to be narked at this old lady?

[fanjoforthemammaries7850]

was on the bus with DD and DH. Bus was half empty.DD and DH were in buggy space. I sat behind them,mindful that I was in priority seat for elderly/disabled,but there were 4 others and i'd move if required (DD has SN so i hope I'm sensitive to such things).↲ An old lady got on. There was a clear seat beside me. She didn't sit on but stood there looking at me as if I were vermin and said 'these seats were meant for us.' I said 'well there's a seat there and if anyone needs this one I'll give them it.' then i couldn't help it and said 'they are priority seats,not noone else can ever sit there seats'.↲anyway,i just feel a bit mean,was i harsh?DH thinks she was just looking for a fight. There was an empty seat for her beside me. Was IBU?

i mean,the other half of my seat was empty,btw

Just being awkward I suspect.There was no need for her to pass comment.

No YWNBU at all

YANBU

phew, i have a real fear of people thinking i am rude, but suspected she was a bit out of order,have been stressing though about it.

How did she know you were not disabled, those seats are for elderly and/or disabled.Its not just old folk who need priority seats, younger people need them sometimes too.
You offered to move if bus became full, she was just being mean.

YABU

she clearly had her imaginary old lady friend with her and they needed to sit together

or she is a member of a hardline geriatric rights group

(loving the fact she said "these seats are meant for US")!!!

YANBU. I had a similar situation a few weeks ago where a middle aged man made it his mission to say very loudly, 'I will give up my seat for anyone older than me, as some of these young people have no manners.' the bus was heaving, i had DD in the buggy space and was sitting next to her in the fold down seat. She is 7 months old so can't sit unaided and did not want to attempt to get her out and fold the buggy up mid journey. Some other people were sitting in the spaces for the disabled/infirm priority spaces but none of the people who got on the bus were particularly old or infirm; they were just over 60!!! I would willingly give my seat up for a very elderly or infim person, but not just because someone is drawing their pension!

lol. I suppose i felt bad as i really did verbally kick her to the kerb, didn't i?

xposted-ethelred, i feel your pain,what a passive-aggressive twunt of a man!

I wanted to shout out 'shut up you bloody pompous twat' but of course, i just sat there, seething away! It makes me laugh, when i was at school i had a saturday job in a bakers and the old people used to nearlty have physical fights about who had pushed in front of them in the queue!!

Oooh ... you missed the perfect come-back line. " 'Us'? Do you have a tapeworm?"

well she only has one arse, she can't sit in two seats, so she was being unnecessarily obnoxious.

it was quite a big arse, maybe that was it!

It really does grate on me that so often, those Senior Citizens complain and say we are rude, but it's more often that they are rude.

Fanjo, I think you were within reason. If you say that there were 4 other seats available for her to pick and she went out of her way to challenge you for your seat, then YANBU.

I went to a Proms Concert near us last night. We were among the first to arrive, so had to wait for doors to open. Other audience members arrived and waited in the foyer with us. When the doors opened it was sticks and walking frames a-flying! I got slo-mo elbowed out of the way!

At the ticket desk I got overrun with seniors who just barged in around me and I had no physical way of actually getting to the chap with the tickets.

I said loudly, "I am here too to buy my tickets, I'm standing here and I'm being shoved out of the way. I don't think I'm invisible...."

My 4yo behaved better than they did!

I think it's because they are given priority seats tbh, not saying they don't deserve them, but it just leads to these sort of arguments.

I remember when M and S introduced signs saying please don't sit down until you had got your food..which is fair enough..but until then everyone had muddled through, after these signs were put up there were loads of arguments and much righteous indignation at people who sat down.

as in..common sense thinking "well there is a free seat there" goes out the window and in comes an attitude of "THESE ARE MY OFFICIAL SEATS WITH A PICTURE OF AN OLD PERSON WITH A STICK ON THEM"...

True, it's the ENTITLEMENT, and the need for everyone to ram it home to demand said seat, to be given way to etc.

Trouble is, it's being rammed down our throats immediately, not giving us the chance to give up our seat if it's needed, the entitlement makes them DEMAND the seat, as you say, even if it makes no sense to demand that particular one.

Common sense is clearly no match for entitlement...

note I am not being entirely serious and suggesting priority seats are abolished, before I get any s

Maybe we need a bit more writing on the seat, a few paragraphs should explain it fully

Bloody old foggies,some of them are worse than ignorant teenagers

AAAAAArggh I find some old people really anoying

Glad my mums not like this she actually sits further back on the bus.
But maybe she's just more tolerant because of DS's SN and the attitude shes seen towards him.

She was being difficult for the sake of it. YANBU.