You Are Being Unreasonable - 092 - Shopping basket etiquette and mysterious marital essays

Episode Date: January 21, 2021

"Serving poutine for six out of a shopping basket." Join us as we explore the last social media site that hasn't banned Donald J. Trump and answer more Am I Being Unreasonable questions. Are we allowed to remove shopping baskets from supermarkets or not? Where have all the walkers in my Wicker Man-esque folk horror village come from? How much cheese does the McDonald's Filet-O-Fish come with and how much would Jon Bon Jovi want on his Filet-O-Fish? Is this mysterious essay in an envelope evidence of a husband's sordid affair? We end the episode with this classic mystery and, in a surprising turn of events, actually solve it!

Hello, driving on drugs feels better when their prescription. All I know is the world looks beautiful, the world looks so damn beautiful. I feel fantastic, and I never felt as good as how I do right now, except for maybe when I think about I felt that day, when I felt the way that I do right now, right now. I feel fantastic, and I never felt as good as how I do right now, except for maybe when I think about I felt that day, when I felt the way, welcome to your being unreasonable,

the podcast about people being unreasonable on mumsnet.com with me, Hells. And me, Simon. So, there was an armed insurrection at the start of the year. Yep. Led by Donald J. Trump, the president at the time of recording. But not at the time of release. After that, he was banned from loads of social media platforms, like Twitter and Shopify, all the big ones.

Yeah. My question is, if Donald Trump wanted to get really into Mumsnet, would he be allowed? Almost certainly. Oh, they haven't made a statement that he's allowed on there or not. There've been some people joke. Well, I think the post came from Mumsnet, a joke post of Donald Trump saying, oh, I've been kicked off Twitter, so here I am, because that's what Glynner did. Yeah, exactly.

But with that being said, I imagine that if he did join Mumsnet, they would probably let it stand. As long as he didn't use the word SIS, which Mumsnet believe is a bannable offence. Anything else goes. That's it, inciting armed interaction, for example, would be fine. Yeah. Not a concern for Mum's Net. No, no. Not a concern.

They only care about women's sex-based rights. Not a thing. Well, no, not at all. So in some ways, what I'm saying is they just don't care. So, I guess in the next few weeks, with nowhere else to go, we can look forward to Donald J. Trump's. I've been unreasonable. I look forward to him catching up with the 172 Trump threats

that have run over the four years of his presidency. trying to reply to them but finding that they'll reach capacity so you can't actually reply and having to get to the final spread to start addressing all of these points. Sad. Am I being unreasonable to be mad at these losers and haters? The thing is people just come along and be like, you're right? Yeah, you go. I'm sick of the wokeery too.

Oh, goodness me. Am I being unreasonable to have tried to keep my job by sending a mob of armed insurrectionist to my workplace? Should we do a speed round? Yeah. Am I being unreasonable? When do we teach daughters to fight back? Tuesday. Am I being unreasonable to not expect neighbour to use washing machine overnight?

Hmm, yeah, I don't think that's on. I would never run my washing machine over night. Am I being unreasonable to tell mother-in-law she was out of line. No, if she was out of line, you've got to tell her why she might not know. Yeah, and am I being unreasonable to worry about playing playing? pick-and-mix online. Yeah, you don't know what quantities you'll get. What if it's all sugar mice?

So you're saying, the questions are I being unreasonable and you're saying yeah, but you mean like, yeah, no. Yeah, I think it's a valid way. Okay, great, got you. So, good to know. I like sugar mice. Yeah, all those chalky chocolate mice. I really like those. So chalky.

Are they chocolate? I thought they were just sugar. I haven't had one in about 20 years. Never, man. Since Woolworth shut down. I was just thinking actually 20 years ago, I was. would have been too old for sugar mice. What sort of dweeb is in year seven with a bag of sugar mice? A lucky dweeb. Loser. Am I being unreasonable? Who knew there was shopping basket

security? Is it me or has this shopping basket etiquette always been in place? I went shopping for a few bits on a local supermarket, but as usual, I forgot my bags, but instead of wasting money and plastic, I decided against buying a bag and didn't fancy juggling my shopping to the car, so I took a basket to my car. A security guard came charging after me, telling me I wasn't allowed to remove the basket. I told him I'm taking my shopping to my car and I'd be returning it straight away. I mean, seriously, I don't want another plastic bag in the house, let alone a big metal basket. Am I being unreasonable to think this rule is crazy? Or is it an unspoken rule I've never been informed of? There's been an uptick in the number of supermarket

Fred's we've done over the last few months, because it's one of two places you're allowed to be. Yes. Supermarket or your home. Almost every threat at the moment is about a supermarket and everyone's really unhappy about the supermarket, which is odd. Because going to the supermarket is a rare treat. It's a day out. So, like, try to find some positivity. We can't even sit on a bench in the park because we'll be moved on by the police.

