I was watching Sky News yesterday and to fill their airtime they had reporters scattered all around the UK covering the Winter Sales. I thought News Channels were there is keep you a breast of news worthy items, like what was going on in the mess that is Iraq. No the winter sales are of far more importance. The BBC had an expert explaining that Jesus did'nt teach that we were to go shopping at this time of the year but the retailers have made the connection with Christmas and shopping. What kind of a ejiit would go on TV to make such a ridiculious statement.

Whats more the news channels were gleefully telling us that people were queueing at 1in the morning to get into NEXT at 5 am for their winter sale. This poses 2 questions for me,

1 What kind of muppet gets up at 1 am to go and queue for 4 hrs just to get to a shop sale?

2 What kind of muppet decides to hold its sale at 5am in the first place?

Call me old fashioned but I always find that sleeping during the night far more beneficial than shopping, or could it be that I am missing the point?

Yesterday I needed to buy batteries for a toy that Santa made a mistake when he visited on Christmas Eve, silly Santa.

As it was St. Stephens Day I knew that there would be very few shops open but felt confident that the local petrol station would be open, so I drove to the village. On my way I noticed a ViVo convienence store open and as parking would easier I decided to go in. I located the batteries with the price of €5 per battery attached to it and said "that pricey" but I needed the batteries. I asked the girl for 2 batteries and as she scanned them through the Epos a price of €5.49 came up. I protested and said the price is €5 to which she voided the first transaction and charged me €10 for the two batteries. I was annoyed but went home, when I got home I noticed that the €5 sticker was covering the original price sticker of €4.35 (they did'nt even have the brains to remove the old one) 

So not only did the shop increase the price by 65c it attempted to extort another 49c on top. That's a total of €1.14 or 26.2% of extortion on top of the large margin that batteries would attract anyway. It never fails to amaze me that these so called business men and women appear to be more intent on short term gain as opposed to ensuring that customers will come back time and time again to help secure the future of their business. That ViVo has lost me forever as I will never use it again. Additionally we as customers need to pay more attention to what is going on when we buy goods as I have a feeling that this practise is not confined to Christmas.

Another thing why do batteries have best before dates now? the ones I bought had a 2013 date, but they'll be long dead before that.

Christmas is a time for magic and wonder. It is also a time for staying in an watching a lot of telly, something that I do very well.Christmas night we were all sitting down watching the telly when Eastenders came on, now I have never seen more than a few minutes of this but other members of my family like so I did'nt flick.

After about 10 minutes I could'nt watch anymore so I went to make a cup of tea and allow the others enjoy the programme. I re-entered the lounge as the programme was ending and the storyline was about Christmas and misery, apparently this is a stable diet for this programme with the emphasis on misery. Anyway, the final few scenes were of a woman,looking miserable walking out of her house. When she left her house it began to snow, thats right it began to snow. Now this programme is meant to be shot in London and while the rest of London was mild and cloudy its snowing on Eastenders. Not only that all the patrons of the pub come out and start throwing snowballs at each other!. This programme is produced by the BBC, a channel that gave us a detailed summary of the Stern Report on Global Warming and yet within its ranks there are muppets writing a storyline with snow falling while 2006 is expected to be the warmest on record.

Its incredible, the Aritic icecap is shrinking and could be gone by 2040, Alpine ski reports are reporting very little snow, but its snowing on Eastenders.Yesterdays episode did,nt have as much as a frost in it.

So the only solution is to film Eastenders in Aritic and in the Alps so that the icecap won't dissappear, and people can go skiing.

When these people realise that reality is all around us?

Before I begin I would like to wish all of you a Happy Christmas, now on with the reallyannoyings##t.

Christmas Day(Early).

Santa has hopefully arrived, and you together with your children tiptoe down the stairs at 7am, I will repeat that , 7am, to ensure that he has arrived and left, but more importantly has left the toys that they asked for and not the "bag of coal" that Mammy and Daddy kept saying that they would get if they did'nt stop mis-behaving over the last long dark 8 weeks.

