Monday 6 August 2012

And Another Thing ...



I’m in the mood for a rant. Will you indulge me?

Too bad – I’m going to rant anyway. Let’s see where this goes. I’ll start with the Olympics.

You know how brilliantly Great Britain are doing at the Olympics? That’s something I am not going to target with my plastic wrath. Instead, I have BBC TV sports presenters in my sight.

Having endured about a week of listening to them on TV and radio, I am fed up of the constant gushing about the gold winning athletes. Please, please just offer congratulations instead of inventing superlatives and turning these athletes into deities.

I am happy that Bradley Wiggins won the road race; I am absolutely delighted that Jess Ennis beat the odds to triumph; I am over the moon that Andy Murray actually beat a legend; I couldn’t be happier for Ben Ainslie, Greg Rutherford, Victoria Pendleton or any of the other magnificent athletes.

But please stop going on about them as if they could fly to the moon and back.

And while we’re on, stop overusing the word journey.

X Factor started it.

"What a tough journey One Direction had to get here.”

These guys are BBC presenters and they prattle on about “journeys”. I know it’s difficult to talk about other things but please, for the sake of my sanity please try!

And why is X Factor still on TV? I am dreading the return of possibly the worst show ever to be conceived; a show that makes me want to destroy my television set. I could turn over but it is seriously difficult to find quality television sometimes.

I have Sky TV and I love watching sport and movies but, as Bruce Springsteen said, there are “57 Channels and nothin’ on.”

In fact it’s more like 357 channels. And that is particularly true in summer.



You may be wondering why I would want to watch TV in the summer when the weather is supposed to be  beautiful and we should all be outside basking in the heat and sunshine.

I can here you cry:

“Stop moaning at the TV, you plastic imbecile and get out there in the sunshine.”

Well, dear reader, I would – if it wasn’t pissing down outside.

July and August have been more like November and December this year.  We have had the wettest July on record and that is added to earlier months this year when it was also the wettest on record. The Jet Stream has been hovering south of the UK and bringing with it so much dreadful bloody weather that I want to put the whole thing into Room 101 together with Piers Morgan.

Constant, relentless rain has dampened my spirits to the point where I feel like running out to the middle of our street and kneeling down in the deluge with my arms skywards, pleading to whatever God is willing to listen to me:

"WHY WON’T YOU STOP RAINING?"



We had plans to take a week off work and travel to Scotland next week – but we daren’t. So instead we are spending more money – to fly south to Spain and spend a lot more money than I would have done.

Don’t get me wrong; a holiday to Spain will be most welcome, particularly Marbella, a place I haven’t been to before. The problem is that we have picked a particularly expensive part of Spain and Mrs PM has already tried to put me on a No Carbs till Marbs diet.

Don’t laugh – this is a genuine diet, inspired by yet another dumb TV show called The Only Way is Essex, full of a bunch of weirdos from (you've guessed it) Essex.

No way. The people of Marbella are going to have to put up with me waddling around with any excess body fat on show.

Not that I am fat. I might be a little bit overweight but my BMI is not bad for a guy of nearly 50. Nevertheless, if you happen to be in Marbella next week – don’t worry. I won’t be waddling around in clothes that make me look fat or ridiculous – unlike some holidaymakers I have seen.

There ought to be a law against wearing clothes that you shouldn’t.

I’m nearly 50 and I know where I’m flabby. I would never wear clothing that made me look like a total arse, under the illusion that I was the reincarnation of a muscular Greek Adonis. I would look like an absolute buffoon and probably make the Spanish throw up over their paella.

If you ever see me wandering around wearing clothes that make people ill, you have my permission to slap me.



I just wish I could do the same to some of the people who consider themselves to be athletic and absolutely attractive to the opposite sex, wearing clothes that accentuate everything that is disgusting about them.

I don’t do it (and believe me I look disgusting); why should THEY be allowed to get away with it?

If only I had the courage of my convictions. If only I had the courage to say to the 60 year old business man with a beer gut that is so huge that people scream when he turns around:

“Put a T shirt on – or should I say a tent! I don’t want to see your flabby, hairy beer belly and neither do all of these good people. And for God’s sake do NOT wear speedos.

