The trials of online shopping

 I wrote a story for Paragraph Planet yesterday but I don’t think they will publish these 75 words. Actually, on reflection I don’t think they should.

It’s about the “ridiculous” laws around buying a knife.

It’s not about buying a machete.

Its about buying a cheese knife for attacking a chunk of cheddar.

Although I suppose you could cause much harm with a cheese knife if you had the mind to.

The other thing you should know about the story is that it comes from a true story. My friend is of a certain age and the way she related her tale had us all giggling.

She was buying the knife on line and somehow had to prove she was over 18 to the robot at the other end.

Being quick witted she typed in her credit card details, reasoning you can’t have a credit card under the age of 18. Incontrovertible proof!

“You have given me rather a lot of personal information.” Was the robots reply.

“Can you delete it please.”

Hopefully it complied but it still didn’t address the issue of proving her age.

 

I realise knife crime is a serious issue. I’d love to visit the knife angel sculpture if I ever get a chance. It looks both magnificent and poignant.

Of course we should have laws for buying knives, scissors, matches, guns, and anything that can cause deliberate harm.

I wish there were more laws against selling weapons and arms to powerful people who use them to destroy and maim and subjugate.

 

I don’t expect to hear back from Paragraph Planet on this occasion. You can’t always explain the context in just 75 words. But hopefully in just under 400 words you will understand this has much more to do with how some people struggle with online shopping. What was once a simple task has now tied us up in knots.

 

This was the day she realised the world had gone totally mad, not only did she have to prove she was not a robot but now the robot at the other end of the algorithm wanted her to prove her age. She remembered rationing after the war and her phone number from 1972. She remembered the days you could but an axe at the hardware store but today she can’t buy a cheese knife online.

Secret Note Night and the Northern Lights

I’ve not written anything about my love life recently, and when I say love life, I mean the intermittent saga of being widowed and single in your middle years and wondering if I will ever have someone special to share them with.

Granite Man was so long ago – sigh! ...because everybody needs a hero...

On-line dating seems like a non-starter. Scarily Honest or Honestly Scary

And yet I found some very depressing stats the other day that 60% of couples meet on-line these days.

Screenshots taken from a video on Instagram - so very random dates
My parents met in the late 60 - through family connections
Andrew and I met in the early 90s through church

I still think we should start a trend of meeting people in bookshops with the opening chat-up line being - “Have you read this book?”

Until that day a local bar, (well local enough to me but far enough away so I don’t run into people I already know or went to school with – that’s what school reunions are made for) holds Secret Note Nights for singles to meet up the “old fashioned” way, in person.

Originally this started as Single Social and I’ve written about that before… a message to the two men at the bar

There wasn’t a great deal of mixing at Single Socials but this new idea has injected an element of fun and causes much hilarity.

On each table is a small note book and pen, the idea being if someone catches your eye you can send them a secret note, delivered by the hostess for the evening – I shall call her Emma. 

With a glint in her eye and a way of getting information out of people, she can recite who is sitting where, what they do and where they live. She also mixes a mean cocktail – this woman has skills MI5 would kill for!

On Thursday I went with a school friend – we have known each other since we were 5 and have both been on our own for several years. We are not desperate for love but some kind of companionship would be welcome.

We chatted with a gentleman in our age bracket, invited him to join our long table but he obviously wasn’t interested in either of us, saying he preferred to loiter by the bar and keep his options open. Fair enough, it was a polite refusal – we ordered food and carried on our own conversation.

Until 2 young men asked to sit at our table. They were both good looking and utterly charming but alas of a similar age to our children.

However, the one beside me slid a note along the table with a cheeky grin.

PLEASE HELP I’VE BEEN KIDNPPED!

I thought for a moment and looked at the remnants of my cheese platter.

I can pay the ransom in half tomatoes and a piece of cheese.

He was very quick witted; I really admired his style.

            Throw in a parsnip, and you have a deal!

Then I wrote the line that perhaps betrayed my age.

            Is your name Baldrick?

We laughed and they did know who Baldrick was… maybe.

But I need someone who understands jokes about counting beans, Mrs Miggins Pie shop and why Bob and Bernard are such great names Darling. I want someone who will pander to my every whim as If I were Queenie.

We left and on our drive home, the moon looked incredible, a perfect arc criss-crossed with wispy clouds. I would have loved to stop and take a photo, but photos of the moon never look as magical as the real thing. Just a smudge in the sky.

And yet I came home to all these photos on Facebook of a magnificent Northern Lights display.

I went out into the garden and starred up at the sky. There was a slight pinky glow but I couldn’t be sure if my eyes were playing tricks on me. I remembered hearing you usually see the colours clearer through a phone lens, so I took a photo. It was RUBBISH! A totally black screen.

Feeling cold I gave up and went indoors but still couldn’t resist another peek, hanging out of my bedroom window looking northwards – I had to check that on Google maps first, my windows don’t face in the right direction, except a bathroom one with frosted glass that opens out to see next door and not an inch of sky in sight.

Defeated I decided to go to bed with a good book, but life would be so much different if I had someone else here. Someone who would encourage me to go out on a midnight walk around town together, even venture further into the countryside, holding hands, marvelling at God’s creation.

But I just have to face facts – some of us don’t get to see the Northern Lights, however much we pursue them. Maybe we are not patient enough, or circumstances conspire against us, we are just never in the right place at the right time.

