Fun with call centre staff

*ring ring*

Me: Hello?

Call centre guy: Yes hello, this is Steve from Wastyertime Services - is Mr... uhh... Eeq...bowl there please?

Me: Mr Who?

CCG:Ummm.... Eeqerball?

Me: ...could you spell that please?

CCG: I-Q-B-A-L

Me: Ohhhh! Mr Iqbal!

CCG: Yes, that's it! I'm so sorry, I-

Me: -Well, he's not here I'm afraid. Sorry! *hangs up*

-NB: My surname isn't Iqbal, I just used that as an example. My sister started the whole 'schooling call centre drones on spelling and pronunciation' thing - seriously, some of these guys don't even try, they just see a brown name, open their mouths, and spew out a few vowels expecting whoever answers to decipher it all. Hmph.

----------

*ring ring*

Me *bored and in a stupid mood*: 'ALLLEWWW?

Call centre girl: Hi-*bursts out laughing*

Me: HAHAHA! lol!

CCG: lol!

Me: Well, bye!

CCG: Goodbye!

-NB: Sadly, this conversation was the high point of my day.

----------

*ring ring*

Me: Hello?

Call centre guy: Hi, is that Miss McPagal? I'm calling on behalf of your bank, do you have a few minutes to do a quick survey?

Me: *what the hey, anything to waste 5 minutes of studying time* Uhhh... sure!

CCG: Really?! Great! Well, our records show that you recently made a transaction at our High Street branch, all my questions will relate to this visit.

Me: Ok...*vaguely remembers running in to deposit £40 or so in my emergency-petrol-fund-debit-card-account, and maybe checking my balance*

CCG: Right, please answer all of these questions on a scale of 1-10, where 10 is the best possible service, and 1 is service you were very unhappy with. How long was the wait?

Me: There was no wait, so... 10!

CCG: Great! Now, how was the general ambience? ...Did the cashier greet you politely? ...Did the cashier greet you by name? ...Were you happy with the service overall? ...Did you get good vibes from the wallpaper? ...How accurate was the clock? ...Blah blah blah? Blah?

Me: *Oh God, why did I agree to this?! I don't even remember this visit! I think the cashier was the blond guy... I was out of there in less than 2 minutes, for goodness sake! Hmmm, I'll just answer everything in a pattern, then go watch Psych.* 4... 5... 6... 5... 4... 5... 6...

CCG: Thanks for your time, have a nice day!

Two days later...

*ring ring*

Me: Hello?

Bank Manager: Hello, could I speak to Miss McPagal please?

Me: speaking...

BM: Hi, my name is something unmemorable. I'm calling about a survey relating to your recent transaction at Bank, High Street, Miss McPagal?

Me: Wait, I think I've done this already, sorry.

BM: Yes Miss McPagal, I just wanted to ask you some further questions about the responses you gave. You see, I'm the manager of High Street branch, and I was very concerned that you were unhappy with the service you received, and want to know what we can do to improve service in future.

Me: uh... to be honest, I can't remember much about the visit, I was only there for a couple of minutes, and-

BM: Yes yes yes. Well, you scored Andrew, your cashier, a 5 for his service. Obviously, I'm unhappy with this. What exactly were you unhappy with?

Me: I-

BM: WHAT DID ANDREW THE CASHIER DO WRONG?! We are committed to improving standards here. Andrew was very unhappy to receive a 5!

Me: I'm sorry! I was in a hurry, and I just said 5 for most things! I couldn't remember much, honest! Bye!

BM: Please come again! Bye!

I don't think I'm ever going to that branch again - if I saw Andrew, I would not be able to look him in the eye. I'm sorry, Andrew. Next time, I'll say 10/10 for everything. You deserve it.

things I do to avoid studying...

