The Joy of Home Schooling

As I have travelled through the rich tapestry that we call life, I have discovered that there are some jobs that I simply could not bring myself to do.

After leaving University, I spent 8 years working in a walled town for Miserable Finance Limited. Although my colleagues all had the most outstanding drinking skills and senses of humour, the daily grind was about as electrifying as counting grains of rice whilst wearing a blindfold and ski gloves. I think the only thing that actually stopped me from committing suicide during those long 8 years was the social gatherings that took place whenever someone clever passed an exam, or someone saw the light and had a leaving do. These social gatherings took place in the pub across the road from our offices at a very prompt 5.30pm. On some occasions you only knew that you had definitely attended, when you woke up the following morning in a strange house, still wearing your suit and your wallet was empty.

Good times.

I have to admit that I did enjoy composing the company’s unofficial quarterly newsletter and found that I had a genuine flair for producing nicknames for the senior management. I’m not sure the partners in the firm ever saw my well-written handiwork and so they may be unaware that the partner who suffered from the most calamitous outbursts was nicknamed Captain Caveman and the one with slightly frizzy hair was known as Pube-Head. I thought these nicknames were only known to a select few in the firm until the day I walked into the Typing Pool to find the typists trying to decide if the name “Wanky Pants” should be hyphenated.

Anyway; I digress.

During those days, I despised the smug VAT Inspectors and once I even had the misfortune of accidently helping one to get a coffee from the machine in our office. I was completely taken in by his nice smile and slightly crumpled suit and it was only later in the day when I saw him in the Board Room with a set of client’s records scattered across the enormous table that I realised I had served a coffee to the VAT man.

I was livid with myself.

Towards the end of my career with the financial miseries, I was based in the IT department which came as a bit of shock after spending the previous 5 years in Accounts and Audit. The IT lads talked in a language that I didn’t understand and got very stressed when any of the servers chose to fall over for no apparent reason.

The IT lads also loved the internet surfing control software that the company used. My neighbour, The Aigle Welly Wearer once asked me to research a sausage making machine so she could buy one as a surprise for her husband. During my lunch break (obviously) I typed “sausage making” into Google and 3 seconds later the head Techie poked his head around my office door and with a wry grin asked if I was “looking for something for the weekend”.

The IT department revolved around cans of energy drinks and food. The Techies brought bacon and egg McMuffins in for their breakfast, ordered pizza for their lunch and if we had to have an early meeting in the department, the IT Manager would appear with a huge bag of hot sausages from the Co-Op’s hot counter for us all to share. This is perhaps why I was a stone overweight when I finally left for a new job in the summer of 2005.

Along with a diet that would rival that of a Shot Putter, the whole of the IT department seemed to have a small issue with timekeeping and so to remedy this problem, we took to parking our cars on the street, right at the office door. This saved a good 5 minutes in the morning although we then had to run the gauntlet with the bastarding Traffic Warden. I had honestly never seen the laid back IT lads move quickly until the day when one of the partners (The Plate Spinner) came into the IT suite and said he had just seen the Traffic Warden at the bottom of the street.

So there you have it, the 2 jobs I could not do under any circumstances are VAT Inspector and bastarding Traffic Warden.

Until just over a week ago.

I collected Britney (not her real name) from school a week past Friday and was suddenly faced with the reality of home schooling.

Not a problem, I thought. I have friends who have home schooled their children and although these friends are much cleverer than me, surely I am more than capable of home schooling Britney.

Well it turns out that no, I am not capable of home schooling my own child.

The first day went quite well, possibly because Britney was excited about the whole working from home thing, until she realised that she was actually expected to do some work.

We went to our desk clutching our travel mugs (rhubarb and custard fruit tea for me, raspberry and elderflower juice for her) and set to work. During our grammar lesson I had to sneakily Google what a frontal adverbial was and even after I had read about where and how it should appear in a sentence; I still didn’t understand it. Basically the grammar that Britney is doing in year 6 is what I was doing at A Level, so after Grammar, Spelling and Punctuation we moved on to Maths. I faired slightly better at this until Britney suggested that I have a go on Times Table Rock Stars, where you have to complete as many multiplication calculations as you can in 60 secs.

