Where has all the common sense gone?

It's been the hottest day of the year so far so of course I'm sure that most people did what most people here in the UK do when it gets hot and humid. Spent most of the day moaning about it. To be fair howevert I am also in that group as I do not enjoy hot sticky weather like this in the slightist. Heat I can deal with, it's the humid 'closeness' which drives me battey.

We went into loughborough early as I had to go to the post office as it was time to give the government some more money for the privilage of driving my Car. Yes it was time to get another road tax disc ( the MOT is also due this month) however due to a appalling lack of common sense in the post office it turned into a bit of a slog in a building with no air con!

Usually when you get a MOT certificate from the garage you get a nice computer print out on a green form. However the last time I had a MOT their printer had broken so they issued me with a hand written one on a red form and although it said emergency MOT certificate they assured me that I could change for a green one at a later date or just leave it as it would be okay for the whole year. Indeed six months ago when I got my last tax disc it was no problem. However this time was someone different as the lady behind the counter seemed totally unable to grasp the fact that it was okay that the form wasn't green and started to argue with me that it wasn't a MOT certificate and that the sentence on the top of the form that sent it had been issued as the computised tester was down meant that I had only a 'partial MOT' certificate which meant it had only passed in certain areas and not the areas which required a computer to test.

By this point I was getting very hot and very annoyed with this women and tried to tell her politily as possible that she was wrong as there is no such thing as a 'partial' certificate. The MOT is basically a car safety check and they won't only test half the things. She proceeded to tell me with her best condescending smile that she was right and I was wrong. I then explained that they had accepted the certificate last time and it was fine then. She then gave me a look like I had insulted one of her children and said it couldn't have been as it wasn't a valid MOT certificate and the title " Emergecy MOT certificate" meant it was only valid in emergency situations when the full testing couldn't be done.

By then I was ready to start banging my head up and down on the counter as I wondered if this women could hear herself or if she was some form of advanced robot. Usually I try to be very sympathic towards people in customer service as I know what it's like to be in their shoes but this women had somehow managed to exhaust my patience. I decided to go for difficult and told her that seeing as it had been accepted last time and the garage who were very well experienced in what was and was not a valid MOT certificate said it was fine could she double check. She glared at me and said she would have to check in the book and walked off. I refrained from making any jokes about the bible.

She came back to the counter two minutes later and started talking to the trainee who she had been well training and started to tell him how to issue a tax disc without talking to me which let me quickly realise that I was in the right and she had been very very wrong. Which almost cheered me up enough to not feel annoyed over having to pay the government more money just for the privilage of driving my own car!

We got home from shopping to discover we couldn't get into the road as some work men had turned up to re surface the road. On the hottest day of the year! That planning went well! Of course it wasn't tarmac they were laying rather those bits of stone which is probably a lot cheaper as they use cars to compact it down for them. Grumpy was most annoyed as we had to park out on the main road and thought it was bad that they hadn't given us any warning.

We got in to discover they had, sort of. They had sent us a leaflet to give us advance warning of the work to tell us it was starting on Monday and it arrived this morning which was Monday morning. D'oohh! The leaflet then told us that the road was going to be resurfaced and then waffled on in great detail about how great the council and goverment is by investing in road. It then told us that to find out the exact time of when the road would be surfaced and access to our house wouldbe restricted we could ask any of the workmen on site.

However we live in a cul de sac which has seven houses and the road is so small one lorry will fill it up. So it wouldn't have mattered even if we had gone to ask the workmen on site when they were starting as they started as soon as they turned up meaning that the road was blocked anyway. Again D'ooh! I'd think you'd agree.

Well it's the start of my second week of secondment tomorrow. It should be interesting.

Later folks!