“Three out of four people say they would rather be assured of one day a week to spend with family and friends than to have extra hours to shop on a Sunday” (NOP Consumer Poll, 2005)

Anyone will tell you that life is busy, and it doesn’t seem to be getting much easier either. In 2005, 3.6 million of us in the UK regularly worked more than 48 hours a week, and the incidence of long hours working in this country is more than two and half times the average for the EU. It’s perhaps not surprising that work-related stress affects more than one in five people and is the cause of more than 13 million lost working days a year. What we need is time to stop and time to rest. (www.keepsundayspecial.org.uk) This was written 5 years ago but still rings true.

I am sure that the people who have to work in shops, supermarkets, petrol stations and such like, would love to get a whole day off but (and there is always a but) what about people like me, who can’t get anything done, other than at the weekend? Do we try and cram everything into Saturday, therefore creating another working day? Do we take a day off work every week or so to do shopping, car repairs, doctors, dentist etc? I am sure I am not alone in trying to fit life around work and not finding it easy, so Sundays are precious but also hard work for the majority of people.

Typical to do list for Sunday includes (sharp intake of breath) washing, cleaning the house, the car, the windows and anything that stands still long enough. Cooking the lunch and preparing food to freeze for during the week. Ironing a huge pile of clothes including numerous sorts of uniforms. Gardening, tidying up the yard, visiting ageing parents and children/granchildren. Checking your bank account and paying bills online. Shopping…don’t even go there! This list is in no way exhaustive.

Oh how I would love to spend my Sunday, getting up late, staying in my dressing gown until I finish reading papers, sipping tea on the patio in the sunshine, popping out for lunch, having a snooze in front of the TV…..isn’t that what it’s supposed to be like? Apparently so….

WHAT A GREAT IDEA!

I have just been looking at some newspaper websites online, shocking is an understatement! The amount of sanctimonious, patronising drivel for women is beyond belief. For example, if there is a ‘women’ link (why they need a special one who knows) the sub headings consist of a list of choices more suited to the 1940’s. To give you an idea, the The Sun’s list has ‘Mums and Dads, beauty, sex and love and fashion?’ Do they think that we are all stay at home, fingernail painting nymphomaniacs who’s role model is Naomi Campbell.

As a full time employee of a really busy FE College, a Mother, a Grandmother and common law spouse (I refuse to be called a wife!) I object to the ‘red tops’ linking me with this kind of patronising crap! I work upward of 43 hours a week on average if you count the stuff I do at home (excluding time spent on ‘housework’).

Now that I am on my my soapbox , maybe there are some men out there, who reside in the same house as a female, who can answer this question;

How come men don’t see what needs doing?

Scenario – You arrive back from your holidays, you have shared the driving during a 5 hour journey from the airport, you have been travelling since 03.00 and it’s now 2pm. You pick the cat up from the cattery, open the door to the house, put the keetle on, turn the heating on, put the coats away, pick the post up and check the house. You (the female this is) open the suitcases to get a head start on the washing, ring the kids to say your home safe, feed the cat. Pour the tea, take it to the man who grunts because he’s tired from travelling…poor love!

He – follows you in, kicks his shoes off and turns on the telly. Need I say more?

I understand all the ‘men are from Mars/women from Venus arguments, the problem I have is that they refuse to see, think or make decisions when they are at home. I am convinced that if I didn’t write a list of chores there would be no help at all. By the way you can’t ask too often, for fear of being accused of nagging!

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So please, if you are a man, who lives with a woman who works the same hours as you, just share the housework, don’t think of us as skivvies, look around and do stuff that needs doing without being asked…oh and by the way a good man should be in full time employment (or doing all the housework), a chef in the kitchen, a gentleman when he’s out and a stud in the bedroom…….. no more than you expect from a woman!

“Young children who are regularly looked after by their grandparents have an increased risk of being overweight, an extensive British study has suggested.”

This was an article from the BBC online today!

Apparently there is a 34% higher risk of children being obese if they are looked after by Grandparents as opposed to registered childminders.

A Department of Health spokesman said,
“We know that obesity is a very complex issue with a wide range of factors involved”

No shit Sherlock, bearing in mind the amount of salt, sugar and additives in the everyday processed crap that some people feed their children!

I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking, that if kids stay with Granny, they are far more likely to eat home cooked, meals prepared from scratch.

So leave us Grandparents alone. Go and investigate someone else, which incidentally is a total waste of our money!

If you were to be in Wales on March the first, you would find the country in a festive mood. As the country would be celebrating St. David’s Day in one way or another. But who was St. David?

Saint David, or Dewi Sant, is the patron saint of Wales. He was a Celtic monk, abbot and bishop, who lived in the sixth century. He was once the archbishop of Wales, and he was one of many early saints who helped to spread Christianity among the pagan Celtic tribes of western Britain. He is said to have been of royal lineage. His father, Sant, was the son of Ceredig, who was prince of Ceredigion, a region in South-West Wales. His mother, Non, was the daughter of a local chieftain. Legend has it that Non was also a niece of King Arthur.

