A Gay Stallion 

The Bitter End

Today is pay day. This should be great news for me. I have been incredibly short of dough for some time. This being because I sacrificed working in order to carry out my studies. Now I am able to work more and today it should pay off, and I can stop being the sponge that I have been for some time now. I don't much like it when I go out with friends and they feel they have to pay my way. I could just say 'sorry I'm not going out', but they do pressurise me somewhat, and I am weak to the forces. I have good friends. For some people it's a bit of a lifestyle to have people pay their way all the time. I know I am refering to the pubs again, but we've all met them. Those who always need a wee when it's their round, or just simply go home. This is not me. I'm a very gracious and appologetic acceptor. And I will repay my debts, my friends, I hope know this. So today is pay day. Two days ago I recieved a letter from my bank 'We're concerned that your Barclays debit card may have been used fraudulently.' And it had! Somebody in America tried to debit from my card £393.91, without success (the funds weren't available) then £1.10 in Canada (once again the funds weren't available, I know). However, back to America they did on one occassion succesfully draw a whole pound from my account. (it just struck me, exactly a pound, in America. How does that fit? Some exchange rate, but this is what I'm told). So, as the letter suggests I call the 'Fraud hotline' which I dutifully do. And indeed some one has managed to get my card details. I'm given another number to call, to which I have to apply for a dispute form. Effectively I have to call this number and ask 'can I have my pound back please?' I know I am skint, but really, do I have to do that? I'm told I must follow the procedure. It's going to cost me 26 pence in postage, and I don't know what to call these 0845 numbers, reeling of numbers and numbers, telling them the 8th letter in my secret password, and who my direct debits go to. I should be pleased really, I haven't been robbed, but the upshot is the bank has turned my card off, so I can't get at my wages, and I still haven't managed to go out and sufficiently celebrate that my degree is over. Or at least not in a guilt free fashion.
I am somewhat puzzled about where these fiends got my card details from. I probed the woman on the fraud hotline team, and she asked 'Had I ever used the internet?' I thought I'd just leave it at that.

I'm reminded now of a time when I did purchase over the internet from www.play.com A reputable CD and DVD supplier. The second time I bought from play.com it was a CD purchase, Placebo - The Bitter End. A great CD, which was subsequently stolen from my car. The CD I was sent for some reason, only the first song played on it. I find this odd, I've never had a problem with a brand new CD before. I'm digressing slightly here, but with good cause. I'd like to consider why we purchase over the internet. The three most cited reasons I suspect would be a) it's cheaper because the suppliers have smaller overheads, b) I can't get the product locally, or I am imobile and c) it's an anonymous way to make a purchase. There are many other reasons too I'm sure. Back to Placebo. I phone play.com to register my complaint and find out how I go about getting a replacement. The nice lady asks me which of my purchases is faulty 'Is it a Placebo CD or is it a DVD?' she asks. Damn it, my annonymity had been blown. I think the DVD I had previously purchased was entitled along the lines of 'Gay Stalions do it Sideways' or something similar.

Y-M-C-A 

In the Navy

I've finished my degree....woop woop. No more coursework, no more exams, no more presentations, no more posters to make. I can relax. For now anyway. I still have the itch to study, so maybe in a year I'll consider doing a Masters. But for now it's time to celebrate.

The pictures down there are of me and my friends last Sunday. We did a charity walk for Sahir House, which is a centre in Liverpool supporting those with HIV. Between us, (The Village People) it looks like we raised around £700, which is great news. So if you sponsored us, thank you for supporting a great cause.

A friend of mine recently came out. Hoorah! He's very invlolved with the church. I'm thinking Christian, but I have a very basic grasp of religeon, and may have got this wrong. Religeon in some ways is a bit like science to me. Lots of words, fundamentalist, re-born, evangelic; it all just means 'religeon' to me, and I yawn. In fact it would offend many if I was to say I don't know, nor care to learn the difference between a Catholic or a Christian. That just struck a chord with me, there is no difference, one head, two arms, two legs, one soul, one brain one heart. I'm digressing. It's odd but most of the gay people I know are very Religeous, and this is odd to me. I know very few straight people who are religeous. The reason I find this bizaar is because homosexuality is so at odds with most religeons, certainly the ones my friends are involved in. Gay people who are involved in say Cholicism, have a much tougher time dealing with being gay, because they are so torn. They are led to believe that Homosexuality is against Gods will, and people are still suggesting that AIDS was Gods way to punish us. How difficult must that be to deal with. Something you very strongly believe in battling against such an overwhelming powerful and unchangeable internal feeling such as sexuality. And those around you, often family and all your friends will be religeous too, are telling you that this fundamental part of you is wrong and evil, and will often reject you for being honest to yourself.. I'm very lucky, I'm not involved in this, my family care little for religeon and I've not been struck by lightning yet. I can deal with people thinking what they like, what I am deeply offended by is when these people suggest gay people are also often peadophiles. And they really believe it, and often, they are happy to go spreading this propaganda, and do you know what, people in the street must pass me and think those horrible thoughts. They really must. And they must feel they have to protect their children from me. That offends me. It scares me. Back to my friend who came out, sadly he's had it implied at him, and one disgusting person even asked if he'd 'Dephiled his first boy yet?' That is very offensive. Thankfully it seems his family and friends are supporting, so I'm sure he won't let it get to him too much.

