Other Stuff!

As above

The Dealership

nedwonderluap2 Comments
The Apprentice Lad's bicycle, parked correctly
The Apprentice Lad’s bicycle, parked correctly

I’ve not seen this programme The Dealership. Apparently it’s a fly on the wall documentary about a, erm, dealership. Even though I haven’t watched it I think it should have been filmed at the garage I used to work at.  In fact I remember the salesman saying it would be a fantastic idea to make a fly on the wall documentary about where we worked. I think the best way of describing what the experience may have been like can be summed up in one word: unique.

We were a main franchised dealership for Fiat and Alfa Romeo. I no longer work there and since the dealership no longer holds the franchise. Some of the people I worked with were great, some not so. I’ve focused in on the people who I liked (except the General Manager), and the rather amusing anecdotes. Most of the recollections are “you should have been there” moments, but alas none of you were so I’ll have to tell them.

Day one at the dealership: Tall lanky salesman (who is a top bloke) says “Weellllll, what a load of old shit. What a fucking liberty” as a customer pulls up. I, the service manager, shares same level of enthusiasm and says “what does this prick want now.” On the same day, a second person turns up wanting to do something strange such as buying a car. Prospective customer number one sees the tall lanky one and is sold a car instantly because the customer has interrupted his online Scrabble game. Prospective customer number two makes the fatal mistake of dealing with the sort, dumpy one (General Manager – likes to tell many many tales of rallying, hearing aids and SAGA holidays. In fact, he used to rally hearing aids) drives in an Alfa 156 and leaves in a hearse. Post mortem later revealed customer died of boredom upon listening to stories of rallying, hearing aids and SAGA holidays. His Alfa 156 is in the customer parking spot for so long, it takes up root in the tarmac. (Some poetic licence in this bit, obviously. He hated SAGA holidays)

Day two:  Our beloved Jaguar XK140, one of the many classics for sale, is sold. The new owner, who was rallied by the General Manager, paid cash and like most people had a part exchange which were, unlike most part exchanges, an old tractor and ride on lawn mower. The lawn mower was taken on by someone who “used to rally lawnmowers” and the tractor served its purpose as a backup rally vehicle, after being fitted with a souped-up A+ Series engine from a 1983 MG Metro, the front brakes from a Ford Granada and the indicator stalk from a Peugeot 104.

Day three: Owner’s son shouts at the back my chair (I’m not there because I’m on annual leave): “Yoooouuuuu! You’re going down the road when you get back!” Our Welsh Mechanic stumbles home to his caravan, falls through a hedge into a stream. General Manager says “Oh my!” a lot

Day four: The owner’s son chases the trainee salesman, known to everyone as Ginger Tosser, around the premises with an air rifle. Can’t say I blame him as he really was a tosser. And ginger. Later on, Police are called to arrest a man for and it takes three to take the owner’s son down. General Manager used to rally Police cars, it turns out.

Day five: Chief mechanic, MoT tester and Mexican Freddie Mercury impersonator says to the Ginger Tosser sales trainee “ah well, at the end of the day, in all fairness I’m going to lock you in the fucking boot of that car.” And he did, good man. Chief mechanic glued radio dial onto Classic FM to stop people changing the radio station. Rebuild on Twin Spark engine interrupted by me talking in his voice to him, and the YTS lad speaking to Welsh Mechanic in his voice. Told many, many stories on how “I used to rally Datsun 120Ys” other enlightening rally stories by General Manager. I fall asleep for a while. Before falling asleep, we all talk to General Manager in his voice, because he used to rally it.

Day six: This day didn’t happen as I was still asleep from the rallying stories. Oh, wait, hang on… The owner’s son used to wash the cars and sometimes had to scratch “himself”. Police were called to investigate a man “masturbating into a bucket.” General Manager used to rally buckets, it emerges. News comes from Dealer Principal who has had to go to London for a meeting with Fiat. Travelled by Motor Cycle rather than car, something happened to his luggage – it fell and caught fire on the exhaust. Luggage found at side of the road on fire. Problem solved, new suit from Savile Row. News also filtered down that he opened the wrong door to use the toilet and ended up opening the front door to the hotel room rather than the bathroom and walked into the hallway stark bollock naked. Without a key. General Manager used to rally keys.

