Irritation.

We all know them. Those occasional, thankfully infrequent liaisons with people who put simply, irritate the fuck out of you.

I've met one.

There are people who I like, and hit it off with immediately. There are people who I know I'll not get on with; and those who I neither care about either way. There are have even been people who take an immediate dislike to me and more often than not I can't care less about them. However, every now and then, you meet one who just really, really, completely irritates the HELL out of you.

I repeat... I've met one.

This person, I will call Y. I have rarely come across someone who has irritated me quite as much as this person does; and it's been right from the SECOND she first opened her mouth. I can't even explain most of it. It's just a totally irrational, entirely unpleasant personification of nails on a chalk board.  I have a few issues with the way this person behaves, talks... and after this week breathes. 

I first experienced this person on the telephone when she phoned the wrong department to enquire about the job vacancy.  After me repeating about five times that she'd come through to the wrong department, after fifteen minutes she took a breath and enabled me to actually transfer her to my friend Dave, who is now her mentor.  My second encounter with her just brought back awful flashbacks of the phonecall; heightened by her smug little face as she twittered on about how she now had a three minute drive to work... to MY preferred job location, while I'd been given an hours commute because I haven't popped out children.  My contact with her has been limited, thankfully, as I then found out this shrill, being is paid about 5k more than everyone else to do the same job.  This has added to my annoyance. 

I now find myself on WEEK LONG training course with Y.  It's Tuesday... and I'm already finding myself digging my nails into the side of my seat on the NUMEROUS occasions she feels it necessary to open her gob and tell another long winded, excruciatingly, mundane story about things the WHOLE room already knows and experiences on a daily basis.  

This person should be a primary school teacher.  She talks like one.  To everyone;  And in a Black country, sing song, nursery rhyme accent that makes me want to smash up the room in some vain effort to get her to just PLEASE. SHUT. THE. FUCK. UP.  I genuinely don't think that would work.  I could smash every single chair through every single window and turn around to still find her twittering away. 

I can't help the eye rolling, the jaw clenching, the whole body tensing and slow intake of breath every time she speaks.  She speaks... TOO MUCH... and FAR FAR too often.  I'm not the only one to notice either.  I am often told I am too expressive; that is that I can't hide my emotions.  They're usually written all over my face and I have limited control over this.  Today she challenged something I was saying and she basically provoked me into challenging her back and making her look like a total knob in front of the whole course.  I had too.  For the sake of my own sanity I had to correct her, if only just to shut her the fuck up. 

I somehow have to get through another three days of this.  Frighteningly the course involves group work and I live in fear of being told I have to work with her.  I fear my head will actually explode if I have to endure that hellish prospect.

I'm not a nasty person.  I'm not.  However I am sensitive, and therefore easily irritated as you may have discovered from my posts about Misophonia last year. This woman, is the human equivalent of that never ceasing nose whistle, the all-night snore, the endless, slushy, chomp chomp chomp of food between salivating teeth and jaws. 

Friday can NOT come soon enough....

Belong.

I've just caught up on a few weeks of blog-reading and thought it was probably time to update my own.

The truth being told- much has changed but I've avoided posting anything for some time for a few reasons: 1- I have been incredibly busy.  2- I had no internet access for a few weeks. 3- some issues I've had I felt best not to air in the public realm (aka- if you can't say anything nice, say nothing at all).

I've moved into a flat with my friend and colleague H.  It's not quite home yet, pictures still need to be hung.  If I'm honest it all feels very temporary. But I think everything does now.  Everything.

It's Christmas and I've been very disorganised this year.  Moving in at the start of November proved very expensive so I think Christmas has been somewhat tainted by a general worry about money this year.  The last few weeks have been busy. Both at work and socially.... genuinely too much to list but it's been a blur of funerals, tears, too much drink, too much work, stress and laughs.  I'm writing this hours before my fourth and final Christmas work do this year. I'm not sure my feet or my liver can cope with many more!

I'm still going to the gym albeit the last few weeks have been hard to find time to fit anything worth while in.  Slacking.

