Reading about Cam's plans for discounted prices for first time buyers under the Cons, I'm stating my objections now. I don't want my taxes funding lower prices for home buyers, i want them to pay for education, heath services and the welfare state. It's no wonder the Cons are so into home 'ownership', along with 'marriage' they are the pillars of capitalism. Keeping your nose to the grindstone to pay for you 'death pledges'. Once the ring is on, the next step is buying the house after which your life becomes centred on paying the mortgage. And what does that mean in reality, you get a large loan and over the 20 to 40 years it takes to pay it off, you will have paid for your property twice over. Then you either end up having to sell it to pay for your care or else you'll leave it to your children to fight over!! How can you own anything? Everything we have is borrowed, our lives are finite, we can't take any of this with us, we might delude ourselves that we 'own' stuff, but we don't own anything, everything is temporary and all that we have for our use in this lifetime will eventually be like ourselves, dust. I know so many people who got caught up in the property boom (trap) and are now sitting with huge mortgages and negative equity, we've been conned people!! If you want to help in the fight against capitalism and greedy bankers, don't buy houses, don't give them your money, keep as much of it to yourself as your can and use it to enjoy your life as much as possible. And if you want to be with someone, just be with them, you don't have to get married! But if you have children, DO take care of your responsibilities!! A happy childhood is the foundation to a good life, and pays better dividends than bankers!! After all, your children get to decide on your care home!
Personal Blogs
Just sitting watching the first love of my life on the telly, none other than Ziggy himself. I used to have a poster on my bedroom wall which must have been taken from this concert because he had that short kimono on, i just loved it, back in the day. Still love Bowie, always have, always will, some loves never die.
I was in Letterkenny on Wednesday night to see this show, it was as the title suggests 'fabulous'. It's a production between Liam O'Maonlai and the Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre performing to Liam's solo album Rian. They have toured venues all over Europe with this show and it is definitely worth going to see. They are in Longford tonight, Sligo tomorrow night and Carrick on Shannon on Sunday night, so if you are in the west of Ireland, do yourself a favour and check this out, you won't regret it!
I was just checking through some of my old blog posts when i noticed 'big society' in the tags, whatever happened to Cam's 'big society'??? Anyone any ideas?? When the Tories come canvassing for the next election, maybe we should ask them?
What a let down! My most sincere condolences to all in the 'Yes' camp, i really hoped you would win. It's really ironic, the 'no' vote was for the status quo but because of the vote, things are going to change anyway!!! All you 'no's' should just have voted yes......
Things will change for Scotland and the rest of us but i think the real losers here are going to be the working class in England, the possibility of Tory rule forever in England is just too depressing to contemplate, you have my sincerest sympathy! Say goodbye to the NHS if the Tories get in again!
Good luck to Alex Salmond, he did a great job, sorry he didn't get the result, but i bet there are many today who voted no and now regret it. Imagine that, you voted AGAINST your own country, that is something you have to live with!
Well, the big day arrives tomorrow and if there are any floating voters out there who are reading this and still not sure what way to vote, my suggestion is, to just go for it. Why not? The chance to run your own affairs, free from the yoke of Westminster, don't listen to the scare-mongers, be like the song 'Scotland the Brave'! I've listened to all the arguments and i have found the no camp so patronising, are the Scottish people so stupid that they would be incapable of running their own country? I don't think so!
I love Scotland, it is one of the most beautiful countries in the world and it never fails to amaze me how many people travel across the world to other places for their beauty but have never been to the Highlands, unreal!! If you have never been, go, you have no idea what you're missing, it is stunning.
There's another myth about Scotland, I've never understood, that the Scottish people are tight with money. I used to go over to Scotland every year for Hogmanay, and far from miserable, i found them the most generous people i ever met. You welcomed into homes and fed and watered to your hearts content, they couldn't do enough for you.
I was thinking today about the outcome and i thought about getting up on Saturday morning and hearing that the no camp won, and i had such a sinking feeling in my stomach, but when i imagined getting up and hearing that the yes vote had triumphed, then it felt great, exciting!! So, if there is anyone out there and still not sure, try that, sit down quietly, take a deep breath and imagine the result and see what your gut tells you, don't let fear decide it for you, let your inner wisdom speak and good luck to the people of Scotland, i wish you well in your future, it's in your hands, GO FOR IT!!
Now on a count of 3, 1 2... Oh flower of Scotland, I long to see your face again.......
