BLOG 80: Shaddupa ya face

AHH SHADDUPA YA FACE!!!

“What'sa matter you, hey, gotta no respect, Whatta you tink you do, why you looka so sad, Itsa not so bad, Itsa nice-a place…”JOE DOLCE, American-born, Australian singer/songwriter.

Is it just me or are there just a lot of people telling us what to do lately?

Now I’m not Britannia knocker, you all know that Jax is an anglophile. I love this silly island of ours, I love the fact we are so little and yet so renowned at the same time. Fourth richest nation in the world and most of the world can’t find us on a map. Maybe that’s how we got so notable, not by size or might… but by being bossy boots.

When Good old Queen Bess was running the gaff and bossing about the known world there were just over 4 million people living in England, Scotland, Wales and what is now known as Northern Ireland. People were rather left to their own devices on a day to day basis and overall most seemed to live within the expectations of the day. Of course life under our current Queen Bess is rather different, her kingdoms have filled up a bit but the general consensus is that this is a nice place we have, and most of us respect that.

These days the United Kingdom is home to 60,975,000 of us and we kind of like it. We have an attractive life style that people from all over the world aspire to. Even the 207,000 British Citizens who leave permanently every year state that the number one thing that made them consider leaving not the lifestyle but the weather! Lord knows the 565,000 new immigrants we get each year think our place better than the place they left. But my word for a country thought of as the land of free thinking – we REALLY like to tell people what to do!

Apparently we are all so stupid that it’s amazing we can get out of bed and stay upright till bedtime returns. Well, we must be because it seems every moment of our waking life is covered by a leaflet stuffed through your letter box, thrust in your hand or publicly displayed. I am told all this telling us what to do is simply a precaution taken to prevent chaos. There must be a department for silly leaflets and stickers that annoy the tax-payer. And lord knows they must always be busy!

I received a pamphlet from my council advising me that should I wish to use the council’s supply of grit, to deal with ‘snow issues’ I can find grit in the large yellow grit bins dotted around town – and mine is at the bottom of my road. I can identify it by the words GRIT in raised letters on it, however if I am partially sighted or blind to ring a number so that the council can send me the same leaflet in Braille.

Errrm…was it necessary to let me know that the huge luminous yellow grit bin has grit in it? And what was the thinking behind telling me that if I am unable to see the leaflet in the first place to give them a call? I’m not going to bother discuss the idiocy of publishing a leaflet telling the locale about something that we all understand it was the publishing of instructions for people who can’t even see the instructions in the first place that strikes me as pure genius! I strongly suspect that my local council simply just likes telling people what to do and don’t care whether or not people actual need the information.

I recently had a sticker put on one of my wheelie bins saying that the dustmen had peeked inside and found… DAH DAH DaaaaaaaaaaaaaH… potato peelings. Actually the sticker read I should see the leaflet they had dropped – so this must be a double whammy for the department of stupid leaflets and stickers! It was upon the afore mentioned leaflet that I found I had committed the sin of having organic waste in the same bin as non organic. Therefore as the scrapings of two potatoes were spotted… they will not be taking my rubbish away until I transfer the ‘organic matter’ to the correct bin. Of course by the time the bin men come back my bin will be home to more organic matter than they can handle! Why can’t these people notice that left litter = rats!

Don’t think that by leaving your leaflet strewn doormat to venture out into the world that you will be free from inheritance of the departments of ‘we tell you what to do’.

Should you leave your home and try to enter a public building you will have to contend with the smoking ban. The powers that be decided on behalf of us stupid people (and with out a referendum) that smoking in public was forbidden. Now over 2 years later… doorways of just about everything the public are full of people having a fast growler. Before someone told us what to do, doorways were simply entrances and exits.. but now they are refuge camps for nicotine addicts. It’s simply impossible to enter any other building but your own home without having to negotiate burning wands of tobacco. You all know Jax is not anti smoking, but trying to get into the shopping malls round here is a dangerous activity! If the cloud of smoke directly outside doesn’t sting your eyes… I can guarantee you when you get home you’ll find a small scorch mark on your outwear. No doubt sustained whilst squeezing through the throng of desperate puffers.

And that’s another thing… who decided that local shops are a bad thing and that all shops should be located together ‘American-Style’ in a Mall? The powers that be are very keen to give planning permission and support to anything that will rip the heart out of your town and place all retail and entertainment in a solo pleasure palace located on the outskirts of nowhere. Where I live, it is very popular to dump these pleasure palaces on land reclaimed from the river – ie where absolutely no one lives. SO, if you wish to shop for more than life’s daily essentials then you need to hoik yourself off to a reclaimed field in Northwest Kent that has been renamed Bluewater, or cross the Thames into Essex where they have renamed a couple of reclaimed fields as Lakeside. I received a gleeful leaflet letting me know that a third Mall will soon add to the choice. Oh yippee can’t wait for the riverside allusion in the title of that one!

