June 2007
Monthly Archive
Avoid Zenith Windows
Posted by Suzi on 25 Jun 2007 | Tagged as: Blog post
I need a new window. I looked in the phone book. I saw an ad for Zenith Windows – I thought ‘I’ve heard of them, maybe they are good, I will get them round for a free no obligation quote.’
I rang Zenith windows they said they had to come round to quote. That seemed reasonable.
The guy who turned up was a sales rep and clearly not someone who knew much about windows or installing them. I politely listen to him for over an hour and then explained I had things to do and asked him to wrap it up. He pretended it wouldn’t take long. I was shown window samples which were made of odd things called ‘compounds’, the advantages of advertising Zenith in my window where painstakingly explained to me, a wonderful formula that kept the windows bright and shiny for ever was explained to me, many other things were explained to me and my protestations grew weaker and my mind felt numb, any will I had to live, slowly diminished.
Suggestions that he actually measure the window and give me a quote were brushed off with more explanations.
3 hours later he finally found a tape measure and eventually proceeded to quote a figure of £4690. In case of a sudden heart attack from his now brain dead victim he spent some time tapping into his big calculator and found he could he knock the price down to £3320. I said I had to think about it. He rang his boss and after a couple of phone calls they offered to replace the window for a new figure which he mysteriously wrote on his hand. He hyped it up for a few minutes and then said in a breathy voice ‘£1800’. I said I still had to think about it. After I paced up and down and opened the door in an enticing way, he finally left after scrawling on the form NEVER TO BE OFFERED AGAIN.
In future I will check blagger.com to find out about rubbish companies.
Political voices
Posted by Suzi on 25 Jun 2007 | Tagged as: Film, Music, Politics
I went to Norwich Arts Centre to see Rory McVicar, Jeffrey Lewis and Kimya Dawson last night. Some of the songs were great. I took to Rory McVicar and the groovy old films they had playing on the screen behind them.
John Pilger was great! Of course a lot was squished into 2 hours so it has its limitations but otherwise it was a well made film. Heartrending but necessary. It was good to see the man himself. What a guy! A life time of investigative journalism! He must be very strong to see the horror for himself. Someone asked him how he managed to do it and he said he felt privileged to be let into people lives and do the work he did but it must be very hard to see so much suffering and hear so many tales of woe.
Right I’m off to meet Rich for coffee and a natter. I’m trying to ignore the fact that we now have another new PM and this one is even more interested in ID cards. Keep an eye on him on this clever little website.
Very excited
Posted by Suzi on 20 Jun 2007 | Tagged as: Blog post, Film
I am very excited today because I am going to see John Pilger tonight at the Curzon Cinema in Soho. Pilger is such an inspirational film maker. I can remember watching his documentaries in the lecture theatres at uni and coming out just wanting the world to be a better place and determined to change it! I haven’t but he is still a brilliant film maker. His latest is called the War on Democracy. I’ll let you how brill it is tomorrow!
The CELTA course is going well – teaching people who want to learn is amazing! I highly recommend it!
In my spare time I have been reading Now or Never – it’s not bad!! Check them out on Wikipedia or (I don’t want to advertise!!) myspace!
The Yes Men
Posted by Suzi on 19 Jun 2007 | Tagged as: Blog post
Yes the Yes men strike again!
The Greenpeace site gives some more info.
Mark Wallinger
Posted by Suzi on 05 Jun 2007 | Tagged as: Art, Blog post, Film
Went to see Mark Wallinger’s State Britain at Tate Britain the other day, it was amazing – an exact replica of Brian Haw’s protest. There were some very disturbing images of deformed and dead babies and other such horror. Well if you’ve been to see Brain Haw’s protest then I don’t really need to describe it to you. It was interesting to have such imagery in a respected art gallery rather than on the street where it is usually seen. Afterwards we stayed at the gallery to listen to views on free expression, it turns out that the first Friday of every month there are free talks and film showings. Last Friday was all about protest so it was particularly interesting, we didn’t stay to watch The Weather Underground but it was interesting that it was being shown. The next ‘Late at Tate’ is on the 6th July. The talk was quite interesting but the best bit was when a member of the audience suggested that we stormed the Tate and took the exhibition back to Parliament Square - needless to say no-one took up the idea! Probably just as well as we didn’t have our camera.
I’ve been trying to write a CELTA essay, plan a lesson and catch up on my OU reading this weekend but I still haven’t got anything finished! Best get back to working. I’m off to Kew Gardens with Rumi tomorrow. I haven’t been since I was little and it was free so it will be fun if expensive to go.