You know, like, updating this blog :)

After almost a year of use, my beloved Uniball Clipturn FREE GIFT pen looked like it was running low, which might sound like a trivial and, to be brutally honest, somewhat boring fact - but if you know me well enough, you'll know is a SERIOUS CRISIS of ULTIMATE SEVERITY to be dealt with as soon as possible, IF NOT SOONER, AND NO THE CAPITAL LETTERS ARE NOT UNNECESSARY. *ahem*. What I mean is, I would be slightly inconvenienced if I didn't have it refilled in time for exams. beginning in exactly five days? aaaaaaaaaaaaargh...

Naturally, I followed the link for refills from the Uniball website, and spent the next hour or so ogling pens on the Cult Pens website, which looks a wee bit scaffy but is actually pretty awesome. I started out sensibly, just looking at what I needed - then I thought, it's better to buy in bulk - and from there it was like, dude, spend a bit more and you get free delivery - and then somehow I started looking at £200 Porsche pens.
Don't worry though, I'm not daft enough to buy anything like that! (...yet)

I did, however, get some AMAZING new Pilot Parallel calligraphy pens... just in case the stash I 'acquired' from my dad and sister wasn't enough. But seriously. These things are crazy fun to play with. They come with 12 colours of ink! And you can blend the colours!!

taken from a great review I read here

Unfortunately, this has resulted in me spending an awful lot of time playing about with them, and practicing my lettering, and looking up part time courses in calligraphy, than actually studying. Ho hum, this happens every year. One year I made a papier-mache chicken instead of doing studying for standard grades - but dude, they were standard grades. That's GCSE's for any non-Scots - basically the exams you get around age 16 to check you haven't fallen through the cracks and can actually read and write somewhat competently :P (apologies to GCSE-taking readers - but guys, don't stress! I didn't study, and I'm doing okay! This cardboard box I'm living in is reeeeally roomy.)

I'm kind of losing the plot now (if I had it to begin with) - but basically, what happens to me around exam time is I start planning new hobbies, or courses, or even careers - and I'm absolutely positive that I'm going to pursue it all right up until summer holidays actually start, whereupon I vegetate in the house for a couple of months then wonder where the time went :-|

Here's my list for this year:
- Learn to juggle (yes, I know this has been on my list for the past 5 years - but so has most of this other stuff)
- Skip for 45 minutes a day I've been reliably told by my physiotherapist that I'm unfit :(
- Start cycling, and perhaps cycle-commute to Uni next year (this one has my dad worried. He says "99% of drivers are sensible, but it's that 1% you should be scared of... can't you just cycle round cycle paths where no one else goes?". I know he's just being protective, and I do agree with him, but dad! At my age you rode a motorbike! In Pakistan, where there's no road safety laws! Even the traffic direction is a suggestion!
- Learn to sew
- Go horseriding
- Go to Go Ape (again!)
- Start a calligraphy class
- Find some kind of.. part time illustration class? If they exist :/
- Go to Morocco and do a kick-ass elective project treating kids who are too poor to go to a normal dentist

If you think that last one seems a tad out of place - it's because it's actually planned out, booked, and going to happen (inshallah!). I can't wait!

...Just have to get through exams first...

Tantrum #2934848356

Things that have annoyed me recently:

People saying ridiculous things about 'ooooh, the weather is so awful, I'm going to get the flu'. IT'S NOT RAINING VIRUSES MAN. Though that would be really gross.

People casually mentioning how horrendously haram everything is, as long as they don't do it themselves, and nitpicking about minor things. Seriously, quit telling me that I have one bloomin' [not literally... unfortunately] hair sticking out of my hijab - once or twice is okay, but every day?! My sideburns will not cause unrelated men to fall in love with me! And if they're flapping in the breeze, chances are that I know and am already irritated at what a bad hijab day I'm having!

Similarly: the whole over-ital'iciz3d-and-decorated-with-extra-apostrophes-and-lines style of Arabic transliteration. The point is to make it legible in English. If you really want to portray the original Arabic, write in Arabic script. Also, people can understand just fine if you stick an 's' on the end of an Arabic word to make it plural - when you start talking Shuyookh and dua'aat and using Arabic where English would suffice, with extra ayns and throat-clearing khaa's where no ayn or kha should go - you're just being difficult.