Then, should you make it through the doorway into a shop you will discover that shops don’t let you walk up to the counter to ask a question any more. Again we are told even how to do this simple task by a series of stretch barriers that zig zag for a mile and a half and is shaped like a maze. Even if a shop is empty, the path must be negotiated so that when you do finally reach the counter you are exhausted! All this to be told on arrival that questions can only be answered at customer service which is located in polarity to where you are now. So yes - you’ve guessed it, customer service comes with its very own mile and a half of stretch barriers. Make a fuss or try to do the side ways on approach to the till, and see how fast the staff refer you to a notice about the importance of following the system.

If the whole shopping thing leaves you fatigued and ready for a sit down – be warned, Going for a coffee while shopping is no longer a case of sitting down getting served and sipping. Now you have to queue at some god forsaken American-owned coffee house that has pledged to save an animal or a rain forest, order and stand about like a spare part while your coffee gets ‘served’ to a random collection point where it will never be announced. Is it really that hard to serve coffee to a table or at least hand it over to me? Apparently it is – or at least so I was informed as I was handed a little leaflet letting me know that a coffee ‘barrista’ is NOT a waiter/waitress and that this ‘technician’ will ensure I get the perfect cup… but not necessarily the RIGHT one, as all perfect cups are placed at the end of the serving area awaiting customer pick up! I don’t know about you but even the word ‘barrista’ annoys me – I think it is a cover title for a brand of catering employees who are too self important to involve themselves with anything more than putting coffee in a cup. I think this is why they have given themselves a job-title that sound like Barrister which plants the implication that their chosen career is very similar to being a lawyer. I’m sure it is… but is it too much to actually GIVE me my coffee?

Getting a bus back from the shops (which we are told on yet another leaflet is something we should be doing – leave the car at home) is yet another opportunity to be told. Bus Passes or exact money Please… it has been decided by the powers that be that giving change is something that is too exacting for bus drivers to contend with. Ermmm… isn’t that why buses used to have conductors? I used to love bus conductors, not only could they give you change, but they could furnish you with directions and ensure you get of at the right stop. But no. This occupation has gone the way of milkmen and rag-n-bone men… just like you now have to purchase your milk supplies in bulk rather than have a daily delivery, and just like you now have to sort and recycle your own surplus… you have to have the correct money and have looked up your destination on Google Earth before boarding a bus. Do not think for one moment you can ask the driver as the department of leaflets and stickers have produced a poster that says “DO NOT DISTRACT THE DRIVER”… talking to the driver is forbidden. So sit down, shut up and hope the landscape on Google earth looks the same as it does in real life.

Get back home and find that more leaflets have littered your mat.

• Throw away used tissues to prevent swine-flu
• How to clear up if you get flooded in the thaw
• Eat five fruits or veggies a day to stay healthy
• Prevent crime by putting away your belongings

All worthy stuff I’m sure… but I’m not too sure that I need to be told. And as I go through each leaflet I get more and more annoyed.

· I long ago figured out that tissues full of snot are neither fashion accessories nor pleasant to touch after use.

· If I get flooded, I can locate a bucket and a mop.

· You’ve moved my shops now you are telling me WHAT to buy??? An apple a day keeps the doctor away I was told but thanks for letting me know I have to eat four more!

· I’m not going to put a blanket over my TV just because a thief could see it if he peered through my window and anyway don’t you think the satellite dish on the side of the house is a bit of a clue?

It just irritates me beyond belief. I wish they’d shut-up.

Maybe all this telling us what to do is necessary – maybe we’ve all changed. I just thought we were brighter than that as a nation.

I did start a campaign to impress upon the powers that be that they should not fret about us and get on with something else. I wrote to the council to inform them that I can see so I will not be requiring Braille and also that I have located my bucket and mop and am on standby for the big thaw. I let the Police know that I have enquired with Sky about a cloaking device for my satellite dish but they don’t have the technology yet. I’ve sent this week’s menu to the NHS so they know I’ve had apples, carrots, pears, spinach and spuds this week and I enclosed a photo of all our snot rags nestling in the bottoms of our bin.

Of course all this lead me to big question which I’m afraid REALLY defeat my whole argument as I think I do need a leaflet on this one to help clarify the big question.

As the snot is organic waste: DO THE USED TISSUES GO IN THE NON-RECYCLEABLE OR RECYCLEABLE BIN?

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