Bah. I'm about to check out the 10 O clock news and see if they have given this story some air time unlike the shameful showing at 6pm - BBC News 24 and Sky are now on permanent coverage from Sheffield so they ought to be sorted out now. It's quite exciting in a way watching the RAF rescuing people and you can hear the choppers in our bathroom - it sounds like 'nam.

You'd be pleased if you'd been shopping in Meadowhall, it's cut off - a whole night in the shops, oooh ;) I'd be making a beeline for the House of Fraser bed department...scarily, I often go there on a day off but I was too tired today!
:eek:

Thankfully davem had the sense to get home early or he'd be sleeping in the city centre under a bin bag or something. Alas, a boy was swept to his death in the river at the bottom of our hill, at teatime tonight. :(

EDIT: Disgraceful! 7 whole minutes on the story. This is Britain's 4th biggest city - is it any wonder we shout about the North/South divide?! Grrrrr....if this was happening in Chipping Sodbury there'd be a helpline set up and a one hour news special....

On the plus side I got very excited to see the Sea King rescuing folk from the office I used to work in by the Don, and a shot of the Sheaf by the bottom of our road, approx 12 feet above normal levels...

Lal, the Sheffield flooding got at least a brief mention in the news here in Germany - glad to hear that you two are well, though our sympathies go to those who lost loved ones in the catastrophe.

We've got no bother apart from a leaky window, but davem's mam has had to resort to sandbags as their village is flooded.

I think Mattius will be perfectly fine where he lives, too, in case anyone's wondering! :)

Glad to hear at least the news in Germany gave it some airtime! I'm still a bit shocked at the blase attitude of our news stations - just to add insult to injury last night's ITV news featured the tragedy of a flooded field in Gloucestershire. How terrible that some blades of grass may have been harmed, in contrast to the ruin facing businesses here - even the vast Meadowhall shopping centre is under mud and water, we face having no post for a week and worst of all....the Bertie Bassets factory was flooded so no Licquorice Allsorts! ;)

I assign mosquitos.

I assign the North-South divide. Even though I live in the South. I'm nice like that. :pI also assign contradictory clocks. Do I trust the 8:20, the 8:23 or the 8:25 one?!

I also assign unfounded rumours. There's one going round that Ulley Dam has now breached (it hasn't...yet) due to some electrical surges which mean we are being told not to use electricity if possible, which is raising a bit of panic because when/if it does go, all our electricity will be knocked out as the main substation lies in the path of any floodwater! :eek:

I also assign sanguinity - we are far too prone to this here, which is why so many people were caught out on rooftops yesterday, assuming it would 'all come to nowt'. I've even heard one or two people being overly bullish today. Or maybe that's just down to something else 'bullish' that folk can be prone to? ;)

Exactly! Unfounded rumors are the worst, except for when people decide that I have started the rumors based on nosy assumptions. I rarely make assumptions and almost never share them with others. *sigh* Some people... Definitely a Mordor experience.

Straight to Mordor for:

Parking Wardens who have been ticketing cars abandoned in the floodwater on Monday - people cannot start the things and drive them away, they are having to wait for limited tow truck services. And to Mordor with tow truck services charging through the nose for people to shift ruined, flooded cars.

Electricity wasters as half the city is now on rolling blackouts due to limited power. Plus the electric company for not choosing my workplace postcode to black out today ;)

Selfish bosses who are expecting people who cannot get to work on time or even at all to make the time up! And those who are expecting some reward for having got in - I've been in but I don't expect a medal for it.

Sweetie, you still live in the North as far as I am concerned ..... :rolleyes:

Yeah, my family ended canceling the trip entirely. We're still waiting to see whether we'll be able to get back the ~$4,000 we paid for plane tickets. :(

Ticks.

I'm paranoid from walking through weeds to get to a paddock. Pretty horses, yes, but I'm wearing a skirt and a tank top and somebody just mentioned ticks and how I ought to check for them and now I swear I've got the little critters crawling all over me.

Eew.

Bug bites.

Because while it's cool that I fell asleep reading Dracula and I woke up to find a crescent moon shaped series of bitemarks that looks like some cool nocturnal beastie was taking a nibble out of my belly, whatever it was set off an allergic reaction to the rest of the world and it's itchy, and I'm allergic to most allergy medications. :(

Mixed signals - especially from guys, and the resulting awkwardness. They're bad enough as it is, but why does it have to involve someone with whom I'll be working in Microbio lab for the whole term?

Falling asleep on the living room floor, suddenly waking up to realise that, and remembering that you were supposed to be working on a Microbio lab report.