This sign that I see on the side of a bowling club on the way home (the old people on grass kind of bowling, not the ten-pin kind): "Shooglediwhoop Bowling Club Welcome's New Members!". Give that apostrophe back, you don't deserve it!

People studying. This may seem absurd (rather, more absurd than usual), but dudes, you're making me feel bad. Quit stressing about exams, because then I get stressed that I'm not stressed and therefore lack the drive to study. Before returning to my desk to play online games, or doodle, or just stare at the wall til it's time for dinner. Or write blog rants. Whatevs, homeys.

hijabuddies

So, I have a mild addiction to facebook graffiti (it can usually be controlled by getting addicted to something else instead, like point and click web games... man, I loved MOTAS). And this is one of the few original things I've done, rather than copying a still from a Disney movie, which is, admittedly, a fun way to spend an afternoon. So I thought I'd share!

My assessment of the above:
1. Purple kurta girl. Jeez, what a snob. She's all like, "Y'all are stupid, stay away from me!"
2. Green abaya girl. She has a hearty laugh, but it masks her sadness at living with strange, warped potato hands. Doing up buttons has always been a challenge.
3. She's not being funny - the wind changed direction all those years ago.
4. Pink abaya girl went one stage further - she glued her arm in that anatomically incorrect position. Good intention though, she just wanted to spread peace. Pity she forgot that from behind, she's swearing at people.
5. Pie head girl - what else can you say?

How to Ruin Your Mum's Favourite Song

This post comes to you in honour of mother's day, which as a somewhat less than perfect daughter, I am clearly honouring a day late.

Step One: Identify your mum's favourite song. In my case, I think it's this:


(although with my innate knowledge for ruining songs, my mum might be deceiving me deliberately...)

Step Two: Sing the lyrics as often, as loudly, and of course as tunelessly as possible. You don't even need to know most, or indeed any of the words. Anything you don't know can be replaced with lalala's or neeneenee's. If you're adopting pro tactics, learn one line and make it fit the entire melody.

Step Three: When you are forbidden from doing the above, hum the melody from time to time, interspersed with amateur beatboxing and shouts of 'break it down!'.

Step Four: This part is treading into dangerous territory. Again, take to singing the song, but now subtly change or indeed completely overhaul the words to be offensive, irritating, and downright unseemly. Bonus points go for toilet humour and abstract symbolism.

Step Five: Take your pillow, your duvet, and maybe your entire winter wardrobe. Duct tape the whole lot to your body. It will be invaluable protection while you receive the (possibly chapal-aided) beating of your life.

Step Six: As a mother's day gift, promise not to do any of the above again. See the tears of happiness well up in your mother's eyes. For bonus bonus points, make her a cup of tea.

To my long suffering mother who sometimes reads this blog at work as of a couple of weeks ago: I love you so much, and am constantly surprised that you put up with me too :)

Canya tell whut it is, yet?

So iMuslim did this post where she took some pretty cool macro shots of stuff in her room, and because I'm all about the cool (and also all about the lazy-blog-updates, and stealing other people's ideas), I thought I'd copy her!

Most of these are pretty obvious, but hey, try to guess what all this junk is before I tell you why not. This should be made considerably harder by the fact that the photography kind of sucks - I can't remember if I remembered to switch on macro for all these, besides they were all taken on a camera phone, and also my hands were shaking and aliens landed and the lighting was poor. 5 excuses in one sentence, I think that's quite commendable.























Answers:
1. My rubbish dental toolkit. Rubbish because we had to buy it for like £50, even though it was only needed for 1 year, But cool because man, you never know when you'll need a wax knife.

2. A plaster cast of my teeth, as of 4 years ago.

3. Pennies. There's 21 in a wee wooden box, one from every year of my life. Some people are born great. Others achieve greatness. Still others collect pennies and photograph them.

