When. WHEN. WHEN!!!!!???? did I become ‘that person’? Can’t have happened overnight? Did it? Must have taken months, years, decades? Possibly covid accelerated, exacerbated, contributed, accumulated…

But one day I was a really lovely, easy-going, no-cares kind’a dude who took everything in his stride, and now I’m a short-fuse away from anger, insult, abuse, swearing, totally intolerant, impatient, inflammatory, who gives no quarter and takes NO FUCKING PRISONERS!!!! on my path through life’s trivia.

Or perhaps, just perhaps, I’m the same as I’ve always been but have been ‘driven’ to my new persona because everyone else on the planet has changed? For the worse.

On Thursday I was driving down a narrow road (they’re all narrow round my way), just enough room for two cars to pass each other. And the BMW I3 coming towards me started to drift a bit onto my side. I don’t slow down. I can’t. I’m in ‘my lane’ and have right of way. Even if it costs me the side of a car to demonstrate. It drifted further, I went for the horn and looked (close enough at that point) at a women with one hand on her steering wheel staring down at her own lap. I was looking at the top of her head. She looked up, still laughing at what had been happening on her phone. Funny enough to justify the 15 grand’s worth of damage about to be inflicted on her vehicle if she hadn’t been so rudely interrupted and forced to pull over. I left my hand on the horn for about 20 minutes. To make the point. And I wanted that woman tortured before being imprisoned for the rest of her life. I swore quite a bit. More than usual.

Yesterday I went to Superdrug to buy my father some denture fixative. Just ‘popped in’ because it was quiet. I gave the cashier a 20 pound note and waited. Five minutes of inactivity later I enquired if there was a problem. The till won’t open. Oh. Can we use another as there are about 15 empty ones in a line here? I’ve called for help. Ok. Help arrived in the loosest possible definition of ‘help’ in the form of a dipstick with a lanyard. Who spent the next 5 minutes pressing buttons and getting confused between the sale price and the change to be given. Then, without word to me or to the original dipstick (sans lanyard), she walked away. To another till. But did nothing she hadn’t been doing for the last 5 minutes, and with no greater success. I didn’t want to swear. Which means I could not speak at all. Because it would have happened. I just pointed at my note and dropped the Denture stuff on the desk and walked out. My dad can eat porridge for a few days. He likes porridge.

In fact I went to Boots, bought the same stuff, 59p cheaper (!!!!) and paid with a card. But really. Till won’t open. Really?

Calm down. Breaeaeaeathththeeee…

Happy Saturday (I hope)

A xxxx