This is possibly the most traumatic thing I have ever had to do in my life.

A last-minute submission of a VAT return at 40 seconds to midnight is positively relaxing compared to this. Britney was most disappointed that her response time had dropped from 2.9 seconds to 2.16 seconds. I was disappointed that I couldn’t remember what 7 x 8 was.

From this high-octane Mathematics, we moved swiftly on to art which involved decorating one of our new bee houses. PE consisted of a game of football in the garden and a walk around the field that borders our garden and Personal and Social Education involved a cuddle and reassurance that we would absolutely go to Newcastle and have pizza for lunch once this was all over.

Day 2 didn’t start quite as well, possibly because Boris had ordered us all into Lockdown the previous evening which meant that Other Half was also at home making it feel a bit weekendish.

Once we discovered that Google Classroom was currently lying in a darkened room, Britney played more of the hellish Times Table Rock Stars while I silently practiced my 8 times table. She then read some of her new Goosebumps book about Horrorland and wrote a synopsis of the story so far. We learnt about light refraction in science and ratios in Maths. We even ratioed (in its simplest form) the number of empty crisp packets to Kit Kat wrappers in the log basket. Result.

I read an article on the Daily Mail online (so it must be true) about the pressure of home schooling on parents. One Dad and this was on day 2 of home schooling; commented that his children were so much better behaved being home schooled that he was not going to send them back to school when it re-opened.

Oh my god, laugh? I thought my pants were never going to dry. I want to speak with this man in a month’s time. In fact if I wait 3 months, I could perhaps snatch a quick word with him as they wheel him out of his house in his straight jacket to the waiting square-wheeled ambulance.

So just to clarify, I don’t hate Teachers like I loathe and despise VAT inspectors and Traffic Wardens.

I don’t hate them at all. I even have friends and family who are teachers and frankly, I am surprised that they don’t receive a carrier bag of Tramadol and Diazepam every month from the Government free of charge. Is it a job I would ever want to do?

Not in a million years.

For JP.

I Hate BT

If you are a regular follower of my sporadic and woeful ramblings here on Jodhpurs on the School Run, you may remember that a few years ago I wrote a piece about rural broadband and the misery imposed when your internet is shambling along slower than a very stoned, 3 legged sloth.

I laughed merrily when my friends asked me if I had Netflix, I left laptops attempting a Windows update to work alone through the night and my whole family knew that if something was being watched on the Amazon Firestick no-one else was allowed access the internet. It was a bit like having an old dial up connection but without the screechy sound effects.

However, at the beginning of December my Very Tall Landlord informed me that Superfast Broadband was available at my home. Unable to believe this, I ran an internet speed check and discovered that my broadband was hitting speeds of as much as 5 megabits per second which was a vast improvement on the 1.7Mbps we were used to.

Sky has provided our internet and telephone for a few years and they always do me a terrific deal as they are essentially unable to provide the speed that I pay for. They have real people that you can in fact speak to and once when I rang to negotiate my new contract I spoke to Darren in “Sunny Dumfries”. He assured me at the start of the call that he was going to do me such a great deal, that I would “immediately want to open a bottle of wine and say, my God, I never believed I was going to get such a great deal from Sky”. He honestly did say that and also knocked £15 off my monthly payment for my broadband.

So upon hearing that it was possible that I could run more than 2 internet-dependant devices all at the same time without buffering; I rang Sky.

When I asked the nice lady for a price for Unlimited Superfast Fibre Broadband, she sounded as though I had just asked to borrow her Rolex for a magic trick involving a hammer. This was because it turned out, I was already paying for Superfast Fibre but Sky were unable to provide it.

As the lady prepared to put me through to technical support, I rudely hung up and began searching for another provider who could deliver enough internet for me to browse the clearance items on equestrian websites while Britney (Not her real name) watches nail art tutorials on MyTube.

I got the most unpleasant shock.

The only company with the infrastructure and therefore ability to deliver Superfast Fibre Broadband to my home was BT.

