You Are Being Unreasonable - 102 - Pants on a washing line and gentle reminders to use verbs

Episode Date: June 24, 2021

"One Mumsnet, one podcast." We're united in our love of odd web forums and back to discuss more unreasonableness. This week: appending 'Gently...' to a sentence to make it more, well, gentle; sending literal children to work; sleeping through your leaving announcement at work; what to put on your washing line when you have a barbecue; cancelling the flights of someone using your email address; and a lot of discussion about how sentences need both verbs and appropriate punctuation.

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 that I do right now. Hello, welcome to you.

Being Unreasonable, the podcast about people being unreasonable on mumsnet.com. With me, Howells. And me, Simon. What up, Simon? Well, just before we came on, I finished my podcast lists. So I figured we should record. Yeah. We should add another one to the world.

Yeah, sometimes when you want something to exist, you need to be the one to make it. Yeah. Going onto my reserve lists, you know, where I don't listen to every episode, but I'll have a look and pick out some episodes. Like, then you reply on. Yeah. Yeah, I do tend to listen to every reply all, but it's probably going to be pushed to the backburner list. Yeah.

I think you're wrong about. I don't listen to whoever you're wrong about. I pick the ones that interest me. Sometimes you're wrong about is about something that I don't know about, and I can't be wrong because I don't know. Yeah, I don't like being told them wrong. I like to learn, but you, it would seem, do not. I do not love to learn. Just before we started recording, having run out a podcast, you were listening to the One Britain One Nation.

song. One One nation. Yeah. So it really is desperate times. Yeah. Dirt the podcasts. The brainwashing of the kids.

The state propaganda that are going to be teaching the kids. But it's critical race theory that you really got to watch out for. Oh yeah. That's the one that's actually ideologically damaging the kids. Absolutely. Nothing to do with One Britain, One Nation. Not making kids sing a song. Why did they only announce it at like four days?

notice as well. Yeah, like teachers have to work this into their lesson plans, which maybe they put together at the weekend. Anyway, with that, one mum's net one podcast, let's do a speed round. Am I being unreasonable to give up my dream job for the sake of my son? No, that sounds quite reasonable and dramatic even. That could be a hallmark movie. Am I being unreasonable to ask for some 11 plus advice?

12. Amma being unreasonable, do you find it funny when people trip over? Yeah, obviously. Whoop. And one more. Am I being unreasonable, do you bastard monkfish a lot when pan fried? Do you bast-I don't understand it even? Do you bastard monkfish a lot when pan-fried?

He's bastard the verb. What does that mean? That's a verb? If you were being pan-fried, would you exclaim, Bastard monkfish? I would. I guess. It's my new exclamation.

If a monkfish were pan-frying me, there's some Twilight Zone-esque twist of fortunes. If a monkfish were panfrying me, I think calling it a bastard would be quite mild. Planet on the monkfish. Oh, those bastard monkfish. Should he do a thread? He's damn dirty monkfish.

You blew it up, you maniac. Bastard monkfish. Am I being unreasonable? To think, gently is a weird stage directiony English. If you want to say something gently, say it gently. You don't have to preface a gentle comment with gently. If it's genuinely gentle, and you don't make a tapless comment by sticking gently in front of it.

Why is this suddenly a thing? I'm not seeing, comedically, you should have hit him over the head with a melon. Or heartlessly, you should just get a grip and take in ironing. So what's this gently nonsense all about? are being unreasonable to think it is nonsense? I think I need an example. Well, that's what everyone on the thread says. There we go.

Post after post. Because this, I can understand putting gently in front of a sentence, but it's not something I've heard. It's not a phenomenon I've come across. But I've barely left my house in 18 months. So somebody has asked, everyone's asked, really, what this means. And then the O.P. came back.

But the message has been deleted by Mumsnet H.Q. For breaking their talk guidelines. It doesn't sound very gentle. It doesn't sound gentle, does it? Okay, so then the O.P. said, for example, gently, you're being a horse-faced pratt. So you just put gently in front of a compliment or insult. Just anything.

Probably an insult. Yeah. So gently, that dinner you cooked was terrible. Yeah, I guess that's what the O.P. is complaining about. But then someone said... It doesn't sound right. Someone said, I only see this in work emails. For example, dear galloping, a gentle reminder to.

