Hello!  I’m here, I’m here!  I am alive and well, but BUSY!  It seems that being an unemployed bum is incredibly hard work and I’ve never been so friggen busy!  It is amusing however, it takes a situation about men opening their legs to get me to write.

So, it, has a name, it, being something that really pisses me off!  I’ve seen, it, for a while, I’ve chatted to BFF’s about it, and I’ve even had several Facebook posts about it.

MANSPREADING

I didn’t realise it had a name until the other day, I didn’t know it was so prevalent.  Recently two gents were arrested for it.  It was on the ABC, it must be true, please God, make this true!  There should be more of it!

The situation has become so dire that they now have posters about it in New York.  Those New Yorkers have stepped up a peg in my mind.

I know you don’t have balls the size of coconuts, and if indeed you do and you’re catching public transport on the way to your surgeon, well, please forgive me, but, I’m pretty sure you don’t.  It doesn’t really worry me too much if there is plenty of space, and if you want to be an arrogant seat hogging arsehole, well, I’m kinda OK with it, I don’t want some peeps sitting next to me either.  However, when we all need to fit in the same space, move ya fucking legs!  Why should I have to have you press up against me?  Why should I have to feel uncomfortable?  Why should I have to ask the obvious?

I live in the country so I don’t catch public transport much, however I do travel a lot and I have seen it in every state of Australia, I haven’t focused in on it overseas as my thoughts are more consumed with figuring out where the hell I am and where I need to get off and am I heading in the right direction.  It has only happened to me once where I have had to have a word with a manspreading gent.  When we travel to our capital city from my home city, we have to travel in a smaller airplane which requires an aerobus from the airport apron to the terminal and return.  We need to fit an entire plane load of peeps on that bus, so if there are two seats, they need two people using them.  I went to go and sit on a seat and there he was, a seat hogging manspreading arsehole!  I immediately wanted to sit elsewhere, but my brain switched to “how dare he” mode, he’s not intimidating me, I’m not too sure of my words, but something along the soft lines of “hey, can you shuffle over?”  He did,,,,not enough mind you, I think half of my arse cheek was hanging off the edge, bearing in mind I’m an average sized female.  I know I asked politely, not sure why I had to as it was glaringly obvious, I wanted to say “close ya fucking legs arsehole”.  I do believe a bit of RedundantK elbow action may have come into play, I have a knack of using my elbow to provide myself with well-deserved personal space, I don’t jab it, I just place it  😀  It has been very useful over the years at music events, I can’t stand a “Johnny come lately” trying to stand in front of me to see a favourite band, if you wanted to be in front, get there earlier than me, I won’t have a problem, I’d be happy to stand behind you!

Anyway, back to the leg spreading chumps!  I guess some women don’t notice, or are intimidated and don’t say anything and I am fully aware not ALL men do this.  I also think that most of the culprits don’t even know they are doing it, most guys don’t have a clue about others personal space or surroundings, fact, by the way.  I’m sure, having balls the size of footballs would give you an excuse to sit like this, or if indeed you are catching public transport to your chiropractor to have your displaced hip sorted.  But,,,,DUDE,,,, STOP THE SPREAD!

So, it turns out I am the WORST consumer ever, no surprise there I guess.  I’m that person supermarket chains hate as I don’t get sucked into their nonsense or over purchase because the shops are closed for one extra day.  I didn’t buy one Easter egg or even one packet of hot cross buns, even though I’ve had ample opportunity since January when they appeared on the shelves, not one.  I didn’t even succumb to the mindset of stocking up on booze as on Good Friday the pubs and booze outlets are closed.  I didn’t even have any Cadbury crème eggs, this may be difficult to believe for some of you, but I swear this is a true story!  I did however think of them, and their gooey innards, a lot!

I was horrified at the amount of Easter eggs some kids were given, horrified!  WTF?  Thanks to Facebook I was made aware of this.  One we used to get, one!  I do also believe we got a small one if we went to church, hehehe, bribery at its best Catholic Church!  I guess with so many split families a few would even be acceptable, but a table full?  Fucking madness!

