1. “That gets my goat”
Excuse me?! Does a clothes-munching farm animal escape its petting-zoo-confines, rapidly bound towards you, like a trusty canine companion from a 1950’s family movie the minute something winds you up? I simply can’t understand how comparing something that annoys you with a glorified sheep makes any sense!
2. “No offense, but...”
It’s the “but” that really bothers me. Demonstration: “No offense, BUT (actually whatever I’m about to say is more than likely to cause you offence, thus the prefix ‘no offence’, so I’m going to say it anyway and couldn’t care less if it offended you).
3. “Do you know what I mean?” (At the end of a sentence that requires no retort)
Um, yes. I do know what you mean. I do speak English, thus the conversation we were partaking in so far going so swimmingly. It’s as if the culprit suddenly worried that they may have been speaking in Japanese in an absurd Freudian-slip and just wanted to check that stupid little you had understood. I know the phrase is uttered rhetorically, but if the question requires no answer then why waste your breath?! Oops... guilty!
4. “World class”
I realised the stupidity of this phrases whilst watching an utterly boring documentary about floods (yawn). An engineer described the Thames Barrier as a “world class flood defence system”. Let’s clear a few things up here. The Thames Barrier is in the world, oui? Therefore, surely, by default it is of a class calibre enough to automatically be classified as “world”. Just me?
5. “Figure of speech”
Is a figure of speech. And a very cocky, know-it-all one too!
Stay tuned for the next episode of “phrases that piss me off!” Until then...
Tuesday 30 September 2008
Sunday 28 September 2008
We Never Learn
Why is it so easy to make the same mistakes over and over and over again?!
Fret not, I’m not referring to anything remotely important, where actual feelings of remorse and regret are incurred. I’m simply talking about those niggling little things that we do, that we know before we’ve even done them, are going to be looked back upon with slight unease and questionability. Those moments in time where the levels of human willpower are thrown into question.
Allow me to clarify. Last night was my dear friend Chop’s (don’t ask where the name comes from) twenty-third birthday night out. Needless to say the obligatory fancy dress theme of Cowboys and Indians was taken extremely seriously by al those involved (myself included).
The evening followed the usual pattern. A pattern, that over a five-or-so year long commitment to partying, has been established amongst my close friendship group. And this is where the mistakes begin.
Why, for example, do we still deem it necessary to ALWAYS go the same nightclub (for about four years now), despite all having expressed hatred towards the place!? And why once we’re in there do we complain about the state of the grotesque toilets?! We know that they’re a health and safety hazard because they always have been and always will be. Despite a recent refurbishment I believe the toilets to actually be worse now than pre-modernisation. The lavatories resemble chrome urinal bowls with a horse-shoe shaped piece of what can only be described as butcher’s-slab plastic screwed precariously on top. On one particularly occasion there was an actual infestation of flies in the ladies. It was at that point that we collectively decided to call it a night. I can honestly say I’ve used more pleasant facilities in a third world country.
And it gets worse. Sadly for this regrettable, yet frequently-occurring action I have no one to blame but myself!
I refer to the Apple VK.
For those lucky enough to have never tasted this fine elixir let me illustrate to the best of my abilities the kind of experience drinking one of these concoctions produces.
Packaged in a putrid green bottle, it could be mistaken for a bottle of Becks at a distance. However, saying that is comparable to saying that Jodie Marsh could be mistaken for a well-dressed, conservative, natural beauty from a distance. You see where I’m going with this.
The beverage is served with two straws (something which has always baffled me! You know the old one straight and one bent classic. What’s the point?!) Upon parting with your hard-earned three pounds, the inevitable first sip approaches... (*I’m actually cringing as I type*).
The taste. Imagine mopping the brow of a Sumo wrestler who has just finished a fight on the hottest day of the year, wringing the liquid from the cloth into a blend of 1 parts apple juice to six parts sugar and a squeeze of vinegar and you’re getting close.
The rate at which a white layer of fuzz that one of these brews can create on even the freshest of tongues (I am obsessed with cleaning my teeth and brushing my tongue) is breathtaking. Literally.
There’s more.
Without being arrogant, my friendship group is made up of some uber-hotties. We’ve got blonde-haired, blue-eyed, butter-wouldn’t melt Emma. There’s Charlotte with her perfect complexion and lean, tall physique. Chop with her smoky eyes, cheeky smile and ample bosom. Red-haired Row, who is effortlessly stylish and exudes petite pixie-ness. And there’s porcelain-skinned Laura with her gorgeous dark hair and enviable figure.
Needless to say, as a group we attract a fair bit of attention, especially when in fancy dress. Fair enough. But when the admiring glances cross over into the territory of actual physical groping, accidentally-on-purpose bashing into us and full on grinding, we are less than impressed.
