A word about life

Paper Fortress: 2009 - 2011 Reflection from Paper Fortress on Vimeo.
Found this over at Ryan's blog and it has that kind of poignant quality that really makes you stop and think for a minute. Well worth a re-post if you ask me.

Smile damn you!

I don't tend to take much notice of business success tips, but as I sit here with a scowl on my fizog, I'm minded to change my outlook a bit, and I'm posting this here to remind myself. 

“What does it cost to smile? Nothing. What does it cost not to smile? Everything, if it prevents you from connecting with people. While smiling sends a very clear message about your state of mind, not smiling creates an opening for many interpretations, including grumpiness, aloofness and anger – none of which helps you enchant people,” he says.

Maybe it's because he used George Clooney as a case in point, and maybe it's because he's got a tasty pad in Lake Como, but it makes sense.

Read the City AM article in full here

Ebay washes its hands of another ripoff

This is a real version of the fake I received

Here's a warning to all the Ebay buyers out there to get a dispute filed straight away if you ever end up in a situation where you have received something suspect.

Ebay seller Wrongworks sold me a counterfeit Headporter x mug x Beauty & Youth backpack on December 5. It took until December 19 to arrive, I emailed him, he promised me a refund and I returned the bag on December 20. I have been waiting for my refund since then, and today decided to try and get it through Ebay.

The following is a transcript of a conversation I have just had with Jason from Ebay.

I'll let you make your own minds up.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:45:42 AM)
Welcome to eBay Live Help, my name is Jason. How may I help you?

niceman-g (2/3/2011 08:46:32 AM)
I received this item in December and it turned out to be counterfeit. I contacted the seller who agreed to refund and the item was returned on December 20. Refund has still not been received.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:47:20 AM)
I'm sorry to hear that you still haven't receive a refund.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:47:47 AM)
Aside from this, would there be any other concerns that I can help you with?

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:50:03 AM)
I don’t mean to rush you. Can you please send a reply to confirm that we’re still connected?

niceman-g (2/3/2011 08:50:12 AM)
How about you tell me what to do about the refund Jason? Right now this is a clear cut case of theft

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:50:36 AM)
Okay. Please bear with me for a moment while I investigate this for you.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:52:39 AM)
Thank you for waiting. We usually advise our members to go to the Resolution Centre when they encounter problems with a transaction. However, after reviewing our records, I have confirmed that you purchased this item last 05 December.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:53:06 AM)
Since this listing ended more than 45 days ago, opening a case in the eBay and PayPal Resolution Centre is no longer an option.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 08:53:38 AM)
Maybe you could suggest the options I do have

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:53:53 AM)
The best thing you should do is to phone the seller and talk to them about what's happened. These situations can often be resolved with a friendly conversation.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:54:46 AM)
You can request the seller's contact information here:

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:54:51 AM)
http://shop.ebay.co.uk/ebayadvsearch/__W0QQ_advZ1QQ_sofindtypeZ9?_rdc=1

niceman-g (2/3/2011 08:56:06 AM)
The seller was notified of my intention to return the item. To be honest Jason, right now, Ebay is party to the pedalling of counterfeit goods across international borders and then claiming I have no right to take action because "this listing ended more than 45 days ago." I would suggest you take a more pro-active approach, such as perhaps contacting the seller yourselves.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:57:55 AM)
Please understand that we cannot communicate with members on another member's behalf and directly intervene in disputes between eBay members. This is to maintain trust and fair trade in eBay.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:58:19 AM)
For future reference, this page has an outline of all the steps you can take if you ever have a problem like this again - open a new window on your browser and copy this link into it:

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 08:58:21 AM)
http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/buy/item-not-as-described.html

niceman-g (2/3/2011 08:59:43 AM)
Ebay might like to wash its hands of this but it has a duty of care to insure its members do not get ripped off.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:01:46 AM)
We have taken note of your complaint. I assure you that we will take appropriate action against the seller once the investigation is completed to ensure that eBay remains a fun and safe place to shop. However, to maintain member privacy, we can't share details of actions taken on another account.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:02:37 AM)
I don't want you to share details, I just want my payment back. Please could you tell me the case number?

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:02:59 AM)
What do you mean by that?

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:04:25 AM)
You just told me you were investigating this case. Please tell me the case number.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:06:42 AM)
Yes, however, we won't be able to update you about the results of this investigation or give you more information of this.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:08:48 AM)
Without sounding flippant Jason, how do I know you are actually investigating it if you provide me with no information or even a case number?

