Scoville Units Unite » Funny http://agraham.org/blog reviews, rants and random chilli ratings Wed, 16 May 2012 13:32:36 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v= Family Guy runs for First Minister http://agraham.org/blog/2011/04/15/family-guy-runs-for-first-minister/ http://agraham.org/blog/2011/04/15/family-guy-runs-for-first-minister/#comments Fri, 15 Apr 2011 17:58:25 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=828

Does anyone else see it or is it just me?

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2011/04/15/family-guy-runs-for-first-minister/feed/ 0 Elvis has left the building http://agraham.org/blog/2011/03/21/elvis-has-left-the-building/ http://agraham.org/blog/2011/03/21/elvis-has-left-the-building/#comments Mon, 21 Mar 2011 20:35:06 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=809 Given that the company is long since dead it’s probably ok to write about the computer systems at Virgin Megastores.

Note: I fully expect to edit this for errors and clarifications when other former employees see this, especially as I can’t remember what each of the 20 function keys did so am making up the specific ones for illustration.

I started work in Virgin Megastore in Dundee in December 2001 and left in 2005. During this time I was at university so started off doing weekend work, more shifts during summer etc before being a supervisor (and the manager on duty Friday 4-6, Saturday 4-7, Sunday all day). I think one of the reasons I was initially kept on (apart from being brilliant, obviously) was I was able to pick up their bizarre computer system so quickly.

The core stock management system they used in stores was called ELVIS (EPoS Linked Virgin Information System) and used dumb terminals throughout the store. The other systems at the time I worked there were the intranet – a PC which had a mouse!, a Ticketmaster terminal and machine used to close and open the store for the day and return sales data at night.

Elvis had terminals at each till counter and in various parts of the back of the shop including the stockroom. It was used to check inventory or whether an item actually existed for customers and rough stock levels – sales were adjusted overnight although I believe it started using real time polling sometime after I left. In the back office it was used to adjust stock, add on deliveries and so on.

I did a variety of jobs in the store, from till duty, restocking, stock management, cash office, returns, customer orders and so on so can see how the system worked from a number of different angles.

The Basics

Your first interaction with the system was probably on the tills. You’ve just been taken on at Christmas thinking yay, some money and CV fodder little realising the sheer hell of the two weeks either side of Christmas in a busy retail store. You’ve had your till training and are confident that you can take a cheque, swipe a credit card with a broken magnetic strip and spot a dodgy tenner. With your encyclopaedic knowledge of real music (stuff you got into in the last year minus anything which later charted) as oppose to the drivel in the charts you’re pretty confident that you can help anyone with their queries.

Someone approaches the till and instead of having a pile of swag in their hand they ask you about the new single by FooBar and when it will be out. (In reality of course they will ask have you got that album by that band, that song by the guy and the girl – you know the one or the VHS of that film which comes out at the cinema next week, but we may return to crazy customers later.)

So someone else has logged in to the account limited to permissions that are safe on the shop floor and you move over to the terminal. So I don’t want to see what’s playing on the shitty in-house radio station I’ll go to the stock inventory search bitty using a function key (F4?). Good, now I can filter by categories, 200 is singles. If I’ve used the system for a while I might know that the band FooBar are in category 216 post industrial grunge funk unless some philistine at head office has added it under industrial grunge funk – 217 instead of course.

So you search for FooBar and you are sent to the index in the entire category starting at FooBar. You weave your way down the entire list of 12 singles on the page in alphabetical order. At this goes up to G and it’s a song starting at H you need.

So you page down by pressing either Page Down or a different function key – F6. You know this because at the bottom it says F1 is back up a level, F4 does something else and F6 is page down with F7 being Page Up. Notice the other ones missing. So you go to the second page and there it is in the second six. You press F9 to see more info and this refreshes the screen with 2 lines about each single instead of one. But you are on the first half of the page. You press F6 to page down and you see a new page with singles starting at S by that band. What was that did you press page down twice? best page up and find it. Ah there it is. You just found your first bug. Page Down always skipped page 3 when zoomed in.

I noticed this bug in 2001 about 5minutes after using the system. It was still there in about 2008 – the last time I asked someone in store to check for me.

