Being late and other peoples imposed commitments

Now this will either hit home with you or you will be one of those people who don’t share my resentment towards people who are late, because you most probably are such a person. Being late is a sin. It is the most impolite and rudest thing to do. Then to make it worse is turn up after your agreed time and act like it’s no big deal. If you are such a sort, do you know what you’re saying about the other person? That their time is not important. Their very being and other commitments are obsolete. You are basically looked upon with the same sense of human warmth as child molester.

Why be late? I don’t understand it. In order to not be late you leave early. You don’t agree to meet at nine, then get up at nine and say you’ll be there in half an hour. Or talk about your “bitch of a hangover.” Tough! We’ve all felt like we’ve been thrown at deaths door by two of satins heavy handed minions, but that’s no excuse. It’s self inflicted. The only excuse that harvests no negative feelings is death. Death for you, death for a person you love or on the way. That I can say, “Ok, fine. I’ll just order another Americano and blueberry muffin so the trip isn’t a complete waste of time.”

Another thing which some people do is ask a favour of you. And generally, unless their Adolf Hitler or George Bush, you agree because you’re a ‘nice’ person. You want to be helpful. But then, after some time, the favour hangs over your head like a constipated vulture. You wait for the person to come, but they fail to appear. It gets drawn out, and now it becomes an inconvenience. Let me give you an example. An acquaintance wants to play a CD in my hi-fi (no sexual innuendo), and I’m now sat watching black adder waiting for this so and so to turn up with his disk of relief and sod off again. Thing is, he asked 4 hours ago and I want to open a bottle of wine, have a glass, watch the rest of black adder and relax. But I can’t because I know any second this person with the human sensitivity of a carrot, will appear at my door.

The best idea is probably just pretend I’m not in. When the knock comes I become a mute. But why should I live my life like this to appease someone I don’t particularly like anyway. I’ve just thought of another thing. I wish some people would just get the hint that no one likes them.

Oh the joys of Christmas

Like me you’re probably pondering on what to get those you love for Christmas. I’ve personally spent the past three days thinking about this and have yet to come up with an answer. At first I thought perhaps I should get a coffee maker for one member of my immediate family. But this has become somewhat of a recurring event, as because of my bad eye or her copious consumption of coffee, they only tend to last a year. Now this is fine, the circle of life continues for coffee makers, but I fear it may be somewhat of a letdown for my poor mother, who is probably already clearing the side to make way for a present she expects is coming. I could in all fairness head down to the body shop, pick up a couple of those bags that smell of the French country side and be done with it. Simple. But I’m a stickler for gifts that have thought poured into them like caramel into a chocolate cup. I want what I give to my family to bring a smile to their faces and know just how much time and effort I poured over each and every one of them. Now I know what you’re thinking. “It’s not all about the presents”, “Stop being so commercial”. True, but the pure matter of fact is, I’m not taken in by all the commercial nonsense. But it’s that one time of year where you can choose to be with the one’s you love, and share in that warm fuzzy feeling that the whole nation is contented. So to show how much those around mean to you, you need to give an appropriate gift. And I’m back to the same problem I had three days ago.

To see if it made the challenge any easier I pretended I had won the lottery in order to see if the confinements of money had anything to do with over coming this new adversary. My answer in short. No. I could buy them a Cartier watch for every day of the week and clothing made out of baby seal cheeks, but it wouldn’t be anything they would really want. There is no thought in such gifts. Only higher home insurance and the threat of not getting on with vegetarians.

Like most of us I’ll end up in London searching the floors of Selfridges trying to find that one diamond in the ruff. It’s probably there. Right now. Sat on the shelf with the word ‘Perfect’ floating majestically over it. But will I find it in the biggest department store in London? You can bet you soft and fragile bits I won’t. Or if I do it’ll be the last one in the shop and I’ll have to wrestle some American tourist who’s already bought half the shop in a desperate effort to piss off the check in desk at Heathrow airport when they go home.

All I would ask of anyone who is going to get a gift for someone this Christmas is to put some thought into it. This is truly an example of quality and not quantity.

Good luck!

Here goes nothing.

Here we go. Blog number one. The truth of the matter is that I’m probably only going to be writing this for myself. A sort of self reflection or a method of venting my frustrations and opinions. Or perhaps one person will read it and consider it mildly more entertaining than Saturday night television.

Quite often in life you meet people. Some you like, some you hate and all those in-between, and that’s fine. That’s life. The difficulty comes when you don’t like someone, but they don’t do anything that is particularly hate worthy. These are often the people who you hate to be cornered with at a party, for fear they will talk about their favourite type of post box or go through a list of what is and what isn’t classified as a nut. (By the way, in case you were wondering it’s quite a few.) I had the misfortune to be cornered by such a person today in the hallway. I tried to look bored by fiddling with my key, looking up at the ceiling and staring at him without reaction to any of his convocation. The mistake I made was presuming he was as emotionally switched on as me. Whereas I can sense if a person is uncomfortable, he seems oblivious to the civil war breaking out in my head and carries on talking about a subject matter he probably knows I a) don’t care about, and b) I politically stand against. But wait, it gets worse. Afterwards I beat myself up that I dislike this person because of what he stands for and for being a complete bore. Your right, it’s a little cruel, but surely it’s crueler on his side, inflicting his inconsequential life stories on me?

The subject, in case you were wondering or cared, not that it matters because I’m going to tell you anyway, was the army. Yes, I know we need one blah blah blah, but I take objection to the mentality of the majority of people I have met who have serviced and find the armies moral codes questionable at best. For example, part of the skull shattering convocation was about twelve and thirteen year olds handling live weapons. Oh but wait it gets better. Some of these little cherubs of death have aspects of them which make them special, such as ADD. Oh wonderful! I can’t help but think the army’s main purpose it to provide a mother like figure to control their lives. Not to get too Freudian on your hidden cheeks, but quite often people who are attracted to the army are those who require the need to be told what to do. Making decisions for themselves is uncomfortable. I presume this will either offend or seem accurate by my one reader. Anyhow, that’s probably enough from me for now.