told most of the interviewees that Simon Cowell had changed his mind and Imran would be released and back on X-Factor next week they would have been happy.

Students have always come in for plenty of stick. Work shy lay abouts wasting the tax payers' money and in need of a good wash, is just one such example. The thing that really grates about students is the selective washing up. They will happily spend 5 minutes searching a sink full of cups and plates for the one mug that they have used, refill the sink with the dirty crockery, and wash just their own cup. This is fine when you are living in the squalor of your student house, but not so when you join the world of work.

Innit.

Donald Trump's hair

I'm sorry we can't show you a picture of it here. He's very rich and no doubt has teams of people scouring the Internet for mention of his name to keep his lawyers busy so here's a picture of some noodles instead. Google it. Make sure the kids are asleep and the curtains are closed before you do. Oh, and turn off safe search. It's got to be seen to be believed.

something that really is Marvelous!

I went to the doctors today. I had an unsightly growth on my wrist and I was beginning to lose sensation in two fingers (not those two). Before setting out for my appointment I did what any responsible person with dependents would do and made my own diagnosis with the help of Google. A ganglion. A pocket of synovial fluid that has leaked from the joint as a result of trauma. The prognosis was for a ganglionectomy by aspiration or excision (if you didn't know me you'd swear I was a doctor using such big words). Aspiration involves draining the fluid with a large gauge needle, injecting cortisone into the now empty lump and then having the patient lay down for 30 minutes to recover. Excision means cutting the skin, removing the offending item without damaging any blood vessels or nerves and stitching the wound up. So off I go and present myself as John Merrick to the GP.

"I think it's a ganglion," I say, as he squeezes it from all angles. "According to Google."

"It is indeed," concurs the good doctor, before snapping on the latex gloves and, with a quick rub of a sterile swab, plunges what is best described as a sterile prison shank into my wrist and squeezing an aspic like fluid out of it. Elastoplast on (optional) and I'm restored to my lump free self.

So why am I telling you this? Because, dear reader, Google also listed the cost of having a ganglion removed in a private hospital. £900 - £1500. Isn't the NHS marvelous!

I mean, how hard is it?

There are some things in life that are unquestionably hard to do. Performing vascular surgery, managing the England football team, or being a friend of Dorothy in a South Yorkshire mining village are some examples. Then there are things at the other end of the difficult-o-meter that require minimal, if any, effort - getting drunk and breathing would be two examples, listening to what your customer actually said to you 3 seconds ago is another. Step into my time machine and let us re-traverse the temporal plane to a time hitherto spent and we will find my younger self sat at his desk trying to pay some bills using HSBC's online banking system. Only the chuffin' thing isn't there. It's not working because it's not there. The box to log in has disappeared like a Romulan vessel before the tightening sphincters of the crew of the USS Enterprise. So I picks up me phone (I often act like Popeye when I'm frustrated) and ring the number buried deep within the HSBC website. Naturally, being in Yorkshire and having an account holding branch in Manchester I'm greeted by a woman who can barely speak English.

Me: "Hello, I'm trying to log on to Internet Banking but the log in box isn't there"

Cusotmer Care: "I see. Well we've had no reports that it's not working."

Me: "Really?"

Customer Care: "Yes, there are no reports of any problems."

Me: "So what did I just report to you?"

Now please don't take this as condemnation of foreign call centers. Our web hosting company is based in Blighty and their staff announce themselves with a grandeur straight out of Dickens.

"Good afternoon, Hostway Sales. Charles De Vries the third, grandson of the late Admiral De Vries, great grandson of the Fifteenth Earl of Tossington, and generally thoroughbred Englishman. How may I help you?"

"Your website isn't working."

"I see. Well it seems fine at this end..."

My favourite courier service

Long ago, back in the dawn of time, whilst woolly mammoths frolicked in the snow covered mountains of England, and far below in the glacial meltwaters primitive lifeforms began to contemplate evolving into something slightly less primitive, in a stunning anachronism I ordered something from Ebay.

Years passed. To quote Monty Python; Winter changed into Spring. Spring changed into Summer. Summer changed back into Winter. And Winter gave Spring and Summer a miss and went straight on into Autumn. Not having received anything I dispatched an urgent message by Pterodactyl to the sender of my package.

