I'm a runner up in the Typhoo OO-Along competition! The prize is to go to afternoon tea with two members of the Corrie cast at the Lowry Hotel in Manchester. That'll be quite an experience I'm sure (although I'm not a Corrie watcher!!! Hope I recognize the actors!) Here's my video!
Showing posts with label comping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label comping. Show all posts
Sunday, 2 January 2011
Friday, 24 December 2010
A Comping Christmas...Cheers to Everyone!!
My aim this year was to try to win Christmas! With the recession biting and the people at Student Finance robbing us blind, an extra mouth to feed and me being made redundant, I decided in September to resume my comping hobby with an aim to win the things we couldn't afford.
This week I was lucky enough to win the Naked Wines Consequences Story Competition and won £1000 worth of beer, wine and chocolate! Perfect for the festive season! This morning we had a delivery that made my husband smile!
Our garage is now full of festive goodies that I am looking forward to sharing with friends and family. So, cheers to everyone. Hope 2011 brings good luck to everyone!
This week I was lucky enough to win the Naked Wines Consequences Story Competition and won £1000 worth of beer, wine and chocolate! Perfect for the festive season! This morning we had a delivery that made my husband smile!
Our garage is now full of festive goodies that I am looking forward to sharing with friends and family. So, cheers to everyone. Hope 2011 brings good luck to everyone!
Tuesday, 14 December 2010
The Great Fine Art Fiasco...a Cautionary Tale to Compers!
As someone who regularly enters and sometimes wins competitions, I am used to receiving mystery parcels through the post. Usually, the goodies inside come with a note from the sender congratulating you on your success, but occasionally nothing more than a mystery gift arrives on your doorstep. 9 out of 10 times the package's contents triggers a memory and you recall filling in the form or commenting on the blog in question, and you pat yourself on the back for being a clever clogs!
Rarely though, something completely anonomalous occurs. Something unbelievable that shakes your trust in the entire foundations that provide the backbone to our hobby. I know because it happened to me!
A knock on my door heralded the arrival of a huge parcel. It was massive and heavy and encased in a plastic box. My mind boggled trying to work out what would fit in this box...it was kind of TV shaped, but didn't have the right packaging. Thankfully, my husband was home. He armed himself with a knife and began hacking through the tape. The plastic box covered a polystyrene box, which contained a thick polythene wrapped package. It was like some sort of crazy grown-up pass the parcel, as we pulled aside layers to reveal the hidden prize.
At the very heart of the parcel was a picture. It looked like a child's drawing of a house containing a black scribble, framed in a big, thick wooden boxframe. I looked at it with puzzled eyes. I've never entered any competitions to win any artwork, let alone weird absract artwork on a giant canvas, wrapped up like it was the crown jewels! We sat wondering how my name and address could have been known by the sender. I'm always filling in forms online or in person, but surely I'd remember trying to win that! I don't follow art blogs and don't move in the circles where fine art would be considered as a prize for filling out your name and address on an entry form!
Ian looked closer and saw the artist's name was Antony Gormley. I googled. He was the artist behind the Angel of the North. A little further delving and we discovered the picture that stood propped up against Fred's highchair was in fact The Firmament. One of only 60 in the world and priced at £1245 + VAT. At this point, I felt even more confused, panicky and in total shock. An important piece of artwork would never be proferred as a prize. This is when alarm bells started ringing. The Conspiracy Theorist in me starting concopting elaborate ideas involving art smuggling and fencing stolen masterpieces via innocent compers who spread their details far and wide on the internet.
We didn't know what to do for the best. We had signed for this unsolicited item unwittingly. We were liable. We rewrapped it and stashed it away, scared to death in case Freddy hit it with one of his projectiles! We sat back and waited for some repurcussion.
