Grains Of Golden Sand

So, it appears I haven't posted here since 2012. I've been busy alright, leave me alone. So much has happened in the intervening years, but of course you wouldn't really be interested so I shall refrain from boring you. Why am I posting you will be asking yourself by now, well, New Year's Eve always fills me with a multitude, a myriad, a veritable multiplicity of emotions. It is the embodiment of time, an arbitrary place holder in the fabric of modern society, the one day that we are all made to sit up and take notice of the passing of our lives and the loss of another year in our tenure of this world. We think of the New Year's Eves past and how quickly the 365 days (or 366 in the case of the coming year) will pass, what we should achieve and what we will probably fail to achieve during those days. It reminds me of Edgar Allan Poe's poem (mentioned elsewhere on this blog) 'A Dream Within A Dream' in which the great man laments the loss of time, the swiftness of its passing and the futility of our attempts to arrest it:

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?

So 2015 draws close as I write these words in the heat of another Australian NYE, my 21st in this, my adopted country. I have already began to partake in my celebratory (or is that self-commiseratory) glass of single malt and I hope to be unconscious at the hour the unstoppable juggernaut of the new year finally arrives, drawing us all closer to that pitiless wave.

More Loud People In The Office...

It seems that my posts regarding loud people, especially loud people in the office, have been quite popular, so I thought it was about time I regaled my readership of the latest issues I have been experiencing in this area. The initial posts were published a number of years ago now and inevitably I have moved about a bit within the office during the interim, in fact the company has even changed hands. Obviously over the intervening years I have been subjected to the usual loud idiots in the workplace, but miraculously managed to retain my sanity to a large degree. Today though I am facing the biggest threat to my remaining sanity so far encountered in the long service I have given my employers. I moved to my current seating position six months ago and at first found it pleasant. I overlook the city from my high up window seat and found the office space to be a fairly quiet and peaceful place to work. I should have known this idyll would of course be destroyed sooner or later, that destruction occurred about three weeks ago when two people moved to the work spaces opposite mine. It is hard to believe that just two people can cause so much aural disturbance. I have now not only the unfortunate position of being an office worker but of being an office worker in an office with the equivalent ambient noise of a major building site. 

Last week I decided to make some objective measurements of the noise level so downloaded app for my iPhone called Decibel 10. With it I measure the ambient noise level at my desk. In just two days I have peak reading of 99 decibels (remember this is at my desk). I partly blame the fact the vocally louder individual of the two individuals sits on the other side of the partition from me.

Decibel 10 app screenshot - max decibel level: 99

For this duo everything in their working day is a big disaster. To call them drama queens is the understatement of the century. Upon reflection it’s fairly obvious though that this is all a sad attempt at getting attention from people to validate their importance and for constant reassurance that their self-perceived humour and lovability is still working, when all it does is alienate and engender a feeling of intense dislike toward them. Just yesterday I found out that the vocally louder (and older) one opposite my desk seems to have an overbearing father who I suspect bullied him whilst at the same time did not allow him the parental attention a small child craves, resulting in the ‘look at me’ personality now displayed. I am no psychologist, however, this seems fairly obvious to me. And how am I privy to such intimate details of a stranger’s personal life? I have to say I know more about this individual now due to his obsessive talking, that I feel I have had the misfortune to know him all my life.

But it’s not just family matters and work he broadcasts, every thought in this one’s head is vocalised loudly. There appears to be no disconnection between thought and mouth. Most of us have a thought and then consider whether to vocalise it based on its importance and relevance to others. This individual has no such check mechanism, the thoughts, no matter how insignificant and pointless, are broadcast to half the office undoubtedly without any idea that it is being done.

Anyway the two constantly rib each other and listening to their shtick is like being in the front row of an Edwardian music hall and being treated to a particularly cheesy and an un-enjoyable performance by a wanna be Laurel and Hardys. I find myself cringing with embarrassment every few minutes.

Why whinge? Well I can’t complain as I know neither will ever change, their personalities are hardwired and unfortunately one of them is a general manager. I wear headphones but this really has no effect unless I turn up the volume to eleven, but then concentrating on my work is an issue (not that it isn’t when they're at it). I guess though in summing up this is to be expected, I cannot assume I will ever work with decent, responsible or mature people in an office, I am simply resigned to having to put up with imbecilic idiots like this for as long as I remain doing what I do, so ultimately have only myself to blame.