You select the singles row using the up/down keys and press F12 to see more info about it. Name, label, release date, price, cat number (on side of case, maybe, alpha/numerals), quantity in stock, grade and SKU (virgins 6 digit numeric code). When I started the SKU for new items was about 800,000. I was really interested to see what happened when they hit 999,999. Well they did a clean up removing loads of old Laserdiscs, Super Nintendo games, cassette singles and so on which were still on the system. Any new items started from the earliest available free code.

Seriously in 2001 they still had SKUs for D&D figures and master system games on the system, in case anyone you know, wanted to order one.

From an items screen you could also, using function keys, see the order history of it, including current orders, future entry into sales or offers (and could advise people, don’t buy this DVD for £19.99, it’s going in the 3 for £18 tomorrow, sometimes they would take the advice…).

So it says 1 in stock in the new singles bit and you wander along to find it, sometimes with the customer following like a puppy dog, sometimes waiting at the till for your return. You then get it from the place in the rack, unless it’s been stolen, or someone has moved it in a different slot, or into the albums, or it’s sold.

Hold up.

Yep, you could have 1 in stock at 9am, open the store and sell it at 9:01. All day long the system still said 1 in stock.

This was actually useful if you were trusted to do the manual checks of daily sales, popular stock etc, but for dealing with customer enquiries it was a right pain. Every day you would get a print out of everything in the shop which had sold. You sold 1 copy of an old Beatles album so go check the correct amount are in the store and if there is 1 in the stockroom and none on the shelf go check it has the correct price (it may have lain there a year) and put it out for sale.

Old Stock Adjustment

After Christmas Virgin in their great wisdom decided to keep me on as a part-time employee. In January or so I had some free time from uni and there was some overtime available through the week. I turn up and I’m being introduced to our stock adjustment system.

VHS is dying, we still have a whole wall of it – 8 metres or so as well as several metre racks for different genres and only 4 metres of racking of DVD but it’s pretty obvious where the trend is heading. VHS take up twice the space of DVD per item and our stock room post-Christmas is creaking at the seams. There are about 80 boxes of VHS in there which is old and Deleted, 20 VHS to a box makes 1600 VHS. That’s money paid to suppliers for dead stock which is stopping us fill up the back room with lovely pretty new things. This is the task that really let me get to grips with the ELVIS system and Virgins product categorisation strategy.

Each item had a grade, 1 was Chart, 2 and 3 were popular sellers. 4-17 were various grades of obscurity and the smaller stores might only stock up to grade 10 stock sending their bizarre shit to the bigger stores who had more space and more chance of selling that concept album by that band only wanted by collectors and so on. 18 was new release and 19 and 20 were deleted. These were the stock which was impossible to order from the makers of the items, that 10 year old follow up album by a shitty 1 hit wonder who got dropped by their label shortly after and whos singer works in the Fast Food Emporium next door – that’s a grade 20. Grade 20 was also pretty awesome cos it was where you would find such wonderful stuff and amazing prices – Luniz 12″ album for £3.99 and A Man Called E by E from the Eels for 99p were two such gems. The E album was also the last copy of it in the entire Virgin chain and it had been gathering dust in the stock room for who knows how long.

Generally anything in stock which was grade 10 or better had at least 1 copy on the floor, unless it was like a Beatles album or the like and you would probably put that out too. When Biffy Clyro played an instore gig I trawled the stock room for early singles which were now grade 20 and put them out – selling out of loads of old stock which would never have ever sold under normal circumstances.

So anyway, getting back to the task – I had to go through all these old crap grade 20 VHS, check they were on the system so we could sort them to go in the next VHS sale at 99p each. Should they all go that nets the store an easy grand and a half for dead stock.

So I had to go through each item in each box with a big print out of all the stuff we expected to be there. When you had a video you could find it in the system by title, Cat Number, barcode or SKU. Sometimes the cat number didn’t match. Sometimes the cat number of the box said X137 and it was in the system as X00137 etc. Warner Brothers DVDs were amazing they said Z1642 and what that meant was it was really D0642. Little things like that you picked up in the stock room quite quickly.