We turn the handle on the door, my little girl is so worried/excited that she grabs my hand and squeez'es harder than I can ever remember, my little boy, a warrior 364 days a year is reduced to a hapless little boy with a qivering lip,but with eyes that tell's you that if it is a "bag of coal" war will ensue.We proceed into the lounge where the fact that there are 2 half eaten mince pies, a missing carrot,and a half glass, of by now sour milk, are next to the fireplace means that Santa did visit. A sense of calm decends over the room. "Daddy switch on the big light" is the cry, I oblige and there it is, an Aladdin's Cave of all they asked, and a little bit more.My little boy has to go the bathroom to release a "pressure pee", while my little girl inventorises everything just to be sure.

Its time to open the boxes and reveal the Toys.There is a lot of ripping and pulling and then it starts "Daddy can you open this?", "Daddy, you will have to help me with this", "Daddy the batteries for this are different to the batteries on the box".By now I need to get a cup of coffee, so I tell my children to put the toys that they need help with to one side,and open the ones that are easy, and as soon as I have made myself a cup of coffee I will return and will help everyone. I went and made myself a cup of coffee and returned to find everything still in the box and my two children sitting on the couch, watching cartoons eating a "curly wirrley",as the only thing that they could open and use was the "Selection Box".

So I begin, I open a toy, and being older and wiser, I explain to my children that we must read the instructions carefully to ensure that we assemble everything correctly. I fish out the instructions and begin to read,

Here is a rough guide to what I encountered,

1 "Remove the parts and Instruction Sheet from the box". So I must open the box to read the instruction's to tell me to open the box.

2 "Ensure that all of the following items are contained, 15 of X, 10 of Y, etc,etc.Fine but why to the diagrams not agree with the actual's.

3 "Should any of the items mentioned in point 2 above please call 0044(whatever) and a customer service agent will help you to assemble this product". On Christmas day, I should have but did'nt bother.

You know where this is going, one toy did'nt even have English instructions so I muddled through in French, I was going to call my brother in law in France but I thought he probably has English instruction's for something else and we'll be one the phone forever.

This is a plan to drive us all mad, and resign us in a heap of frustration whilst they sit back and count the money.

To further illustrate my point my wife is at present downstairs with a 24 page instruction manual for a toy sewing machine, thats a full 13 hrs later a real sewing machine would'nt take this long to get going.

Another thing the instructions says " You should keep this instruction sheet as it is an important document" so when the banks reopen I will go into the branch and ask them to put this pile of instructions with my deeds and investments in its vault.

Micheal Stone, a former member of an Unionist Brigade during the 30 or so odd years of turmoil in Northern Ireland went on trial today for his attack on Parliament Buildings on the 24th of November.

During the proceeding's Stone's defence lawyer Arthur Harvey, QC, said he had received instructions from Stone that the incident, which caused chaos at Stormont and led to the evacuation of Parliament Buildings, was not intended to endanger the life of anyone.

"It was, in fact, a piece of performance art replicating a terrorist attack," said Mr Harvey

"Performance art replicating a terrorist attack,". Well that's ok then, the next time that you or I see a person walking along a street with a gun or a bomb in hand we will assume that they are taking it to the local gallery as part of a visual/performance art exhibition.

Is it me are QC's strange people, I mean they actually stand up in a court of law and defend somebody who is clearly meant to harm people with such drival.

Perhaps Arthur Harvey, QC, should remove his head from his arse and enjoy some real performance art, in the form of dancing, opera, or the ballet, and stay away from gun touting weirdo's.

With the advent of 24hr News Channels, the "Breaking News" headline has become part and parcel of your viewing. You know the one, a banner appears at the bottom of the screen summarising new information that has come to hand. Well "Sky News" wins the lamest "Breaking News" headline of the year for what it just threw up on the screen, it read "Police erect tent at No.79 London Road, Ipswich".

I watch the news to be informed not to be told every detail just because they need to ensure that they look like they are the only News Channel available. Where is the editorial standard?. As usual sensationalism and not journalism seems to be winning the day.

What will the next "Breaking News" headline something like "Team loses games as opponents score more goals".

Good God,what the feck has gotten into people.

As we all prepare for the festive season there needs to be a physological study into the behaviour of people. I have to say that it appears to be getting worse year on year. People appear to be losing all the basic manners that you would expect from a child. Driving has become a game of "russian roulette" as you simply do not know where the next car is going to come out of. I went to the nearest Tesco yesterday to pick up a few things and to buy things that you never buy 51 weeks of the year but feel compelled to buy for Christmas, you know the things that get thrown out on the bin in August as they have developed a blue mold around the ring of the jar due to the fact that it was opened once and never say daylight again.

