Of manners and etiquette

Depending on where you get your news, you may have heard about Pres. Obama's dinner at Buckingham Palace, at which he toasted the Queen.  Depending on where you get your news, either it was a gauche debacle, an international gaffe, or the British were too high on their pomp and circumstance horse, rudely cutting off the leader of the free world mid-oration.

This is a perfect example of the benefit of manners, social etiquette, a standard of protocol.  Yes, it may be restrictive. It may be more formal than we're accustomed to. However,  manners not only provide us a blue print of how to behave in a given situation, they provide a safety net when in an unfamiliar situation, or when things go wrong in a social setting.

Granted, British Monarchy has its own protocol, but they helpfully publish a guide, and staff an entire office of specialists to guide visitors meeting a member of the royal family through the details.  The visitor is then responsible for learning the etiquette - and not presume themselves to be an exception to the rule.

It seems the age of the gentleman statesman is over.  The politicians of North America at any rate, are eager to seem ordinary and common. They appear on talk shows in their shirt sleeves, and drape their arm over the shoulders of monarchs.  In my opinion that doesn't make them the same as me; it shows a want of good old fashioned courtesy.

If this is the example we're being shown, it's no wonder people go to Church in shorts and flip flops; it's no surprise that shop keepers feel no compunction in using colourful language with their customers; it makes sense that young people have no idea how to introduce themselves or have a civil conversation with a stranger; it's a natural progression for men and women to be familiar and crude with each other in the workplace.

It used to be that manners were taught at home, and presumably they still are, but our lowest common denominator is so low now that an ant could straddle it. Boys and girls were taught etiquette in school, at the various service clubs they belonged to, and at dance class where they learned to relate to each other.  The idea in doing away with such old-fashioned fustiness as manners and etiquette may have been to level the playing field, or to allow life to be more spontaneous, I don't know, but it seems to me there's room for a little more civility and good behaviour in public life.

Of time and change... and time to change

Do you ever notice that certain people or situations prompt a specific reaction in you, one which you are hard pressed to explain or understand? Someone inexplicably rubs you the wrong way perhaps, and it's not until years later after much inner healing and talk therapy (with your best friend over chocolate ice cream) that you realize that person reminds you of Uncle Herb who embarrassed you at your eighth birthday party. It could also be that specific conditions combine to turn you - normally even-keeled, placid, happy-go-lucky you - into an irrational harridan. That too, after many pints of frozen dairy goodness, you come to see has roots in the past.

There is this tendency in me to behave in a certain way in specific situations which is working my last nerve.  I've had enough of it, and am determined to change my ways.  I know I am able to respond in those situations like a fully-formed, healthy adult and once I figure out what that is, I'll give it a shot... I just have to let myself do so. 

If only it were as easy as saying "I'm going to change"!  But don't 'they' say that when the time is right, you just do it? It feels like that time is now, and if I step out in faith all will be well (and all will be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.)  Not easy, mind you, but well.

I realize this is cryptic and probably makes no sense to anyone but me (and then only if I pay very close attention)  but I think I had to make it very official with an announcement, sending it out there into the void. So good night dear void; I'm going to follow my father's advice and go to bed at once.


There are four quotations in the last two paragraphs.  Catch them?

Guns-n-brushes

I'm no housekeeping maven, but I do pride myself on a certain level of tidiness. Around the house I'm known as The Kitchen Nazi (not in general, you understand, but when the occasion calls for it) because I'm pretty good at whisking that spoon out of your hand and depositing it in the dishwasher.  And then getting you a new one when I realize you weren't quite done with it yet.

There are clearly areas that I'm not quite so proficient (let's not discuss vacuuming), though I did still consider myself competent. In these areas my sister shows me up for the slattern I now know myself to be. For example: I like a clean shower, so I hose it down each time I use it, and include it in the weekly elbow-grease session.

I recently discovered, however, that there is a whole new level of shower cleanliness I wasn't familiar with. My sister bought a nifty product that seems to be battery operated, with an on/off switch which delivers cleaner like an automatic rifle: steady, sustained bursts, evenly distributed, and highly effective for the job at hand. Imagine!  No more pumping a nozzle with your finger! No more excess in one area while another is under-sprayed!

