Saturday, 19 March 2011
BLOG
149: A-Team?
“I
love it when a plan comes together”
Colonel John “Hannibal”
Smith
“In 2008, a crack writing unit was continually
frustrated by a series of crap they didn’t commit. One of these writers promptly
threw regular wobbles in written format on the World Wide Web Aka the writer’s
underground. Today, still frustrated by the crap throwers, she survives as a
soldier of blog. If you see a problem…if no one else seems to notice the
crapfest…and if you can find this webpage…maybe you can find your thoughts
reflected at…JaxWorld.”
You know, life… the living of it should be the
easiest thing in the world once we have taken care of a few little details like
food, water, and shelter.
So can SOMEONE please explain to me why it is that
at every turn… seemingly the crap fest awaits? It always starts small… but
like watching a dung beetle at work, that small little splatter of crap rolls on
increasing in size by the minute…
Like this seemingly ordinary mid-week
day…
You know how it is… you are about to go out. Your
schedule is precision timed and if you leave right now you will comfortably meet
your transport connections. You put your hand on the front door and….. The
landline rings. Pick up or leave it? What if it is important? …What if it is
pertinent to where you are about to go? After a 6 second internal battle you
pick up… and it’s a rubbish sales call/ over emotional friend/ family member
wondering if you could run a trivial errand. It only takes a few moments to dispatch the
caller… but you are now flustered and behind schedule. I don’t know about you
but the invention of the mobile phone to me means that the landline is for
IMPORTANT stuff like the dreaded I have you down as the next of kin
calls… NOT for someone to talk to me about double glazing. And if it is
errand request or an over emotional friend… can we not TEXT? (POI: Has anyone EVER bought
double glazing because a salesman called them at home?)
Muttering to yourself, you scoot on. You pick up the pace and are striding purposely
towards your transport links when… suddenly the pavement doesn’t quite feel as solid as it did
a moment ago. Which of course means that your shoe is now wearing the gift so
thoughtfully left by a dog lovers objet d’amour. Maybe it’s me
(I’m a cat person so I’m not wired to understand the need to build a
relationship with an animal with such high levels of dependency and
incontinence)… but I REALLY don’t get why it is considered okay by some dog
lovers to allow their objet
d’amour leave faeces on the public thoroughfare for my shoes to find!!!
(Look I have nothing against mans most
dependant friend, if your best friend has to be a critter that retrieves sticks
that is fine by me… but when it wants to poo on the street will you please
PICK UP AFTER YOUR DOG!)
So now you are late, flustered, smelling vaguely of
poo even though you have spent a good few moments trying to surreptitiously
transfer the poo onto the curb and any clump of grass… admit it you’ve even
deliberately walked in a puddle to see if you can dislodge it and dissolve its
pungency.
Slightly damp of foot you arrive at your
transportation links. Yay public transport! Unlike driving where one can only
guestimate the time of arrival, public transport be it train, plane or automobus
have schedules that show time of departure and time of arrival. Take the trains
for example. If you are on the direct 08.49 it will arrive at 10.42. Which is
good …as you have an appointment at 11.25 in a location that is quarter of an
hour walk or five minutes cab ride away from the station, so that gives you a
comfort cushion of time. The delay and dog-poo have meant you have already eaten
into this. You are now aiming for the 08.59 which is an indirect service but the
connections look slick so you should still arrive for about 11.05 which means
you’ll probably get a cab at the other end to be on the safe side. You take the
luxury of exhaling. All’s well. Rejigged… but all’s well. Then something takes
your breath away. The squawk box on the station kicks in “National Rail is sorry to
announce a delay to the 08.59 service”.
Delay? How long a delay? Well one thing is for sure… the squawk box is
hedging it’s bets on not committing to an actual time that can be measured in
minutes, National Rail has filled it’s contractual obligations… it’s let you
know that train will be late. How late? Well that’s for you to find out as they
ain’t telling. Your plans are dissolving before your eyes. But no worries, you
have a mobile phone. Best ring ahead and advise them that there are issues with
your transportation and there is a slim possibility that you may be a few
minutes late. So you turn your back to
afford some privacy from your fellow would be passengers and relay the message.
During which the train (which was NOT delayed at all) rolls into the station in
stealth mode and leaves without you.
So have dealt with the transportation issues by
expensively chasing the train to the intersection in a cab, and arrived at your
destination, the crap fest seems to ease for a while. You do what you have to
do. You are back in control. Poorer yes…the nice lunch you were going to treat
yourself to is not going to happen as that budget was eaten by the cab fare at
both ends. Less confident in your footwear yes… one foot is still decidedly
damp and there is a slight eau de dog poo wafting in the air (though this may
well be psychological). And you are still a tad resentful about being personally
selected for a unique offer for cut price double glazing at 08.30 in the
morning. But hey ho. Things are looking up. You have a seat on the direct
service and you are heading back to base.
And look who gets on the train! An old friend you
have not seen for years…. how nice. Until they say a series of those well
meaning things people say about your life that serve only to leave you quietly
seething for the rest of the day.What you want to retort with
is “Thank you so much for your
unsolicited commentary” and freeze them with an icy glare …. but you are
far too well brought up to make THEM feel uncomfortable… so you just suck it
up, smile nicely and pray the train has no delays between there and the terminus
so you can get rid. On the bright side after the double glazing call, you know
you’ll be changing your landline number… so you’ll gladly give them the
current one when the friends say you both simply MUST stay in
touch!
