Not Floating On The Air




OH dear, I'm getting more and more like a mad old woman every day. And not just any mad old woman. A mad old woman with Tourette's.
I began the week with a foul-mouthed tirade against a young van-driving oik with one elbow out the window and a gormless expression on his face driving two inches from my back bumper as I was on my way to work.
Luckily, sealed in my metal tube with my back to him, he couldn't lipread what I intended to do with my mangled bumper should I have to brake sharpish and he collided with it.
Then, dashing around the supermarket in my lunch hour, another wave of rage rolled over me as the queues lengthened and supervisors who didn't look old enough to be allowed out without their mums spoke into headphones in a self-important manner.
"It would be better if you stopped talking about the queues and actually manned a check-out," I said sharply to one chubby boy who was picking at a scab while asking if "Shanna" could come to the tills. He looked surprised, blushed to the roots of his greasy hair and apologised – so then I felt guilty for being so bad-tempered.
In the pub I had to be shushed by the dearly beloved after making disparaging remarks about a young man in baggy shorts. Well, it was blowing a gale outside. I was only concerned that should he step outside the door, a gust of wind would inflate those shorts and he'd be swept away like the eponymous Raymond Briggs snowman singing, "We're walking in the air; we're floating in the moonlit sky; the people far below are sleeping as we fly…."
Then I had to bite my tongue as one of the villagers with a "look how clever I am to bag this" expression on her face walked in with her new toy-boy boyfriend – a well-known local womaniser.
"Isn't he lovely?" she whispered to me as she passed my table later.
"Lovely," I replied. Then muttered under my breath, "Lovely if you like sleaze balls with the morals of an alley cat on Viagra and the personal hygiene of a wart hog," earning another despairing and reproachful stare from the dearly beloved.
He says he won't go out with me if I don't behave so for now I've promised to be a good girl and keep my opinions – even if they are under my breath – to myself.

16 comments:

  1. Kitchen? Are you, in fact, my Mum?

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  2. LOL that read like something off 'Grumpy Old Women'! :)

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  3. Don't bottle it up - you'll explode.

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  4. This is so funny. I fear, at the age of 31 I am already a grumpy old woman.

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  5. You and me, both.
    I frequently do that in-car ranting thing - occasionally with hand signals if repeated squirting of the widscreen washer's had no effect on the distance between my car and theirs.

    Generally, the older I get, the worse I become and I just have to listen to my mother to know it's only going to get worse.

    One of these days I'm going to remind her of the adage she used to spout at us as children ... If you can't say something nice, say nothing.

    Actually - I don't agree with that philosophy. It turned my sister and I into girls who found it difficult to stand up for ourselves for fear of not being nice.

    Mind you, we're both making up for it now. Ha.

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  6. you have my full sympathy, l regularly explode when faced with incompetent nincompoops! erghhhh, from another grumpy 'old' woman!

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  7. I was wondering this morning as I drove to the station, why every white van that passed me was driven by a manically grinning man, window down, elbows out and sitting almost hunched over the steering wheel. As if he was craning to see whats on the bonnet (usually another persons car).

    Glad its not just me who gets pissed off just at the sight of them.

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  8. What's the point of HAVING opinions if you keep them to yourself? Might as well be dead. Keep 'em coming.

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  9. I have become a grumpy old woman myself at the age of almost 54. I don't allow any sort of foolishness and I won't shut up about it either and I say "Bullshit" a lot, or the Dutch equivalent of it. Men, get out of my way when you see my wrath! A woman wronged is nothing compared to it.

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  10. Somehow I had missed that you had started blogging regularly again - welcome back. I can do either unreal calm (infuriates the family) or full blown rant, but not much in between.

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  11. It's natural and beautiful and, in my case, acid comments are all that stand between me and a foray with a meat cleaver, so I think you should be encouraged.

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  12. Ahahaha! There must be quite a few of us grumpy old women out there driving around swearing at the young guys and gals. LOL!

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  13. What's the point of having opinions kitchen table, if you have to keep them to yourself! Sometimes it's fun to be grumpy.

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  14. Well I don't consider myself a grumpy old woman, but I probably would have said all the same things!

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  16. I hate tailgating too. It's dangerous and I don't blame you at all for being upset by reckless driving. And I too suffer reproaches from my partner (well, he's my husband) for getting hacked off with other people's idiocy. The worst bit is when he reminds me to be aware of 'my own limitations'.

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