I along with approximately 15 cars were waiting for cars to pull out and with patience and manners, we all realise that those at the top of the queue were first in line to get a place should one become available,time to sit back and listen to "The Jam". This was proceeding when out of nowhere a car drove up the wrong side of the road and pulled into a space that another car was clearly indicating into . You would expect that should a brave move would be the domain of a "hard man" no it was a woman of in her 50's. When the man got out of his car to complain she blew up,it is rare to see people use language and hand jesters at the top of their voices but this woman simply did not hold back, the expression on the man's face was of disbelief, and I don't blame him try explaining that to your children sitting in the back of the car being good just in case Santa does'nt arrive. She refused to get out of the space and told the man to "F  off" at the top of her lungs.

When I eventually got into Tesco's it was the same tense, forbidding atmosphere. People were not making eye contact with anyone and everyone looked mean and nasty, you'd swear that it was the Devil's Birthday we were celebrating rather than Jesus. People nudged and pushed passed you with menace, reaching out over your shoulder to whip something from shelf without a simple "excuse me" just in case you got something that they did'nt, even if they did'nt know what "fois gras" was or is.I pushed my trolley along with due care and attention when it happened, yes two people having a chat in the middle of an isle leaning up against overflowing trollies taking up the space to allow others to pass safely. I approached and they seemed reasonable they were joyous and looked in the spirit of the season,I said "excuse me" no reply, again slightly louder "excuse me" it was at this point one turned and glared at me, knowing that they were causing a blockage they both threw their eyes to the heavens and began tutting loudly whilst parking their trolleys, I was going to say something but thought better of it as you'd never know. I eventually got out of Tesco's and went home to sit down a have a cup of tea.

I began to think about my experience's and wondered what is going on, Christmas is a special time of the year and its meant to be a happy time yet everyone is totally stressed out. Me Fein (Me Me Me) has taken over there seems to be no respect or consideration for anyone except me.Clampers creep around the underbelly of Car Parks catching unsuspecting "customers".

 Would,nt it be nice if people smiled and behaved with just a little respect you'd never know it might be fun.

Alcohol has developed a bad name over the last couple of years, due in part to programmes like "Booze Britian" where you can watch the antics of people who are out of their heads causing trouble.

However alcohol does have life saving properties as proven by the man who went out got totally hammered and decided to go to sleep on the railway track. The man Kevin Craswell was found in a foetal position sound asleep on a train track near Epsom last March. He used one rail as a pillow and his feet were only inches away from a live rail which was carrying 750volts. It was alcohol who saved him as he ensured that he drank enough and the alcohol ensured that he was unable to move. Had he taken other drugs you can bet that he would no longer be with us.

It was claimed in court that he drank "a lethal amount of alcohol" but obviously this claim is untrue as he is still alive.The alcohol even made the man to think that the rail was a nice pillow.

Homer must be running around punching the air shouting "in your face Marge, beer is a life saver".

We are " a small open economy on the peripheral of Europe" thats how some economists describe Ireland and they are not wrong. Competition has an important place in this economy and being a "small open" economy, competition is seen as being an important factor in maintaining our competitive advantage on the Global Economic stage.

Why then have the Government decided to allow the elimination of competition in the Health Insurance Market?.Yesterday BUPA announced that it will be pulling out of the Irish Market due to a ruling in the courts that it will need to transfer nearly all its profits to its main competitor VHI (which is a Government owned company), a wonderful way to attract new companiesand increase competition into the Irish Market. The details of this decision will bore you so I will not go into the detail here, but there are some questions that as consumers and citizens of this country need to be pondered.

By eliminating one company from the market place the Government is essentially handing over today control to one company, thus creating a monopoly. The only winner in any monopolistic market is the company who owns the monoply they can charge what they like and we as consumers have no choice in the matter. You are essentially told that if you do not pay what we say,go without.This is one of the arguments that the Government put foward to reject the offer that  Ryanair made for control of Aer Lingus, can I hear the whispers of double standard?.

Pages and pages of newsprint have been allocated to the theme of "rip of republic" and we as consumers have been told by the Government to "shop around" for value when we are spending our money, to assist you the Government eliminates competition in one area of the market that most people would view as being an essential as opposed to a luxury.