You see, dear reader, I am a silent ranter – one who rants to the cats, work colleagues who are entertained and my poor beleaguered and beloved Mrs PM – and nobody else.

Oh – apart from you, dear reader.

You see, I am a coward and I have to hide behind an alias here on the internet. Don’t get me wrong; I am not a troll. I would never openly insult a person, alias or no alias. I would never post a nasty comment on a blog post – even if I violently disagreed with the contents of that post.

I like to debate and allow discussions to germinate into an enjoyable experience for both parties – even if I think the other party is a clueless imbecile.

Debate is good; discussion is good. It opens up a whole new world of possibilities and, if done properly, can be an enjoyable learning experience.

So why, Mr Troll (and you know you’re out there reading this), do you insist on hurling abuse at poor innocent bloggers? Keyboard warriors wind me up so much that I have been tempted to track the buggers down.



Still, there’s no point getting upset with people who don’t know how to have a discussion about disagreements, people who just want to post vindictive nastiness under a pseudonym, in the hope that nobody will be able to track them down.

I think I’d better stop now before I get carried away.

Thanks for listening, dear reader – or should I say, thanks for reading.

Getting rid of stress by having a good rant is very therapeutic and, although I don’t genuinely get that upset over things, it eases any pressure that life has to throw at me. It is a necessary part of my existence.

I’ll finish off on a positive note.

Well done Team GB. I hate the name but 18 gold medals and counting is a majestic achievement.

Well done to each and every one of you. And well done to all athletes who have won medals for every other nation too.

I will not gush!

I WILL NOT GUSH!

And I definitely WILL NOT WEAR SPEEDOS!


7 comments:

MedicatedMoo said...

Gush all you want, Plasman, because Team GB have literally had the Games results of a generation or three at least!

We've been watching the BBC here ('cos it's in English, funnily enough) but when the gushing got too bad (SWIMMING), we'd flick over to Eurosports. One incident was when someone or other from the UK came second to a swimmer who broke the world record. The best swimmer in history was completely ignored for a immediate and lengthy discussion of their champion silver effort.

We Aussies were/are just as bad, but it's been a bitter pill this time around because we've had precious little to gush about. But that's when it's time to get caught up in Jess Ennis winning; seeing the hilariously ecstatic father of the South African swimmer who won; celebrate Michael Phelps (despite believing that all swimmers who wear those enormous headphones are tools) and just sit back in awe at the abilities of all the track and field athletes.......

Trolls - oh yes, I'm still getting some really awful comments from my 'Clerk is a jerk' post of 2010, which is why comment moderation is on. Trolls must hate that.

No carbs til Marbs - maybe that's why a rant was in order - you're missing your bread and chips!

River said...

Rain rain go away,
let Plasman come out to play.

There, that should fix it.

I hope you enjoy Spain, I'm looking forward to photos.

Plastic Mancunian said...

Bonjour Kath,

I am loving GB's exploits - record medals. Wonderful.

I see Australia have won a couple too. Good on yer :-)

I didn't realise you were a victim trolls - I think we all are from time to time but I've had some very harsh words with one on a message board recently - so I had to rant about it.

Hopefully Marbs will let me relax a little.

:-)

Cheers

PM

Plastic Mancunian said...

Hi River,

It worked. You are a magician! Look at the weather forecast for Manchester.

Just in time for me to go to Spain.

Off you go North Jet Stream - and take all that rain with you.

:-)

Cheers

PM

Anonymous said...

Hi Mr PM,
'Journey' is Rob's pet hate too. But what word will you use to replace it? 'Experience' doesn't quite capture the same sentiments and growth.

Plastic Mancunian said...

Hi drb (I presume?),

I would prefer "experience" but let me think about that and get back to you.

:0)

Cheers

PM

drb said...

Yes, it was me. :-)
I must have clicked the wrong circle in a hurry - trying to avoid getting caught reading your blog udring work hours. ;-)