I’m Beggin’ of You Please Don’t Take My Man
Graceland. Little known fact:Named after previous owners Grace and Lando Fuffkin
For about five minutes last week Meeester and I entertained the thought of moving house. We even did a slow drive by of a house on sale in not so nearby Fyvie. By the time we’d driven by, we decided that we’re happy where we are. At least we’re not unhappy enough to move to Fyvie.
Some hours later we both admit what really bothered us about our quick not-quite-stop-off to the village featured in the famous party piece of old codgers everywhere, The Bonnie Lass O’ Fyvie-o! (You’ve got to add an –“o!” to all folk songs, it’s the folk song law. There’s never a “Bonnie Lassie”, she’s always a “Bonnie Lassie-o!”; you’re never alive but you’re “Alive-alive-oh!” You know the kind of thing. )
No, it’s not the village itself -OK it is a wee bit, it’s a horse short of being a one horse town. It’s not even the house in question -OK it is a wee bit, Meeester didn’t like it, but if I liked it enough I could’ve strong armed him like I did into the whole living together, getting a job, getting married and having kids thing. Easy. No it was the house next door. Specifically, the name of the house next door.
The house was called Johlene. The name stood brazenly in big mirrored letters reflecting the entire village back. Clearly someone called John and someone called Arlene or Carlene or Sharlene had decided to proclaim their union to the world by Frankensteiningly forcing their names together into one like a big bastard hybrid monster. We both clocked it, we both stored it and we both dwelt upon it silently until some hours later.
“Did you see that house?”
“You mean Johlene?”
“Yes. Yes I did.”
“I don’t want to live in Fyvie-o.”
“No, me neither, let’s just stay where we are.”
“Yes, let’s just stay in The House of the Flying Martinis. Let’s just sit tight.”
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Woooo-wooooh!
Today I got wolf whistled at.
This took me quite by surprise. When did wolf-whistling come back into vogue?
Imagine the Guardian or the Grazia “What’s Hot, What’s Not List” -type feature.
Going Up
- Wolf Whistling
- Homo erotic subtexts
- Michael Palin (never sold out, not never)
- Picking your spots
- Mooning out of car windows
- Laughing
Going Down
- Being polite
- Sapphic undertones
- Ewan MacGregor (Davidoff advert, anyone??**)
- Leaving your spots alone
- Giving the Vs
- Smiling
And it’s not as if the guy doing the whistling was a grizzled old Gene Hunt type . He was a youngish bloke. Have I missed a meeting?
The whole wolf whistling thing is not exactly a mating call, though, is it? I mean, I doubt that in the history of man, any wolf whistler has let out the call, to be rewarded with the object of his affection giving him the nod and the wink, Barbara Windsor style.
The actual temptation for a woman on hearing the whistle of the wolf is to take out her gun and fire at the tyres of the van the offending bloke gets into. That’s why Thelma and Louise did such big box office.
So what function does the wolf whistle serve? Intimidation ? Showing off to mates? Is it more of a mateyness call letting the baying band of mates witnessing the event know just what a geezer you are?
Maybe I’m just watching too much Attenborough. All those lizards, turtles, frogs and snakes with clear cut mating signals that let the ladies know what’s on the scaly manbeast’s mind.
Is there a documentary being made by an alien production company somewhere in the Universe right now about earth-dwelling human beings, with a scene in it where a hapless on-heat male gets rejected by an angry female after displaying a ridiculous mating call?
** Sweet Jesus, have you seen it? Words fail me…
The Flying Martinis are crap.
We’re here; we’re in Holland. It’s not exactly gone without a hitch. Some of the reasons for this may be my fault but rest assured I’m currently working on a revisionist history where they are all Meeester’s fault.
Things we forgot:
- Waterproofs for Misssy and Meeester. Kids are fine as usual.
This is normal practice for me. Two months after giving birth to Indy I went down to Edinburgh to show him off to friends. Indy had every thing a new newborn could possibly need, I had NOTHING. I forgot to pack anything for myself. Had to go to Marks’s to buy undies. Had to go to Boots to buy toothbrush. Proof your brain goes mushy when you pop one out.
So since the thunder and lightning storms are frequent here in otherwise warm and lovely Zuid Holland, there’s not much we can do. It’s either buy new waterproofs or go naked. Had a torrential storm about an hour ago. Meeester had to go out to sort caravan awning as it was needing re-pegged (guess who half arsed-ly did the pegging…) and he went out in swimming trunks.
It would have been hilarious if he wasn’t threatening to divorce me through the plastic windows. Maybe I should have put my wine down and helped him. Do you think so?
- Sleeping bags. Oh we’re so crap.
- Sheets for the double bed. See above.
- Worst of all. As bad as all of above put together and put to the power of ten. I forgot my makeup. I don’t do au naturelle. And frankly I am disdainful of people who do. There’s no need.
