Maybe Yes, Maybe No, May Be Crepey

[QueenQueenie]

Unilateral decision... No space for consultation. Call me Dave...

Molly, it's not worth even asking DH. He makes me look like the techiest person in the world.

I do internet searches, but I have given up on this now and if DH (see above) can't mend it during half term, I'll be paying someone.

Asking on Facebook sometimes helps - techie friends come out of the woodwork.

Re Butterflies, I too remember laughing at it, but deciding I never wanted to be like Ria, and couldn't understand how she'd got so stuck. I see now. I heard of one woman killing herself after a particularly bleak episode...

You might be better with a taller biffer, of course.

I see a lucrative sideline for the Techno Boy...

Yes, Herbs, that's sort of how I felt about Butterflies too. And I could never understand why she fancied the other bloke who was even wetter and less attractive than her DH. Unlike one of her sons

Yes, MI, does he live in SE London?

He does. I'll try him and see what he's like!

I also search for helpful people on the interweb, and am often triumphant in solving things myself, but currently have a problem with my cursor jumping around and rearranging all my text . It's a common problem with Dell computers (do not buy one, they are pants) and I have fixed it in the past, but now my software has clearly reverted and the steps to fix it don't work any more due to laptop being 7 years old. To be fair, I am desperate for a new laptop as this one is dying in every way, missing keys, refusing any software updates etc. Dh is also pretty good at looking for this kind of solution, but his issue is with Getting Around To It, which could take anything up to 12 years if previous tasks are anything to go by.

I still would.

Yeah, he's still pretty lush.

Oh FFS, Virgin are cancelling all trains up to Liverpool Mon/Tues next week which is when I was meant to be going up to DM's It is not clear how to reschedule/reserve or how to get a refund when booked online...

Oh no BTM! It is the strike day isn't it? What a PITA. Did you book through the Virgin website?

No, booked on thetrainline - have emailed to enquire. Don't really want to change plans...

Rose, sorry to hear your dh is being a bit of an arse at the moment. Blaming the tech probs on you is pretty low.
Hmm, Butterflies. I am afraid I found to it to be weedy and self-indulgent at the time and that creepy bloke who followed her around was, well, creepy - and I don't think it looks any better now. It doesn't make me sad, it annoys me. Meh, she had a nice house and her bills paid. She could have broken out and done something more. She didn't exactly have it hard. I remember not finding it at all funny or endearing and actually leaving the room quite a lot when my mother had it on. My mother never let any of us ignore her and pretty much did what she wanted, including getting a job when my father said she couldn't. She just told him to stuff it and went back to work as a physio anyway and he didn't speak to her for 2 weeks (she still mentions it now), so I never got the sense she was watching it with much sympathy, although I remember wondering if she was hankering after a bit more excitement than she had with my father.
As someone who was fairly odd and often very fat during her teenage years (when I wasn't being very thin), I spent most of my teens being completely ignored and still envy people who had teenage years that they actually enjoyed with all boys and makeup and friends and stuff, but I've never felt particularly ignored within my current family. I think I have a voice. I get fed up being the only person who ever cleans the loos etc, but no one ever gives me the feeling I am a pointless robot who exists only to clean the loos. They just assume that I'll do it on top of doing everything else.
The being ignored when I was a teenager thing nearly turned me very bad indeed, but I think that is a whole different story than the one you're looking for.

Argh, BTM, hope the train thing doesn't stuff up your arrangements completely - what a pain!

And on a lighter note: the Child Benefit people have coughed up the £1400 they owe me. So that's nice. I now don't feel so guilty about buying those expensive clown shoes and having 2 goes of private physio, as I have been able to book ds on to the combined arts week "put on a show in a week" thing that he really, really wanted to do in the summer holidays and get him a new pair of trousers and have been able to give dd 2 months' worth of allowance. She hasn't had any allowance since December, as she has been so horrid, but started being nice about a fortnight ago and I am rewarding her constantly at the mo for just being a decent human being again.

Ah, I loved Butterflies back in the day, but the whole downtrodden wife nuances were rather lost on me because I too was perving after the boys.

IT-wise - at Chateau Cointreau any such issues tend to fall to me, with the occasional assistance of DS. DH is worse than useless whenever he hits a problem - he stabs at the keyboard for a few seconds then hurls the device aside in disgust. He has absolutely no patience and is used to the office environment where you just "phone someone" to sort it out.

More by accident than design, I have fallen into an IT support role at work as well; it's a case of no-one else having the time, so why not ask CV to do it? I mean, she's got nothing else going on; she'll work it out... This is why I've found myself dragged into recruitment recently, conducting interviews for a new Purchasing Assistant and finding temp administrators for one of our sites. And sorting out the telephone problems in a portacabin somewhere in Buckinghamshire. And sorting out nuclear clearance for a load of pipefitters. And 1001 other things that are Not My Job.