I don’t really remember the point of when we were visited by the Easter Bunny to when we placed our order with mum and dad?  I do however recall the tough decision to make when I was a child, there were really only two choices to make, either the Humpty Dumpty Egg or the Elegant Rabbit.  It really was a gut wrenching decision, which taught us to deal with the decision we made.  The novelty of the humpty egg with his elastic attachment, but to *BOING* him and hit the ground just enough to break it but still keep everything contained in the foil wrapper was an art.  The beanies were the treat inside, you gotta remember when I was a kid there were no such things as kinder surprises and things inside things, we knew the beanies were inside but it was still a treat all the same.  Then the elegant rabbit, it was bigger and sometimes the ears and base were thick with chocolate, so the lure of greater chocolate volume was the deal maker here, but no novelty factor or no beanies!  What about those freaks that used to get the candy egg?  A coloured sugar and water egg?  Why?

I remember back in the day when some cousins visited, they were given a standard chocolate bar, a chocolate bar.  *BLINK BLINK*  I thought at the time that they were totally duped, ripped off, surely the Easter Bunny knew they were on holidays, surely he shares the same tracking skills as Santa?  Now when I think back about it, they most probably got more grams of chocolate than us with our fandangled treats.

It was nice to hang out with some peeps though over the Easter break as it was long enough for people to travel.  I have 4 day weekends every weekend at the moment, so the pleasure of such things no longer is there, it was nice to see others relish the time off though.  School holidays are here too I believe, time to hibernate at home for the next two weeks, I wished IGA or Coles home delivered in my city for times like this.  I did do well this morning however, it has been raining for two days, so I went in when the shops opened in the rain, what bliss, straight through the checkouts, yes, plural, you always have to go to two or 3 shops to get what you want around here, I got decent car parks too!

Oh, I believe there is some other reason behind Easter, but all I saw was chocolate, so if the other reason is your thing, I hope you enjoyed it and it filled you with whatever makes you happy.  For all those who did over indulge in the sweet poison, I hope that your moods and insides are back to normal!

Anyway, until next time, I’ll be parked up on the couch watching Judge Judy  🙂

My name is RedundantK and it has been 24 hrs since my last tennis fix.

So,,,,,,I’m a little lost.  The Australian Open has finished.  I am not a sports fan, however I love my tennis.  I wouldn’t watch 5 minutes of any other sport for the whole year, I dont do AFL or Soccer (yes, it’s called soccer), I don’t even do The Olympic or Commonwealth Games, but tennis, yeah, I’ve got a problem.  I was even more lost when during the men’s final, Miserable Moooray and The Joker, at one set each, the tv channel, the only way to watch, dropped off air due to the local tower being struck by lightning and the backup power supply failing.  I went into panic,,,,watching the score on the net just wasn’t the same, feverishly Googling, I found you could watch live via a website.  Thank goodness even during the severe storm we had, I still had a stable internet connection.  Times like this I am grateful for not being a tightarse and securing a high speed connection and have good equipment.

I used to play a lot of tennis, socially, as I like the outfits, and TBH, I looked pretty decent in them too  😀  But a few years back when I was sick, I had to give it up and never got back into it.  This year I will, a great excuse to buy new fluro tennis shoes  😀  I loved the Nike outfits this year, another reason why the Aussie Open Grand Slam is worth watching, they wear the cool stuff, unlike on the hallowed ground of Wimbledon.  I’m a Rog fan, not a freak arm butt picking Rafa fan, I’m amazed by the strength of the Williams sisters and I’ve even warmed to Azarenka and her quivering squeal.