Two days passed. No Mafia gangsters appeared, no further works of art appeared on our doorstep. I continued to wrack my brains and fervently google looking for clues as to why I had over a grand's worth of art gallery sat in my dining room. Then, the next evening there was a knock on my door. A man told me he'd come to collect a parcel. My immediate thought was that a deliveryman had popped a card through a neighbour's door saying they'd left a parcel from Next at my house. As a stay at home mum, I often take in deliveries for our cul-de-sac for those that go out to work during the day. So I apologised to the man saying I hadn't taken anything in for anyone. He went away. Minutes later he returned saying that he'd spoken to his boss and I had something for him to collect. It was at that point that a shiver ran down my spine as I connected this man to our mystery work of art. I got on the phone to Ian who told me not to let anything leave our house without an explanation. We had signed for the piece, our name and address was linked to it. Thankfully Ian was nearly home and I told the stranger on my doorstep that he'd have to deal with my husband as I knew nothing about it. (Yes, I'm a coward!) I shut the door and hid out in the living room!
When Ian arrived home, it became clear that the man who had been sent to retrieve the picture had no idea about what was going on. Several phone calls followed with Ian looking for some explanation and some proof that we were not embroiled in some scam, with us as unwitting patsies! Eventually, he untangled the truth.
An art dealer had ordered the rare artwork from a gallery in London at the same time as I won a prize through a PR company, also in London. The art dealer lived up North, I'm in the Midlands so our parcels took similar journeys to a courier company that serves these areas. On arrival, that company attaches their own address labels to the packages before loading them onto the vans. Only, in this instance, my name sticker ended up on the artwork and the art dealer's name sticker ended up on my prize.
How this can be allowed to happen? Surely there are failsafes in place to stop this sort of thing from occurring...but apparently there aren't! It happens, they told us! I can only imagine the look on the art dealer's face after parting with his £1245 + VAT only to receive my little prize instead! I'm sure heads have rolled over this. I was so stressed having the Gormley in my house, wondering how and why it came to be there. Wondering who was using my name and address, not knowing whether it was a genuine mistake or at the heart of a more sinister activity that I had been sucked into.
Today, my parcel (something I won for my husband for Christmas, so I won't tell you what it is!!) arrived to me, its rightful owner and the Firmament went to an art lover from up North. Everything back where it should have been. But it still beggars belief how this was allowed to happen, in a time where we have computers, parcel tracking and bar coded delivery labels. It makes me wonder how many other parcels go astray or get sent to the wrong addresses. We've all had prizes go AWOL. I never received my Asda Mountain of Mugs that I won back in September. I've stopped chasing them. Is there someone, somewhere sipping tea out of a mug printed with my children's faces?? My mum received notification that she had won a hamper...it was never delivered to her. Did someone else enjoy her prize? It does make you wonder.
This experience has opened my eyes to a situation that I wouldn't have thought possible. It's like something out of a Carry On film. What other things go on, that we don't know about!!! I guess we'll never know...unless it happens to us. So Compers beware....keep your eyes on your prizes, you don't know where they might end up!!
Rarely though, something completely anonomalous occurs. Something unbelievable that shakes your trust in the entire foundations that provide the backbone to our hobby. I know because it happened to me!
A knock on my door heralded the arrival of a huge parcel. It was massive and heavy and encased in a plastic box. My mind boggled trying to work out what would fit in this box...it was kind of TV shaped, but didn't have the right packaging. Thankfully, my husband was home. He armed himself with a knife and began hacking through the tape. The plastic box covered a polystyrene box, which contained a thick polythene wrapped package. It was like some sort of crazy grown-up pass the parcel, as we pulled aside layers to reveal the hidden prize.
At the very heart of the parcel was a picture. It looked like a child's drawing of a house containing a black scribble, framed in a big, thick wooden boxframe. I looked at it with puzzled eyes. I've never entered any competitions to win any artwork, let alone weird absract artwork on a giant canvas, wrapped up like it was the crown jewels! We sat wondering how my name and address could have been known by the sender. I'm always filling in forms online or in person, but surely I'd remember trying to win that! I don't follow art blogs and don't move in the circles where fine art would be considered as a prize for filling out your name and address on an entry form!
