Are we becomming too Insular ?

[Steamport Southport]

1 minute ago, Michael Hodgson said:

If there's even more of it there tomorrow morning perhaps you'd better call the emergency services.

 

It was a joke.

 

I don't think anyone around here has got milk delivered by a milkman for decades. 

[Michael Hodgson]

3 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

It was a joke.

 

I don't think anyone around here has got milk delivered by a milkman for decades. 

 

Perhaps but it was the milkman who found my mother's next door neighbour dead having collapsed and fallen down the stairs.

As it happens my partner's father was a milkman, and I know quite a number who still get doorstep deliveries; these days milkmen who have managed to stay in business have diversified into additional products such as bread etc.

I stopped getting milk delivered in the mid 1970s because the milkman thought me uncreditworthy - I was always working late when he came round in the evening for his money!

[alastairq]

On 25/05/2022 at 11:49, kevinlms said:

I'm not at all convinced by the argument that 'most' prefer them.

I agree.

 

How many times does one find an item absent from the shelves...yet when one bothers to 'ask', one is told, 'there's no demand'...........No wonder, if it isn't stocked!

[alastairq]

22 hours ago, Fenman said:

And once a month or so I'll have dinner in my neighbours' house,

 I've stopped doing that now.

The neighbours got very annoyed when they came home early.....

[Hobby]

You just need to stop the cats doing it in your house now, A! ;)

[alastairq]

55 minutes ago, Hobby said:

You just need to stop the cats doing it in your house now, A! ;)

The cats don't 'do' doings in either my house, or my garden [contrary to popular belief]...their pooh-spot is actually in her own front garden..which is a bit of a 'wilderness', herself not being a gardening sort [worse than me!]...the front garden is given over to an irregular pond, loads of shrubby things, and general overgrownedness.

Currently it's a wet day here, now & again. So I have at least one, if not two of her cats hiding away snoozing, as they do when it's wet.

Most of my interaction with her is inclined towards talking with the cats...who respond to being talked-with.

One of the younger one's doesn't know when to shut up, either.

I tend to spend quite a bit of time sitting in my front garden...it being more 'sheltered from passing winds, and  sun trap. There's a good 10 yards or so to the front hedge & gate....so interaction is confined to a n occasional ''now then?'' to passing dog walkers.

The sheep in the field opposite get quite noisy...especially when the lambs start playing 'charge of the light brigade' up & down.  The lad who lives over the road, his bungalow is literally on a plot taken out of the feld, so they charge right around the back of his home.....and back again [repeated ad nauseum]

[John M Upton]

I had a new experience with a self service till this morning in my local explosion in a church jumble sale WH Smiths.  Before the card reader would allow me to tap any pay, I had to answer a survey on the thing about the cleanliness of the store!!!

 

The store had only been open for a couple of minutes as well (still managed to look the usual messy shambles though...)

[Nearholmer]

WHS electronic check-outs are on my hate list of time-wasters, because they use them to pester you about all sorts of stuff, special offers, surveys, pointless questions of all sorts. It takes about ten button presses to complete the simplest transaction.

 

One day at Euston when I was in a hurry to catch a train the thing started all that, and there happened to be a party of WHS Senior Bods in the store, so I politely (if a tad grumpily) gave them some “customer feedback” about it, which I’m sure they took absolutely no notice whatsoever of. 
 

I don’t mind having conversations with people; long dialogues with robots are not my thing.

[AndrueC]

7 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

WHS electronic check-outs are on my hate list of time-wasters, because they use them to pester you about all sorts of stuff, special offers, surveys, pointless questions of all sorts. It takes about ten button presses to complete the simplest transaction.

 

One day at Euston when I was in a hurry to catch a train the thing started all that, and there happened to be a party of WHS Senior Bods in the store, so I politely (if a tad grumpily) gave them some “customer feedback” about it, which I’m sure they took absolutely no notice whatsoever of. 
 

I don’t mind having conversations with people; long dialogues with robots are not my thing.

And there's never a 'Just F* Off' button when you want one :D

[Hobby]

21 hours ago, alastairq said:

The cats don't 'do' doings in either my house

I meant coming for dinner!! ;) :)

[woodenhead]

16 hours ago, John M Upton said:

I had a new experience with a self service till this morning in my local explosion in a church jumble sale WH Smiths.  Before the card reader would allow me to tap any pay, I had to answer a survey on the thing about the cleanliness of the store!!!

 

The store had only been open for a couple of minutes as well (still managed to look the usual messy shambles though...)

These are popping up in Aldis too, it's bad enough when I am just shopping at normal hours - though if I don't have glasses it's going to take some time for me to decipher what it is asking and what I need to click.  However, 4pm on a Sunday, big queue and a checkout assistant who really wants to go home - why Aldi, why?

[62613]

On 27/05/2022 at 13:49, petethemole said:

The economics of running pubs has had a major effect which hasn't been mentioned.  The effect of the Beer Orders of 1989, intended to increase 'choice' in the pub trade was to break up the tied estates of the Big Six and place them in the hands of 'Pubcos', which rapidly morphed into property companies that leased pubs.  Long-term tenancies were replaced by leases that you paid up front for, often with a requirement to cover repairs and maintenance, previously covered by the brewery, and with rents regularly increased.  In addition leaseholders were normally require to buy their alcohol, and frequently most of their other stock, from a supplier contracted by the pubco.  Hence many leaseholders struggle to break even.  The properties are regarded as an asset to be realised, so are often sold to developers or shop chains even when they aren't failing.  Three pubs near here were bought up by the University and demolished for expansion (of car parks, mainly), another became a Co-op and another a Macdonalds, leaving a huge residential area served by one pub at its periphery.  Two bars have opened up in former shops to serve the area.

 

Pubs still owned by breweries seem to be surviving better although some have gone.  Free houses that can arrange their own deals with breweries are generally doing well; micro-pubs and bars of all sizes converted from shops have replaced the locals but you often have to travel a bit, especially for a good ale.

Agreed!