Ah the joys of travelling. Count them all day, check behind the sofa and you’ll still come up with a bit fat zero. Much to tell, couple of problems, the first is the horror of my inbox which is unravelling in perfect synchronisation with the world’s financial markets. I fully expect to have reduced it to a managable size at exactly the same time as the FTSE 100 index drops below about 3.

Displacement activity, that’s the key here. Not just for the implosion of anything that may be useful for paying mortgages and eating, but also from my stupidly sore shoulder that I’ve injured in a very middle aged way. I can now barely turn my head after a session of extreme sleeping. Yes, folks went to bed a bit drunk, woke up in a silly amount of pain. Maybe I fell out of bed.

Anyway, once I’ve hosed out the fetid cesspit of the outer reaches of my inbox, and secured a sequential line of cold beer, I shall re-enter the world of pointless rambling. Until then, it is time to lay down some sick moves while hitting “reply-to-all”

I have been reading extensively on the history of politics, and the emergence of new nation states in preparation for my coronation as World Dictator. Today is a great day as my campaign funds have been significantly swelled by a lucky win on the Nigerian Lottery. So in addition to 50p, an IOU from the children and a collection of slightly used cycling assets, a further 13.9 million euros was added to the fund this morning. I merely need to affect some tedious administration around bank accounts and the money is all mine!

And since I understand the inner workings of democratic governments, I shall merely bribe, cajole, bully and blackmail my way into power. It’s worked since 1945, so I’ve no reason to doubt I’m a shoe in for President Of The World before the year is out.

First order of business is “The List”. Rather than muck about with all this airy-fair manifesto nonsense, I’m going to create macro policy based on a to do list. It’s served me well in the world of work, so it’ll be seamlessly transplanted into World Affairs without wasting any (of my) money on policy think tanks, strategy groups or finance committees.

Let’s face it, I can hardly do worse than this bunch of muppets, and I’m going to be the cheap alternative. A few cronies, a head of cheese, a man to provision the scorpion pits and a fridge full of beer. So to the list, let’s start with things that will be outlawed, shot or destroyed in a cruel and sadistic manner:

1) Wood Pidgins
2) The 3 year warranty
3) The 0553 from Ledbury to London
4) Singlespeed bicycles
5) Heathrow
6) The M25
7) A man called “Tony Jones” from Nissan UK Customer Service.
8) Calories in beer
9) Reality TV shows
10) Fat people

I accept this list looks a little personal and biased towards some of my recent experiences, but the thing is it’s all doable. So rather than focus on the negatives, let’s look at what we could replace these blights on society with:

1) Bird than don’t make a sound at 5am like they’re being bum raped
2) Unlimited Warranty (to be first introduced by Nissan) for all components, especially French ones
3) 0930 with beds, complimentary breakfasts and no delays. Ever. Punishable by being run over by the late train.
4) Gears. Wow that’s one done already. Superb start for the new team.
5) Helicopters for all worthy individuals in the new state
6) Death Race 2000 for real. Build some grandstands, a burger bar and let free all the frustrated reps in a last man standing battle
7) A soothing and sympathetic voice explaining “Yes Mr Leigh, you are so right, let us supply you with a brand new car”
8) Beer as a compulsory condiment to every meal. Wine can be substituted
9) Round the clock re-runs of “What a top bloke Alex is” in the full glory of the original 47 episodes
10) Thinner people who don’t complain about glands.

I don’t want go mad and bite off more than the scorpions can handle, but feel free to get involved in the policy debate. But be clear the Tony Jones principle is non negotiable. I’m personally selecting the spiders for that individual.

Nissan UK are squirming and stalling in the telephonic image of our most statesmanlike politicians. First it was “was it dealer serviced?” and then “where?” and now “which dealer did you buy it from?” Still, no decision on whether they are going to pony up for their illicit altercations with the frenchies, but by drawing a line between their points of misdirection, I’ve divined:

a) They are probably going to pay for some of it

b) They may do this before I am too old to continue driving

c) They are going to be shit out of luck if they think the dealer is paying, since I bought it from a one man Internet band residing in a posh shed.

