Eastenders - how unrealistic??!!

OK, so one of my most favourite TV programmes is 'Eastenders.'  I am a 'soap' queen.  Or was??!!

Tonight's episode was the most unrealistic of any 'soap dramas' that I have ever seen...............

Alfie & Roxy's wedding was a joke - I might even have to stop watching!!!

This is the storyline:

Ex shows up at wedding.

Bride gets jilted (after getting married).

Groom goes chasing after ex.

Groom hi-jacks a motor bike (& abandons the motorbike right outside the departures door at the airport as if airport security would let anyone do that?)

Bride gets drunk - OK that's probably the only realistic scene in the whole episode?!

Biana says - 'You've got family'.

Kat says - 'Say goodbye to Alfie for me'

Cue scene -  where we see Kat & kid, dragging a teddy along, just about to get on plane.

Since when did Kat & Biana become best mates???

Next thing we know, there is a screeching of motorbike tyres, Alfie runs into the airport, conveniently bumps into Biana and asks if she has any cash???

Well, Biana doesn't normally have enough cash for a tin of beans, so how all of a sudden she has enough money to pay for a ticket to Ibiza is a bit of a mystery???

So Alfie purchases a ticket, runs onto the runway and up the steps to the aeroplane where the door is closed so he bangs on it and miraculously the staff open it.  Would that really happen??

Alfie then walks through the aeroplane until he finds Kat who amazingly has 3 whole seats for her & Tommy.

For Gods sake - the plane is just about to take off?!  Would he really be allowed to do this???

Kat says - 'I'm moving on. I can't believe you've done this'.  Neither can the rest of us.

Cue - Alfie being thrown off the plane.

This must be the most unbelievable episode of East Enders ever??!!!

And the last scene we saw, was Kat running after Alfie.  No surprise there then,; it is a soap opera after all.  Planes have to fly to tight schedules so can't believe that a door that was previously shut was then allowed to stay open  indefinitely??

And Kats last words before we got the East Enders cliff hanging music?! ......................

.................'And you're my man in the moon'.

Throw me the sick bucket now................................

...........................And note to East Enders script writers................. Please can we return to reality???

Stalkers!

20 or 30 years ago I don't think 'stalkers' had been invented?!

OK - there may have been people that were obsessed with other people but I don't think 'stalker' was a word that many people would have been familiar with?!

Today 'stalker' is a word that is branded around all over.

Anyone who shows the slightest bit of interest in us............... is a 'stalker'.

We get chatted up too much - we're being stalked.
Somebody tells us we look gorgeous - we're being stalked.
Too many phone calls - and we're being stalked.
Too many comments on our Facebook page - and we're being stalked.

And all of a sudden we're a 'victim' because we have been stalked and are now traumatised??!!

Get a life people:

If you're being 'stalked' on a social media site delete your account and just connect with people in the real world.

But will you silly people do that??? 

I suspect not??!!

No?! - you want to send messages to your 'stalkers', or 'friends of your stalkers,' in an effort to connect with them and tell them to leave you alone.  Why would you want to do this??

As far as I am concerned................  If you're being stalked.................... don't have any contact with the stalkers.

Just ignore them.  Why on earth would you want to partake in a dialogue with the idiots???

And yet every day when we open the newspaper we read stories about 'victims' that have been traumatised via a social networking site.

Just leave the site, delete your account.......................

...............And don't post stuff online.  Grrrrrrrrr....................

Wages in the South West

OK; so I'm not sure whether this is going to be a 'rant' or a 'moan' or just a general whinge???

OK - it's probably going to be a 'rant'???

Wages in the South West are one of the lowest in the country.  House prices in the SW are one of the highest in the country.

Most people who work in the SW do so in the tourism industry and get paid the minimum wage.

Although, over the last few years, the tourism season has expanded, so the seasonal workers have more work, and therefore get more pay; they still have absolutely no chance of getting onto the property ladder.

Think I might have to have a rant about SW people buying their homes at a later date.

Anyway, what has inspired me to write this blip is this:

One of the young boys who I work with, turned 17 the other week.  He's just gone off to college to do some sort of an art course.   He's dyslexic (so his academic qualifications weren't that good) but because his art work was so good he was allowed on the course (with the proviso that he was monitored).  The pictures of his art work, that he posts on Facebook, are absolutely fantastic.

However, this young boy, who is a fantastic artist, is not getting anywhere near as much support as he would if he lived 'upcountry'???  Wages are ridiculously low in the SW, so even though his father is self employed (& his mother is working every hour under the sun), they've still got a mortgage to pay, & still have other kids to support.

He turned 17 years old the other week and for his birthday his parents bought him some 'brushes' which cost £40.  He was ecstatic about this.  Painting is his passion.