Last night’s gaggle of undesirables that the club tossed our way were of the calibre you would expect in the X-factor’s reject room. You know, the ones that only get shown on TV because they were that bad.
These kind of men come in various varieties and I am seriously considering writing a guide which helps identify them from a distance. Like a nature guide to poisonous snakes. One of our newly acquired admirers had some questionably tight jeans on and repeatedly danced his way backwards into our circle, using his derriere like a battling ram. He also had halitosis, which I found out much to my disgust as he uttered the words a girl never wants to hear from this kind of species: “my mate wants your number”. Wow. If he’s anything like you, just try and hold me back! I politely declined.
Another adopted the 90’s-raver dance combined with full on body smack-downs into each member of the group one after the other. He was a persistent little bugger and still came back for more even after Row had given him numerous shoves in the opposite direction and an earful sufficient enough to scare most grown-men away in tears.
Then there was the inevitable, “can I wear your hat?” guy. Some people just don’t get the fact that if you ask for something twenty-eight times and the answer is always “No”, it is unlikely that on go twenty-nine it will miraculously become a “yes”!
It wasn’t just men though. One particular sizeable woman, who’d had a few too many VK’s and was clutching some free ‘champagne’ (aka Lambrini) like a baby would it’s milk bottle, decided to reverse into Charlotte and then verbally attack her for bumping into her. That was the final straw.
Yet despite all of these hiccups, the night was considered to be an all-round success. After all, Emma was still alive despite having been drinking for two days solid without sleep, no one had been physically injured, no one had cried and Chop the birthday girl was still in her element.
But this is the beauty of being an irrational woman. It’s perfectly OK to go out and do things that we know are going to be unpleasant/annoying/leave your mouth tasting like fur, as long as you can look back on them and laugh. Which I do. Mostly.
Fret not, I’m not referring to anything remotely important, where actual feelings of remorse and regret are incurred. I’m simply talking about those niggling little things that we do, that we know before we’ve even done them, are going to be looked back upon with slight unease and questionability. Those moments in time where the levels of human willpower are thrown into question.
Allow me to clarify. Last night was my dear friend Chop’s (don’t ask where the name comes from) twenty-third birthday night out. Needless to say the obligatory fancy dress theme of Cowboys and Indians was taken extremely seriously by al those involved (myself included).
The evening followed the usual pattern. A pattern, that over a five-or-so year long commitment to partying, has been established amongst my close friendship group. And this is where the mistakes begin.
Why, for example, do we still deem it necessary to ALWAYS go the same nightclub (for about four years now), despite all having expressed hatred towards the place!? And why once we’re in there do we complain about the state of the grotesque toilets?! We know that they’re a health and safety hazard because they always have been and always will be. Despite a recent refurbishment I believe the toilets to actually be worse now than pre-modernisation. The lavatories resemble chrome urinal bowls with a horse-shoe shaped piece of what can only be described as butcher’s-slab plastic screwed precariously on top. On one particularly occasion there was an actual infestation of flies in the ladies. It was at that point that we collectively decided to call it a night. I can honestly say I’ve used more pleasant facilities in a third world country.
And it gets worse. Sadly for this regrettable, yet frequently-occurring action I have no one to blame but myself!
I refer to the Apple VK.
For those lucky enough to have never tasted this fine elixir let me illustrate to the best of my abilities the kind of experience drinking one of these concoctions produces.
Packaged in a putrid green bottle, it could be mistaken for a bottle of Becks at a distance. However, saying that is comparable to saying that Jodie Marsh could be mistaken for a well-dressed, conservative, natural beauty from a distance. You see where I’m going with this.
The beverage is served with two straws (something which has always baffled me! You know the old one straight and one bent classic. What’s the point?!) Upon parting with your hard-earned three pounds, the inevitable first sip approaches... (*I’m actually cringing as I type*).
The taste. Imagine mopping the brow of a Sumo wrestler who has just finished a fight on the hottest day of the year, wringing the liquid from the cloth into a blend of 1 parts apple juice to six parts sugar and a squeeze of vinegar and you’re getting close.
The rate at which a white layer of fuzz that one of these brews can create on even the freshest of tongues (I am obsessed with cleaning my teeth and brushing my tongue) is breathtaking. Literally.
There’s more.
Without being arrogant, my friendship group is made up of some uber-hotties. We’ve got blonde-haired, blue-eyed, butter-wouldn’t melt Emma. There’s Charlotte with her perfect complexion and lean, tall physique. Chop with her smoky eyes, cheeky smile and ample bosom. Red-haired Row, who is effortlessly stylish and exudes petite pixie-ness. And there’s porcelain-skinned Laura with her gorgeous dark hair and enviable figure.