Tomorrow I’m off to Athens but shall continue to annoy the proxy garage who are responding to Nissan’s never ending questions. Because if 4 hours of economy travel from Terminally Bored 5 isn’t bad enough, the prospect of a still leaky car when I’m finally allowed back into the country certainly is.

As part of my ongoing discovery/head in hands voyage into the murky depths of Nissan ownership, it seems the poor bugger has already suffered a Turbo transplant at 10,000 miles. Assuming I’ve purchased the Lemon’s lemon then – by the time my feet touch the shores of ol’ blighty again – the wheel arches will have rusted, the electrics fused and the CD player mutated to a permanent bump’n’grind setting.

Having just told the nurse at the health centre, I barely drink at all and never in the week, guess which localised cold spot I’m heading to now? And while you’re at it, have a dash at the percentage of the repair the oily oiks at Nissan are going to offer. My starter for 10 is 50{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2}, but then I always was a deluded optimist 😉

EDIT: Deluded and indeed wrong. Nissan decided not to honour any “goodwill” as I was not a loyal customer. The crux of their argument was I had not been loyal to the brand and the car was no longer in the dealer network, and they couldn’t see any reason to help. My counter argument went something like “it’s a known problem, half of it has already been fixed under warranty, the car has 20k miles on it, it is 2 WEEKS out of warranty and has been dealer serviced. The only difference is I bought it off a bloke in a shed who had BOUGHT IT FROM THE DEALER“.

I took a breath and pointed out it was hard to show brand loyalty when I had only just bought into the brand and my first experience was Nissan giving me the bums’ rush. I further moved to close the discussion with a simple “Okay, I’ll never show any loyalty now, I’ll go back to Honda [wince from other end of the phone], I will use the awesome media power of the hedgehog to disparage their products, and further they can expect to receive a VERY STRONGLY WORDED LETTER”

That left them quaking I can tell you. They even promised to re-open the case in order to stall for another day, before telling me to get stuffed. So, as expected, it’s down to the customer to receive no satisfaction and a large bill. Someone once told me it’s ten times harder to get a new customer than retain an existing one.

Did anyone tell Nissan?

.. YES IT IS. I have lowered my Personal Yard Arm and Autumnal sunshine is peaking over the top of it. Therefore I pronounce this time Beer O’Clock, and God Bless all who drink in her.

It’s been that kind of week. I missed out on the best night ride of the season because my less than trusty car was leaking. At work, I seem to occupy a position at the epicentre of ‘other peoples screw ups” which has done bad things to my patience, temper and inbox. I overslept one day, so over compensated waking up on the hour, every hour ever since, so increasing my grumpy co-efficient to a value similar to the loses on wall street.

And around me things have been whirling in an orbit of wrongness. The dog has Shrapnel-Poo(tm) after stealing a full bag of cashew nuts – now every time he shits, it’s making a sound like small arms fire. I’m sure the Kennel Club are secretly watching and he’ll soon be taken in care. The house remains unchanged, as does my enthusiasm for painting 11 doors and a million walls.

One child has decided she wants to be a professional footballer (until yesterday and now it’s Netball that offers her future employment), the other is having a massive sulk for some terrible slight such as receiving 1 gram less desert than her sister. I expect her to exact terrible retribution for this sometime later in life, and so have vowed never to own a rabbit. Aside from getting noticeably bigger and eating anything that.. no sorry just anything, Murphy appears to be the world’s first hydrophobic Labrador. Show him some lovely clean lake to swim in, and he’ll show you his award winning ‘arse glued to ground and DONT PUT ME IN THERE face”

On the upside “Windsock Child” has now decided she loves bikes again. Obviously hers is now too small, and she has been experimenting riding her mums’. It’s fair to say that one parent thinks that’s bloody great and is already investigating something blue, 26inch wheeled and suspension fangled for Christmas, while the other has received the news with slightly less glee.