I'm 54 years old and yet when I came into work, that was the first thing that he told me.  'My mum & dad bought me £40 worth of brushes for my birthday'?

I'm not a millionaire, but I'd actually just love to give him £100.  He is just soooo talented and I know he'll go far as an artist.

Obviously I cannot just give him £100.

That would totally undermine what his parents are trying to do for him.

It just makes me so mad though.......................

I have 2 nephews and a niece, all of which, have absolutely no idea 'how the other half live'.

I love my nephews & niece to bits but I have no idea if any of them have any talents or passions that they are likely to pursue.

And what makes me really mad; is this poor kid (who is exceptionally talented) is really having to fund all of his dream himself.  He's worked 6 days a week throughout the summer holidays and now he's working all day Sat & 3 hours on a Sun.

..............And I know if any of my nephews or niece wanted to do a college course, my sister and her husband, would just buy them all the equipment they needed before they went.  The kids would just expect them to do it, and the parents would just assume that was what they had to do.

Life for children is not fair and it never, ever will be.

On my niece's Christmas list is a laptop & guitar???  ...................And she'll probably get them!!!

OK so this rant seems to have changed into a rant about what children expect.

My little 17 year old colleague will go far.  He's got a passion, an ambition, a focus, and a determination to achieve his dream.  He may not have money, but he's working towards what he wants, and because 'mummy & daddy' aren't funding it, I'm sure he'll go far.

Good luck my lovely little colleague. xx

Children in Need

Tonight it is 'Children in Need' night.

I have absolutely nothing against 'Children in Need'.  I think it is a very worthwhile cause and I hope a lot of money will be raised tonight.

My rant is and I'm a ranting middle aged spinster so obviously rant is what I do why do we have to have c*** on all the TV channels that aren't doing 'Children in Need'???

I'm more than happy for BBC1 to have 'Children in Need' stuff on that channel all night.  It's a fundraiser night and I really hope they raise loads of money.  It is such a good cause.  I can even live without 'East Ender's for one night??!!

However, why have ITV gone into 'football' mode?????

I've been really busy all day and was really looking forward to an evening in front of trashy TV.  I knew that BBC1 would be taken up with 'Children in Need' stuff and I'm happy about that.

What I am not happy about is; ITV showing football all night.  Who wants to watch football except for a load of beer drinking men??  What's happened to the normal 2 episodes of Corrie that we normally get on a Friday night?????

.......................Soooooo, I've poured myself a very large glass of white wine and am faffing around on the computer??!!

My life would be so much more healthy, if I just sat in front of the telly, watching soaps and doing my knitting???!!!!

.................That is what 'middle aged ranting women' should be doing??!! LOL!

Cleaning holiday lets - Take 2

OK; so today I am going to have another rant about holiday makers who rent holiday properties.  As I said in a previous post; I clean 2 of my neighbouring properties which are rented to holiday makers.  Normally by the end of the October half term week, they remain empty for months.

Not so this year?!!

For some reason a couple of men decided to rent No. 2. 

I don't like to be judgemental but when I've walked past the house at night, and the lights have been on and the blinds not closed, I couldn't help but look in?! 

.........................OK I'm nosey!!!!!

However, if you saw two men sitting on a sofa at 10pm (when there are other chairs that one of them could be sitting on) you would think they were gay.................................  wouldn't you?????

To be honest, I couldn't care less whether they're gay, straight, bisexual or whatever?!

..............But because for some reason, I assumed they were gay; I also assumed that they would have slept in the same bed, so I would only have one set of bed linen to wash,  I assumed they would be clean & tidy gays are normally very clean and tidy so I didn't think I'd have too much to do.

I don't think they were gay??!!

Both beds had been slept in, they had left a load of crockery/cutlery on the draining board which I had to rewash because it was filthy, they'd obviously been cold because the thick blankets that are provided for extra warmth, were on the beds.  No cuddling up together then???

Actually, I think I'm probably wittering on a bit too much now.  The place was a mess but it actually wasn't any more of a mess than it would have been in the summer with mum, dad & 2.4 kids.

I think I'm just ranting because I wrongly made an assumption about two men that I only ever saw through a window??!!

That'll teach me to be nosey!!!!!!!

It took me hours to clean today but I guess I shouldn't complain.  Cleaning in this town is extremely well paid.

.....................Actually, it didn't take me hours to clean - It took me 2 hours - And for that I get £40.  Doesn't take a genius to work out that's £20 an hour??!!  That's a lot of money for not a lot of work???

No doubt I'll be doing more 'cleaning' rants at a later date.

Scottie dogs/Westie dogs - Shortbread??

 

This is a photograph of a box of very yummy shortbread which was bought at Sainsbury's.

 

It's called 'Scottie Dog Shortbread'.