And I hate BT.

I hate BT more than I hate the sound of nails scratching down a chalkboard and the feeling of bare feet on a cold kitchen floor. I hate them more than a wet weekend that follows a week of sunshine and battling with Britney over her maths homework. I hate them more than my horse losing a shoe on a bank holiday weekend, more than my sock slowly sliding off my foot inside my welly, more than World Book Day, Trick or Treating and more than I hate people who steal from the elderly. I hate them more than people who hog the middle lane, more than people who throw their Macdonald’s rubbish out of their car windows and more than people who think it’s amusing to feed their chips to Seagulls.

I even hate them more than I hate bloody Chris Packham and that is saying something.

Nevertheless, determined to have the lightning fast access to Ebay and the Daily Mail that I was entitled to, I swallowed my pride and rang them.

My order was placed quickly and when I put the phone down, I was astonished how easy it had been. The engineer was booked to come to my house on 31^st December to connect us to the fantastic fast internet that I had been paying Sky for and we would have mammoth fast interweb browsing that very day.

Due to the chaotic festive period and multitude of Christingles, Christmas plays and parties, I sort of forgot about the Openreach lad coming on New Year’s Eve until the day before when I suddenly realised that I had not received confirmation of his visit.

So I rang BT.

The nice lady I spoke to apologised profusely that I had not been informed about this, but my broadband order had been cancelled as I had failed a credit check.

Absolute rubbish, I told her. I’ve never failed a credit check in my life, there’s more chance of the Chief Cashier at the Bank of England getting turned down for credit than me. She sympathised and gave me the details of Equifax who run BT’s credit checks and told me to contact them.

The telephone number she gave me was incorrect but I discovered (using my sloth-like internet connection) that an account with Equifax is free for the first 28 days and after emailing them a copy of a utility bill and my driving licence I was advised that my very own credit report would be available shortly.

The next day I was able to download this important life-changing document and discovered that my credit score was excellent and that no UK company should refuse me credit.

So I rang BT.

The nice lady who I spoke to, sympathised, agreed that it was ridiculous I had been turned down for credit as my credit score was excellent and once again tried to place an order for my broadband. After 30 seconds she informed me that I had again failed the credit check and she advised me to contact Equifax as they would be able to explain why I was failing a credit check for a broadband order which someone of no fixed abode could set up without issue.

So I rang Equifax.

I’ll just point out here that should you ever be in the regrettable position where you need to contact Equifax, always turn the volume on your phone to “high”. All the call handlers (or at least the ones that I spoke to) speak with a foreign accent and sound as though they are speaking through a very thick, woolly sock.

The lady at Equifax told me that she didn’t know what criteria BT check on a credit report but that I had possibly been refused credit as I wasn’t on the electoral role.

I replied that I had been on the electoral roll at my current address for 11 years, and I knew this for definite as I had been able to vote at the last election which took place less than a month ago.

Ah, she replied, but Equifax don’t get the updated electoral role until the end of January, so I would be able to apply for credit then.

So I rang BT.

The nice lady sympathised, listened to my tale of woe and put me through to Cruella de Vil in the accounts department. Cruella told me that there was a discrepancy between the personal details that I had just given her for security clearance and my personal details on my credit report, namely; my date of birth was not the same.

I replied that the 2 dates of birth were exactly the same and I knew this because I was currently looking at my credit report, and this was the same as the date of birth I had just given her, my real and actual date of birth.

She replied that they were definitely different.

So I rang Equifax.

The gentleman I spoke to told me that my date of birth was correct (I knew this) that I was on the electoral role (I knew this too) and told me to email my credit report to BT and ask then to do a manual check.

So I rang BT.

By this point I had found my old BT voodoo doll and was not only viciously twisting its head and stabbing pins through it, I was also holding it over a naked flame as I waited to be connected to an adviser.

Luckily, Lauren could hear that I was at the end of my tether with her employer. To be fair, I gave her a very clear sign that I was at the end of my tether as when she picked up my call I told her that I was going to kill myself because I really, really wanted to give BT some money in return for a product that I was absolutely certain they wanted to provide me with.