Sometimes the item had 0 quantity in the system. That’s weird, you have it in your hand, probably someone couldn’t find it before and had adjusted it down by 1. Then you check the back and it has a sticker over the barcode 0123 4568 – 1.99 sale. So you check the system and it says there are 100 of them in stock for that barcode. Great, someone previously made a store specific barcode as a dumping ground for old shit and didn’t reallocate things off. Probably because it hadn’t sold at 1.99 so why waste money on such a useless task. So I then got a list of all these generic sale barcodes and noted how many VHS were already moved to them as I went.

Once I got through the whole box we then adjusted loads of the stock onto these generic codes and made the adjustments for all the discrepancies. This was a logon with a higher elevation than the store front one, say DUNDEE_BACKOFFICE or whatever. This system also shows the price the item was bought for so you could see that the VHS selling for 99p was originally bought for £10.99. This was revealing towards the end of 2004 you would see chart album bought for £10.29 selling for £13.99. You’d grab a paper at lunctime and see Tesco selling it for £9.99.

In this higher permissions account you would also see some of those missing functions from the shop front. As well as that access to other areas of the system which used different keys. F12 as more info on all the screens and F1 as back – that’s crazy talk. Lets allocate function keys to different functions on different screen and keep those damn till monkeys on their toes.

The night before the sale arrived and the stock was put out. I went in the next day and it was all in strict alphabetical order (genrefication of stock happened and was undone all the time, I actually think it was one of the causes of Zavvis failure, having a Film A-Z instead of Sci-Fi, Horror, Anime, Kids etc). This was especially amusing as there were 4 copies of some gay porn VHS flanked either side on the bottom shelf by kids movies. One copy was still there the last time I saw back-stock of VHS in the storeroom.

Stockroom

I was later trained to work in the stockroom. I got my own logon for the system with even higher permissions and the username DUNDEE_AG. Brilliant I get set up and go to enter my password “PASSWORD” – Error. Oh it’s because I used the same character twice. Your password then went through rotations every 28-30 days and you couldn’t choose any of the last 9. This inevitably led to you thinking up some seven letter word and appending a number to it cycling through them all.

Now I had my till log on (2 digits, 42 obviously) and my 4 digit password to remember. The password and account for front of store and my own log on and account. Later I would also have the ticketmaster info, safe combination and the alarm code to remember too. As well as all my online stuff and uni passwords etc which was great fun. Especially when you went to work hungover. (not that I ever did of course as that would have meant drinking on Thursday, Friday and Saturday night which just so happened to be when all the rock nights and gigs were on in Dundee.)

In the stockroom you had barcode scanners. You would get a parcel or packet in and find it’s order number. Bring it up on the system, check the invoice and each item. If it was all correct you would enter the correct quantities next to the order details on the system and save it. If there was an item missing you would fill our a form to send back to the supplier. If there was a wrong item – they send 2 copies of 1 item instead of 1 of a different one you would mark up that mistake so that the item was still outstanding. Depending on the item and it’s likelihood of selling you might keep it or send it back. If they sent an extra item then you adjusted that on and robbed some small supplier whilst making pure profit for Richard oppose unionisation whilst giving a million pound to the Labour Party Branson, mwaahahaha, mwaaahah mhhahahahaa! etc.

Customer orders also came in and you had to faff around and find the paperwork and then phone or write to the person letting them know that the order had arrived. Sometimes these would be days after an order, sometimes years after an order. Later pre-orders were handled the same way and you had to shrinkwrap the order form to the Spiderman DVD and keep separately so that the fanboys would make sure they could buy it on the day of release.

Supervisor

Around a year later I was promoted to supervisor and had my account upgraded to the Supervisor level of security. Actually that’s a lie. It was upgraded to Assistant Manager which put a couple of the other supervisors noses out of joint now I remember about it. Especially when they couldn’t find the manager to do something 1337 and had to ask me to do it for them. This game me so much more power mwaha. To be honest I can’t remember much except now only 1 main option screen was out of action for me and I had pretty much full function permission on the other screens. This let me see the full extent of the weird UI decisions. Sometimes F1 would be back, sometimes F12 would be back. Sometimes F12 would be more info and sometimes F20 would.

It was truly bizarre and worst of all there seemed to be no way to feed back bugs about the system and so on. The fact that more functionality was added later shows it was being maintained at some level.

Where did Elvis go?

I really have no idea what happened to Elvis or where else used it. Zavvi still used it and probably Head as well. There are still some Head stores so perhaps it is used there. Was it made by Virgin or did they get the makers of some system to customise a core package with HMV getting a similar customisation made. I really have no idea but if you know leave a comment below with more info.

