What makes you happy ?

We used to pay little attention to the utility bills. If they said they wanted 35 quid a month (or any amount) then they got it. We took it for granted that what we saved in the summer would even out with what extra we used in the winter. Oh how wrong we were….
After going bankrupt we naturally examined where each penny was being spent. And once we got the ability to pay bills again by getting the utility back (water are okay, electric/gas aren’t too bad, phone? they make you sweat blood. No, I am not joking) we looked really hard at these budgeting schemes. Initially we left it to them and it slowly but surely slid in their favour. I don’t mean that they had our money – I mean that our debt increased. Their grip got tighter. This matters because we wanted to change suppliers.

You ring your gas supplier and say “I want to switch to someone else”. They reply “No problem, but fully settle your bill first”. And all of a sudden you can see that part of their ploy is to put that financial obstacle in your way. After all, if you are moving suppliers to save money chances are you don’t have the money around to pay that bill off. So you are more likely to stay with that costly company – who then say you can save money by having your electric / phone / broadband / satellite with them. And you can pay monthly there too…. bargain….

With the costs of energy going up (and we can only hope the Govt immediately start telling the elderly that they will help more than they do) then I’m sure many people will head over to USwitch, find the deal and only then discover just how bad their debt is. So when the Govt and journos say that so many people have yet to switch it must include not just the inertia effect but also this financial hostage taking that the energy companies deal in.

Are we switching? Hell yes. But only when Martin Lewis says so. (The only thing I will not change is my ISP. At £35 a month it’s costly but when I ring Zen I get someone who really does know all the technical stuff. I don’t ring often but when I do the last thing I want is someone reading from a screen. I also – obviously – need an excellent service which I get).

D got an offer from Derby University today – Behavioural Sciences Hons degree course. She’s walking on air and smiling so wide the top of her head could drop off :)

There was a Youtube vid meant to appear – looks like 2.4 doesn’t agree with the plugin. But then why should it? Yet anyway :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg6ruPjnVxs

Not the best track, but it’s still an excellent album and the only music in my ps3.

I’m in the market for a graphics tablet and the Bamboo from Wacom seems to fit the bill. It’s got 4 programmable buttons and the reviews are pretty good. This is not for high-end Photoshop use – far from it – but I’m wondering if anyone else has used one? We have a Volito for the PC which is nice but (1) it’s aimed at kids and (2) it’s used by them. It also has no mac drivers. Wacom do seem to be the people to go with – or is this model bettered?

New Year starts and so does the propaganda. We now have a government funded website called “Act on CO2“. It offers tips for motorists to help them ‘reduce their carbon footprint’. Things like “have less junk in the car so it is lighter” and “keep the tyre air pressures right”, “Petrol or diesel” and using a smaller car. They even have a Brand Partnerships page which if you look really carefully at you’ll realise that every brand there is absolutely reliant on the car. No car, no brand. This then explains why the biggest clue for car users is not anywhere on that website. So here it it:
Get out of the damn car and walk or use public transport.

Fact is there are school mums taking the 4×4 to drop off little Timmy when they live only yards away, people driving to shops they could easily walk to, perfectly good public transport that car drivers will ignore because it is beneath them. That website – which we as taxpayers have also funded – is car propaganda, nothing else. If the govt were serious they could do so much better. I’m surprised they haven’t followed that ridiculous Honda ad from last year which seemed to preach that the internal combustion engine was in fact a gift to nature.

This is why the Road Tax is a nonsense. It’s a one-off pain that is shrugged off. Abolish it. Get rid. Instead, impose a car insurance tariff and double the tax on petrol. The person who has the best clue about this? Ken Livingstone. The congestion charge in London isn’t just right, it should be extended to all cities. (The arguments against are in the main crap because the govt actually wants to see this fail. No way can the govt lose the support of the Roads lobby). Until the motorist is actually hurting daily they won’t consider using their head and will not consider what they are actually doing. But then it’s always the other guy isn’t it?

I can’t be the only brit to keep seeing loads on blog posts about some guy in the USA called Ron Paul. According to some he’s great but then so is Bush / Guiliani etc. Mr Paul also believes in creationism. Whatever. There’s so much noise about him changing US politics. And yet in this article about the US election, there is no mention of Ron Paul at all. He’s not even hinted at. So either a respected and knowledgeable BBC corespondent has no clue, or the blogs are doing nothing but inflating the impossible. I go with the latter. But hey, I’m a brit, what do I know about it :)

For the last 364 days and 20 hours the people next door have not been in residence for more than an hour in total. They decided to have a party and bring all their LOUD FRIENDS with them. So I accompanied their wailing at midnight by blasting out the Cunninglynguists (it’s the only music I have in the PS3). I hope I annoyed them, I really do.

(Bee Gees – they are playing the Bee Gees and loudly too. Baaaaaaaad)

Users who install Windows XP Service Pack 3 will not be required to enter Microsoft’s product activation key before they use the operating system, according to a Microsoft white paper. ZDNet

For some reason ZDNet seem to think this a good thing. It’s not, and the last sentence in the article says why:

Most Microsoft software asks for the product key before installation. If the key is not valid, the user is unable to install the software.

So what Microsoft are actually doing is not saying “You can’t have the new code”, they are really saying “We want you to upgrade to Vista because we can now lock you out”. They are enforcing the upgrade path. How many genuine users will get locked out and then get told “Hey, thought of Vista?”. You can bet that the SP3 does not warn of this at the time of installation.

I rarely check Facebook but now I have a reason. I want to see how many stupid people look at the above and decide to give this guy their money. Someone somewhere will figure this will increase their chances of winning. That same someone somewhere has jutting eyebrows and scabby knuckles. If I thought Facebook would do a damn thing I’d report it as what it is – a scam – but seeing as all the spam I have reported has never been removed I’ll spare myself the typing. The group owner doesn’t even have a full profile.

And if you want to join the “fun”, here’s the link.

When we agreed with P that we would get Sky I was looking forward to the 24/7 news. As it turns out CNN is still a pile of junk but between Sky News (all that red gets old fast) and News 24 (noticed how many of their female presenters are blonde? Not that there is anything wrong with blonde) it’s not too bad. But Dave is perfect. It’s like so much of my favourite stuff distilled into one smooth package – I don’t even mind the ads. Right now it’s 8:05 am on a Sunday, I’m working and TOTP2 is on in the background – ideal for what I’m doing (mind you, all the miming is a bit weird). And Top Gear? My girls sat and watched a couple of programs – they love it. (hasn’t the accident aged Hammond! I suppose it would though). Anyway, on the cheapest Sky package Dave is by far the best channel for me.