Ranty McRantalot

Sometimes it does a body good to have a good rant about everything & nothing in particular, so brace yourselves, there is going to be some ranting going down.

I made a choice a few weeks ago to be happy. I really did. I said “You know what? None of the little things I let bother me really matter. I have a good life & a great family. I should bloody well enjoy it!”

And I have been. Does it show?

Because of that, I have been wondering about the validity of one of my favourite hobbies (whinging). If I’m being all sweetness & light, where do all the good old whinging sessions fit in? In the face of the suffering of so many people around the world, what right do I have to grump on about what can only be described as the epitome of “first world problems”? None, that’s what, but you know, having a good whinge/whine/rant/wail is not about what is right. It’s not about world peace, or charity or even common sense, it’s about yelling as loud as you can, letting it all go & throwing a bit of a tanty in such a ridiculous manner that you can’t help but feel better afterwards, & if what’s bothering you IS the suffering of others then you’ll be better placed mentally to get on your white horse & help out after a bit of a ranty release.

Even the happiest people in the world get irked sometimes (I totally just made that up. The truth *may* be, that I still get irked, even when I am making valiant happiness attempts. Other people may just smile through it).

In no particular order, here are, to put it eloquently “Some things that shit me”;

People that chew with their mouths open. I hate you. You are rude & noisy & when I hear you smacking & slurping & crunching away I want to grab the remainder of whatever hillbilly road-kill snack it is you’re chowing on & shove it so far down your throat you won’t have to worry about chewing anymore, mouth agape or not.

Speeding drivers. I know I annoy you because I drive at the speed limit. Where do I think I am? The genteel city streets of some fairy-tale land? Don’t I realise that if the speed limit says 100 kilometres per hour, it isn’t, as I wrongly assumed, that 100 is the maximum speed I should drive at, but a rough guide & a low one at that? I apologise for impeding your life or death mercy dash to Big W & I also apologise for silently (or not so silently) hoping to see you pulled over a couple of K’s down the road by a police officer who is having a particularly bad day.

Second-hand dealers. I’m on to you. EVERYONE is on to you, which is why I am particularly perturbed by your “Oh, all of these are for me!” attitude when stacking 17 vintage coats of varying sizes onto the op-shop counter. I understand that it’s what you do for a living but that doesn’t mean I have to like you breezing into my oppies & snapping up all the gold to sell at an exorbitant price. You make finding “the good stuff” even harder & take the fun out of it, so excuse me if I give you the stink eye when I see you have just snatched up that piece of white vintage luggage I was mulling over. And and AND, DO NOT TRY TO GET A DISCOUNT! It is a charity shop you Bourke!

Supermarket price wars & the “Current affairs” programs that promote them. The winner is not the consumer as you opine but YOU, the multi-million dollar corporation. Someone must be losing when you dramatically cut the price of everyday staples, & it just wouldn’t make good business sense if that loser, long-term, was you. I am not at all looking forward to that day in the future when there is not only no choice when it comes to where we buy our groceries, but no locally produced products to buy either, since it costs too much to support our local growers & cheap imports fly merrily off the shelves, regardless of the cost to our country, community & economy. And to those television shows with the “winning formula” of two diet stories, three worker’s compensations stories, six supermarket price enquiry stories, four miracle bra stories & three ‘How to save thousands on electricity’ stories per week; I hate you less than I hate the fact that I am forced to sit through your drivel, even if I’m doing something else, because SOMEONE in my house thinks it is required viewing.

I think that will do for now, until I get a bee in my bonnet about something else… so… don’t worry…

Be Happy.

(Linking up with FFS Friday, which I didn’t even know was “a thing” until 3 minutes ago when I saw a link on The Twitter & had already posted this… coincidence? Well… yes, actually…)