If there is one thing I've learned about life, it's that you never really get over anything. Whatever trauma, sorrow or heartbreak you may have suffered, you won't fully get over it, the best you can do is to try and find ways to live with it. Over time you will cry less but no matter how well you may appear to be, it doesn't take much scratching at the surface to realize the pain is still there, hovering somewhere below the surface and then there are always those dates, songs or other triggers that remind us of our losses. And that is the hardest lesson to learn in life, how to cope with loss, whether it's saying goodbye to those we love or recovering from trauma, continuing through the daily grind is the toughest battle of all.
Just home from finishing my exam, (DD203) it wasn't too bad but of course, driving home i remembered 3000 things i forgot to put in. Anyway, i'm just glad it's all over after all the stresses and strains of the last 18 months. (I've had the year and half from hell and it ain't over yet) but at least i have 4 months of doing nothing but going to work, coming home and being able to read just for pleasure again.
i am going to sleep for my summer holidays this year, roll on July!
A while back i was given poems that were written by a young man callled John Jones from Enniskillen in Co Fermanagh who died in 1979, aged just 22. Tomorrow is his anniversary so I thought i would put up one of them. This is my favourite one and perfectly captures the dark misery that was 1970's N. Ireland. It was dated Oct 1978 and this month also has deep resonance for me as it was one of the darkest periods of my life.
The Town I Love So Well
They sipped from cups of steamy welcome tea
and fag ends hissed as they hit the water.
The traffic lights were amber, the cinema closed
As they plunged once more with twilight sneaking.
The peckish crowds drew lots for a better view,
Their consensus instability, despite his tender years
and that Daglish would surely hit the thirty mark.
The paper boy dripped when they brought him up.
His feet were encased in two large pumpkins
And already the pike had nibbled at his flesh.
He left no note and no one mentioned murder.
The power battle between East and West is about to be settled. The power base shifted last year over Syria when China backed Russia. If China backs Russia again just sit and watch the West hand-wring but be powerless to do anything.
The West is in decline and has been for years and the East has risen. That's why England is so anxious to keep Scotland in Britain because without it they are just one small country on an island of three. Will they still be able to keep their seat on the UN Security Council when they are no longer 'Great Britain'? Probably not.
Going back to the politics, I've been doing a lot of thinking about the problems, economic and otherwise that are afflicting the UK at the present time, and the biggest and least acknowledged obstacle to improving life for the majority, is the class system. This hierarchy of privilege is what is stifling the entire country and stopping any real progression both socially and economically. So in order to get the UK moving, real action is needed and the place to start is the House of Lords.
The class system needs dismantling and it needs dismantling from the top down, so, the first thing i would do is, get rid of the House of Lords and replace it with a House of Representatives. That is, an upper chamber that is truly representative of all the groups that make up society, not just the political cronies and privileged who occupy it now.Firstly, every county would have one representative and the 20 largest cities one representative as well. London, being the capital would have two, one from North London and one from South London. One of the criteria for representing your city or county would be that you would have to be permanently resident there. Next, I would have a representative for the top 10 religious groups, ethnic minorities, charities, unions and a couple of representatives from business, farming and the industrial sector. There should also be a representative from the NHS and the armed forces. Then, there would be past Prime Ministers and one representative from all the political parties with seats in the House of Commons. I would also give a seat to the monarch and their immediate heir because, although i completely disagree with the whole business of monarchy, I would still leave that decision to the people in a referendum. I also feel that as the Head of State, they should be entitled to a say; all voting in the Upper Chamber would of course be by secret ballot.
So that's the starting point, none of these ideas are set in stone as yet but it starts the debate. I would also get rid of all the titles handed out by the Queen, it only gives people delusions of grandeur and promotes division is society. The Queen, if she was still there, could hand out medals or something instead.
I would also introduce fair employment legislation to Britain, we have it here in N, Ireland because of all the problems in the past/present, and it was news to me that it didn't exist in the rest of the UK, so that would be one of the first steps to creating a more meritocratic society and it would help to break up the 'old boy networks' that discriminate against the working classes and deprive them of opportunities to advance.
So that's the starting point for my political alternative, comments as usual are always welcome.
Did you ever have one of those days when you think, there just has to be more to life than this. If I could live anywhere at any point in time, I would live in Dakota with the Sioux back about the 14th Century, well before the Europeans landed and wrecked the place. It's my idea of heaven! Clean air, clean water, pristine land and no daily grind. Instead here I am, living in a grey concrete box, working in a windowless office with only artificial light, working to have the money to maintain a lifestyle that I don't even want, it just isn't right, not for me anyway. My spirit yearns to be set free!!
