Bars which are so loud, no one can communicate!

You…..what?

Whilst out with some very close friends this evening, we decided to try a new bar nearby the restaurant we had recently left. The evening was young and it felt too early to simply go home. Whilst we may be middle-aged (or whatever that means) we already felt the music was on the louder side of our comfort zone before we had purchased drinks. Perhaps we should have taken the hint and gone home. However, we liked the ambiance of this bar with its Turkish ambiance, private booths immersed with candle light and tent-like scarves  and were enjoying a good evening. The music was reasonable, but the volume simply wasn’t. After a short while the volume increased meaning we three amigos had to lean in further to hear one another. I spoke to the bar lady to enquire about the possibility of hiring this rather soiree bar in central London, but to also ask if I could control the volume, which, apparently, If I was hiring the space, I could.

After about half an hour a large hen-party arrived. It seemed frustrating that we should leave a venue, but on the other hand, we could no longer communicate and it seemed a waste of what had been a very good evening. We begun to observe the groups of people and realised that only those next to each other could speak to each other. Anybody else seemed ostracised or had decided to use their phone as a method of communication, which seemed rather unfortunate when they were already “apparently” with a group of their friends. I thus concluded that we were, after all, completely isolated beings with all the isolation that entails.

As someone who has a mental health problem, I found this incredibly sad. I had come out for an evening to spend with some close friends. We had enjoyed a lovely meal together but yet our evening was abruptly terminated because the bar we chose to visit opted to make their music so loud it rendered conversation impossible. As a race we are becoming more and more isolated. It is time to turn down the volume and listen.

Isobel Knight

28.7.13/

At the Vets

At the Vets:
“What do you feed her on, mate?”
“She gets what I get!” “Last night she had Indian.”
“No wonder she is farting like a trooper!”
“She got Mexican the night before!”
“Do you give her chocolate?”
“Oh yeah! She gets two or three Mars bars or Flakes a day!”
“Do you exercise her?”
“Yeah, a bit. She gets ten minutes here and there throughout the day.”
“She’s only a year old, no wonder you can’t control her!”

Conversation heard at A&E

At A&E:
“Stick a finger up your ‘ole’ and swivel!”
“I don’t care what I say or what anyone else ‘ears me saying; they can shove it up their fucking arses”
“These chairs are like in Police Cells except there warmer. There really ‘ard in the cells and cold. These ones are warmer, but still fucking uncomfortable.”
“Ere, give us a fag. Does anyone want a fight? – I’ll give ‘em a fucking fight!”

Keep on trying to ring then!

Keep on trying to ring then!

I just rang an NHS Therapy centre to organise for some therapist who gave a talk to my volunteers at work, another training session next year. Despite the fact I have emailed several times and left a few messages, I decided to ring their main switchboard operator, who most helpfully told me to "keep phoning them then"

Pain out to lunch

Pain Out to Lunch

At 1.40pm on Wednesday afternoonI stood at the counter of my local chemist clutching my stomach, and stooping like an old woman. Distress radiated from my face and I had a green NHS prescription in my hand. The pharmacist assistant spent five long minutes talking to the man ahead of me about his piles and returning his tablets and various other completely unimportant matters. The pharmacist assistant had clearly clocked me and could see clearly that I was in pain and had a prescription to hand in. After what seemed like another five minutes of extraneous banter with the piles man, she turned to me and said, "The pharmacy is closed until 2pm". Having seen me in the state I was, why could she not have told me? My retort was "You can see I am in pain, why on earth couldn't you have told me that before keeping me waiting in pain for ten minutes". She just said "sorry love". Honestly, these people have got no common sense at all. This happened on another day at another chemist where the assistant said "we have the tablets", but the pharmacist is at lunch. I wish I could park my pain at lunch!

Self-Service

Self-Service

I only went into Morrisions to pick up a few things; I really wasn't in the mood for shopping, and I dragged my feet around the aisles gathering precisely two cartons of orange juice, which happened to be on offer, 3 packets of chocolate raisins and a fab pair of really essential purple tights. I made my way to the check-out. As per usual in this store, the lines were long until I got to the self-service section which appeared to be empty. "Why not?" I thought to myself. "must be easier than the work photocopier to use". I requested some assistance and someone shuffled along to help me at the speed of light (could have lit at least 500 candles in that time) and said I must use a plastic carrier bag and put my things in there. "Well! - so much for saving the planet from overuse of plastic bags", I thought. I even had a recycled bag with me. Then things got interesting. I scanned in an item to hear the customary blip as the machine recorded the item (purple tights), but chocolate raisins were more a problem - same item to scan through three times, and machine took a dislike to the other two packets. The final straw was the orange juice "You must put all the items in the plastic bag, love" - Second orange juice wouldn't scan. I nearly left the lot there and then. It is as plain as day why the self-service section is empty - it seemed to take twice as long for half as many items as I normally have. The tortoise who helped me made a sloth look fast. It will be shopping at check-out all the way for me in future. God save the check-out staff!