Fade To Black...

More than 500 websites are protesting about the forthcoming (yet to be tabled) Australian internet filtering laws to be introduced by senator Stephen Conroy over the next week by fading to black (see this ABC news story).

This censorship MUST STOP! What are we? This is the 21st century and we Australians don't need to be told what to read about on the internet by middle aged, technology illiterate idiots who are acting like the cardboard politicians they are. Stephen Conroy will disappear into the nowhere land of forgotten politicians soon enough, nobody will remember him for anything except the stupid mess he made (if the law is passed) and they way he lowered Australia to the level of laughing stock amongst the international community. Thanks Mr Stephen Conroy, you will have made this country look stupid and backward in the eyes of the rest of the world (except for maybe China who will be applauding your ideas).

This is typical of the short sighted political style of this country. Granted some 'free world' countries have some form of filtering but that is highly regulated and accurate. The laws that are to be introduced here next year, if passed, are nothing like these. More worryingly, they are open ended and will be amended as 'somebody' sees fit. Perhaps it's time that Australia considered that constitution it never bothered with...

I wonder how long it will be before posts like this will be 'filtered' for the 'good of the population' too? Dissemination of a differing opinion to that of the government could be seen as ban worthy!

Addendum to the above post - 2013

"Stephen Michael Conroy... was the minister for Broadband...until his resignation on 26 June 2013" (Wikipedia) - My bold/italics and underlining.

I also want to add another FACT from the Stephen Conroy Wikipedia page (the capitals are not ironic) regarding a website I linked to in this very post:

"In December 2009 "Internet pranksters" registered the domain name stephenconroy.com.au which was swiftly removed by auDA raising concerns about auDA's political neutrality and the further potential for suppression of political speech after the proposed mandatory Internet filter is legislated." - Rather telling isn't it?

So although you may still be a Victorian Senator, goodbye Mr. Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, now we can move on into the 21st century properly.

More from Google Docs

Let's try this again - a year after the first trial with google docs where no post title appeared when it should have, I have decided to give it abother go and see what happens with the formatting.
Perhaps this will work...

Well it worked to a degree - Google if you ever read this why is there a large space in between the title and the body of the post? How hard can it be? (At least the republish after amending the document works).

Heard of Google Docs? Well I have, and I am currently blogging from it. If you can read this I am no longer logged in to blogger as normal. I have bypassed the sometimes moody and recalcitrant blogger writing software and am writing from a google doc. Amazing what the wonders of modern technology can do these days...

Shame that the title of the post doesn't appear, even though I have checked the 'Include the document title when posting (if supported)' in the settings. Well, modern technology does have its limits I suppose.

Grumpy Old Man Monologue No. 6 - Knuckle Crackers

I am very excited. Tonight on my daily commute home from work on Melbourne’s exemplary train network I encountered my first knuckle cracking commuter. I can’t actually remember the last time I came across one of these rarities whilst on the train, so I think it’s time for another Grumpy Old Man Monologue. What is that makes someone want to crack their knuckles? The traveller in question this evening boarded the train a few minutes after me and took up the seat opposite - the seat having just been vacated by a commuter who had alighted at the station, allowing me to temporarily uncurl my legs from the uncomfortable position in which I had had to put them due to the woefully insufficient leg room in the carriage. This resumption of the uncomfortable leg position immediately increased the level of grumpiness I was experiencing up to about a 7.5 on the grumpometer (believe it or not I just made that word up – I think I’ll try and introduce it into the everyday vernacular, if you hear it from now on remember I coined it). The Knuckle Cracker, sat relatively quietly for a few minutes until the time came for him to begin his sinovial gymnastics. He pulled at each finger in turn on his right hand then followed quickly by performing the same action on his left hand. Everyone of his fingers made a loud cracking noise as he tugged at it. He almost didn’t seem to know he was doing it by the blank look on his face. He stared, mouth slightly open, out of the window as his joints were pulled at and his chunky jewellery rattled around on his wrists. The sound is almost up with finger nails on the blackboard in my opinion.

Anyway, he performed this digital abuse in the same manner in which the majority of the other stereotypes in my growing list of train travelling ‘Types’ perform their own distinctive behaviours – apparently totally oblivious to the fact that there were people closely surrounding him/her who don’t necessarily want to hear their private conversations, nose blowing / throat clearing techniques or the style of music they prefer.