Can't even take a coffee with you that you've brought from home in a sippy cup? Because that's a picnic. Because that's a picnic. Nonsense. A picnic needs a picnic basket. And a picnic blanket? Terrible. No blanket, no picnic. Strict rules. Strict and baffling rules. But yeah, if some listener wants to do a graph of the number of supermarket threads per episode,

dataise it. Sure. I mean, I don't know why. Data it. Should we make a U.R. being unreasonable version of information is beautiful? Mm-hmm. Make a little zine of various data graphics from the podcast. visualisations of data from the Am I Being Unreasonable Board? Yeah.

Who was unreasonable or not? What's the balance? We don't know. We'll never go back and listen. You do it. Well, I don't think, I mean, unless you're really bored, we won't be offended if you don't do it. There's no homework with this podcast.

That would be terrible. No, it's homework enough to listen. It is. Thank you. But the question is, is there shopping basket security? Are you allowed to take the shopping basket outside the defined perimeters of the store property. Yeah, and the other question is, has this always been the case, or is this new? Is this new? Is this a new rule? In the absence of anything better to do, people are going to the

supermarket and stealing to get their kicks because they're bored. I personally wouldn't take a basket outside the shop. Why not? A breach of the social contract. I think it is an unspoken rule that I've picked up on and never thought about and would never do. And I think it's because there's, I mean, there's trolley part. You're allowed to say the trolley. Let's use the trolley as the example. Okay, the trolley problem. Exactly. Here's the trolley problem. You're allowed to take the trolley inside

the supermarket from outside. Yes. You get it from outside and you take it inside. And so you're allowed to take it outside again because that's where you gut it. Yes. And so there's trolley parks, like buy in the car park where you can leave the trolley. Yeah. There's not the equivalent for baskets. Baskets are inside the store

and you put them back inside the store when you're done. So something that I was reminded of when I read this thread was on the local buying and selling group for the area that we used to live in. There was someone on there posted two vintage basketettes. They called it something that wasn't a basket, but it was like a basket. I can't remember how they phrased it. But anyway, it was just two Sainsbury's baskets, and they were like quirky orange basket. So it was a metal basket with the orange plastic over the handles like Sainsbury's used to have

before they moved to plastic ones. and they were asking for something like 25 quid a basket trying to make out it as like a kitsch vintage home decor item so maybe rather than that being an anomaly of a chancer that's an actual trend that we don't know about because we're not allowed into anyone else's houses maybe everyone's got this except us because we can't go into each other's houses at the moment

we're missing out and if that's the case you would need to put security on your baskets wouldn't you? I can see that having kitsch value only kits value though because like the aesthetics and the economy of supermarket baskets. Like, they're just shit.

They're just utilitarian. I don't know where you would put... Shit. Where would you put your supermarket? Like, would you have it as a hanging basket for plants? You'd have a fruit in it, a stylish centrepiece for the table. A stylish centrepiece for the table, yeah. You could use it to put all your junk mail in.

Yeah, you could put grease-poo's paper in the bottom and have a big load of putteen in it. Yeah. Yeah, like... It's a surf poutine for six. A shopping basket. Like you'd get at a pub. Once you're allowed to have people around again,

I'm going to invite four of our closest friends for dinner, and then I'm going to serve it to them in a shopping basket. Yeah. And then they're going to say, oh, actually, I'm still not sure that it is safe to be in people's houses as they back away slowly. While I wield a basket of puteen around. Some combination of Sarah's and Andrews.