We have an INSET day on Friday, so I'm having the day off and taking the DDs and assorted mates to a local trampoline park. It's very popular and always fully booked during school holidays, so an INSET is perfect (see also theme parks). DS will be off on his practice DofE expedition, if I haven't killed him first for being so bloody disengaged and disorganised. I took him to Millets to get kitted out, but he was in a foul mood, so we came away with nothing more than two boil-in-the-bag meals. He tried to sting me for a £30 penknife, yeah, right. He does at least now have his backpack, so he won't be wheeling a suitcase.

Now crepeys, what the hell can I buy DDad for his 80th? Truly the man who has everything.

The podiatrist has told DH that he should buy some Hotter shoes. Oh how I laughed. I have spent a pleasant evening showing him the joys of the Chums catalogue, too. He is not amused at the thought of having to ditch his Church's for something unstylish with velcro. He has also bought some sunglasses, which cause me to burst into "Welcome Home" whenever he wears them. Cruel, me? Oh yes.

BTM yes train strike would appear to be playing havoc with my half term plans too! Ahhhhhh

Butterflies hmmm besides the boys, what I really recall is how she couldn't cook and I founf that quite liberating the idea that some women can't. (Dp's mum is pretty bad to be fair). My mum worked so it did resonate there - although I did see that she worked AND did everything else. Think it was about this time I bought her a postcard that said ' one mans meat, another woman's sunday gone'.

Work gets worse - there's more to come apparently....

MrsS - re Hotter shoes for dh. He could look at Mephisto as well - slightly less grim and v good for feet apparently.

BD - yes, my mum worked AND did most of the house/cooking. To be fair, we had nannies and au pairs for a lot of it and my dad did a lot more than most men of his generation - he did cook on occasion, did supermarket shopping and so on. But still far, far, far less than my mum on the household front. I do, however, remember a conversation with mum when I was in my teens and had probably said something right on about the division of labour and mum said "it's about who get to sit down first" meaning that for her, since Da did vast amount of gardening & DIY, plus all the household admin (since mum was embarrassingly inept with money), she was happy with how it worked for them on a practical level. I guess we all need to reach that happy level of compromise - I am sadly nowhere near it as I seem to do loads of stuff I hate (admin and cleaning) and dh does loads of stuff that's quite fun or that he can watch tv while he's doing it (power tools and ironing).

Re Butterflies again - what strikes me is that the other man (Leonard?) is yes a bit of a drip but he is kind and says nice things to her, which she is unable to process. She is used to her husband who is clever and funny and cares for her (in some ways) but always behind a smart remark, slightly belittling. I think a lot of men do this - they don't realise that always looking for the joke in a situation can often be quite unkind.

My mother pontificated on about feminism while doing pretty well all the domestic stuff. Except the ironing.

Your takes on Ria etc are so interesting, ladies, thank you. Wilbur, I couldn't agree more…whether Leonard is a drip, (or hot as hell, for that matter) is irrelevant. He pays Ria attention…he fancies her, and he's the one thing she has which has the potential to define her away from her family…. (in the event, she isn't strong enough to do what many of us nowadays might think seriously about doing…having a steamy affair and then, L-ing TB… )

Others of you are very irritated by Ria…why doesn't she value what she has? Why is she so pathetic? I listened to an interview filmed back in the day, of Carla Lane taking about the show. She called Ria "a dying breed of woman". I don't think she's dead at all. I think she alive and kicking and living in most of our households some of the time. The difference is we perceive we have more opportunities and are more likely to go after them. But how many of us crave some attention for who we really think we are, and get angry because we don't get attention for the "right" things? Most of us are doing independent things but still getting upset about cleaning other people's shit off the loo. Aren't we. And if someone does recognise us for the cleaning, we stamp our feet and say "..but you don't value me as a professional…." and if we someone notices the value of our professional work, we stamp again and say "but you take me for granted even though I cleaned your shit off the loo…."

Just having a bit of fun playing the Devil's advocate, all in the name of research! Am now thinking about Keith Waterhouse's Billy Liar and how he escapes his pathetic self by creating and living in Ambrosia where he is King, and how he has 3 girlfriends…and just can't bring himself to finally run away with the most promising of the three….

Have just received a text from DS2 who had his French written AS early this morning.This was hours after the fact (so I'm going quietly doolally..) as follows : "Somehow I ended up in Le Pain Quotidian. Exam was ok. See you later"

The arse has gone to the Midlands overnight. Hopefully he will reflect and come back slightly less in need of MI's biffment….

DM has always worked from home, but was/is a rubbish cook. Memories of "Hot Salad" (some sort of crunchy casserole, featuring beansprouts, chicory and chunks of corned beef ) And DSDad was about as far from a New Man as could be.

I have a vivid childhood memory of when I was at home alone with DSDad for a few days after DB was born (so I was just six), standing in the kitchen directing him how to open a tin of soup, switch on the hob, and heat it up.

DSM cooks like a dream, though (Cordon Bleu trained in Paris, apparently).

That's not good news, BD.

'biffment' Rose, that's hilair.

Careering through on way to take DM to hairdressers. More later but hello one and all and 'I hear ya.' to much. And to rather a lot too.

Looking forward to catching up with Butterflies clips.