Note: I heard some anecdotal evidence recently that knuckle cracking is bad for you. Apparently someone performed an experiment over a number of years whereby he cracked the knuckles of just his right (it may have been left I don’t remember) hand over a number of years. Eventually he found that the knuckles he had cracked everyday were constantly painful and inflamed. Urban Myth? Maybe, but I’m not giving it a go.

I’ll be publishing my hierarchical list of human annoyance behaviours seen on public transport soon. It will include detailed personal observation and the types will be divided into biological classes based on observable similarities. It ill be called,

‘Relative Behavioural Trait Differentiation between the species Homo Sapiens Commuter and its subspecies, Homo Sapiens Commuter Annoying Git’

Beware the heather sellers - take two

It seems things have changed in Covent Garden. Since my post entitled ‘Beware the heather sellers’ from about this time last year, it appears London Mayor Ken Livingstone (or Sheriff Ken as the locals like to call him) may have done to the heather selling small business people of Romany extraction as he did to the pigeons in Trafalgar Square, i.e made them disappear… Now I cannot be sure the lack of ‘cultural colour’ I experienced during my most recent visit Covent Garden last September is Ken’s fault or whether the purveyors of fine hand made goods have simply moved on to pastures new, an inherent part of an nomadic lifestyle of course, so I am not wishing to implicate him in the changed situation, I am just theorizing.

I will just say that this time I didn’t came away from the place without unwanted bunches of overpriced flora.

What year is it again?

So another year dawns. It came round a bit quick in my opinion, wasn’t it just a couple of months ago we were doing this before? It makes me think about all of the other New Years that have come and gone – the memories of which seem to be accumulating at a great rate in the recycling bin in my mind. It won’t be long now until they overflow and bury me in a landslide of old age. I’ll say to myself “What happened to my life?” The older I get the more I dislike the New Years celebration. What good is it but another reminder of your own mortality? Maybe we should just stop right here and go no further – it can remain 2007 indefinitely. This New Years Eve a group of people in Nantes, France held a small protest. They didn’t want to go into 2007 but to stay in 2006. Apparently they chanted: "No to 2007" and "Now is better!" whilst demanding ‘governments and the UN to stop time's "mad race" and declare a moratorium on the future.' (according the to the BBC news website).

I think I might have joined them had I been there. As you may have guessed it didn’t work and 2007 arrived relatively unperturbed by this group of hopeful, but ultimately misguided, French.

Oh well, I am sure the next 363 days will soon pass and well be doing it all over again.

A word on airports, part 3

Dubai International Airport, United Arab Emirates. We arrived at Dubai airport about 5.30am, it was still dark, and after clearing another security point (seems the only way into Sheikh Rashid Terminal after leaving an aircraft is through more metal detectors) we headed to the food court for breakfast, carefully stepping over the acres of sleeping people lying on the floor, there were chairs of course but obviously not enough as one false step and you’d be waking someone with your shoe in their leg/head/hand luggage.

The food court is located on the side of the terminal which kind of looks like a giant tube that’s been partially squashed flat. I sat with my coffee and croissant, watching the dawn arrive through the glass walls. The daylight allowed me to see very different world to that I’d left. It was an alien panorama of misty desert and distant sand coloured buildings (excepting of course the ubiquitous taxiing planes and concrete runways in the foreground) very different to the pastural views seen from Melbourne airports windows the previous evening.

After breakfast it was time to head to the departure gate for the third and final seven hour leg of the trip. The airport itself is quite modern although I personally question the need for the life size, fake, palm trees, the trunks of which are made from plastic gold bars, that line the central concourse. A proud symbol of the country’s wealth, or just tacky decor? I couldn’t decide. Well thinking abut it I can – tacky.

Like many airports, it seems overrun with golf buggies ferrying the old, infirm or just plain late people up and down the endless corridors. They airport employees who drive these buggies do so with apparent disregard for those walking in front of them. They don’t seem to be looking where they were driving, and apart form the constant siren/horn/warning signal the buggies emit, they seem to just assume the crowds through which they speed will separate like the parting of the Red Sea. Perhaps this was a reasonable assumption considering the relative proximity of the Red Sea itself, I don’t know. But part the crowds did, usually. I did note though that every now and again some weary traveller seemed not to hear the approaching buggy and failed to jump out of the way like all the others. The buggy would come to an abrupt halt and the driver would stand on his horn until the hapless pedestrian turned around to be confronted by the bizarre scene of a roofless golf buggy laden down with exotic looking (but often elderly) passengers, driven by an exasperated looking official with an evil stare.

