Happy Holidays!

The bills are paid, the work Christmas dinner went swingingly, we're not in the red, I now have my very own copy of the Guns'n'Roses version of Live and Let Die*, and it's time I went home.

The tree is up, the turkey's in the fridge and I've just a couple of stocking fillers to buy, do a 'white tornado' round the house with the hoover, and that will be me pretty much organised for Christmas day.

I have steadfastly decided not to worry about: not having the right port for sauce/brie at the right stage of gooeyness/proper bread sauce/clean carpets/enough mixed nuts/having made home made bread/having enough space around the table/having enough food (or having too much food, as at the infamous Halloween party**)/having the laws and in laws around the Christmas table for the first time/whether people will like their presents/any other neurotic thing.

And this makes me happy.
Shirley Bassey on the CD - hurrah! Canny beat it.

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* superior by far to the Wings version
** more of the party later, perhaps


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Number of car park enquiries so far today: probably about six or seven

This really does beggar belief. It probably justifies a post all of its own, but I'm a stickler for continuity, so as an orange postscript it stays.
Fed up with a steady flow of bewildered passenger-wannabes giving me grief, attitude and generally trying to offload their festive stress on to me while I try to get on with an honest days' work, I called the airport car park booking line this afternoon.

Sitting comfortably?

(I'll spare you the details of the common-sense-void which is their call routing system which I went through before speaking to a booking clerk.)
Me: Hello, I wonder if you could tell me if you are still taking bookings for long term car park 5?
Person: Em, yes, we should be.
Me: (not even ranting, I kept it very much under control although my blood was boiling - you would have been proud) Can you tell me why that is please, as car park 5 has been closed for several weeks. I work just beside Car Park five, and we get several people in here every day who're quite stressed about getting their flight, to find that their booking isn't for car park five at all.
Person: Eeeemmmm - I'll just check that out with my supervisor
Me: Could I speak to your supervisor - that would be really good
Person: I'll just check for you
same Person again: Hello - yes, on our system I see that people are being directed to car park 4, so our operators will tell them that
Me: (incredulous) Seriously? There is a sign up here, and it has been here for about four weeks saying that parkers should go to car park 1, not 4.
Person: Well, it says four on our system
Me: Hmm. Sounds as if either the sign here or the system needs to be updated. Could you see that one of them gets updated?
Person: (to his credit) Yes, I'll pass that on to the rest of the staff that car park 5's closed and customers should go to the other car park.
Me: That's good. It would be a good idea to send out a wee email to people whose money you've already taken to let them know that they should go to whichever car park you choose rather than car park 5 - just as a courtesy measure and to save them getting frustrated with you and with me - because I don't work for the car park but the holidaymakers think I do and they can give some really quite bad attitude to us here. They usually leave my office being quite cross with the airport because they've paid for a parking space and find that the car park is closed.
Person: Well, I can't do that, but I'll pass it on to my supervisor, and from your call onwards, people will be given updated information.
Me: That's great. Thanks. Can I take your name and your supervisor's name in case I need to call back?
Person: (he willingly did)
Me: That's great - thanks - bye.

So - we'll see. Thankfully I won't be around for the next few days - too much quaffing of mulled wine to do - but if even one poor frustrated ratty stressed traveller turns up in my reception area (so much at the end of their tether that they totally ignore the 'no car park enquiries please' sign), I'll be on the phone to 'Person' then and there. In fact, I'll dial the number, and let the traveller speak to the booking people. The travellers will probably be much less friendly than I was this afternoon.

= As I finish this post, I've just had a nice Irish woman in asking about the car park. Apparently she booked an hour ago - (Can't quite work out whether that was before of after my call) and is looking a bit worried. There's no light on the sign, so she hasn't seen the notice saying 'go to car park 1' =

Yeh. Pure Dead Brilliant. Maybe the airport shouldn't bother with carbon neutral flights, and sell carbon neutral parking. I wonder how much additional carbon has been pumped in to my air as a result of parkers making unnecessary journeys because of the airport's rubbish booking information? Or maybe they should sell special stress relief products, so that travellers can do what they booked to do in the first place - have a relaxed and Happy Holiday!

OK. That's likely my last rant of this year. ( I hope. I really really hope.)