My Beautiful Launderette

Yet again I have proved to myself beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am missing the DIY gene. Completely and utterly.

Picture the scene. Finally the rain has stopped and the temperature in good old Surrey is rising. Perfect day to do some washing I thought. First lot of whites go into our 7 year old (ie past its best) smeg. Take bizarre work call which gets me confused & slightly annoyed & I am about to pop second lot in when I (foolishly) look closely at the detergent drawer; Ugh, Could do with a clean.

Musing on the call & so not really paying attention I clean out the drawer and put all the bits back properly (so I think) and as I am slightly cross I whack the drawer back into place. I don't push is gently I thump it. Then I try and open it to put detergent in. It won't open. It is jammed. Naturally my instinct is to whack & pull and thump but no. I guess I could do a load without Calgon or Vanish Oxi whatsit & without softener but I don't want to.

I look online for a solution. There isn't one. The most helpful suggestion is to completely break the drawer OR take the machine to pieces & remove obstruction from the top. Despite the fact the machine is less than new I don't want to break anything. So I decide to take the machine to pieces. Lovely competent neighbour pops over to help - pah how hard can this be? Who needs boys??

An hour & a half later we have dismantled the machine, wriggled everything about then eventually had to force the lid to get to the damn soap drawer but WE HAVE REMOVED THE OBSTRUCTION! Then putting the machine back together begins. How hard can it be - we kept the screws in separate piles .. didn't we? Ooops droped one ... was it important? Doesn't fit well - oh just keep screwing. Does it matter that plastic thing broke off? Bang lid back on & hey presto!

I start a mini wash just to see my handiwork work - all goes well until 2 minutes in BEEP BEEP error code E01. Look it up. Leak /electrical malfunction - stop now. FSHubby gets home and spends an hour on a wet floor (after a 12 hour day at the office) trying to rectify my bodging. He is not best pleased (but most impressed I had managed to dismantle the whole machine!) I buy fish & chips. Pour beer. Wring out towels. Apologise. Turn electricity supply off. Then at 9pm I admit defeat & go online & spend £500 of my hard earned cash on a brand new washing machine. And here I am, waiting at home, twiddling my thumbs, as despite paying £30 to guarantee a timed delivery it will be 2 hours late.

One of those days huh?

Film 2013

When it comes to watching movies I have realised that I have become a squeamish child again. No fighting, no shouting, no blood, no horrible deaths, no sadness, no cruelty, no threatening behaviour ... basically the scariest I can go is Harry Potter, the saddest Dumbo & Bambi, the most exciting any James Bond (or if I am feeling grown up The Bourne movies). I want to watch a film & feel GOOD about the world afterwards not wonder what's wrong with humanity.

The lid was put on this realisation last night. FSHubby was home late & tired (as ever) and just wanted to collpase in front of the TV. However there was zero worth watching on TV so we thought aha! A movie! And here the problem started. FSHubby checked the movies he's downloaded over the past few months. Star Trek? The new one. Ugh no. OK Robin Hood - also the new one with the marvellous Cate & the useless Russell. Hmm - what else? The Hurt Locker? An Oscar winning movie! NO - about war & bombs & people really killing each other. Miserable. OK The Ghost Writer - one of my favourite actors Pierce Brosnan is in it? Looked at plot - political intrigue, personal threat & no happy ending - anything else? No Country For Old Men? - also Oscar winning - good lord no - violent & dark & miserable

I never used to be like this. I used to devour movies of all genres. I saw Pulp Fiction more than twice; I willingly went to see Sophies Choice & Schindlers List (although after both I went home in silence, shell shocked, pondering human nature). I have seen all the Alien & Predator films; I've even watched The Accused & Sleeping with the Enemy. I once gave in to FSHubby & agreed to watch a terrifying film called Sin City. Oh my goodness. I had full on nightmares for 3 weeks afterwards. Although I have NEVER seen Reservoir Dogs & given what I have read about the film I never want to.

And then one day I decided that filling my head & therefore my life with cruelty, negativity, violence, threat, fear & sadness was not a good thing. If I want that, all I have to do is watch the news. And that I would choose from now on to be entertained & entranced & made to feel better not worse. To watch films with a happy ending or if necessary where good prevails over evil, where the world is actually a basically NICE place and a place where people do find joy & redemption.

So I will continue to watch & re-watch Powell & Pressburger classics like I Know Where I'm Going, A Matter of Life & Death and The Life & Death of Colonel Blimp. My box set of every Doris Day movie ever made will stay within easy reach. I will default to the Harry Potter series, choose a James Bond (or even an Austin Powers - Yeah Baby!), or Zoolander or Dodgeball (god bless Ben Stiller - and bring on Zoolander 2) or I will watch again & again a spiky Sandra Bullock find love in The Proposal (and swoon over the scenery & the house - oh and of course Ryan Reynolds)

Yes. I will continue to choose to cheer myself & fill my head with notions of
happiness & fun & love & kindness.

Sorry - what was that - Pollyanna? Moi?

(addenum - see this link - I AM right!!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/apr/12/news-is-bad-rolf-dobelli)

R.I.P. The Iron Lady

Whatever my politics may be I cannot let the demise of the UK's ONLY female prime minister go without mention. As a child growing up on a council estate in the 60's & 70's my parents generation worked hard & were sick to death of 3 day weeks, household rubbish piling up on the street not being collected, wage freezes and the ubiquitous strikes.

So when Mrs T came along talking what seemed immense common sense and refusing to allow the country to be bullied into financial ruin by misogynist, arrogant, workshy union nutters, a sigh of relief was palpable around our estate. There were an awful lot of working class people in the 70's & 80's proud to call themselves Thatcherites. As many as who hated her & everything she stood for. And goodness me she is still managing to really rile people even though she's gone!

She was absolutely not to eveyones taste. She believed utterly & completely in self awareness, self responsibility & self motivation. It's up to you mate - don't expect help from anyone else. She made difficult decisions; she looked at out of date & unprofitable industries and told them modernise or die - and they chose death. I was essentially anti Thatcher in my youth. As an ambitious teenager in the 80's in Liverpool still working out my own politics, I assumed I stood firmly on the left but was pushed further to the right than I expected to be as I was harangued daily by newspaper sellers not just selling but forcing Socialist Worker upon me and by angry rude bucket rattlers shouting at me to "Support the Miners!" - and who often followed me down the street, verbally abusing me after I refused a screech in my face & a bucket rattling; No I will choose to NOT support the miners with my hard earned cash thanks.

What was it Winston Churchill said? "If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain". Hmm. I like to think I still have both.

And lest we forget, whatever you may think, someone's mother & someones grandmother has just passed away.