An additional point to consider is the cost to business. Many large employers in Ireland pay private medical insurance for its employees and their families as part of pay. This ensures that the company attracts and retains key people. If business now essentially only has one company to choose from how will this effect that companies cost base? for example a large company of say 3000 full time employees may cost a company somewhere around €3,600,000 to provide medical insurance for the year a 5% increase would increase this bill by €180,000 pa, with the average industrial wage at approx €30k per year this equates to 6 jobs. I have a feeling that business will not accept this and if they were either expanding or indeed setting up I feel that countries with a lower cost base will be chosen before Ireland, so well done again Government.

What about the human cost of this decision? There are almost 300 people working for BUPA in its call center in Fermoy Co Cork,not to mention the other employees scattered around the Country, the Christmas present from the Govenment to these people is an uncertain future and a loss of spend to the local economy.It is estimated that BUPA contributes over €15million to the local economy,and with the Government taking VAT on goods and services and payroll taxes how much will the true cost of this decision be to all of us?

What will the European Commission make of this decision? Charlie Mc Creevy will not be happy with this, and knowing our luck we will probably be fined for breach of competition rules again adding more expense to you and me as taxpayers.

Now that the Government has removed competition (they may argue that it was the courts and not them, they should be reminded that they own the VHI) in the health insurance market, what next, will they start telling successful businesses up and down the country to hand over profits to the business next door who is making a loss. Stalin would be proud of us.

Ah yes, the Irish version of competition unique and in-describable.

Well its the 12th of December and NTL have repaired my service.Please no clapping as I know that there are many of you out there still waiting to have your telephone call  answered and I'd say that there is quite a considerable amount of you out there waiting as I did for someone to Call.

It has to be the worst customer service experiences of my life, and while listening to "Newstalk106" this morning it would appear that there are thousands of NTL'ers out there suffering in the same way. To be fair to Brenda Power on Newstalk she did ask NTL to provide someone to field questions from NTL's customers but true to form NTL declined.No surprise there then, it is not only do they allow its customers to be waiting for hours on end on the telephone, they do not have the basic manners to allow people to express their opinions on the service that they get good money for in a monthly basis.

The only way that NTL will listen is for people not to pay for the shoddy service that they are peddling, I appreciate that its difficult for people to do this as TV has become a mainstay of our lives.People could for example stop paying by direct debit and pay for what they receive and not what they think they will receive (your NTL bill is prepaid) to do this either contact your bank or go online, if available, and simply cancel the direct debit,you can then pay for what you received and if you have a problem deduct the amount(pro rata) and email NTL detailing the deductions that you have made, ensuring that you keep a softcopy and a hardcopy on a file to show anyone in the future.A record of your telephone calls should also be kept for reference. I can almost say without a doubt that any email that will be sent to NTL will never see the light of day, and the onus is on them not you, to show that you informed them of your actions. Alternatively you could go to the trouble of paying them a visit as one gentleman did to get results but I think that time may be a constraint.

Finally to all you out there who cannot get through the freephone number here are two more to use 01 245 8600 now I have to say I did not get through on this and when it rang the person on the otherside simply hungup or rejected the call.What I also did was to ring the above number and simply by adding 1 instead of the 0, I got through to a voice mail, at least you might get answered.

 The other number I have is 061 272190 this is a private number of NTL and is nearly always answered but before 5pm.

Well, I would love to be here telling you all that NTL have gone the extra mile to fix my problem of not having any TV service but that would be wishful thinking on my behalf. I would like to be here telling you that they have done their best to help me but again wishful thinking.

I am now so fed up of this that I have stopped calling the "numnuts" who are employed by NTL as they are all singing from the same crib sheet.

I did finally get through to someone and to be fair he empathised with my situation, I just know that by talking to him the the word empathised is not from his normal vocabulary but is written down on a big piece of paper next to his screen. He informed me that he had sent my technical request through and they will be here on the 12th of December. In the meantime its two channel land with a set of "rabbits ears" picking up grainy dark reception. I did invest €17 on a new set from "Matalan" which was Channel 5 ready, so thats why Channel 5 have no viewers.

