Good To Be Alive

Diamond Geezer

Diamond Geezer

Gone But Not Forgotten
Joined
May 2, 2003
Messages
13,884
Georgeous here today on the North Coast of Cornwall, unbroken sky,warm sunshine and thermometer shows 22 degrees. Daffodils, primroses, are out even the odd bluebell. Took a walk across a deserted beach, the surfers were just going out without wetsuits for the first time this year as I left. Sat on a rock which was covered by crashing twenty feet waves just two weeks ago and stared out to sea for an hour contemplating the meaning of life ( didn't find any solutions) :lol:
Good for clearing the head though

One of those days when it's good to be alive.
 
I hate this bloody hot weather, the only good thing about summer is that we have Evening Racing :D :D
This weather is bloody ridicilous, we are only in mid March and it feels like Summer already :angry:
 
Must agree with you both.
Though not yet made up my mind on evening racing, supposedly means the betting shops open later so hopefully will mean able to work more and get paid more and owing to the concept of "pre-emptive spending" be able to attend all 3 days of the National meeting.

Top stuff and I will be back in the swing of things tommorow at the golf club Sunday morning comp. First time out this year though I tend to go well after a break :)

Hope we're all having a good weekend.

Martin
 
Absolute glorious day. At least the racing at the Curragh tomorrow wont be run on desperate ground as is usually the case....another day like this tomorrow and it will be hard to keep me from the Curragh.
 
Martin, have you told Joe Corals that you will be unable to work Liverpool??!!!! That'll go down like a ton of bricks!!!!! :lol: I promise you'll come to hate evening racing in time too - there's nowt more galling than having to sit in an empty shop until 10pm every night watching your social life slowly dwindle & die! This year it'll be worse as SIS are going to show US racing every night until 10pm (I think it is) from the start of evening racing to the end of it. Gone are the days when you'd have evening racing 3 times a week until 9.30pm at the latest (& that only for about 2-3 weeks in the height of summer).....I really feel for betting shop staff, things were bad enough when I ran my shop & that was 3-4 years ago when things were nowhere near as bad. The powers that be just don't seem to realise how much of a strain all this excess racing puts on betting shop staff; unlike stable staff they have to work every single evening/Sunday meeting & as there is a shortage of betting shop staff it invariably means that the staff have to work stupid amounts of hours - at one point I was working 60 hours a week, & that was when there was only evening racing 3 nights a week!
 
I'll second that, Dom.

The bookmakers are just greedy BASTARDS.

I hope you enjoy the evening racing Martin, if you do, you'll be the only betting-shop staffer that does.

Roll on September and the dark evenings. :rolleyes:

Colin
 
My boss talk a holiday the week before Cheltenham (think he's trying to tell me something?).

Not told him yet Dom though i've still to ask for a transfer back home for a couple of weeks prior to Aintree so i can make some money to be able to afford to go the National.

I think my contract etc. means that i'll be working just the evenings with lectures etc. and hopefully the Sunday though my social life is already in a bad state, in fact some would say that evening racing can only improve it :lol:
Hope you're not working 60 hours a week over Summer, i don't know what i'd do if i was on a hot peninsula and working, would kill me, at least i can rely on the fact that it invariable rains in Sheffield/Rotheram/Warrington/Liverpool etc.


Martin
 
Ah, no, I don't have to wrok those hellish hours anymore, thank God! We need people to be alive & awake whilst they are working, not in a zombie like state induced by too much working!!! :lol:

Good luck with breaking the news about wanting the National off!!!! :lol: In this indutry it's the one day that you don't have a hope in hell of getting off!!!!! :lol: :lol:
 
I'm another who feels terribly jealous to see everyone else enjoying the lovely weather, sitting outside the pub with a drink or three while I'm stuck behind the counter in the bookies night after night after night :rolleyes:

Wasn't so bad last year when I was just a cashier but now I'm deputy manager some days I'll start work at about 8am and still be there at 10pm :blink: :angry:

I wasn't going to start managing for another few weeks but next week my manager is on holiday, and there's no relief manager available so for four days next week for the first time ever I'll be managing :what: I'm a teeny bit scared at the prospect :shy:
 
Dom, one of the perks of a "zero hours contract" - don't have to work if i don't want to. Though negatives including not being guaranteed work every week so i can't spend money before i get it (well not really anyway).

Good luck this week Griffin.

Martin
 
Fair enough, I'm just warning you that they won't be happy if you can't work GN day - believe me, all bookies are so desperate for staff on GN day that they get their staff to try & get friends or family to work the day with them to help out.