I have been to The Australian Open several times with my sister, what could be better, a girlie week in Melbourne combined with tennis?  YES PLEASE!  We would always spend equal time watching the greats, yes, I’m talking Rog, and watching the punters.  We discovered this young gent who would wear his homemade Venus shirt, and VERY proudly display his love for her during game play, then as soon as Serena would come on, quickly whip off his Venus shirt for a Serena shirt and equally solidly display his devotion.   There was the bread chewing guy, each day he would appear with a bag filled with his carby delights, and munch on them for the entire day with no noticeable break.  There was the frizzy haired blonde lady who must’ve had a seat in an area she wasn’t too fond of and spent the entire match sitting in any available seat closer to the ground and spent the entire change of ends being shunted along.  There was Mr “I have a hat for every country playing”, changing them out before every match.  There were also the tourists who were fucking clueless on the game and had to chat all the way through and ask ridiculous questions and banter total garbage throughout game play.   There was a desperate middle aged lady who declared to be “Rafas #1 fan”, more like crazed fucking stalker, call the cops Rafa!  There is always Federer’s dad, wandering through GA, it was always a tick off the “things to see” list.  So many extras to look at on top of such thrilling high quality matches, it was EXHAUSTING.

Melbourne Park is a credit to Melbourne and Australia, it is a fantastic venue, run extremely well, they sell decent food (don’t queue for the poofyjesus’ though, not worth it) and decent booze, there is never any drama and they are super-efficient at getting patrons in and out swiftly.  I think I may have to go again next year!

There was talk just recently about the monetary gap and inequalities between the haves and have not’s in tennis.  The fact that there are several of the Forbes rich list being from the playing and winning of tennis.  Blah, blah, blahing about the fact that they earn huge salaries where teams sports and regional tennis, not so much,,,,are you kidding me?  If I had to exert myself for up to 5 hours at 100% in over 40 degree heat with zero assistance from anyone else, I would want a huge pay cheque too!

Anyway, here I sit, after two weeks of all day and night tennis watching from home this year, I am at a loss as it is now all over.  I believe it is 15 weeks and 5 days until my next grand slam fix.   I guess some work may get done around the house now, and my couch may reset its shape after having my fat arse planted on it for so long.  Anyway, I can’t relive the glory and watch re runs,,,,our power is out due to storm activity.   I’ll just sit here in the dark and deal with my addiction,,,,eating cheese.

Methinkies they call this time of the year the SILLY SEASON because of people’s silly desire to get somewhere first and their silly idea that they are the only ones on the road or their silly notion that they don’t have to obey road rules?  Slow the fuck down people!

Recently I had the great displeasure of being involved in a car accident, on my very last day of work, in a crash of absolutely no fault of my own, yeah, the timing right?  I learned a very valuable lesson that day, vehicle 5 star safety ratings are a good thing and concentrating solely on driving your car can minimise injury should something happen.  My car was a write off and my body although battered and bruised was not.  One more trip to the physio before Christmas and I am as good as new,,,well, as good as I am going to get!

I learned a few valuable lessons:

• Vehicle 5 star safety ratings are a great idea, anti-lock braking systems and crumple zones are there for a reason.
• Airbags and seat belts are awesome, they do a great job, however it is like being kicked by an obstreperous mule.
• Driving sensibly and doing everything right does not always work out for the best when other people are about.
• Having AGREED value on your motor vehicle insurance is well worth the extra few dollars a year.
• Having the Police and Ambulance involved makes for a far easier claim process.
• Some people are still arseholes, a person nearly run me over after the crash when it was pretty obvious people were hurt but I guess some people just need to get to where they are going in a hurry?
• Some people restore your faith in humanity. I had a lovely couple come to my rescue after the crash and come forward as witnesses to the Police and stay with me until my husband arrived and Ambulance had seen me.
• I was very bloody lucky, it could have been far worse!

So, all I can ask once again is, slow the fuck down!  I have been to the shops every day this past week in the lead up to Christmas day, there is still plenty of food in there, there is still plenty of fuel in the bowsers and there is still enough room on the roads to get where you are going.   If you can’t chillax whilst driving and find yourself on edge, add this classic to your playlist, Leo Sayer – You make me feel like dancing, there is NO WAY you can get shitty and stressed singing to this pearler!  Please keep both hands on the wheel during “WHOOAH” part though  🙂