A gentle reminder. Yeah, you can call things, it works as an adjective. But you're saying that I'm saying gently. I'm saying gently. No, it doesn't work. It doesn't sound right. This isn't something I've come across. And I'm frustrated at the whole thing.

You are. I know that I said it to a colleague the other day, actually. that's because we were on a team's chat, and I was correcting them on someone's pronouns. Someone they didn't know. And so I was just like, I'm just doing a correction, but I didn't want it on a team's chat where it's like written out to look like I was being like, no, bad, you're naughty. I was like, gently, correction, moved on. So I have actually done this.

So you said, gently, it's he hurt. It's unlikely. It happens, though. Gently, it does happen. Gently, it's he, him. Yeah. And you prefaced it with Gently. Yeah.

Because if I just said, it's he, him. I think that could read as being a bit like, why are you being so confrontational? I don't know this person. But I'm not saying, just to let you know, it's he him. Or by the way, it's he him. But Gently does the same thing in fewer letters. It just doesn't sound right to me. There's a whole local...

This is nonsense. There's a whole local boutique chain called Gently. And one of them, which specialises in children, children's things, it's called gently elephant, and that annoys me because that makes no sense. No. Why are they all called gently, except for the one that sells kids' stuff, which is called Gently Elephant. What is the elephant doing gently?

It's an adverb. I hate all adverbs, though. It's an adverb, and it needs a verb, is my problem. So when you say gently, the implication is, gently I am saying. Yeah. So it's saying that's the verb. But because there's no verb, gently, do not go into that good night. Yeah.

I just think there needs to be a verb. I mean, that's fine. I don't think there should ever be an adverb. I mean, it's a weird internet parlance, but in most situations, I don't want to see an adverb. We were talking about this the other day. You were telling me a story that you had written, and it had a lot of adverbs in it. People kept doing things lustily. I'm glad I fooled you into thinking that was pre-written because else.

I was actually making that. for the wrong. Improv, an improv bit. Yes, and... Yeah, a few people have now said, some people use gently, some people use flower emojis, they're just trying to get across that they're not being a dick. And someone else has said it's because tone is hard to convey in text. People use it when they're saying something that could be interpreted as critical or hostile, but it's actually intended to be firm but fair. I think it's fine to use it on a forum. Often, fora have their own conventions and rules when it comes to grammar and language. And then the OP has said, but where did it come from?

Where does any language come from? I think what would work better is putting what type of exclamation it is, putting what type of dialogue you're getting across. Go on. Like, gentle reminder, like in square brackets, like a stage direction. No, that seems pass-ag. Why are you giving me stage directions? It's not a play.

Triangle bracket. Retort, triangle bracket. Because hell. I think you're going to... I think this works. better. End retort in triangle brackets. I don't have to end retort. It's fine. You do. If you use triangle

bracket retort, triangle bracket retort, triangle bracket retort, because hells it's better, triangle bracket, slash retort, triangle bracket. There was a robot in Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic that did this. He'd say whatever type of sentence he was saying, like warning or fret, and then he'd say the sentence. Okay. It's a great reference.

It's a reference. It's a reference. Yeah, I mean, I don't know why the O.P. is so worked up about it, but they really are. At the O.P. side, frankly. I think it sounds silly. And someone said, maybe we need a, this is meant kindly or gently, but get a grip emoji. For example, Mary Poppins. Mary Poppins was not as gentle as you remember. She was always shouting at the bank's kids. A Mary Poppins emoji is something that only moms never think is necessary. I think we need a Mary Poppins emoji. Yeah.

I think so often do we behave like Mary Poppins that we should. you'd simply have an emoji. I'm drafting an email to the Unico's consortium right now. Just the Mary Poppins emoji and then your pronouns in your bio, because you want people to know that you're being firm but fair. You're not being hostile or critical, but they need to know. Yeah, brackets, Poppins, end brackets. Mary Poppins.

Poppins slash he slash him. Yeah. Should you do another thread? Yeah. Am I being unreasonable to think society would be better if you could join the work force sooner? And the age of compulsory education was lowered. I'm not sure exactly what age two, but 18 seems quite. And as a result, it is then longer before you can move out and gain independence

that generations ago you gained much earlier high. Am I being unreasonable to think it would be better if it was more practical for people to get a job and as a result move out, become adults, than what they already are with the system. For most young people, adolescence seems to drag on into their early 20s due to delay, leaving school and university, and getting on the property ladder. Take a breath. If you stayed in school for 18 years and you can't use a single full stop. That's exactly what I was going to say. Literacy privilege and all that, but this paragraph needs some full stops. It doesn't even have a comma.