4. My Filofax. I love this thing. The weird blue-ness in the background is some abstract Vista background.

5. My wallpaper, I haven't drawn on it, I promise.

6. Origami froggy! Needs no further explanation.

7. A cool wooden puzzle thing, from a set of 4. This one is the least fiddly, and the second most pretty.

8. Some books. They're not all just Oxford Dictionaries of Words and Phrases and Terry Pratchett. There may be a medical dictionary and a BNF in there somewhere too.

9. A glass egg ornament thing I bought from TK Maxx on a whim, then regretted as my arm near enough fell off as I carted it home. It'll be worth it when my glass chicken hatches though.

10. The wheel of my chair. Check that out.

11. My beloved stationery drawer. I feel blissful just looking at it. A clearer angle:

*drool*

Uhhh.. that's all for today, folks. Except for me telling you that I'm finishing this post a full week after starting it. Now that's dedication.

Let the revolution begin!

Observe:



Notice anything? How about:



Ok, I mean apart from the fact that the adverts are mind-bogglingly inane...

What's bothering me [this time] is the tiny little disclaimer - filmed with lash inserts and enhanced in post-production. I don't know if I got the wording exactly right, and I can't be bothered to check it now, so hooray. Aaanyway, it strikes me as rather bizarre that an advert aiming to sell gloop to make your eyelashes look bigger relies on methods other than said gloop to in fact make eyelashes look bigger.

Doesn't that just prove that said, said gloop does not in fact work as claimed, and that buying said, said said gloop in hopes of one's eyelashes reaching the stars of infinity and beyond (I may be mixing mascara methaphors here), is in fact stupid, since the only way to make one's eyelashes look like the ones in the advert is to wear fakey's and carry around some kind of holographic projection post production device that may or may not be invented in the near future? Doesn't it?!

Perhaps, on a day not too far from today, women (and men - hey, who's to judge) all around the world will collectively put down their eyelash-gloop-brushes and say: no. No to going around all day with hardened, gloopy eyelashes for no reason. Perhaps all these women will then have a few extra minutes per day each - adding up to millions of hours worldwide (no, I haven't actually done the maths, so er... shush) in which they can focus their minds on other, less banal things - such as proving that women can reverse park along with the best of them, and maybe taking over the world.

I think I should have stopped typing a few paragraphs ago, non?

Procrati-whoozits.

I posted a big-mama-jama doodle up here once, but now all the pictures from it have inexplicably disappeared into the ether, making linking back to or even mentioning that post really quite useless, which is why i've done it anyway :)

Another year of soul-destroyingly boring lectures brings you this(!)

The MegaDoodle!

Kind of the opposite of the disappear-ded MacroDoodle (oh my word, I'm so creative with these names...). It got kind of boring doing random swirlies all over the place, so in there somewhere are a:

• snake
• fish
• ladybird
• dodo
• peacock
• wizard
• giraffe
• gorilla
• sheep
• cat
• aeroplane
• alligator
• broomstick
• snowman
• diamond
• cow
• dolly
• pencil
• butterfly
• cake
• skull
• bits of lyrics
• and maybe some other supersecretbonus stuff, also known as mcpagal-can't-be-bothered-remembering-what-else-is-in-there stuff.
  

I was bored enough to fill that whole page. If you're like me, why not spot all the weird junk in it?

Oh Lordy. I guess this means I have nothing to distract me from studying now. Unless... *caresses computer*

Twittererer

Seriously, I'm a twit.
If you're a twit too, follow me why don't you? [It's one of these things I made an account for ages ago and forgot about til they emailed me then I remembered, only I didn't make it in my blog name (or my real name for that matter) so don't let that confuse you, it's still me typing and you getting to read it, you lucky things.]