Yeah. All our friends seem to be called Sarah Andrew. That's not true. We only have five Sarah. this person seems utterly affronted at being confronted by the security guard and from this I assume they are white oh completely hundred because this is white privilege to be upset at being asked to take a shopping basket back in and then to start a thread about it and then to start a thread about it when if you if you were a different race you probably would have received this kind of targeted harassment

even if you had put the shopping basket exactly where you should yeah earlier in your life by the till. Yeah. Came charging after me? Well, the security guards will come charging after you. They're not going to just... Oh, goodness.

Should we open a thread? Yeah. Our consensus is like it's an unspoken rule. When England adopted a 5P bag charge in 2015, rather than behave rationally, many people started stealing baskets instead. Some stores even had to put electronic tags on them they were losing so many.

Just use a small trolley instead. In many places, they either have a coin deposit or electronic wheel locking to stop them being pinched. This country went mad when the 5P bag charge came in. What was that about, like, it's 5P, my friends. People were furious. They had it in Wales before they had it here, and I remember somebody who lives in Wales,

who isn't my cup of tea, but somebody going on and on about how, like, they had prior experience of this, and they knew exactly what it was like to live under the tyranny of the 5P bag chart. Under the yoke of the 5P bag charge. I almost exclusively used, boat bags as handbags. I'm not one for a fancy handbag, which means I've never really needed

to worry about it unless I was doing a big shop. And who does a spontaneous big shop? Oh yeah, I wasn't planning to do the big shop. It's fine. Remember when a 5P bag charge was all we had to worry about. Yeah. Anyway, the 5P bag charge really changed the political current in this country. See my upcoming article. I'm going to pitch somewhere for more details. The next post that says in pre-COVID times I had a little collapsible picnic basket much like the one in the picture and then there's a picture of it

I'd take that in with me use it to do my shopping and then repack it at the checkout I was never questioned about it at all and found it much easier than bags whether it was allowed or not I don't know but I always wondered why nobody else seemed to use their own baskets

see that you couldn't go out with this basket now could you because if you were carrying your shopping home you'd get arrested and thrown in jail for having a picnic basket because someone will think you're having a picnic. Yeah. You just come from a picnic or are going to a picnic. Yeah, it'd be like, your picnic is terrible.

Why have you got raw chicken breasts? A bag of onions, some stock cubes. This is not a good picnic. Yeah. But it is a picnic. You've got a picnic basket and therefore jail. Clearly also going to set a file without a permit to cook this chicken breast. Right, but that's totally different because they brought their own basket.

It is. Although when I see people with the little push-along trollies, packing directly into the trolley rather than the basket. You know, like the shollies. The old lady things. Yeah. I always wonder about that. I feel like it would be very easy to do some shoplifting that way.

Yeah. I'm not judging. No judgment. Not a tip, either. Not advice. Just an observation. And then the OP came back and said, how do you know it's always been a thing and where does it tell you this?

We're encouraged not to use bags. Even the bags for life are not recyclable and not environmentally friendly. So I don't quite catch the point. in my supermarket does not have security tags on the basket. I haven't noticed these anywhere else, and neither have I noticed any baskets thrown into canals. That's because they're all in people's homes, filled with poutine. Filled to the brim with steaming hot poutine.

They've been lined with lovely padding, and people are using it as a little crib for a baby. It's very kitsch. I don't know. I hate it when a system isn't explained. Yeah, me too. But, yeah, I'm coming around to their side. We need to move on.

so you said there are a lot of supermarket threads because what else would there be to do so here's one of the other big topics on mum's set at the moment am i being unreasonable to wonder what all the walkers would usually be doing i live in a small village near a lovely green open space for walks i walk every single day and have done since i moved it many years ago it's always been very quiet many many times i've been the only person out and have walked for an hour plus and not seen a soul Since COVID, and particularly since the summer, it's been mobbed. I'm dodging people constantly when I'm out walking. I know the size of the space means I can keep two metres away. I now often have groups of people behind in front and to the sides of me, which makes me a bit uncomfortable. Most are considerate, but some are assholes that want to brush past you,

so you have to be aware, and it's a lot less relaxing. I'm pretty sure they're local people, as it's not a day-out place, or anywhere people would know about, let alone go to. And it's nice that many more local people are out walking. But why have they all just discovered walking? It's not like it was a closely guarded secret before, and we are quite rural. What would they normally be doing? For example, today on a Saturday afternoon,

that they now can't do that leaves walking as their only option. Yes, I do wish they bugger off, and yes, I am being unreasonable for that, as I don't own this piece of land, but mostly I'm just really perplexed. is to why so many people are now out walking. Why is everyone walking, Sye? Why could everyone be walking? What would they normally be doing?

