Considering that we got up early, which was a huge effort, I can jolly well tell you, I don’t seem to have achieved very much at all.
We crawled out of bed at half past nine this morning, because we had a lot to do and I wanted to do it before lunchtime, because somebody was coming in the afternoon to see the poopies.
We have already had a couple of visitors, this one would not be the first, but this one, irritatingly, did not turn up. Having assured me that they would be turning up at two, they did not, and neither did they email to cancel, much to my irritation.
I have emailed them to see if there is some kind of problem and whether or not their plans have changed, but they have not replied. Oliver says that this is called Gaslighting. I do not really understand why, because gaslight glows and is lovely, and this was not lovely, just infuriating, because Oliver was out and I could not go to the chemist to collect Mark’s prescription, nor even into the attic to do the ironing, because I can’t hear the door from there if somebody just knocks and doesn’t have the brains to ring the doorbell.
Hence I had an afternoon of not doing the things that needed to be done, mostly the ironing, which is still left over from a week or two before Christmas when we went to the Midland, and which will have moths in it at this rate if I am not careful.
In fact a very great deal of time seems to be occupied with just cleaning up after the poopies. They have now become a furry crowd of hoogliuns, a word left over from Ritalin Boy, aged about three, determinedly insisting he was not one. He was, and so are the poopies. They are all over the place now, they have almost learned to climb the stairs, much to poor Roger’s horror, because upstairs is his last safe refuge. It took them all night, but they finally managed it up to about the fourth stair, although fortunately the effort exhausted them and they fell asleep there, ready for me to trip over them when I came down this morning.
We have taken to banishing them out into the back yard with the dogs whilst we clean up after work and in the mornings. This makes our lives much easier, and they think it is very exciting.
When we had done dog-emptying, and dog-clearing-up, and dog-feeding, we had a small project for the morning. Oliver’s homework was to create a breakfast for a three year old using yoghurt, berries and bananas, and so obviously we did porridge. He photographed all of the porridge-making stages, including one of the smiling face on the top made out of berries. I do not usually bother with this when I make my own porridge but I can see the appeal. He took it upstairs to eat, since we do not have any three year olds, and it would have been a shame to waste it.
I made my own porridge and took it upstairs to the computer to eat whilst I was puzzling through my conundrum of the day, which was related to a letter I have received from somebody calling himself the Information Commissioner. I had never heard of such a person, but it seemed he had heard of me, and he wanted forty quid, for no discernible reason whatsoever.
It appears that when you are a business and store personal information of any kind on your computer, you have to give the Information Commissioner forty quid. He gives you nothing in return, but apparently this is, according to his letter, the Responsible Thing To Do. I do not know what he does with the forty quid, or why it is responsible to give it to him. In fact, quite the inverse seems to me to be true, it seems to be an entirely feckless waste of forty quid.
He promises no services whatsoever in return, just wants forty quid, after which you can consider yourself Registered.
I have been pondering this.
In any case, I don’t store any information on my computer. The Employee Database has got me, Mark and Oliver on it, and is not so much a database as a Facebook reminder of when all our birthdays are. I have not even got anybody’s bank details on the computer, everything is written down in a hidden little book so that only the old-fashioned sort of burglar can scam me.
If I do not give him forty quid, he adds, I may be liable for a fine of five thousand pounds.
I think he has got an absolute cheek.
I am probably going to have to give him the forty quid, although I am jolly well going to telephone him first and find out why.
I imagine this charlatan was set up by the last set of Beloved Leaders.
I expect this new lot will feel it incumbent upon themselves to do something about it. It is, after all, a form of daylight robbery.
I had better cough up quickly before they increase it to fifty.