So…the day rolls on and so far you have been made
late by a random unimportant call to your land line, you rushed off flustered
and stepped in dog poo, the attempts to remove have left you with one grass
stained, curb scratched and puddle soaked shoe, you missed your train once
because of the former delays and a second time by making a courtesy call when
you thought that one was delayed. You have spent a good deal of money chasing
the second train across the county and donated yet more money to the cab society
at the other end in order to get to your meeting on time. Your return journey is
marred by an old friend who at first appeared as if they would be a welcome
diversion but instead managed to insult all of your life choices to date and do
little else but brag about their own.
But hey ho.
The day rolls on.
It’s evening and you think a nice glass of wine is
called for. You decide to make it a event
. You run the bath, you light the candles… you soak the day away. Wrapped in
your fluffy dressing gown you sidle down and take a large glass out of the
cupboard. You put the nachos in a bowl and pull the dip out the fridge. Which is when you notice. There IS no wine. Not in the fridge, not in the cupboards, not in the house… you are as alcohol
free as a bar in Jordan during Ramadan. GAH! There is only
one solution…. corner shop.
For my readers who do not live in the UK, the corner
shop is a British institution. This is the shop you would never consider
shopping in unless you are desperate. The reason for this being that sleek
modern retail practices are unheard of in a corner shop. Every conceivable item
is crammed onto their shelves: some bizarre, some essential and many are just
simply chronically out of date. Corner shops
survive purely out of the British nostalgia for the old ways PLUS the fact that as they are open all hours
they bail you out when you have forgotten to pick something up at the
supermarket. And as the name suggests
they are located quite literally on the corner of your road (or one very
nearby).
Okay.. you have decided (in your fluffy dressing
gown) that a dash to pick up some wine at the corner shop is the only way to
resolve the problem. (Nachos and a cup of tea is a non starter). But you’ve just
had a bath. Your hair is wet, you have no make-up on and you are in your
nuddy-suit under your robe. It’s only on the corner… less than five minutes
away… BING! The solution is obvious…
pop a coat over your dressing gown, push your purse in your pocket, sprint down
the road, get a nice bottle of Rioja, sprint back… job done. In fact you don’t
even need to change out of your slippers.
The Corner Shop does exactly what it says on the
tin. It’s on the corner… and it sells everything from models of the Bismark to
packets of Spacedust. It also sells wine (located next to the rather solid
looking cheese and pet food from brands that ceased trading in the late 1990’s).
You realise that this is a massive bonus as the only Rioja they have is Vega
Sicilia which they are retailing at £3.99 or £5 for two. (Yes wine buffs I said
Vega Sicilia and we all know that the 1998 vintage goes at £200+ a bottle
these days. But as I said Corner shops have notoriously out of date stock…
however wine unlike cheese gets more valuable (and less blue) with age). So the
day IS looking up… well at least the night will be as having parted company
with £5 you are walking back to your house with over £400’s worth of
vino!
You put the bottles down carefully and root in your
pocket for the keys. You just can’t wait to get this party for one
started.
Remember our friend the dungbeetle? Yep the ball of
crap has now achieved critical mass.
You came out with a coat thrown over a dressing gown
and slippers. You pushed your purse into your pocket. You closed the door . You
went to cornershop. You got 2 bottles of wine. You came home.
Nowhere in that did I say you picked up your
keys.
YOU.
ARE.
LOCKED.
OUT.
Neighbours are a wonderful thing when you are half
naked with wet hair two bottle of wine and are locked out of your house. They’ll
let you in theirs . They’ll call an emergency locksmith for you. And they’ll
happily not notice that you are in your slippers and a coat if you let them
share your wine while you wait for the locksmith.
But hey ho these thing happen. Could happen to
anybody all in one day. I mean so far you have been made late by a random
unimportant call to your land line, you rushed off flustered and stepped in dog
poo, the attempts to remove left you with one grass stained, curb scratched and
puddle soaked shoe, you missed two trains and spent a whole heap of money in
cabs. You were insulted about all of your life choices to date by an old friend
who did little else but brag about their own. You ran out of wine and only found
out after you’d had a long soak in the tub, which left you half naked in the
neighbours house because you slipped out to replenish the wine but forgot your
keys. Your unexpected bonus of quality wine is being quaffed by the neighbours
as if it were ribena. And the emergency locksmith from the yellow pages came
around and drilled the lock out (opening the door) for £160, then you had to
purchase a new lock, and get him to fit it and make spare keys, which came to
nearly £300.
Just a seemingly ordinary mid week day, frustrated
by things which may or may not be within your circle of control… but
frustrated none the less. It makes me wonder…Do we need an A-team to jump in
and save us from just trying to live our daily lives? A crack commando unit
who’ll stop your whole day going of track by a series on unfortunate
minutiae.
You know, life… the living of it should be the
easiest thing in the world once we have taken care of a few little details like
food, water, and shelter. And yet at every turn… seemingly the crap fest awaits
ready to pounce and turn life into a musical hall farce!
I just try to
grin and bear it but you know… to quote Lieutenant Templeton “Faceman” Peck:
“That’s not even a smile, it’s
just a bunch of teeth playing with my mind!” ? It always starts small… but
like watching a dung beetle at work, that small little splatter of crap rolls on
increasing in size as the minutes pass .
Enough already of reporting the crapfest to the
writers underground… It’s time stop that dung beetle … please… we have a
problem… no one else can help… so if you can find them… maybe we should
hire….the A-team !
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