Season's bleatings

The festive season is upon us.  I don't know why I'm saying that as though this comes as a huge shock since it happens every year.  Every year we spend much of the lead up to Christmas pushing and shoving around various high street shops trying to track down the latest must-have toys, whilst simultaneously hoping that inspiration will strike us and tell us what to buy for that one relative who, whilst being perfectly nice and inoffensive, is an absolute git to buy for.  Every year we run through a list of wonderful gifts in order to avoid resorting to Boots three for twos and Bodyshop gift boxes. The problem is that the relative in question either has everything already or absolutely detests technology. To them, a tablet is a headache remedy that is taken with water and tastes like arse.  You'd get them a book but the only thing they read is the "Radio Times" or maybe "Readers' Digest."  Bugger it, they will probably adore white musk scented toenail exfoliater.

I've just returned from one such trip into my local town centre.  I decided that best policy would be to make my shopping trip on a day when most other people would be working but failed to factor in the fact that it was so close to Christmas.  So, amidst the familiar sounds of Cliff Richard and George Michael, I got in my last bit of Christmas shopping before heading home on public transport.  Whilst sitting on the bus I began my regular festive ruminations....

After considering the whole meaning/ point of Christmas questions my mind wondered to the John Lewis advert.  For those who aren't familiar with John Lewis or their latest vomit inducing ad, allow me to elucidate: John Lewis is a British chain of department stores that stock everything from ladieswear to random over-priced tat.  Their overly sentimental festive ad campaigns have become something of a Christmas institution; rather like the Coco-Cola ads and the awful ballad type songs that are churned out by X-Factor hopefuls.  Last year we had one boy and his penguin; this year we have the man on the moon:

 This advert seems to be making a rather salient point about the festive season and loneliness, particularly with regards to the elderly.  I mean, here we have an elderly gentleman who seems to crave human interaction and a young girl who wants to reach out and befriend him.  Oh it does tug on the old heart strings, particularly because, as much as many of us complain about the prospect of having to spend days having enforced fun with relatives we would probably rather avoid, very few of us would actually want to be alone at this time of year.  Even the most hardened among us would feel a little twinge of loneliness if we had nobody to spend our holidays with.  Aside from anything else, Christmas is billed as a time for families and if yours are no longer around or desiring of your company, that has to hurt.  Year after year we are implored by various charities and the media (I knew they were capable of being "nice" once in a while) to consider those who may be alone.  It would seem that the John Lewis ad may have succeeded in doing just this as Age UK have reported an increase in people expressing interest in becoming volunteers.  Bravo.  Bravo.  Even I can't snear at that.  So what if John Lewis is a company trying to bring attention to their brand in order to get us to purchase more cack that our loved ones probably neither want nor need?  Perhaps more elderly people will have a much more fulfilling 2016 because of a simple Christmas ad.

Ex and why

If there's one rite of passage that confirms you've emotionally arrived at adulthood, it's an emotionally fraught break-up.  You know the drill; your-once-one-and-only-now-new-ex calls, after what may have been months of epic verbal battles and grudging truces, to announce that it's not working and you should break up.  You then spend weeks, maybe even months, chewing it all over in your jumbled little head.  You start to torment yourself (and anyone who is brave or bored enough to listen) with the following questions; what's wrong with me; could I have done things differently; does (s)he miss me; what is (s)he doing now; do they have somebody else.  It's these last three questions that tend to motivate you to engage in the kind of frenzied snoopage that is usually associated with socially inept weirdos and government agencies.  Yet, sometimes curiosity and the very human need to torture oneself just gets too much and one simply has to....

Now, until relatively recently finding out the salacious details of your now ex's life was much more difficult.  I'm not saying that it wasn't possible to find out whether or not they were seeing somebody else or whether they had mentioned you in a conversation.  Indeed, gossips and misery vultures have always existed to hoover up and disseminate news, however banal or corrosive, to those most or least in need of this week's fix.  The thing is that now we have social media we can find this stuff for ourselves so we needn't rely on busybodies to find and hand over the dirt; we can find it for ourselves.  I'm working on the assumption that the ex is somebody who posts their entire being and doings online, which mine aren't.  I'm also assuming that you haven't been blocked from seeing your ex's content...

Step forward Mr Zuckerburg, who is working to decrease the suffering of the broken hearted everywhere.  How's he doing this, you ask.  Well, Facebook are currently trialing a function whereby if a user changes their relationship status from "in a relationship" to "single," the site will ask them whether they would like to restrict the material that their now ex partner can access via the site.

The skeptic in me wonders why this is even deemed necessary.  Surely, if you don't want your now ex to see your beach pics and details of the relationship that you dumped them for, you could just "unfriend" them.  What ever happened to making a clean break if that is what you deemed to be the most appropriate course of action.  Why oh why must we remain friends with everyone online, when we wouldn't in real life?  Cynic that I am I have often theorised that the reason why so many people keep their exes as friends online is so that they can keep them as a sort of insurance option (in case other options don't work out), whilst keeping them at a safe distance.  In other words; you're maintaining contact with them but you're not engaging with them on a level beyond that which is convenient.

That said, I do like the idea of the site blocking any little reminders of your relationship, such as photo tagging and that timehop thing.  I know.  I know.  In times of old you wouldn't have needed this.  You would have either archived or binned any little reminders of your relationship so that they didn't haunt you at your weakest moments.  This was before the likes of Facebook came along and essentially allowed us to archive and broadcast every aspect of our lives so that we could relive every moment, picture by picture, status by inane status.  Whether we like it or not social media may just be here to stay.  The question is not simply how we avoid or get rid of it; it is now how do we utilise it without it encroaching on our mental and emotional space.  This may be one solution to this question.

It's been a long time

So, I've been away from this blog for longer than I intended.  I have no excuse, other than life and adult stuff just getting in the way.  Like so many of my other creative projects, this blog has sort of fallen by the wayside, which is a crying shame because I enjoy writing.

Disappointingly, I haven't actually done or been involved in anything beyond working and day to day living.  I'm finding that I am becoming increasingly weighed down by the business of being an adult and just having to fend for myself.  It tends to be the little pernickety things that prove to be most time consuming; ironing, getting to and from places and sorting through mountains of paperwork (how do I accumulate so much of this?).  I swear that my time was not wasted in these ways when I was younger.  Or maybe I just cared about my messy living room less.  On reflection, the latter is the most likely reason.  I don't know why there has been such a sea-change in my attitude.  Could it be because now that I am thirty I feel I need to start acting thirty.  How ever a thirty year old may or may not act.  There is probably a spectrum of thirty-something behaviour and where one sits on that spectrum is probably largely dictated by personal circumstances and standards.  Even so, I still feel this pressure to be less slovenly and more productive.  Thus, sleeping in and remaining in my pajamas until past noon is no longer permissible in the way that it was when I was a twenty something year old woman.  If I am not at work then I MUST use my days off wisely; namely by doing boring household chores and running errands.

