When in April 2009?

I really like the Multiflex web templates designed by Pastor Gerhardt on http://www.1234.info/. I used one on the online property auction site http://getset2move.com, but looking at 1-2-3-4.info, I think they are a trifle optimistic about the date! (Highlighted in the red box April 31, 2009).

Much Better Spirit of Christmas!

Coming home on the Central Line today around 2.00 pm and this nice bloke was giving away Quality Street sweets on the tube. No catch, no charge, just a gesture of good will at Christmas.

I had a sweet and took his photo. Sir I salute you! Merry Christmas!

English- as she is Bespoken!

This at least made me chuckle, also in Canary Wharf. (Hey I work there!). The sentence in capitals on the white banner. "Allegra will be signing books bespokely"! She looks quite cute but I bet she is bespoken for...

Spirit of Christmas - Canary Wharf

This photo- taken of a Christmas tree* in the Canary wharf says everything you need to know about the UK in the 21st century. Bah Humbug!

*Every Christmas tree and hanging decorations in Canary Wharf has one of these. Nice eh, the bastardisation of a bauble with a CCTV message!

Sat here in a pub

Out tonight having a drink.

Mispellings in TV Adverts

With a product name like Cillit Bang, (Silly Name!) I suppose it was to be expected but I saw an Ad today on Sky One (about 14:10 pm GMT+1) with a big bad spelling mistake. I wasn't even paying much attention but as it flashed past something must have registered so I rewound and paused it.. et voila.

The top photo was the full screen advert (as seen on a Sky+ Box) and the bottom is an expanded version of the bottom right part of the screen. "Stainless Steal!". Er chaps, you mean "Stainless Steel"?

Argos screw up a purchase reservation!

Yesterday my wife reserved three items on their website, to be collected within 48 hours from one of their stores in East London. She received an email confirming that the three items were reserved and would be held until the end of tomorrow.

Today we traipsed down to pick them up. 3.00 o'clock at Argos on a holiday Sunday- almost an entire outer circle of hell to itself. It took 5 minutes sat in the car park just to get a parking spot.

Anyway they screwed up. So much for three items reserved. They only had two. The other was 'Out of Stock' according to their staff. So here we have a no doubt expensive stock/booking system which gets it wrong.

Presumably at some point the branches stock figures were matched against reservations and the system should have realised that a reserved item would be out of stock? So why no notification, apology or anything?

I tried their phone line support. Getting through to a human was an achievement, however she might as well have not been there. Full marks to her for passing me to another number where the staff had long finished for the day. But a waste of my time (on an 0870 number- gee thanks Argos).

So I have used their online email system to send an email that should glow white hot with ire (polite, no bad language but firm). Watch this space... I wonder if anyone in Argos land ever checks the web for good/bad customer feedback?

I made top ten for C++ Programming on Google!

Writing for About.com (see previous post) isn't done just for love; they do pay and that depends upon how many people visit the site. Which means I have to write stuff that people want to read and also apply a bit of SEO magic to make sure it's found for what people are actually searching for.

Well my C++ column (including C and C#) is now at #9 on the first page of google for c++ programming. Getting to #1 position will be a lot lot harder. In fact staying in the top ten won't be that easy!

Now I just have to work out how to get something that people on Digg and Reddit want to read...