Also, just so this isn't a useless post (why settle for useless when I can go for entirely useless?), and to continue the bus-y theme from before, you might like to know that my past bus journeys have featured:
- A fat man clutching a Glasgow Sweet House box to his chest and scoffing jalebis
- A drunk man drinking beer and smoking a tiny dog-end cigarette, the kind with something smellier than tobacco in
- A drunk man arguing with a woman who told him to stop smoking, but he said he wasn't pished enough yet
- A drunk man who had a small dog wearing a jacket, and it sat beside me. Drunk man kept proclaiming that doggy was his best friend, better than any human, and had an IQ of 120 and like to play Countdown and smoke joints with drunk man
- [All of the above were on the same bus journey!]
- Oh and one time a guy sat beside me and started drinking, but he was already so drunk that he fell asleep ON MY SHOULDER and spilled beer all over the floor.

The End.

BUSLIFE: Act 2^48, Scene 1

MCPAGAL sits at the top of the bus, tucked behind the staircase, feet resting on the barrier in front. The upper floor here is fairly empty, the only other passengers are a couple behind her talking in such low tones as to be inaudible, and a middle-aged lady up front laden with shopping. Our heroine contemplates deep things like the meaning of life, the futility of ambition, and the fact she has to cook dinner tonight.

Traffic slows to a crawl due to an accident on the dual carriageway; another bus is stranded on the pavement like a beached whale (or possibly, like a vehicle on the pavement).

Uneven, thudding footsteps alight the stairs.

DRUNKMAN enters the scene

DRUNKMAN: Shjpshhsh? Krjzhh.

DRUNKMAN stumbles forward, his frazzled proprioception and the swaying of the bus combining to give him the gait of a ballet dancer wearing cement shoes, trying to walk in a straight line after being spun round in an office chair til dizzy and nauseous, and also the ballet dancer has taken drugs. As he reaches the front of the bus, he misjudges where exactly the front of the bus is, and smacks his head neatly on the window.

A neat imprint of DRUNKMAN's head is left, ironically, beside the convenient 'MIND YOUR HEAD' sign on the glass.

DRUNKMAN: Auuuurghhh! Awwaaaah! Owwwww!

DRUNKMAN thumps heavily into a seat and clutches his head in his hands, bending over so his head is in his lap too. He tips forward a little, so his head is now unfortuitously placed beneath a horizontal pole. DRUNKMAN continues to emit quiet whimpers, while MCPAGAL awaits the inevitable.

DRUNKMAN is soon recovered - and sure enough, when he raises his head: THUMP.

DRUNKMAN: WAAAAAAARGH! AAAAAAARGH! AWWWWWWWWWGGGHH! OOOOOOOOHHHHHH! [...continues along the same lines for a number of minutes]

...eventually...

DRUNKMAN: If it's no one thing, it's another, eh?? EH??

Ssshhhh... Shuu... SHE sez tae me, right?! Schchchcheeeeehh sez, be up the road the noo, right? And I sez tae hurrrr, there's a bus onna pavement! Eh? And ah'm gonnae be late right?

And shhhe tells me whatta dae alla time right? Dae this, dae that, go here, do that! And I ha' tae gie her a-hunner-an-shikshtae-pounds a month! Jussshhhht cuz she had a wean by me, eh? AHUNNERANSHIKSHTY POUNDS! [continues in incoherent mumbles]. An' she goes tae hur brother's, right, and get's like, a big fancy dinner! Wi' all the... fancy bits! An' I gie hur allae ma money, sho all ah get is the f'in sh*tty dinners the same as the wean huz!

DRUNKMAN seems to have sobered up enough to have recovered some fine motor skills - enough to dial a mobile phone in any case.

DRUNKMAN: HAW!! WHIT DYOO MEAN AH'M LATE? AH TRIED TAE CALL YOO SUX TIMES AWREADY! WHIT? WHIT? AH DIDNAE CALL YOO SUX TIMES! YOO JUST CHECK MAH PHONE WHEN AH GIT THERE! AH'M AT THE WEE SCHOOL NOO!

At this juncture DRUNKMAN heaves himself out of his seat, and manages a controlled fall down the stairs and out of the open bus doors - the bus driver seemed to think it advisable to stop prior to opening the doors, however.

MCPAGAL and the remaining passengers can now meet each others' eye - when they do, they share a tiny moment of understanding, and a laugh.

FIN.