Month: September 2014

How hard can it be?

Very, very, impossibly hard. Mending the screen on my smashed ‘phone, btw. Finally got my two toolkits (one from abroad, ETA next month so I bought another,UK, set. Both arrived same day*sigh* only a couple of quid, but still) Yesterday I got finished early so cracked on. The youtube video has him stripping the ‘phone down, peeling off the glass, putting a new one on, job’s a good ‘un. Bollocks! It came apart relatively easy but then tore the digitizer screen when I was trying to get the glass off. No worries, I had the replacement sealed unit. That was, upon closer inspection, still attached to part of the frame and the back board upon which are mounted all the electronic gubbins. Except on this they weren’t. So I had the option of trying to remove the screen and use my back board with electronic bit attached or rip all my bits off and hope they just popped back on to the new board. I had no idea how I could do the latter, or if it would work, so I removed the screen and digitiser. Successfully, I might add. I reassembled it, just as on the video, but somehow the power button had disappeared off the side of the ‘phone. I used a screwdriver to depress the button inside anyway, just to get it to power up. It didn’t. Took it apart, made sure everything was all as it should be, put it back exactly as shown, hit the power. Nothing. I was thinking I’d been sold a dud screen, it was obviously second hand off a scrapped ‘phone as it still had the back thing on. I took the screen off again to try my old screen and the bloody thing snapped. That was me, head in hands, cursing roundly, with a dead ‘phone. I had to run out as soon as the shops opened this morning and buy a cheap smart ‘phone and stick my sim in. I’ve been setting it up today and it’s surprisingly OK. The camera is crap and the memory is tiny (upgraded with an SD card for £10), but for £89 a Kitkat 4.4 ‘Droid is fairly awesome. This will be my penance for trying to be a clever dick. Leave the techy shit to the techies. I was going to replace my Nexus 5 with another one, sim free, but at £260 that’s a lot of cash to throwing about. Of course, I could have save the £70 for the screen and digitiser, the £10 for the screen, the £89 for the Moto E and the £10 for the memory card, added £80 and bought a new one, but hindsight is 20/20 and screw you. I was trying to do it on the cheap, the video looked simple enough… Bah.   Enough depressing, irritating shit. Other stuff. I went about that new job with the agency on Monday, I was apprehensive and wary as befits agency experience. So far it sounds […]

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Screw this for a lark!

I’ve had enough of this job already. I’ve had four paydays, they’ve got one of them right. I’ve not been paid again this week, I’ll get it on Tuesday, allegedly. I’ve still not been paid for that night out I was forced to take two weeks ago, and I’m generally sick of the place. There are some other jobs going on the jobsite. Better pay, but agency again. I’m going down tomorrow to register with one to find out the full details before I commit. Looks like I’ll be going back to Limited Company. Balls. But the money is atrocious on PAYE on emergency tax. When they deign to pay me. The last two weeks I’ve only got 45 hours or so, the only down side to bailing now is the job security for January/ February. There is bugger all agency work then. And the holiday pay and that. This job is pissing me right off though. Piss up. Brewery. Driver’s law says we must have a 45 hour break after 6 shifts, can be reduced to 24 once a fortnight. This is what I’m up against: *sigh*   In other news I’ve had a productive weekend. Saturday my new (cheap but as it turns out, sufficient) vacuum gauges arrived. I had a few mis-steps working out how to use the bloody things, but now I know it is really quick and easy. They are to balance the carbs on my bike. Apparently they go out of synch at the drop of a hat so one cylinder is getting bucketfuls of petrol the other just drips. Doesn’t make for smooth power delivery. I had a bit of a dick about setting them up. Put the pipes on the gauges. Then looked at the instructions and saw the valves fit on to the gauges, then the piper to valves. That didn’t work. Looked closely at the instructions and saw it was gauges, bit of pipe, valve, rest of pipe. The when I fitted the pipes to the carbs they took ages for the needles to drop or rise. I had to keep taking the tank off to get at the adjust screw. Three times on and off. Then I realised I’d left the valves closed. D’oh! Opened the valves, quick turn of the screw, job’s a good ‘un. Still, never done it before, had no idea what I was doing, sussed it in the end, next time will be a 2 minute job. Also I went and saw my mam who’s over from Johnny Foreign land. Long time no see. Then I set about a simple job (‘how hard can it be?’ To which the answer is invariably; ‘very’.) replacing my indicators on the bike. Nothing wrong with the old ones, I just fancied some tiny ones that don’t really show on the bike. Easy job, unscrew a nut, pull the old ones off, tighten new ones connect the wires. How wrong can you be? Turns out because the new ones […]

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