After spending 20 minutes on hold to my credit card company this evening I realised that by calling their 0845 number, not only was it costing me more than a normal call, but they were also making money out of keeping me on hold. The solution was to call their 'if you're calling from abroad' number which is a standard landline number.

Why should any company make money from you calling them? If you have an inclusive minutes package on your phone line it's also unlikely that 0870 & 0845 numbers are included. A quick Google led me to Say No To 0870. The next time you need to call an 0870 or 0845 number, search by company name or the number and it will give you the landline equivalent. And stop paying companies for something they should be providing for free

Another four series of Humphrey Littleton's stories about Samantha:

Samantha In The Gramaphone Library - Series 32 - 35
Samantha Has To Go Now - Series 32 - 35

Full index here. Enjoy!

Having given up on my search for a Modular Technology PCI card (£130 on ebay seemed a bit excessive) I decided to buy a Pure The Bug digital radio. It has a timer that you can set to record to an SD card, so it does essentially the same as the PCI card, plus I wouldn't have to leave my PC on to record a programme. It also allows you to pause and rewind live radio.

It's solidly built, quite large, but not excessively so, and has a design that grows on you. Before it arrived I was a little unsure whether I would like the rather unusual shape, but it doesn't look out of place.

When you first switch it on it auto-tunes to find the available stations, then you're away. I live in a bit of a dead spot for FM, but am able to get all of the BBC stations at 100% signal quality and a number of others at between 70-90%.

Apart from a brief play with another Pure model at Christmas, this was my first real experience of digital radio. First impressions were that it sounded good, comparable to the quality of a portable CD player. Certainly not hi-fi, but I wasn't expecting that from a radio with two small speakers.

Then I tried it through headphones . It sounds absolutely appalling. There is a constant background hiss even with the sound paused (not disimilar to the hiss on the iRiver mp3 player I had) plus what I can only describe as a growling sound. It doesn't make any difference which station you're tuned to, so it's not being broadcast, nor is it interference as it's the same anywhere in the house. It's also independent of the volume the radio is set to, which suggests it's a poor quality amplifier at fault. Once I'd heard it through headphones and knew the background sound was there, I was also able to hear it through the speakers.

There are three possibilities - either the radio is faulty, the model wasn't tested properly or Pure know it's there, but have decided not to do anything about it. When I speak to Pure technical support tomorrow, if it's anything other than a faulty unit it's going straight back for a refund.

**UPDATE 28/01/05**
It seems I'm not the only one to have noticed the problem with background noise. I've just found this forum post that describes exactly the same thing. This doesn't make me very confident that I've just got a faulty unit.

**UPDATE 30/01/05**
Spoke to Pure Technical Support. They said that a certain amount of background hiss is to be expected (so bear this in mind if you plan to listen through headphones) due to the amplifier, but there shouldn't be any other sound. It's being replaced next week, but I'm not holding out much hope the new one will be any better.

The New York Times puts it beautifully:

Before Mr. Bush's re-election, the prevailing attitude in Europe was definitely: "We're not anti-American. We're anti-Bush." But now that the American people have voted to re-elect Mr. Bush, Europe has a problem maintaining this distinction.

Exactly. The thinking goes something like this - in Europe, George W Bush is universally portrayed as being a bit thick. Alright, downright stupid. It is almost unheard of for someone with a low IQ to be voted in to head a government in Europe; you're unlikely to vote for someone who is less intelligent than you are, therefore 51% of Americans must be at least as stupid as Bush is. And does anyone actually believe this empty rhetoric?

Some shameless self-promotion here, but if you're at all interested in politics and the upcoming general election, get yourself over to my new site www.electionwatch.co.uk.

Partly inspired by Manic's call to arms at Bloggerheads, and partly so I don't gunge this site up with political posts, that will be my place on the interwebnet to post news & views in the lead up to this year's general election. And before anyone says it, yes, the layout may look a bit familiar - I was too lazy to do a new template.

If you have a website, please join me in starting a new Googlebomb. The target is the website of Christian Voice, the organisation who have the audacity to complain about Jerry Springer The Opera, whilst preaching their anti-gay, anti-abortion, racist message, and the link text is ignorant bigots. Once again, ignorant bigots.

**UPDATE 16/01/05**
A fine effort chaps, thanks - Christian Voice are now 1st in Google and Yahoo for the search ignorant bigots. Now it's there I'm going to change the title of this post to try and drop from 2nd.