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:09:37 AM)
While I can't share details about this seller's account specifically, the actions that we can take against poor-performing seller include ending their listings, stopping them from buying and/or selling, and either temporary or permanent suspension from eBay.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:11:57 AM)
And what does that signify in terms of me receiving my refund? Is it possible for me to raise a dispute through Paypal?

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:12:40 AM)
As I've said earlier, since this listing ended more than 45 days ago, opening a case in the eBay and PayPal Resolution Centre is no longer an option.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:14:51 AM)
OK Jason let's get this straight. I received a counterfeit item through an EBAY seller which I returned and for which I have received no refund. So I have no item and no refunded payment.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:15:50 AM)
I returned the item within a day of receiving it and because it has taken more than 45 days you claim I should just swallow the loss? Are you for real?

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:16:03 AM)
I understand that this must be frustrating to you, Graham. However, the option you have here now is to contact your seller directly.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:19:05 AM)
I don’t mean to rush you. Can you please send a reply to confirm that we’re still connected?

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:19:16 AM)
I have contacted the seller but if he doesn't respond I would expect the company that facilitated this transaction to take a degree of responsibility, regardless of your self-imposed rules, which I am quite certain do not stand up against the law.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:20:52 AM)
I would like to inform you that eBay is not involved in the actual transaction between Buyers and Sellers we have no control over the ability of sellers to sell items or refund their buyers.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:21:21 AM)
Also, while we can limit or suspend member accounts, we don't have the powers of the police or the courts. This means we can't mediate or take sides in a dispute, make decisions for a user, force a user to fulfil their obligations at the end of a listing, or initiate a criminal investigation against a user.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:22:53 AM)
But you still take the fees, which makes you responsible. I think that's been proven by more than one court case. I would therefore like you to monitor this situation.

Jason Jones (2/3/2011 09:24:08 AM)
Your complaints has been noted, Graham.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:25:07 AM)
So has this conversation. I will be back in touch if the seller doesn't respond to me withing 24 hours.

niceman-g (2/3/2011 09:25:23 AM)
Cheerio

System message (2/3/2011 09:25:29 AM)
The chat session is being wrapped up.

System message (2/3/2011 09:25:58 AM)
All times in the above transcript are in the following time zone: (GMT) Greenwich Mean Time : Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London

System message (2/3/2011 09:25:58 AM)
The chat session has ended.

Livid? Moi?

Ace or Arte (below)? The big question

The car got towed to the garage this afternoon, my watch is still at the menders, Orange seem to be doing all they can to keep me disconnected and the stereo's on the blink.

I don't like to burden you with my trials, but I think I'm fairly safe in saying that this is a pretty crap state of affairs.

What's made it worse is the service that people expect you to put up with when you need to get these things sorted out. Orange, for instance, have been messing things up since November 23. The list of correspondence is so long I could publish it as a novel.

Then there's the watch. The face smashed just before Christmas and when I got the repaired one back it was evident they had put the wrong glass in, even though I was assured it would be genuine. In some sort of denial over what is going on, the watch mender has now sent the thing to Rolex for their opinion.

As for the car, that is an example of crap design that has been a disaster waiting to happen. Seeing as it seems to have been raining since November, it was inevitable that sooner or later the wiper tray would overflow and soak the car's brain, which the designers decided to put directly beneath it. So that's had it, and what was one car shared between two is now one car waiting in a garage for a full frontal lobotomy.

Thank god for the invention of the bicycle, that's what I say. Which reminds me, I really must investigate which Colnago to get on the Ride to Work Scheme. Every cloud, as they say.

Sorry for the rant.

Moncler V Betu: there goes a piece of history

I once walked out of a suit fitting in Aquascutum because the peg-toothed salesman guffawed when I said I wanted the opinion of the missus. "Ask the missus sir?" he sneered. "A gentleman doesn't have to ask the missus what she thinks of his suit." So he lost that sale.

As far as I am concerned, the missus does need to be consulted sometimes. It isn't a case of getting permission, more the fact that she gives an honest view, because she has a vested interest in making sure I don't look like too much of a berk.

I am lucky in that I consider her to be possessed of considerable taste, and also to take a sizeable interest in the clothes I dress in and who they are made by. Thanks to this she knows her Visvim from her W)Taps and if put in a Mr and Mrs situation would be able to name the five stores I make a point of visiting when in London and probably the very route I take to get to them.

It works both ways. I once persuaded her to put back a jumper with horses all over it.

However there have been occasions when my faith in her judgement was tested.