The smoking areas were interesting. They looked like they were based on the model I’ve seen used in Frankfurt airport of confining the smokers to small areas located right in the middle of the main thoroughfares just below what appeared to be a small domestic kitchen extractor fan hood. The billowing clouds of cigarette smoke would lazily ignore the extractor’s feeble suction and happily disappear sideways out of the ‘smoking zone’ before curiously investigating the nostrils of the many nonsmokers who coughed and spluttered their way past. Unlike Frankfurt’s design though, which didn’t see the need for any form of enclosure for the smoking areas, Dubai had partially enclosed theirs with clear Perspex about six feet high (apart from a few entrance/exit gaps for the smokers) which gave the whole thing the odd look of a smoke filled goldfish bowl that was so full of smokers who had been deprived of their fix for hours on board a plane, that the walls would almost be groaning against the pressure of bodies within. Now and again the smoke would clear and you could make out the gaunt face of someone, their nose or ear squashed flat against the grubby Perspex, gasping for breath. Of course the cleverer ones simply stood outside the entrances of these zones (probably office workers in their daily lives) whilst half heartedly making an attempt to be inside by ensuring a foot or an elbow was just within the enclosed space.

So that was my experience of Dubai airport. On the whole I liked it, it was interesting, but slightly tacky.

- Interim Post -

This post replaces our regular post this evening due to, well, inexcusable indolence by the blog owner (and an un-missable episode of Mythbusters).
The regular program will resume shortly with 'A word on airports part 3 - Dubai International'
Please stay tuned to this channel.

A word on airports, part 2

Changi Airport – Singapore. Always somewhere I just travel through, this one (one day I will stop there a while) – but one of the best. Compared with Dubai and Heathrow it is quiet and relaxed usually. Plenty of space, always somewhere to sit other than the floor (unlike Dubai which seems so busy any time of the day/night that there is nowhere to sit as we shall see in the next post).

I like the fact Changi has free internet terminals in many of the waiting lounges too. If you don’t happen to have your Wi Fi laptop with you, you can just find a free terminal and check your email to pass the time before your next flight. As would be expected in a place like Singapore, it’s spotlessly clean. I have never even smelt cigarette smoke or actually seen anyone smoking, although it must go on, I think that the airport management have banished smokers completely to an out of the way corner that can only be found by those desperate for a nicotine hit.

Next airport revue - Dubai Airport, UAE.

A word on airports, part 1

Travelling between Australia and the UK (relatively regularly) you have the pleasure of visiting quite a lot of airports. Different carriers use obviously use different hubs, and this time I flew with Emirates. So I thought I’d relate here the differences between some of the airports I noticed on this most recent trip. Obviously my first one was my point of departure; Melbourne Airport.

Melbourne Airport – My first impression of Melbourne airport in the mid nineties made me think, well, it wasn’t really going to give Heathrow a run for it’s money in the ‘modern’ department. The arrivals hall was really basic, with just a small painted wooden screen separating the new arrivals from the waiting family/friends/chauffeurs. Everything had a tatty air to it. It had a car park that was no better than the average supermarket’s. Now though, after extensive redevelopment the whole place actually matched the style of the rest of the city. The arrivals hall has been dragged into the twenty first century, gone is the chipped wood replaced by cut bluestone walls and a more airy atmosphere. There is now a large piece of artwork on the wall so the families/friends/chauffeurs can stare blankly at something other than arrivals board. Even the car park has been enlarged with a number of stories added.

However I have one major issue. When I had passed through immigration and found myself waiting for my flight’s allotted take off time I was planning on spending my last few minutes on the ground having a quite drink. A handy place to do this in Melbourne airport was TGI Fridays which had an outlet near the departure gates. I discovered on this trip though that TGI Fridays has gone, in it’s place was now another duty free outlet. Nearby was what seemed to be to be a hastily put together little bar that sold nothing but bottled beer and pre mixed drinks in a can. Not being a fan of cheap spirits in a can with no name cola (and not fancying a bloating beer) I found that any choice had been removed from my hands in the matter of pre flight drinks and that didn’t make me happy. The bottom line is if you need a small (or large) pre flight nerve calmer – get it prior to going through immigration when in Melbourne...

