The Smart Gasman Cometh – a Smart Metering Song

It’s almost exactly fifty years since Flanders and Swann wrote their classic comic song “The Gasman Cometh”.  With the advent of smart metering it seemed an appropriate time to update it, and give all those involved in smart metering something to sing at their Christmas parties.  I’d also recommend singing it whilst reading DECC’s First Annual Progress Report on the Roll-out of Smart Meters.  It has the advantage of being considerably shorter.

Twas on a Monday morning,
The gasman came to call.
My meter wouldn’t work,
It wasn’t being smart at all.
He put another meter in,
It took him several hours.
But it couldn’t send a reading, as the comms hub wasn’t powered!

Oh, it all makes work,
For the working man to do!

 

Twas on a Tuesday morning,
The comms hub man appeared.
He wiggled his antennas
And he said “It’s as I feared.
Your DLMS is buggered,
Your ZigBee’s obsolete. 
But I’ve set you up on prepay.”  So off went all my heat!

Oh, it all makes work
For the folk at DECC to do!

 
Twas on a Wednesday morning,
The DCC man came.
He asked my for my date of birth,
My shoe size and my name.
He said “You’ve failed security,
I’ll have to go away
And check it with my database.  But have a free display!”

Oh, it all makes work
Over at GCHQ!

 
Twas on a Thursday morning
The Display man tapped my door.
He showed me lots of menus,
But I’m not sure what they’re for.
He said “It shows your gas bill,
And your current tariff rate.
But that isn’t what they’ll charge you, as the head-end’s out of date!”

Oh, it all makes work,
For consulting folk to do!

 
Twas on a Friday morning,
The Head End man came by.
I showed him my new meter
And he gave a heartfelt sigh.
“That’s not SMETS2”, he said to me, 
“It won’t connect at all.”
But he wrote my meter reading down and told me who to call!

Yes, it still makes work,
For the working man to do!

 

On Saturdays and Sundays,
They charge a call-out fee.
So I bought some solar panels and migrated to PV!

 

This is obviously the short version.  Writers are needed for another 1,820 verses to take us through to 2020, when every house in Great Britain will be reaping the benefits from have working smart meters and IHDs.

If you’ve never heard the original version by Flanders and Swann, you can listen to it here.  Or buy the piano score and play it yourself while you wait for your smart meter to arrive.

 

Download “The Smart Gasman Cometh - a song for the Smart Meter age”

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