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This Month's Contents
Podcast Interview................................. "My Illness Was a Blessing"
News and Politics......... Tony Hoffart
Current Issues.............. Lindsey Kay
Technology................... Natasha Stillman
Humor........................... Vicola England, Kirk Starr
Science......................... Paxton Daryl Branson
World Events................ Ilias Kountoupis, Peter McCarthy
Sports........................... Patricia Volonakis Davis
Religion......................... Mr. Snowy
Women's Issues............ Charlotte Steggs
Leading a Good Life...... Tom Hames, Miranda Krebbs
On Growing Older.......... Cyd Madsen, Michelle Solange
Motherhood................... Grace Bon, Amy Flanigan
This Month's Guest Writer................ Amber Burke
About the Writers at Harlots' Sauce Radio
Podcast Interview................................. "My Illness Was a Blessing"
News and Politics......... Tony Hoffart
Current Issues.............. Lindsey Kay
Technology................... Natasha Stillman
Humor........................... Vicola England, Kirk Starr
Science......................... Paxton Daryl Branson
World Events................ Ilias Kountoupis, Peter McCarthy
Sports........................... Patricia Volonakis Davis
Religion......................... Mr. Snowy
Women's Issues............ Charlotte Steggs
Leading a Good Life...... Tom Hames, Miranda Krebbs
On Growing Older.......... Cyd Madsen, Michelle Solange
Motherhood................... Grace Bon, Amy Flanigan
This Month's Guest Writer................ Amber Burke
About the Writers at Harlots' Sauce Radio
| email this writer at: vicolaengland@harlotssauce.com |
Passports, Stupid Subaru and Colds.
Vicola England
The PMT monster has arrived and once again people are avoiding me. This week has been simply brimming over with
help and cooperation from the site management at work. (And again the sarcasm rears its ugly head.) Requests for
information have been ignored, stupid requirements have been sent in and the word 'please' seems to have been lost
from the English language. I am now giving serious thought to fucking it all off and going home for the afternoon to do
something less frustrating and annoying like trying to work out how to achieve world peace or cheese-grating my
forehead.
And the week rumbles on with the usual petty annoyances that include:
Passports - You'd think that changing the name on your passport to your married one would be a simple thing wouldn't
you? You send them a copy of your marriage certificate, then they'd reissue your passport, with the same date of expiry
as your previous one, for a nominal fee of £20 or so. Well, you would be so wrong. In the happy days of state-induced
fear of foreigners and terrorism, getting a passport is more difficult than finding the Philosopher's Stone and the key for
turning base metals into gold. You have to have a completely new passport, at a cost of no fewer than seventy two of
your English pounds, plus you have to send in your original marriage certificate, so, naturally it has to go registered
post. Then you have to send a prepaid registered post envelope for the penny pinching misers to send the certificate
back to you. As they've just charged seventy-two bastard quid for the passport, you'd think that the postage would be
free. This is all before you even get to the issue of 'the passport photograph'.
The passport photograph has long been an ordeal dreaded by the average person. You go into one of those little
booths in the post office or the supermarket and emerge 10 minutes later with a handful of photos that made you look
mentally deficient and drunk all at the same time. You then send one off with your application. I assumed that things were
still the same. So I sent off my application with my mentally deficient photo and a cheque for half of my remaining
overdraft. A week or so later, it wings its merry way back to me. I had had the audacity to smile in my photo. This was not
acceptable and I’d have to redo the photo, but this time sending in one with a blank expression. Yes, well, that should
make me easier to recognise, as I often walk around an airport wearing no expression at all.
Anyway, I did some more photos and sent my new, surly pic off with my application. And again it returns to me, this time
because the background was not the correct shade of white. What the fuck? Are you serious? I rang the helpdesk
(there's a misnomer, if ever I heard one) to see if someone was pulling my leg. According to the girl I spoke to," no," they
were not, the passport office takes identification very seriously and would not joke about such matters. Right then. So I
have now been to a professional photographer to have some photos taken and am waiting for them to arrive so I can try
again.
Pedantic wankers.
Stupid Subaru - Whoever it was that thought it was a good idea to design Subaru cars so that they sound like an
elephant with wind was a tosser. And whichever pillock sold one to the fool next door was an even bigger tosser.
Recently the fool next door acquired a Subaru estate car, and since then his principle source of pleasure has been to sit
on the driveway next to our front window and ‘rev’ the engine. All bloody evening. It's driving me nuts.
What is even more annoying is that last night, at 10 p.m., he decided that the revving didn't sound like it should, so he
called the RAC. He and the RAC man (who arrived at 10.45 p.m.) then spent an hour and a half fannying about, revving
the engine, driving around the estate and generally interrupting my sleep. After a while, I moved into the spare room at
the back of the house.