I generally feel very tired.. I'm always tired these days.  I don't work long hours like others but I give 110% to a job where I get paid averagely for the effort I put in.  My priority next year is to get a new job and possibly outside of the Force so I don't have to be quite so worried about being made redundant every few months. In addition to work stress, I don't sleep well.  I have two Zopiclone on ration for when I really REALLY need to sleep but generally I think I've gotten used to feeling semi tired on a daily basis.

I'm struggling with Christmas this year.  It seems to have lost its meaning, like many things have to be honest. Recent events have put certain things in perspective and I am lucky to have my health, my family and a sprinkling of friends who genuinely care, however all this is clouded by a general feeling of not belonging anywhere.

This is the trouble with Christmas.  It's great if you're happy;  If you aren't it's like a giant microscope magnifying everything you're missing in full focus...

So you just smile and grab another drink.

Fresh Meat.

The Sexism of Freshers Week

A brilliant article by the Guardian about "Lad" culture impacting on young women during the crazy time that is Freshers week.  I have to say I can't remember being exposed to a great deal of this at my university, however that was around ten years ago and the whole pathetic "Lad" retaliation movement hadn't occurred.  Also, I tended to avoid those horrendous meat market uni nights to favour other club nights out and social occasions because I've never really felt the need to follow a crowd and conform, especially if it's with total twats.

The article highlights some disturbing and obscene trends which I hope women begin to fight back.  One occasion I do remember at uni, at one of the horrendous Friday Night Disco (FND) meat markets I rarely went to- was being physically picked up and carried out of the union by a really tall man who looked like Greg Rusedski.  I laugh at it now, but to be honest, the whole thing really bothered me.  This man was a stranger, and although we'd danced on the dance floor, this man was able to physically pick me up and walk out the Union with me, as if he'd picked me off the shelf at a supermarket. Because I'm so small, petite and skinny, it really bothered me that he was able to physically over power me.  Nothing bad happened, he put me down outside the union with no malicious intentions and I promptly walked back inside, but it could so easily have been a different story.  It's one of the reasons that I feel so much better about feeling physically stronger through my gym training, because whilst I'm still tiny and easily overpowered at least I know I have some strength to punch, kick and fight back; anyone who knows my tenaciousness will know I'd put up one hell of a good fight if I had to. 

Anyway, read the article.  It's a good'un.

Sound of not-so-silence.

At the risk of revealing that I've achieved NONE of my tasks today- I'm going to share one of my many quirks with you.

For years, more so the last ten years, I've had this issue with certain sounds.  It all started with my Grandad.  My Grandad, probably no different to most older folk, is a loud eater.  I've been seeing my Grandparents and family in the city of Nottingham since I was a kid, and our traditional day would be spent visiting the rellies for Sunday dinner and then the other set of Granparents for tea.  (Yes that's DINNER and TEA. As it should be).  My Grandma would prepare us a small buffet tea of sandwiches, salad and rolls for tea and for reasons unknown, my Grandad would always wait until the rest of us had finished eating before selecting his food and starting his own.  I began to dread this moment.  Then it would start- the slow, inevitable chomp chomp munch squelch of chewing. On and on it went... having to endure every morsal of food sometimes with the addition of a slop and a churn... until it was all gone.  Each sound enraged me.  I would get so uncomfortable I would have to move or eat something myself just to drown out the sound.  Even weirder, no one else seemed to notice.  Although fleeting, the rage was there, I'd physically grit my teeth or clench my jaw with annoyance. 

This has got predominantly worse over the years to the stage where if I can hear pretty much anyone chewing or chomping I feel uncomfortable.  I don't usually act on it, other than the odd comment now and then. 

Regular readers will already know that I hate snoring but my dislike of hearing these kind of sounds doesn't stop there - I dislike hearing people breathing- the whistle nose or worse still- a combination of whistle nose, chomping and heavy nose breathing at the same time.  Hell.  Pure, utter hell.  Oh god.

Well, I'd never really linked all these together, putting it down to my hyper sensitive body- but it turns out this whole thing is a recognised condition!!!!