 

Since when was a 'Scottie dog white?'  Since when did a 'Scottie dog look like a nice cute cuddly teddy bear?'  Westies look like nice cuddly teddies, Scotties do not. 

 

Scottie dogs have more square features.  Westies are like cuddly teddies.

 

However, once opened, the 'white' Scottie box of shortbread actually looked like 'Scottie' dog biscuits inside.

 

It annoys me though - it makes me 'rant'??!!

 

The 'Scottie dog' white biscuit tin is obviously designed for Christmas. Shoppers see cute white (thinking of snow & winter & Christmas) dog shaped tin and think 'whoopee doo' - lets just buy that.

 

The shortbread is lovely and the shape of the biscuits look like 'Scottie dogs'.

 

It just makes me so mad that the tin is 'Westie' shaped??!!

 

Scottie dogs and Westie dogs are NOT the same.

 

Perhaps I will lodge an 'official' complaint with Sainbury's'??

 

................Or perhaps I won't - because who cares?????????

Another Facebook Rant

Think I'm going to have another FB rant!

I have an iphone because I am a very 'hi tec' 50 something lady!!!

The problem with an iphone is; I feel the need to keep looking at it to see if anything interesting is happening.  One of the things I keep looking at is Facebook.

I'm not sure how many 'friends' I have on FB?  Just over 100 I think, but they are all people I know in real life and I have absolutely no desire to make any 'virtual' friends.

I never, ever, post anything on FB that I wouldn't want the whole world to see.  I am very conscious of the fact that the minute anything goes on the internet it can be copied and pasted and sent around the world in a second.

What annoys amazes me about FB is the amount of rubbish that people put on there.  Do I care if one of my friends is waiting for the kettle to boil???  I do not!

My life is pretty boring!  Actually I like my life but if I were to put my day to day activities on FB it would probably be something like this:

Me in the shower.
Me walking the dog.
Me at work.
Me walking the dog.
Me shopping in Tesco's.
Me watching soaps on TV.

Why on earth would anyone be interested in that and need a running commentary of it on FB?

The point I'm getting to is; I have a friend on FB who drives me mad, because she records every single little detail of her life on FB.

I feel I need to add here, that this is someone who I have known for more than 10 years, but she isn't actually a friend in the true sense of the word. I have been out with her on a few occasions but I wouldn't exactly call her my best buddy in real life. We work in close contact and I probably speak to her a few times a week.

Every single time I look at FB, there's a new comment or photo.  I don't want to see what she had for breakfast, I don't care what she's watching on TV, I don't want to know that she's in a bad mood/good mood/having a bad hair day, I don't want to see photos of trival things!  It's driving me mad!!!!  She posts cryptic stuff like, 'One of my so called friends has really pissed me off'.  That just makes all her friends (obviously not me) comment, 'Hope I've not done anything to annoy you'.

People have said to me, 'Why don't you just defriend her?'

Well, the reason why I don't defriend her is because she actually checks how many friends she has and comments when she loses one. 

If she is watching 'Strictly' or 'X Factor' or 'BGT' she tends to post a running commentary for the whole of that show.  Some of her friends obviously get annoyed and 'defriend' her.  .................And then she comments that her number of friends has gone down.

Personally I find that very sad.  If someone is looking on FB every 2 secs to see how many friends they have; then they obviously haven't got that many in real life?!

So I won't 'defriend' her, as I actually think she's quite a sad, lonely, person who needs all the friends she can get.

.............But I never comment on her posts.

And I'll continue to be annoyed about her clogging up all my 'news feed' on FB with her trivia.

PS - 'Proper friends' have told me I can remain her FB friend but 'hide' her???!!!  I may be a very techie 50+ lady with an iphone but I don't know how to do that!!!!!!

Picking up a prescription

OK so picking up a prescription should not really be a difficult thing to do..........

............Go to the prescription counter, pick up prescription, pay, off we go, toodle pip!

Oh if only life were that easy???

I had cancer two and a half years ago so now I am on 'anti cancer' drugs for 5 years.  I have to go and pick these up every 3 months.  (Oh and while I'm on the subject of prescription drugs I may well have a rant about this at a later date - ie, people in Scotland do not have to pay for prescriptions so why do the people in England?)

Anyway my gripe isn't with the cost of prescription drugs............. It's with the inaccessibility of being able to pick them up!

Today, I finished work at 1.30pm and I had loads of stuff to do so I thought I'd just drive down to the surgery on my way home, run in quickly, and pick up my prescription.

Could I do this?  I could not!

All the lights were on in the prescription shop.  There were people in the prescription shop.  But would the door open?  It would not!

I rattled the door and a snooty member of staff yelled through the door, 'We're closed for lunch'.

So I yelled back, 'When do you re-open?'  And she said 2pm.