Ian looked closer and saw the artist's name was Antony Gormley. I googled. He was the artist behind the Angel of the North. A little further delving and we discovered the picture that stood propped up against Fred's highchair was in fact The Firmament. One of only 60 in the world and priced at £1245 + VAT. At this point, I felt even more confused, panicky and in total shock. An important piece of artwork would never be proferred as a prize. This is when alarm bells started ringing. The Conspiracy Theorist in me starting concopting elaborate ideas involving art smuggling and fencing stolen masterpieces via innocent compers who spread their details far and wide on the internet.
We didn't know what to do for the best. We had signed for this unsolicited item unwittingly. We were liable. We rewrapped it and stashed it away, scared to death in case Freddy hit it with one of his projectiles! We sat back and waited for some repurcussion.
Two days passed. No Mafia gangsters appeared, no further works of art appeared on our doorstep. I continued to wrack my brains and fervently google looking for clues as to why I had over a grand's worth of art gallery sat in my dining room. Then, the next evening there was a knock on my door. A man told me he'd come to collect a parcel. My immediate thought was that a deliveryman had popped a card through a neighbour's door saying they'd left a parcel from Next at my house. As a stay at home mum, I often take in deliveries for our cul-de-sac for those that go out to work during the day. So I apologised to the man saying I hadn't taken anything in for anyone. He went away. Minutes later he returned saying that he'd spoken to his boss and I had something for him to collect. It was at that point that a shiver ran down my spine as I connected this man to our mystery work of art. I got on the phone to Ian who told me not to let anything leave our house without an explanation. We had signed for the piece, our name and address was linked to it. Thankfully Ian was nearly home and I told the stranger on my doorstep that he'd have to deal with my husband as I knew nothing about it. (Yes, I'm a coward!) I shut the door and hid out in the living room!
When Ian arrived home, it became clear that the man who had been sent to retrieve the picture had no idea about what was going on. Several phone calls followed with Ian looking for some explanation and some proof that we were not embroiled in some scam, with us as unwitting patsies! Eventually, he untangled the truth.
An art dealer had ordered the rare artwork from a gallery in London at the same time as I won a prize through a PR company, also in London. The art dealer lived up North, I'm in the Midlands so our parcels took similar journeys to a courier company that serves these areas. On arrival, that company attaches their own address labels to the packages before loading them onto the vans. Only, in this instance, my name sticker ended up on the artwork and the art dealer's name sticker ended up on my prize.
How this can be allowed to happen? Surely there are failsafes in place to stop this sort of thing from occurring...but apparently there aren't! It happens, they told us! I can only imagine the look on the art dealer's face after parting with his £1245 + VAT only to receive my little prize instead! I'm sure heads have rolled over this. I was so stressed having the Gormley in my house, wondering how and why it came to be there. Wondering who was using my name and address, not knowing whether it was a genuine mistake or at the heart of a more sinister activity that I had been sucked into.
Today, my parcel (something I won for my husband for Christmas, so I won't tell you what it is!!) arrived to me, its rightful owner and the Firmament went to an art lover from up North. Everything back where it should have been. But it still beggars belief how this was allowed to happen, in a time where we have computers, parcel tracking and bar coded delivery labels. It makes me wonder how many other parcels go astray or get sent to the wrong addresses. We've all had prizes go AWOL. I never received my Asda Mountain of Mugs that I won back in September. I've stopped chasing them. Is there someone, somewhere sipping tea out of a mug printed with my children's faces?? My mum received notification that she had won a hamper...it was never delivered to her. Did someone else enjoy her prize? It does make you wonder.
This experience has opened my eyes to a situation that I wouldn't have thought possible. It's like something out of a Carry On film. What other things go on, that we don't know about!!! I guess we'll never know...unless it happens to us. So Compers beware....keep your eyes on your prizes, you don't know where they might end up!!
Tuesday, 12 October 2010
The Ugly Side of Comping
My family have had the most amazing experience ever since nominating my wonderful parents for the title of Ultimate Family Superhero. We loved making our home video which captured the very essence of our big, loving family. I enjoyed the phone interview describing the thirteen talented, incredible grandchildren. We thought the photoshoot of my parents was amazing...they felt like celebrities and deservedly so!! And as for the challenge itself, the party we hosted will be remembered forever by everyone involved. We waited excitedly to see the final cut of the film and looked forward to sharing it with family and friends. I can honestly say that the prospect of winning a car was secondary to relishing the once in a lifetime oportunity of celebrating our family in such a unique manner.