Next post - Singapore airport.

An Unexpected Trip...

Is anybody there, or do I return to an abandoned blog? Well I expect it is the latter, but that will not stop me from making my excuses. I have recently experienced an unexpected absence from Australia. A short notice trip home to England has necessitated a lack of entries on my blog. Why didn't I blog in England? Well they don't have the internet there you see... OK, I found that I was doing so much interesting stuff whilst there that blogging was, I am ashamed to say, quite a long way down my list of things to do. Perhaps you can draw from this the kind of commitment levels I have to the blogosphere. But trust me - you would have done the same in my position. However I am now returned to antipodean shores so it's time to reopen the Sanctuary.

Actually I have something else to add. My last entry was on the 23rd of June and to be honest I haven't been overseas for a whole three months, in fact my trip took up only a small amount of that time, so I am even less committed to blogging than you thought I was. There it is said, and my head is now hanging so far down in shame I cannot see exactly what keys I am prwessindg (I can't touch type. Wish I could but I can't).

It's amazing how quickly you can get used to not working and actually enjoying your life. I never find it is long before I begin to take the fact I can do what I want when I want, for granted. But I always find holidays make coming back to work almost impossible. It's only then you realise that the majority of your waking life is spent doing things that you don't want to do, and you are being kept from the things you want to do by the ever present spectre of things like, well let me see, starvation or exposure due to the fact you will find yourself on the streets because you lack an income.

That's enough of the self pitying waffle; excuse me whilst I adopt a more positive attitude.

*INTERVAL*

There, that’s better. Let me begin again - this time with some pictures I snapped in London,

The Millenium Bridge with St. Pauls to the north across the Thames

Well maybe just this one then. I would upload more, but Blogger has decided it doesn't want to play anymore and two images per post is enough for now, but trust me when I say I took more than one photo during the trip... About 800 more...

Creating order from chaos.

Ikea. The destination of millions worldwide every weekend. And that’s why I try and avoid it on weekends. Opinion seems split regarding the quality and style of Ikea products, but I for one have been bitten by the Ikea bug and find I have an odd fascination with the place.

In my vast experience with mess, I find quality of life can be strongly influenced by your immediate environment (read: home) and if your home is disorganized or chaotic then so too can you, and in order to stem this propensity toward chaos we need to organize ourselves. There is a word for this, and that word is Ikeaize. Anyway enough feux Feng Shui and on to the story. Mrs. Logan and I found ourselves with Monday off this week so we took the plunge and made a visit to our local Ikea store. Being a Monday it was relatively quiet - which means you could actually move, see the displays and hear yourself above the screams of a thousand bored children. This makes for a far more civilized shopping experience, even more so when we had time to stop for a leisurely lunch at the Ikea in-store restaurant. The Meatballs were great and I highly recommend the excellent Spendrups Swedish beer, although I think they should rename it Ikea Beer in keeping with the theme.

The day wore on and more impulse items were grabbed (my favourite being a square plastic digital clock/timer/thermometer/alarm that changes it’s function when you turn it around – the ‘Virra’ for those of you who wish to rush out and buy one). Eventually, loaded down with our prepackaged goodies, we wearily headed towards the checkouts. After a brief but intense CPR session on my wallet everything was paid for and loaded into the car, then, wishing we drove a Volvo, headed off into the sunset. Having said that, we actually headed away from the sunset (less romantic, but I try and keep this blog as close to the truth as possible at all times). Here is a picture snapped through the rear window of the car by way of an illustration.

During the ensuing few days we have been industrially constructing our new Ikea products, and now have a lounge that looks a quarter Ikeaized rather than an eighth Ikeaized. Only another three quarters to go…

Everybody needs good neighbours.

