Nagging DOES NOT WORK
December 4th 2010 10:03
In Women's Mag Mind Poisoning, I wrote about Dr Marie Claire, my neighbour, who has screaming rows with her de facto. Much of her dialogue is lifted from the 'Relationships' columns of glossy women's magazines. I find it baffling that someone with a medical degree gets her ideas from such low-brow sources.
I have discovered there is another source of the verbal birdshot she fires at her boyfriend--her mother, a social worker.
I met Dr Marie Claire's parents when they visited from England. The mother is friendly, bossy, outgoing, plain-spoken and down-to-earth. She also wears the pants in the marriage; Dr Marie Claire's father seems happy to be led around by the ring in his nose.
Dr Marie Claire has obviously imbibed her mother's idea of domestic harmony, and her mother's social worker mindset that it is both desirable and possible to change and improve people, even if they don't want to change. Weekends are meant to be spent in a cleaning and gardening orgy, with the female directing and the male happily doing as he's told. Unfortunately, Dr. Marie Claire didn't shack up with quiet Englishman. Her Significant Other is a passive-aggressive, fifty-ish Australian cashed-up bogan whose idea of the perfect weekend is lying on the couch watching the footy and listening to bad 60s rock. (Why did she choose him? Hmmm. He's not bad looking, and she's no supermodel.)
When the CUB humours Dr Marie Claire of a weekend, the sounds of cushions being thumped, carpets being vacuumed and hedges being pruned waft over the fence, accompanied by giddy laughter and music by the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.
Weekends when the CUB refuses to leave the couch start with wails and end with screams and tears. "We're supposed to be a team!" Dr Marie Claire wailed. Last weekend, this escalated into a three-hour nagging marathon. "YOU just sit there...I love you more than anyone else in the world and then you hurt me like this! No, that is NOT what I said.... Why do twist everything I say? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY DO YOU DO THIS TO ME?"
By 8:00 in the evening Dr Marie Claire was fully hysterical, and I'd had enough. I put my mobile phone in voice recording mode and propped it in the window, planning to burn the recording to a CD and leave it on her doorstep. When she went quiet(er) after 40 minutes, I figured I had an adequate sample and went to get my phone. It was dead. Would not be switched on. Would not be re-charged.
DR MARIE CLAIRE'S SCREECHING POMMIE VOICE BROKE MY MOBILE PHONE.
In the previous post, I noted that Dr Marie Claire kindly leaves her magazines on my doorstep when she's finished with them. The last lot of reading matter contained a weekend newspaper supplement. One page had the top right corner folded in as a bookmark--a full-page ad for a fertility clinic.
Watch this space.
I have discovered there is another source of the verbal birdshot she fires at her boyfriend--her mother, a social worker.
I met Dr Marie Claire's parents when they visited from England. The mother is friendly, bossy, outgoing, plain-spoken and down-to-earth. She also wears the pants in the marriage; Dr Marie Claire's father seems happy to be led around by the ring in his nose.
Dr Marie Claire has obviously imbibed her mother's idea of domestic harmony, and her mother's social worker mindset that it is both desirable and possible to change and improve people, even if they don't want to change. Weekends are meant to be spent in a cleaning and gardening orgy, with the female directing and the male happily doing as he's told. Unfortunately, Dr. Marie Claire didn't shack up with quiet Englishman. Her Significant Other is a passive-aggressive, fifty-ish Australian cashed-up bogan whose idea of the perfect weekend is lying on the couch watching the footy and listening to bad 60s rock. (Why did she choose him? Hmmm. He's not bad looking, and she's no supermodel.)
When the CUB humours Dr Marie Claire of a weekend, the sounds of cushions being thumped, carpets being vacuumed and hedges being pruned waft over the fence, accompanied by giddy laughter and music by the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.
Weekends when the CUB refuses to leave the couch start with wails and end with screams and tears. "We're supposed to be a team!" Dr Marie Claire wailed. Last weekend, this escalated into a three-hour nagging marathon. "YOU just sit there...I love you more than anyone else in the world and then you hurt me like this! No, that is NOT what I said.... Why do twist everything I say? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY DO YOU DO THIS TO ME?"
By 8:00 in the evening Dr Marie Claire was fully hysterical, and I'd had enough. I put my mobile phone in voice recording mode and propped it in the window, planning to burn the recording to a CD and leave it on her doorstep. When she went quiet(er) after 40 minutes, I figured I had an adequate sample and went to get my phone. It was dead. Would not be switched on. Would not be re-charged.
DR MARIE CLAIRE'S SCREECHING POMMIE VOICE BROKE MY MOBILE PHONE.
In the previous post, I noted that Dr Marie Claire kindly leaves her magazines on my doorstep when she's finished with them. The last lot of reading matter contained a weekend newspaper supplement. One page had the top right corner folded in as a bookmark--a full-page ad for a fertility clinic.
Watch this space.
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Comment by Anonymous
Comment by LadyDiazepam
LadyDiazepam
My mobile inexplicably came back to life this morning, so I got to work uploading all my voice recordings from my phone onto my laptop, then converting them from amr files to mp3 format. Five of the voice recordings were of my family doctor explaining medical matters. The doctor recordings play back on the phone just fine, and allowed themselves to be uploaded and converted to mp3. Two of the recordings were of my younger cat snoring--no problems with these either.
The ONLY recording that will not be played back on my phone, and refuses to be converted to mp3 so that it can be burnt to a disc and left on Dr Marie Claire's doorstep, is the recording of Dr Marie Claire's hysterical rant. A 'corrupted file' message appears.
Cue Twilight Zone theme music....