No, now you read all that as one long, unbroken sentence, and it needs some punctuation there. It's got a couple of slashes in it. It's got some capital letters, capital letters, a bunch of a sort. Are the only capital letters I can see at the start? And then for, am I being unreasonable, where they've said, A, I, B, you. And they've only capitalised the A, so that it's like, like, you're supposed to be saying, Ibu. For non-regular listeners, this is, this is something we come across every six months, where a mum's now once child labour reintroduced for whatever reason.

It's always part of a scheme. Yeah. Stick them down the mines, make Britain great after Brexit, like whatever wild idea they've got that children can do this labour for. I don't know why they think that reducing the education, like compulsory education age, will fix the housing crisis. People aren't going to suddenly be buying homes because they left school at 14. The reason that people who did leave school at 14 could buy homes at 18 is because it was 60 years ago. and things were quite different. It's not that everyone's got too much education to buy our house. It's that the market doesn't work.

What are you on about? To think society would be better as well. Like, not the UK, not UK society, not British society. Just society. Just society, yeah. The Federation. United Federation of Earth. Gain independence that generations ago you gained much earlier,

Why? Why does it just say hi? That's high as in height as well. That's H-I-G-H. Yeah, I don't understand. So earlier on on the radio, when they were talking about how allegedly talking about white privilege means that white working class kids do badly at school, somebody had phoned up to say, well, I think the working class kids who are working class should just do vocational courses. and that would be better for the working class kids who are working class. Why have you assumed that all working class kids have no interest in study in the academic sense and that all middle and upper class kids have no interest in vocational things?

This all seems to tie into this like weird view of the world that people have. Yeah, it's cool to literally segregate children by class. That seems like a great way to... Well, like secondary moderns, is that what you mean? Is that because that sounds like what you're saying? And I just feel like, I bet if we dig into this, this is what we're going to get from this as well. There we go. Unless you're academic, being stuck in education until 18, isn't really a benefit for many teenagers. Yeah, with academic has occurred there for middle or upper class.

Yeah. And a lot of, like, you can stay in education until you're 18 in things which are not your A levels. Like, people are in education till 18 on apprenticeships, because apprenticeships are education. And so, I suppose, what's the argument there that the apprenticeship wage is too long? low for them to count as being part of the workforce because they could not buy a house on it. This country, where everyone wants to work themselves to death, just throw me down the mines and let me work forever.

That's what people really want. They don't want four-day weeks or universal basic income. They want to be worked to the grave. Someone said we have a couple of 16-year-olds at work, their hard work, and we're all being mum at work these days. Some days they're a reliability. It's got their children. Let them be children. Yeah, completely. Don't force them into the workplace.

There was a woman I worked with, an old job, and she joined as an apprentice at 16, and she was 21, and the workplace was lent towards being an older group of staff anyway. She was 21, and she'd talk about, like, the menopause and slimming world with all these women in their 50s, and she'd be like, really into it. I'm like, oh, girl, you're 20, you should be out clubbing. Yeah, the workforce prematurely aged you. You should be having fun. You shouldn't have to be talking about hot flashes over. for a lunch of someone just eating a potato with a tin of warmed up macral on it. What are you doing? Come on.

Yeah. Oh, good. Another education bashings, Fred. There are enough underqualified and educated people in the workforce. Thanks very much. Great way to drive wages down. You're a genius, O.P.

I roll emoji. Mary Poppins emoji. I was not gentle. I joined the workforce at 14 and still stayed in school until 18 and then university. working and being educated, not mutually exclusive. Your post really undermines your argument, to be honest. I wouldn't hire someone who can write a few coherent paragraphs.

Ooh. How would society be better? No. You're a long time working as it is. Also, when people did choose to join the workforce at 14, they weren't expected to work until 67, 68, 75, 80, whatever it is that we're going to be when we're finally allowed to retire. Yeah.

So, no, let people delay it for a few more years, and fanny around. And just shut the hell up, actually. You can't apply old paradigms to society the way it is now. You can't be conservative. You simply must not be conservative. Some people can for some reason. Yeah, and now people are saying,

oh, well, when I was at school, they used to doing classes in, home-ex, textiles, woodworking, metalwork, mechanics, technical drawing, child care and first aid. They still do teach all those things. Yeah. I have a GTSE and woodwork. Electronics. Yeah, and my sixth form ran like NVQ, whatever it is, B-TEC child care courses and other six forms did other vocational things.