I think it’s time to take a break from my grumpy old man monologues for a while and talk about something else. I would like to clarify something. In a previous post I may have painted the Australian TV show ‘Hey Hey It’s Saturday’ a bad light, and perhaps this was unfair of me. Granted it was a bit of a revelation to view it for the first time. A bit like being introduced to the family of a new friend on their home turf as it were, where all pretence is dropped and the real face is shown. It was the sort of show that could only be watched and enjoyed by a home audience with an intimate knowledge of the history and foibles of the native social structure. In fairness it was no more shocking than what is, in my opinion the British equivalent (as near as there can be one); ‘Noel’s House party’, shown on the BBC with Noel Edmunds as host. Over time I actually came to enjoy ‘Hey Hey’, and was not a little sad when it was cancelled. Like many Aussie TV shows it grew on you until it had become part of your TV diet, and a week without it resulted in mild withdrawal symptoms. And that is exactly how Neighbours became an addiction for me, many, many years ago. The story goes like this…

It begins in a medium sized English town in 1988. Friends of mine were planning to emigrate to Melbourne, and in an effort to acclimatize themselves, they had began to watch Neighbours, which had just started to become popular on British TV. As with most things that suddenly become popular with the masses, I avoided it like the plague, and thus without having seen anything more than the odd glimpse of the show, ridiculed it, and those who watched it. I relentlessly teased my friends who were planning to relocate their lives to Australia about their viewing habits, but one night I happened to be visiting them when it was ‘Neighbours time’ and under protest, I sat and watched it all the way through for the first time.

The following night, at home alone, with drawn curtains and a heart full of self-loathing, I turned on Neighbours and willfully watched. That was it. I became hooked on living a vicarious life in the perpetually sunny suburbs of this wondrous new world. A world of ‘mates’ and ‘barbies’ with ‘snags’ and ‘stubbies’ in the ‘arvo’. Where It was always time to put on your ‘sunnies’ and go to the ‘oval to chuck a footy’ or take a short drive to the beach to lay down a towel on the endless golden sands.

It was the Australian dream packaged for envious British eyes. Slowly but surely the Aussie terms crept into the British vernacular. It was not long before the playgrounds from Southend to Penzance, from Brighton to John O’Groats rang with the Australianisms, and a whole generation wondered why their dreary neighbourhoods were not as bright and sunny as those of the fictional Neighbours suburb of Erinsborough. This of course paved the way for the first wave of Aussie colonization of Britain with the likes of Kylie Minogue and Jason Donavan. Generation after generation of Neighbours actors migrated north from the channel 10’s Melbourne studios to the well-worn boards of London’s West end and the hallowed halls of the BBC. Anyway, my addiction to the show grew and, I found if I was unable to watch it one day for some reason, I would tape it, but then, due to the episodic format, I couldn’t watch the next episode until I had watched the taped one - so, if I hadn’t seen it by the time the next one was shown, I’d have to tape that one too. Sometimes I would have a week or two to catch up on, and have to spend a whole weekend in a Neighbours watching marathon, which looking back on now, I realize was extremely dangerous behavior, bordering on wanton recklessness…

Ironically it was not Neighbours that precipitated my own migration to Melbourne, it was meeting up with my friend who emigrated in 1988 during a visit of his back to the UK. I decided to try my luck out there too, but by then I was not watching the show nearly as much as I had before. And so now, nearly twenty years after first watching Neighbours, I find myself living that very ‘dream’ I first glimpsed on my television all that time ago. Sometimes I spot the British fans searching for their Erinsborough Elderado. In fact they can catch the Neighbours tour bus (click here for the Neighbours Tour website), which takes them directly to it. You see them, pasty and listless, all strange haircuts and thick regional accents, waiting outside backpacker hostels throughout Melbourne city for the bus to pick them up and whisk them off to Ramsey Street, where I am sure they stand with incredulous facial expressions, saying to one another "Ay, that's brillyunt that is." and “It’s just like on the telly innit?”

I still remember my first inadvertent brush with a Neighbours cast member after my arrival in Melbourne, but more of that in a future post.

Do I still watch Neighbours? Of course I do, it’s still better than watching Home And Away!

Grumpy Old Man Monologue No. 5 - Throat Clearers

For my thoughts regarding throat clearers on public transport see the previous post, Grumpy Old Man Monologue No.4 - Sniffers, and substitute the term Throat Clearer for Sniffer, although thinking about it, not all of it will make sense, but try it anyway.