And the weather looks great which means BBQ, bikes and – predictably – beer. I’ve given up with the biking spreadsheet this year, but on examining the gut/trouser interface, a lack of commuting and a refusal to ride in the pissing rain may be a vector for some early onset porkiness.

And as a mature man with a good handle on health matters, family responsibilities and vocational issues, the way forward is obvious.

UNLEASH THE BEER 🙂

.. 4th biggest investment bank collapses. Stock market values drop off vertical cliffs and incalculable sums are lost every hour. Thousands of people lose their jobs and that’s not even close to the end of it. High street banks panic and merge, huge insurance providers get emergency funding and de-facto nationalisation. A quarter century of greed comes crashing down, and we’re left wondering what the fuck will happen next.

But that is NOTHING compared to how I’m feeling right now. You can simply deal with shit like financial markets imploding, because there is really toss all you can do about it. But when stuff in your control goes badly wrong then that’s so much better – you can feel like a right bloody charlie, and that is exactly what you are. I’m so fucking annoyed right now, staccato and rhetoric are my only forms of communication. So here goes:

1) What kind of nutjob spends two days researching problems with potential new cars and then buys one anyway?
2) Have you ever heard an engine expire with a noise that can only be described as “expensive“?
3) Exactly how many months out of warranty counts as out of warranty? Here’s a clue, it’s about exactly how old my car is.
4) What’s the most expensive part to replace? Another clue, it’s currently chucking litres of fucking oil into the engine bay
5) What specifically is excluded from the extended warranty? See 4) for further insights into possible answers.
6) If you buy a car from a broker, not a dealer, what comeback do you think you might have?
7) How the hell am I going to get to Heathrow next week?
8) Is it time for another beer?
9) How much is it going to cost to get fixed? What’s to say it won’t just happen again?

8) is really rhetorical. 7) Involves trains and boredom. 9) is string like in its’ length. The rest you can probably work out for yourselves.

You know that old expression “Don’t beat yourself up about it?”. Well it’s bollocks. I knew better and I did it anyway. And now I’m somewhere between mildly vexed and vein throbbing mad. Although tending somewhat more to the mad.

It’s not just the four figure fee to fix it. Or the castigation for not actually acting on good advice. It’s the ball ache of getting it sorted, arguing with Nissan and tramping round dealers with a sick car. Worse than that is the worry that you’ve bought a lemon and this is merely an aperitif to the main course of never ending spending.

Still I did save two grand buying it off the Internet. That’ll about pay for this repair. And if/when it happens again, it may just spark another rash sell/buy transaction. Tell me again, why the fuck did I sell the Honda?

Another new word is squeezed out from the grumbling backside of the hedgehog. It’s not rude although phonetically it could be. But in the same way that ‘Stiction’ is a clever coming together of Sticky and Friction, Strapathy combines Strategy and Apathy to describe an approach to life of not doing much at all.

Not the case with work unfortunately, but my riding motivation has ground to the kind of halt that can only be shifted by explosives. Post Scotland, I’ve found many and varied better things to do including looking out of the window at the rain, sitting in front of the computer while it’s raining, and watching the talking heads on TV discussing the flooding. I believe my lack of interest may be linked to the fact that, only this morning, I was strolling on the banks of Lake Tallet. A vast expanse of water created in our garden/car park by four solid days or torrential downpours.

But it’s more that that, I really can’t be arsed at all. And that’s a bit of a worry as at no point in the last six years have I missed three consecutive weeks of riding. Until September 2008, and unless I can drag m sorry butt out this evening, it’s hard to see where that’ll end. Summer 2009 maybe? Depends if we have one.

In the meantime I’ve updated the bike page which took a while, and the choice cuts of hedgehog which didn’t.

Even that was only slightly more interesting than surfing for “Labrador sleeping pills“. Apathy is Strategy, you know it makes sense.