To sometimes feel like a brusque tweedy old lady on MN

[Imogentlasting]

I'm not that old, but some of the views on here really astound me. No one touch my child (on a thread I started); Christmas is just for me and my little unit, no relatives allowed; how dare an elderly person park in a P&T space; etc etc etc

AIBU to sometimes think the world is slowly going mad?

And a 2 minute lukewarm bath in the morning.

I think Judith Woods, Telegraph columnist, has been reading this thread as there is an article today complaining about whingeing women. Did anyone else see that thing about the barista who wrote the flirtatious message on the latte cup? To a 19-year-old? And her mother complained? Oh, if only I could get a flirtatious message on my cup! (Trouble is even if I got one I'd have to fish out my reading glasses to make out what it said...)

shins much as I love the internet I can see how it isolates people and encourages them to become entrenched in their self-righteousness. If you had lots of imaginary friends on the internet cheerleading your dickishness it'd be harder for you to realise you were being a dick in real life.

Absolutely

nauticant It's that these days people have much greater freedom to select their own communities, particularly with the assistance of the Internet. As a result people can live completely within their self-selected communities and this seems to encourage an intolerance with the general community. It's insiders vs outsiders.

Both good points. Agree although I also think there are other factors in play.

Overall if, for whatever reason, you don't feel that you need family or community then there is no real incentive to work within it. If there is no benefit in "the whole" then human nature says that we put the individual first.

The internet, transport, television, online shopping and banking, working from home, working away from where you live, immigration, house prices, rental costs - all these factors contribute to a change in the way society functions. One of the consequences is the prevalence of attitudes like some of those mentioned.

RhodaBull

We are not whinging - we are talking about society and changing attitudes to community. If a couple of men were discussing this it would be called a sociological discussion.

These attitudes do affect men. Men talk about them too. It isn't whinging.

Oh, no. We're not the whingers on here! It's the wimpy miseries posting their terrible grievances on just about every thread.

We are not the whingers, we have far too many grips for that. I have plenty to hand out when necessary

To be a fully paid up whinger on mumsnet you must be capable of getting absolutely furious and incensed about:

MILs buying your kids presents just to be annoying
School rules infringing on your child's human rights, delicate self esteem, fragile ego and sense of self worth
Strangers touching your children and not realising that 6 month old babies hate their personal space being invaded
Grandparents daring to want to see you and your kids for a few hours on Christmas Day when they should know they're no longer immediate family
Old tweedy ladies exchanging a few pleasantries with the checkout girl or fumbling with their purses and delaying you for two minutes in your busy important life.

Let me join the tweedy brigade, please please please.

Another mumsnet 'thing' is the immediate assumption that if someone offers to do something kind for you, they are only doing it so that you will 'owe them' at some future unspecified date. A complete disbelief that anyone might offer to do something nice for a friend, or even an acquaintance, without keeping some mad spreadsheet in their head of favours owed.

In my real life most people I know are quite happy to help someone out occasionally (the key being occasionally) without it ever occurring to them that they are owed something in return.

It reminds me of my MIL who has an obsession with only giving a gift or card if she has had some corresponding thing from the person in question. So it goes 'well, I'm not buying a wedding present for Sally's daughter, because Sally didn't buy a wedding present for any of you lot'. Well, I suppose that might work, but what if Sally is someone that only came into your life years after your kids got married, and now you are very close. It seems a bit weird to refuse to acknowledge her DDs wedding purely on the grounds that you didn't know her 10 years ago

I did wonder whether my "just brace up and get a grip" reaction to half of what is posted on MN was just because I'm a bit of a battleaxe and currently have a bristly hair under my chin. It's so nice not to be alone!

Is anyone reading the thread where someone wants to set a trap for their new cleaner to see if they steal anything?
WHAT? No, I have not seen that. Bloody hell.

Some people really do need to get a grip.

Yes I saw that. Cleaner hasn't even started yet! There are threads I have to avoid because my 'pearls of wisdom' might not go down too well !