I also have no idea what language it was written in and so on. I remember seeing some old modems in the back which sent back the info and the whole kit looked pretty ancient. I first saw it in 2001 and it was apparently made in 1991. I would have no trouble believing some of the hardware (especially keyboards) had been in operation longer than that.

I probably also got some of the function keys wrong as it is 6 years since I used it so corrections are welcome for accuracy. A quick Google search didn’t reveal any images of the terminals either so I couldn’t check on them or include any for illustration purposes.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2011/03/21/elvis-has-left-the-building/feed/ 5 Freemen On The Land http://agraham.org/blog/2011/03/08/freemen-on-the-land/ http://agraham.org/blog/2011/03/08/freemen-on-the-land/#comments Tue, 08 Mar 2011 20:49:12 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=773 I think I have found my new favourite conspiraloons, just pipping the 9/11 Troofers at the post.

Freemen on the Land seems to have started in the US and then spread to the UK. Some of the absurd arguments which reflect the US legal system seem to have translated too which is most amusing.

Basically it seems to be based around a number of premises

1. you are a freeman on the land
2. when your birth certificate is filed that is the creation of a legal corporation which bears your name
3. you can pick and choose when you are Jim Smith and when that is the legal corporation
4. courts areadmiralty court and you can demand to be tried under common law
5. taxes, driving licences, passports etc are unnecessary.

Amusingly most of their legalistic arguments don’t seem to be tested and those that are fail miserably.

You can see a number of their arguments on various Youtube videos and the David Icke Forum. They are mercilessly ripped to shreds on the JREF forum as you would expect.

One of my favourite series of videos and which explains theur fruitcakery quite well is the 8 parter by the Toronto Truth Seekers

In one of them (part 4?) one of them claims that you don’t need a passport to travel internationally as your birth certificate is fine. When asked where he had went with it the reply is nowhere. Which kind of sums it up. The Toronto Truth seekers also have videos about chemtrails, why polio isn’t real (tell my aunt who lost a leg to polio that you fuckers).

The Free Keene group are equally hilarious

Like all libertarians they probably rant about free enterprise and how glorious capitalism will lead them to riches. When asked how he will pay his fine when he inevitably loses his case he pauses. Then says from the wages from his job cleaning floors – keep living the dream.

Ben Lowrey from the UK seems to take delight in getting attention from the police and wasting their time.

Quite amusing to see some of his encounters with them – explaining how he is a member of a sovereign nation and so doesn’t need a drivers licence.

The other main tactic is to refer to a courtroom as a boat (people leaving are given a comment of man overboard) and claims that a birth certificate is Jim Smith and not the person who is called Jim Smith.

No doubt any cheques sent to Jim Smith are deposited in the human beings business account and not the non-existant corporate account for the legal fiction corporate person strawman Jim Smith.

So, has anyone encountered these guys or found better examples of their delusion?

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2011/03/08/freemen-on-the-land/feed/ 0 First Search Consultancy http://agraham.org/blog/2010/04/23/first-search-consultancy/ http://agraham.org/blog/2010/04/23/first-search-consultancy/#comments Fri, 23 Apr 2010 11:31:38 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=658 I was recently contacted by someone else who had received legal threats from First Search Consultancy. They have since edited and re-published their post about First Search Consultancy.

I recommend reading it. Ryan also says he has a recording proving the claim made by a number of people online and my partner that they say they can guarantee first place in a search on Google. This is of course not possible to do and any company claiming so would be obtaining money from customers by deception.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2010/04/23/first-search-consultancy/feed/ 0 Private Eye – ooh err missus http://agraham.org/blog/2010/01/25/private-eye-ooh-err-missus/ http://agraham.org/blog/2010/01/25/private-eye-ooh-err-missus/#comments Mon, 25 Jan 2010 17:38:28 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=587 This fortnights edition of Private Eye is quite good.

The two stand-outs for me though were the ingenuously fuelled letter about classical music with the quote the capital is positively stiff with magnificent organs.

