Thursday 21 October 2010

Offline

Last Sunday some ??!?!?? !?!??! stole the communication cabling out of the road nearby. It happened before about a year ago and like last time it will take 4 days to replace it. So for the sake of a couple of hundred pounds worth of copper, several hundred homes and businesses have been severely inconvenienced. Services such as alarm monitoring services and personal care alarms have been rendered useless. Obviously they will never catch the thieves but even if they did, what would the punishment be; few hundred quid fine, a bit of community service.


From a personal perspective, it is particularly infuriating as internet access is my main method of communication and as importantly a means of keeping occupied, without which I am left watching TV or sitting in the garden watching the water level in our new pond, descend (more on that another time ). The other activity still possible is blog writing, although nothing can obviously be published yet.


So the situation has coerced me into shuffling my backside and writing something. So this might be the first of a deluge of entries or not depending on how addictive Cash In The Attic proves to be. Until now, and despite subscribing to almost every Sky channel, I have avoided watching TV all day long. I admit to watching Heir Hunters (terrible) and Homes Under the Hammer as it simply is preferable to listening to the electric toothbrush, shaver or the silence of my rather uncommunicative carer while she operates them. But I try and avoid watching TV after 11. I have countless DVD box sets to watch but decided a couple of years back to save them until there is nothing else I can do. And that time hasn't arrived quite yet.

Weather permitting I would rather sit in the garden or better still, go out. I don't put the computer on the outdoor wheelchair but when the broadband is working, if I decide to sit in the garden I can keep busy with all the stuff most people do in their office while they should be working.

But for the next four days its Daytime TV or this

I have decided that once we are reconnected I am going to research the extent of this type of theft and start a campaign to get telecom companies to put better protection in place.
.

5 comments:

phil said...

Nice to have you back online mate.

I know i'm a little late here, but still can't believe how well Chris did the other week- what a star.

Hmmm countless DVD boxsets, you say..... better rethink that birthday prezzy!

Take care,

Phil

Anonymous said...

Hey Steve,Just for the record - coerced or not - you shuffle good!!! ( Andrea,Grahams misses.XX So much for being Anon.My lack of IT skill would drive you MAD !!. XXX)

Nursie said...

Hi Mate
Hope the scumbags get fried when they try to get their next load of copper!
No idea what Andrea was drinking when she posted her comment, could have been turps, meths or petrol LOL
Shouldn't let her near computers
Take Care mate
Graham

Anonymous said...

Unbelievable. What do these people do with the cabling? So good to hear from you again though. Anna P x

Anonymous said...

Hi Steve. I was recently working with an instrumentation company who were making little vibration sensors that clip onto power cables cables on the underground and send a message via GSM if they detect the vibration from the cable being cut. One of the guys from the instrumentation company said "It's a terrible problem - only last month a man was trying to steal a cable by sawing through it. It was live and his body burnt right through: The maintenance team just found his legs with boots attached poking out a mass of charred stuff."
I said "I don't think that this is a problem that needs solving."

An energised power cable seems to have a very good defence mechanism already!
Richard V