Have we had the first chocolate advent calendar outrage yet?

There's one every year about a mil daring to buy an unsolicited advent calendar, or - heaven forbid - one depicting a nativity scene . The tweedy posters on a chocolate one who advocate scoffing all 24 pieces yourself will be drowned out by the posters incensed on the OP's behalf and screeching that it is valid grounds for going NC, let alone having the old bat for Christmas.

I bought my nieces and nephews Easter eggs years ago, without asking their parents. I just thought if they didn't want to give them to the kids, the parents would eat them. Little did I know that I was I being a terrible Auntie.

Oh, yes. Checking in as an old bat (even though I'm not 40 yet).
Round my way older people regularly give you money "for the kiddie". It's nice! When ds was a baby and I was in the library trying to do something on the computer, an nice Indian lady came and scooped him up out of my arms, where he was trying to hit the keys, and had a little cuddle and a dance around with him so I could get on with it. Win win!
I know I am not having any more babies, and I find myself often touching children, patting their lovely soft heads etc. It would make me very sad to think that would upset anyone.
I had a funny exchange with the 70 ish year old lady on the checkout in the supermarket today when she commented that the wine I was buying was nice. I said " well , it is Friday". " oh, in that case, everyday is Friday in my house!" She laughed.
It's nice to talk to people and be part of a wider community, and a wider family. I hate the obsessive nuclear family gubbins on here sometimes. All very well to be " our little unit" when you are a couple with 2.4 kids. Not everyone has that.

Funny, when I was a child I had no idea that my mums family and my dads family weren't one and the same, if you know what I mean. They were just all 'family'. There was non of this 'oh, those are your dad's relatives, not mine' stuff from my mum, or vice versa.

Now, as an adult I know that everything wasn't all perfect, but they hid any ill feeling or strain and I think that was a lovely thing to do, for the benefit of the wider family. (I'm talking obviously about the sort of annoyances that go hand in hand with family life, not about any family member who was particularly dangerous or malicious. I'm not advocating families all sticking together when one of them might cause mental or physical harm).

Checkin' in the Tweedy Bunch...this thread is great, it's made me and at same time

People do need to get a grip or, as one wigglesrock so brilliantly put 'catch themselves on' (my maths teacher used to say this, can only assume it's an Irish thing right?)

rhodabull
I'm an oldie (51) and loving this thread!

I am 46 and definitely tweedy.

However, I like the misery of cooking Christmas dinner. I get prepared the day before and then get pissed on sherry as I cook. It's traditional.

Whenever someone mentions "a grip", I imagine it looking like this.

Just me, I suppose

Rhoda - along with the advent calendar outrage, we have all the nativity play ones

My child hasn't got a big enough part
Gender stereotyping because all the angels are girls
Complaints if anyone's son is in fact made an angel
Complaints because a child hasn't got any part because the parents withdrew them from all religious observance in school
Complaints because the nativity play mentions God ( in a CoE school , who could have guessed )
Feigned outrage supposedly on behalf of Muslim and Hindu parents , all of whom are perfectly happy for their child to participate

Funny, when I was a child I had no idea that my mums family and my dads family weren't one and the same, if you know what I mean. They were just all 'family'. There was non of this 'oh, those are your dad's relatives, not mine' stuff from my mum, or vice versa.

Same here. In fact, shock horror, my grandparents on both sides used to get on really well with each other.

I know the conversation has moved on, but...

Today a tweedy older lady made 2 workmen give up their seats next to her on the station platform to my 4, 8 and 10 year olds (to their credit the workmen immediately agreed the kids should be sitting as platforms are dangerous places...)

IMO Proper Tweedy (older) Ladies like children and look out for them, and don't expect them to stand up in public transport situations to show respect to their (healthy, non elderly) elders (Tweedy Lady remained seated, but was in her early 80s at a guess and had a stick to tap people and point at things with , so that was entirely right).

My name is badders.
I am 43
And I have finally found my mn spiritual home

:)

I'm here with my tweed bloomers

You know what I like?
Elbow patches