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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Imagine if Betty lived near you

240 replies

Aserena · 08/09/2023 18:19

Inspired by another thread.

Meet Betty:

  • Betty earns £50k (pre tax) per year, with a stable career.
  • She is mid-life and single with no children.
  • She has no wealthy relatives.

What living conditions and lifestyle would you expect Betty to have, in the area where you live?

Tell us where she’s living and how she spends her dosh. Feel free to be imaginative!

OP posts:
Dymaxion · 08/09/2023 20:52

Betty lives in a small two bed terrace, she used to live in a four bed detached with Paul, her previous and only long term relationship, who she was sure was going to propose to her every year until she hit 38, then he fucked off with a 29 year old brand manager, married her and they are expecting their second child.
Betty lives quite frugally for her income as she is saving up to have Paul killed by a hitman, she knows she can get it done cheaply should she choose but she prefers to wait until she can afford to use someone with a 5 star trustpilot rating. It should be easy to make it look like an accident, Paul having taken up cycling when his first child was born.

cardibach · 08/09/2023 20:52

ScroogeMcDuckling · 08/09/2023 20:51

I’m actually finding your behaviour towards me, one of a nasty vindictive bully. You haven’t had a pop at anyone else on here, just me, and that, shows to me and others that you are the meanspirited, awkward, and objectionable individual here.

Yours is the only objectionable ageist, sexist post I’ve seen. Show me others and I’ll report those too.
Bullying? Seriously?

BIossomtoes · 08/09/2023 20:53

I thought we were supposed to be supportive and inclusive like decent human beings.

You go first.

ScroogeMcDuckling · 08/09/2023 20:54

cardibach · 08/09/2023 20:52

Yours is the only objectionable ageist, sexist post I’ve seen. Show me others and I’ll report those too.
Bullying? Seriously?

You really cant see it can you.

baroqueandblue · 08/09/2023 20:56

Aserena · 08/09/2023 18:48

Sorry about the name!
I just picked one that seemed pretty anonymous.

She can be Sarah if you prefer.

Not market research, I’m just a bit sad 😂
and want to know what my lifestyle would be like if I lived somewhere else

Yeh right

BygoneDays · 08/09/2023 20:56

Fascinating. What sort of steak does she eat on her wild nights? Fillet or sirloin? Do tell.

LaffTaff · 08/09/2023 20:57

I reckon Betty is an auld tert.

cardibach · 08/09/2023 20:57

ScroogeMcDuckling · 08/09/2023 20:54

You really cant see it can you.

No. Mainly because I’ve only replied to things you’ve posted. First ti your objectionable sexist shite about a woman needing sex, and then others saying how uptight I am. If anyone is bullying, it’s you.

WiddlinDiddlin · 08/09/2023 20:57

Betty lives in a cottage she bought in North Wales, in the 80s for about £3.50.

She's done all sorts of things but now lives on the royalties from several childrens books she wrote and illustrated, and some freelance writing as and when she feels compelled to bother. She made some sensible investments at some point in the past when a higher income coincided with a financially clever boyfriend.

She likes knitting, spinning and weaving, has 14 cats, and a field full of sheep.

She's had a series of weird and wonderful boyfriends, of varying suitability, and has one daughter who lives in London and calls her Mother Dearest when she phones, which is once in a blue moon. She should care about this but isn't really all that bothered.

She drives a tatty VW Golf with bits held on with baler twine, she'd prefer an even tattier Volvo estate but the last one finally died aged 25, halfway across her field. Where it still is.

She makes jam, it isn't very good and never wins at the WI show, but she doesn't care. She makes sloe gin too and never enters that.

Her daughter thinks shes boring and isolated but actually she has all the company she needs in the local community, is rarely alone more than a day at a time and really wishes sometimes people would stop popping in. This morning she found the postman at the kitchen table, making himself toast whilst he waited for her to come down and sign for a parcel.

Lifeomars · 08/09/2023 20:58

Initially thought this had something to do with the anniversary of the queen's death

cardibach · 08/09/2023 20:59

BIossomtoes · 08/09/2023 20:53

I thought we were supposed to be supportive and inclusive like decent human beings.

You go first.

Well, I said it was objectionable to say Betty was smelly because she needed sex with a man to give her a reason to be clean.
Which bit of that don’t you agree with?

Jacopo · 08/09/2023 20:59

Because Betty's life has been unencumbered with men or children, she was able to buy a small detached house in a Scottish town in her early thirties. Fifteen years later she sold it at a considerable profit, which she has invested wisely.
She is now contemplating retirement in about five years time and does not give a stuff about smug marrieds' view of her as a boring sad spinster.

Shortbread49 · 08/09/2023 21:02

She would own a very expensive cafe with fat rascals and Swiss breakfast rosti

SleepingStandingUp · 08/09/2023 21:02

• Betty earns £50k (pre tax) per year, with a stable career.

• She is mid-life and single with no children.

She loves in a house worth about £250k which she brought years ago. She lives a good life, plenty of spare cash. Goes on holiday with her friends a few times a year. Drives a newish car. Thinks about moving occasionally but she likes that she knows all the families around her.

ScroogeMcDuckling · 08/09/2023 21:03

cardibach · 08/09/2023 20:57

No. Mainly because I’ve only replied to things you’ve posted. First ti your objectionable sexist shite about a woman needing sex, and then others saying how uptight I am. If anyone is bullying, it’s you.

you have not read the thread in it’s entirety, because you would be responding to others in your bullying manner as you have to me.

the thread is a bit of fun it’s a “what if”, and there has been lots of funny ones tonight with stronger wording than I’ve used.