The second is the large column with outrage that a comedian has been dumped from a festival, the comedian in question being Paul Merton, he who co-stars with Eye editor Ian Hislop on Have I Got News For You. This got as much disclosure as they look for when the Sun gives 5 star ratings to Fox films though which made me chuckle.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2010/01/25/private-eye-ooh-err-missus/feed/ 0 Wordplay http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/18/wordplay/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/18/wordplay/#comments Fri, 18 Sep 2009 16:52:18 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=504 One of the areas I wanted to write a few pieces about, but have neglected, was the strangeness of the English language.

Those that know me in person know I love puns and wordplay. I can generally be found giggling at something which amuses me which I then have to explain to others who hadn’t noticed it, or in some cases had but hadn’t been amused and then are annoyed at me explaining it to them. To quote Brian Keenan in Blind Flight

The Englishman is funny,’ he says, ‘He makes me laugh. The Irishman is witty, he makes me think.’

I’ll dump a few random pieces here so that if I don’t get back to the subject I have at least written something about it.

Lisp

A lisp is a speech impediment which causes people to have trouble pronouncing the letter S. The word lisp has difficulty being pronounced without using said letter. Which cruel shit decided to name it so?

Speech impediment

Seeing the wikipedia article on lisp reminded me of number 2 on the list: speech impediment. See: lisp, how does someone with a stammer communicate they have a speech impediment with dignity? Again with the cruelty etc.

Abbreviation

An abbreviation is a shortened version of a word. Doctor may be abbreviated to Dr. You can see the clever wee bit of HTML there? That allows you to expand the text using a variety of means to see the full version of the word. The HTML tag for abbreviations is abbreviated to <abbr> due to length.

There were others I had come across and neglected to put up. Do you have a favourite ironic word or phrase? Maybe you call an ambulance when you hear some illiterate prat exclaim my arm has just literally fallen off?. Post yours in the comments.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/18/wordplay/feed/ 0 Polo and Posh Portaloos http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/14/polo-and-posh-portaloos/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/14/polo-and-posh-portaloos/#comments Mon, 14 Sep 2009 18:34:20 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=501 On Saturday, Genna and I attended an event with a group who funded her business. They had some space at a corporate event day.

Anyhoo, the two amusing things prompting the title.

Firstly posh portaloos. They had hired the poshest portaloos I had ever seen. The sinks were bowls on raised daises. They had motion sensor activated taps. To dry your hands there were no paper towels – only small disposable towels to be dumped in a bin and presumably washed afterwards. You don’t see these at T in the Park.

Anyhoo we then retired to an afternoon of polo. A game I had never seen played before. I can’t imagine why I played football as a kid. All you needed was a ball between 20-odd of you. For polo the entry-level requirements are a bit less – 2 horses and one of the eight of you to have access to a flat marked out area the size of three football pitches.

It was quite fun to watch for the first half, got a bit boring towards the end, but that was due to the play rather than the game of polo itself.

The commentator was highly amusing, some of the phrases that I remember were:

Joe’s riding Sue hard from behind to stop him playing with Bob.

And he’s just stepping down to examine the horses girth…and seems happy with it

The game was Scotland vs South Africa so hearing And you can now that only the white man is allowed to do that sent a shiver down my spine a bit even though they were referring to the jersey colour.

There was a meal afterwards. Starter was excellent on the second attempt (fish was first), the sweet was an amazing cheesecake. The main was cold steak with a large blob of fat in the centre. All in all a fun day and it was all free for me so I’m not complaining at all.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/14/polo-and-posh-portaloos/feed/ 0 Hannah for president http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/04/hannah-for-president/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/04/hannah-for-president/#comments Fri, 04 Sep 2009 19:24:25 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=497 I have no idea who she is but I like her style

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/09/04/hannah-for-president/feed/ 0 Bow before the king of the nerds http://agraham.org/blog/2009/08/17/bow-before-the-king-of-the-nerds/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/08/17/bow-before-the-king-of-the-nerds/#comments Mon, 17 Aug 2009 18:47:19 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=489 i finally managed to see Rob Deb‘s comedy show. I couldn’t manage the past two years but after seeing the stuff in SciFi Now was more determined to go. Being on earlier made it easier too.

He was really, really funny. Lot’s of nerdy material, references but also stuff non-geeks could get related to his attempt to appear on Britain’s Got Talent (but not the drivel on this show).

