Save money on UK non-geographic phone calls

As some of you will know, I've been overhauling our phone bills recently. We've exchanged home highway for broadband which has cut a large chunk. I've signed up with 1899 and call18866 which have great savings. The only big hassle left was non-geographic phone numbers. The ones starting 0870 and 0845 (and 0800, but those are free as long as you use BT when you're calling).

0870 in particular can be very expensive. A lot of companies have 0870 numbers and get part of the money from the call. They're nowhere as bad as premium rate numbers or calls to mobiles, but they can still cost you 7p a minute during the day and cost even more if you call them via phone providers other than BT. (you've really got to watch out for them if you use any other service)

However, I have discovered this wonderful web site
http://www.saynoto0870.com/

It lists all the alternatives it can find to 0870 numbers. I've already used it twice today, to call the customer service about my son's computer (it was his 20 min call to them at the weekend on an 0870 number that sparked my determination to find an alternative) and to get information about online banking from NatWest. In both cases, this site had a valid freephone number instead of the one on the invoice/bank statement.

That wretched book meme

I've been tagged by two people now, so I guess I can't ignore them both.

How many books do I own?

We have 6 bays of books in the library. Probably more of them are Richard's than mine, but it's still loads of books.

Last book bought

I bought two of Colin's 'New Naturalist' series for waveney when we passed an Oxfam bookshop on a ZZ9 slouch. They're very good reading. Seriously in depth, but still intended for the intelligent amateur rather than people who studied biology at university. Even the really old ones are still worth reading.

Last book read

'Cod' - a very interesting book on the history of cod and cod-fishing. Did you know that the Basque were in North America long before all the people who supposedly discovered it. They went there to fish and kept the location of their fishing grounds secret.

Books that mean a lot

Several, though for a mixture of reasons. Sometimes the associated memories are painful, but the books still have other resonances.

'Lord of the Rings' is the book I've read more times than any other, followed by 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress'. I'd hate to be without a collection of Kipling's poetry, even though there are linked memories. 'Self-editing for fiction writers' taught me an amazing amount about the art of writing (far more than many books with flasher titles) 'Screw the Roses, Send me the Thorns' is fun, and 'Family Jewels' is, um, memorable. (If you recognise the first title, then you might possible recognise the second. Otherwise, if you look up the second, don't say that I didn't warn you...) Last, but not least, my two Stargate novels both mean a lot to me. Someday, I really must write the third - maybe when I've finished wrestling with banks and utilities.

Budgie wrangling

We used to have half a dozen budgies free-flying in one of the bedrooms, but as the boys got older and Kelvin left home and several of the birds died of old age (age 10 is pretty good for a budgie) we were finally left with just Zathras. He's in a cage downstairs now, so that he at least has human company.

However, we feel guilty about not letting him fly free, so about once a week, we let him out for a few hours. The hard part, is getting him back in the cage. He never seems to be hungry enough to go back on his own (we can't leave him out forever as people are going in and out the room and he might fly out the door) and he's a nifty flyer.

It's a two man and a sheet job to get him back again. I fend him off one curtain rail and Henry hovers under the rail at the far end of the room with an old sheet to fling over him.

It usually takes around 15 minutes...