After putting me on hold for 7 and a half minutes she told me that I had already spoken to 3 of her colleagues over the past 2 days and her Supervisor had advised her to put the order through from her broadband services desk and not run it through the sales department as it would be rejected again, thanks to my apparently fictitious credit report.

Initially Lauren said she couldn’t find my landline which we both thought was a bit odd as I was actually using it to make the call, however she told me not to worry as she would put in an order for a new line and the lad from Openreach would disregard this when he came to my house as he would be able to detect the line then.

It took over half an hour for Lauren to complete this and she even called me back once the order was placed to confirm that it was definitely going through. I was so pleased with this information, I instructed Lauren to tell her Supervisor that she and the rest of her team should receive a free bottle of wine every Friday and a short city break at a European venue of their choice as a thank you for their exceptional service.

So the Openreach lads came, gave me a new phone number as they couldn’t find the landline I have been using for the past 11 years and left me running internet speed checks for pure novelty value.

And so, we have speeds of over 100Mbs now, my phone is running at the dizzy height of 114Mbs and when our computers start an update instead of having to leave them overnight, it’s complete in a few seconds. It’s absolutely amazing.

Until a month ago, when I discovered that our internet service had been turned off.

I checked the details on the My BT App on my phone and it assured me that as I paid by direct debit on or just after the 3^rd of the month, I had nothing to pay and did not need to do anything.

Instead of ringing BT, because frankly I just did not have the energy or the patience, I began an online chat with Soumyadip who told me that my first direct debit had been declined.

ME: When did you attempt to take the payment?

I typed very loudly and with a muscle twitching ferociously in my jaw.

SOUMYADIP: We tried to collect the payment on 25^th January 2020 and it was declined by your bank

Came the reply.

ME: I have not had any notification from my bank that a payment has been declined and as My BT says you were taking the payment on or just after the 3^rd February as agreed when I placed the order why did you decide to try and take the payment 9 days earlier than agreed???

I was so incensed at this point that the only punctuation I would be bothered to use was an exclamation mark.

SOUMYADIP: As a valued BT Customer I can only advise you to contact your bank but I am turning your service back on now then you can use this link to make payment…….

So I rang BT.

I paid what was owed using their very quick automated payment service and 2 hours later, Britney was back on Yourtube and I was able to surf the net for items I could not afford.

All was well with our superfast surfing experience until 2 weeks ago when I received an automated call from my friend BT saying that I had not paid my bill.

So I rang BT.

But this time instead of calling the number they had given me which only leads to an automated payment system, I found a number on the internet where I could be connected to a real human person who I could shout at converse with.

I spoke to Joanne, who asked me for my account number which I recited from the My BT App. There was a long silence before she told me that account number did not exist – and then the penny dropped. My BT was showing me my original account that I opened at the beginning of December and despite the original order being cancelled owing to my credit report stating that I was a terrorist and a habitual money launderer, the account had not been completely closed.

So Soumyadip had told me a lie so big it should be on a specialist diet plan. My bank hadn’t declined the payment as the payment had never been requested, because the direct debit set up on the old unused account had not been transferred to the new account.

This made me exceptionally furious with Soumyadip but as he/she probably already has a new job with a diligent employer there was very little point in taking the subject further.

Joanne very nearly restored my faith in BT, as she has credited all the charges on my account as an apology for how utterly shit BT is. She even reimbursed the charges that the robbing bastards had charged me for my internet to be reconnected and has given me a month of superfast surfing for free.

Ironically Sky did ring me to ask why I had left them. I told them that unfortunately they are currently unable to supply my house with Superfast Fibre Broadband. The lady replied that they are rolling out Superfast to lots of rural areas and that in the future they should be able to provide me with the service that I want.

So this rant of a blog post is really a message for Sky; urging them to get on with rolling out Superfast Fibre Broadband to those half-forgotten rural areas as quickly as they can. Because Sky, as soon as you do, I’ll be on the phone to Darren in Sunny Dumfries, I’ll have the bottle of wine at the ready and I won’t even ask him to strike a deal with me.

And I hate BT.