View Across The Tyne

I'm in Newcastle again at the moment, spending a few days working in the office.

I didn't bring my camera with me so I thought I'd have a go at seeing how well my phone takes photos. I'm actually fairly impressed with the quality - click the link below to see the larger version and then click the link on Flickr for "All Sizes" and you'll see what I mean. For a telephone it's not bad. It's totally the wrong shape for a camera of course and so it's hard to take a photo without moving and causing camera shake and the tiny little window of plastic that they call a lens can't hope to compete with my usual Canon digital Eos, but... for a telephone this ain't bad!

Viewpoint from Jurys Inn, Newcastle on Tyne.

Larger Version of the Photo: Newcastle view

AA Telephone Box 487

It's Fran's birthday today!

To celebrate I took a day off work in lieu of working on Saturday and took her on a day out.

We went to look at this magnificent antique AA telephone box. Now before anyone takes a dim view and starts thinking of berating me, I should point out that not only is it rare these days but it is an icon of Britain's motoring past. Any birthday girl should be proud to have been taken to view it. When I was a lad there were many of these telephone boxes. They could only be opened by AA members (that's the Automobile Association, by the way, not Alcoholics Anonymous) who were issued with a special key that fitted all the telephone boxes. It meant that in the days before mobile telephones any driver who suffered a breakdown in a remote area would have to walk no more than, say, fifty miles or so before being able to call for rescue!

This box seems to have been fitted with a non-standard lock. Had I still carried my AA key about with me I could have tried it out, but:

1) I threw it away years ago
2) The lock definitely looks to take a large Chubb type key
3) After all the rains we've had the ground around it was boggy and waterlogged to a depth of several inches
4) I wasn't technically broken down

Anyway, Fran really enjoyed her trip out to see the telephone box, although I was a bit disgruntled when she stayed in the car and only got out when we stopped in places like Keswick and Kendal in the Lake District. Even then, she insisted on looking at boring things like shops, instead of searching for old telephone boxes. Women... just not easily understood...

Return to Lake District and Cumbria Index

Back In Touch!

After the second time BT said they'd fixed our problem but without anything happening at this end I bit the bullet and phoned them on the mobile.

The phone worked if I unscrewed the BT socket and connected to the test socket but not from the main socket. This still managed to be mainly because of something BT had no responsibility for although as previously said it is working temporarily. For some reason our predecessors at this address had the telephone socket upstairs and there's a cable down the outside of the house that will cost us 50 quid to have fixed - or 300 quid if BT do it...

I'm going to take a while to think that one over...

Ok, I'm ready for the question, Noel!

Out of Contact

If anyone's trying to get hold of me then please be aware our phone isn't working. You'll have to try my mobile number.

This also means I can't log into my main email account so please use the Hotmail one - this is linked from my main webpage (see left).

BT allow you to order a test of your phone on their website. Luckily I can access the Internet from my laptop using a 3G card. Anyway once you have said you need a test there is no way to comment on their results and the original form only gives you 500 characters which is hardly anything at all. Anything less would limit you to "my phone is duff" and there's no chance to put any details on.

It also appears that having ordered a test they do one and then close it no matter what.

Eg - "We have to test this number"
"Ok"
"Is it broke?"
"Yes"
"Ok that's the test done then..."

That appears to be what happened to us anyway. Our phone is still dead but our job has been closed. I've reported it again but in 500 characters couldn't exactly make my feelings known... Customer service??? Don't make me laugh!