As I type this I am beginning to see the silliness in these sentiments; I am no less entitled to "me time" than I was when I was a student or when I had first properly left home at twenty five.  Whilst blogging may not seem to be as productive as baking, I still believe that it is productive, not least for the personal and creative potential that it presents.  If somebody happens upon this blog and is entertained or inspired by it then that is a bonus.  For now I am happy to have a platform from which I can share my views and observations of the world.  This is why I am going to make a more concerted effort to keep this blog up to date.    

And I Guess That's Why They Call It The News

 If there's one thing that is guaranteed to whip up the general public into an emotional frenzy, it is a pointless celebrity story. This past couple of weeks has seen two such stories: the sacking of Jeremy Clarkeson and the exit of Zayn What's-his-face from boy band One Direction. Both stories have led to a storm of speculation and strong feeling from a baffled public who have seemingly nothing else to occupy their time. I'm not going to sit here and pretend that this is an amazing new phenomenon because I vaguely remember girls in my class being positively distraught when Take That announced their break up in 1996. Admittedly, I was relatively unmoved by the whole thing. Come to think of it, I don't think I have ever felt any sort of affiliation to any band or celebrity. Don't ask me how I occupy my time and thoughts because I don't really have an answer for you. All I can tell you is that celebrities and their goings on don't really intrigue me and never have. What does intrigue me is that fact that people, many of whom earn a mere pittance, can spare so much time and energy on people whose lives are so far removed from their own. Apparently the online petition to reinstate Jeremy Clarkeson got over 1000 000 signatures. To place things into perspective, over 1000 000 people decided that Jeremy Clarkeson's job was worth giving a toss about. This is probably greater than the number of people who would sign a petition to save the jobs of those working in the NHS, local government and police force (many of whom probably haven't assaulted colleagues but who, nonetheless, face redundancy through no fault of their own). Again, this should come as a surprise but doesn't.

Look, I don't want to get into a debate about what should happen to Clarkeson because it's been debated to death by others. Besides, that's not really the point of this post. My main concern here is why, in the name of Hades, we are so hung up on one guy and his job when hundreds, possibly thousands of people from all different walks of life are facing losing their jobs. My guess is that we are just not good at looking at bigger pictures. We can hear facts, figures and anecdotes all day but they don't actually mean anything to us unless we are personally affected. Only when we are waiting for hours in A&E does everything begin to feel real. Until this point, it is just an abstract story and something that is far too big and out of our control. It is as though larger, national issues are so large and unmanageable that even forming coherent opinions can be daunting and somewhat tiring. Sure, we may discuss the privatisation of the NHS with friends and colleagues, we may even sign a petition to save our local A&E department when it is threatened with closure. Yet, we somehow cannot summon a fraction of the vitriolic energy that seems to be so abundant when having a heated discussion about all that is wrong in the world. Why is this? It's not as though we don't care. It's not as though we don't understand what is going on around us. So why this apathy?

I don't know but my guess would be that we are surrounded by such misery that we feel impotent in the face of it all. In the end, we know that however much we may bitch on social media or sign petitions, nothing is going to change. We will still be ruled by the same social elite; we will still be stuck paying taxes to fund wars that we disagree with and powerful people will continue to use their wealth and influence to hurt and abuse others. Our collective outrage will do nothing to alleviate any of this and will only serve to further alienate us from those around us. Conversely, you can bitch and debate about celebrities until the cows come home because it is unlikely to be divisive. Even if your opinions differ from those around you, it is unlikely to cause any lasting ructions. Ergo, celebrities provide an outlet and a focus for all of that misplaced social frustration.

I recently met up with a friend who I have known since primary school.  As has become the custom at such meet-ups, we enjoyed a rather fun trip down memory lane.  I suspect that part of the reason why this occurrence is becoming more and more frequent is because we both turn 30 this year.  We have joked about this eventuality throughout our twenties by saying things like “do you realise that in six years’ time we will both be 30?  This is terrifying!”  I think the jokes came about because we genuinely used to think of 30 as being old, which also meant that we had a long list of things that we wanted to have accomplished by the time we reached that milestone.  Obviously, we both struggled to recall very many of the items on our lists.  My friend had always said that she expected to be married with two children by the age of 25 (on reflection we agree that 25 is a mere baby and 30 int exactly old either). 

Like any effective appraisal (for that is what our lunch had unintentionally turned into), we discussed what we had actually achieved; degrees, homes, friends and careers.  The big stuff.  Or some of the big stuff.  The rest would, we assured ourselves, just happen in much the same way as our other attainments have.  It’s not that we were being particularly philosophical; more that we have become tired by the whole “by the age of 30 you should be doing x, y and z.”  I mean, our generation have enjoyed greater freedoms and choices than many that have gone previously and rather than enjoy this simple fact, we are becoming a generating of compulsive whingers.  Rather than celebrate our choices and accomplishments many of us are regretting not having taken the alternative routes through our twenties.  Sure university was fun whilst we were there but wouldn't we have become much more enlightened if we had traveled the world instead?  Maybe starting a family would have been much more satisfying than the job I worked so hard to get.  Who needs a clean house and loads of antique furniture anyway?  Bah.  Contrary to this self-indulgent bellyaching, my friend and I spent a good half an hour slapping ourselves on the back and gobbing off about how much we are actually enjoying our lives.  We then descended into a discussion about our fifteen year old selves….

This particular friend probably wouldn't mind me stating that we were both oddballs (I have withdrawn her legal name just in case she would).  By this I mean that we were both rather young and naive compared to our peers.  I can’t actually remember what sort of stuff we actually used to talk about but I know that it wasn't ever the same sort of stuff that other girls of the same age used to talk about.  There were also the various fashion disasters that are endemic among she-geeks everywhere; white socks with sandals, bad haircuts, perms (I think that was just me) and wearing heals with tracksuits.  Often when I look back at myself as a teenager I cringe, even if reminiscing about these years of awkwardness make for some hilarious conversations. 

It’s really odd to think that at 15 I had literally no idea how things worked or how I myself actually cogitated.  I have often heard it said that you have no genuine concept of self until you leave your childhood and teenage years behind and I think that this certainly holds true for me.  I know that many people would disagree because they had grown and developed their characters when they were still quite young.  However, at 15 I was still a child.  I had not yet met most of the people who would become my closest friends and confidants.  I had not yet discovered my chief motivations, my absolute unremitting passions and my wildest aspirations.  Like many young people I wanted to work in show business.  Leaving aside the fact that I could neither sing nor act and that I had the face of a deformed bulldog, the chances of me ever attaining a career in show business were always going to be pretty slim.  Very few people succeed in this line of business and many of those who do probably wish they hadn't.  Still, at 15 I was convinced that I was destined to be a star and became unable to see any reason why this would not transpire.  Needless to say that this particular dream has not been realised, much to the relief of my 29 year old self!  I’m almost chortling at how much I wanted to be some glamorous actress, whilst conveniently forgetting that it this particular dream was like a soothing balm to an ego that had been repeatedly injured by bullying and social exclusion.  Dreams and delusions were probably the safest and cosiest place for the 15 year old me to exist.  At this present moment it is easy to forget the pain and isolation that I felt as a 15 year old.  It is also easy to idealise my younger days by overemphasising the carefree aspects of my youth.  My anxieties over turning 30 have often led me to wish for a return to my younger days, without paying much heed to the fact that my adolescent years were frightening, confusing and miserable.  I may lament that fact that I now have to worry about paying bills and running a home but I promise you that these things are a definite improvement over wondering whether you will get through an entire school day without having your lunch money nicked or getting spat at by the people in the year below you.  This realisation has been somewhat bizarrely uplifting for me.  I now realise that as a 29 year old I have much more influence over the direction of my life than I did at 15.  It’s not that old chestnut about years buying you wisdom (my wisdom points are probably in minus figures) but more about realising that I have choices.  The 15 year old me was tethered to the life and identity as a social outcast.  I had to share space with my tormentors because our parents were legally obliged to send us to school.  Very few if any of us actually wanted to be there, sharing that space with each other.  We had no say over what we did or where we went.  We were just sitting it out, waiting and hoping that when we finally made it out of there it would be to something better.  Finally, the something better is here and I feel that it should be marked in some way….

