Diary of a Grumpy Old Git (10 page)

I felt much better this morning, which was annoying. I was hoping to drag my illness out for a few more days. Unfortunately, I had no choice but to plough through my to-do list,
starting with ordering the garden decking. I selected some online and clicked the ‘purchase’ button. For some reason, last time I used this website I decided against storing my card
details. I wonder what I was scared of. Hackers sprucing up the shrubbery?

I had to root around for my debit card and enter my details all over again, including the three-digit number that’s so completely and utterly secret it’s written on the back of the
card. Then I clicked on ‘purchase’, but had to fill in all my details again because I’d neglected to type in my phone number, which was apparently a ‘required field’.
I clicked on ‘purchase’ for a third time, but this time nothing happened because my wireless connection had gone down.

I tried turning the computer off and on again, then I tried turning the router off and on again, then I tried turning my printer off and on again, just in case that was something to do with it.
I looked around the flat, desperately trying to find something else to turn off and on again. Maybe the fridge was somehow involved.

There was nothing else for it. I was going to have to call a helpline. No doubt someone whose voice hadn’t yet broken would sneer at me for missing something glaringly obvious, but I had
no choice. I fished the manual out of a drawer and looked for the helpline number. The only thing that was given was a website address, which is very useful when your Internet access has gone
down.

I typed the Web address into my phone and waited as it slowly brought up the page. There was still no number, but there was a ‘contact us’ link. I must have especially fat fingers,
because it took me about ten attempts to click on it.

I then had to scroll through endless pages of frequently asked questions and online help request forms until I eventually found a phone number. Then I had to navigate through a confusing series
of options on their automated service before I was finally allowed to speak to an actual human.

I braced myself for the condescension. But guess what? The fault was at their end, not mine. They reset the connection and it all started working again. I’d been made to feel like a
grunting Luddite for wanting to use something as primitive as a telephone. And yet it was the only way I could have solved the problem.

I bought a magazine from the newsagent’s this morning, and as I was walking home an insert about a wine company fell out into a muddy puddle. I ignored it and continued
down the street, as any sane person would have done. Unfortunately, a woman with straggly brown hair darted towards me, accused me of littering and demanded that I pick it up. I explained to her
that I hadn’t known anything about the insert until it fell out, so I couldn’t possibly be guilty. Maybe she’d like to address her complaint to the newsagent, the sales director
of the magazine or the media agency who recommended that the wine company book an unbound insert rather than a full-page ad like civilized human beings. Of all the people whose decisions led to
that insert floating on the puddle, I was the least responsible. Unfortunately, the woman insisted that I pick up the filthy bit of paper and fling it into a bin.

I was then forced to tramp up and down the high street looking for somewhere to wash my hands. Am I imagining this or did there used to be things called public toilets? When did they take them
away? Why did no one complain? Were we all too ashamed about our bodily functions?

Well, it’s too late now. If you want to urinate in public now, you have to sneak into a phone box and pretend to talk into the receiver as a suspicious trickle of liquid runs out
below.

I didn’t even have that option as I looked for somewhere to wash my hands. I was forced to go into a coffee shop and ask if I could use their toilets. They said they could only give out
the door code if I bought something, so I had to spend three quid on a mocha just for the privilege of washing the mud off my hands. This sort of experience is the real reason that print journalism
is dying. It’s nothing to do with the Internet.

Josh came over to my desk this morning to check if I was feeling better. His tone was sympathetic but I could tell he was looking for evidence that I’d been skiving. I did
a couple of unconvincing sniffles to help my case.

He asked how I was getting on with the time-logging website, which is worrying. I’ve already put a total of six hours down on it. What more does he want?

I can tell the little bastard is using that website to monitor my entire life. This is fascism! This is the thought police! It’s all turning into
1984
! The novel rather than the
year, that is. If everything turned into the year I watched
Police Academy
and got off with a girl who looked like Cyndi Lauper, I wouldn’t be complaining.

I’ve ordered my decking now. I even stored my details in the website so I wouldn’t have to go through all the punishment for missing out required fields again.
Although it did mean that I had to sign up to the website, which was also very stressful. Above the password box it said, ‘You can choose any combination of numbers and letters between six
and sixteen characters long – get creative!’

What utterly shitty advice. Don’t get creative. It’s a password, not a Turner Prize-winning installation. Use it as an outlet for your artistic urges and you’ll never get into
your account again.

I used my mother’s maiden name as my password, like I always do. The site told me this was ‘very weak’. Thanks for that, website. I wanted you to remember my details, not
evaluate my password-devising skills. Is there anything else you’d like to criticize while you’re at it? Perhaps you’ve been spying on me through the webcam and you think my shirt
doesn’t go with my trousers. Jumped-up little cyber bastard.

Josh asked me how my workload was today. Like the snooping little Stasi officer doesn’t already know. I told him it was moderate and he said he’d like me to come
along to a ‘chemistry meeting’ with a client called TC Waste Solutions, who are apparently the second-biggest industrial bin suppliers in the south-east. Whoop bloody whoop.

He said that if we impress them, they’ll give us their business, which will make up for the loss of the Donaldson Sweepers account. Then he said it was the sort of account we could
‘have fun with’.

What does that even mean? How can working on something like that possibly be the same as having fun? Maybe ‘fun’ is one of those words that’s changed its meaning now. Maybe it
means the opposite of what it once did, like ‘bad’ and ‘wicked’. It would certainly explain fun pubs.

I was woken up at seven this morning by the doorbell. It threw me into a panic. Was it the police? Had they finally worked out who stole that Lion bar from WHSmith in 1978? I
threw myself out of bed, desperately fighting my pins and needles to drag my jeans on. I rushed to the front door, fumbled around for my key and opened it to see a deserted driveway and a card that
read, ‘We called to deliver a package, but you were out.’ No I wasn’t. It’s seven in the morning, my curtains are closed and the horrified cries of a middle-aged man trying
to get dressed were ringing out. Don’t pretend you thought I was out.