[MadTheEddos]

Nicole Scherzinger sang a Snow Patrol song? FAIL.

Good call posting that up here(Although to be honest she annoys me most of the time - especially when she appears at F1 races and the cameras seem to spend more time looking at her than at the cars).

[Yudster]

Thankfully those days are over.

[Travis Bickle]

The hassle of trying to find a suitable person to countersign a first adult passport application. My Doctor wont do it and my dentist barely knows me. Everybody else on the list of acceptable professions I either don't know or haven't known for two years or are related to me in some way.

I suppose there are people I could ask, but it would be very embarrassing as I barely know them and they have to put their own passport number on it and possibly home address and phone number.

It just seems like a stupid way of doing things to me. I have got a birth certificate, NI number, bank accounts, mortgage, driving licence and none of that is good enough on its own, but I could get someone who barely knows me to sign a form and the back of a photo (who I could easily have given a backhander to) and that would do it?

Annoyed

[Yudster]

I agree, it is bonkers. But I can't understand why your doctor won't do it. Do you or your parents know the local vicar perhaps? Even if you aren't a churchgoer, if he or she knows your family even a bit, they would do it, you don't have to be well acquainted or anything.

[Travis Bickle]

I agree, it is bonkers. But I can't understand why your doctor won't do it. Do you or your parents know the local vicar perhaps? Even if you aren't a churchgoer, if he or she knows your family even a bit, they would do it, you don't have to be well acquainted or anything.

I have done plenty of google searches on this and it seems doctors generally wont do it, even for a fee. I called my surgery and asked the receptionists if the doctors would do it but they said they wouldnt unless for medical reasons... dont know what they might be.

No, I dont know the local vicar either and neither does my mother. You have given me an idea though. My workplace has one. I dont know him, but I have seen him about a bit so maybe he might recognise me.. Failing that the only other person I can think of is my old driving instructor, but I havent spoken to him in nearly five years!

The whole thing is really awkward. My mother has a friend who is a retired doctor who may do it, but she has never met me and it would be asking her to lie.

The annoying thing is I know civil servants and legal secretaries, but they are related to me!

It's all really awkward

[Bas]

The hassle of trying to find a suitable person to countersign a first adult passport application. My Doctor wont do it and my dentist barely knows me. Everybody else on the list of acceptable professions I either don't know or haven't known for two years or are related to me in some way.

I suppose there are people I could ask, but it would be very embarrassing as I barely know them and they have to put their own passport number on it and possibly home address and phone number.

It just seems like a stupid way of doing things to me. I have got a birth certificate, NI number, bank accounts, mortgage, driving licence and none of that is good enough on its own, but I could get someone who barely knows me to sign a form and the back of a photo (who I could easily have given a backhander to) and that would do it?

Annoyed

All the professions that are deemed acceptable to do this task, police, doctors, clergy & solicitors , are the very people you spend most of your life trying to avoid.

[dimtimjim]

The hassle of trying to find a suitable person to countersign a first adult passport application. My Doctor wont do it and my dentist barely knows me. Everybody else on the list of acceptable professions I either don't know or haven't known for two years or are related to me in some way.

I suppose there are people I could ask, but it would be very embarrassing as I barely know them and they have to put their own passport number on it and possibly home address and phone number.

It just seems like a stupid way of doing things to me. I have got a birth certificate, NI number, bank accounts, mortgage, driving licence and none of that is good enough on its own, but I could get someone who barely knows me to sign a form and the back of a photo (who I could easily have given a backhander to) and that would do it?

Annoyed

I can get it signed for you.... if you're still stuck. I know loads of peeps who qualify for that (architects, teachers etc), what with me being such an upstanding pillar of the community and that...

[chrysostom]

Plans to introduce a milk chocolate variant of Jaffa Cake. I don't know why but it's annoyed me. Dark chocolate is being marginalised.

[MK Chris]

So it * should be too. A milk chocolate Jaffa Cake would be all kinds of BRILLIANT.

[Yudster]

I don't think that slightly bitter orange centre would work with milk chocolate at all. Still, don't have to eat them.

[dimtimjim]

A pre-wanring. This is gonna be one of those moans, thats not really a moan - its me, being incredibly lucky.

So, all happy working away in Sheffield, still. Phone rang - its my old boss - just won new contract, want me back....

So, I now have to choose between two jobs. Effing great...

One is really good fun, pays really well, with great people, with one of the worlds largest architects - But, its 100 miles away from where I live. The other is for a small company, with less pay - But, it would mean working with my best mate (again) and it would mean the office is only 15 miles from my house...

decisions, decisions.

[DevilsDuck]

Whats better for the family... Extra money or extra time with you?

[bmstinton93]

Definitely extra money...

[DevilsDuck]

Yeah, but they may actually like him...

[bmstinton93]

Nah. Doubt it...

[dimtimjim]

Much as I know you're trying to take the piss, you are kinda exactly right in what you say...

In my current job, I earn enough to be able to live a certain way. No, i'm not rich by any stretch of the imagination, but I do well enough to live in a detached house and have 3 foreign holidays each year - which works for me.

But, should I take a pay cut, how many things like that would start to slip...? Be it family holidays, weekends away or just popping for a swim on a saturday with the kids... The idea of less money worries me slightly. I don't want my decision to make life 'easier' for myself to have a detrimental knock on effect on my family.

[Yudster]

Have your wife or kids expressed any dissatisfaction with the situation as it is currently? Does the distance you have to travel have a detrimental effect on your health and wellbeing?

If the answer to both of those is "no", well, seems to me that you can have it both ways - ie the content family and the slightly more expensive lifestyle. If the answer to either of them is "yes", well, you might be wise to have a think and maybe re-package your lifestyle a bit. But really, it all hinges on the answer to those two questions.

[Nicola_Red]

In my current job, I earn enough to be able to live a certain way. No, i'm not rich by any stretch of the imagination, but I do well enough to live in a detached house and have 3 foreign holidays each year - which works for me.

But, should I take a pay cut, how many things like that would start to slip...? Be it family holidays, weekends away or just popping for a swim on a saturday with the kids... The idea of less money worries me slightly. I don't want my decision to make life 'easier' for myself to have a detrimental knock on effect on my family.

Yep, some of us dream of those type of decisions! I don't think I could ever afford a foreign holiday. But I do know that the amount of stuff you wanna spend money on expands as you make more - that's happened to me as my earnings have crept up over the years.

In other news, all the trams are off here due to cable theft. Spent a tenner on a cab into work. SO ANNOYING.

[a-moron]

Spent a good few hours and used a fair amount of expletives putting together the toys we'd got my son for his birthday today. Had them all set up super, surrounded by banners and balloons. What does the wee one boy wreaking crew do when he see's them...

That's right. Two's up to the toys, let's lick me some balloons.

On the bright side, that's his birthday gift sorted for next year.

[dimtimjim]

Happy Burfday mini-Bodger.

[Yudster]

I still can't believe that they let Badger actually breed.

[DevilsDuck]

You cant stop them...unless you gas the whole set!

[MadTheEddos]

Having had a bad head-cold this weekend. It sucks!

[chrysostom]

I'm riddled with what I think is flu.

[bmstinton93]

Ah its that time again when I'm due to be going home again so I have the regular problems with arranging work. I phoned my home store today and basically they don't want me back yet. My store here also want to get rid of me as they are overstaffed. So it looks like the store in Bristol are gonna have to be forced onto keeping me for a bit longer which is gonna piss them off and I'll probably only be allowed home for like 6 weeks or something.