Bloody Women

Earlier this week we celebrated International Womens’ Day, which always presents the perfect opportunity to reflect on how far women have come and how far we have yet to go in the long march to equality.  Whilst it is true that we have much to celebrate; we now have the vote in many countries, we have prominent females in many sectors including politics, business and science and womens’ issues are now being pushed up the international agenda, there is still an awful long way to go before we can truly say that we enjoy equality with men.  Nowhere is the lack of equality between the genders more apparent than in society’s attitudes towards women and their bodies.  

 

Women are constantly being appraised, not for their abilities, but for their body shapes and their general appearance.  It is not considered enough for a woman to appear neat and tidy; she must also appear aethetically pleasing and match some impossible cultural ideal, which nobody has a cat in hell’s chance of ever attaining or maintaining.  Women and girls who openly refuse or rebel against this are jeered at and made to feel inferior.  

Girls are taught to feel ashamed of their bodies from a young age.  Menstruation is still never really discussed or represented beyond sex education class and even when it is, it is normally referred to either in jest or using half arsed euphomisms, such as “the curse.”  You certainly never see or hear of it being referred to in popular culture.  It is almost as though this very normal part of female biology just does not exist.  We are certainly discouraged from openly discussing anything concerning our menstrual cycle in public, lest we embarress anyone.  It often feels as though women’s bodies are strictly for the purposes of hetero-male titilation and that any discussion or representation of anything that would challenge this is actively discouraged. 

Since the age of sixteen, I have suffered from horrendous pain, fatigue and dizziness.  It afflicts me for at least one week out of every four and yet social etiquette dictates that I must not discuss this in public, even if somebody asks why I am keeled over and screaming in pain.  Thus, when somebody does ask why I am doubled over I must fabricate some vague lie so as not to embarress them or myself.  Not that I am embarressed.  Fourteen years of explaining these symptoms to various medical professionals is enough to make anyone forget their embarressment.  I am a woman and lots of women menstruate.  We should not have to feel or act ashamed of our bodies, simply because society says so.  Only when we can stand up and say, “this is me and this is part of my life and my biology” will we ever be truly liberated!

Let's Facebook It!

 I have recently discovered that many of my friends have opted to leave Facebook altogether.  Whilst initially astounded at this (I mean, it's quite a handy communication tool and not all that bad, really), I have to say that I am becoming more and more sympathetic to their reasoning.  I have found myself thinking of more and more things that I don't like about being on there.  Admittedly, I am one of those people who use the site most days, usually to repost an article or to update my status.  I have often wondered whether I have become one of those frequent Facebookers who annoy other people simply because I post so much that I am actually needlessly filling up other people's newsfeeds.  I don't know what prompted me to do this but I decided to sit down, have a serious think about my Facebook use and note down the main things that I have come to dislike about using the site.  I must point out that this is only my personal opinion and is in no way representative of other users.

1. It gives a false impression of popularity

Remember when we all first signed upto Facebook and were keen to "collect" friends, even friends who we may have only met once or twice?  Aaaah, me too.  Whilst this was initially a fun way of keeping in touch with people like Mike the intern or Jessica who is the friend of a friend's cousin whom you once met at a party, this game soon got boring.  Why?  Because you also found that you were getting friend requests from people who you either barely knew or wish you'd never met, such as the guy with whom you'd had an awkward snog in year eight.  I am coming around to the belief that there are some people with whom we are only supposed to have a passing and polite acquaintance (clients, for example) and nothing more.  Yet, with the advent of Facebook we were all suddenly supposed to become besties.  Before we know it, we have 748 "friends," many of whom we probably wouldn't say hello to if we saw them in the street.  Furthermore, we are sharing our most treasured moments and lowest thoughts with these people, who probably don't even care. Out of these 748 "friends," there are probably only about four people who we could genuinely count as friends.

2. It makes us socially competitive

OK, so most of us have moved on from the whole friend collecting game. That got boring when we realised the home truths that I spelt out in point one. However, this by no means that the competition's over. We are now competing over who has the best life. Don't pretend you don't have a sneak peek through profiles of exes/ school acquaintances “just to see what they are up to these days” and then get all downbeat when you realise that they are travelling the world/ sitting on the exec board of a major blue chip company/ starting their own school for impoverished school children in Mozambique, whilst you are stuck in your “dead end” job and your rancid rented flat. The thing is that you actually enjoy your job and you love your flat. Or you did until you logged into Facebook and found out that the numpty who made your life hell at school is living the life of Riley. Sometimes there is simply no justice in this world. There, I've hit the nail on the head for you. You are usually happy with your lot until you start comparing it to that of others.

The main problem here is the saturation of information. We can only really compare things if we know what we are comparing, which means that we would need to find out about somebody else's life in order to compare it with ours. Prior to Facebook, we would have either come by this information if we had spoken to the person in question or if we had had it passed to us via somebody else in the know. Now that we have Facebook, we don't have to rely on this information being passed to us simply by chance. Now we can snoop when we most feel inclined to do so and that can often be when we are bored or at a low ebb anyway. It goes without saying that this can lead us to become rather miserable and more prone to just fixating on what other people have rather than on what we want to achieve in our own lives. It's a slippery slope down, folks.

3. People only post what they want us to know

This is closely related to point number two. When we are truly fixating on the reasons why one of our “friends” has it all whilst we are really struggling, we fail to take into account the fact that we are not seeing a true representation of that person's life. I'm not saying that it is all pure fantasy, although there are some people who probably do fabricate their entire lives on Facebook. What I am saying though, is that people manage their online persona in the way that many of us try to manage our offline image. Users will post the statuses, photos and videos that they feel best represent the person that they want to be rather than the person that they actually are. That person who seems to always be down the pub having a whale of a time with friends whilst you're sitting at home watching Gogglebox and eating the remains of last night's pizza is probably no more of a social butterfly than you are. Those photos were probably taken over the previous weekend, you know, the weekend where you were also out having a few bevvies with your friends.

Conversely, you will very seldom find a person that wants to broadcast the breakdown of their relationship or their forthcoming disciplinary proceedings on Facebook. Oh, I know that some people do. But generally most people don't. Things go badly for all of us at some point but most of us prefer to only focus on the positive and amusing stuff, which can give the impression that we are all super happy and amazingly successful all of the time.

