...is without doubt the most stressful and tedious process I've ever been involved with. By a very very long way. It's now over 5 months since my offer was accepted on the empty property and I've still not moved in.
(Yes, it's rant time again.)
The reason? Well had it been just one reason I would have pulled out ages ago. But it's lots and lots of sequential reasons. It's been a bit like running the 200 metres hurdles having been told there aren't any hurdles there. Blindfolded.
The next time I hear the words "I'll chase it up" rather than "it's all been sorted", I am going to kill someone.
All of the following parties have at some stage either cocked something up or apparently sat around done nothing for weeks on end despite there being a considerable degree of urgency:
My solicitor
My mortgage lender
The vendor
All three of the vendor's solicitors (two were fired, we're now on the third)
The company managing the sale for the vendor
The surveyor
The environmental search provider
The estate agent
The local council
The freeholder
I want to slap you all. Really hard. Repeatedly.
They whole process has been an eye opener as to how deeply useless people can be. And how badly afflicted by red tape we are in this country. It's pathetic.
*And relax..*
Oh by they way, you actually don't have to read these rants. The act of writing them alone is therapeutic. I feel better already.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Friday, January 19, 2007
Inspiring photos on Flickr
Photos by rebekka
Note: If you're a Flickr user you probably already know all of this. Though you might still want to check out the links at the bottom.
If you're interested in photography but haven't spent much time browsing Flickr I urge you to do so. Among all the fuzzy shots of people's nights at the pub are some really great photographs.
A good place to start is the Explore page. Each time you refresh that page you'll get a different selection of the most 'interesting' shots from the last seven days. If you find a photo you really like click on the user's name and explore their photo sets. Then see who they have as a contact and check out their photos too. Before long you're bound to find some fantastic photographers.
One of Flickr's best known photographers is Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir from Iceland. The four photos at the top of this post are from her portfolio.
Here are a few more of my favourite Flickr photographers:
wiseacre photo
helveticaneue
cymagen
sam.d
p@ranoid
razorbern
And here's a link to my favourite shots from various Flickr users.
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Five Things
If you don't know what this is all about then you've obviously been spending too much time in World of Warcraft instead of in 'The Blogosphere'. Well that's just fine, you need to save up for that new armour. I understand.
Anyway, I was tagged by Nick so I need to write five (less than obvious) facts about myself on my blog and then tag five more people and tell them to do the same. Uh-oh, this is where I get worried that I'm not interesting enough. Anyway, here goes.
My five things
1. I was taught History by Mike Atherton. He went to cricket-mad Manchester Grammar School, as did I, and he returned out of season to do some teaching.
2. I had a cup of tea with Paul Hartnoll from Orbital in 1996.
3. I can beat-mix records with impressive accuracy, but now only DJ sporadically with other peoples' records when drunk at parties (and therefore mix them less accurately).
4. I believe that the Commodore 64 is one of the coolest things ever. I still own mine but some of the keys don't work, thanks largely to Daley Thompson's Decathlon.
5. I once performed Walk This Way by Run DMC / Aerosmith, karaoke style, solo, in a packed bar at a French ski resort. When I stepped onto the stage I thought the five people who were going to accompany me were still behind me. I don't think I did the best Steve Tyler.
My five nominees
Zeno
Eyechild
Peter
Dave
Eamon
Anyway, I was tagged by Nick so I need to write five (less than obvious) facts about myself on my blog and then tag five more people and tell them to do the same. Uh-oh, this is where I get worried that I'm not interesting enough. Anyway, here goes.
My five things
1. I was taught History by Mike Atherton. He went to cricket-mad Manchester Grammar School, as did I, and he returned out of season to do some teaching.
2. I had a cup of tea with Paul Hartnoll from Orbital in 1996.
3. I can beat-mix records with impressive accuracy, but now only DJ sporadically with other peoples' records when drunk at parties (and therefore mix them less accurately).
4. I believe that the Commodore 64 is one of the coolest things ever. I still own mine but some of the keys don't work, thanks largely to Daley Thompson's Decathlon.
5. I once performed Walk This Way by Run DMC / Aerosmith, karaoke style, solo, in a packed bar at a French ski resort. When I stepped onto the stage I thought the five people who were going to accompany me were still behind me. I don't think I did the best Steve Tyler.
My five nominees
Zeno
Eyechild
Peter
Dave
Eamon
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
new toy
I'm taking some press shots for a dance music producer on Saturday, which seemed the perfect excuse to get something I'd been thinking of buying for a while: a proper flash gun.
I've just spent a couple of hours going through the manual and trying a few things out. The conclusion: it's absolutely fantastic.
Canon make some very clever stuff.
Sunday, January 14, 2007
SW4
The road I live on borders (like much of London) on a slightly run-down estate. And over the past two years the disrepair has started to creep closer and closer to my home. Large household items get dumped on the pavement where they just rot for months on end. Just a few doors away there's an overspilling heap including a broken bed frame and a washing machine. And increasingly the pavement is decorated in the morning with shattered chunks of safety glass.
Now, people shouldn't dump stuff on the streets anyway, but it would be nice if Lambeth Council cleared it up once in a while.
If I owned the flat I would probably care a lot more, but as it is I'm leaving the area pretty soon anyway. Me and Clapham are like "over".
Saturday, January 13, 2007
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Monday, January 08, 2007
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Err... template
Blogger has been updated by Google and it was hassling me about upgrading my template, so I thought I'd have a look. It said it would save my previous template somewhere but I'm not sure where that's gone.
So turquoise it is - with slightly silly "futuristic" arrows (hey, it is 2007), until I get round to designing my own template or editing one of their ones.
So turquoise it is - with slightly silly "futuristic" arrows (hey, it is 2007), until I get round to designing my own template or editing one of their ones.
Day One
New tune. So called because it was the only constructive thing to come out of my hangover on Jan 1st.
Oh, you probably won't like it unless you enjoy minimal techno, by the way...
Listen on Last FM »
Listen on MySpace »
Back to London tomorrow. Work on Thursday. My new year's resolution is to set aside some time each week to keep up the music production.
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