I love my car. Really, I do. It’s great, economical, fairly sporty, and has a load of space in the back for Aimee and her copious paraphenalia. It has lots of toys – like parking sensors, dual climate control and loads of three-letter-acronymns that I don’t fully understand (like ABS, EBD, ESP, TCS and so on), it also has a bluetooth mobile phone system, built in. The phone system is one of the reasons I bought the car – what with doing quite a bit of travelling, and the ban on using mobiles in cars. Everything is great in the car, absolutely wonderful German quality – except this phone system.
Firstly, the number of phones it supports is meagre at best – most of which are old and retired now. None of the Nokia E or N-series phones (or indeed, any Series 60 Symbian phones) are supported – though that’s a Nokia issue, rather than an Audi one, which they’ve only just fixed with the E71 and N96.
Secondly, when you have a compatible phone, and you wish to utilize the Audi’s wonderful voice-activated controls, it all turns to goopy shit. To illustrate this, I recorded my attempt this morning at trying to dial my voicemail box using the voice controls. All the car needs to do, is dial ‘901′.
Apologies for the quality of the recording, it was done by using another phone’s Voice Recorder and then exporting the audio off.
the fucking cops are fucking keen
to fucking keep it fucking clean
the fucking chief’s a fucking swine
who fucking draws a fucking line
at fucking fun and fucking games
the fucking kids he fucking blames
are nowehere to be fucking found
anywhere in chicken town
the fucking scene is fucking sad
the fucking news is fucking bad
the fucking weed is fucking turf
the fucking speed is fucking surf
the fucking folks are fucking daft
don’t make me fucking laugh
it fucking hurts to look around
everywhere in chicken town
the fucking train is fucking late
you fucking wait you fucking wait
you’re fucking lost and fucking found
stuck in fucking chicken town
the fucking view is fucking vile
for fucking miles and fucking miles
the fucking babies fucking cry
the fucking flowers fucking die
the fucking food is fucking muck
the fucking drains are fucking fucked
the colour scheme is fucking brown
everywhere in chicken town
the fucking pubs are fucking dull
the fucking clubs are fucking full
of fucking girls and fucking guys
with fucking murder in their eyes
a fucking bloke is fucking stabbed
waiting for a fucking cab
you fucking stay at fucking home
the fucking neighbors fucking moan
keep the fucking racket down
this is fucking chicken town
the fucking train is fucking late
you fucking wait you fucking wait
you’re fucking lost and fucking found
We were away for the weekend, at Emma’s mam’s. Emma is getting her bridesmaid dress all fixed and fitted up for Katy’s wedding in July. We came home on Sunday evening, ensuring we’d left the Bank Holiday Monday free for a full day spent together as a family.
It wasn’t til bedtime that we’d realised that we’d need to go grocery shopping. The idea of wandering around Morrisons on a Bank Holiday didn’t really appeal, so I reckoned that we could get with the rest of the 21st century and order our shopping online. We’ve done this a few times before, but for some reason the habit never sticks.
By the time we’d got a list together, and found all the items on Tesco’s site, it was nearly half one in the morning. To my amazement, the site offered us a delivery slot between 2 and 4pm that afternoon! The same day! On a bank holiday! Madness.
And, just after 2pm, as promised, the Tescos van drew up with our shopping. That’s pretty damned impressive. Obviously, Tescos has a ready-made logistics and distribution network (eg. its stores all around the country) which makes this feat somewhat easier to manage than a traditional online business, but wouldn’t it be lovely if all big retailers could manage this?
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Picked up our ‘Navigo‘ sat nav units from the Citylink depot this morning. From there we went on what appears to becoming a weekly sabbatical to Meadowhall. We went under the guise of buying Emma a necklace, but ended up – of course – returning with full bellies from La Tasca, and more toys. Specifically, the Guitar Hero III game that I said only 6 days ago that I’d not buy.
One highlight of our time around an exceptionally busy Meadowhall was Aimee walking around the centre, holding my hand. She’s becoming more and more reluctant to idly sit in her pram, and likes to walk around holding our hands. I was as chuffed as hell walking down the busy covered ’streets’ of Meadowhall, holding Aimee’s hand whilst she giggled madly, walking properly, like a little girl. We pick up a waking ‘harness’ for her from Mothercare, we’ll see what she’s like in it in the coming days. It’s amazing – every day that passes, she becomes more a little girl, and less a toddler. I can’t believe she’s only sixteen months old.