I did a search and eventually found his MySpace page. So he loses geek cred for having that as his only online presence, obviously. Was highly amused by a review I found.

Read what this cock has to say.

I could just imagine similar.

As a feminist, mother in law and lesbian I did not appreciate the comedy of Roy Chubby Brown.

Or the like.

Guess what, comedian is targeting his audience by saying it will be lots of geek humour, if you don’t know who Captain Kirk is you probably shouldn’t go along as you will probably be sitting there with a glazed look on your face you numpty.

Rob mentioned overhearing some people looking at his flyers and saying meh, it’s probably about capes n’ shit.

So hopefully he will still be kicking around next year and I can see him again.

Before Rob I also saw two other comedians.

The first, an Australian was ok, he had some good material but a lot was related to lols England sucks at cricket compared to Australia etc. Not only has it been done to death before but no one really gives a shit about cricket in Scotland. His other material was enjoyable though with his sperm test tale being very funny.

The second of the pair was pretty good. His stage persona was just verging on being more enjoyable than funny but his material was really good. Excellent on stage, ditching the mic and just going without.

These were free shows so at the end the comics had a whip round to pay for extravagances like food, rent and the like.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/08/17/bow-before-the-king-of-the-nerds/feed/ 0 Wi-fi woo http://agraham.org/blog/2009/07/28/wi-fi-woo/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/07/28/wi-fi-woo/#comments Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:01:42 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=465 Amused today to read about some cretin who claims to be allergic to wi-fi.

Of course it will be no surprise to know the rag source of this garbage is the Hitler supporting Daily Mail.

Of course if such a claim were true the DJ would be in luck, with a profile and a paranormal ability he can go for the Randi $1million Challenge.

Given that previous claimants with similar abilities have not been able to tell when wi-fi signals are on or not his chance of winning is low, but surely it would make his illness bearable to live off a million dollars?

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/07/28/wi-fi-woo/feed/ 0 First Search Consultancy – SEO cowboys with a different technique http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/18/first-search-consultancy-seo-cowboys-with-a-different-technique/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/18/first-search-consultancy-seo-cowboys-with-a-different-technique/#comments Mon, 18 May 2009 19:33:11 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=374 I am used to seeing all the scam letters Genna gets from SEO companies guaranteeing first place on Google etc. Lately she has been getting pestered by phone calls.

Today she had one from Google.

Or at least a company impersonating Google.

The company was First Search Consulting (). A bunch of snake-oil selling cowboys.

I won’t link to their shit website as it:

  • Plays music when you load it
  • Doesn’t have valid HTML
  • Will help them in search engines

Amusingly, like all SEO companies, their own search results are pitiful. The only search page keywords which get them on the first page of Google are the company name.

SEO isn’t the only thing they do though, oh no.

They also do Broadband and Web Design.

On broadband, they don’t actually have that yet, but they are taking orders for a too good to be true deal. Their expertise in the area shines through when they mention they need your MAC code, which changes on a monthly basis.

Fuck knows what they mean by that.

A MAC code in relation to broadband would be a code put on your network card when manufactured which stays the same forever unless you go into the guts of the software and intentionally change it. It certainly doesn’t change frequently never mind monthly.

But their web design side.

Holy crap what an abortion.

Their portfolio has 9 examples of their work.

None of which validate.

Nine of which have table based layout.

These fucking cowboys shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near computers.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/18/first-search-consultancy-seo-cowboys-with-a-different-technique/feed/ 35 On your Marks, get set, go! http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/11/on-your-marks-get-set-go/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/11/on-your-marks-get-set-go/#comments Mon, 11 May 2009 12:01:18 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=361 I just finished reading two books I grabbed cheap in Virgin, Zavvi, Head.

First up was Mark Thomas with As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela: Underground Adventures in the Arms and Torture Trade. This was really interesting, funny and horrifying in equal doses. Some brilliant anecdotes of groups set up to take on arms dealers.

Next was Mark Steel with What’s Going On?: The Meanderings of a Comic Mind in Confusion. I had been looking forward to this as it covers the last ten years or so. Each chapter has a mixture of the disintegration of his private life, the disintegration of any lonely last principles in the Labour Party and the disintegration of his relationship with the SWP.

Each of these is quite depressing and bitter to read and the contrast of the three leads to a real understanding if what he has been going through.