And why aren't they just doing that? Yeah, what large-scale public health event could have caused this? I just don't understand. Why don't they all just go to the pub or the cinema or a gallery? Exactly. Or a sit-down restaurant. A sit-down restaurant sounds like how you would describe a restaurant, which is actually barely a restaurant at all.

Taco Bell. I was thinking like wimpy. anywhere that says it is a sit-down restaurant rather than just saying it's a restaurant feels like it's really trying too hard Why aren't they all look wimpy? Why aren't they all look wimpy? Yeah, there's a lot about walking here

I'm intrigued by the detail that they live somewhere a small village with a lovely open green space It's not a day-out place or anywhere people would know about that alone go to Yeah, it makes it sound haunted So you live in a village from a folk horror film

You live on the island from the Wicca Man. A village from a folk horror film sounds like a great day out. You wouldn't say that's not a day out. Well, no, but it ends with you being sacrificed to some pagan god. Yeah, yeah, okay, fair enough. Well, in that case, it's better that there are more people out because that reduces the likelihood of you being the person that gets sacrificed. Every extra walker is an extra chance at surviving.

I live in the village from the early folk horror film Blood on Satan's Claw. Too many people are interrupting my satanic rituals. Why aren't they doing something else? I mean, it's not like this person doesn't understand there's a pandemic happening because their username is closed schools protect the NHS, unless they don't know there's a pandemic, and they just hate schools. They've been doing that since 2017. They've been on the closed schools, but at the NHS train,

since then. Children have mucky hands. What a trailblazer. I'm pretty sure they're local people. people. Would you be more upset if they weren't? Let's try and work out where this person lives and everyone should go and visit. I mean, we shouldn't. But they have some fair points about walkers being assholes. Like some people are assholes. Like couples who walk too abreast. We're a couple and we know to move into single file when there's people near us. Sometimes I see someone

approaching before you notice them approaching and so I do a little run to get ahead of you and you look at me like I'm a bit mad and then the person passes and you're like, oh yeah. Well, you know what she was doing I was in the queue to get into a shop yesterday and rather than just walk straight out and then at a right angle, people were just veering into where the front of the queue was

so they were brushing right past my face. Nonsense. If I get COVID, I'm going to blame the people who shop at Marks and Spencers because the people who shop at Marks and Spencers are the most entitled people and yes, I was at Marks and Spencers and I can own that about myself.

People with push chairs. Ooh, ho ho! People with push chairs certainly in our area, tend to monopolise the paths. They think the paths are built for their push chairs, the little push chair tracks. Yeah, we have, I mean, we live in somewhere that is very yummy-mummy. It's undeniably a very yummy-mummy area. London.

No, I mean, the particular part of London, you know what I mean. But you can't go to the park anymore because people just stop their push chairs in the middle of the path, and then someone else has their push-chair facing the other way opposite them. And then if you say, oh, excuse me, they sort of edge their push-chair about on inch over and look at you like, you're welcome. Like, no. I feel like using the push chairs to enforce two metre distance between the parents is also bad, because the kids should be enforcing two meter distance too. If you're using your child as a human shield against COVID. Especially since, you know, your kid will only bring it into the house with them anyway. Yeah,

close the schools. Protect the NHS. Don't go for a walk. Yeah, so let's hear from this thread. somebody who said, going to the pub, seeing friends, being on holiday, any of the many activities that make life enjoyable that are prohibited right now, meaning that walking is all that's left. Oof, dose of reality. Yeah, that's a real, real shame. Someone has said, well, they're working from home during the week, and during the weekends, they're at home rather than going shopping or going to friends or playing sport. Do you really not know the answer, OP?

Yeah, this OP has been disingenuous, right? They know the answer. I mean, I really hope they know the answer. I guess it would be annoying if you've been someone who did something first and other people did it. You know, like if you're a teenage hipster, you're like, I was walking before walking was cool. I've been catching deadly respiratory infections since before it was cool. And I have found push chairs irritating, no, we won't go there, lose a load of listeners. COVID-19, I actually had COVID-17, so.

