2013 — 25 April: Thursday
Had this been one of those ghastly "get up and go to the office" days it would be fair to say that I overslept1 but that concept is now only applicable to fixed appointments. Just as well, really. I've always hated being at someone else's beck and call.
Today's a day, I feel, for marching into my Spanish Bank and saying "So long, and thanks for all the paella." Let me just finish my cuppa.
[Pause]
Well, that'll learn me. Never set off to interact with a bank before you've had any breakfast. I paid in my three ERNIE cheques on Monday at the Spanish gang's local branch. Got home. Observed them show up on my online account display by the time I got home. Waited an over-cautious 24 hours and whacked them over to my new bank on Tuesday evening. Observed them show up on my new bank's online account within five minutes. Waited an over-cautious 24 hours and drained the rest of the linked pair of savings and current accounts at the old bank last night. Observed the effect show up on my new bank's online account within the time it took me to login there.
One hour of trying this morning actually in the Spanish gang's branch, holding up everyone behind me, and can they close my account? Don't be silly. Monday's three ERNIE cheques have yet to wipe their feet on their way in, as it were. And, until they've cleared ("And they might 'bounce', sir") the account has to stay open. I mildly pointed out that if National Savings bounces payments then we both were facing a whole different level of difficulty.
"Just give me back my driving licence, destroy my current account card while I watch, and shut the account down at your leisure." But we can't do that while these credits are still showing as on their way into your account, sir. "Really? Even though they've already been moved to my new bank and, as you've already seen on your system, the balance here is now zero?" Oh, yes. I can see that now, sir. That's odd. But it won't let me.
It's nearly time to set out for my lunch date and I still haven't had any breakfast, dammit! Wait, I forgot the good news. I picked up £2-82 in closing interest from the savings a/c. They had to root around for small change to hand over.
Mad, or bad?
Fascinating essay on the late Thomas Szasz. My kind of dissident, up to a point, Lord Copper. (Link.)
Tasty. Very tasty...
I must stop visiting my chums. (Reason.)
Given the way I feel...
... about Stravinsky's music in general, I don't really understand why both 'Apollon musagete' and 'Oedipus Rex' are so relatively unfamiliar. Tonight I have a chance to rectify that. (Link.)
We stumbled back...
... from the pub (and the ice-cream parlour) via the discount DVD and Blu-ray shelves of Asda, where I recommended "Hanna" to Len and picked up a pair of monsters for my own delectation:
Actually, the prospect of seeing what happens when Clint Eastwood directs Judi Dench as J Edgar Hoover's mother is simply too surreal to pass up. As is Arnie as Conan a boggling 32 years ago. Director John Milius went on to produce the recent HBO series "Rome" and screenwriter Oliver Stone hasn't done too badly, either.