Needless to say, as a group we attract a fair bit of attention, especially when in fancy dress. Fair enough. But when the admiring glances cross over into the territory of actual physical groping, accidentally-on-purpose bashing into us and full on grinding, we are less than impressed.
Last night’s gaggle of undesirables that the club tossed our way were of the calibre you would expect in the X-factor’s reject room. You know, the ones that only get shown on TV because they were that bad.
These kind of men come in various varieties and I am seriously considering writing a guide which helps identify them from a distance. Like a nature guide to poisonous snakes. One of our newly acquired admirers had some questionably tight jeans on and repeatedly danced his way backwards into our circle, using his derriere like a battling ram. He also had halitosis, which I found out much to my disgust as he uttered the words a girl never wants to hear from this kind of species: “my mate wants your number”. Wow. If he’s anything like you, just try and hold me back! I politely declined.
Another adopted the 90’s-raver dance combined with full on body smack-downs into each member of the group one after the other. He was a persistent little bugger and still came back for more even after Row had given him numerous shoves in the opposite direction and an earful sufficient enough to scare most grown-men away in tears.
Then there was the inevitable, “can I wear your hat?” guy. Some people just don’t get the fact that if you ask for something twenty-eight times and the answer is always “No”, it is unlikely that on go twenty-nine it will miraculously become a “yes”!
It wasn’t just men though. One particular sizeable woman, who’d had a few too many VK’s and was clutching some free ‘champagne’ (aka Lambrini) like a baby would it’s milk bottle, decided to reverse into Charlotte and then verbally attack her for bumping into her. That was the final straw.
Yet despite all of these hiccups, the night was considered to be an all-round success. After all, Emma was still alive despite having been drinking for two days solid without sleep, no one had been physically injured, no one had cried and Chop the birthday girl was still in her element.
But this is the beauty of being an irrational woman. It’s perfectly OK to go out and do things that we know are going to be unpleasant/annoying/leave your mouth tasting like fur, as long as you can look back on them and laugh. Which I do. Mostly.
Friday 5 September 2008
Everything Must Go!
Due to my apparent ‘un-employ-ability’, despite having a degree (cheers economy!), many of my days of late have been occupied by rearranging the furniture in my room and as a result of this upheaval, a strange yet common phenomenon has come to my attention.
The phenomenon of ‘stuff’.
And lots of it!
As I root around the room that has remained relatively unaltered since before I went to Uni, I’m constantly coming across and array of utterly pointless items that for some unknown reason I have decided to keep.
And the worst part of it is wondering why I even had these items in the first place, let alone deemed it necessary to store it away in some dusty drawer for nearly ten years. For instance, amongst my top ten ‘why the hell do I own this?!’ collection was a sticker of Wolf from Gladiators, seven keys to doors/padlocks that I was unaware existed, a clay sculpture that I made at school in year seven, twelve empty perfume bottles, fifteen photos of my ENTIRE class on a year six excursion to a country manor in period dress and a yellow plastic beaker with my name on it which I got at nursery school! Yet despite all of these bizarre objects ranking highly, my absolute favourite item of utter uselessness had to be an unused paper Starbucks cup. Why of course! A must have for every home!
I can’t imagine what was going through my mind when I last did a purge, came across these items and actually thought, (within some degree of logic and reason), that they would even be of use to ma again! Of course there is the sentimentality of such items and the memories attached to them, although most of them are probably made up memories. What I mean by this is when one looks at a photograph of them self at an age where it is highly unlikely that any ‘real memories’ can still exist (for the sake of argument let’s say age four), fake ones replace them based on our parents’ stories or what we would like to think happened. Perhaps it is just me whom does this... Anyway I’ve completely sidetracked.
Back to the stuff. The worst part is it’s not just my bedroom that is under this curse. The entire house is full of literally pointless objects! Why, for example does my father have the cardboard box which his laptop came in stacked away in the spare room along with a telescope he’s never used, an exercise bike so dated I’m sure it’s from circa 1952 and three television sets?! If you think that’s bad then venturing into his office is a whole other dimension and gives a new meaning to the word ‘junk’. Is it really necessary to have three clarinets, six brand new, unused canvases of varying size and a fox skull in an office? Methinks not.
My musing upon all of these useless, material belongings and subsequent obliteration of all things pointless has prompted me to try to understand why it has only began to bother me so wretchedly now. I have come to two conclusions.
One: because I am in a period of strange, slow and tedious transition from the joys of irresponsibility towards the burdens of gritty reality (and at the moment a fairly bleak looking future - the inevitability of never being able to own my own home, massive debt, no job etc...), it would seem that I physically need to rid all of this baggage that I’m so desperately clinging on to in order to move forward. Yes, in some respects I am still a sentimental fool who can’t bring herself to throw away photos or birthday cards from four years ago. But the rest is just metaphorically holding me back.
