Is it just me or do the Power companies set your monthly payments too low when you switch suppliers or move house and then let you run up a huge bill which ties you into them till you have paid off the balance.

We moved in to our house in October last year - in November we switched to E-on who told us our payments would be £65 a month.

After a few months we found out they had totally under estimated our reading at our old house and we now owed them over £1000. We were then told that our payment should have been £80 per month. With the money owed for our old property we now had to pay £140 per month

we then found out they had under estimated our readings in the new property too and their current estimate is £159 per month (double what we were originally asked to pay. So with the money owed from the previous property and the money owed from this one they want us to pay £235 per month (and that is after they waived almost £600 of the back money.

So we have gone from £65 to £235 in just under a year - talk about inflation and we are stuck with them for at least two years - after which they'll be dumped without a doubt!!

Yesterday Sarah was sitting with the kids in MacDonalds in Thornton Heath (near Crotdon)talking to her mum on the mobile. Ben was in the play area with his sister and cousin. Suddenly he let out a scream and came running over to his mum in tears. he had been bitten on the face by another child.

This child was about the same age as Ben and launched an unprovked attack on him - ben had just been standing there quietly when it happened.

The bite mark on his face was so bad that he needed to go to hospital to have it checked over. Thankfully the bite wasn't so deep and to require any major treatment but he has to take anti-biotics as a precaution and may need a tetanus injection.

The staff in Macdonalds were useless and the person who Sarah asked didn't even know if they had a first aid kit. Luckily for them there wasn't a serious disturbance between the parents of the two children because I doubt they would have coped.

Meanwhile Sarah's mum had driven down to the restaurant and while she was inside her car was keyed from one end to the other in the car park outside.

And I think to myself what a wonderful world!

I've been watching that Trinny and Suzanna program the Great British body and I had to laugh at the end! All through the program they were banging on about how they were going to get these people to strip off to help them deal with their body issues. In reality when it came to the crunch the only two people in the field who seemed to have issues about stripping off were....Trinny and Suzanna!! Everyone else got their kit off and lay about naked for hours on end while they organised the sculpture. The two of them wrapped themselves in space blankets and only shed them when they were so close together their bodies were actually hidden!!

I wish I'd known about it - I would have been up there like a shot - never known to be shy about getting my kit off in public!! I always wanted to be in one of those Spencer Tunick pictures - maybe one day!!

I can't believe I just did that!!

She said she wanted to go and see Madonna so I bought her tickets!!

I'm still recovering from the shock!

Sarah's eldest daughter's school organised a "Take your daughter to work" day and we were asked if we could take them with us to give them a taste of what a day in a work environment was like. So a couple of weeks ago I asked my boss if it was ok and to my surprise he said yes!

So today she came in with me and found out just how boring work can be!! I got her to help me sort out some graphics for an event next week and generally observe what I did. The girls in admin nabbed her while I was talking to one of the Directors and got her putting purchase orders into envelopes and franking them.

After a while I ran out of things for her to do and she started rummaging in my desk drawers and found a toy monkey which is now dangling from the back of my seat!

Tomorrow she has to discuss her experience and give a presentation so I blagged her a company t-shirt to wear but she's just tried it on and it's miles too big!! Oh well maybe she'll grow into it!!

All of 40 miles!!

There was an accident on the London bound side of the M20/A20 and the motorway was shut. I don't know what had happened but as I past the spot the Police were turning all the traffic round preparing to get them to drive back down the motorway on the wrong side.

Meanwhile it had taken me over an hour and a half to get the 5 miles to that point. The reason the driver of a 40' truck full of beer obviously hadn't spotted the stationary traffic in front of him and had to slam the brakes on. This caused him to turn over and as I passed the police were unloading the beer from the back of the truck as it lay on it's side across two lanes.

Sometimes I hate the South East!

....except incest and Morris dancing!

Well it finally happened I've gone back to Morris dancing. It happened at the Sweeps festival in Rochester last weekend when I was finally convinced to go back. So I went along to practise last Wednesday and again this afternoon - and to be honest I really enjoyed it. I'm also amazed how many of the dances I can actually remember after 2 years.

Also today the side - Wolf's Head & Vixen - were in the Independent on Sunday magazine in an article entitled

"Hey nonny no, no, no: Goths and pagans are reinventing morris dancing"

you can see it here

And there are pictures of the side here and here

Here is one of them it's our friends Hanna and Matt with their daughter Lillie

'Ere Garry you're a senior Police officer maybe you can spot what is wrong with this picture.

We have lived in our house for around 6 months now. In that time we have noticed that there are a few minor problems with vandalism and drunken behaviour on Friday and Saturday nights - nothing in the league of the guy who was kicked to death in your area - but enough to be of annoyance. My wing mirror was kicked off one night, I've had to pick up broken beer bottles from the front of the house on several occasions, next door's for sale sign has been kicked down more times than I care to remember - you get the picture. So with that and a number of quite vocal drunks wandering down the street in the early hours how many Police Officers have we seen in the street in those 6 months........

.....none!

Until today....

....today at the bottom of the street we have 10 armoured Police vans and about 40 Police officers -some in paramilitary uniforms with batons. Oh and apparently the area will be patrolled by a helicopter later - just in case! The reason?

A football match - Gillingham's last game of the season in which they may be relegated.

The two things that I can see are:

Firstly - remember all those years ago when we used to follow Sunderland around? Well what would antagonise football fans more than a large visible Police presence.

and secondly - if the money can be found for such a large Police presence today then why can't it be found for normal policing in street like ours (and other like it) every other day?

I'll shut up now or you will think I've turned into our Dad!

We just got back from a lovely weeks holiday in Wales near Aberystwyth. The Weather was really nice for most of the week which was most unexpected. In fact we had better weather in April than we had in Southern France in August last year.

We had picked the area because it was somewhere we had never been to but when we looked into it we found there were lots of interesting things to do and see. It is also a very scenic part of the world with stunning views.

On our first day - after we had made sure we had some food (didn't want to repeat the problem we had last year) we went into Aberystwyth to have a look around. We visited the castle and went down to the beach. We also noticed it had a Cliff lift which we investiagted later in the week (turns out it's the largest cliff lift in the UK.

One of the things that I noticed quite early was the number of steam railways there were in the area and we got to see not one, not two but three of them even though we only went on one of them. The first one we saw was the Vale of Rheidol railway which is in the centre of Aberystwyth. We happened to get to the station just as a train steamed in. It was a toss up between this one and the nearby Talyllyn railway as to which we went on.

In the end it was the Talyllyn because we found out that it was the railway on which the Rev W Awdry based the Skarloey Railway stories after he had worked there as a volunteer Guard. In fact the train that was in steam that day was No.2 Dolgoch which appears in the stories as Rheneas - the train that saved the railway. We also saw Rusty and I got a glimpse of Peter Sam in the sheds as we went past.

On the way home we stopped off at the Welshpool & Llanfair Railway and once again just as we arrived a train pulled into the station. Ben amd I had an intersting discussion as I thought the train was like Duck (being a GWR engine) but he said it was like Percy because he was green!! We also spotted another railway when we went to King Arthurs Labyrinth - The Corris railway which also features in the stories of Rev Awdry but sadly iy wasn't in steam that day.

Overall we had such a good time that we have booked to got back there next year at Easter to do some of the things we didn't get to do this time. Looking forward to it already!!

I just watched the latest episode of Skins again

I still can't believe Chris died - it was horrible

Poor Cassie