You can live a perfectly fulfilled life without – even marvelling at the photos on social media. You can be happy for everyone else and their sightings.

At the end of the day, I am content that once I did see them.

We took a family day trip to Lapland at see Father Christmas when the boys were small. Andrew was working away that Christmas so this was a special treat. We never took photos but I do remember the colours dancing, the magic covering our family of four.

Maybe one day I will see them again but until then…

stolen from a friend on Facebook 

Content warning: contains S**t

This is a blog post I never thought I’d write and if you are squeamish or don’t like conversations about bodily fluids then look away now.

I feel compelled to write because this weekend it is Stoma Aware Day or World Ostomy Day if you want to go global.

So, let’s start from the beginning with the obvious question, what exactly is a stoma?

A stoma is an opening on the surface of the abdomen which has been surgically created to divert the flow of faeces or urine. And it is estimated that one in 335 people in the UK are currently living with a stoma. Taken from the Colostomy UK website.

Chances are if you know over 300 people one of them might have a stoma and you might not even know because it can be a very private thing that they don’t want to discuss. How many of us like to talk about our toilet habits if we poo normally, the idea of pooing into a bag stuck to your tummy due to rearranged internal plumbing is quite a lot to get your head round.

I have written about having a stoma, I’ve never been secretive about it. Mine was created during surgery for bowel cancer. It ended up being an emergency procedure, but I knew before I went under the anaesthetic it was a possibility, although I had no idea what it would actually entail – it was a steep learning curve waking up in critical care – but that another long story.

Cancer is only one reason people have stomas. Others have them because of bowel and digestive complaints such as Crohn’s and colitis. Often their quality of life is greatly improved as their symptoms are alleviated and they don’t need to access the toilet so frequently therefore enjoying a more “normal” life.

However I found a new statistic recently…

Over fifty percent of people living with stomas suffer from leakage which means access to public toilets is vital to enable them to live fulfilling lives and ensure they do not face social exclusion and isolation. https://www.colostomyuk.org/campaigns/stoma-aware-day-2024-do-you-see-me/ 

I am fairly lucky, leaks when I am out and about are few and far between. I usually get to a toilet in time for a quick bag change and no one is any the wiser, even if I spend longer in the cubicle than most. I carry a small pouch of supplies with me, but to be honest it only happens about three or four times a year.

The worst one was about a year ago when I went to visit a friend for a few days. I was driving up the A1 and suddenly became aware of a sensation akin to having a balloon fill up with water in inside your clothes.

I slipped my right hand just inside my seatbelt on my tummy and yes I was leaking!

Fortunately, I found a service station with a disabled toilet not too far away. I grabbed my stoma supplies from under the passenger car seat, where I keep them for emergencies. As I was visiting friends, I had an overnight bag in the boot with everything else I needed. I emerged a new woman.

As I said this happened a year ago and I’ve had nothing as dramatic happen to me since. At night I tend to wake up before a serious catastrophe occurs. Although I have been known to have a 3 a.m. shower and have to change the bed. Living alone, sometimes has its advantages.

However yesterday, after reading the statistics about leakage I had another major incident – very similar to my A1 experience. Only this time I was much closer to home. A good thing right?

Hmmmm, well I knew where I was going and I knew there was a petrol station up ahead, but sitting in a car breaking for the roundabout, then accelerating means you are almost pumping the bag to squeeze a little bit more of the offending fluid out.

I’m sorry if this is all gross, I did give you a warning but this is reality, not just for me but for many others. Often people are denied access to a toilet in an emergency, or get disgusted looks when exiting a disabled toilet but looking perfectly able – not all disabilities are visible!

I reached the services, grabbed what I needed and was thankfully unchallenged when I slipped into the toilet at the back of the shop. It was spacious with a sink that was most welcome. The floor was wet with an A frame cleaning sign in the middle. It didn’t look like it had recently been cleaned but it certainly wasn’t the worst I’ve seen.

I then proceeded to strip off and clean myself up. 

"Sorry it's engaged!" I called out a couple of times when someone tried the door

Now I’d only been out for lunch and I don’t regularly carry a full spare set of clothes with me.

However, the chance of a mooch round the charity shops after lunch was too good to miss and I’d bought myself a new dress, well I say dress, one of those shorter ones I prefer to wear with leggings but I emerged bare legged with my boots and socks on carrying my rolled up stained clothes.

Cath Kidston dress - a lifesaver!

No body saw me – phew!

Only I had to stop for printer paper on the way home so I pulled my coat over the short dress, it didn’t cover me any more than the dress did. Then I dashed into Currys, trying to act all nonchalant and not spend all the time pulling the hem of my skirt down to cover my legs – never my best feature – just keep smiling.

At least I didn’t bump into anyone know…

“Sarah!” Oh no too late.

I apologised for the way I was dressed.

“Your boots match your dress, you look lovely.”

Ah a true friend, someone who overlooks my eccentricities and quirky dress sense, and sees the real me.

I could have lots of labels if I want them, a writer, a mother, a widow and an ostomate but none of them define all of me.

Please be kind if someone takes longer in the loo before you. Don’t tut if someone walks out the of disabled loo but looks perfectly able, because I have a radar key for legitimate reasons and I am not afraid to use it! 

And I am NOT alone!

a radar key used to access disabled toilets and a stoma bag