It never ceases to amaze me that business seems hell bent on destroying itself than actually listening to its customers and working out the amount of money that they will gleen from its customers. I pay approx €65 per month or €780p.a. should I be a customer for 10years that would be €7,800, these cowboys dont give a shite as the management probably would'nt know shit from cake. Should they lose 1,000 customers over this 10 year period that translates to €7,800,000, €7.8m based on 1,000, what they are going to lose?, as I have a feeling that 1,000 is a little light, is anyones guess.

To further compound my angst the IVR, thats the smarmy voice that comes over your phone when you are in a queue, must be the worst I have ever heard. At one stage it told me that "due to the fact that NTL's products are proving so popular that they recieved more calls than expected" listen NTL those calls are from customers who are pissed off not new ones. Additionally on playing "Vivaldi", for heavens sake leave the thing play not give us 30 sec bursts and then start again.

I have decided not to get mad anymore with them as I am only making myself ill, but it does raise the question who wins?.

Rain has many effects on people but why does it have to change people from being able to drive with a little bit of  respect and care to downright bullies and clueless morons?. When its raining all reasonability goes down the drain with the water, lights are put on by some but not by others, indicators become surplus to requirements. Parking becomes a game of getting the car as close to the shop as possible even if this means double parking and holding up everyone else. Seeing a pedestrian struggling on a pavement simply means that they are fair game for the idiots to plough through the flood and drenching the hapless walker.

Just slow down and show a little respect for others and anyway whats the hurry you are only going to get to the traffic jam quicker. Oh just because you own a "Chelsea Tractor" does not make you the godess of the road.

Ah! feel better now.

I am a customer of Ntl television that is carried over a digital arial. Saturday and yesterday saw the arrival of an Atlantic Storm that was as fierce as anything that I have witnessed in my life. At 11 am yesterday I decided to reboot my desktop box as the weather was bad and the picture broken. After a few minutes a notice appeared on the TV explaining that the box was retrieving my information and this should take a few minutes and TV services will be restored. 24 hours later the same message is appearing on both TVs. So what do you do? you call customer care and see if they can help. I called yesterday 18 times and got no response. I have been calling since 9am this morning and I must say that as much as I love Vivaldi I am growing to associate "The Four Seasons" with unprofessional call centres and companies that will take your money but find that assisting its customers a step to far.

Every 30 seconds or thereabouts a voice comes over saying "we appreciate that you are holding for a customer care agent. Please bear with us a little longer , we apologise for this delay", a little longer 24 hours and I still have'nt spoken to a homo sapien.They say that they apologise for the delay but deep down they could'nt give a s##t about you or anyone else. We are left frustrated and angry , I am so angry now I would bite a dog but you must surpress your anger as if you start shouting down the telephone they will simply hang up saying that you were harressing them. Never mind that your blood pressure is dangerously high and you cant get through thats life in the new world.

There must be something seriously wrong with us as consumers if we accept this but the more I think about it there is little we can do except wait in line for somebody to answer you.

Well I'll sign off now and if this has a happy ending I'll update, a happy ending getting what you pay for.

Its that time of year again that many of us will go to the loft or garage and pull out the Christmas Decorations to adorn our houses for the festive season. The sense of expectation is high in the house, children and indeed adults are smiling in the knowledege that despite their behaviour over the last 12 months Santa Claus is going to come again this year.Dressing the house is one of those traditional jobs that involves everyone and it is enjoyed for the most part.

With such a wonderful scene set, why is it that the fairy lights never work when taken out of storage?. I spent 3.5 hours yesterday pulling and tweaking every bulb in the 350 set of fairy lights to find the bulb(s) that for some unknown reason decided not to work this year eventhough when they were taken down last year they all worked. What mysterious bug invades the unplugged fairy lights while they spend the year in storage?. If they can manufacture bulbs that will self distruct while dormant, why can't they manufacture bulbs that will work for more than one year?

The answer I suspect is to do with us as we expect to spend hours looking for, finding and replacing bulbs, its tradition. It maybe tradition but its also a pain in the arse and very frustrating.

Now that I am on a roll, why do some shops and some television channels insist on spelling Christmas, Xmas. It has to be the only religious holiday that gets abbreviated, would it be too much to add 5 letters when refering to it?

I must go now there are three ghosts waiting for me downstairs and we are going to have a pint before lunch.