Dewi travelled far and wide on his missionary journeys through Wales, where he established several churches. He also travelled to the south and west of England, Cornwall and Brittany. It is also possible that he visited Ireland.

Dewi is sometimes known as David the Water Drinker and, indeed, water was an important part of his life – he is said to have drunk nothing else and sometimes, as a self-imposed penance, he would stand up to his neck in a lake of cold water, reciting Scripture. Little wonder, then, that some authors have seen Dewi as an early Puritan!

Dewi founded a monastery at Glyn Rhosyn (Rose Vale) on the banks of the small river Alun where the cathedral City of St. David stands today. The monastic brotherhood that Dewi founded was very strict, the brothers having to work very hard besides praying and celebrating masses.

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Perhaps the most well-known story regarding Dewi’s life is said to have taken place at the Synod of Llanddewi Brefi. They were to decide whether Dewi was to be Archbishop. A great crowd gathered at the synod, and when Dewi stood up to speak, one of the congregation shouted, ‘We won’t be able to see or hear him’. At that instant the ground rose till everyone could see and hear Dewi. Unsurprisingly, it was decided, very shortly afterwards, that Dewi would be the Archbishop…

It is claimed that Dewi lived for over 100 years, and it is generally accepted that he died in 589. Dewi’s body was buried in the grounds of his own monastery, where the Cathedral of St. David now stands.
St David’s Day, as celebrated today, dates back to 1120, when Dewi was canonised by Pope Callactus the Second, and March 1st was included in the Church calendar.

It is not certain how much of the history of St. David is fact and how much is mere speculation. At the end of 1996, bones were found in St. David’s Cathedral which, it was claimed, could be those of Dewi himself. Unfortunately, these were later found to be medieval remains.
Regardless of this, St. David was, and is, a very important figure to the Welsh. Naturally, then, St. David’s Day is a time of great celebration in Wales

We've heard all the stories about H&S and whether you believe them or not there is no denying that the times they are a changing.

As a GOW (grumpy old woman), I can remember the good old days when if you got whacked in the street by a thug, your parents promptly sent you back out to 'whack 'em back', even though you were scared witless and bleeding! If you didn't have a plug to put on your radiogram, you just wrapped the wires around the appropriate prong on the lamp plug and plugged it in...anything to listen to the charts on Sunday evening after your bath, in which the rest of your siblings had bathed previously, taking turns. I was lucky, I was the eldest and got to go first, oh and by the way, by the time the last person got in, someone had probably peed in the water!

It would be good, if we could make our own minds up about H&S, without being governed by the Nanny state! I know I'm going to sound like my Mother now, but it never did us any harm. To go through life without any risk at all, is to miss out on all those things that make you tingle with excitement, that make you laugh out loud and the things that memories are made of, so stick your H&S guidelines up your IOSH!!

.....right now where did I put my skateboard?

I am a 50+ woman, with a partner, 3 grown up children, 5 grandchildren and a cat called Valerie. My life is somewhat chaotic and that’s just the way I like it. I have been married and divorced twice and I am now happily co-habiting with my significant other, who shall remain nameless unless at some point I want to shame him. I work in F.E. with mainly 16-19 year olds and alongside some really inspiring people.

I try to live my life to the full, I like to read, camp, walk, play word games and socialise…..I’d better stop now as I’m rambling and I think that is what I should be doing in the actual BLOG!

50 is the new 40…yeah right, tell that to the people, especially women of a certain age, who feel that they are a mere shadow of their former selves. Not that they are going to fade away quietly into obscurity mind you, in fact, quite the opposite!

Personally, since reaching the age of nifty 50, I have a new found energy, the trouble is, I have turned into a cross between, the Incredible Hulk, Dame Edna and my Mother!

The unmistakable signs of being a ‘Grumpy Old Woman’ include;

Shop assistants cower in fear when I return goods
I am the litterbugs worst nightmare
Men are afraid to be left alone with me in case I pounce on them (which I have no intentions of doing BTW)!
I like flat, slip on shoes that save me bending but I insist on trying to walk in 4 inch heels with ankle straps.
I should wear BIG knickers but I still insist on trying to squeeze my backside into cheese-cutter thongs!
I’ve started collecting used margarine pots to do a bit of ‘potting on’
I have started to enjoy staying in (sound familiar)?
I have started to morph into my Mother

I say things That Grumpy Old Women Say such as

It’s a bloody disgrace
I want to talk to someone in authority
In my day, or in the good old days
I’m not having that!
I’m off to spend a penny
Whoops a daisy
Is it me or is it hot in here?
There’s nothing to beat a nice cuppa
I can remember those flared trousers first time around
Why does no-one write their own music anymore?

I want to ensure that it is not a downhill slide from here to 60 something, so from now on, I will dance like no-ones looking and generally enjoy myself. Let’s face it, you’re a long time dead!!