Which brings me to the Moncler V Betu.

I was stoked that this made it to the sale - checking the End site for a price reduction had become a daily ritual. The thought of completing the Wasi-Betu two-piece had consumed me for weeks.

More so than I realised, it turns out. So much so that when I put this jacket on I was unable to see that it gave me the silhouette of Spongebob Squarepants, that it fitted all wrong. I looked "like a padded box with legs."

All I could could see was grade 1 goosedown comfort with a water resistant shell and a little white Moncler badge on the arm, perfect on its own or as a liner to the Wasi. What's more, after months of persistence I was in posession of a piece of Visvim collaboration history. This wasn't just a jacket. It was a quest realised.

In the process of this quest I had become blinded to the fact that the Betu might not actually look that good.

Convinced Lizzie's style sense was going askew, I posted a picture on FUK. It didn't go down very well there either.

So it went back (sorry End). Like a prize fish lobbed back into the lake. All I have now is these pictures as evidence it was ever here.

Am I bitter? I was, for a week or so, especially when I saw someone trying to flog an identical one for £800 on Ebay, and when I saw it had once again sold at End.

But the pain is subsiding, and deep down I think I know she was right. She usually is.

Guest post: when style turns nasty

Turn of the century workers: boots of death (Pic: Kathleen Potter)

The last thing we think about when it comes to styling ourselves are the health risks, but as guest poster Eric Stevenson points out, fashion can be painful.

Polyester: combustible

Ever hear of fashion risks? People dive into the craziest trends, eyes closed, head first. Sometimes it pays off, and sometimes it doesn't. It's all up to your fashion sense, your guts, and your timing. But fashion can damage more than your reputation. It can be seriously dangerous. Did you know that fashion can literally kill you? It's possible, and it happened all the time.

Back in the day (the Fifties), lots of clothing, especially kids clothes, were really, really flammable. We're talking brushed rayon sweaters , cowboy chaps, and even pyjamas. Scary, right? These days there are laws to keep people from igniting every time they get too close to any kind of heat. Back then, kids and others who followed these fashion trends would actually catch on fire. If that's not risky fashion, what is?

Maybe this. Did you know people can get cancer from clothes? Yep. Mesothelioma. Deadly. As recently as the Seventies people wore their work boots to factories and construction sites. Those old triple stitch, steel toes carried asbestos (which lead to Mesothelioma Symptoms ). The workers inhaled, and within 50 years they were dead. Even if the boots were washed, asbestos could still get in the air and into lungs. Talk about dangerous.

As well as spontaneously combusting or contracting lung cancer, people could lose their minds. Fashion could do that. Ever heard anyone say "Mad as a hatter”? The phrase has more to it than Alice and Wonderland lets on. In the past, hat makers used mercury in their pelts. The poor hat makers inhaled the stuff and that was it. Their neurological stability went out the door. Mercury can make you crazy, and with too much in the air, it could kill you. In the 1800s hat makers walked the streets incoherent and blubbering, just so ladies and gentleman could keep up with latest trends. Sacrifice for fashion? I think so.

So what does this have to with now? If you're a retro fanatic, if you love throwback sweaters, hats, and boots, watch your back ... and your lungs ... and your brain. Flammability, asbestos, and mercury may have been involved with the making of those old accessories and tops. Don't be fooled. Fashion can be deadly dangerous.

Fifties leisurewear: unsuitable for digging roads (Pic: Ed Woods)

Season's Greetings

Watch out for low-flying raccoons

'Twas the night before Christmas ...

Best wishes to all and may Santa bring you some fine clobber.

I'm still here ... honest

A day is a long time in blog land. A week seems like an eternity. So I understand if you've all cleared off somewhere that actually offers something to read.

Worst of all, Sky have told me they won't be hooking me up with broadband or a landline until December 10. The way the snow is coming down, I'll probably be buried under six feet of the stuff until then.

But the one thing that is keeping me going in this technological drought, where even my dongle has coughed out it's last byte, is the thought that someone might still be out there to read the tosh I pedal out.

Normal service will resume one day I promise, and if I get a reasonable connection I might even post a picture. What luxury. I tease myself.

Hang in there.

We're in the house ... is anybody out there?

I've just dug the laptop out of the shanty town of cardboard boxes that is my new office in the hope that I might be able to get some kind of communication to the outside world.

Right now we are pretty much devoid of any of the technological niceties we have become accustomed to, which I wouldn't mind so much if we had moved to a third world country, or even the Lake District, but is proving a bitter pill given that we have moved half a mile to the other side of town.