Recently I also read Jack Jones Union Man: Autobiography and have just started on IOU: The Story of the Debt a book I got in Poundland and has a first chapter praising Bono so looks to be pretty shit.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/11/on-your-marks-get-set-go/feed/ 1 Inbetweeners http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/09/inbetweeners/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/09/inbetweeners/#comments Sat, 09 May 2009 14:39:13 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=358 So the Inbetweeners has come to the end of series 2. After the disappointment of series 3 of Skins this was a breath of fresh air. Some really funny moments couple with some really cringe worthy moments.

The final episode had Neil with the best quote of the series though.

ghost stories like Harry Potter and the Bible

So random, I spluttered in giggles.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/09/inbetweeners/feed/ 5 La Rebla Fam – internet lawyers http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/01/la-rebla-fam-internet-lawyers/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/01/la-rebla-fam-internet-lawyers/#comments Fri, 01 May 2009 11:12:06 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=354 It appears the management of La Rebla Fam made a boo boo.

They sent out moronic street teamers. They spammed forums etc. When they spammed UGS the users ripped the piss out of them. Now their management have noticed that the thread on UGS has a Google ranking of 2, just behind the band site. This obviously makes him a bit scared their hordes of fans will see what a bunch of fannies they are.

Their management PHases UK appear to be a bunch of cretins.

Not onlys is their website a single image, but the content of it says they provide Management and Music Solutions

Cocks of the highest order.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/05/01/la-rebla-fam-internet-lawyers/feed/ 3 Wrong numbers http://agraham.org/blog/2009/04/17/wrong-numbers/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/04/17/wrong-numbers/#comments Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:50:20 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=342 My landline keeps acting in bizarre fashion. I keep getting wrong numbers and recently someone claimed to have tried to contact me several times and we never got their voicemail.

Just checked the voicemail there and had 2 for Joanne, 1 for Kevin and 1 from a plumber installing a shower in Riverview Terrace and trying to arrange an appointment.

Is my number so similar to other peoples? Do a number of other people have numbers 1 digit away from mine? Previous experience with phone lines is that you get the odd wrong number every few months. I appear to get both persistent wrong numbers and frequent ones for different people from different people.

The problem solver in me is curious. Perhaps previous numbers have had very few neighbours? If my number was 123456 perhaps the only immediate neighbours were 123457 and 223456. If now I had clashes each side that would be 12 immediate neighbours. Given the rise in mobile numbers and presumably fall in land line numbers it does seem bizarre to have more nowadays. Maybe being on Virgin means there is a smaller allocation of numbers which are re-used more frequently than BT do?

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/04/17/wrong-numbers/feed/ 0 Amusing Tale of Protest http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/28/amusing-tale-of-protest/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/28/amusing-tale-of-protest/#comments Sat, 28 Feb 2009 17:52:10 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=245 Mark Steel has written an amusing entry on his blog about taking his kid to an anti-war march and the point where you notice a change in your life.

For some people Mark Steel went from being Double Plus Funny to Double Plus Unfunny overnight. Thankfully I don’t have anyone telling me what to think so can still have my own opinion about such matters.

Poignant and funny at the same time.

Oh for God’s sake, they’re not going to break down the embassy with balsa wood. Then he added Come on dad, let’s get to the gates.

No I think it’s safer to stay here, I advised.

COME ON, he insisted, and we shuffled through the squashed crowd to get nearer the front. Why don’t we all invade the Israeli embassy? he asked, and whoever was stood next to us answered Because the Israeli embassy is better protected than Buckingham Palace.

Well then let’s invade Buckingham Palace, he said.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/28/amusing-tale-of-protest/feed/ 0 Hae a pictur http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/16/hae-a-pictur/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/16/hae-a-pictur/#comments Mon, 16 Feb 2009 13:12:34 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=218 Reports from the weekend have a certain tanned celebrity and his acolytes handing out autographed pictures to kids in Glasgow.

Laughing so hard.

