The view from my window

The view from my window
The view from my window

Sunday 9 June 2019

A productive day - and a misogynistic troll!

The weather is just unbelievable here. We get a few days of sunshine and then it's back to piddling down rain. I can't really say we have even had a spring, it's so weird. Buuuuttt the weather was glorious yesterday when our local town of La Roche held its annual (or is that semi-annual?) vide grenier! I routinely refer to a "vide grenier" - "attic emptier" in English - but for those that don't understand, they are not car boot sales as such, nor are they garage sales. They don't really have either here. Vide greniers are organized by the local village, commune or town where people can indeed set up stalls/tables and try to sell their unwanted items. You have to reserve and pay for your spot and all the stalls are centrally located. There is always food and drink available, sometimes a bouncy castle and sometimes even music! It's a very sociable event and also a great way to pick up a few items cheaply. Anyhoo, La Roche had theirs yesterday and were lucky enough to have the most glorious weather! I'm on a bit of a roll with the decluttering so I wanted to take a trip down to the recycling centre first (one of my "foibles" is that I have to get the stuff out of my house now if possible so I don't change my mind), and so I arranged to meet my friend in town. We had a merguez sandwich (a spicy North African sausage) as we wandered round but nothing seemed to catch our eye - or maybe we've just wise up to the fact that we don't always have to buy things - so we decided to go sit on the terrace of a lovely local restaurant and have a drink. The place was heaving so we had to wait ages, but we didn't mind actually as we were sat in the shade trying to decipher the latest missive from the UK Government on the "driving licence position" after Brexit! Great fun. We had quite a giggle because this shit makes the US constitution look like kindergarten reading! My friend's problem is that she never swapped her British driving licence for a French one when she moved into France (I did) because she didn't have to. Now she has sent off her licence to the French to get it swapped and they are either sending them back saying "not necessary" (as yet) or, as in her case, have just hung on to it. From what we can decipher, it may well come to the point that she will have to retake her test (including the highway code) at the age of 62!!!! What a bloody mess! I'm so glad I went ahead and swapped mine. It was like trying to read a Harry Potter novel in one sitting so we were really glad when the drinks came, I can tell ya!

The church in La Roche. My husband used to hang out in the skuzzie bar opposite! "Fond" memories!
A local drum band formed the only entertainment, as far as I could tell. Very loud, very inclusive (all ages) and actually great. They made you picture Rob Roy and the "marauding" clans swarming over the mountain top (or that could have been the wine)! But seriously they added a great (and unusual) atmosphere!



When I got back I ended up spending an hour tidying up my front garden - which is a joke actually because it is about the size of a postage stamp, but at least I trimmed back the wisteria and the rose bushes as (a) I don't want the wisteria growing up into the eaves and (b) trimming back the roses allows me to open and close my shutters more easily!

I stayed up late again (!!) because I saw that "Mrs. Brown, Da Movie" was on so I thought I would watch that. It's daft really because I bought it when it came out and I wasn't overly impressed (even though I love Mrs. Brown's Boys) but last night I either just "got it", or my taste has changed. Either way it tickled me this time!

On to today (and most likely the rest of the week), and the weather has been crap! I wasn't too bothered about it though as I decided today would be the day to "get things done" - and I actually did! Now I've had my hair cut I decided to colour it - I don't have any grey (thank you dad - he never went grey) but I get a bit bored with the colour so occasionally decide to colour it to "jizz" things up a bit. Now this I can do, though that being said, many moons ago, when I was living in the States, I picked up the wrong colour dye and came out with jet black hair. I have pale skin and that hair colour would have put Morticia Addams to shame, so I have finally learned to be really careful to pick up the right box!

With that needing 20 minutes to fix I set to and started working on my middle bedroom (the junk room) and got quite a bit done in 20 minutes, sorting sewing fabric and putting it into proper storage boxes (as opposed to in bags on the floor). After that it was a pedicure (ahhh bliss!) and I decided I was adamant that two bags of decluttering were also going to leave the house that afternoon. I managed to pick out five or six (can't remember) handbags, so that filled one trash bag, and then set to working on my sweaters (I mean, how many does one person need?) and fairly easily filled a second bag! Too much stuff!!!! So I hopped in the car right away and off I went to get it out the house immediately. It really is true what they say, you feel instantly "lighter" when something - anything - goes out that door (actually my divorce had the same effect)! So just another million bags to go then!

Then, since I was on a roll, I decided to use up the odds and ends in the fridge to make lunch (and dinner as it turns out), so I put the Gypsy Kings on at full blast and worked my way through the "leftovers" compartment of my fridge, deciding to throw it all into a quiche. Lovely!