This bloke just approached me and asked me if I'd arrest him, Kinky. 

BA BA Blacksheep

I finished my last exam today. Woop woop! I can't party just yet, because I still have masses of coursework to do in a comparatively short space of time, however I do feel good. That is my last exam for this degree. Could it be my lasy accademic exam ever? I hope not. I love education. I love learning cool, new and interesting stuff. I'm not saying I want to be a student again, but I could do things like a part time masters degree, or other types of accreditation. It is quite hard to be getting used to the idea that this time a week and a day away, I'll no longer being studying towards my degree in Consumer Studies. What a drastic change in my life that will mean. On the bright side I expect to become Emil Bird BA (Hons). How exciting. Can I be pompous enough to have people know this on, say, business cards? I think I can.

Today I wish to whinge about call waiting. This little nugget of technology means that when you are on the phone, and someone else calls you, your phone lets you know that someone else is trying to contact you with an annoying beep. I hate it. Worse, I hate it when you ignore the second incoming call and the bastards try and try again. Give it a rest and eat a biscuit you sad little person. Beep beep beep. Consequently I insist on not using it, and have mine turned off. This does not, however, mean I can escape it. Worse still, I was affected by it to a humiliating extent just now. I called my friend, for a chat. Nothing interesting to talk about really. Just a bit of small talk to break up my studying. We'd hardly finnished saying hello when he says, 'I've got call waiting...gotta go.' Well dosn't that make me feel valued. I took this to mean 'I'm sorry, someone far more important wants to speak to me...bye!' How rude!

Ker-Boom! 

The Value of Life = $$$$$$$

Today I have been writing an essay for my Ethics module. Consequently I've been looking through business ethics book for my research as you might expect. Here's a lovely story I found about Ford. I read it once before, but seeing it again just refreshed my memory.
Once upon a time (in 1971 actually), Ford produced a car called a Ford Pinto. They had this wonderful idea that they were going to sell the car at no more than $2000 and it was to weigh no more than 2000lb's. Isn't that clever. After the car went to market, the lovely people at Ford found that there was a fault with the vehicle, and if it was in a rear end shunt at above 30 miles per hour, the fuel tank would explode, and the car would warp in such a way that the doors would jam, leaving the occupants trapped, and left to burn to death. Thankfully, the clever engineers at Ford found a solution, for just $11 per car, fitting a baffle (I don't know either) between the fuel tank and the bumper, would prevent this from happening. And this would save many many lives. They got their calculators out and worked out how much it will cost to put all the cars right.

$11 x 12.5 MILLION CARS SOLD = $137.5 MILLIONS

The very clever financiers at Ford also came up with a figure as to how many lives would be lost - 180. And also predicted 180 people would be badly injured (i.e limb loss) and with this information they got their calculators out again and did this calculation.

180 DEATHS x COMPENSATION PER DEATH ($200,000) = $36 MILLIONS

180 SERIOUS INJURIES x COMPENSATION PER INJURY ($67,000) = $12 MILLIONS

TOTAL COMPENSATION PAYOUT WOULD BE = $48 MILLIONS.

So all the lovely clever people at Ford sat in their cosy office looking at these two calculations, and after looking at them for a very long time one thought - Hang on a minute, if we don't fix the cars, and we don't tell anyone, shhhhhhhh, we will only have to pay $48 million, instead of $137.5 million, and we could save, like, $89.5 million, and we'll all still get a lovely bonus. So they all jumped up and down, and celebrated how clever they are, and as they predicted hundreds of people died in Ford Pintos. Aren't they lovely.
Watch what happens here. Don't worry it's nothing gruesome. http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/1977/09/compress.mov


I phoned the guy at Skoda today to tell him I don't want his job. He was short with me, but I didn't want to waste my time, or his. I thought about it loads, and the whole package just wasn't that great. It wasn't just the car thing. So I'm going with my gut feeling. Although I would have liked to have known if I'd still got the job. I feel better now. In fact I feel really good today.

Do this personality test now. I found it in the grace pages. http://www.gesher.org/Myers-Briggs/keirsey%20temperament%20sorter.htm I'm an ESTP Artisan Promoter. I'm Extraverted Sensing Aided by Thinking. That might make more sense if you do the test.

