Being all at sea
The good ship SS Head Rambles continues to sail in extremely rough seas.
The main problem now is that I am not sure if we are sailing into the hurricane, out of it, or just circling the eye. Our navigation system never coped with these conditions before and the radar blew overboard some time ago. However the hull is still watertight, and the main risk is of hitting a hidden rock in these uncharted waters.
However we have gathered a small but powerful flotilla of battleships to escort us so I am optimistic.
And then on a completely unrelated topic I got a letter this morning. For some reason, best known to themselves [and probably a little man in Outer Mongolia] Social Welfare want to know all the details of my bank accounts. As if I didn’t have enough on my mind at the moment.
They sent me a list of accounts, one of which I had completely forgotten about, but at least I know now which accounts they don’t know about. That’s always handy to know. They want statements for the last three months which is a pain in the fucking hole. Some of the accounts are fine – I just print off the statements from the web site but there is one they always moan about – my main account that I use for everyday stuff.
You see, my bank publishes statements on line for me to download and print. But the bastards only do that twice a year, so the latest statement brings me up to June 31st which isn’t exactly the last three months. So I have to phone them. I have had to do this before a couple of times before so I now know the routine. Can I have a statement for the last three months, I will ask. They will happily reply that my that all my statements are available online, as if I were some kind of fucking idiot. I will then point out that those statements are nearly three months old and that I can’t wait until December as I have to reply to Social Welfare within 21 days. They will then huff and snort and generally prevaricate, but when I refuse to concede defeat they will eventually agree to run off a special statement just for me. You’d think they were doing me some kind of extraordinary favour instead of just providing a service. Cunts.
I don’t know what they want those details for, but I do know that it isn’t for my benefit. Maybe they think I’m over claiming on my pension which would [*cough*] be a reasonable assumption, but knowing them, if I don’t provide the details they demand, they’ll stop my pension altogether.
I bet they don’t give Bono this much grief.
Hi G.D.
Might just be worth mentioning to them that it’s YOUR money that you are lending to them .
Find that banks tend to forget that fact .
Not only that but they probably charge me for answering the phone, printing off a statement, the cost of an envelope and stamp, and an overall “administration fee” on top of all the interest I pay ’em.
“. Our navigation system never coped with these conditions before and the radar blew overboard some time ago.”
*1950 BBC voice (Miss.Ovaltine)*
Ooh we know a song about this one, don’t we Boys & Girls? Now follow the dot on the screen and lets sing those nasty old black clouds away:
â«Like a drunken sailor in a tugboat
With a bottle of vodka in my overcoat
& my dog eared bible lost–overboardâ«
â« On the good ship Venus
By Christ you should have seen us
The figurehead was a whore in bed
Sucking a dead man’s …… â«Â [Can’t remember the rest]
Grandad, I believe the last line goes, sucking on a dead dog’s… ?
Isn’t the fourth line
“And the mascot was a  ……”
Always knew it as ” And the Figurehead was a Nude Mermaid, Sucking a dead man’s …..”
It’d have to be a damned wide prow to get a carving of a ‘whore in bed’ on it. Wonder if it was a single or double bed?
Mermaid doesn’t rhyme very well with Figurehead? I also heard “the figurehead was a maid in bed sucking a dead man’s….” There seems to be quite a few variations? The power of Chinese Whispers!
Bono isn’t a pensioner. The public sector’s job is to make misery.
They’re all the same – Social Welfare, Income Tax – all make it as easy as possible to take money off you, and as difficult as possible to get any back.
Probably depends on which version of the song. AFAIK the Sex Pistols’ version was:
It was on the good ship Venus
By Christ, ya shoulda seen us
The figurehead was a whore in bed
And the mast was a mammoth penis
But the song itself predates Mr. Sidney Vicious…perhaps by a couple of centuries even, as always Wiki is our friend: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Ship_Venus
So that’s what the last word is! I have been racking my brain all day trying to remember. Along with everyone else, apparently.
“Frigging in the rigging,”
“Wanking on the planking,”
“Frigging iiiinnn the rigging!”
“There was…. else to do.” Â And here memory fails me.
June 31st…
Is that an Irish date?
Statutory bank holiday here. Several months have bank holidays on the 31st. February has two – 30th and 31st.