Day seven: Son of service manager of other branch steals my office chair. Wondering where it is I launch a full scale investigation to hunt down whatever bastard stole my chair. Its whereabouts are soon discovered. It’s at the back of the yard with a hoover and a photocopier smouldering on a bonfire. Fire brigade called out by the bunch of ejits at the council yard. Fire officer who knew the cheeky arsonist bastard what set fire to my chair, looked at it, basically said DILLIGAF and fucked off. General Manager used to rally chairs, photocopiers and Fire Engines.

Day eight: I try my best to get General Manager to swear and say “fuck”. I try all sorts of things and none of them successful. Closest I get is “bastard” and “shit”. Apprentice mechanic opens bonnet of a car and says “eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee” a lot. Instantly declares that the air filter on this JTD likes men. Then declares that all his colleagues like men and we’re all going on a trip to The Isle of Men, via a concert at the MEN Arena. General Manager apparently used to rally men.

Day nine: Fiat/Alfa DET “strategically places” airbag onto battery to see what would happen. It shoots across the floor underneath several scooters, fills the workshop up with smoke and causes Dealer Principal to come out of his office shouting “Who the fuck is letting off guns in the workshop?” General Manager says “shit!”

Day ten: I steal Apprentice lad’s bicycle and Chief Tech and MoT tester parks it in a tree (see picture). General Manager never rallied bicycles, strangely. Trees, however…

>Technologic

nedwonderluap2 Comments

>

It doesn’t help sometimes that my wife keeps telling me I’m ancient before my time. True, I am what can only be classed as a grumpy old man. But at 28 I’m really starting to believe her. Mainly because I really do not know how to use my portable telecommunication relaying device (that’s a mobile phone to the youth of today) properly. That, and I’ve started saying certain phrases that members of my staff have said that I’ve subsequently used to impersonate and mock them. The favourite is “Back in the day”. But worryingly I have actually started saying it seriously which makes me sound about 60. But then Jayne would argue the fact that my hair is rapidly going grey that I look it too.

Anyway, back in the d… oh shit, there we go already. But back in the day I thought myself as quite learned toward technological things and was considered by many to be a geek. I could build a computer, wire up a HiFi system quite nicely and program a VCR (how old does that sound?) to do everything include blow up the Pentagon. I even did bits and pieces of web design and computer programming. Hell, I even use to create multi-track recorded songs on the computer using loops, keyboards and this that and the other.

But give me my current portable telecommunications relaying device and I’m stuck. Only a 6 year old could program the events timer on my DVD recorder. And these days I’m lucky if I can just turn on a computer to do such trivial items as check Facebook and write this silly little blog thing. At work there are many programs I have to use, which I have been using in one form or another for getting on close to ten years. It still doesn’t mean I’m any good at using them. Only today, my wife and our friend were engrossed in an amusing conversation over the differences of many different varieties of Microsoft Office programs and how they’ve changed over the years. Seriously, my tiny little brain is retarded enough without having to cope with that. I mean, I’ve not progressed past Office 1997. The one I used whilst still at school. Sorry, for the young and uneducated, that is skool.

However I’ve now joined Twitter, which I admit I’m fairly late in getting into. But when I get into something I get into it in a big way so I’ll no doubt be tweeting whenever I can. This does mean I’m buggered as being a male I’m unable to multitask. I will now have to juggle Facebook, blog, Twitter and Media Player at once. Well Media Player if I’m not listening to vinyl or CD or other such mediums that young people would refer to as “old skool”. Although that particular way of spelling it winds me up. People who spell it like that seriously need to go back to school to realise the correct spelling of the word.