It just looks like someone's looked at one extremely small six-form, probably attached to a grammar school, seeing that everyone's doing like A-levels and thought, this simply does not work. Everyone's studying critical race theory. My A-level and critical race theory. These kids wandering around with their Angela Wydier. This text. Why aren't, mate, down pit? Yeah. All the pits are closed.

Put down your Tenehassy Coates, children. Have you got something from Not This Board? Yeah, would you like an Ask UK? Always. Question. Let's go over to Reddit slash Ask UK. My alarm failed to go off, and I slept through my own leaving announcement meeting at work today. What on earth can I do?

Was this where the OPE found out that they were? were leaving. It's like, Bob isn't here again and we're firing him. He shouldn't be the last to know, but I mean, really, he's brought this on himself. No, they just slept through the going away announcement in the morning meeting. The team are rightly furious with me. I'm mortified. Why are you being? The damage has plainly been done. The team need a sense of humour, because I think that's extremely funny. Yeah, it's big being on your notice energy. It's a sleep for your own, leaving announcement meeting. I want to know everything about what made it such a big deal

that the team are understandably fuming or whatever it is that the OPEC said. And where are they going? Oh, I need backstory. I need so much backstory. They're finally beginning of Masters and then hopefully going out to do a PhD. Thankfully, neither of those things require me to get up at 9 a.m. when they noticed that the OP wasn't there why didn't they say we'll push this back

we'll do this next time why did they do it unless it's a super short notice period and in that case don't worry about it you won't see these people ever again really soon don't stress about it someone says you're leaving and never have to see these people again exactly the spirit

I missed my leaving announcement and presentation at an old job because I was somewhere noisy in the factory fixing something. Apparently there was a lot of piss-taking about me being useless and reliable. I couldn't care less. I was leaving. That is the spirit. That is very much the spirit.

When I left my last job, it was the custom there that Bond's manager would send an email round saying, I have some news to share on behalf of so-and-so. I'm delighted to say that they've been off a new role will be sad to see them go. Which I think is the custom in many places. but I asked my manager if she intended to do that

and she was a bit like, well, why can't you send the email? I could, it's just, that's not what people do here. It seems weird. Like, you know I'm leaving because working here has made me miserable and I think it's toxic. Do you really want me to send an all points email about this? And she was like, okay, we are very sorry to see Helen go, but, yeah, because I will say exactly what I mean.

I think that might be why we didn't do leaving announcements in case someone blurted something out. about how much they hated everything. Yeah, why do they make a big announcement about it? Why do people care so much? It's so weird. With all due respect, and you really should have thought of that

before you became an absentee employee for sleeping at work. I chill out. I'm sorry, with all due respect there is doing the work that that OAP accused gently of doing. And I think gently is actually used when people are conveying a gentleness. I don't think that with all due respect

ever conveys respect I've got another quick one Let's do it What's a wear for an interview at Weatherspoons Oh And there's a lot of discussion on actual interview stuff to wear But I just liked this comment

Massive EU flag I had this real shit show In Alex who worked at Weatherspens and was so excited for the interview I'm pretty sure that you had it in a suit You're a dweeb The consensus is like Dress Smart

maybe a collared shirt, but don't go, don't go overboard. You probably don't need a suit. Probably don't wear a suit to your Spoon's interview. At the end of the day, it's Spoons. They have a chronic staffing shortage due to Brexit and COVID. It should be okay. Union Jack shorts, crocs and a hank of your horny t-shirt. Whatever Tim Martin has been wearing in his latest press clipping.

Oh no, you can't dress as the owner. Yeah. Because the person hiring you will be someone who's worked. They're for four months and is therefore the longest serving employee. And they don't care. They just need to get by. Some spaghetti sauce over a white shirt and beer stains on the trouser. So not a seat then.

Going dressed as a microwave, your foot right in. Yeah, that is something that I heard. Apparently the only thing they don't microwave is the burgers. And I was like, well, about the steaks? It's like, don't. You don't eat steaks. You don't need to know. You're never going to order a steak from spoons, but don't think about it ever again.