Let’s just say that the ferry on-board beauty shop did some brisk business.
5. Oh and we also forgot that Hull is in bloody South Yorkshire and not “just below Newcastle”.
We missed the ferry.
The Wolf and the Eagle
I watch with interest to the current news story of that bloke Wolfowitz who has resigned from the World Bank. I like it when bad bosses get found out and paraded in front of us for public humiliation. If you haven’t been following it then click on the linky:
Paul Wolfowitz
It appears that aside from his indiscretionary dealings in getting his girlfriend a promotion and pay-rise, the reason for his actual downfall was that no-one he worked with liked him very much, so were unprepared to stand by him when the shit hit the fan. In fact he was a terrible, overbearing and arrogant boss. And we’re not just talking a lot of whinging minions under his employ idly bitching by the watercooler for sport, we’re talking, top of their field intellectuals who have chosen to use their financial skills to help manage third world debt and poverty. Clever types that know numbers and stuff; that sort.
Wolfowitz was on Radio 4’s Today programme yesterday as well as one of the former management team who has left the World Bank whilst he was in tenure there. Just ten minutes worth of interviews with both and it was easy to see why Wolfowitz was hated. He came across as arrogant, unapologetic and disdainful of his colleagues. The other guy was restrained in his description of Wolfowitz but clearly delighted at his downfall.
We’ve all worked with that type haven’t we? The Wolfowitz story reminded me of a couple of gits I have worked with and in particular I dwelled on one particular git who was hoisted back into my conscious mind a few months ago. I keep in touch with a few people I used to work with in a company I have now left for over 6 years. We were a nice bunch, we got on well, did a few good projects, we worked hard and all but one of us has now moved on to better things. Including the main reason we all left; the manager of our department. We’ll call him “The Bald Eagle”, for that was his name and it seems he has left too. Here he is:
As far as I could tell from the gossip, one of the Bald Eagle’s lousy business decisions had finally made so much of a financial mess that he was unable to hide it and his own inadequacies from the MD (oh, he’s another blog all together…just wait for that one!). He was sacked!
Hooray”, I shouted. “They’ve finally found him out!”
Might they perhaps start calling round all the decent people who got sick of this bloke and decided to leave because of him, and apologise to them? Perhaps even offer some kind of compensation for messing up their careers momentarily? No, of course not- life isn’t like that. They’ll just employ another git like him and the process will begin all over again.
Time after time, we’d be forced into working on one of the Bald Eagle’s hairbrained, ill- thought-through schemes that would eventually lose the company money. Except by the time it lost the company money the hairbrained, ill- thought-through project would be our fault. If any of his schemes worked, I have it on good authority that profits would be skimmed off into Bald Eagle’s personal pocket.
But I reckon many of you can recognise the type; the buck-passer, the type of guy who would receive emails asking them to do stuff and they will instinctively reach for the “FORWARD” button on their email and send it onto someone else with no attached email either asking for help, or acknowledging that this was anything to do with them in the first place. The shit ducker, the management butt kisser and the tyrant who couldn’t handle the responsibility when anything went wrong and blamed those in his department.
He was also one of those “let’s get our ducks in a line” Jargon Wankers. We used to play “Jargon Bingo*” at any of the meetings he held. See below for rules.
So a couple of weeks ago someone I used to work with emails me a link. His email is entitled “Bald Eagle Rises from Ashes” and there he is; the flipping Bald Eagle in the paper getting some press (always with his picture in! Vain git- though god knows why…) about the new company that someone’s employed him to trash. Plus ça change!
Thing is the Eagle looks the part, he can talk enough bollocks to convince people he knows what he’s talking about. It takes time to realise that underneath he is woefully incompent, thick, crap at his job and a complete coward. Word is that when he got sacked, rather than the MD phoning ex-employees up and apologising to them as I have suggested, the Eagle was calling ex-employees up and asking them if they knew of any job opportunities for him. Why didn’t he call me? Why? I’d have LOVED that! Denied!!!!
So if the Bald Eagle can rise again you can be damn sure that Wolfowitz will spring up in some highly paid job, able to abuse his power all over again.
I’ve a feeling that this is first in a series of “people that have pissed me off”…..
* Jargon Bingo
Got a boss/workmate who uses phrases like “Blue Skies”, “Herding Cats”, “Ducks in a Line”, “Let’s Action That!”? Then suffer his dullness no more and liven up your meetings with Jargon Bingo!
Simply ask your fellow sufferers to choose two or three of their favourite pieces of jargon. One you have all chosen you are ready to play “Jargon Bingo”! Once the meeting begins, the fun starts. As each piece of jargon spews forth from the mouth of the Jargon Using Arsehole then cross it off your list! The first to cross all jargon phrases off their list wins! Shouting “Bingo!” is optional.
Disclaimer: The orginators of “Jargon Bingo” take no responsibility for loss of jobs resulting from playing “Jargon Bingo”.