I'll be watching Ben Fogles Wild Lives to see if there's somewhere out there I can escape to!
I haven't posted much on the blog in the last year. I had to defer my course DD203, from last year too but i'm picking up again now and can't wait to get started.
I had a bad year, the worst for quite some time, from heart-break to sickness and death, it was a tsunami of grief which hasn't quite ended yet but life goes on and so must I.
I'm looking forward to getting back into politics, the world is shifting and last year saw the balance shift from west to east when Russia and China usurped the US over Syria. I think history will see this as the turning point.
Russell Brand editing the New Statesman was interesting too, although i don't agree with his call not to vote, the usuals will still get in because their supporters will still turn out, and if we give up our right to vote, then you get minority governments (like the present incumbents) getting it all their way. If you don't like it, do something about it, start a new party maybe, (something which has been on my mind). I'm working on a restructure of the House of Lords which I'll post shortly. And our vote is the only voice we have, maybe at the next election we should all turn out and vote for the candidate who is the least likely to do any harm.
I've been decorating all week and the muscles are feeling it, I haven't done anything much for months and the shock of some activity has made me realise how I've let my fitness go. Time to get back to something!
There’s a bit of a debate at the minute around smoking on hospital grounds which, again, like all debates usually approaches a problem from how to deal with the symptoms rather than the causes of the problem, in this case smoking.
I used to smoke, I stopped 14 years ago, in February 2000. I had tried all the usual methods, hypnosis, nicotine patches (which were worse than smoking), none of which worked. I wasn’t a heavy smoker, I could cut it down to 3 a day but I just couldn’t manage to stop them completely. Then I came across the Alan Carr book on smoking ‘The Little Book of Quitting’ ( I had tried the bigger book, the Easy Way to Stop Smoking but found it too much). I used to carry this little book around with me and read it while waiting for buses, appointments or just when I got 10 minutes to myself. This went on for several months and then one magical day I stopped. I had been out the night before and as all smokers know, when you drink you smoke like a train,(this was back in the day when I used to drink too. My mouth felt disgusting, as if it was carpeted, I looked at the packet of cigarettes, there were about 5 left in it, and I thought to myself, ‘ I am never going to put one of those disgusting things back in my mouth again’. I threw the packet in the bin and that was the end of that.
The amazing thing about this is that it was during one of the most stressful periods in my life. My marriage had ended (I had left the marital home in January) so I was homeless, jobless, broke, with 3 teenagers in tow and 4 year old! I didn’t put on any excess weight either, I even managed to lose about 10lbs of extra weight that I was carrying, not to mention the 150lbs of dead weight I dropped from leaving the marriage!!
So, if anyone is thinking about stopping smoking, I would recommend this little book. Now, the only thing you have to be aware of, is that someday you may have an emotional outpouring because smoking is another of those methods that people use to ‘suck’ down their emotions so you will find that you will be a bit more emotional for a while but this will settle down. Just remember, feelings are just feelings, and no one ever died from a feeling, if you just realise this and sit with it, it will pass. Just have a good cry! It’ll do wonders for you.
Now if any government was serious about stopping smoking, here’s a suggestion which would wipe out smoking within a generation or at the very least reduce it drastically.
The legal age to buy cigarettes is 16, starting from next year, raise the age to 17, and the year after to 18 and keep raising the age every year until it reaches 25, because most people start smoking as teenagers but if they can’t buy cigarettes until they are 25, there’s a very high probability that they will never start. Simple.
As usual, all comments are welcome.
jesus comes to the city of culture - YouTube
Watching Secrets of the Workhouse last night, I was struck by how the rhetoric of the Victorians in relation to the poor is exactly the same rhetoric employed by the present Government in relation to the poor and people on benefits.
Which just goes to show how completely out of date Cameron and Co are.
Reading the New Statesman last weekend,(for week 7-13 June, I'm a bit behind at the moment) I was reading a John Pilger article about feminism and austerity and I came across the story of Stephanie Bottrill, a disabled grand-mother who committed suicide out of despair over the 'bedroom tax'. I would ask people to check it out on-line and sign the petition calling for the resignation of Ian Duncan Smith, it's on Change.org. This so-called bedroom tax isn't a tax, it's a welfare cut and the Lib Dems should be ashamed of themselves for letting this through Parliament.
