A grand a bottle, Brum's new library and payemnt must be made.

5 February

Would you pay £1000 for a bottle malt whisky? No, I wouldn’t either. As much as I like malt a grand a bottle is silly money. Whisky of that price is not for drinking, it’s an investment. Even at a grand it’s in the shade pricewise with some I’ve seen. I found one selling for £56k, yes, £56k! The mind boggles. This has come from Tom who is in Coventry and I’ll get more details off him tomorrow when he comes over here. I didn’t know there was whisky shop over there, it might be worth a visit one day.

Remember this place …   

It’s Brums’ new library and cost millions to build, and then even more to move all the items from the old building into this one. Oh dear; the council are now saying that they can’t afford to keep running it at current levels of staff and opening hours. Around 150 jobs are to go there and others will be part-time between two different departments. The thing is, that building is packed with old records and documents that need to be constantly looked after and cared for. There’s a lot of other conservation work to be done that will take years to sort out.

Part of the problem for Brum council is of course the huge cuts to funding from central government that all councils are having to deal with. On top of that is a bill hundreds of millions due to female employees were under paid in comparison with male employees for years and years. That money has to found and paid out. I can’t say that have a lot of sympathy for the council here, yet I can’t help but wonder how the bill is worked out.

The idea is that people on the grade of job should be paid at the same rate. Fine, I have no problems with that. Council refuse collectors are full time employees, but school dinner ladies were part time in most cases. A lot of these ladies have been long retired so how will the council know how many hours someone worked 25 years ago. Most of the ladies will not have saved their wage slips either. Their employment contracts will also be gone I think. Getting a fair and correct back dated for them will be hard to sort out.

It reminds me of a woman I used to with years ago. We were both drivers and I was taking home a lot more than she was, even though we were on the same hourly rate. That woman kicked up about it. I started work at 6.30am and rarely left before 6.30pm. When it was suggested that she worked the same number of hours she didn’t want to know. This was an issue that caused a lot of resentment within the firm and we were all very pleased when she finally left us.

There are regular news items that women are being held back at work. There is no excuse for that! If a woman is the best candidate for a post, then she should get it, and at the same rate that and males would be employed at.

Today’s photo … 

A squall on our bird table.

Today’s funny come from the Sage again …

Little Suzy was not the best student in Sunday School, because she usually slept through class.
One day the teacher called on her while she was napping, "Tell me, Suzy, who created the universe?" When Suzy didn't wake up, Little Johnny, seated in the chair behind her, took a pin and jabbed her in the rear.
"God Almighty! " shouted Suzy and the teacher said, "Very good," and Suzy fell back asleep.
A while later the teacher asked Suzy, "Who is our Lord and Savior?" But, Suzy didn't stir from her slumber. Once again, Little Johnny poked her in the butt.
"Jesus Christ!" shouted Suzy and the teacher said, "Very good," and Suzy fell back asleep.
Then the teacher asked Suzy a third question. "What did Eve say to Adam after she had her twenty-third child?" And again, Little Johnny jabbed her with the pin. This time Suzy jumped up from her desk and shouted:
"If you stick that damn thing in me one more time, I'll break it in half!"
The teacher fainted.