Im hoping that you are at work, just like me, cos if you’re not, then you are not Betty according to most of the other posts, she would be out partying!

EarthSight · 08/09/2023 21:05

Fieldofbrokenpromises · 08/09/2023 18:42

What the fucking fuck are these fucking threads about?

😂Sounds like someone trying to get ideas for a fiction book/ creative writing class. I imagine the OP spends a lot of her time daydreaming about other people's lives.

FrenchFancie · 08/09/2023 21:05

I’m pretty certain I know Betty!

in this case, Betty lives in a 3 bed apartment in the centre of a small city. She has a cat that’s spoiled rotten. She has a small fast car and goes on foreign holidays at least twice a year, outside of school holidays because it’s cheaper. She’s very close to her Mum, and worries because Mum is getting older and frailer. She’s now happy in her life but had some massive wobbles towards the end of her thirties as she realised she would stay child free and single.
on the whole she’s very happy!

ghostyslovesheets · 08/09/2023 21:07

Honestly @ScroogeMcDuckling I think you are giving as good as you are getting - more so really

You got called on your sexism saying older women don't bother being clean as they can't get a shag - then called that person 'Betty' - by your definition a smelly unshaggable woman, told her to 'look within' and then called her 'meanspirited, awkward, and objectionable' - in response to one post calling out ageism

cardibach · 08/09/2023 21:07

ScroogeMcDuckling · 08/09/2023 21:03

you have not read the thread in it’s entirety, because you would be responding to others in your bullying manner as you have to me.

the thread is a bit of fun it’s a “what if”, and there has been lots of funny ones tonight with stronger wording than I’ve used.

Im hoping that you are at work, just like me, cos if you’re not, then you are not Betty according to most of the other posts, she would be out partying!

There’s nothing bullying about my manner. I haven’t read it all, no, but what I have read has been, as you say, quite complimentary about Betty. You said she was smelly and that was because she needed sex. That’s horrible. I haven’t pursued you, I’ve just responded to your posts in a similar way to your comments to me. You’ve been first every time, and your tone is quite unpleasant so yes, I’ve been a bit assertive too.
I’m not sure why you think I’m Betty, or want to be her. I’m not at work. I’m writing my packing list for a solo holiday, if that matters.
I just didn’t like your nastiness about your manager (let’s remember that’s what your post was. An attack on a woman who doesn’t know you are talking about her, saying she smells and is sex starved).

Aquamarine1O29 · 08/09/2023 21:07

Doggy

HoneyPotts · 08/09/2023 21:10

Betty sounds like a drag.

ScroogeMcDuckling · 08/09/2023 21:11

cardibach · 08/09/2023 21:07

There’s nothing bullying about my manner. I haven’t read it all, no, but what I have read has been, as you say, quite complimentary about Betty. You said she was smelly and that was because she needed sex. That’s horrible. I haven’t pursued you, I’ve just responded to your posts in a similar way to your comments to me. You’ve been first every time, and your tone is quite unpleasant so yes, I’ve been a bit assertive too.
I’m not sure why you think I’m Betty, or want to be her. I’m not at work. I’m writing my packing list for a solo holiday, if that matters.
I just didn’t like your nastiness about your manager (let’s remember that’s what your post was. An attack on a woman who doesn’t know you are talking about her, saying she smells and is sex starved).

And like I said she is the first to admit it. That is why she is so likeable because she knows her own failings.

have a lovely time on your solo adventures, and hopefully in future you will read everything and understand everything that has been said or written before you come after people like a vicious bullying harridan

Fanlover1122 · 08/09/2023 21:14

Betty isn’t living where I live unless she is in a council flat.

Saverage · 08/09/2023 21:17

Jesus, a lot of people underestimating how 'Bettys' live. I am 53 so maybe a bit older than what OP had in mind, not sure. But I am single, childfree and on 50k in London. I feel like this is a PR firm thread but not sure I care as long as they get a more accurate representation of what midlife single women are actually like.

I own a £700k 3 bed house outright, as I bought 20 years ago.
Hybrid work as a PA, enjoy it a lot.
Go to the theatre once a month, depending what's on.
Have membership to Tate, go to a lot of exhibitions in general.
Have a cat.
Have lots of weekends away with friends, like to eat out with them when in London, we try lots of new restaurants.
Like to go long haul at least once a year to places I haven't been before, this year I went to Colombia.
Have a degree in fine art, so paint and sell my work.
Don't shop at Primark (just doesn't occur to me to go in there, it's so big).
Have done my house up nicely in exactly the way I want.
Spend rest of my time exactly the way I want - reading, walking, sometimes take a class in something like improv.
Worry about my elderly parents, who live a long way from me.
Not particularly interested in dating, not sure what it would add to my life.

Echobelly · 08/09/2023 21:18

It depends a bit here in North London - if Betty had parents that had space and that she got on well with and had carried on living with them for the first 5 years of her career to save half her earnings for a deposit, she might have bought a small studio flat in this area about 20 years ago. Or possibly she could have bought something in a cheaper part of London and maybe upsized from that to a two bed flat here a few years after that.

If she moved straight out when starting work and house-shared for a bit, she might have missed the opportunity to buy and would be spending about half her salary on renting a not especially nice one-bed flat.

Although assuming she is my age (45) I suppose she might have just about managed to scrimp and save enough to buy a place at the turn of the millennium even if renting beforehand.