*This New York Times article* describes my "condition" precisely and calls it Misophonia! Who knew that this was a recognised disorder of the brain!? Woohoo! Another one to add to my collection.  Hehe, I jest, Obviously. 

Crawl!

My neice has finally started crawling! Here she is showing off her skills- both forwards AND backwards! She is now 9 months and absorbing so much, copying actions like clapping, exploring surfaces and textures.  It looks like she's really pleased with her newly acomplished mobility.  She always puts a smile on my face. :-)

I have just finished a particularly manic week at work.  The weeks just seem to get busier and busier, and the nature of it can be stressful at times.  I realised today that I've not taken any big chunks of annual leave for about a year- choosing to have odd days here and there rather than a week at a time; I think I've suffered for it.  Whilst it's been important for me to be at work while my home life has been unstable, I wouldn't be surprised if my lack of leave has been one of the reasons for my general fatigue and many illnesses over the last few months.  To quote Bilbo Baggins " I feel thin... sort of stretched... like butter scraped over too much bread".  I always loved that quote; Tolkien was a master of similies and I think thats the only way you can use language properly to describe.  Words don't fit many things, but a similie or metaphor will paint the perfect picture.  Anyway, I digress.  I now have FOUR days off work.  Count 'em, Fri, Sat, Sun and Mon.. that's FOUR whole days.  FOUR.  Four days not having to get up at six o'clock.  FOUR days. I will sleep.

Tomorrow I plan to spend the afternoon catching up with my good mate Markuuuus as it was his birthday today- Happy Birthday Dude! We will chat and laugh, have a good grumble, eat food and have a few bevvies in a bar in Brum. The perfect way to spend a day off! Saturday I will be going to see Bastille (omgomgomg can't wait) and then Sunday is Mothers Day so I'll be off to Nottingham to see family.  Happy times!

Did I mention I have FOUR WHOLE DAYS OFF!!!!

Ill Manners

Chav-Bashing- a bad joke turned into bilious policy

 

I've posted the above article because it very much relates to the video below.  I came across the below a few months ago and was struck by it's social commentry.  I would strive to say it's the most powerful music videos I've seen for many years and I think it sums up the last few years better than anything else I've seen or read. 

 

It's aptly crafted - edgy, raw and with a deep, angry intensity which is captured both musically and visually.

 

I have no doubt it's messages, many ironically contradictory, will be missed by both sides using it as an influencial piece condoning certain lifestyles and behaviour and for this reason I fear it's potential poignancy has been negated.  In all the articles, literature, websites and papers I've read on the social impact of the Tory Government- THIS, to me, is the most intensely powerful and honest account of the widening social divide that's expanded before everyone's eyes. 

 

P@ssw0rd5 R@nT

If I have to remember another password I actually think I'll suffer some sort of hemorrhage.  And all that will come out will be random numbers and letters.

I now have passwords to just about every area of my life now- business, pleasure, ANYTHING. 

Bank - MY money!
Phone accounts
Facebook - friends
Twitter
itunes- music
Shopping accounts online
My website! My art is passworded?!?
Work - getting on for about 26 systems, door codes or passworded accounts now.

Next my friends are going to be passworded.

IMPORTANT information is being lost out of my brain on a DAILY basis by having to remember all these ridiculous passwords. 

They're not even words anymore either- they have to have numbers in awkward places or they can't actually be an english word at all!!!! And THEN. THEN you have to re-bloody-create them after 30 days!!!!! I have to write them down. But you forget where you wrote them, or forget to update them when you ultimately have to reset your password that one time you lose your list of passwords.  I even have a remember password thing on my computer, but I sometimes forget the password for that... YES, you read that right, I have a PASSWORDED password rememberer service.  Oh. My. God.  It's like one of the circles of hell.

It's becoming impossible. One day I swear I'll forget my own name and instead have to replace it with a highly secure password made up of between 8 and 10 alphanumerical chraracters ensuring at least 3 numbers equidistant from the start and end of the chosen strand, replaced every thirty days with a password NOT previously used in the past five months!!

If I ever become a multi millionaire I will employ someone full time to remember ALL my passwords.

Rant over.

Distortion.