Grumpy Old Man Monologue No. 4 - Sniffers

Today we examine the public transport using Sniffer. Not the substance abuse sniffer, we shall investigate the criminal element on public transportation in a future post, but today I wish to talk about the sniffing person who has the eternal running nose. Not as common as The Loud Person On The Train or The Personal Stereo Listener, the Sniffer is accursed with the condition of excess olfactory fluids whilst lacking tissues or a handkerchief with which to right the embarrassing situation. Two broad groups of Sniffers can be observed: the habitual sniffer, who usually doesn't even know they are sniffing, and the cold stricken, sick Sniffer, who should be home in bed rather than playing the martyr by refusing to have a sick day and insisting on going into work, only to do substandard work due to illness, and spread their contagion to all others they encounter. What do you people think you can achieve by going to work? Are you that important that the company will collapse without your invaluable input? Are you that vain and egotistical that you think you are indispensable for just one day? Get over yourself.

Regardless of the category, The Sniffers are annoying in a particularly subtle way. You hear the first sniff after they board, or perhaps after you have sat down, or maybe had the misfortune to choose a seat next to a Sniffer already on the train but didn't realize they were such as you boarded in between sniffs. You think, OK, that was one sniff, probably just a one off. Then a few seconds later you hear another one, *sniff*. Your shoulders drop and the fear begins to creep over your soul, you wait then there it is, a third and decisive sniff... You know that the rest of your trip you will be listening for the next one, then the one after that and so on, unable to concentrate on your book, meditative exercises or sleep, as you know there will be another sniff at any second.

*Sniff*...*sniff*...*sniff*...*sniff*...*sniff*...*sniff*... etc.

In my experience the timing of the sniffs varies between individuals. There are rapid machine gun sniffs, then there are the slow, plodding sniffs (which are particularly annoying as they can lull you into a false sense of relaxation when you begin to think that perhaps they have stopped - but then *sniff*). There are little meek sniffs and there are great snorts where I have seen small children almost drawn into the nostrils of the snorter, such is the nasal power.

If it annoys you that much, why not offer them a nose blowing implement? I hear you cry. Well if you were to offer one of these sniffy individuals a tissue (assuming you had one to offer) your actions run the risk of misinterpretation. You could well be seen as being patronizing or perhaps trying to deliberately embarrass them in front of the whole carriage and attempting to bring to the attention of the others the fact they were sans tissue. Commuters rarely like to embarrass other commuters in this manner (they appear to shy from even the most basic of communication in my experience).

So like the Loud Person and the Loud Personal Stereo Listener, the Sniffer will continue to obliviously cause aggravation to the rest of us, and sleeves everywhere will be slightly apprehensive.

Grumpy Old Man Monologue No. 3 - Personal Stereo Listeners

The meteoric rise in popularity of the MP3 player, notably the iPod has been a growing thorn in the side of every train traveller who seeks peace and quiet on their journey. The phenomenon of the noisy personal stereo first started appearing in the late seventies and really took hold in the eighties, however the numbers of people inflicting their 'music' on others has exploded in recent years due to Mr. Steve Jobs and his clever Apple marketing. He accurately predicted and exploited the human need to appear musically and stylistically superior by plugging little white ear buds into the sides of their heads and listening to the vast collection of illegally downloaded mp3s that they had amassed on their computers. I think the word 'personal' is not entirely accurate when it comes to this. We have all been there, admit it. The guy or girl, in many cases sitting well away from you who has the music blasting into their ears at full volume and all you can hear is the nasty tinny noise blaring out. Sometimes these audiophiles are not satisfied with the smaller (more popular) ear buds, eschewing convenience for the larger, full headphone style. These people obviously know what they are doing; they do not want to be confused with the general riff raff of personal music consumption, with their unsubstantial little ear plugs. These 'Full Headphone Wearers' purvey an air of musical superiority, in a 'mine is more professional looking than yours, bigger is better' kind of way. I concede that the enclosed phones do cut out much of the surrounding noise, especially the noise of Loud People talking at full volume to the person next to them, to the person on the phone or to themselves. But that does not make up for the fact these people look like they have just left the recording studio and forgotten to remove the 'cans'. I half expect to see the ‘phones ripped off their head as they get up from the seat to leave the carriage, having forgotten to unplug the headphones cord from the mixing desk. There is no mystery as to what type of music they listen to because it is being listened to at number eleven on the volume dial. Inevitably the enclosed headphone wearer is always listing to rave/techno music, as this type appears unable to leave the 'rave scene' behind, even when commuting. This may sound like a sweeping generalisation, but I challenge you to actually pay attention to these ‘enclosed headphone wearers’ next time you see one, and consciously listen to the type of music pumping out – it will be techno.

