Cyber Sulk?

Well as cyber sullks go, that was quite exceptional. 

Except I wasn't sulking. Honest.

I just seem to have been soooo busy.

So I hired Top Management Consultant Anders Hoch  to review operations at Blighty Inc and make recommendations on how to improve productivity.

Here are excerpts from his report, with my reaction in italics.

Taking Blighty Inc. Forward  Into the 20th Century*

* Anders old chap how much wine did you have at lunch exactly?

Scope of Review

We were asked to review all domestic operations of Blighty Inc.  We observed operations at Blighty HQ and interviewed key personnel in Catering, Procurement, Staff Training, Laundry Services, Hygiene and Health Services, Transport, Policing and Judicial,  Social Activities and Sport (which in this report will be collectively referred to as MUM).
Er, that's  me I think...

We also spoke to the Chief Executive Officer and Finance Director.  So Mr B gets the fancy job title, typical

We had a brief interview with the junior members of the Blighty Inc. team but they were very busy watching telly and were unwilling to fully enter into a dialogue  you mean they ignored you completely as they were watching re-runs of Top Gear on Dave TV


Scope of Activities

The breakdown of MUM activities during a typical working day are:

23%  reading gossip on the Daily Mail website
27% drinking tea, reading fashion blogs
2% furiously carrying out domestic tasks in state of guilt and quiet frenzy
12% looking for reading glasses
5% reading thrillers and detective novels
5% answering cold calls on telephone from insurance companies and acting delightfully dizzy and charming while telling them to get lost
4% ringing Grandma Whacker back and apologising for being so rude under misapprehension that she was selling car insurance and of course you don't mean her to do that with her insurance policy

5% watching X Factor with Mr B and putting on silly Northern accent and exclaiming "oooh Gary has such kind eyes, I really feel he understands me and my journey" and falling off sofa with laughter inventing sob stories for contestants: "It would mean the world to me to win X Factor as I have a conjoined twin who is currently in prison  and a granny confined to a wheelchair by terminal flatulence..."
77% watching junior executives playing rugby in a light drizzle
86% watching junior executives playing football in a light drizzle
34% attending to sports related injuries
36%  sports psychology counselling
7%  cobbling together costumes for school theme days (" I know it's a fitted sheet but well- to- do Romans would definitely have worn fitted sheets, honest!")

10% watching The Killing, exciting Danish police thriller
45% providing taxi services to Blighty junior executives
42% struggling to help with Maths homework


Key Recommendations

• MUM is a very inefficient member of the Blighty team; her role needs to be more focused, and preferably carried out by someone else with better motivation and better skills re work product delivery do you mean get a cleaner?  Yay!
• MUM to attend management training course and be reprogrammed
• MUM must be denied access to the Internet
• MUM to give up tea and novels
• MUM to stop watching X Factor But Gary is the only man who really understands me
• junior executives to give up rugby and football and instead take up needlework at home
• MUM to accept that never going to get through 100 hours of The Killing so return the DVD the library NOW
• junior executives to learn to drive They are only 9 and 10 so this might be a bit tricky

So there we have it.  I am going to be re-programmed.  I  will be dynamic, efficient and focused. 

Just as soon as I've had a cup of tea and a little sit down.. and a look at the Daily Mail website...

I'll Be Back

Oh dear, have really fallen off the  blogging wagon recently...but in the words of the Terminator*, I'll be back!"

Dahlings, I leave you with a Public Education Announcement.  I know which category I fall into.

* excellent new role model for dealing with obstreperous offspring (and try saying that after a gin and tonic) who are now on holiday from school AGAIN...yep, 2 week half term..

Mrs Blighty, Rock Chick

The other night I went with Mr B to see his old favourite group Echo and the Bunnymen play.

When I mentioned this recently to anyone, they looked a bit blank and then said, " Oh, yes, Echo Beach."

Nooooooo! That was quite different, that was Martha and the Muffins.

The Bunnymen are a rocky, moody, sort of post punk band with a charismatic Liverpudlian lead singer called Ian McCulloch.

Their best known song is "Killing Moon", featured on the soundtrack of  the film " Donnie Darko".


Must admit, prior to the event I was not terribly enthusiastic as I knew Mr B used to go to gigs wearing a greatcoat and pointy shoes and with his hair all spiked up, and it all sounded a bit goth and gloomy to me.

In fact, it was brilliant!

It was a thrill to skip off up to London on a school night and meet up with Mr B.  And the concert was at the London Palladium, a theatre I last visited for my 8th birthday to see Cliff Richard (bless  Grandma W, she organised that for me, what a nice mummy).  So it was great to see the inside of the Palladium again and bang on to Mr B about seeing Cliff and Olivia Newton-John, while Mr B carried on a parallel monologue about last seeing the Bunnymen at the Glasgow Barrowlands in 1984..not quite sure whose anecdote had the most street cred, mmm, tricky one..

