What's mildly irritating you today?

[Rhianne]

I was in Tesco today. They were selling Christmas decorations and wrapping stuff. How long before this festival lasts 13 months a year?

[DanaC]

Bleh. All the pubs round here are taking Christmas bookings already.

[Trilby]

I hated Christmas then I sort of liked it again and now I'm back to hating it.

It's so stressful. My goal this Christmas will be not to shoot anyone intentionally.
I should be able to stick to that. But, as I said, it's merely a GOAL and not a PROMISE.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by Rhianne

I was in Tesco today. They were selling Christmas decorations and wrapping stuff. How long before this festival lasts 13 months a year?

How's the weather up your way?

Originally Posted by DanaC

Bleh. All the pubs round here are taking Christmas bookings already.

And up yours? [snort]

I do understand pubs taking bookings. When I was responsible for booking work Christmas parties we used to book midsummer. And full company parties used to be booked in January. Lots to plan, not the least staffing.

We've yet to book The Dairy Maid, but it will be in the next few weeks to ensure we can get our preferred seating time. Then again that's on Christmas Day (just four of us), so it's kinda a big deal. Must remember to take a leftovers box this year for the cats. Wish I could have 1/3 of the meal for 1/3 of the price, but then I'm not really eating at the mo - maybe I'll change my mind by December and be packing it away again.

[Trilby]

My mom.

And dad. You all know about dear old dad and how we don't get along.

Well - mom is driving me up the wall. I should have more patience. She's got vascular dementia. It's making her mean and petty and even more parsimonious than ever. My sister says these types of illnesses bring the person down to their core personality.

At any rate - they're both curmudgeons of the first order, rubbing their two pennies together for warmth when they've got a pile of cash to burn.

I don't get it. If i lived beyond expectancy, I'd be blowing my money on anything that I felt like doing. They act like they're the Little Match Girl about to freeze in the snow. I just don't get IT.

[limey]

It's the dementia. My mum was the same. She could have made her house comfortable, she could have taken taxis to go shopping once a week, and socialising too, but she though she had to hoard every penny. It's the dementia.
That being said, I also think that dementia strips away all the social veneers we have learnt to apply in order to get along, and does reduce a person to their core personality.
My mum was very anxious about money, distrustful of men and pretty scared of a lot of things really, but put on a stupendous act of being confident and capable for all of her adult life, which crumbled with the dementia but I just didn't see it because she'd been such a strong role model all my life.
My dad was shallow and selfish - which we kind of knew all along, anyway.

[Trilby]

thanks, limey, for sharing that.

My mom has been a helpless damsel in distress her whole life - looking for some big,strong man to bail her out of every situation, to TELL her exactly what to do b/c she didn't KNOW what to do. She was decorative and my father loved winding up his doll wife and making her do his bidding. She still serves him like she is his Mammy.

Ugh. He'll walk into the kitchen, sit at the table and say, "Where's the marmalade?" and she JUMPS up to get it. she's always been that way. She's never had to pump her own gas to keep a checkbook or do anything but play paperdolls.

How is it that she got stuck with three witchy daughters when she's so very, very good? I can only begin to imagine her disappoint.

[limey]

Maybe she envies you?
Towards the end of her life, my mum would look at me in wonderment and say "You are so BRAVE! Where did you get that?", and I'd look back at her and say "You taught me". I just didn't understand that she didn't feel that way any more, didn't even remember feeling that way ...

[Trilby]

Maybe. She would tell us to pull ourselves up our bootstraps be strong fearless show the naysayers they were wrong - all things she had NEVER done herself lol. I'm being mean I know. I'm just angry.
boo-hoo.

[limey]

No, no. Be angry - that's OK. But maybe she is not total dissapoint.

[Trilby]

She's not a total dissapoint. Actually she deserved better than at least two of her three kids./

[xoxoxoBruce]

Trilby, don't look to them for role models, you are a role model. You've lived your way, fucked up, faced up, owned up, and moved on. You are woman, lemme hear you roar.

[Trilby]

how can I not love you, bruce?

xoxoxox!

[xoxoxoBruce]

We'll never let any condom between us.

[limey]

Bruce is right. Of course.