Don't worry Griffin, you'll be grand - just remember the most important thing - don't let them bully you & stand your ground!! The amount of grief the punters will give you & the amount of strokes they try to pull on a female manager is staggering - I was a relief manager for 6 months before I took over as manager in the one shop & it was amazing the tricks they would try; didn't last for long though as they soon realised I wouldn't take any shite!!! Good luck, you'll be grand!

Trudi - it's taken me years to perfect being able to work & act perfectly normally whilst intoxicated - it's an art form, you know!!! :D
 
Fantastic weather at Lingfield yesterday and today - the birdies are out and about tweeting their little heads off, even a nice red-bum bee was inspecting the grass for a tasty morsel, some midges dancing, and a few hoverflies. Time to cast your clouts, since the may is well on the way to being out - some lovely pink buds just starting to pop. It certainly lifts the spirits to see the crocuses and daffs brightening the banks and borders. It was so warm, we actually asked punters to leave the doors to our hut open for the first time since October! :) And the first time I didn't wear a vest and fuzzy-lined boots since around then, too.
 
Originally posted by Diamond Geezer@Mar 19 2005, 04:24 PM
One of those days when it's good to be alive.
Click to expand...
After being at the weighing room party till god knows when last night, try telling my head that!
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Warm but disappointingly cloudy today - good to come home and see the daffs late crocuses and camellia in full bloom though
 
:lol:

Actually , temperature has dropped rather . Complaining about the warm weather is madness it is probably all we wil get for a while
 
It's certainly warming up here! B) Actually, we've had a very mild winter (with the exception of a few days' cold snap in January) with very little rainfall. I've even been up on the roof sunbathing already & got strap marks & the start of a tan to prove it!! The temperature has been crawling into the low twenties over the last couple of weeks & we've had some gloriously warm days - riding through the deepest darkest parts of the Andalucian countryside is amazing, where I ride is in the middle of nowhere on the outskirts of the Los Alcornocales National Park; there are always buzzards, eagles or vultures circling in the skies overhead, it's fantastic.
 
Spring is definitely in the air. My puppy had his first sexual experience - with the cat basket. :what: (luckily, the cat wasn't in it at the time) :D

I won't go into the graphics but poor Barney was unable to walk properly for 5 minutes afterwards. Bless him. B)
 
Ah, yes, the old 'Hormones in Spring Syndrome', Kathy? One of our racing regulars has a 10 month cream Labrador male, Bertie, who was neutered (as a rescue dog, that's mandatory) a few months ago. I was introduced to him at Plumpton, and he's completely bonkers - spent most of the time savaging grass roots, and snouting along the ground.

He's recently discovered shagging - he's been discouraged from mounting his owner's legs, but has found an ancient old male Lab on whom to practice his new-found skills. It seems that the old dog is quite happy turning tricks - just stands there smiling until Bertie has had enough, and wanders off to practice on an assortment of dog toys, blankets, etc.

He wakes his 'mummy' at 5.30 a.m. and forces her to play 'pat-a-cake' and 'this little piggy' with his toes until the call of the loo takes hold.
 
Dear God - too much information people...

It's raining here in Somerset this morning but mild and Springlike for all that. Hedges are greening up, primroses everywhere, the muck-spreader's going full tilt, all the fields bar the horse ones have been spread with fertilizer and/or slurry, the general public are out in full force ignoring all the well-signed footpaths and tramping all over our fields destined for silaging, their mutts off leads crapping everywhere and they get arsey when you politely ask them to leave and to put said mutts on leads..... Interestingly enough, when asked civilly if they would like dog turd in their breakfast cereal, they usualy decline. Funny how it should be acceptable for our cows to have to put up with it!

Our new Belgian Blue bull - Vernon - was turned in with a few in-calf cows yesterday to start to learn his manners around a herd of females before he's let loose with the 'real thing' (the whole dairy herd). He'll be shagged out within the first few days!
 
Sorry for being too descriptive Songsheet, but Barney's experience was surreal. There I was, innocently eating my steak and kidney pie at the time, and he had dragged the cat basket into the kitchen and proceeded to mount it. He then had the most peculiar expression on his face. It was then that I realised what had happened poor thing. My boyfriend was nearly on the floor in hysterics whilst poor Barney tried to work out what had happened - he looked very shocked (Barney that is).

I was half waiting for him to roll over on the floor and ask for a fag!! :what: B)
 
Er, excuse me, Missy Songsheet - "too much information", and we get the shit-&-slurry treatment, plus more (bovine) shagging? :o

Kathy - naughty Barnacle! I hope your boyfriend had a stern word with him about doing such things in public places, and has shown him the loo and the box of Kleenex by now?
 
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