Sky have informed me they will connect the broadband on December 10, which right now seems like next year, so I'm relying on an unreliable dongle that Dave kindly donated.

The stereo people have yet to wire up the house, so we only have a TV which seems to lose its satellite connection whenever it is switched off and a ... wait for it ... FM radio. This worked fine until Lizzie tried to plug a dodgy lamp into one of the kitchen sockets and tripped the ring main. Now it doesn't seem to want to find any stations.

The good thing about all this is that I can concentrate on getting things unpacked, and it is at least an exercise in coping in the event an electromagnetic pulse takes out the world's electronic communications.

It has helped me realise that I probably wouldn't cope very well.

PS: I'll try and post some more pictures of the state of the place during the first days but I can't promise anything with this dodgy dongle connection.

Goodbye to all that: the shed

I reckon I will miss the shed more than I'll miss some bits of the house, especially after spent a good few weeks in the summer turning it into a bolthole.

That involved turning the thing for the second time in its life and while it was empty, painting the inside of it.

To make it a bit more homely I added one of out Vietnamese day beds, then spent at least ten minutes lounging in it looking at the bike.




By the time I had finished Lizzie told me I'd made it look like something out of MASH, which I thought was a little unfair, considering.

Of course I will have a shed at the new place, and quite a substantial one it is too But like a lot of things in life you never forget your first shed. Especially when so much effort has been wasted on it.

Doing the off: anticipated service interuption

In this day and age moving house shouldn't really prove too much of a problem when it comes to blogging, unless you are a Sky customer.

Even though I didn't get my moving date until four days before we were due to move, Sky expected two weeks notice, so I can now expect to be without broadband or would you believe, a telephone, for three weeks. If I want to keep my landline number it could be 30 days.

Of course the moment I was notified of this I again told them I wanted to leave, to be reminded I was still "under contract."

So please forgive me if my posts become sporadic in the coming days. It might mean I haven't been able to track down a wi-fi hotspot, or hook onto someone else's without them knowing.

And whatever you do, never become a customer of Sky.

The influencers: they're in your head

INFLUENCERS FULL VERSION from R+I creative on Vimeo.
Just like something out of some sixties secret agent series, the influencers get inside your mind. They plant seeds and make you think the decisions you are making are actually yours.

Over the years the art of influencing, putting people on things, creating trends, has become big business. Which it would, seeing as we are all influenced in one way or another every day of our lives. From the coffee we drink to the shirts we wear.

This little film looks at what all this actually means. It has been put together with some of the leading tastemakers in New York, and goes some way to explaining why you just dropped a monkey on those new kicks.

Give yourself 15 minutes to watch it.

"Ideas and products and messages and behaviours spread just like viruses."
Malcolm Gladwell

Via sartoriallyinclined

Village Green: The festival in our park

You will always find a weird bloke at any given festival.

It doesn't matter what the festival is - it could be a festival of cheese in Cheddar - the weird bloke is a legal requirement.

Take the second annual Village Green up the road from us in Leigh-on-Sea. A gathering of young, upwardly pointing open-minded parents for the most part, all-terrain buggies by the dozen, and probably equally attended in numbers by their pre-school toddler clans.

And yet there he was, happily blowing his horn as the nu-age jazz funk band warbled into the sunset.

And the fact is that he had more staying power than me. As the sun dipped, even the chunkiest cardie ever made couldn't keep the chill out, and by 7.30pm I was out of that gate heading for the curry house.

As I left the weird bloke was limbering up for his next act.
Here's two more weird blokes: Badger and Wilco

On the move

Apologies for the lack of any posts over the past few days. We're on the move and the amount of time this involves, even at this early stage, is staggering.

First it was the estate agent visits, as they took their pictures and came up with suitably flowery descriptions of each room of the house.

The estate agents were followed in very short succession by the viewers. I don't think this place has had so many people through the door since the day we moved in. A lovely bunch they were, and out of them we managed to find ourselves a buyer.

We now appear to have progressed to the Next Level and since we accepted the offer yesterday my phone has been welded to my ear as the solicitors and lenders swing into action.

They are all confident we could be in for a swift transaction. Done and dusted within six weeks. It seems feasible given how quickly the place sold, although I've heard that before.

Last time it took us six months.

The sad side of life

This is not a happy post, but I want to put it up because as well as a blog about the nice things in life, this is also a journal.

Some events make you realise the cliches are true. You must live every day to the full and if you love someone, let them know it each and every day.