4. It kicks off rows in the real world

This has never happened to me personally but I have heard of it happening. There isn't much of a need to elaborate much more with this one. Suffice it to say, that it is really easy to just type a thoughtless comment and even easier for that comment to be misconstrued (or understood perfectly, as the case may be).

5. It negates the need for effort

Hands up, who has assumed that, just because they have sent somebody a message on or via Facebook that this is enough? I know that I have fallen into this trap before and I am now beginning to truly count the cost of this assumption. Why? Because I suspect that the same is being done to me. The difficult thing is that it is not personal and nor is it wilful. The person means well. They are busy but at least they are still finding time to like and comment on your grumpy cat memes. In some ways, the whole concept of Facebook cheapens friendship to a few soundbites and likes.

Here's the thing. As entertaining as your memes and statuses are, they are no substitute for taking an afternoon of your free time and just spending it talking to somebody who you actually care about and want to talk to. To coin my mother's saying “you only get out what you put in” and if all you put in is a generic “look at me” every so often, then maybe that's all you deserve back.

6. It has become a barometer of our self worth
   Again, this one is pretty much self explanatory and risks repeating the previous points but it is still an important point in its own right. Intellectually, we know that we are worth more than a mere Facebook page, which doesn't even have a physical manifestation. However, if you spend too much time on there as I have been guilty of doing, then you can begin to see it as some sort of reflection on you. The lack of responses to posts can become something of a suggestion that you yourself are not an interesting, worthwhile individual. Facebook can be something of a virtual school yard in this respect. Whilst doing research for this post I can across a problem page by a woman who was becoming depressed because very few people responded to anything she posted. Naturally, some participants told her to grow up and get a life outside of Facebook, which seemed harsh and easier said than done. It also made me question whether Facebook was the problem in this case. Maybe, just maybe, this woman already suffers from very low self esteem and her Facebook usage is her way of trying to overcome this by galvanising positive attention. If this is what is going on in this case then maybe the problem isn't Facebook but the user's expectations.
   
   
    By this logic, it would seem that it is not Facebook that is the problem but the way that some of us choose to use it and the importance that we place upon it. I can't tell you why people are choosing to delete their profiles. No doubt there are a whole swathe of studies that can tell you why different types of people have decided to switch off and either move to a different social network or abandon the whole concept of social media altogether. What I will say is this; the problem is not Facebook. The problem is with the individual and how they use it. It can only really reflect life. If you do not feel contented in your life offline, the chances are that Facebook will not make you happy or fulfilled either. It exists as a social network to help you to maintain contact. It will not reconcile you to people from your past who you dislike; it will not make you a better friend and it certainly won't give you better social skills. We need to stop trying to use things as quick fixes and substitutes for taking real and positive action. Whilst you won't necessarily need to delete your profile to achieve this, it might be an idea to limit the amount of time and energy you spend on there if you do feel that using it is having a negative impact on your life.

Drinking Out Loud!

 Well, that's January done and dusted-or, as it has come to be known within some orders of British society, Dry January. For those of you not in the know, Dry January is an initiative that has been thought up to make us re-evaluate our relationship with alcohol by challenging us to give up the stuff for an entire month. Presumably, the hope is that if we manage to make it through to February without touching a drop of alcohol, we will realise that we don't need it to have a good time and will be much more inclined to drink in moderation in future. This may sound like it should be a fairly obvious and somewhat common way of thinking but let me tell you, it appears to be much less obvious and common than you would want to think.

As someone who has a very low tolerance for alcohol and by that I mean that it only takes a tiny amount of the stuff to make me ill, I am fed up of constantly having to justify my lack of indulgence to other people. I get that people are trying to make sure that I have a good time by insisting that I drink as much as them. I also understand that some of the best stories involve alcohol fuelled debauchery and that if you do not drink much you can be perceived as something of a geek. Look, I grew up in a provincial northern town where there was little more to do than drink, take drugs and have sex but I still resent the notion that it is not possible to have a good time without drinking enough to cause you to barf up your entire digestive system. I have battled against this assumption ever since I was old enough to go go out drinking and it is getting a little bit annoying. Like many other moderate drinkers, I feel resentful of the constant need to explain why my orange juice doesn't contain vodka or why I'm nipping off home early. Why must non-drinkers always have to state “not for me because I'm driving/ on medication/ tired/ working the next day” as though drinking to excess is somehow part of your day job that you're trying to shirk. By rights, we should just be able to say “no thanks” or “an orange juice for me please” without feeling the need to justify our choices all of the time. Come on guys, non-drinkers and moderate drinkers can be a laugh too (isn't it sad that I feel the need to point this out!), you don't have to constantly badger us to keep up pace with you if we can't/ don't want to. You must also stop assuming that we are not having fun just because we happen to be more sober than the rest of you. The chances are, we are sitting back and enjoying your garbled conversations and sordid confessions much more than you are. We will also enjoy repeating these back to you whilst showing you the grainy footage of your drunken antics whilst you're vomiting up your digestive system the following morning.

Suffice it to say that I didn't participate in Dry January because I didn't really see the point. I don't think that my relationship with alcohol needs re-evaluating. I do, however, think I need to learn how to upload video footage onto the likes of YouTube because this might just MIGHT persuade some of my clan to re-evaluate their relationship with alcohol.

Twenty Four Hour Party Poopers

Every so often a story makes it into the news that makes you question whether you have tripped over and stumbled into some parallel universe where absolutely nothing makes sense and everything contravenes all that you previously understood to be normal, rational behaviour. The most recent example was the story about the five year old boy who was sent an invoice for £15.95 for failing to attend the birthday party of a classmate. 

This begs many questions, the main two being: why was this even in the national news (by extension, why am I even blogging about it) and why would anyone spend £15.95 per head on a party for five year olds? I'm not saying that five year olds don't deserve to have fun, particularly when it is their birthday. What I am saying, however, is that they would probably enjoy and value a much simpler set up with a group of friends, simple buffet food and fun party games just as much, if not more, than something more pricey and lavish. Of course, some of the other parents with whom you're competing may disagree with this but that's their problem. Your child's party is not and should never be about trying to impress anyone other than the child whose birthday it is. Let's face it, very young children do not have any concept of how much things cost and will therefore not feel obliged to be impressed by something that has cost a small fortune to plan and execute. We've all seen and heard of toddlers and young children who, upon Christmas Day, prefer to play with the box over and above its overpriced content. This is probably because children have something called an imagination and enjoy making up their own realities and narratives rather than becoming overly involved in the material realities that surround them. It is adults who care about the cost and appearance of things, not children. OK, I'm willing to conceded that many older children are into doing big, expensive activities but small children? No. Small children just like kicking back, running round and eating whatever the hell they like whilst in the presence of friends. That is what children value. I'm not getting at parents for wanting to make a child's birthday special and memorable. However, I cannot help but wonder whether there is a certain amount of competitive parenting at work here? Although not a parent myself, I do have friends who are and they tell stories of parents competing with regards to the virtues of their offspring and the holidays, gifts and parties that their said offspring can hope to enjoy thanks to their amazing parenting. One of my friends told me a dreadful story about how she had put a lot of time and effort into making a special birthday party for her little boy, only to overhear a group of parents bitching about how the music wasn't very good and how the whole party seemed “cheap.” This had, understandably, upset my friend who had done her absolute best to give her son a happy and memorable birthday only to have other parents (not children) berate her for it. If this demonstrates one thing other than the rudeness of some people it is this: children's parties have become too much about the parents and not enough about the children. It has become more about parents showing off to each other than giving a child a happy birthday. And so it is with these parents.