Do these people realise that their personal music is anything but? Do they notice the uncomfortable sideways looks shot at them by their long suffering fellow travellers. Like the Loud Person, I am sure there is an allocation of a certain number this type per carriage; usually they outnumber the Loud people by about two to one in my observations. They are to be found evenly spaced along the length of the carriage - arranged so that the circumference of their noise 'footprint' just overlaps the other Personal Stereos Listeners' on board. Looks like I’m going to have to get myself an iPod to drown out the noise…

Grumpy Old Man Monologue No. 2 – Knee Jigglers

Sometimes, seen out of the corner of your eye, spied over the top of your newspaper or book, half glimpsed across the aisle are the Knee Jigglers. They sit oblivious to the world around them, usually absorbed in a book or staring with empty eyes out of the carriage window, with one or both of their knees moving up and down constantly. The rate at which the knee moves varies with each individual Jiggler. Some are slow, but the vast majority seem to vibrate their knees at speeds rarely seen in the animal world. For the Jiggler's fellow traveller this presents a distraction almost impossible to ignore. The concentration of those around the Jiggler collapses, and all they can think about are jumping patellae. However it's not always the knee that is afflicted for these Jigglers. It can be a foot, doing a constant little dance on the carriage floor or maybe suspended from crossed legs. Whichever, the effect is the same on the observer; extreme irritation that elicits an urge to lash out at the jiggling appendage with a rolled up business section. This though rarely happens due to the etiquette of commuting. In fact even asking the Jiggler to cease their unending movement is taboo, so the jiggling goes on and silent pain of the non Jiggler continues...

I'm not grumpy...

I have been watching the BBC's grumpy Old Men TV show, where middle aged British male TV personalities whinge on camera about things they find tedious and stupid about modern life. It has made me realise something - I am a grumpy old man. At the beginning of the show the narrator - a brilliantly chosen Lionel Jefferies, states that the generation of men in the age group 35 to 54 are the grumpiest of all. That hit home a bit, as I just fit into the lower end of the demographic, and I get very annoyed and frustrated at society in general these days, ergo, I am a grumpy old man...At first, just because I fell into that age group and had the occasional whinge about things, I didn't necessarily think I was that grumpy, but when I watched it with my wife, she turned to me and said "That's you, you know?" That made me think, and I realised I agreed with these grumpy old men on the show, and found that they were grumpy about many of the aspects of modern life I too am grumpy about. So I have decided to examine some of the things that cause my grumpiness in a series of posts called The Grumpy Old Man Monologues.

Grumpy Old Man Monologue No. 1 – The Loud Person On The Train

I cannot help be get angry when, having carefully chosen the least noisy and most boring part of the carriage to sit, I am disturbed by a Loud Person. Again and again this happens.

Imagine a peaceful commuter carriage scene in the earlier morning. A little quiet murmuring, but nothing you can really decipher. Everyone is minding their own business, reading the paper or half asleep. Upon boarding I carefully select my spot, as far away from any potential source of disruption as possible. But with monotonous regularity, usually one or two stops later, a Loud Person gets on. They look around, for a good spot on the half empty train, then head directly for me. They often travel with a quiet person – this allows them to speak at high volume to a real person rather than be forced to call someone on their mobile. After settling down in the seat directly in front/behind/beside me, the Loud Person proceeds to launch into the most asinine conversation possible with their long suffering travel partner. This partner nods at intervals in total agreement with the Loud Person and very occasionally actually says something, but never loud enough to be heard. This one sided conversation is full of spurious, cringe worthy detail such as the travel itinerary for their planned trip to Noosa or the Gold Coast in six months or how the new girl at work is a useless waste of space. Of course I could simply move seats, but the fact I was there first and letting these people win galls me too much to do that. However sometimes I have to resort to such actions in order to preserve what little sanity I have left. Occasionally I even need to move to a different carriage only to find yet another Loud Person there as well! I have a theory that the public transport organizations actually provide at least one Loud Person for every carriage. It’s as if they are evenly spaced along the length of the whole train – ensuring any chance at a quiet journey is completed destroyed.

In the next post we shall address the question: foot and knee jigglers; excess energy or full bladder?