I was like, oh, okay. You do. Yeah. I think the best thing to come. come out of that relationship with a deep understanding of how spoons works and what not to order. Anything. Just don't order anything. Just don't go to spoons.

Yeah, great. Should you do another mum's net. Am I being unreasonable to think pants shouldn't be on the washing line if you have guests? I attended a barbecue at a colleague's house this weekend in the garden, obviously, and I thought it was a bit strange because his pants were on the washing line in full view of everyone. I felt a bit embarrassed that he didn't seem phased. There were about ten people there from work. Maybe I'm a bit odd, but I wouldn't put my underwear on the washing line if they have people over. Am I being unreasonable?

So we are talking about pants as in undercrackers. Yeah, kecks. Not trousers. Yeah, panties. Panties, boxers shorts, briefs. Exactly, yeah. Whatever they happen to be wearing. Yeah.

Not at the time. No, I think if you went to someone's barbecue and they were wearing only some briefs and also they had some pants on the washing line, the washing line pants wouldn't be the ones I found note worthy. I mean, if it were me, putting myself in their shoes, in their pants, I probably wouldn't organise my washing, so it's not hanging out on barbecue day. Well, this is what... But I'm very organised. I do wonder how dire the pants situation was.

If you were like, you know what, all my pants are going to smell like sausages, but that's just how it has to be. Well, yeah, that's a consideration. You shouldn't have stuff out at a barbecue anyway, because it's going to stink a smoke. Exactly. Like, you know, when you come home from a barbecue, you smell that you've been at a barbecue. Yeah, you can be down wind of it, but you're still going to get some residual. So what, you found those pants. You're going to have smoky pants. You put your pants away. A week later, a week after the barbecue, you open your pants drawer.

You put your pants on. Oh, great. Now your bum smells a barbecue. Delicious. Delicious, but you don't want to eat your own pants. You go to work, your colleagues are like, can you smell barbecue? And everyone's like, it's Jeff's pants, remember, we saw them. Ten of us were there. We saw them on the washing line in full view of everything. We saw everything.

It's a bit of a power move, isn't it? I'm going to invite my colleagues over to look at my pants. You hope they have been cleaned properly. They don't have, you know, skid marks. Oh, no. Oh, that would be very off-putting. Inside-out skid-mark pants on the washing line. Oh, no.

That's a power move. That's not a power. That's a cry for hell. They're going to be manager within a few weeks. Oh, skidmark. Oh, meaty skid marks, the manager now. Yeah, he is. Oh, no.

That's manager skid marks to you. No, I wouldn't do it. And I guess I would think it was weird, yeah, if I was at someone's house and they did this. Yeah. I might say, your pants are going to get smoke on them. Very matter-of-factly like that. Gently, your pants are going to get smoke all. over them, mate.

Someone has said in my old flats, people used to have washing lines outside their front door because we had no balconies at the back or gardens, just a communal balcony on the front. One woman used to have all her underwear hanging up outside her front door. That's all right. That's very different. That's not a social event. This is what we used to hang our washing. One woman hung her washing.

Did you just never wash your pants? All your pants just put away wet. During the summer, I've been putting washing out on the balcony. Road hard and put away wet. Who cares? Terrible. Yeah, lots of people commenting on the smell of barbecue. Someone, I can't find it now, but someone was like,

oh, we'll have the dogs chasing him. Okay. Yeah, that's true. I have dogs chasing you as if you had sausages in your pockets. Yeah, it's weird to have your washing out, but whether specifically I find it weird to have your pants out, any washing at all I would find odd, because of the barbecue thing. Because of the barbecue thing.

But also, one of my most mum's netty beliefs is, this could take a turn. One of my most mum's netty beliefs is something a bit declasset about having washing on balconies. Yeah, and I know that's unreasonable. Yeah, because I want to use the power of the sun to get our clothes dry. Yeah, and I, for some reason, think that makes us look a bit common. But they're only out there for a few hours. Yeah, I know. I know I'm being unreasonable.

But what I'm saying is because I know I'm being unreasoned about this, I have no idea whether my take is reasonable in any way. I would find it weirder if it was bed sheets. Bed sheets, you don't want barbecue on towels. You don't want barbecue smell on. No. Socks, I might put out there at a push. Because you want your feet to smell like barbecue rather than feet.

Well, they're way down there. I can't smell them. Barbecue spend is strong. I think I could accept it on. I could live with it on socks. But the question is, why have I done? on the load of socks. That's not a sensible washing load. Yeah, what happened that meant you got through so many socks that week?