When the site finally went live it was great to hear the reactions and responses from all our loved ones. The messages of support and the sharing of the link was heart warming. But very quickly I realised that this old school approach was not the way that this competition was meant to be played. We are meant to court this new fangled social media and enter blogs and comment on trending tweets all in the name of promotion. I am very naive and thought that people would look at three videos and vote for their favourite on the merit of worthiness, entertainment or that all elusive X Factor. I was happy to be judged on this criteria with a level playing field. However, when the result is going to depend on computer savvy, "going viral", stalking opposition to look for weakness and adding links direct to your own entry on Comping Forums thus by-passing the other two videos, I can not compete. My parents are 78 and can't switch a computer on, let alone promote themselves this way. I enjoy what I do on a computer and simply could not compromise my enjoyment by trying to infiltrate blogs and forums for the sole reason of self-promotion. I know that my refusal to enter into this will result in my parents losing...but my integrity is more important than this dangling VW carrot. I will continue to talk to friends and my fellow comping friends...who are few but wonderful. I will talk to the schools who would benefit from the prize money. I will occasionally tweet. I will let the local papers run stories that celebrate my parents. I will print flyers for my parents to hand out to the other OAP's who live in the bungalows next door to them...knowing full well they will not have access to a PC. I will invite anyone who reads my blog to watch my parents' film and if they like it they can vote. I will continue to respect the Mummy Bloggers and not turn their sites into "Vote for me" advertisements.
And do you know what...I feel so much better for having articulated this. I've had a miserable, tearful day thinking that people have made assumptions about me and concluded that I am not worthy of winning because I am a "serial winner" of cars which 1: I am not...my husband spent six hours in a cold shopping centre with his hands on a Hyundai and won on a tie-break question. This was not my doing, I've NEVER won a car and probably given what I know now, never will. And 2: Have only been entering competitions seriously since August this year. And 3: Entered this because I believe my parents deserved to be honoured never believing it'd get this far.
So...I'm basically happy to enjoy this ride to the end...but on my terms! The joy of the adventure will not be tarnished by my feelings on this desperate scrabble for votes. I want my voters to vote for me because we were the best candidates not because I invaded their cyberspace relentlessly. I have loved being a part of VW's Ultimate Family Superhero Competition but I am happy not to win the final prize if I can't achieve that without compromising my beliefs!
When the site finally went live it was great to hear the reactions and responses from all our loved ones. The messages of support and the sharing of the link was heart warming. But very quickly I realised that this old school approach was not the way that this competition was meant to be played. We are meant to court this new fangled social media and enter blogs and comment on trending tweets all in the name of promotion. I am very naive and thought that people would look at three videos and vote for their favourite on the merit of worthiness, entertainment or that all elusive X Factor. I was happy to be judged on this criteria with a level playing field. However, when the result is going to depend on computer savvy, "going viral", stalking opposition to look for weakness and adding links direct to your own entry on Comping Forums thus by-passing the other two videos, I can not compete. My parents are 78 and can't switch a computer on, let alone promote themselves this way. I enjoy what I do on a computer and simply could not compromise my enjoyment by trying to infiltrate blogs and forums for the sole reason of self-promotion. I know that my refusal to enter into this will result in my parents losing...but my integrity is more important than this dangling VW carrot. I will continue to talk to friends and my fellow comping friends...who are few but wonderful. I will talk to the schools who would benefit from the prize money. I will occasionally tweet. I will let the local papers run stories that celebrate my parents. I will print flyers for my parents to hand out to the other OAP's who live in the bungalows next door to them...knowing full well they will not have access to a PC. I will invite anyone who reads my blog to watch my parents' film and if they like it they can vote. I will continue to respect the Mummy Bloggers and not turn their sites into "Vote for me" advertisements.