I'm almost tempted to assign Microbio for indirectly causing these, but it's too cool for Mordor. :cool:

allergic to allergy medicine. . . .that is tragicomic.

I would probably laugh a bit if I did not know how awful alergies can be (and mine are not even that seriouse) and how much I love that medication.

That special kind of trouser spoiling fear that only comes with being driven at breakneck speed on a surreal route around the city centre by an elderly taxi driver who has an uncanny knack of making the car constantly lurch from side to side, ranting all the while about tax, braking hard behind other drivers, cutting up lorries on roundabouts, yelling about women drivers and going "Eh?!" at everything you say. In a torrential rainstorm.

:eek:

Travel agencys messing up your tickets!

I assign to Mordor unexpected delays that pile up from little things requiring you to do this and that to actually make you unable to accomplish anything you would wish to for days or weeks.

Rainstorms that lead to cancellations of barbeques and fireworks displays.

This Live Earth nonsense. I agree with the message but the coverage is appalling - I've sat there for two whole hours through some truly miserable tripe (including a dreadfully flat Chillis performance) to hear Metallica and they not only missed the beginning while they showed Enrique Ingelsias but they cut off Enter Sandman to show some highlights!!!! Blasphemy or what?! :eek:

:mad:

CD players from "The Family Dollar" that inexplicably stop working 2 weeks after you buy them, and can't be returned.

Having your daughter spend her third birthday at her father's house.

The. Horrible. Bright. Sunshine.

Why can't they be returned?

I don't know the american rules, but if the flaut was already there when it came from the store we have a two year guarentee. . .and it is them that has the burden of evidence.

It depends on the store; Family Dollar won't let you.

Is there no national standard?

It is weird. . .so they are allowed to sell you broken goods and there is nothing you can do about it?

Yep; all you can do is stop shopping there. Which I will do, trust me.

Hmm...maybe I should assign my country to Mordor; but I don't think it would fit. I guess I'll assign Mordor to the US! :smokin:

Working afternoons. It tosses my entire day. Working on a Saturday afternoon means not having time to accomplish anything during the day, spending the best hours inside, and leaving late at night too tired to do anything but collapse into bed. :(

And worse... the hour leading up to when you're supposed to be in work. What am I supposed to be doing when I only have twenty minutes before I have to walk out the door?

Family events that are scheduled at the last minute so I have to miss them b/c of work. *grumbles* *prays for patience*

Politicians, particularly those in the U.S., should be assigned to Mordor. I am dreading the upcoming presidential elections and the political dog-and-pony-show that is trotted out every four years with the same lackluster crew of misbegotten candidates who speak around issues (in keeping with the aims of their corporate patrons), while retaining the stilted status quo.

I am reminded of a quote Mark Twain wrote over a century ago that still holds true:

The way one simple government transaction inescapably means several others, and any goverenment transactions mean paperwork and signatures.

The way I never fit into categories properly so I actually have to talk to people to make sure the fine print does or doesn't apply to me and they're invariably confused about what I'm talking about because they've "never encountered this problem before."

Though this is (probably) already assigned, Harry Potter spoilers in livejournal. Shame on you!:mad:

The cancer that is stealing my friend away bit by bit, moment by moment.....

Chickens. If you've never taken care of twenty laying hens(that don't lay), who get out all the time(and often try to get back in but can't figure out how), you won't understand my complete dislike of them. And then I have to go and feel guilty every time one of them dies, or gets killed by a dog. Humph.

Having one eye that's red and gooey and seems impervious to eye-drops.

Extreme drunken foolishness

and even more so,

people who do not signal while driving:mad:

Poor fellow! What happened?

The fool who ran the red light and hit my coworker while walking across the street - at the light - while the pedestrian sign said "walk" - who is, thankfully, merely bruised and battered and cuncussed and a good deal shaken - and missing work (where he's needed badly, but first things first, of course).

Again poor fellow! So no broken bones? Aren't cuncussions bad?

Seasonal Allergic Conjunctivitis. Thankfully nowhere near as bad this year as when I firs got it two years ago. The world's not so bad... :)

Driving through suburbs when you're used to either highways or back country roads. People parked on both sides of the road, unsupervised kids on bikes, pedestrians that ignore crosswalks and favor jumping out from behind shrubbery, hedges that obscure stop signs...

Head split open in back actually. Stapled by the EMS folks. He'll survive and probably be much more cautious in the future.

60+-year-old men who wear very small cutoff shorts in public. They were far shorter than anything I, as a teenaged girl, have ever worn.

Ew. :eek: