Half a percent

original_aj came round last night and we went over to the Hoose to try the pub quiz and the Skullsplitter. Success was mixed.

As he arrived the phone went and I leapt for it in case it was Ed. It wasn't. It was a recorded marketing call - something about a holiday in Florida, I think - so I did what I generally do in such cases. I put it down and left it talking to nobody for a while in the hope that the marketers pay for the call by the microsecond. After finding and putting my boots and jacket on, I checked the phone and it was still going. In fact, I realised that it had looped. I wasn't quite sure whether to put it down, and said so to AJ. The evil grin on his face persuaded me - I left it talking and we went to the pub.

When we arrived, we found that the Skullsplitter was still lurking unconnected, so we had Thrappledouser instead. It was an entirely acceptable alternative. The Whisky Angels invited us to join their (quite large) team and we went on to beat everybody except - crucially - the bar staff.

Back at the house, we were saddened to find that sometime in the several hours I'd been out, the telemarketing machine had given up and rung off. Still, at least I wasn't left with the same decision to make this morning, or even this evening. Would I eventually have ended up getting a second phone line just because I couldn't bear to stop wasting their resources?

It's possible. A lucky escape, I think.

Addendum: More irrelevance - Arcosanti. Yes, I did use to play a lot of SimCity, actually.