You see, the grievance is between the parents not the children. At the very worst, the birthday boy may have felt a little miffed at being let down but would have then perked up and had fun with his friends who had turned up. I very much doubt he would have clung to the grudge had his parents not chosen to make an issue of it in the way that they did. One of the many virtues of small children is that they do not hold grudges in the way that adults do. It is the adults here who are at fault. Of course, the parents of the no-show should have done the considerate thing and let the parents of the birthday boy know that he would be unable to attend, rather than just not showing up. According to the version of the story I have read, they did not have contact details for birthday boy's parents, which has to be one of the lamest excuses I have ever heard. For one thing, why would you not put contact details on an invitation when you want and expect people to respond. Furthermore, we live in the age of mass communication. Even if you don't know somebody's contact details, somebody else in your circle more than likely will. Could these parents not have thought of a way of finding said contact details or relaying the message to the parents another way? They could have, for example, got one of the other parents to contact birthday boy's family on their behalf or slipped a message into birthday boy's satchel. However they chose to communicate the message would have been much more considerate than just not letting them know at all. 

Having said that, I'm not in favour of billing somebody for not showing up. It just seems petty and, despite birthday boy's parents saying that it's not about the money, it makes it precisely about the money. I understand that there is a principal here and there may well have a point in that when you say that you will attend an event you should either honour your word or let the host know that you will be unable to do so. That is basic consideration, which is something that many people seem to think is lacking in today's self centred society. I am all for expressing your disappointment when you've been let down by somebody but I question the way that these parents went about doing it. Aside from the financial issue; there is also a feeling that this is underhand and, yes, immature. Why was it that these people did not feel able to approach the other parents and have an open discussion with them about why they and their son were disappointed? I can wager that this would have probably been much more effective than simply slipping an invoice into a child's school bag. Who knows? The parents may have even offer to pay up or make it up to the birthday boy another way. Instead you have two sets of parents dominating the news and social media with their adultish falling outs and two little boys who will probably grow up to be very embarrassed about their parents' behaviour.

Wedding belles and feminist hell

I don’t know whether I have shared this piece of lovely but ultimately useless information with you yet but I’m getting married next year.  Don’t worry; I’m not about to morph into one of those dickheads who constantly rambles on about wedding dresses, seating plans and table tat.  I wouldn’t be mentioning it now if it didn’t provide me with a context for my latest rant.

So, today my partner and I went to a wedding fair.  I had visions of it being full of over-enthusiastic business proprietors trying to flog their wares, most of which are very pretty but largely inconsequential, to a load of overenthusiastic wannabe princesses and their pushy mothers.  I wasn’t far wrong.

On arrival, we were greeted by the sight of a Bentley and some other classic vehicle, which were suitably blinged up for the occasion and flower arrangements that would have made Chelsea Flower Show look woefully amateurish.  There were also the cursory bewildered looking fathers and boyfriends who had presumably been dragged there against their will (I felt their pain).  All this was set to a soundtrack of wedding ballads being played by what were, admittedly, two very talented violinists.  Thus, I was choking back my disdain before even entering the building.  Things didn’t improve any when we actually entered: we were greeted by a very jaded looking woman who didn’t seem all that interested either in us or in the event itself (though, to be fair, by this point she had probably overheard more than enough ridiculous conversations to last her her entire lifetime), who duly handed us a prize draw form.  My main issue with this was that it asked for the names of the bride and her partner, which is both heteronormative and very presumptuous.  For the benefit of any non-British readers: civil partnerships are now a relatively common occurrence in the UK, which means that the people getting “married” could be of the same or opposite gender and yet this form appeared to make the assumption that the couple in question would either be lesbian or heterosexual without stopping to consider the possibility that two men might be getting married.  EPIC FAIL.

The rest of the event went pretty much as I anticipated.  There were plenty of businesses present, all touting their services.  There were the novelty juke box people; the wedding dress people and the photographers.  However, my all time favourite had to be the cake people.  Not people who were made of cake, you understand.  Although this would have made the day that little bit more bearable and even mildly entertaining.  No, these were local bakeries who had cakes that were so big that they could have made rather spacious dwellings.  Thinking about it, this could be the answer to Britain’s housing crisis: instead of buying the couple gifts the guests could all contribute towards a colossal wedding cake which the couple could then live in.  It might suffer from the odd problem with mould but it would probably last a lot longer than many of the new builds you see being thrown up all over the place these days and you probably wouldn’t need planning permission!  OK, so it’s technically a stupid idea but it’s no more stupid than spending a stupid amount on ONE DAY.  Seriously, why on Earth would you need stupid table decorations?  Do you seriously think people will question the validity of your marriage if you don’t have them?  In one hundred years time when some random descendent is looking back through their family history, do you actually think that your lack of centrepieces is going to be apparent?  Probably not.  All these thoughts were whirling through my little head as I wondered round the place, dutifully avoiding the hungry eyes of the predatory sales people.

Then there was the fact that they targeted me rather than my partner.  Even when my partner instigated conversations with company reps, they aimed their responses at me.  Like I am going to know or even care about how many people to cater for.  If I had my way, they would all be paying for their own lunches or at least being fed gruel (I desperately wanted a Charles Dickens themed wedding but, alas, my partner refused on the grounds that it was a stupid idea).  Besides, I felt a little uneasy discussing the merits of cheesy filo pastry thinglets whilst I know that at that present moment, there would be some poor Ethiopian child dying of hunger or some Bradfordian pensioner dying of the cold.  In light of such suffering, deciding which overpriced decorative horrors to inflict upon wedding guests seemed to be a pretty pointless exercise.  I was on the brink of asking whether we could forfeit the buffet and send the cash to Oxfam or something but I’m pretty sure this would have gone down as well as a turd in a vindaloo. All these thoughts were occurring to me as the catering rep was talking at me about the various options available.  I wasn’t entirely sure why you would focus all of your attention and information on somebody who was blatantly not paying any attention to what was going on.   I’m sure there is a reason for this that does not involve me being a woman who has dreamed about her perfect day since girlhood but I just can’t think of what this would be.

Needless to say, we didn’t stay too long.  My exasperated partner had to give in gracefully and concede that I probably wasn’t going to stop being facetious after I snubbed a poor lady who was trying to sell cake lollies to me.   I think it is fair to say that I will not be accompanying him on his next wedding related excursion.

GTA 5

Sorry I haven’t been around much (ok at all): I’ve been busy with stuff.  I appreciate that this is rather evasive as excuses go and that may seem unsatisfactory but that’s the only excuse you’re getting.  Anyway, I’m back....

Sooo not much of note has happened, apart from the usual recession related crap and I’m presuming that you really don’t want to read about that.  Or maybe you do.  Either way, I don’t want to write about it so you will have to go elsewhere for your fix of doom.