These people have no idea how the rest of us live. Roll on the next election, it can't come quick enough!
This poem is dedicated to all those lost loves who have broken our hearts and sometimes their own too. The title comes from a text message I received from my daughter one day, the sky was very heavy and dark and she had said in her text the clouds were skyscraper black. I don't know if she mispelled something or if she meant that but it struck me immediately as a great description, and this poem just poured out it.
Skyscraper Black
Searching across a moon dark shore
Leaving midnight traces in the sand
I follow the trail of my lost love
To this distant other-worldly land
I feel the grief of other lonely souls
Moving in shadowed circles around my head
Crying for life and dreams not realized,
For hopes and wishes now long dead.
For I was loved, though he is now gone,
My heart remains clasped firmly in his hand
And feeling his presence still, I follow
His ghostly foot trails across the sand.
Now, standing alone along this darken'd shore,
Lost between his reality and my dream
I wait for the sun to rise and lighten
The skyscraper blackness in my soul
Finally, have all my internet problems sorted, and am back on-line. the computer had to go back to the shop because the browser wouldn't open. If I was paranoid I would be blaming Big Brother, after all the G8 is on not far from where I live, and after all the recent revelations, well, who knows?
I suppose I should be out protesting with the rest of the anti-capitalists but I've too much going on at the moment and i don't watch the news very much these days either so I've no real idea what is happening.
Anyway, i was on holiday a couple of weeks ago in Munich. I was there before and had always wanted to go back in the summer time, unfortunately the weather was more late autumn, apart from the Tuesday, when i went on a day trip to Neuschwanstein. That's the castle built by Ludwig the Second. Bavaria is a stunningly beautiful place, it was like travelling through a fairytale. Looking out of the bus window, I was thinking 'how do you get a life where you get to live in a place like this?' If there are any unattached Bavarians on the lookout for a partner, just give me a call!!
If there is reincarnation, I know where I'm coming back to.
Another busy weekend ahead, I'll be in Letterkenny tonight for Crash Cabaret, I'll be taking part in a play reading and maybe some improv, and then off to Derry in the morning for some extras work.
The Earagail Arts Festival kicks off next weekend, so if anyone is going to be in the North West of Ireland in the next month, check it out, there's some great stuff in it.
Now I must go and get my props sorted. It's good to be back'!!
If rumours of a possible appearance by Noel Gallagher as a judge on the X Factor are true then all I can say is ‘NNNNNOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!! Please Noel, don’t do it, pulleeeeese!
If this turns out to be true, then it will go down as another black day in the history of human kind, like the day the first McDonalds opened in Moscow or the day Robert Plant accepted a knighthood. It’s a bitter disappointment when your heroes sell out, Plant I could overcome to some degree, at least he was English but Bob Geldof will never be forgiven. His honorary knighthood, for Live Aid, was just too much. Firstly, because he was Irish but mainly because he came to fame on the punk wave of the late 70’s, this made it doubly unforgiveable. You sold your soul Geldof, but not to rock and roll, shame on you!!!
My first big music hero, like many others, was none other than David Bowie, and recent reports of a comeback were a surprise to me because he’s always been a regular in my music collection so, for me, he has always been there. David Bowie was my first love and I still love him, even more so now because I read recently that he turned down both a CBE and a knighthood. Way to go Bowmeister, I’ll luv ya forever!!!
My favourite Bowie album is Hunky Dory but my favourite song is Drive in Saturday from the Aladdin Sane album, the saxophone on that song raises the hairs on the back of my neck every time I hear it. Aladdin Sane was my teenage rebellion album, songs like Time, with its sexually provocative lyrics used to drive my mother nuts, her being ultra Catholic, so I used to ramp the volume up whenever it came on.
The TV is so crap these days, I’ve been listening to a lot more music recently, George Harrison has been getting a lot of play round my house and I’m awaiting the arrival of a Sparks CD, Kimono My House, remember them from the 1970’s, I loved the strangeness of the Mael brothers. I’m going to stick my neck out and predict a renewed interest in them.
By the way, none of these albums belonged to me, they belonged to my older brother who had great taste in music and it was through him that I was first introduced to Bowie. He still has all his albums too, now there’s a collection worth robbing!! Although, I probably have most of the same albums now, anyway. My brother didn’t allow us to play his records and used to keep them locked up in a case but my sister and I were able to open the lock with a hair clip and played them when he was out, well, what’s the point of having older siblings if you can’t borrow their stuff!