This is the best thing since the disposable toilet-bowl brush.

Home

Holidays are wonderful, but there's no place like home, and the people there.

Five (standing) and Four (with all the muscles)

From left to right: Five, Four, Two, Three. I thought I had them all,
but One is behind the tree.

Manchester United vs Math

It would make things so much easier if the whole world were on the same time.  Hear me out now, because this could work.  Instead of clocks being different at each time zone, people would just hold to different schedules.  For example, I am GMT -5  so I would work from 4am to 12 pm which translates to a 9-5 day.  The sun would come up around 1am, and I would go to bed at 5 pm.  It's simply a matter of becoming accustomed to the numbers meaning something different.

This is a brilliant idea because Manchester United plays an exhibition match today, in honour of Gary Neville who is hanging up his boots. (Imagine retiring at the age of  36 )  He's been with United since 1992 and is part of an illustrious group that includes his brother Phil, Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Nicky Butt, and Paul Scholes who came through the United youth academy in the 90s.

The match starts at 8.30 Manchester time, and though my heart is Mancunian, my time is Eastern. I can never remember if England has daylight savings, and if so does it cancel out ours, or does the time difference increase?  Decrease? Is Manchester on the same time as the rest of the UK, or is it like Newfoundland with an extra half hour tacked on?  And if i comes before e except after c, then clearly science breaks the rules.

I think I've worked out the math correctly, but I wouldn't count on my figuring skills. How sad to miss out on this event because numbers make me feel like my head is on backwards.  Unless those numbers look like Manchester 4, Juventus 1.


*edit:  First half 1-1 United. goal Wazza, assist Giggsy.   Giggs has been subbed off.  Juve  goal  Pepe
*end game update: United 1 - 2 Juventus

All is right with the world

Becks will be wearing the Red and Black again on Tuesday in an exhibition game honouring Gary Neville who is retiring from United.
Life is sweet.

Of little feet

I've been staying at Oma's house in the country.  It's being here that I realize I'm not as much a country girl as I like to think, and that's all thanks to little feet.

All God's creatures are precious, but some of them I prefer to love from afar.  I like to invoke the blessing from Fiddler on the roof:  May God bless and keep the Czar..... far away from us!  (Only I take artistic liberties, ad-libbing said creature in place of the Czar)

I've mentioned the birds a time or two, and posted a picture of the chipmunk.  There are also hummingbirds, any number of squirrels, a bunny, a fox, and a couple of helpful kitties that wander the area but these guys are not only cute, they are outside. It's the critters that invite themselves inside that I have issues with.

There are ants in one corner of the kitchen counter.  It happens only at this time of year, and then they're never seen again, but I've been doing all I can to kill them coax them to leave: Raid poison drops seem to be an ant hallucinogenic. I put drops down, and little tripped-out ants zig zag and circle around, looking like they're at a party rather than being at death's door. I've tried salt because I remember reading something about how the grains hurt their feet but I could be confusing that with deer in the garden, I'm not sure.  I heard that vinegar is effective, so I tried wiping the counter down with a vinegar-dampened cloth and when that didn't seem to make a difference I doused the counter with a lake of vinegar and they took to it like ducks to water. Instead of withering they were doing laps. I have now put out an ant trap, which is providing sustenance for all the swimming and partying going on. Not impressed but at least they're relatively contained.

The spiders are not so contained - they can be found in unexpected nooks and crannies, thinking the shower stall is dual occupancy or that they'd like to spin a little web on the wall beside my pillow.  No go, sorry.

At night, I hear a little scurrying something or other on the roof outside my bedroom window.  He's welcome to the shingles and even the eves trough, but I keep thinking about the flimsiness of the screen between me and him. I picture his little paws prying the corner free of the window frame so he could come in and ask for a bedtime story. I roll over, hug my pillow tight, and pretend I don't hear a thing. If I don't acknowledge it, it's not real, right?

There was a bat in the house once, and a mouse or two as well - thankfully not on my watch. If I were to come across a mouse outside, I'd be a total girl, squealing about how cute he was, offering to bring it food, hoping he had shelter from life's raging storms.  But the mouse inside my house is an interloper, getting the backside of my broom.

You can move a girl to the country, but you can't make her cohabitate with little feet.