Of course, two weeks ago they released Grand Theft Auto, much to the delight of nerds everywhere.  To be honest, I haven’t played the game so I’m not entirely sure what the point in it actually is.  From what I understand, it revolves around shooting at people whilst driving badly: something that nerds everywhere probably wish they could do and get away with.  Ah if only.

I’ve heard many complaints about the game, mostly from abandoned partners of GTA obsessed nerds.  I am one such partner as mine is, right at this moment in time, barricaded in the study playing the game whilst I am typing up this blog post and listening to Alice Cooper.  Rock and roll.  Anyway, I seem to be in the minority of partners who is actually relishing the freedom that this game has bestowed upon me.  Below is a list of freedoms that have come about as a result of the boyfriend’s newfound obsession:

1.       Eating on the sofa.  My boyfriend normally hates this so I try not to do it when he is around or conscious enough to notice what I’m doing.  However, not only has he barely left the study in the past two weeks; when he has left he is so focused on his game that he’s not really paying attention to what I’m doing.  Therefore, I can actually eat my meals on the sofa without him noticing.

2.       Watching bad TV.  In an attempt not to appear too inane, I tend not to watch anything that has been broadcast by channel four or five in the presence of my boyfriend.  This means that I usually have to wait until he is out before I dare tuck into any guilty pleasures and even then I am always a little worried that he might reappear before my programme has finished.  However, now he is distracted by GTA I can watch such gems as “My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding” and “The Undatables” until my heart’s content.

3.       I can leave my stuff lying around the house knowing that he will have neither the time nor the concentration to tidy it away.

4.       He’s not around to nick my chocolate, Doritos and other confectionary.

5.       I can write facetious blog posts safe in the knowledge that he is far too busy to read them.

6.       Endless happiness.  My boyfriend is currently experiencing unprecedented levels of euphoria and I HAVEN’T HAD TO MAKE ANY EFFORT.  I’ve not had to go out of my way to be nice, buy gifts or massage his ego.  He is just happy.  And I haven’t had to do anything apart from leave him in front of a games console to stare at a screen and moan in pleasure every few seconds.  This appeals to my emotionally lazy side.

I’m sure there are more benefits to this new addition to this household but I’m far too lazy to try and think of them just now.  Back to “Don’t Tell The Bride” or whatever drivel channel 4 are currently broadcasting.

Bridget Jones Tax

Just when you thought that this country could not get any more hateful towards singletons, the Labour Party comes out and suggests that they should be paying more council tax.  Just in case you don’t already know, single occupants currently enjoy a 25% discount on their council tax, which may sound like a lot (especially given the fact that local councils are feeling the pinch due to cuts that have been imposed by Westminster).  However, you need to remember that single people won’t produce as much waste as couples or families.  They probably won’t use schools (well, unless they are a single parent family) and, above all else, they get sidelined by policy makers and think tanks alike.

Despite the fact that single occupant households now make up 29% of total households in the UK, singletons are repeatedly ignored when it comes to designing services or offering financial help, with the majority of financial help being offered to families and pensioners.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating leaving children to starve or pensioners to die of hypothermia.  I’m not totally heartless.  However, I do feel that more could be done to help those who are trying to survive on one (often moderate) income. 

I’m not entirely sure why this inequality exists.  I certainly think that as a county we are so family centric that we fail to understand that there are those who live alone, be it through choice or through circumstance.  We are socially conditioned to believe that in order for an individual to function socially, they must be part of a family.  Preferably that family will be a loving, nurturing one in which every individual is loved and supported and whilst society acknowledges that this model does not always work out at times, we still champion the family as the basis of a functional society.  After all, a society is made up of individuals and so healthy individuals make a healthy society.  Thus, it seems to be a commonly held belief that even the most dysfunctional family is better than no family at all.   That a person who lives alone is in some way sad and deficient.  It is also a challenge to what society deems as being normal. 

Or perhaps it is purely because nobody stays single forever, right?  After all, everyone so wants to meet the perfect partner, get married/ have a civil partnership, buy a house in the suburbs with a double garage and neatly manicured lawn, have or adopt lots of kids and continue their onward march towards middle-age and an ever expanding waste line.  When you think about it like that, who the hell would ever choose to remain single?  No, singleness is a stop-gap.  A transition period between the not so perfect partner and the partner to whom you will eventually surrender your sense of self and independence.  You don’t actually think anyone believes it when you say that you really enjoy your own company and could never imagine having to share your space with another person, do you?  Thus, if singleness is “just a phase” and one that most of us, at some stage or other, are to grow out of, then why should the government and the rest of society make exceptions and provisions for it?

Maybe because we live in a country that claims to respect individual life choices and because we need to stop being so darnright patronising.  Just because somebody does not want to waste their Sundays in B&Q or running around after smaller versions of themselves; it does not make them non existent.  It also doesn’t mean that they don’t need help.  Things like fuel bills, rent/mortgage payments and insurance all have to be paid.  Many of these costs are ever increasing and would cost as much for one person as they would for three.  OK, so maybe if you’re on your own then you could get away with smaller house, which would cost you less in terms of rent/ mortgage payments but still....

Then there’s the fact that married couples get tax breaks.  Why?  Apart from conforming to the whims of society, I really don’t see why a piece of paper should automatically mean that you qualify for tax breaks, especially if you have two incomes.  It’s simple really, the more your household earns, the greater your tax bill should be.  No ifs.  No buts.  Relationship status should not come into it.  Single people who live alone and earn less than married or cohabiting couples should not have to surrender their council tax discount.  Likewise, married couples should not get preferential treatment.

RIP equality

So last week we waved goodbye to Margaret Thatcher and some people were, predictably, more thrilled at the occurrence than others.  Reactions to her passing seemed to vary; some were literally dancing in the street, others were openly venerating her and talking about what a fantastic person she was, whilst others just couldn’t give a shit.

I have to admit that I did actually watch bits of the funeral.  Whilst I cannot claim to be her biggest fan (OK, I thought that in many ways she was an absolute disaster for this country and for the working classes in particular), I found it interesting from a modern history point of view.  I also like to see where my taxes are going and since I was generous enough to contribute to the funeral fund I thought I should at least show some interest.  By contribute I mean that part of my taxes had been creamed off in order to pay for the anger inspiring vomit fest.  I’m still not entirely sure why I was forced to contribute towards the funeral of somebody I didn’t even know or like.  If you ask me (and nobody did), it should have been something that was conducted in private for her family, friends and colleagues rather than as a grand media circus.

I haven’t actually been to or witnessed that many funerals but I couldn’t help but note the contrast.  The limited number I have attended have been simple affairs in a church or a crematorium with very little fuss.  I know that this is probably going to be the same for my own goodbye.  I certainly won’t be hauled onto a gun carriage and paraded through the streets of London accompanied by police and members of the armed forces.  David Dimbleby won’t be narrating my coffin’s progress or interviewing my friends and colleagues about what a wonderful person I was.  I won’t have flags flown at half mast or an adoring public clapping as I make my final journey.  In short, nobody will give a shit because not being pretty, rich, powerful or famous, I am just not that important.  I am just a number and when I finally do give up the ghost not that much will change as a result. 