I had absolutely no idea that a doctors surgery's, where one picks up a prescription, actually closes for an hour for lunch???  How antiquated is that????  It's 2013 - Surely picking up a prescription for a serious illness is something that one should be able to do during normal working hours.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.........................  It makes me mad!!!!!

Tesco's - 4th rant

For those of you who have been following my 'rants' you will know that I HATE Tesco's??!!

I only shop at Tesco's because there is no other supermarket nearby.

Anyway this is my 4th Tesco RANT.  And RANT I am going to do.

Went to Tesco - Bought 3 trashy magazines, bread & milk, and 2 bottles of wines well it would have been rude not to!!!

Went to the check out for hand baskets.  One person in the queue in front of me.  That's fine - I can cope with one person in front of me in the queue.  I was quite happy to wait until the person in front of me had been served.  After all the max no. of items one can take through the hand held baskets check out is 10.

.............And actually the person in front of me only had a pizza!  One pizza?!  I was more than happy to wait in the queue while 'Mrs One Pizza' was served.

Would Tesco staff let me do that?  They would not.

The conversation went a bit like this:

Tesco employee - 'Would you like to come over to the self service tills?'

Me - 'No - I hate them. I don't know how to use them'.

Tesco employee - 'I'll put your shopping through for you'.

So over to the self service till I went, even though I didn't want to.  Handed my basket to Tesco Employee.

I had my own bag because I am a very 'environmentally aware' shopper.

So Tesco employee put my shopping through the self service scanner and I tried to put it in my shopping bag but apparently I can't just hold my shopping bag.  My shopping bag was not in the 'bagging area'.  So I put it in the 'bagging area' but there must have been some sort of problem because a strange automated voice kept saying, 'blockage in the bagging area, blockage in the bagging area'.  Tesco employee took my bag off me, put it in the 'bagging area', re-scanned my pint of milk, loaf of bread, trashy magazines and 2 bottles of wine........................  And then spent 5 mins showing me where to put my money and clubcard??!!

Meanwhile 'Mrs One Pizza' had left hours ago OK slight exaggeration & two other people had gone through the hand held basket till. 

I'm furious!!!!! 

I HATE self service tills.  I don't want to use them and it annoys me that supermarkets don't want to offer a 'real live service'.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr.........................  I'm sure I'll be ranting more about Tesco's!!!!

Jimmy Saville

I am getting so fed up with the number of 'celebrities' that are being charged with sex offences dating back to the 60's 70's 80's.  Sitting here watching the news and yet another one has been charged with some form of sexual assault from years ago.

Just what is the point of all this???  Especially if they're dead??!!

Perhaps I'm in the minority.  Actually, I'm sure I'm in the minority - But is stuff that happened 40 years ago really that relevant?  Shit happens.  Move on!

When I was 13 years old I was kissed by Jimmy Saville.  I was doing a sponsored walk and he was opening it and he just happened to be standing next to me.  I have a photo of me & Jimmy together.  Think it's in the loft somewhere.  I really must look it out, as I was the spottiest teenager ever, and Jimmy, as always, had a cigar in his mouth.

Anyway the press were there taking photos for the local paper and Jimmy Saville just turned and kissed me.  Not a peck on the cheek.  This was a full blown 'tongue down the throat' job!  It was horrible.  I was only 13 years old and he stuck his tongue down my throat in full view of everyone (though I doubt if anyone actually realised what was going on?!).

At the time I remember thinking that it was horrible and he absolutely stank of cigar smoke.

Did I report him to anyone?  Of course I didn't.  Why would I?  I didn't particularly like what he'd done but he was mega famous, even in the 70's, and and the whole experience only lasted a couple of seconds - hardly enough to traumatise me for life!!!  And also he was a 'grown-up' and in the 70's there was no such thing as children's rights, etc. etc.

I know that if I'd gone home and said to my parents that Jimmy Saville had stuck his tongue down my throat my parents would have said something like, 'You'll never have to see him again'.  They certainly wouldn't have reported him to the police.  It would just be something that was swept under the carpet and never talked about again.  In the 1970's a lot of stuff wasn't 'talked about'.

So....................  for the last 40 years, even though I didn't like the way Jimmy Saville kissed me - I've been boasting about it??!!

.................It's been my claim to fame!  I was kissed my Jimmy Saville!!!!!!!

Probably if I went to the police now and reported it, and said I'd been traumatised for the last 40 years, and that the fact that Jimmy Saville stuck his tongue down my throat has affected how I've lived my life.....................  Maybe I'd get a huge compensation payout??!!

....................Or perhaps I should just continue living my life as a contented, well adjusted, ranting middle aged woman, happy person, who believes that stuff that happened in the past is just that .................... stuff that happened in the past.

What's happened in the past has created us into the people that we are today.  Nobody can change the past.

Everyone has the opportunity to create what they would like to be in the future!!!