Vorsprung Durk Fuktit

I'm going to give you a little snap shot of my day today. Sometimes when I read peoples blogs about their day they can get a bit boring, but I make no appologies if you get bored. If you don't like it, fuck off.

Today I had an interview to become a Skoda car salesman. This morning I was preparing my clothes which I would wear at said interview. My lovely Mummy bought me a new suit and shoes specially. Aint Mums great. All I had to do was choose a shirt and tie from my limited selection, and I was ready to look beutiful. I choose a nice grey shirt, and a black and white tie. It all looked great, and my lovely Mummy offered to Iron my shirt. Isn't she boss. You can't have her, she's mine. So she irons, while I faff in my room, and I hear her say that there is a stain on it. So I go to where she is and examine said stain, which is without doubt mans baby gravy. Oh dear. It looks like it, and is in just the right place, and I am living in cringesville. 'It's just toothpaste she says.' And she man handles it, and she scrubs it with her hands, and picks at it with her nails, and do you know what, she must know. Surely she knows and is just being nice with the whole toothpaste thing. She's old. That does not make her stupid. She's made babies, so she knows more about spunk than I do. And here, she does something that only Mum's could do. She looks after her baby in only a way Mothers can. She saves me from my embarrasment. Eventually she gives up on the cum and we look for another shirt to match. Five shirt tie combos later, and she decides to have another go at the bad cumshot. LEAVE THE CUNTING SPONK ALONE FOR FUCKS SAKE i only think. Why must she be so nice? I never got to wear the grey shirt, but stilled looked good. I'd have asked me out.

My interview was at 5 O'clock. (Aren't you glad I missed my luch out of this blog). I got there with a minute to spare, due to my failure to figure a cab would be so difficult to get. The interview was going well. I seemed to talk loads. He asked me what my weakness is. 'I sometimes snap back, and this sometimes takes people off guard.' I didn't have to bloody prove it though did I. I asked what the package was, and it was dissapointing and then he told me there was no car for 3 months 'Oh forget it, that's no good to me' I proclaim. Der, Emil shut up. We nearly rowed about it. I told him I needed a car because I don't have one. Hello, I just went 5 months without one. What's the problem? When I told my friend after, she said I was arrogant and need to know when not to argue. But the truth is when I left the interview I waited 30 minutes for a bus and I was cold. So on Thursday when he calls me, and in the unlikely situation he offers me the job despite my procrastinations, I may well tell him to stick it.

I'm sure some of you might be thinking how spoilt I am. You may well have to get the bus everywhere you go. I sympathise. Some of you may be also thinking wouldn't you rather get the bus than drive a Skoda anyway. I see your point. But the situation is this, I want a car. I would buy one if I had the money. I don't care what I drive. If I worked at this Skoda garage, whilst I'm waiting for the bus, I'd be looking at a shed load of cars with no one to drive them. There's plenty more jobs in the sea.

Some new blog additions to my favourite list:
http://siriusgreen.blogspot.com/ A woop to Liam
http://www.gracepages.blogspot.com/ a tip of the cap to you.
http://www.livejournal.com/users/mrplip/ And an Oi Oi Savaloy to Plippy

Who'd want to drive one of these anyway? 

EVIL? 

The Biddie Bus

I've been getting the bus quite a lot lately and it has made me aware of how rude old people view young people to be rude. I think I've mentioned it here before, but it seems that the great british tradition of queueing is dissapearing quickly, and we are taking up the German pushing skills. Yesterday, I was the victim of one of these rude old biddies. My bus had arrived at Liverpools major bus station, Queen Square, and I just waited patiently as people pushed and shoved their way onto the bus. The old hag behind me obviously was infruriated that she wasn't making progress because I was impeding her. I thought I was being polite letting these people get on before me, but she thought this called for her to shout at me that I was ignorant, and part of the inconsiderate youth of today. 'I'm sorry?' I said, in a way that was rightly construed as 'what the hell are you talking about?' Her reaction proved to me beyond all doubt that she is right, and that she comes from an age where manners were impeccable. She showed this because she hit me. She hit me on the arm, and screamed 'Don't you talk to me like that.' Unbelievable.

I had a two day interview last week for a car sales job. I didn't have to tell any lies thankfully. It turns out the company is a local Skoda garage. I'm not sure what to make of this really. Skodas used to have a terribly embarassing reputation, but apparently they make a much better product now. Here's some old Skoda jokes I remember.
Q) How do Skoda drivers keep their hands warm?
A) Put the heated rear window on when they are pushig it.
Q) What do you call an open top Skoda?
A) A skip
Q) Why do Skodas have a rear wash wipe?
A) To remove the flies that crash into them.
Q) What do you call a Skoda with two exhaust pipes?
A) A wheelbarrow.
Q) What's the difference between putting your hand in Jordans top, and being in a Skoda?
A) You feel a bigger tit in a Skoda.
I have to go to another interview next week. I'll go with a paper bag on my head.