We tell children that everyone is important but the older I get the more I realise that this clearly is not so.  We have had governments that will happily surrender tax payers’ money to fund lavish royal weddings and lavish funerals for royals and ex prime ministers, whilst allowing ordinary people to die of cold and lack of food.  All around us, the poor and disabled are dying because of cuts to benefit and the disgusting prices being charged by greedy utility companies.  Yet, very few people are out on the streets bewailing their deaths.  The BBC are not reporting on their suffering with the same vigour as they did the royal wedding or the death of the queen mother.  One would almost think that, unlike the parasitic royals and evil politicians, these people do not matter.  

When I’m Big I Want to be a Pwincess

I think I may be having a mid-youth crisis.  Having suddenly realised that I am inching ever closer to 30, I have suddenly found myself in a desperate bid to reclaim my idyllic childhood by gobbling through endless plates of jelly, flicking through photos of family fun days out (what was I wearing) and stocking up on Disney films.  I realise that as a feminist, this poses a problem.  Behind all the sparkle, magic and catchy tunes lurks a negative message and that is that girls and women need men.  We need them to help us to escape from whatever hardship life has thrown at us and to elevate us to a position where we will never have to worry about evil stepmothers, poverty or wicked witches ever again.  All we have to be is beautiful, feminine and charming.  Things that the “average” girl or woman doesn’t believe that she is or can ever be, which leads to low self esteem. 

Sooo...this leads to a conundrum, particularly for a feminist.  On the one hand, these films are well put together, beautifully crafted masterpieces that offer some escapism in dreary times.  Yet, on the other, they peddle a belief that a girl’s sole ambition should be to marry a prince and become a princess.  Not exactly a teaching that is in line with feminist thinking, which centres around a woman being independent, self sufficient and appreciated for her capabilities and achievements rather than her physical beauty.  After all, most girls and women are not Disney princess material so what do they do?  Oh that’s easy.  We go to university, study hard and get jobs as doctors, teachers, solicitors, librarians, journalists, business leaders and scientists.  Some of us may even get married/ enter into civil partnerships and procreate.  Others may adopt, cohabit or remain single.  We may have once dreamed of being Ariel or Belle but life, common sense and lack prancing ability intervened and we decided to try and be something more sensible, such as meteorologists, estate agents and call centre workers.  No longer can we envision jamming along with singing crabs and happy woodland animals (not without a ready supply on hallucinogens and my employer tends to frown on this sort of thing).  True, some facets of the Disney experience have carried through into real, adult life.  There are still evil villains (otherwise known as the Conservative party) just begging to be defeated and lured into a fiery pit.  However, many of us have already come to terms with the fact that there is no handsome prince to rescue us from the drudgery of everyday life and that even if there was, he probably wouldn’t be interested in us.  Sigh.

Are we disappointed?  Obviously, I can’t speak for every woman ever.  I am guessing that most women are probably not too disappointed in the lack of a two dimensional poser with a blinding Colgate smile.  Furthermore, those princess dresses look tight and uncomfortable.  Such a far cry from our comfortable dungarees and summer dresses! 

So is Disney harmful?  I really don’t know.  Certainly, the message that in order to achieve anything in life a woman must be beautiful, is harmful.  We live in a world where beautiful women are celebrated over and above women who have contributed to fields such as science, politics, art, literature, law, business, technology, sociology and medicine.  If you don’t believe me, try this simple test: ask a random sample of people who Marilyn Monroe is.  Then ask the same person who Anita Roddick/ Harriet Harman/ Anne Lister/ Constance Briscoe/ Rita O’Grady/ Marie Curie/ Emily Davidson are.  I can guarantee that more people will be able to tell you who Marilyn Monroe is, whilst comparatively few will be able to tell you who the others are.  This is despite the fact that these are all women who have contributed immensely to their own field and to the wider world.  Furthermore, these are strong women and examples of people who we should want our daughters to emulate.  Yet, they are not celebrated as they should be.  As children we look for people to look up to and emulate.  We can only look up to those we know about.  Young boys have their male role models in footballers, business leaders and politicians.  Young girls have models, actresses and Disney princesses.  That is it.  Every other female role model is kept away from them or ridiculed as being unfeminine and unnatural.  Therefore, young girls look to those examples of womanhood that are accepted and celebrated in the hope that they too will be accepted and celebrated.  I would argue that the existence of Disney is not harmful in itself.  However, when you combine it with the severe LACK of representation of strong women within society, you do have a very dangerous situation indeed.

Sssssh

It is an oft repeated gag: elderly relative bursts forth with some very un PC comment in a room full of people, which probably includes those who belong to the group being mentioned/ discussed.  More often than not, it is their very presence that has inspired comment.  For example “Oooo look Jenny, there’s a (insert offensive term here).”  Shocked at their apparent lack of embarrassment and self censorship, you desperately try to tell them that they shouldn’t say such things whilst glancing around to make sure that nobody overheard.  You are conflicted.  On the one hand, you know that such words/ phrases are offensive and shouldn’t be said at all, let alone in public.  Yet, granny is 86 and such words were not deemed offensive in her formative years.  When she was growing up gay meant happy rather than homosexual.  Words that we now consider racial slurs were probably nothing more than descriptive terms.  No harm intended.  Furthermore, she’s got this far and lived her life using these words and isn’t liable to change at this late stage.  So does this mean that we should merely accept it when older people use language that we deem to be sexist, racist, homophobic etc?  Is age really a valid excuse for saying things that other people may find offensive?

The reason I ask is because an eighty year old soap star is currently being slated for saying that victims of sexual abuse are paying for sins committed in past lives.  Not surprisingly, this has caused outrage, particularly amongst victims of abuse and organisations that support them.  However, there are those who are leaping to his defence and stating that he should not be vilified for this abhorrent point of view because of his age.   Call me a social fascist if you like but I don’t think that age is any excuse, unless of course there are other underlying medical things going on (such as Alzheimer’s or autism).  To me, if a person fully understands what they are saying and what is going on in the world around them then they are responsible for their behaviour.  This rule should apply whether the person is eighteen or eighty six.  To say that they are simply too old to change is ridiculous.  As humans we never stop learning and part of the learning process involves adapting to the changing world around us.  It may well be disconcerting to learn that certain words, customs and beliefs we were brought up with are redundant or no longer acceptable but that’s life. 

If we want a more tolerant and accepting society we need to challenge prejudice wherever we find it, even if it feels mean or uncomfortable to do so.  I mean, you can challenge without being offensive or condescending.  You don’t have to necessarily have to treat them to a lecture about how not to behave in public but it is always a good idea to patiently explain that some people may find their words offensive and/ or upsetting.  Of course, if you do this you lay yourself open to being criticised for being intolerant.  You may even get the whole “I fought a war so that we could all be free to talk the way we like” speech.  And yes, this may be the case.  I am not for a second disputing that the older generation have made and continue to make a valuable contribution to society.  However, this does not exempt them from having to consider the possible ramifications of what they say.  Just like the rest of us, they should (as far as is reasonable) ensure that what they say does not offend and upset other people.  Surely this is not too much to ask of anybody.

