I had the Royal Bank of Scotland on the ‘phone this morning. Complaints department ringing me back about my call yesterday.<\/p>\n
They gave me a brief and unconvincing explanation about why they had sent out the letter to my old address but I didn’t pursue it any further – they were well and truly on the back foot. They did however confirm that my new address had been noted.<\/p>\n
So having dealt with that, I asked about my bank cards. In my letter advising them of my change of address I had told them of my … errr … missing bank cards and requested duplicates. So I wanted to know when I might receive them.<\/p>\n
There was a brief silence – and then a cough. “It seems like no-one has dealt with the second part of your letter” was the embarrassed reply. So he had to deal with that, and then pass me through to the Bank’s credit card centre to talk to them.<\/p>\n
“Please enter your credit card number” said the automatic reply.<\/p>\n
And so I did.<\/p>\n
“I’m sorry. We don’t recognise that as a valid card number” replied the machine. And that’s hardly a surprise because when I noticed that the card was missing, I rang up to cancel it.<\/p>\n
And so we went round and round in circles until some human intervened.<\/p>\n
You really couldn’t make up any of this nonsense. <\/p>\n
Although I didn’t have a very long sleep last night, it was quite deep. And I was off on my travels too, not into an igloo with Sylvia or with TOTGA either, but I ended up running around after some neurotic 40-something woman. Very tense and edgy – and also armed with a pistol. And the people whom whe was intended to confront were likewise armed, but much more experienced and much more at ease with it, so I had to try to persuade this woman to calm down and at least disarm herself, otherwise this could all end in tears.<\/p>\n
One look at the weather convinced me that I wasn’t going anywhere this morning, despite my plans. Howling gale, freezing cold and torrential rain. I didn’t even have my shower, but sat on the sofa sorting through that disk full of photos and merging another pile. That was my morning’s work.<\/p>\n
Despite not liking the soup, I finished it off at lunchtime and then – surprise surprise – I did some more housework. I’ve cleaned the hallway and what will be the dining area. That’s all tidied, vacuumed, washed and cleaned. And Brigitte, one of my neighbours, caught me washing the floor. That will go down well, I reckon.<\/p>\n
And then I braved the elements for my walk. I declined the opportunity to go round the headland in view of the howling gale. It was tough enough going around the city walls.<\/p>\n
Back here with a coffee, a little .. errr … repose, and then I attacked the issue of my train and accommodation next week in Leuven. Fortunately I can receive messages on this new phone now so I could pick up the bank’s confirmation code.<\/p>\n
And then the database. I’m still no further forward in the long run with this.<\/p>\n
Tea was more tortillas and spicy rice, and then a walk. And bumped once more into Brigitte. Apparently there was a meeting this evening of the local residents and I missed it.<\/p>\n
But back around the walls and now I’m home again in the warm and my nice partly-clean apartment. If the weather eases tomorrow I have things to do in town. But there’s no chance whatever if it continues like this. <\/p>\n