A short while later a message was returned, by a runner from Olympia who managed to gasp his reply before he sadly expired on the floor. The delivery man was unable to find my address. His gnat-nav must have failed him. The runner however, was duly honoured for his fine work. They named a famous sporting event after him. The Rutland County Biannual Trout Tickling Championships will now and forevermore be known as 'Dave'.

As the final throes of the Ice-Age began to subside I contacted the courier service, and asked that they deliver the package to my work address. They responded heroically and flung the full weight of their Tortoise Department behind the task of delivering my parcel. A particularly slow Tortoise was selected for the job, and began his laborious journey.

Several years later I phoned the courier service. Unfortunately the Tortoise had neglected to yet make it out of the depot, probably having been distracted by a small piece of lettuce. The managerial staff duly issued him with a kick up the arse, and as the 21st century dawned my package finally arrived.

Imagine my excitement when I discovered on opening that they had included a special free 'Missing Part' with my order. At first I was thankful, then on later reflection I came to the conclusion I would actually like the aforementioned component - it being necessary for the correct functioning of the product. And so, a flea-mail was sent asking if the Special Missing Part could actually be included after all.

After a while I received a reply. Their flea mail took slightly longer than mine - the carrier dog being distracted en-route and having to spend a few minutes sniffing other dogs' bottoms before resuming his journey. Many apologies were offered and the component would duly be dispatched.

Another bold Tortoise commenced his journey. For years he trekked through snowy topped mountains and windswept plains. And finally, in my absence, delivered his burden to a neighbour of mine. Or possibly someone in the same road, or maybe the one next to it. Come to think of it, it could have been anywhere. Having completed his task, he fell exhausted into a ditch, where he was picked up by MI5 and taken off to have his memory erased.

Further contact with the courier service confirmed that the delivery Tortoise had completely forgotten where he had left my parcel. He also forgot to put one of those little cards through the door at the time of delivery telling me where he'd left it. Bastard Tortoise.

And so, time slips on. In a few years, after the end of World War Three, and when global warming has destroyed all the crops and flooded most low lying countries, just before we slip into the next Ice Age a package will turn up in a sorting depot somewhere near Wyre on Piddle. A look of astonishment will come over the old Tortoise's face as he remembers that day years ago when he stopped for a nibble at a brussel sprout and mistakenly left this package here.

With a sudden burst of enthusiasm surging through his old rheumatic tortoise limbs, he decides then and there to complete his long lost mission and deliver the parcel safely to me. Just at this moment however, as Historians tell us has happened several times in the history of the world, the Earth's magnetic polarity suddenly switches.

Guided by his faithful internal compass, the old tortoise lumbars off into the sunset, my package on his back, bound for Tahiti.

GRRRRRRRRRROOGLE!

I have a sneaking suspicion that Google is owned by the People's Post Office. Now I know that Google is a work of genius, provides this lovely blog for free, has totally improved our lives and done more for mathematics than even Carol Vorderman reciting Pi to 58 decimal places while wearing nothing but a mortar board could do but is it really that hard for them to test their websites? Perhaps test is the wrong word. Google employs more people with doctorates than any other organisation on the planet. Maybe 'testing' to them means interrogating the code and comparing the speed of algorithms like a high brow game of paper-scissors-stone. Unfortunately most of us speak in a language where words have vowels as well as consonants and we value simplicity above all else. Have you ever tried to contact Google? Their sites (Google Maps, Google Webmaster, Google Adwords) all have links to contact them but invariably link you back to a help page that has no doubt been shortlisted for the Long John Silver Arse Kicking Web Awards for Usefulness. If you do manage to get an email to them you'll get a standard cut and paste reply. We know it's a cut and paste job because half the last sentence was missing one time they deemed us worthy of a reply (and the content is exactly the same every time they do reply).

It's not rocket science to have a website that is logical to navigate (the rocket science graduates are probably not clever enough to work at Google) so please, Sergey and Larry, take a random selection of non-egg heads and ask them to test your websites. I'm not talking window lickers, just everyday computer users who are only interested in what a website can do for them.

New statistics say the heaviest users of computers are now men aged 50+. I suspect many of these are simply unsuspecting forty somethings who went onto a Google help page a few years ago and were unable to find their way out.