One last comment from the thread. irritated by your pretend ignorance. Am I being unreasonable? McDonald's fillet o'fish, lighthearted. Just got myself a fillet o fish from McDonald's drive-thru, obviously. It comes with half a slice of cheese as standard. That's a whole other issue. I want more than half a slice of cheese on my fillet o fish, so I ask for an extra cheese slice, and it costs an extra 20p. When I get my fillet, it has just one full slice of cheese. Yes, there is extra cheese, but am I being unreasonable to think if I've paid for an extra slice of cheese, my fillet should contain one and a half slices. Background information, this is not a one-off. It happens every

time I order, which is my favourite McDonald's order. I do go to McDonald's on a relatively regular basis, as my child has ASD. He is very underweight and he has no appetite, but he can often be attempted to eat most of a cheeseburger. We watched Michael Showwater's The Big Sick last night. We did. And this is just like the scene where Camille Nandiani once a burger with four extra slices of cheese. Yeah. And a guy at the counter won't give it to him.

So he's shouting, he's angry. He's got, he's a girlfriend's in a coma. Yeah, he's got a lot going on. Yeah. But he's so furious. And he's like, why can't we just be humans to one another? You're a person, I'm a person. Just put four slices on.

And the person's like, no, we can't do that. We can't do that. There are rules. And then in the end just charges him for four burgers. Yeah. Also, we were talking about. the fact that a fillet-o-fish comes with a processed cheese slice just the other day. Yeah, a filet-o-fish. It's strange to have fish and cheese.

Yeah, it's not hope cuisine. No. But it is a fillet-o-fish. Yeah. I can you imagine maybe like a bit of cod in a white cheese sauce. Maybe. It wouldn't be my idea of fun, but you do you. Yeah, but that's about the only cheesy fish circumstance I can think of. I mean, I haven't had a fillet-o-o-fish in years, but as I recall, it doesn't really taste very fishy. It's just like salty white fish. It doesn't actually taste of fish at all. So it's just salty goodness. Salty goodness for pescatarians. Cheese, salty. Fish, salty. Sauce, maybe salty. Mmm. Moja salty. Yeah. But the issue is, if you pay for a full cheese slice, shouldn't you get a slice and a half? Or double, which is a full cheese slice,

because normally it's a hot. Yeah, if you pay for extra cheese, should you get? Yeah, we need to establish what the extra in extra cheese means. Yeah. Because this person's paying 20p. Now does that cut? Is that doubling the amount of cheese, which it is, or is it paying for an extra slice? And neither of us used the parlance of the thread, and the poster is the only person who's described what they asked for accurately, because it's their lived experience. They asked for an extra slice of cheese. Right. So they've been very specific in what they're asking for, and I could imagine probably they might be willing to splash out 40p rather than the extra 20p, so they could have a slice and a half of cheese.

But we just don't know. We don't know. We weren't know. Are you currently looking up on Deliveroo whether you can add things to a fillet O'Fish? It's not quite 11am, so I don't know if they'll have affiliate O'Fish available just yet. Oh, beans. My Donald didn't even on delivery.

Well, I've all passed it yesterday, and it said very proudly that they were on Deliveroo. Will they not deliver it to here? Apparently not. Well, now I know I can't have it. A fillet of fish is all I want for lunch. I'm sure that we can cobble together some fish fingers

and a processed cheese slice on a burger bun that's not the same and you know it I know it McDonald's knows it okay but we do that's why they've sold

one billion burgers fine fine I think it's really sad that the OP felt they had to justify why they go to McDonald's fair time

just a tree do what you want even if it's not just a tree even if it's what you eat every day it's your life it's fine yeah don't spit it

