John Speaks!

I thought that, after Ruth has womanfully created this blog and made the first entries, it was time for me to put my oar in. I'll never be able to do this clandestinely, however, as I have to keep asking her what our access codes, passwords etc. are since ISP's, banks, credit card companies, Old Persons' Railpass providers and every man, woman and his/her dog insist that you have your own, individual, unique Personal Identification Number which you have to keep deadly secret and not reveal to anybody on pain of your soul being separated from your body and used for psychic torture. Furthermore, you will be denied any Euro, Dollar or any kind of currency, status, self-respect, family members, nationality or finger nails for eternity. So you think up a way of writing your own, individual, unique name that you have been known by since the second you were squeezed unknowingly from the womb and are told that somebody else has already got that name, so could you add half a dozen digits to it so that you won't be confused with somebody else with the same individual, unique and personal name that they might get you mixed up with. Well, speaking for myself, I've never actually come across anyone with the same 10 letters in their name in the same order as mine with whom I've been confused and I suppose I must have been around a lot longer than the children who come up with these stupid rules, so how likely is it to happen now? However, in that extremely unlikely (e.g. it's never happened to me) eventuality, they then ask that you invent a Password that you will remember which is not obvious. So you come up with something you think you might remember if you're not rushed (and this is after 3/4 of an hour of frustration and obfuscation at the keyboard trying to find your way round their bloody website) they tell you that "Oh, dear, no!", your own, individual, unique and personal Password won't do because it's got too many/not enough, some/no capital letters, too many/not enough digits, symbols, spaces American/European grammar. So eventually you finish up with your own, individual, unique and personal Password that has been mostly chosen by them and not you. You can't write it down of course, because they don't allow that and they can't tell you what it is if you ask. What they can do of course is to insult you by sneering "Forgotten your Password, you miserable piece of dingo do's?" and offer to send you another password which is entirely chosen at random by them to whatever interloper happens to be sitting at your computer, intending to relieve you of whatever identity you might have left.

But it doesn't end there! You try to open up another potentially planet-destroying account with a supplier of, say, theatre tickets, and they tell you that the identifier you have selected is already being used by somebody else. OH, NO IT ISN'T, IT'S ME. THAT'S MY NAME! As far as I can remember - which I obviously can't - I've now got 7 names and 5 passwords so that gives me 34 opportunities to get the combinations wrong, typing errors excepted. Obviously I can't try all 35 combinations out, because at the third failed attempt they'll pull the plug on my identity support and I'll have to open a new account and apologise to the 63 suppliers, friends, professional bodies etc. whose direct debits have thereby been cancelled and start all over again. Meanwhile Experian have sent out an APB, pillorying me as a BAD MAN.

Sorry. This was meant to be about buying mobile homes in Belgium. Another time perhaps. Cheery-pip!