As I mentioned back in April, I decided to fire O2 when my contract was up since they offered literally no incentive to stay with them despite having been a perfect loyal customer for 18 months. Oh, how I wish I could undo what I did.

When I got my first mobile phone in the late 90s, I went with Orange, and found them to be fine. I had literally no complaints, until I moved to London, where I suddenly found that approaching half the time I would be unable to make a call because their network was busy. So I chucked them and moved to T-Mobile, which had no such problems and also had the advantage of offering me half-price line rental since I had a mate who worked there and he put me on their Friends & Family scheme. This was nifty for a good few years, and the only gripe I ever had with T-Mobile was their laughable range of handsets. Whenever the adverts and magazines trumpeted a new phone or range of features, I knew I wouldn’t be seeing it any time soon since the range of phones available was always a good year behind that of the competitors. Still, no worries really. I had a Sony Ericsson walkman phone something-or-other that did the job and let me listen to music without a separate MP3 player, and that was all good.

Then the iPhone came along. Not being a bleeding-edge-early-adopter (read “credulous git with too much cash”) I did some waiting and seeing, and when the price came down and the handset got good (the 3G), I took the plunge – which at the time (Autumn 2008) meant switching to O2. This I did, and right up until April this year I had not one complaint about them or their service, but so piqued was I that my custom meant so little that I took proper umbrage and left, plumping for Vodafone instead.

Now, instead of getting a bit of a weak signal in the building where I work, I get zero signal pretty much all of the time. If by chance a call does come through, I have to quickly answer it and dash for one of the kitchens, where signal is mysteriously much better. The 3G coverage is laughable (I’ve heard people say this about O2 – trust me, you are in signal heaven compared to being on Vodafone), and I live in fucking London. We’re not talking about the bloody Shetland Isles here. Best of all, when using the maps feature as a route planner while driving (yes, using a cradle attached to the windscreen, not holding it in my hand) it routinely loses connection to the maps service and the Little Blue Line of Ultimate Hope – i.e. the line you must follow to get to your destination – just disappears while driving, usually in the middle of a series of complicated junctions.

I got married in June. Thanks, it was awesome. Previous to that I had my stag do in May. Two of the organisers of this splendid event were coming from overseas, including my best man. When I tried to call him THE DAY BEFORE THE STAG DAY, I was unable to do so, since there was an international calling bar on my new Voda phone. Moderately outraged, I called customer services and asked them WTF, and they said that it would be lifted once I had made three payments. So… no international calls for the first three months of my contract? And you didn’t bother to even fucking tell me this? A month or so later I had occasion to look up some actress or other on google images while I was out and about. I tapped a likely looking result, fully aware that the website I was about to arrive at was very likely what is referred to as NSFW, to arrive at a Vodafone webpage informing me that I wasn’t allowed to look at material of this nature. Vodafone had decided – by default – to shield me from not only the danger of speaking to foreigners but also of seeing ladies with no clothes on. Without telling me.

I have been with all four of the big UK networks now (I don’t really count Three) and never had any of these problems before. Really, none of them. Without a shadow of a doubt, Vodafone are the worst I have encountered. My wife says I should complain – but to what end? I’m under contract until October 2011. Yes, another 13 months of this bollocks. But I have signed a contract, and unless I can prove that they are failing to deliver their end of the bargain, I’m fucked. She says “But they’re not providing the service you signed on for,” and while I agree with her, how would I prove this?

Do any of you have advice or similar stories/experience? Do you know of any other ways out of my contract (I’ll happily give the phone back and go back to O2, cap in hand) other than paying the line rental for the next 13 months?

UK mobile networks in order of preference:

1. O2
2. T-Mobile
3. Orange
4. …dunno, maybe try Three
5. Carrier Pigeon
6. Two cans and a really long string
7. Don’t use one, just become a hermit
8. …
9. Vodafone

–c.

Please can it be arranged that I spend the majority of my days playing guitar, writing music and drinking coffee? I mean… really?

Thanks, much appreciated,
Clive.

Firstly, let’s get the obvious crap out of the way:

• I like my iPhone
• I know that other smartphones do various things the iPhone doesn’t
• I don’t care if your Blackberry, Android, or whatever has better camera/speed/apps/whatever than the iPhone
• I don’t evangelise my choice of phone to other people, please afford me the same courtesy
• No, really

OK? Still here? Then let us continue.

I’ve had my iPhone 3G (8GB) for just over 17 months now, and my contract is an 18-month one, so O2 have been urging me to upgrade to the shiny new iPhone 3GS, which is something I want to do*, so I popped into the local O2 store to talk turkey, and more relevantly, money – specifically focussing on contract lengths and handset costs.

I got my iPhone on an 18 month contract at £35/mo, and the handset cost me £99 at the time. Total money handed to O2: £729. Not inconsiderable, n’est ce pas? Now, if I was just any old Joe off the street wanting an iPhone 3GS (16GB, for that is the smallest size of the new model), and wanted to keep the monthly cost down around £40, these would be my options:

• 18 months @ £35/mo, handset cost £149. Total: £779
• 18 months @ £40/mo, handset cost £89. Total: £809

Those are basically the two plans I would be interested in. They both come with the standard O2 unlimited mobile data, unlimited texts, and enough minutes for me not to have to worry about it (the £30/mo plan only has 100mins whereas these two have 300 and 600 respectively).

OK, so either of those sound about doable. But! Hey, those prices are for any old bloke who wants a new iPhone – what about me? I’ve been a loyal customer for the last 17 months, never missed a payment, never caused O2 any trouble except for the minor inconvenience of having to count the money I hand over to them on a monthly basis. Surely they’ll waive the handset fee? Surely. I’d even go to the £40/mo plan, which would mean I’m still worth £720 to them over the next 18 months – it’s not like I’m asking for the moon here. I’m asking for an £89 handset charge to be knocked off in recognition of the fact that I’ve already handed over £700+ without so much as a quibble.