The Bunnymen were good, really good -  a very tight band - and Mr McCulloch can really sing.  And what confidence, arrogance, to sing in front of all those people !   He was a real character - he took a lot of liquid refreshment between, even during, songs, we were a long way from the stage but the bets were on Guinness, with whisky chasers... a soothing vitamin drink and mineral water.


Here's them doing The Killing Moon  back in the 80s. They did it brilliantly last night too, they just look a lot less boyish!

And now dahlings, I am off  for a cheeky nap on the sofa - it's very tiring being a rock chick at my age.

Mrs Blighty, Literary Stalker

As I mentioned in my last post, I am completely caught up in the Gus Dury novels of Tony Black - hardboiled Scottish detective novels set in Edinburgh with gritty characters and punchy dialogue.

I dropped old Tone a line, a bit cheeky, telling him how his readership included none other than Grandma Whacker (who quite frankly at her age should be reading The Lady and, maybe for a bit of excitement,  The Radio Times).

Well, look back at the penultimate comment on my last post - the author himself commented! How very nice of him. So impressed he did that.

Here is Mr Black, talking about the latest Gus Dury novel. 

Mmmmm, he's a bit of a dish, isn't he? And that accent! But I am not going to push my luck.  No more cheeky comments.  Otherwise I might get a visit from a couple of heavies...

A Worrying Pair

Dahlings, there are two members of Blighty Limited who are giving me cause for concern.

First, Boy 2.

I was prepared to overlook this (and blame it on all those wildlife programmes he watches).

Mummy: Can you stop playing now and get out of the bath?
Boy 2: OK, Mummy, the killer whale just has to finish off the seal..

I decided this was just a sign of his keen interest in History and not a warning of  Hannibal Lecter tendencies.

Excerpt from Boy 2's school report - proof that teachers do have a sense of humour or evidence of something more sinister?

But this.

Boy 1 was being particularly noisy and annoying the other evening when Boy 2 was doing his spelling homework.  I do vaguely recall Boy 2 saying something along the lines of "Mummy can't we tape his mouth over?"  It was only later I noticed he had got the electrician's tape from the toolbox in the garage...

So the youngest in the Blighty family is a worry. But so is the more senior end.

I thought Grandmas were supposed to sit serenely doing sewing and smelling of Parma violets and face powder, and for excitement might listen to The Archers.

Not so Grandma Whacker.  During her recent stay she was engrossed in these rugged detective novels set in Edinburgh,  which she has recently discovered at her local library*. 

The dialogue is, to put it mildly, quite robust.   You know you are in trouble when Grandma is reading lines like this, spoken by our hero after he has visited a very rough council estate :

WARNING, THIS IS VERY CRUDE, NOT FOR THE EASILY OFFENDED
"Later, eh. I've just escaped Deliverance territory and I'm mightily relieved not to have a length of hillbilly parked in my farter..."

Should I contact the library and ask them not to let her have any more books by this author?

Must go.  Have to hide the electrician's tape again.


*Gutted;
Loss;
Truth Lies Bleeding; and
Long Time Dead, all by Tony Black.
I have now read Gutted and must say it's excellent, and a refreshing contrast to the whimsical Corduroy Mansions of Alexander McCall Smith

Mrs Blighty Turns Over A New Leaf

Enough of this obsession with animal print fripperies.  I am a mature woman of today, I will stop yearning after silly frocks in dodgy prints. Instead I will engage in spiritually enriching activities like learning to mix up killer cocktails playing the harpsichord and pickling  -er - squirrels  pickles and reading Tolstoy in the original Russian ( note to self: take evening class in Russian for Beginners).  I will devote myself to Mr Blighty and Boys 1 and 2.  Where are they actually?  Oh I forgot, they are in the office/at school.  Well, anyway, I will make sure they always come home to piping hot underpants and a freshly laundered Chicken Kiev.

Ooh.  Look at this,  this is nice....

From Next

A couple of thoughts -
I am terrified of snaks, so would this dress give me the heebie jeebies?  Would it squeeze me tight and then swallow me whole?
Why am I looking at patterend dresses when my current uniform seems to be navy blue jumper/cardigan/trousers? yes, I have turned into Sensible Navy Blue Mummy.

LA Woman

Hello,  my name is Mrs Blighty and I am addicted to all things leopardy, and that is why I have come to Leopards Anonymous.

The shops continue to act as enablers: everywhere I look there is leopardy goodness to be had.

I bought these little leopardy numbers as I JUST HAD TO. (Note to Mr B, Head of Austerity Measures, Blighty HQ - they were from New Look and therefore Cheap as Chips, so would have been a Crime not to buy them).

And I NEEEEEEED this cardi from Pure.  Need. It. Badly.

(Note: I think the other hand in the above photo is that of the chap the model is with; at least I really hope it is...)

And look at this dress from old Toppers (TopShop).

Right.  I WILL be STRONG.  I am off for a lie down and a look at the school fees invoice.
That'll calm me down.

Mmmmm, could really do with some leopard print silk lounging pyjamas. RRRRRRRR!