Something really strange happened yesterday, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since.

We were woken at 5.30am by my neighbour shouting his wife's name, at the top of his voice, with increasing urgency.

They are a couple much like Lizzie and myself. Happy, devoted, comfortable in each other's company and totally in love. We hear them sometimes cracking jokes, ribbing each other, always good natured.

At the end he was so loud it was as if he was in the room.

Our initial thoughts, in those moments that follow a rude awakening, were that he had been out for the night and she had locked him out.

That was until he made the phone call. Panic was in his voice as he told the person at the other end of the line that "she's not breathing."

I got my clothes on, then sat on the edge of the bed, unsure of what to do. We're not the close to the neighbours, as friends. We exchange pleasantries, but the most we have ever spoken was when the fence was down last year because of some building work they were having done. Other than that, the extent of our contact has been Christmas cards and saying hello in the street.

So I didn't know whether going round was the right thing to do. But I was also scared, that if she was ill my lack of first aid knowledge might make things worse, and that if she was dead, well.

My decision was made for me when the paramedic pulled up. We heard her go into the room. "Her heart's not beating sir, I don't know why."

The ambulance pulled up a short while later. They seemed to be in there a while, and then everything went quiet.

We discovered later that Laura had died that night, in bed. Just passed away in her sleep.

She was 39-years-old.

The high-rollers: Let's see those ankles

If you haven't been walking around with your trousers rolled up past your ankles this summer, what have you been doing?

Living outside of London probably, although the high-water look is slowly making inroads to the home counties.

If you're one of the younger tastemakers it's now not enough to merely turn your trousers up mid-calf. You have to engage in the cinch-roll, which does require a bit of practise and basically results in a tapered appearance to your strides.

It also leaves you looking exactly like I did back in the Eighties around about the time of The Breakfast Club when I wouldn't be seen dead in anything other than a navy blazer, roll neck and a pair of tapered jeans.

Looking back on pictures of myself shortly after that period made me realise what a fool I looked, so there's no way I will be returning to the cinch-roll anytime soon. Or the boufant flick, for that matter.

But I am a purveyor of the airy ankle, and do believe the art of a successful trouser roll lies with the distance between floor and roll-up. The ideal height should be somewhere around the lower calf, maybe one turn lower if you're wearing deck shoes.

If it looks like your trousers have just had a row with your feet, you've got them at the correct height.

And if you're wearing deck shoes ditch the socks.

For the approaching autumn breeze, perhaps some high-tops or a pair of hunting boots should be brought in to play. Because something tells me the high-roll will be around for a few months yet, and you wouldn't want your ankles getting cold.

Give it a few months and I might have perfected my own roll.

That's a pair of Yuketen Sport Hunt boots in the picture. More on them later.

Hollywood bites

Last week was marked by a sudden and uncharacteristic bout of depression, which began sometime around Wednesday and lasted until Sunday.

During this time I existed under a cloud of gloom so heavy that I was walking with a stoop. A veil had dropped and the world became a pretty crappy place by all accounts, populated by grim people.

I longed for smiling faces, for a sign that someone, at least, was enjoying themselves.

That must be why I watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall twice. I know this is essentially a film about a bloke who has had his heart broken by a sour faced blonde ex (we've all had them) but in my bout of melancholy the gags and the smile of Mila Kunis (pictured) were like beacons of hope. And it's got a happy ending.

The trouble is, the humour of this movie, and the laugh they seemed to have had making it, brought on anxiety like I had never experienced before. I became overwhelmed by the feeling that I was missing out on all this fun to be had in Hollywood. Life was passing me by. I could not leave it a moment longer - I would have to go over there.

So by Friday I had decided that we should no longer live in England (I would take Lizzie and her smile with me, whether she likes it or not).

The upshot of this is that our Managing Editor has an application on her desk for the position of LA Correspondent and if I had seen the job of anchorman for KTLA TV a little sooner I would probably have applied for that, too. I also know the best neighbourhoods to live in, what the traffic is like and that the sun shines for 340 days of the year.

By Saturday, day three of the depression, I had been through a blow-by-blow re-run of sad stuff and tried to find my dog's ashes on a hill. I had also researched the best place to stay in LA (Chateau Marmont).

If it had gone on any longer I would probably have booked a flight. But when I woke up on Sunday my cloud had lifted.

The cause of that episode? I reckon it has to be the antihistamine pill I took for horsefly bites. Depression and anxiety are known side effects.

I might add to that a desire to go to Hollywood. Which still seems to be in my system.