Nope. Not a bit of it. They don’t want to know. It’s full bloody price, or don’t bother. Been with us a year-and-a-half have you sir? Well that’s nice, but it doesn’t count for squat. Excuse me sir, there are clamouring hordes of customers behind you all queuing up to pay full price. Don’t let the door hit you on the arse on the way out.**

Screw them. Orange’s prices are almost identical, and they have far better data coverage***.

O2 – you are the weakest link. Goodbye.

–c.

* Please, honestly, leave it. Any comments along the lines of “You should get an HTC! They piss all over the iPhone you stupid fanboy!” will be left here for all to see just how boring you really are.
** No, of course he didn’t actually say that, but that was the inference.
*** Yes they cap 3G usage, but 750MB/mo is included and I’ve never been anywhere near that.

I’ve been doing this since 1997 or so. Since before the word “blog” was coined – it was an “online journal” then. But now I have less free time, more to do offline, and more forms of entertainment jostling for my attention. Also Twitter has moved in and taken up at least a small part of that need to self-publish, even if it is just announcing what I had for lunch or what so-and-so said in the pub.

I’ve been compiling my top 100 albums of the 2000s ready for another post, or series of posts, and have come to the conclusion that there’s really very little point. I’ll probably still post it – I bothered to compile it after all – but after that I may well wrap this whole thing up. My archive goes back to 2003 here at cm.com, purely because before that I was doing it manually, and from that point on I was using a blog engine which let me move my archive from place to place. I hope it’s been enjoyable to some, perhaps even occasionally informative or amusing.

But I think it may be time to hang up the keyboard officially.

Yell if this displeases you – I do still read the comments – but unless life changes wildly in the coming months I can’t see me feeling like updating this thing very much more.

One thing I can say – my top 100 albums of the 00s will feature a lot less Jack White than NME’s chart.

–c.

In actual fact, I had to delete the previous post that was here (I can’t actually recall what it was about now, either) because something went hugely wrong with it, causing Google Chrome to refuse to show my site at all, claiming it was infected with malware, and when I tried to view it in Firefox my entire PC shut down. I took that as a sign and deleted it.

But also, as some of you closer to me will know, I have had a bad month with regard to my anxiety problems. Looking back – and I have now felt pretty good for three or four days in a row, so I’m hoping I’m out of it – I can see that a lot of factors all contributed to the problem which overwhelmed me so.

Firstly my Dad got ill. He’s 83 this year, and while still very fit for his age, he is starting to get on a bit, so when he got the shingles it was never going to be pleasant. During this there were complications that hospitalised him, and I worried about him, as you would. Additionally work was super-crazy for a period, and the stress levels involved there climbed higher than usual. Hayfever made its presence felt. I developed a stiff neck which (according to my fiancée, who is a therapist and masseuse) triggered twinges and tingles all down my left arm, which my now anxious brain decided to interpret as heart problems. I decided to get round this on at least two occasions by drinking alcohol to make me relax, and then ended up feeling worse the next day because of it.

It all mounted up, and got on top of me, is what I’m basically saying. I know I’m basically jumping at shadows, but that’s anxiety disorder for you. Even though I know I have it, it doesn’t make the worry any less real, or the symptoms any less frightening.

Of course, it helps to talk about it. My fiancée, my boss, my friends, the people on Twitter, everyone has been really supportive and helpful, and I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your support and your helpful words, comments and tweets.

Love,
–c.

Jesus Christ. This reminds me why I usually shun online delivery services in December. I know if I was to have words with either service in question, or the postal service, I would be told “We are experiencing an unusually high volume of post at this time.” Yes. It’s December, hence Christmas. It happens at the same time every fucking year. You might want to think ahead.

Benders.
–c.

Music is, as you likely know, very important to me. If I’m not writing it or playing it, I’m usually listening to it. And in all this I try to be reasonably open-minded, even though my listening habits are usually pretty narrowly confined to the arenas of rock, classical and ambient. But… But but but…

I’m sorry about this, but there are some artists that I just hate. I really do. I’ve tried not to, I’ve tried to give them a fair go, but I just can’t do it. A few bars in and I’m either reaching for my headphones or heading for the door.

At this time that list includes:
- The Smiths/Morrissey
- Johnny fucking Cash
- Beck
- The White Stripes

There are plenty of currently trendy bands that I would put on this list if I knew their names (one I know is Vampire Weekend – more irritating than genital warts) purely because they seem to take pleasure in singing just a bit off key or pjaying just out of tune enough to make me wish I could go spontaneously deaf, but I really don’t have the stomach to research their names.

Jesus. Just thinking about some of the shit that is played on the office stereo gives me the fucking shakes.

Still. If ever I’m at a party of yours and you want to get rid of me, now you know how to do it.

–c.

I expect many people found it to be unwatchable dross, but I loved every second of it. It’s the only film I can think of in the last few years* that made me want to see if I could hide under my seat and stay in the cinema to watch it again immediately. Honestly. And the only film that’s every engendered that response in me before was when I first saw the original Matrix film, though that was on VHS in my bedroom, so in that instance I simply rewound it (remember rewinding?) and watched it again.

Wanted is brilliant fun. But if you want something that makes sense or teaches you something or gives you some deep insight into life, it’s not the one for you.

–c.
* Dark Knight included. Yes, it was great. But it didn’t make me go “Holy shit let’s watch that again!”

Congratulations, America, and welcome back.

–c.

Jesus Crispy Deep-Fried Fucking Christ. GET OVER IT.

–c.