Simon Rumble’s blog

We had a rather abrupt start to the day this morning: the ceiling in our kitchen collapsed! There's now a 2m diameter hole in our ceiling.

A few months ago upstairs had a leaky bath. The ceiling started to crack and our useless not-very-handyman missed two appointments to come and repair it. After this collapse, we got him to come around and do the majority of the cleanup, though we've spent much of this evening cleaning still.

Well it's historic dust at least, last seen when George V had his royal buttocks on the throne.

Photos here.

Last Friday I had a rather unfortunate experience with my bank card. It stopped working, with conflicting messages from different points: ATMs said "your bank is unable to process your transaction" while POS terminals just said "Declined" (just before the checkout clerk looks at you like you're a bum).

So I ring the bank and they lie to me twice. First they tell me that their fraud detection system has suggested there might be fraud on my account. Not unreasonable considering I've been buying lots of stuff all over the world for our big trip: train tickets in Germany, SIM cards from Switzerland and Hong Kong, flights and festival tickets in Denmark, hostels and trains in Spain. Fair enough, that's pretty unusual activity given my past usage. She then tells me that they called and left a message: they didn't; lie 1.

Next she goes through some of the transactions. The useless thing about all this is that for most of the transactions she couldn't tell me more than the date and the GBP amount. She couldn't even tell me the currency of the transactions, let alone the merchant putting the transaction through. I don't know about you, but I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of all the transactions I've made recently, converted into GBP!

Anyway, I get through that and figure it's _probably_ kosher, so she says she'll unlock my card. This will, of course, happen immediately. Lie 2 comes in and my card still doesn't work. Another call later in the day and, whaddaya know, it's not unlocked. Grrrr.

Fortunately Scott spotted me some cash for the gig we were going to. Thanks mate.

Now the interesting part: it seems that Shittybank's ATM network has been cracked. At least my situation wasn't as bad as this poor guy visiting Toronto.

In case you don't know, Holly and I are heading off travelling around Europe in April. We're planning to be on the road up to eight months, so I've been doing some research into communications on the road.

Mobile phone companies are making ridiculous amounts of money from what they charge for roaming. Text messages cost 30p and data can weigh in at £16 a megabyte!

After rather a lot of hunting around, I've found there are other options. In fact, some of these options are worth considering for UK residents anyway as they're cheaper than most pay as you go tarrifs. Prices are in Euro unless otherwise specified.

I'm going to get two SIM cards, one for Holly and one for me.

My one is the GT-9 which costs €39 and gives you a UK mobile number. It does 26 cent/min calls to landlines (worldwide) and 9 cent SMS. It also allows data, so we can check our email and browse web. Downside is you pay for incoming calls (38 cent/min) while you're outside the UK and it has limited coverage so a couple of our destinations aren't covered: Belarus, Ukraine.

This would be worth exploring even if you live in the UK and don't travel all that much. 9 cent SMS, 26 cent/min calls to landlines or 39 cent/minute to mobiles is certainly cheaperthan Orange's 10p, 20p and 40p, what's more those rates are for calls and texts to anywhere in the world!

For Holly's phone, we'll get United Mobile for £29 which gives you a Liechenstein number. This has free incoming calls in all the places we'll be visiting (except Gibraltar, Ukraine and Liechenstein), coverage everywhere though in the abovementioned and some other places you need to pay for incoming, 49 cent SMS, 39 cent/min calls to Australia and UK or 59 cent/min calls to Australia and UK mobiles.

This way we've got coverage in all the places we're gonna be, can make calls at quite reasonable rates and can receive calls free (the caller needs to call Liechenstein, but the rate for people in Australia is the same as calling a UK mobile). Most importantly, SMS will be cheaper than it is in the UK and I imagine that's what we'll be using most.

As a kid growing up in rural Australia, I used to religiously watch a programme called Towards 2000 (inexplicably renamed Beyond 2000 in 1981) which showed cool technology we could look forward to seeing. For the Brits, I imagine Tomorrow's World was the same idea and probably where they nicked the idea.

Anyway, I distinctly remember a really cool thing being demonstrated: a drink can that cooled the drink within when you popped the top. Now this was back in the early to mid eighties and now, twenty years on, I still haven't seen the technology.

From memory the can had a small CO2 cylinder which was released when you opened the can. The expanding gas would cool down the drink, so cold that there would be a thin film of ice on top. Brilliant!

Holly and I are going to be spending a lot of time over the next half year camping, and there's nothing nicer after pitching your tent than a cold beer. But we won't be carrying an esky, so where are these self-cooling cans we were promised?

A quick Google around finds New Scientist talking about such a device, though it looks like a fairly different technology. Maybe the CO2 thing was too expensive or there were safety issues. So it looks like this sucker exists, and has done for some time. So, beer manufacturers, how about it? I'd pay a premium for only having to carry the beer, not ice and insulation!

Yesterday we had Scott and Katie around for late lunch. I cooked up some chicken I had in the freezer. This was an old bird I'd bought for coq au vin, organic but old so it had used those muscles. Chucked in pancetta, onions, garlic, thyme and chicken stock, then simmered for about three hours. Served with roast veggies. Delicious!

I'm looking forward to leftovers!

Well about forty minutes after my last moblog post, I lost my phone on a gondola. Doh! Hopefully insurance will cover it. Until I get a replacement, you'll have to contact me through other methods.

But I now have no reason to complain about the Australian Tax Office. I just completed (yes, very late) my UK tax return for 2004/2005. ARGH!!!! I think the Marquis de Sade couldn't design a more convoluted, confusing form.

Wow, these flat pack bowls, plates and cups look great. I think I want them.

Wired are doing their cheerleading again. This time, we're assured, it's a boom and not a bubble. Of course, last time Wired told us we were in for 25 years of prosperity, freedom and a better environment for the whole world.

Still, the last bubble was a lot of fun, even if it means my CV is littered with companies that no longer exist. Must be time to dust off my plans for Bubble Goo and make bank.

The last two days, I've received emails through two addresses registered over the years with The Guardian. These were addresses used to register for competitions, forums etc. I never gave permission to be spammed with "GuardianUnlimited Today". That's rather sad as they used to be The Good Guys.

Fortunately, the addresses they were spamming are (or were, as you'll see) Sneakemail addresses. Sneakemail allows you to createdisposable email addresses for just these kinds of things. When they start spamming you, you know the source and how conned you into supplying the email address. What's more, once it starts getting spammed you can delete it. Lovely!