And do you know what...I feel so much better for having articulated this. I've had a miserable, tearful day thinking that people have made assumptions about me and concluded that I am not worthy of winning because I am a "serial winner" of cars which 1: I am not...my husband spent six hours in a cold shopping centre with his hands on a Hyundai and won on a tie-break question. This was not my doing, I've NEVER won a car and probably given what I know now, never will. And 2: Have only been entering competitions seriously since August this year. And 3: Entered this because I believe my parents deserved to be honoured never believing it'd get this far.
So...I'm basically happy to enjoy this ride to the end...but on my terms! The joy of the adventure will not be tarnished by my feelings on this desperate scrabble for votes. I want my voters to vote for me because we were the best candidates not because I invaded their cyberspace relentlessly. I have loved being a part of VW's Ultimate Family Superhero Competition but I am happy not to win the final prize if I can't achieve that without compromising my beliefs!
Monday, 4 October 2010
More Car Madness!!
Just as the excitement of the VW filming has calmed down...we now have another crazy experience to contend with!!
I spotted a competition to win a Hyundai car with the Eden Shopping Centre in High Wycombe. You had to upload a picture of a car you had built and post it to their wall. Ten finalists would win the chance to compete in a Hands on my Hyundai Competition. The person who lasts longest takes the car! After 6 hours in the event of a tie, a tie-breaker will take place. Runners up win a goodie bag!
I challenged my husband Ian to enter this one, because he is the gadget mad one, who loved Meccano as a child! So next day at work he set about carrying out this task. As he works in the IT industry it seemed obvious to use computer components...CDs, pieces of Hard Drive and Key Board bits helped construct a rather ingenius little car that he proudly photographed and emailed to me!! I was very impressed, especially with him spelling out Hyundai with keyboard letters! So we entered it!
Surprisingly, only 22 entries were received in this competition. So the odds were very much in Ian's favour. I also think his was definitely one of the best, having been built especially for the competition and paying homage to the brand...making it particularly apt!
Today he received the phone call to say he is in the final 10. It's going to be mad. High Wycombe is 3 hours away from us and the contest starts at 9.15am. 6 hours standing up with 2 hands on a car is going to be horrible...but Ian was a Venture Scout and loves a challenge!! We're looking at it as another unexpected adventure that we would never have done otherwise. Life throws these opportunities at you...I think you have to grasp them and roll with them and see what fate has in store for you!! I'll be there supporting Ian and regardless of the outcome, we will have another unforgettable family adventure!!
IAN'S COMPUTER CAR
I spotted a competition to win a Hyundai car with the Eden Shopping Centre in High Wycombe. You had to upload a picture of a car you had built and post it to their wall. Ten finalists would win the chance to compete in a Hands on my Hyundai Competition. The person who lasts longest takes the car! After 6 hours in the event of a tie, a tie-breaker will take place. Runners up win a goodie bag!
I challenged my husband Ian to enter this one, because he is the gadget mad one, who loved Meccano as a child! So next day at work he set about carrying out this task. As he works in the IT industry it seemed obvious to use computer components...CDs, pieces of Hard Drive and Key Board bits helped construct a rather ingenius little car that he proudly photographed and emailed to me!! I was very impressed, especially with him spelling out Hyundai with keyboard letters! So we entered it!
Surprisingly, only 22 entries were received in this competition. So the odds were very much in Ian's favour. I also think his was definitely one of the best, having been built especially for the competition and paying homage to the brand...making it particularly apt!
Today he received the phone call to say he is in the final 10. It's going to be mad. High Wycombe is 3 hours away from us and the contest starts at 9.15am. 6 hours standing up with 2 hands on a car is going to be horrible...but Ian was a Venture Scout and loves a challenge!! We're looking at it as another unexpected adventure that we would never have done otherwise. Life throws these opportunities at you...I think you have to grasp them and roll with them and see what fate has in store for you!! I'll be there supporting Ian and regardless of the outcome, we will have another unforgettable family adventure!!
IAN'S COMPUTER CAR
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