I didn’t have the money to buy LP’s when I was young but I got a job the summer I turned 13 and bought my first Bowie single, Young Americans. I haven’t bought the new CD yet but it’s on my to-buy list. Bowie has so much symbolism for my generation, he was never just a singer, he was an artiste, and he drove the parents crazy!
That’s one thing I really miss about the changes to how we buy our music, there’s nothing special about downloading a piece of music compared to buying an LP which had its own ritual. Everything was much more expensive back in the day. You had to save your pocket money if you wanted to buy an LP. Then, when you had the money saved, there was the whole experience of going around your local music shops, and spending a Saturday afternoon just browsing through the records before deciding what to buy. There would be deep discussions between you and your friends before the purchase would be made, as the covers were taken out and examined in detail. LP covers were like works of art and there were some amazing ones, like Led Zeppelin’s, Physical Graffiti or the futuristic landscapes on the great prog rock band, Yes’s covers. Browsing through the records was probably the teenage equivalent of walking around an art gallery now. Then when you had made your purchase and headed out around town to show it off to your peers. Now, that was a big deal, everyone would ask what you had bought and your coolness lived and died by it, and if your choice was approved you walked tall all day.
There are many advantages to all our modern technology but it is robbing us of so many great experiences too, and I am grieving the loss of HMV. There are only two shops I love to visit now, HMV was one, the other is any bookshop anywhere, and they’re rapidly disappearing too. If the local bookshop goes, I’ll have no reason to go out again. It seems, the more connections we make online, the less connections we have with real people out in the real world. Sad...
I’ve been off line for a while now, there were a few personal issues that came up and demanded most of my spare time and attention, then to top it all, my computer crashed and burned, leaving me with no internet access. Well, the personal issues have eased and I also have a new computer and I’m back online, and what a week to come back with Margaret Thatcher departing this life.
When I first heard the news, I didn’t really have an emotional reaction which surprised me because back in the days when she was in power, I loathed her with a passion. I had watched the film, The Iron Lady a while back, and it aroused a certain sympathy in me for her as a human being, which was a big surprise to me considering how I had felt about her. Maybe I’ve grown up!
But what I realised while watching the film was that her glory days were far behind her and that no matter how much power she may have wielded, or how important she may have been in the world of politics, she was now just an old woman and was going to die, just like the rest of us, and when I sat down to write this last night I was reminded of these lines from Gray’s Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.....
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power
And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave
Awaits alike th’inevitable hour:
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
And when Thatcher’s children attend her funeral next week, it would do them no harm to reflect on their own mortality and realise that arrogance and money will not insulate them from the reality of death and, one day, they too will take the same journey.
Maybe the outpouring of hatred towards Margaret Thatcher will serve to remind them of the damage that can be done by those whose self-serving beliefs allow no consideration for the humanity within us all.
Margaret Thatcher was contemptuous of the weak and poor, regardless of their life situation, and used the power of the state to wage war on the working classes, wrecking their communities and their political power bases. Everything that is wrong with the country and the economy today, has its roots in the policies enacted under her leadership.
I certainly understand the outpouring of hate against her, those wounds run deep and it is not my place to condemn or condone someone else’s actions but I will say this, at least you knew what you were getting with her, there was no ambiguity in what she stood for, even if you completely disagreed with all of it, which is more than can be said for Tony Bliar, the Tory in a red tie.
But whatever she was, she is no more, and is now dead and gone. Her legacy will be debated for many years to come and how much of it will all matter in a hundred years from now, who knows? The great pity of her life is that she could have done so much more good, if she had just remembered her humanity and had been a bit less intransigent.
Life is short, too short for many of us, and I can only hope that this present administration would take some time out to consider the legacy they are creating and the damage they are inflicting on future generations: that they would realise the divisions and the hate they are fomenting will remain long after they have been kicked out of office, (which will be soon, hopefully) and that the responsibilities of political office demand that you serve all the people not just the rich and powerful.
Live well people
One for the working classes whose political voice is rapidly disappearing, in and out of Parliament. Free market economics are fine if they apply to all, but workers are forbidden from joining unions and striking, the law is skewed in favour of practices that favour employers. Banks gamble and lose, and the tax payer is left to pick up the bill; so where is the ‘free’ in the free market? Are we under the Orwellian, ‘everyone is free only some are more free that others’ or are those on top ‘free’ to exploit those on the bottom? Time for a wake up call.
