I don't understand the appeal of...

[Mike Gloady]

Another example of the "Arrogance of Parenthood".  Apparently having had successful, viable offspring is a bloody excuse for anything. 

Did she just look meaningfully at her child as if the fact some sweaty oik had haunched her was reason enough for her ignorant behaviour?  That's one I've had before.  Huge fun to puncture.

[House of Usher]

"some sweaty oik had haunched her"

Stop emulating speech patterns dreamt up by Pat Mills! It'll do you no good in the long run!

[House of Usher]

I don't understand the appeal of: X-Factor, Katie Price, Kerry Katona, fat girls going out with a bare midriff, thin girls out with a bare midriff September through to May, anyone going out anywhere underdressed, wide belts (except maybe to cover up a bare midriff?), flip flops, ugg boots (wasn't a woman hit by a train at a level crossing trying to retrieve one?), handbags, tracksuits, falling down trousers and on-display underpants, wearing hats indoors, woolly beanie hats except for anyone who's trying to hide going bald, gross ear piercings, school proms, graduation from anything other than a university, graduation from anything including a university, the Last Night of the Proms, celebrity tittle tattle, 'Heat!', 'Pick Me Up', The Jeremy Kyle Show, i-technology of any sort ("me" technology?), or bobble heads.

But I can see the appeal of: shopping, on a budget, for things you can really use or that will brighten your day; big, ironed hair; teenage vampires (although they are emphatically not as cool as grown-up vampires - teen vampires are only cool when they have a teen audience), and boys in skinny jeans. Tanky and Peter look amazing in theirs! I have a couple of pairs myself. Not for daily wear, I'll grant you, because I do have a big fat arse. But if you can wear wear them, there's nowt wrong with them. I'm wearing a nice and comfortable baggy fit pair right now, but they don't tuck nicely into my boots.

[Jim_Campbell]

(wasn't a woman hit by a train at a level crossing trying to retrieve one?)

In the immortal words of Bill Hicks: "I don't think we lost a cure for cancer there. As far as I'm concerned, next traffic jam: I'm one closer to the front."

Cheers!

Jim

[wild-seven]

but they don't tuck nicely into my boots.

The one saving feature of skinny/tighter jeans!

[wild-seven]

Another example of the "Arrogance of Parenthood".  Apparently having had successful, viable offspring is a bloody excuse for anything. 

Did she just look meaningfully at her child as if the fact some sweaty oik had haunched her was reason enough for her ignorant behaviour?  That's one I've had before.  Huge fun to puncture.

Sadly no, just looked at me like the pathetic scum I clearly am for nearly falling over having been rammed by her enormous buggy

[Mike Gloady]

Sorry for the use o "haunch" - I promise, Mr Mills, it'l never happen again and I didn't make a penny out of it.

[Mike Gloady]

Oh, and HoU?  Best post on this thread so far.  Well done.

[Peter Wolf]

Sounds like someone had a run in with a self important parent.

Theres plenty of them out there......

[Dandontdare]

If I didn't have a portable device on which I could receive my e-mail immediately, I would face the choice of either losing business every time I needed to go to the shops, or be tied to my desk or laptop from my UK clients' business hours starting up -- 8:30 to 9:00am -- to my US clients' business hours concluding -- 11:00 to 12:00pm.

I don't buy this. Nobody expects an e-mail to be replied to IMMEDIATELY - if they need to get hold of you that urgently, why not call you? Any cheap mobile phone can do that. I'm sure that you can check your e-mails after popping back from the shops and not lose out. If someone e-mails you at the check out in Tesco, do you drop your basket on the floor and immediately go back to work in the frozen food aisle? Or do you think, that's good, I'll reply as soon as I've finished this bit of shopping? Sounds like you're becoming a slave to your tech rather than the tech serving you.

I work in a busy office and there's an sensible rule mobiles must be switched off during the day (or on silent if necessary for childcare emergencies for example). Loads of people blatantly ignore this rule as if it's some kind of infringement of their civil rights. I think that line in Savage about people topping themselves because they couldn't face life without their mobiles is sadly coming true. (And I'd hate to be a teacher these days!)

I often opine, when the computers are throwing a hissy fit, that we created these devices to make life easier but spend all our time wrestling with them - we managed to run a global empire with big ledgers and fountain pens. The number of times I've seen work processes changed because it's the way the system requires it, is staggering - the machines should support what WE want to do, we shouldn't have to arrange working practices around the way the software works, which is all too often the case.

Basically I'm with Noisybast - I resisted a mobile for as long as I could and I resent the fact that it's getting harder and harder to function without one - eg online forms that list mobile number as a required field. Whether or not I choose to have a mobile is my business and is usually irrelevant to whatever I'm buying or booking.


*phew* rant over.

[flip-r mk2]

The fucking Jeremy Kyle show and it's new underclass of British society, that spend all there fucking time rutting and producing even more subhuman scum.     

Whoa, calm down Adolf! The people who like to parade their dysfunction on shows like JK are fair game, but you seem to have a rather Victorian attitude towards the whole lower classes. Do you hate everyone who doesn't have a job? What criteria do you use to differentiate between people who don't have much money and live in crappy areas and those who are "subhuman scum"?

Dandontdare I think of myself as working class and although I am working at the moment I have spent time on the dole a few times.I also try to treat everybody as equals, but there are some who just don't give a fuck about anybody or anything. I think that Noisybast explains it all lot better than I ever could

To be honest, I'm with Filip on this one. There *is* a new underclass of Epsilon Semi-Morons who believe they're entitled to take what they want without giving anything back to society. They don't follow the rules of society, and they reproduce at an alarming rate.