I finalized the translation of the order of service for the wedding yesterday and sent that to Jen (it sounds less "translated" now), and because I must have been on speed or something, I decided I really had to sit down and get Jordan's US taxes done. So I pulled out his US tax paperwork and got started. Now he earns a pittance and in any case is entitled to over $100,000 "foreign earned income exclusion", but you still  have to do the paperwork to prove that he is fiscally resident here. Anyway, the forms have changed and even though much of it doesn't apply to him I took my time and waded through it nicely on the pdf form (bearing in mind that he left one job, was unemployed for a month, did one day's temporary work in a factory and then got another job - oh and filed French taxes) - and the first time I went to save it the bloody thing crashed. Damn, blast and sod it! So with much gnashing of teeth I did it all again, saved it and when I went to print it I was "told" that to use the fill-in pdf form I had to pay! Of course they offered a 30-day free trial but even with that they wanted my credit card number. NOOOOOO WAY JOSE!!! So I ended up going onto the IRS site proper (lesson learned) and did it yet again. Even then, when I went to print the various forms (1040, 2555-EZ and Schedule 6) many of the boxes that I had filled in didn't print. Some did - like his name and address - but not his social security number, so while it is correct online it didn't print properly! I had to go back through and hand fill-in the missing info! I seriously hopes he appreciates all my effort. Yeah, all that sodding effort for a filing where he owes diddly squat!

[And by the way, I'm having problems with the space bar on my computer so if you see words that looklikethisitsnotmespeakingGermanitsthebloodyspacebar!]

And speaking of misogynistic trolls (I was at one time wasn't I?) I have spotted comments on a few ladies' blogs by an absolute dickhead of a troll, with a link to his bile-spewing blog (I had a look)! He obviously hates women - ok; he particularly hates white women - again ok; and he seemingly hates white American women more than anything else in the world! Wow! Just wow! I mean, they can be writing a post about kittens and he spews his bile! You see, all women over the age of 25 should just shrivel up and die because they are no longer beautiful and they offend his sensibilities. And did you know the ideal biological age for a woman to reproduce is between 18 and 23! Now having reproduced at, say, 23, I wonder who this dickhead thinks is going to raise these poor little orphans - their nubile mothers having had to shrivel up and die once they hit 25!!!! He rants about white women with black men, with Arabs - you name it, his loathing of women, and white women in particular is quite spectacular. One British lady whose blog he infested just wrote "oh dear, he must be pms.ing"! But I've seen  him on more than one blog (not mine as yet but he won't get through anyway). Now either this troll is a joker just trying to drive traffic to his vile blog, or he is deadly serious - and that's kinda scary in a "who's gonna be the next mass shooter" kinda way! I hope I'm wrong. For me I just picture a sad virgin with short, fat hairy legs, a bald pate and bad breath sitting behind his computer in his underpants in mommy's basement waging war on all those evil white bitches! So ladies, be warned!

12 comments:

  1. I have seen his nonsensical rants!

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    1. It seems to be recent (well to me at least), but I've seen him on a few blogs! What a dick!

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  2. I love wisteria. I have wisteria. I'm getting rid of wisteria after 18 years, otherwise it will consume every inch of my property.

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    1. I love it too but we don't want it growing up under the roof. And those branches grow so strong so quickly that I have to make sure to hack it back before it gets that bad!

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  3. Yikes! No trolls my way but I don't let any anon comments get thru. Sounds like this guy actually has a blog, very scary - there are so many freaks out there these days. It does feel good to get "stuff" out of the house. We've sorted and tossed so much this spring and still keep finding more. I've paid for our fishing trip out the fun fund (where everything we sell goes) and am now allotting that money to a future float plane trip which is on my bucket list - likely next Spring for that. I tend to haul off things the second my Mom says she is ok with letting them go as she used to be a semi hoarder but now much less so.

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    1. He didn't come through on mine either but he does have a blog. I didn't spend much time on Dr. Demento's blog though. Full of hate! And yep I love getting rid of stuff too. I thought about doing vide-greniers but in the end I don't want the hassle so off to charity it goes (hence it has to go out quickly or I might change my mind). Good for you for putting the money towards a trip though. That's a "free" trip in my mind!

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  4. I laughed that you used the term Dick head in your post. I'm still laughing about it! You had quite a week. Good think you retired because working would have cut into all these important things.

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    1. It's true what they say - I don't know how I found the time to work, especially not to be gone 12 hours a day! I suppose I take my time now, read a lot and so on. You'll find out for yourself soon enough! And yeah, "dickhead" is the politest word I could find for that amoeba!

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  5. Oh, I haven't come across the troll. Luckily, it seems! I'm sure he'll appreciate your efforts to cheer him up with your funny picture! ;) Sounds like you've been going gangbusters with stuff - my cousin, since taking voluntary redundancy at end of March, has dropped off the planet. She's never home! She's way too busy doing fun stuff. Us shrivelled up old women have to at some point, right? Ha ha! Hope you don't hear from him again xx

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    1. Oh he didn't come through on my blog but I noticed a couple of minutes ago he just hit John Gray's blog. What an asshole! And yes I agree, I'm never home, or hardly ever! I guess I just take more time to do things now (stop and smell the roses kinda) whereas before everything had to get done in 3 or 4 hours in the evening. I can definitely recommend it if you get the chance to go for it!

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  6. There seems to be a cold weather trough going south through Ontario (but missing my area) and heading across the Atlantic and heading north through your area. It stinks! We've had so much rain and flooding that I feel it is my right to complain!

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    1. We Brits would be struck dumb if we couldn't talk about the weather so feel free to complain all you like - it's music to my ears!

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