I John Bonjuri said it's your life yeah don't he's like it's my life life. It's John Bon Jovi's life, sorry. Okay, you're ordering a fillet-o-fish for John Bon Jovi. Yeah. And he has said to you, I want extra cheese. Do you assume he wants one-and-a-half slices of cheese or one-slice of cheese? All John Bon Jovi has said is fillet-a-fish with extra cheese, please, So I'm I used to John Bon Jovi. Am I like his PA? Or is this a one-off? This is a one-off. So I want to

to impress John Bon Jovi? Not necessarily. It's a one-off. Maybe you're like, I'm never going to see this guy again. So I'd get two fillet-up. fish, one with double cheese and one with an extra slice of cheese. And if he, he can pick the one he wants and I'll eat the other. What if he's like, great, I'll have both. Okay, fine. What are you going to eat? Well, nothing. You would go hungry for John Bon Jovi. I didn't know I was getting lunch for me as well. Okay, okay. Someone has said, I ask for a salad on mine. It's just treating myself as a bin. You're not a bin. I didn't know you didn't get, what? I didn't know you didn't

get salad on a fillet-o-fish. So it really is just fish. A fill-out-a-fish is just fish and cheese. Half a slice of cheese. Why is it half a slice of cheese? Only menu items that doesn't have salad, though. And then someone said, I don't get why this one's not on the saver's menu. You get more on a 99p chicken mayo

and yet the fish is priced like a quarter-pounder. It's madness. Madness. Fish is a premium food item though, isn't it? We know that. Oh. We're looking at a picture of fillet of fish now. Yeah, we are. Phileo fish. Phileo fish.

Mm-hmm. A delicious white hokey or pollock fish in crispy breadcrumbs with cheese and tartar sauce in a steamed bun. A steamed bun? Mm-hmm. Steamed clams. This fellow fish is obviously steamed. And then it's got a section called the makings of the fillet-o fish. It says cheddar cheese slice, not half a cheddar cheese slice.

It does. No, this is very confusing. Do you have any final thoughts on the fillet-o fish? It looks like half a cheese slice on the feather cheese slice on the feather cheese slice on the photo because it'd go all the way to the back. It's so weird that it's half a cheese slice. That's so weird. That suggests that someone's touched it with their grubby fingers to tear it in half. Someone's job. Yeah, someone's job is to slice up the cheese slices. Cut them in half for the filial fish. Yeah, and leave one half on the counter for the next fillet of fish. Yeah, like at

subway when, if you only get a six inch sub, they leave half on the side. But it's just a pile of cheek, well, it's not a pile, I seem you do it one at a time. Pile. It's not like you get in and your first ask of the day is to slice up loads of bits of cheese ready to go. Anyway, anyway, one more thread. Am I being unreasonable? My husband received something very strange in the post. In the post today, my husband received a letter. It was handwritten, with his name and address on the outside.

No return info. The writing in the envelope was definitely a woman's. Inside is a copy of an essay. I googled it, and it's by Robert... This is Robert Louise Stevenson, but we know who she means. it's called on marriage the gist of it is that marriage has lots of ups and downs and requires

communication there is nothing else no name just a folded printout of this essay any explanation other than my fear I have no reason other than this to suspect anything you are being unreasonable don't jump to conclusions you are not being unreasonable he's cheated I'm shaking

this feels so surreal I hope I'm overreacting he's currently at work p.S we open each other's posts we think nothing of it usually is always junk or bills. Ooh, this is intriguing. It is, isn't it? Some midsummer murders shit.

Yeah. This is, I mean, we haven't had a thread like this in months. Intrigue in the suburbs. It's motivating me to print off various weird essays and send them with handwritten notes to various people. I'm just going to start looking people up in the phone book. Yeah. Sending them handwritten envelopes.

Just random people. Yeah. Make the text vague enough and people will adjust it to their lives. Yeah. However. You know, we're all bored with trolling people. on the internet, why not just throw some grenades into people's marriages through the post? Yeah, exactly.

If a letter came for you, firstly, I wouldn't open it. But if for some reason I did open it, and it was this essay talking about the importance of communication in marriage, I would feel like that was such a bird on me from rifling through your post. I'd be mortified. Yeah, it is somewhat ironic. You've discovered this by going through your husband's purse. Why would you assume he cheated? This is from the, this could be from, you know, the jaded former lover, the jaded mistress or from someone who found out about the affair, like their boss or someone who's blackmailing them. An enterprising hotelier, who's seen them going into their room. Yeah, I was about to say, there's always an enterprising hotelier. The night manager at the hotel.

It could be anyone. Some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, soldied hotel who has delivered them, you know, champagne and oysters and whatnot. Yeah. And he's sick of this obvious infidelity. Yeah, perhaps. Think of the moral standards. I mean, it could be that, couldn't it? I would prefer to think it's just someone who's bored and sending loads of weird essays to address as they've found in the phone book. I mean, yeah, the exciting conclusion is some disgruntled hotelier.

