Destroy All Onions!

A couple of weeks ago I finally got myself a new mobile phone, after much pondering. It’s taken me a little while to get into it, but today clinched it, and I’ve decided that I definitely like it.

It’s a Sony Ericsson C702. For me, it has two key features – it’s a Sony Ericsson, which means it works pretty much the same way as my previous phone (a Sony Ericsson K800), except that it’s got a built-in GPS.

I’ve been tempted to buy a sat-nav for ages, but I’ve been resisting because I don’t often drive to unknown places; however I’ve always remained very keen on the technology. Now that GPS is available in phones (some of the new Nokias, and of course the devil’s own iPhone), it’s even more attractive.

Of course, multi-purpose devices can never work as well as a dedicated single-purpose one. Sat-navs work out where they are very quickly, whereas this one can take quite a while to pick up the satellite signal (a few minutes sometimes). For the first few days, the performance was very poor, but it has improved as it has downloaded more info from the satellites (something called an almanac, apparently). And once it does get locked on, it’s pretty reliable, and works fine inside a car.

I’ve been experimenting with it on my bike, with some success, but today it managed to guide me reliably from Manchester Airport to a meeting in Doncaster, and back again (over 2 and a half hours of driving) with the voice telling me every turn of the way. And since it was just my mobile phone sitting in the car, and not a GPS stuck on the windscreen, I am very impressed. It also still had enough charge to make phone calls, which is also useful for a phone.

I know the camera isn’t as good as the old one was, and in time I’ll probably miss that, but for now, I really like my new phone. 🙂

Earlier today, I watched the street outside my house fill up with water, as it rained all day. Then the rain eased a bit, and the flooding went away, and I went out. That was a bit of a mistake.

Trying to get home tonight was mental. Every road I took ended with roads closed by flooding. I saw houses with water at the front door, I saw a road with a bulge like a volcano because of the pressure of water under it, I saw water running down roads like rivers. In the end, after much driving around, I managed to get to my street, but I couldn’t get down as far as my house. I abandoned the car on a dry footpath a few doors up, and waded home.

I reckon there was over a foot of water on the footpath, so it was even deeper on the road. The jury’s out on whether I’ll be wearing those trainers again. The water flooded my garden, and was well up the drive, but stopped short of my house.

It’s a scary feeling to drive round your own town and see so much chaos. Its even scarier when you realise you might not be able to get home. But I’m very thankful that my home was safe when I got here.

Despite this blog being called “Destroy All Onions”, I’ve  gone fairly easy on the subject of the onion, and its unspeakable evil.

But I was out for tea a week or two ago and saw this in arestaurant, and felt I had to warn you all.

Do you see it?

Do you see what they are trying to do to poor simple coffee drinkers??

Look at it again upside-down if you have any doubts!

You see it now don’t you – a big horrible onion drawn on the top of the coffee. It can only mean coffee with some kind of vile onion syrup!

Beware the onion, gentle readers! They can be hiding anywhere!