That horse has bolted

I fear I may be trying to jump onto a long departed bandwagon here, given that the storm over the Tesco debacle has been raging for a good few weeks now.  A more with it blogger would have taken straight to her computer to pound out a few pages of outraged diatribe the minute the news broke but not I!  This is mostly because I like to see whether something is really truly worthy of my consideration before I blog about it.  At first I thought that this was just going to illicit a few hysterical headlines and some horse gags before finally dying down and disappearing but I was wrong.

Not only are we still talking (and laughing) about it all; yet more food related screw ups are coming to light.  It now transpires that Findus is amongst the brands whose ready meals are thought to contain horsemeat.  This is one of those scenarios that I wish I was surprised by but I’m not.  The fact that big corporations pack their ready meals with just about anything, package it and then sell it onto an unsuspecting public really does not amaze me in the slightest.  Sure, we have laws that are supposed to protect the consumer by discouraging these kinds of shenanigans but when did the law ever stop big corporations from doing anything.  If recent times have taught us anything it is that the law does not apply to you if you are rich and powerful enough.  And Tescos is both very rich and very powerful.  When it comes down to it the only thing that these companies truly care about is making a profit and as long as they are still doing that then everything else is of secondary importance.  I very much doubt that this horse meat fiasco will have made that much of an impact on Tesco’s profit margins because people do still need to eat, however pissed off they may be that what they thought was a juicy beef burger is actually Black Beauty slathered in BBQ sauce. 

The only bit of the whole episode that took me by surprise was the outrage.  Apparently, people were perfectly at ease with tucking into cows and pigs but were practically hysterical once they realised that they may have inadvertently eaten a cute little horse.  Why?  Surely if you are perfectly at ease with gorging on the flesh of one animal, eating another animal wouldn’t be that much different.  At least, the principle is still the same.  The animal was once alive and now it isn’t because it is on your plate glistening in all its gravified goodness....yum.  Plus, I’m assuming that many of those who purchased and ate the offending products didn’t actually realised that they had been duped since a large proportion of those would have purchased said products multiple times.

Then it dawned on me.  It is not necessarily people being squeamish about eating horses (well, ok it largely is); it is more about the fact that people thought that they were getting one thing when they were actually getting something different.  If they have been fooled once then how many times and with how many other products has this happened?  What else is in our food that we don’t know about?  Cats, frog’s eyeballs, dinosaur bollocks?  Who the hell knows? It is Tesco’s after all.  There could literally be anything in your gourmet microwavable spaghetti bolognaise.  It genuinely doesn’t bare thinking about.  Plus, it is an issue of trust.  Nobody likes being lied to, especially if those lies are about things that we are buying and potentially feeding our families. 

I’m just hoping that Tesco’s don’t establish a used car arm of their business because God only knows what they’d try and sell you; hearses masquerading as people carriers, pushbikes with no wheels, etc.  You just never know what they will think up next (and you probably wouldn’t want to) but hey, that’s part of the fun, isn’t it?  It could be the start of a whole new dinner party game: guess what’s in your burger!  

Love is in the air

I really didn’t want to dedicate an entire blog post to this mushy nonsense but tradition and a bizarre sense of obligation has forced me to do just that.  Anyone who has not been fortunate to live in a cave without Internet access and/ or other connections to the outside world will have noted that International Make Singletons Everywhere Feel Bad Day (otherwise known as Valentine’s Day) is almost upon us.  For the less commercially enslaved readers among you, Valentine’s Day is that special time of year where we all forget to nag our partners about the gigantic pile of washing up that they have still not done and the toenails they have left wallowing in the bath.  Instead our nagging endeavours turn to hints about overly expensive meals in “intimate” Italian restaurants and “romantic” Valentine’s breaks in some country manor house.  We approach the day with rising anticipation and a sense of certain expectation; surely, this time he or she will have pushed the boat out and have planned something really special.  You know they have been avoiding the whole thing BUT that is just so that they don’t give away the surprise.  You have booked the whole weekend off work and told anyone who cares enough to pretend to listen of your impending Valentine’s treat.

Then the day comes round.  You awake to no breakfast in bed.  Indeed, your partner is still grunting and snoring next to you whilst whispering something lewd about Kate Middleton/ Prince Harry/ Russell Crowe/ Harriet Harman/ John Prescott/ Anne Hathaway (delete as appropriate) and licking their lips.  Naturally, you go downstairs expecting that they have somehow miraculously smuggled in your surprise the previous night and have left it somewhere obvious for you to find.  Like a child on Christmas morning, you dash downstairs unsure and excited about what you might find.  A mad dash around the house reveals nothing.  Not a sausage.  Only a headless mouse (at least Tiddles has remembered) and a puddle of cat piss next to the fridge.  You turn from this feline trail of destruction to see your dishevelled looking partner squinting at you through eyes full of sleep and fresh morning sunlight.  Outraged you demand whether they even know what day it is.  Nonplussed, they reply that it is Friday and run off to get ready for work.  Almost hysterical you yell after the that it is Valentines Day and demand to know why it is that everybody else’s partner ALWAYS does something romantic and yet they always forget to.  You then follow said partner to the bottom of the stairs where you proceed to list the various wonderful things that friends’ partners have done for them for Valentines Day.  Every intimate meal, every surprise holiday gets a mention.  All the while your partner seems way too preoccupied with where they have left their shoes/skirt/belt/handbag, which just gets you more enraged.  By the time you have said your goodbyes you are wondering how you can ever admit this embarrassment to your friends and colleagues, who will now think you are a complete failure because your partner couldn’t even be bothered to show how much they love you by wasting their money on a piece of card sporting a pair of smooching teddies and a vomit inducing verse.  Woe is you.  The fact that they have spent the past year holding back your hair as you vomit after consuming your bodyweight in tequila and listening to you as you pour out your latest workplace drama pales in significance next to the absence of a creepy looking teddy holding an embossed love heart. Because when it comes to relationships, it is the small manufactured things that count.

Later on that evening you return home to find a battered looking bouquet of roses and a large soppy card with the 99p price tag still attached.  You peek inside just to see a generic soppy verse that has been seen by countless other people that very same day and your partner’s name at the bottom.  Still, you are not happy.  They did this only because you nagged them to do it and even then, it was done in a rush and with very little thought.  It was done purely to placate you and to give them an easier life.  Just look at the state of the flowers! 

I have spent so much of my adult life hating things like Valentines Day.  I celebrated it a couple of times when I was a teenager and had my first boyfriend but that was before I realised how stupid the whole thing was.  I understand the whole thing about wanting to tell somebody that you love them but why does that have to be done on an allocated day and why does it have to involve buying them random tat and insisting that they do the same in return?  If you genuinely love somebody, why do you need an allocated day to remind you to spend time with them?  Surely, it means more when somebody does something because they want to rather than because they know that you will expect them to. I don’t know, maybe I am just being a tad naïve here but I’m not really sure how a person’s willingness to contribute towards Hallmark’s profits and their feelings towards their partners are linked.  

For those of you who have reached the end of this post and are still wondering whether I will be celebrating this pointless waste of a day: the answer is a resounding NO.  The only time I will ever celebrate valentines day is if I end up owning a business that manufactures cards and random tat.