This is why I want to know why he only had pants out. I want to know why... Pissed himself. Why did he have to do it a whole load of only pants? Pissed himself. Over and over and over again. Oh, that's really sad. There's a lot of stigma around incontinence. Maybe he was trying to break down the stigma. He was trying to start a conversation about continent's issues in men. Yeah, welcome to my incontinence barbecue. That comes to my barbecue. Let's talk about incontinence.

Now's as good a time as any. We're biting into their sausages and they're like, it's not. That is not as good a time as any. That is a bad time, thank you. We've eaten and we've eaten well. And now I'm going to talk to you about a real issue. Yeah, and that's when he gets a big sheet that is hanging over the washing line and the sheet has got a whole load of diagrams about incontinence.

And that's on it, especially incontinence sheets. I do think that having any washing at all out during a barbecue is weird. And I do think it's weird to have a washing load, which is only pants. So I'm sort of with the O-P, but I don't know if I can know if I can know it's enough to go to mum's net and be like, saw a load of pants earlier. You're not four. It's pants. Yeah, I like just keep that in my pocket. Yeah.

Well, at least you know they were clean. One more thread. One more. Am I being unreasonable? Someone keeps using my email address. What would you do? Someone keeps using my very boring first name, love. name iCloud account. I know it sounds like a minor irritation, but it's more than just spam,

e.g, they bought a load of stuff at Walmart using the address. So I was getting the order confirmation, the order dispatch, the order arrived emails, the product reminder emails. It's at least medium annoying. I'm getting loads of insurance email, lots of Fox Nation ones. And it's all the same person, so not spam as such, but purpose for activity. Last year, she bought flights using my email. I could see her full name, address, names of her children, and even had access to cancel the flight. I got in touch with the place where she bought it and asked them to take the account down. They did. Until next time, she's just bought a new flight, a short internal US flight. I can cancel it in one click. I'm really tempted. What would you do? There was a US phone number

in the booking details, so I've messaged it. It was on I message. And asked them to stop using my email address, please. I was nice. I sent a follow-up saying I would cancel the flight. in the morning. The message has been delivered, but not read. Of course, that could be fake, too. I can't find her on social media or Facebook. But I've messaged someone who could be her son. I don't know if it's laziness, stupidity, maliciousness, probably the first. But it's making me grumpy when I think about it, which is only when I get a new email with all her details in it. When deleting her flight, be a step too far. I've changed username for this thread. It's only angry when emails come in. A little pitt.

Ping. damn you why would you assume it was laziness or malice rather than like an error yeah I mean this I mean this sounds like maybe someone who's not very good at using the internet has their email address wrong

and keeps putting it in wrong and is you know generalising contacting like a younger relative to say why do I never get any emails why do I never get order confirmations or things like that oh Walmart service isn't very good How do I look at my eye messages? My mum used to get emails meant for some other woman

who was using my mum's email address. They had the same name. I think it was just that one of them had a dot in their email address and the other didn't. And this woman probably had it on her like auto form filler. But like, oh yeah, I'll just put that in. And she was in America. Do you think it's my mum?

That is not my mum. I'm sure it's not my mum. It just sounds like a mistake, an honest mistake. It really does, which is why canceling the flight. Seems like such a bitchy thing to do. Like, I message and I was nice. Anyway, then I said I'd cancel her flight in the morning. They sound very nice.

They can't have enough trouble getting on the flight without the confirmation email. Without, you know, the booking reference or the PDF ticket or whatever. Just leave them. They got to have enough trouble. I can picture this woman and she's at the airport. She's gone to the checking desk. She's in a flap. She's panicking.

I never actually got an email. That's okay, just give us your name and whatever, we'll sort it out. And they just print her a boarding pass. It's an extra step that she shouldn't have to go through. What if it's like a budget airline, and they charge her $60 to print a boarding pass? Yeah, Delta would do that. I suppose, though, maybe this woman would be saving her $60 if she cancelled the flight. She wouldn't have to buy a boarding pass.

Yes, but she also wouldn't go on a trip. Yes, that would be bad. I hope she needs COVID-Cure. I'm sure that she's fine. Well, actually, I don't know that someone who... He doesn't know how I'm generalising again, that's not fair. That's not fair. There seems to be contact details here.

