Ten things you may not have known about me
- My first job was designing shelf brackets for supermarket refrigerators
- I held, and used, a US State Department Munitions Export License in 2001
- I’m described as “cynical” in the acknowledgments section of a technical book
- I used to be root on 2000 machines
- My only significant unfulfilled childhood dream is to be an astronaut
- I’m banned from Hendy Ford’s Chandler’s Ford branch
- I weigh 30kg less than I did 8 months ago
- I can blow bubbles without technological assistance
- I like dancing, but I’m usually too self-conscious to do it
- I own more hats than pairs of trousers
What did you do to Hendy Ford? And why did you need the export licence?
I asked what price a car was for monthly lease, they said they couldn’t tell me, I asked how I was supposed to know if I could afford it, there was a bit of a loop and after the 6th sentence which began “With all due respect…” I replied “Don’t give me that ‘all due respect’ bollocks again: just tell me how much it’d cost!”, following which I was asked to leave and not return for swearing. So I did.
I wanted to export some munitions from the US (for personal use), and US customs won’t let you do that unless you have a valid munitions export license. I didn’t need a license to import them to Britain, because the items in question are not classified as munitions in this country.
Haha! I know the HR manager at Hendy Ford (a nepotistic Hendy), must tell her to train her staff better in customer satisfaction.
I wrote to the CEO to apologise for using offensive language in his establishment, which resulted in their Marketing VP guy calling me to apologise for them not telling me what I wanted to know. No point in harassing their HR manager too…
It’s a bit academic now anyway – I am unlikely to want to buy another Ford, and even if I did they seemed to be in the middle of demolishing that branch last time I drove past.
They’re the second company to have annoyed me enough that I refuse to do business with them; Michelin were the first.
How boring, I knew all of those.
You’ll have to dig deeper than that!
Given you’re my longest-serving friend, I strongly suspect I lost my capacity to surprise you long ago.
In fact I can only think of one thing you definitely don’t know, and I’m still not intending to tell you it.
[...] culture. I think recent events demonstrate the continuing the truth of that. Incidentally, as I mentioned before, I’m name-checked in his [...]