Yeah. The Occam's razor mundane conclusion is that this is just like evangelical, you know, junk mail. Almost certainly. Talking about family values and Christian values and whatnot, Christian marriage. We seem to be the only people that we're. we know who get the quantity of evangelical junk mail that we do. We get so much evangelical junk mail and when we do, I often, but not always, post it to Twitter. Like, what's going on? And people always astounded by it. Like, why does this keep happening to you? And the answer is because I'm a

terrible sinner. But how they know that? Unclear. I looked up on marriage and essay by Robert Lewis Stevenson and for some reason it's behind a paywall. So, oh, I mean, this person got really lucky then? Yeah. What a coup. They've got it for free. Free copy. Now, narrative magazine, have it behind a paywall.

Oh. Oh, no, it's easy and free to sign up, but... Let's not do that. I'm not going to. I'll just give the first sentence. Hope, they say, deserts us at no period of our existence. From first to last and in the face of smarting disillusions, we continue to expect good fortune, better health and better conduct.

And that's so confidently that we judge it needless to deserve them. Right. You've got to draw your reader in with a good first sentence. You've got to establish a premise from the start. And Robert, this is not good. No. I don't know that this is about marriage if I hadn't read the title. Yeah, I mean, this is, as we discussed a few weeks back,

this is writing an opening sentence for yourself. Yeah. You've written this for yourself, not for the reader. Self-indulgent, Robert. Do you think editors were less picky back then? I think it was all just a big boys club of slapping each other on the back. Well, yeah. Once you're in the club, the essays would just say,

oh, tell you how, yes. Oh, this is like a sequel to. Treasure Island, great. Oh no, this is, this is about marriage. And I don't even know that from the opening paragraph. I think standards were lower because it was such a closed gatekeeper community that they were all so very confident in their own abilities that no one ever stopped to reflect on whether they were in need of a bloody good editor.

Yeah, like Dickens, you can't just have this character, meet this character from their past all of a sudden on the street. It makes no sense. Too many coincidences. Thomas Hardy, have you thought maybe this relentless misery is going to lose the reader? light and shade light and shade you thought about putting a song and dance number in there goodness me

where are the jokes the first response is do you know anyone due to get married perhaps he's been asked to do a reading what a weird way to divvy out the readings seems weird to send the reading with no note no accompanying note just send it through the post

like don't text it to or whatever to send them a mysterious reading on marriage and fidelity. Why is a woman's handwriting? Oh, it's, you know, good little hearts for eyes. Oh, great. It's all curly. An 11-year-old girl has sent this note. It's in like a pink pen.

Hey, I write in a pink pen. Yeah, and you're a woman. That's true, but I don't, I'm not a woman because I write in a pink pen. That's representative of all womanhood. And I don't write in a pink pen because I'm a woman. Correlation, not causation. Oh, someone has said, how on earth can you tell it's a woman's handwriting? And the OPEs said, right, okay, that's helpful, thanks.

What? People are trying to help. Yeah. Drawing out questions, Sherlock Holmes would do the same. Someone has said, Occam's Fraser, the simplest explanation, is most likely to be correct. If he's not actually cheated, he's confided in someone about your marriage and not in a positive way. That's not Occam's Fraser. I used the phrase Occam's Razor earlier.

came up with what I think is a much simple explanation. Then that is some concerned bystander whom your husband has confided in. The simplest explanation. Oh my God. To the best of my knowledge, I don't know if anyone has cheated on me in the past. I don't care.

But it's the best of my knowledge you've not cheated on me, the only person I have ever been married to. And if you have, now's not the time. to get into it. So it might just be that I don't have the experience that makes me suspicious. And I think maybe people who have experienced being cheated on have a greater tendency towards suspicion. And I'm not judging them for that.

Like, we'll bring our own baggage to situations. But that does not mean that the simplest explanation is that if you receive an essay through the post, somebody has had an affair, that's not simple. It's not an explanation and it's not simple. In the film Hannibal, the detectives trace Hannibal by smelling the envelope that he sends to Clarice and detecting the subtle perfumes, which could only have come from Florence in Italy. Right.