Somebody also pointed out the time difference, and they're like, when did you send a message? What time is it there at the moment? Well, yeah. Because this thread was posted at, like, sort of 8.30 in the morning, UK time. That's that night in America. Yeah. They'll be sleeping.

Somewhere between half past 12 and half past 3 in the morning. Yeah. I think this old lady might be having. having a snooze. You've got some contact details, like a dress and stuff. Send a letter, call the number. Yeah, someone said call the number, but don't do it now because of the time difference. That was at 8.30.

You've potentially contacted the sun. If all this doesn't work, go to Neve and Cammy on MTV's Catfish, the TV show. Or better yet, Uber and Julie on Catfish UK, the TV show. Oobes. I think we found something. We've got a good one here, oops. I just don't understand. I may have messaged someone who could be her son

what if she's booking flights for herself and her son that actually makes me think that she might be a little younger than we're placing her and her son is an actual child and she's messaged a wee boy to say it's your mummy there I'm cancelling her flight

is your mummy going to see your grandma for the first time in over a year not anymore there's a Twitch stream where I've been watching for several weeks who I think might be her son I've been trying to get his attention in the chat but he's just big on Minecraft

and he's not really looking at the chat his hot top stream got banned why did the OPE go to cancelling the flight straight away why didn't the OPE like camper with the Walmart order why was there no small escalation just like zero to a hundred in... Oh, I don't understand at all. No, it seems like fairly easily resolvable.

What would you do? If someone was using your email address, out of malice, what would you do with their emails? I would simply delete them unread. Yeah, delete them, see if I could find a way to filter them into a folder. Yeah. Like if they contain... I think it would be easy to filter all the Walmart ones out.

Like, just mark Walmart. spam. Use Walmart. Yeah. The only time I've been to Walmart was to buy a big bag of pretzels in the States. I did that with cash. You didn't order it. Order it for delivery.

No. To my hotel room in wherever I was, Indianapolis. Oh, the life of a globe trotter. It was crazy times. Yeah, it sounds just great. So we do a speed round. Let's mix things up with an Ask UK speed round. Yeah.

I forgot to notify HMRC that I was moving abroad. Am I in trouble? Yes. Spontaneous trip to London. Need ideas? No, we've got loads of ideas. Yeah, it's funny, let's get a question mark. What things are incredibly overpriced in the UK? Housing. It's because the 16-year-olds are at school, so housing is expensive.

And someone put an elastic man on my front door handle, because it's potentially dodger. Oh, yes. I've been paranoid, right? No. Oh, no. No, you used that. email address so they've marked you. They had the address from one of your delivery emails and it happened to be convenient for them to drive an eight-hour round trip to put an elastic

band on your door. Yeah, not just a royal mail person. No, definitely not. Do you have anything to plug else? Uh, no, I've got some poems knocking about, I've got an article knocking about, it's all on linktra.e. slash helen sullis Bowie. Didn't you have an article on the official startrek.com website? I had an article on the official startrak.com website and then someone on Twitter, who I would consider a poetry friend, said, well, your writing career has peaked. So it's good to know what the poets think of my poetry. Thanks, J.P.

But no, it is genuinely very exciting. It was a Pride Month article about Deep Space Nine and Chosen Family. Beautiful. It's a great piece. I had to do so much admin to invoice them that I'm going to pitch them every week for the rest of my life to make getting on their invoicing system worthwhile. Great.

And I had my article finally come out in Press Start Journal about post-humanism and the representation of subjectivities in the game Outer Wilds. I'm telling people to not read it if they haven't played the game Outer Wilds, because it's full of spoilers. And also I presented a paper at the first Twin Peaks, The Return Online Conference about time and nuclear in Twin Peaks. And that's on YouTube. And links to both these things can be found on linktru.e.

Simon X IX. Fabulous. Great stuff. I do have one thing to plug. My lit mag about potatoes will be landing from the printers extremely soon. If anyone would like to buy a copy, it is a 12-page lit mag of poetry, prose, recipes and some art about potatoes. It's all about potatoes. About the humble apple of the earth.

Pondita! That's happening. So that's on Twitter at Tatizene. At Tatizene, yeah. Great. Order yourself a copy. Yeah, you should. Otherwise, we'll have all the copies here.

And that'll get in the way of where Solomon wants to sit. As I move them into every seat, he goes to sit in. Thanks for listening. Thank you, bye. Thank you, goodbye.