You could still hear the bloody thing, so I put in a pair of earplugs that I pinched from work. Even then you could still hear
the noise and it took me ages to get to sleep, I was still swearing and thinking malevolent thoughts as I dropped off. I
swear if this doesn't stop soon I'm going to fill his petrol tank with sugar and shove a galia melon right up his exhaust
pipe. See him rev his sodding engine then.
Colds - I knew it had to happen. I have got the Fridge Witches cold. Or the beginnings of it anyway. This time I refuse to
go down without a fight - I have been to Boots and am now armed with First Defence (to try and stop the cold taking hold
in the first place), Beecham’s Cold and Flu Tablets to try and stave it off, vitamin C tablets, Strepsils and echinacea. I
may still end up with the cold, or worse, this vile flu that is going round, but at least if I do there's every change I'll be in a
decongestant-induced coma throughout the entire thing.
Happy Days.
----May 2008
Vicola England
The PMT monster has arrived and once again people are avoiding me. This week has been simply brimming over with
help and cooperation from the site management at work. (And again the sarcasm rears its ugly head.) Requests for
information have been ignored, stupid requirements have been sent in and the word 'please' seems to have been lost
from the English language. I am now giving serious thought to fucking it all off and going home for the afternoon to do
something less frustrating and annoying like trying to work out how to achieve world peace or cheese-grating my
forehead.
And the week rumbles on with the usual petty annoyances that include:
Passports - You'd think that changing the name on your passport to your married one would be a simple thing wouldn't
you? You send them a copy of your marriage certificate, then they'd reissue your passport, with the same date of expiry
as your previous one, for a nominal fee of £20 or so. Well, you would be so wrong. In the happy days of state-induced
fear of foreigners and terrorism, getting a passport is more difficult than finding the Philosopher's Stone and the key for
turning base metals into gold. You have to have a completely new passport, at a cost of no fewer than seventy two of
your English pounds, plus you have to send in your original marriage certificate, so, naturally it has to go registered
post. Then you have to send a prepaid registered post envelope for the penny pinching misers to send the certificate
back to you. As they've just charged seventy-two bastard quid for the passport, you'd think that the postage would be
free. This is all before you even get to the issue of 'the passport photograph'.
The passport photograph has long been an ordeal dreaded by the average person. You go into one of those little
booths in the post office or the supermarket and emerge 10 minutes later with a handful of photos that made you look
mentally deficient and drunk all at the same time. You then send one off with your application. I assumed that things were
still the same. So I sent off my application with my mentally deficient photo and a cheque for half of my remaining
overdraft. A week or so later, it wings its merry way back to me. I had had the audacity to smile in my photo. This was not
acceptable and I’d have to redo the photo, but this time sending in one with a blank expression. Yes, well, that should
make me easier to recognise, as I often walk around an airport wearing no expression at all.
Anyway, I did some more photos and sent my new, surly pic off with my application. And again it returns to me, this time
because the background was not the correct shade of white. What the fuck? Are you serious? I rang the helpdesk
(there's a misnomer, if ever I heard one) to see if someone was pulling my leg. According to the girl I spoke to," no," they
were not, the passport office takes identification very seriously and would not joke about such matters. Right then. So I
have now been to a professional photographer to have some photos taken and am waiting for them to arrive so I can try
again.
Pedantic wankers.
Stupid Subaru - Whoever it was that thought it was a good idea to design Subaru cars so that they sound like an
elephant with wind was a tosser. And whichever pillock sold one to the fool next door was an even bigger tosser.
Recently the fool next door acquired a Subaru estate car, and since then his principle source of pleasure has been to sit
on the driveway next to our front window and ‘rev’ the engine. All bloody evening. It's driving me nuts.
What is even more annoying is that last night, at 10 p.m., he decided that the revving didn't sound like it should, so he
called the RAC. He and the RAC man (who arrived at 10.45 p.m.) then spent an hour and a half fannying about, revving
the engine, driving around the estate and generally interrupting my sleep. After a while, I moved into the spare room at
the back of the house.
You could still hear the bloody thing, so I put in a pair of earplugs that I pinched from work. Even then you could still hear
the noise and it took me ages to get to sleep, I was still swearing and thinking malevolent thoughts as I dropped off. I
swear if this doesn't stop soon I'm going to fill his petrol tank with sugar and shove a galia melon right up his exhaust
pipe. See him rev his sodding engine then.
Colds - I knew it had to happen. I have got the Fridge Witches cold. Or the beginnings of it anyway. This time I refuse to
go down without a fight - I have been to Boots and am now armed with First Defence (to try and stop the cold taking hold
in the first place), Beecham’s Cold and Flu Tablets to try and stave it off, vitamin C tablets, Strepsils and echinacea. I
may still end up with the cold, or worse, this vile flu that is going round, but at least if I do there's every change I'll be in a
decongestant-induced coma throughout the entire thing.
Happy Days.
----May 2008
| "Something Delicious for you..." |