Trying and failing to find any way to describe the ridiculousness of this all whilst masking their identity and making it political…

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/16/hae-a-pictur/feed/ 0 Skins in Not Being Shit Shocker! http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/13/skins-in-not-being-shit-shocker/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/13/skins-in-not-being-shit-shocker/#comments Fri, 13 Feb 2009 13:37:48 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=196 Well, I had decided to give Skins one more go before giving up. Episode 3 had been an improvement on 1 and 2 (not hard to be honest) especially with the chilli love. Episode 4 started off pretty well and at one point I heard two lines of dialogue and realised holy crap, Genna asked what was up. Effy and Pandora were talking and they said (paraphrasing):

1. Our mums and dads fuck us up
2. they don’t mean to
1. but they do

It’s the opening lines from the first verse of Philip Larkin – This be the verse

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

Well, they needed to redeem themselves and they did so. You finally saw some characters settling into a group and some good interactions between people, although it’s still nowhere near as good as series 1 and 2. There is still a hell of a long way to go to even become as good as the worst episodes of season 1 and 2 so it’s earned a reprieve for a few more episodes. Hopefully the end of the season will be amazing and the early episodes will justify themselves on a rewatch with things you miss or don’t think are important on a first watch.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/02/13/skins-in-not-being-shit-shocker/feed/ 3 So Long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Goodbye http://agraham.org/blog/2009/01/20/so-long-farewell-auf-wiedersehen-goodbye/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/01/20/so-long-farewell-auf-wiedersehen-goodbye/#comments Tue, 20 Jan 2009 08:20:19 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=157 I think that Graham Linehan* sums it up.

* He of Father Ted, Black Books and IT Crowd fame.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/01/20/so-long-farewell-auf-wiedersehen-goodbye/feed/ 1 Tanned Man Trousers More Dodgy Cash http://agraham.org/blog/2009/01/04/tanned-man-trousers-more-dodgy-cash/ http://agraham.org/blog/2009/01/04/tanned-man-trousers-more-dodgy-cash/#comments Sun, 04 Jan 2009 17:14:47 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=120 Seems a certain tanned celeb has taken some money from Silvio Berlusconi, owner of Endemol.

A multimillionaire politician and media tycoon responsible for the harassment and mass fingerprinting of the Roma population in Italy and trying to make himself immune to prosecution for his corrupt terms in power.

After taking a massive amount of cash for a huge spread in the Daily Record including half naked pictures it is unsurprising.

At the weekend I had better things to do, such as attend a protest against the slaughter in Gaza.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2009/01/04/tanned-man-trousers-more-dodgy-cash/feed/ 0 Proposition 8 the Musical http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/11/proposition-8-the-musical/ http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/11/proposition-8-the-musical/#comments Thu, 11 Dec 2008 20:59:01 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=103

Fantastic video starring Jack Black, Sarah Chalke and Neil Patrick Harris.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/11/proposition-8-the-musical/feed/ 0 Committee Rooms no.9 http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/08/committee-rooms-no9/ http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/08/committee-rooms-no9/#comments Mon, 08 Dec 2008 20:46:08 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=90 When in Glasgow on Sunday night and hunting for a place not fully booked Mike recommended the Committee Rooms in Glasgow. We popped in and it was pretty cool. Some nice pictures on the wall including the Battle of George Square.

Barman asked what we wanted to drink and this exchange amused me no end.

Me: What vodkas do you have?
Barman: Well, if you’re a vodka connoisseur then you can have Grey Goose or Finlandia.
Me: Well seeing as I am and Grey Goose is shite, I’ll have the Finlandia please.
Barman: I have never heard anyone say that about Grey Goose before!

He was genuinely shocked.

For the meal I had their classic burger with piri piri sauce and Emmental cheese. It was grand.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/08/committee-rooms-no9/feed/ 0 Link: spEak You’re bRanes http://agraham.org/blog/2008/11/27/link-speak-you%e2%80%99re-branes/ http://agraham.org/blog/2008/11/27/link-speak-you%e2%80%99re-branes/#comments Thu, 27 Nov 2008 20:59:34 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=69 process->output diagram with Daily Mail as the input this is your best bet. My favourite has to be the EUrophobe [...]]]> spEak You’re bRanes is the excellent site which pokes fun at the paranoid, dangerous, delusional and the daft who inhabit the BBC Have your say comment section.

If ever you need to complete the input-> process->output diagram with Daily Mail as the input this is your best bet.

My favourite has to be the EUrophobe who rants about the metric temperature measures. The other excellent parody of this section is the From the message boards section in Private Eye

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