Which neatly brings me onto my equal love-hate relationship with MP3s. I like them for convenience and laziness as it means I can have whatever song that’s in my vast collection at the touch of a button whilst typing this inane drivel. It also makes it easier to have more music because with the vast amount of CDs, tapes, records et al that I own, I’ve run out of room to store them. But the minus side to me is I like to see the artwork of an album and what went into the making of it. It just seems a shame now that an artist can pour heart and soul into a piece of work, go through the motions of having the artwork designed, booklets etc, only for it to become a file on a computer that’s pretty meaningless. It just seems a bit cold. I also dislike MP3s for their inferior sound quality as my computer’s sound card outputty type thing is connected to my slightly vintage stereo separates system, which new would have been the cost of 10 iPods. It shows up all the flaws.

But back to phones. It goes to show as a friend phoned me (on the aforementioned device) to ask for advice on which new mobile was best on the market. I think it was something like an eye phone, a Black berry (which I assumed was actually some fruit) and something that was made up of initials, something like HTSCSFGHJVFHGFFG. Or it could have been PIACTWIR (which stands for Paul Is A Complete Tool Who Is Rubbish). Because I was a geek in a previous life, my advice was called upon. However the best answer I could give her was “Er….. what are you talking about?” to which her reply was priceless – “You’re rubbish”.

So, mobile phones are not my forte, and I prefer to play vinyl rather than MP3. I prefer to play the bass guitar than my XBox 360 and they are located inches apart. In a lot of cases I’d rather read than watch television. Don’t get me wrong, I do genuinely love technology and I love what it can do and I’m not totally allergic to it. Anything to make my life easier is fine by me as I’m a lazy sod at times. But my main pet peeve is when technology doesn’t change something for the better and/or over complicates things. It’s a total disaster zone as far as I’m concerned.

A microwave oven for instance is a good example. There are some posh microwave ovens, which technically is a contradiction in terms. All those different settings for essentially doing one thing: heating stuff. All I want to do is set the temperature, the time and switch it on. Nothing more, that is all it needs to do in life. Essentially that is all I want my mobile phone to do. Not heat food, obviously, because that would be stupid. Then again, there probably is a setting for it to do so somewhere that I’ve not found yet. No, I want to be able to use it as a phone and to send text messages primarily. The other add on bits are nice, but not at the cost of being able to make phone calls and send text messages (mk phn cls n snd txt msgs to you young people reading). Or maybe I should get a simpler phone and look much less of a retard than I already appear.

I used to keep up with technology back in the d… Oh bollocks, I’ve done it again. But it’s moving so fast I’ve been left so far in the shade I can feel the beginnings of hypothermia.

>Introduction

nedwonderluap1 Comment

>Why on earth are you here? Have you nothing better to do that read total and utter inane drivel written by a rotund, greying 28 year old, cynical, sarcastic moronic bastard? No? Oh, alright then.

Now this blog is not here to change the world. I don’t have anything to major to say or any point to make. I will from time to time post odds and sods which will more than likely be irrelevant to anyone that reads it. There may (read will) be rants, an almost diary sort of thing and any random bollocks I see fit to type. This will no doubt be about as interesting as porridge. But without any form of porridge contents within. In fact, the blog should be called “A blog that is as interesting as porridge without porridge. Warning, contains no porridge”. Sorry, i’m rambling. Which is what I do. i ramble on on various different things and get into tangents and also blessed with the attention span of a …. oooh look a squirrel.

As I work in a customer facing environment I may (again, read will) rant about people ranting about their broken cars. Which being an Italian more than likely they will be broken. And tales of members of staff chasing other members of staff across the dealership forecourt with an air rifle. But I shall save that little chestnut for another day.

So, whether it’s something good, such as a concert I attended, an album I haven’t heard in a while or whether it’s my ongoing hatred of hybrid electric cars and Toyotas, the news or even if the toaster is broken if I see fit I’ll write about it.

So, if you’ve got this far in this extremely lame and dull introduction, congratulations and have a cookie. Woopey doo! Stay tuned for the first issue. Someone will need to be as I won’t be. The excitement will be too much for me.