My second conclusion is perhaps more reasoned and logical than the first. Maybe, just maybe, all of this doomsday media propaganda about the eventual and inevitable demise of oil, increasing globalisation, climate change and the rise of Communist China as an industrial superpower has made me realise that as a society we really do need to change our wasteful, consumerist ways.
More than half of the junk that I banished to the bin was made of plastic. It must be more than a happy coincidence that I’m reading a chapter in Michael Moore’s ‘Dude, Where’s My Country?’ about the western world’s dependency on Arab oil, as well as hearing non-stop about Obama’s and McCain’s stances on offshore drilling and alternative energy. I think we have just come to a point where we all need to say ‘enough is enough’ and stop all of this wasteful accumulation of stuff. If the climate change threats are to be believed, slowing down production and consumption of foreign oil and Chinese plastic goods may be our only saviour. The problem then lies with the cost to our already bleak global economic outlook ... At a time like this I don’t envy politicians one little bit! Watch this space...
The phenomenon of ‘stuff’.
And lots of it!
As I root around the room that has remained relatively unaltered since before I went to Uni, I’m constantly coming across and array of utterly pointless items that for some unknown reason I have decided to keep.
And the worst part of it is wondering why I even had these items in the first place, let alone deemed it necessary to store it away in some dusty drawer for nearly ten years. For instance, amongst my top ten ‘why the hell do I own this?!’ collection was a sticker of Wolf from Gladiators, seven keys to doors/padlocks that I was unaware existed, a clay sculpture that I made at school in year seven, twelve empty perfume bottles, fifteen photos of my ENTIRE class on a year six excursion to a country manor in period dress and a yellow plastic beaker with my name on it which I got at nursery school! Yet despite all of these bizarre objects ranking highly, my absolute favourite item of utter uselessness had to be an unused paper Starbucks cup. Why of course! A must have for every home!
I can’t imagine what was going through my mind when I last did a purge, came across these items and actually thought, (within some degree of logic and reason), that they would even be of use to ma again! Of course there is the sentimentality of such items and the memories attached to them, although most of them are probably made up memories. What I mean by this is when one looks at a photograph of them self at an age where it is highly unlikely that any ‘real memories’ can still exist (for the sake of argument let’s say age four), fake ones replace them based on our parents’ stories or what we would like to think happened. Perhaps it is just me whom does this... Anyway I’ve completely sidetracked.
Back to the stuff. The worst part is it’s not just my bedroom that is under this curse. The entire house is full of literally pointless objects! Why, for example does my father have the cardboard box which his laptop came in stacked away in the spare room along with a telescope he’s never used, an exercise bike so dated I’m sure it’s from circa 1952 and three television sets?! If you think that’s bad then venturing into his office is a whole other dimension and gives a new meaning to the word ‘junk’. Is it really necessary to have three clarinets, six brand new, unused canvases of varying size and a fox skull in an office? Methinks not.
My musing upon all of these useless, material belongings and subsequent obliteration of all things pointless has prompted me to try to understand why it has only began to bother me so wretchedly now. I have come to two conclusions.
One: because I am in a period of strange, slow and tedious transition from the joys of irresponsibility towards the burdens of gritty reality (and at the moment a fairly bleak looking future - the inevitability of never being able to own my own home, massive debt, no job etc...), it would seem that I physically need to rid all of this baggage that I’m so desperately clinging on to in order to move forward. Yes, in some respects I am still a sentimental fool who can’t bring herself to throw away photos or birthday cards from four years ago. But the rest is just metaphorically holding me back.
My second conclusion is perhaps more reasoned and logical than the first. Maybe, just maybe, all of this doomsday media propaganda about the eventual and inevitable demise of oil, increasing globalisation, climate change and the rise of Communist China as an industrial superpower has made me realise that as a society we really do need to change our wasteful, consumerist ways.
More than half of the junk that I banished to the bin was made of plastic. It must be more than a happy coincidence that I’m reading a chapter in Michael Moore’s ‘Dude, Where’s My Country?’ about the western world’s dependency on Arab oil, as well as hearing non-stop about Obama’s and McCain’s stances on offshore drilling and alternative energy. I think we have just come to a point where we all need to say ‘enough is enough’ and stop all of this wasteful accumulation of stuff. If the climate change threats are to be believed, slowing down production and consumption of foreign oil and Chinese plastic goods may be our only saviour. The problem then lies with the cost to our already bleak global economic outlook ... At a time like this I don’t envy politicians one little bit! Watch this space...
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