Alarm Call
Wake up the working classes!
Wake up! Wake up!
Your life is disappearing,
down the drain
While you watch TV
That’s rotting your brain.
A cell killing diet
of soap from the sink.
Until, you no longer know
what it is, to think.
2
Wake up the working classes!
Wake up! Wake up!
Your future hopes
Are being cut away,
While you sit dreaming
of stardom in X-Factor
for your son or daughter.
Blinded by celebrity:
wake up and face-up to,
the con of this ‘reality’!
3
Wake up the working classes.
Wake up! Wake up!
You’ve forgotten your history
The story of your labour,
What your ancestors fought and died for.
Remember Tolpuddle and Peterloo,
The Suffragettes and Miners
As citizens, not subjects,
This nation is not one class,
It is your country too.
This poem is quite a heavy piece, I had always envisioned it as a performance piece and it's for all those who have experienced a trauma they would rather forget.
Brainwashing
I wish that I could wash my brain
And make it clean and free from pain
I wish that I could wash my brain
And wash away the hurt and stain.
Brainwashing, brainwashing
Brainwashing, brainwashing.
I wish that I could wash my brain
And make it clean and free from shame
I wish that I could wash my brain
And wash away the dirt and pain.
Brainwashing, brainwashing
Brainwashing, brainwashing.
I wish that I could wash my brain
And make it clean and free from stain
I wish that I could wash my brain
And wash away the hurt and shame
Brainwashing, brainwashing
Brainwashing, brainwashing.
I wish that I could wash my brain
And make it clean and new again
I wish that I could wash my brain
But I can't....
Reading through some of my notes this morning I was drawn to a passage in my politics book, (we’re on ideology at the moment) about Simone de Beauvoir and her book, The Second Sex, where she suggested that the female body made them amenable to being constructed as a man’s ‘other’. Well I was thinking about this, and I concluded that you could say exactly the same about a man’s body, it really all depends on who’s on top!!
Now, for those of you who may not know this, Simone was the long time love of Jean Paul Sartre who wrote The Age of Reason. If there is anyone out there who ever got to the end of this book, then stand up and take a bow because you deserve a gold medal for endurance. I have tried on several occasions to read this and maybe, it’s the practical side of me, or something but I thought this was the most overblown pretentious piece of navel gazing I ever had to endure.
The main character has got his girlfriend pregnant, now this character is not 16 or 18, this guy is, as far as memory serves, around 30, he’s running around trying to get her an abortion and all I could think was ‘grow up and take care of your responsibility, because if you weren’t prepared to face the consequences of your actions then you should have kept it in your pants’. To me this was all a non issue, it was just a story about a man trying to avoid the reality that it was time to grow up which unfortunately IS the reality for 90% of the women in this country.
A friend recently sent me an email extolling all the virtues of Thomas Jefferson and all that he achieved in his life and all the way down reading it, I was thinking, ‘ Well, that’s very interesting, he was able to do all that because there was obviously a woman at home who did all the cooking and cleaning and childcare, leaving him free to think and act. I bet he never cleaned the toilet in his life!’ Which is not to take anything away from how brilliant he was, but just how brilliant could we ALL be if we were freed from the drudgery of housework?
So, on the question of domestic drudgery and gender equality in the home, here is the argument as to why it should be shared by EVERYONE! I call it the ‘Everyone principle’, well why not, I can be as pretentious as Sartre when I need to.
EVERYONE lives in the house, EVERYONE uses the facilities so it’s the responsibility of EVERYONE to care for and maintain them. That’s it, plain and simple.
‘If only it were!’, I hear you cry. Now men will argue that the women stand over them and criticise how they do things, fair enough, I accept that does happen. But the thing about housework is this, we’ve been doing it for many more years than you, and there is a method to it which we have perfected from all the practice we have had.
So, in order to stop this argument, here’s my advice for women, SHOW them how it’s done, don’t just tell them to do it. Show them the method and don’t criticise them if they don’t get it right first time, just recognise that they need MORE practice. For men, just LET her show you how it’s done, it just a job that needs doing, it’s not a threat to your masculinity (whatever that may be) and remember it’s your home too, so take care of it.
By, the way this advice applies to the children as well, they are quite capable of doing some housework, within reason and depending on age. I mean, tie a couple of dusters to the hands and knees of that crawling baby and get the floor polished as they go along, simple!
Just use your imagination and maybe some day, we can all grow up to be brilliant.
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