Nothing wrong with being working class - I count myself, my family and the majority of my friends among them. I work for a living (modest though it may be), ergo I am working class.

For one reason or another, working class people sometimes find themselves out of work. At this point they look for another job which, granted, can sometimes take a while. I'm cool with that. Been there myself.

Sometimes, an individual may be unable to start looking for work for any number of valid reasons (disability, etc). Again, that's a-OK with me.

Now, your average Epsilon doesn't have a job. Never has, never will. The Epsilon has no intention of ever seriously applying for a job. Why work for a living when you can just squeeze out another poor sod to join the ever-swelling ranks of hooded scumbags and the government will just give you a home and some cash. Might not be much, but it's enough for fags and booze, right?

And it's an exponential thing. If the parents don't encourage their kids to do well, to develop and learn, if they feed them on a diet that consists solely of takeaways and Coke, if the only way they interact with them is to shout "Shut up, you little bastard - I'm trying to watch the telly" through a cloud of cigarette smoke, what are the chances of the child growing up to become a productive member of society?

Oh, and before anyone hits the Hitler button, I'm not suggesting any solution to the problem, final or otherwise. I'm just agreeing with Filip's assertion that there is a problem.

Anyway - apologies for further derailing the thread with that little polemic. I don't understand the appeal of, er, Soap Operas. Will that do for now?

I apologize if I caused you offence and hope you don't hold it against me.


filip

Back to Wild-seven's original post, what is it with wooly ugg boots especially in Scotland with or lovely weather.

[TordelBack]

Nobody expects an e-mail to be replied to IMMEDIATELY - if they need to get hold of you that urgently, why not call you?

I have had plenty of clients who expect response to e-mails within a few hours.  As these tend to be project management companies, the reason they use e-mail instead of a civilised phonecall is to create a 'paper' trail to show their client that they have in fact contacted the useless archaeologist in question, supplied the necessary contract information, and from that point on every delay and problem are clearly my fault.  I would also regularly get sent revisions or requests for changes or additions to planning reports at lunchtime on Friday for submission by 4.30.  Similarly, site meeting agendas and progress reports have hour-scale turnarounds, and I could be making a 2 hour journey to the meeting in question.  You can see how instant mobile e-mail might be handy there.

In addition, work is so tight at the moment that if you don't get a tender written and back to a prospective by the end of business, they'll go with one of the five other companies that have.

I'm lucky enough to have an office manager who can screen my work e-mail if I'm away from WiFi land and ring me with the short version.  If I didn't, I'd have an iPhone (or equivalent, but Apple hasn't let me down yet).  

[TordelBack]

Double post deleted.

[Dandontdare]

Nobody expects an e-mail to be replied to IMMEDIATELY - if they need to get hold of you that urgently, why not call you?

I have had plenty of clients who expect response to e-mails within a few hours.

Exactly - 'within a few hours' is reasonable. You don't need an i-phone in your pocket when you pop out for a pint of milk though! If you're doing non work-related things that take more than a few hours then YOU'RE NOT AT WORK!

And my point about labelling people as 'subhuman scum', 'chavs', 'epsilons', or whatever the latest term of abuse is, is how can you tell someone's family history, health status, attitude and current situation by looking? It's like people who generally don't like Asians usually justify it by talking about illegal immigrants, but they tend to look the same.

Just because you regard yourself as working class (as do about 80% of middle class people I find - it's a meaningless label these days) does not mean that you're immune from snobbery

[Jim_Campbell]

I don't buy this.

Excuse me? Considering the hissy fit you had the last time we had a discussion like this and I had the audacity to suggest that you didn't need a car, I take exception to you suggesting that I am being either disingenuous or self-deluding.

Nobody expects an e-mail to be replied to IMMEDIATELY - if they need to get hold of you that urgently, why not call you? Any cheap mobile phone can do that.

Did you actually read what I wrote, or did you just decide to take a couple of cheap shots? Many of my clients are in the States and they most certainly do not want to phone me.

In fact, I've just been offered a job in the last 30 minutes by a US publisher. It has to be on the press in less than a fortnight. Let's assume I'd gone to the pub this evening and didn't have an e-mail capable phone. Do you think that my client would have waited until tomorrow for a reply confirming that I could take on the job, or do you think he would have moved on to the next letterer in his address book?

If someone e-mails you at the check out in Tesco, do you drop your basket on the floor and immediately go back to work in the frozen food aisle?

No. Of course I fucking don't. What I can do, however, is fire back a quick reply confirming that I am available (or, equally importantly, that I'm not so that they can try the next letterer on their list) and thus try to maintain that all-important relationship where the client thinks of me as the reliable guy who gets back to them straight away and doesn't dick them around.

Sounds like you're becoming a slave to your tech rather than the tech serving you.

Do not fucking presume to make judgements about me or my life: just fucking don't.

As much as I love lettering, it is incredibly poorly paid for the most part, so it's all about volume, it's all about getting the work in, and it's not like there's a shortage of people who'll step up and take my work if I let my editors think that I'm in any way blasé about the work they're offering me.

As you so sanctimoniously said last time: don't confuse "want" and "need" ... well, in so far as I only "want" to pay my mortgage and only "want" to put food on the table then, no, you're quite right, I don't "need" an e-mail capable phone.

Bah.

Jim