Have you given the envelope a sniff? Someone said could be a letter from Jehovah's Witnesses. We got one last week about the meek possessing the earth. There we go. There we go. They seem to be sending letters to a lot of random addresses as my mum received one only a couple of months ago addressed to her and my dad. Dad had died a month earlier. Oh, I'm really sorry to hear that.

It's not nice, is it, if posted, like, arrives to someone who's just died. No, no, that's, that's bad. That's incensedism. But they didn't assume from this, that this is Occam's razor, and her dad had inherited the earth. That's still alive. Somehow he's inherited the earth. So, the APs come back and said,

for everyone asking how I can tell it's a woman's handwriting, I'm sorry, in a really needy moment, rejoicing your ability to have a gotcha moment. It looks like a stereotypical woman's handwriting. no, that's not woke, sorry. Not everything needs me about being woke, you tedious, bore. Oh, I'm sorry it's not woke to assume that my husband is cheating because an essay by Robert Louis Stevenson arrives in the post with no explanation.

I know that's not woke. I know that's not what Owen Jones would do. Sorry, I don't know why I got so uptight about that. Can we believe Owen Jones sent this letter. So a little bit more about it It's a photocopy of a page from a book There's no title or author It's just a black and white photocopy

It's just pertinent information We couldn't solve the mystery Because you didn't give us the information Like in The Hound of the Basketville So it didn't give the reader the information To solve the mystery Fuck you, Sir Ralph, Covenant, Doyle We have no issues that I know of

We just have a joint bank account We share everything My mum used to open all the posts As she dealt with the bills and insurance and stuff, and I guess I'm the same. Again, sorry to the woke ones out there about the woman's handwriting. I know I can't tell, but it's pretty girly.

You got me. I would ring or text him, but I'd like to see his reaction, and if it is the worst case scenario, I don't want that combo over the phone. I would be shocked if he has cheated. He's a lovely person who's always kind and thoughtful. We have little kids and have been married for over 10 years. The fact that it's a photocopy makes it more threatening.

Does it? Yeah. Hmm. This feels less like an evangelical church kind of. I don't know about that. I don't know about that because some of the weird evangelical posts that we've got has felt a lot like a threat.

There was one that we got and I posted it on Twitter and my mom was genuinely worried that we've received a threat from the church because it read like a threat. It was printed in a hand, like a handwriting type font that was quite a convincing handwriting type font

that was like you personally, you at this address are a sinner, you will go to hell. It's too late. You should pray, but there's no point because it's too late. So I wouldn't put it past the evangelicals to send out threats. Someone has said, I got that today as well, not married no man in the house. Same writing, the one we got from the Jehovah's Witnesses in December,

but in that one they were on about reaching out and spreading the word and living a good life. Mystery solved. Yeah, and then someone has posted a link to a local newspaper in Hampshire saying that Jehovah's Witnesses have been sending out all sorts of confusing things. Well, nice to have a conclusion to one of these. Yeah, now people... This feels like a conclusion. It does feel like a conclusion, doesn't it?

I'm just going to see if there's any more post from the O.P. Thanks to everyone who enjoyed the post. We are actually lovely people. We don't fight or sulk with each other or betray each other, even in little ways, so I don't know why I was such a psycho yesterday. I'm on Matt leave with a new baby, and I think my husband going out in the world when I'm at home all day, every day with my DC, has made me nuts.

I've been chuckling regularly about this, and my God, I can't believe some of these women on here could even read their phone screen from their high fucking horse. Oh, that was... A nice conclusion, apart from that last sentence. Yeah. It was a bit much. It was all going well until this person had to go back to saying how they hate woke people.

Goodness me. Just like a classic Agatha Christie novel, Proreux wraps up the mystery and throws in a little dig at the woke brigade. Shall we do one more speed round? Yeah. Am I being unreasonable? What am I hearing from next door neighbours? shouting Am I being unreasonable

chocolate should never be stored in the fridge Wrong, cold chocolate is enjoyable Am I being unreasonable Do you believe in ghosts? No And am I being unreasonable Close male friend oversharing Ooh

Yeah, shut him up That's unreasonable Shut him up You don't need to be woke about this Tell him to fuck off Get out of here Thank you so much for listening Thank you

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