Rip off

It's one of those days today. You know the made up days where the card shops, florists, restaurants and chocolatiers are rubbing their hands with absolute glee?

Yes, today is Mother's Day, or Mothering Sunday or whatver. I've no idea what the tradition behind this is, but at least it is a "celebration" that has some tradition from way back - churches have special services so it must be sort of legit.

But Mother's Day needn't be expensive (having spent £30 on it myself - flowers from Marks's that'll be dead by tomorrow - I reckon I got off lightly, considering all the grief I give my mum) and Asda have produced a 6p Mother's Day card. Six pence. Surely nobody would have the gall to give one of those things??? When I was skint a few years back, I used to take the time to make my mum a card, which she appreciated of course.

There are other stupid "Days" creeping into the calendar, no doubt directed by the hand of commerce. These are things like grandparent's day, foster carers' day, etc. Oh and I've no idea what's going on with my apostrophes today, I blame sleep deprivation because of the clocks going forward. But yeah, all these crap "days" coming in, just so the needy can feel loved (or less loved). At least Mother's Day and Father's Day are legit.

In fact, Mother's Day is so legit that primary schools have special assemblies to which all the mums are invited for the morning (on a FRIDAY) while the little angels sing with their horrid squeaky/whispering/lisping/out of tune voices and all the mums shed tears of joy and pride. One of my colleagues actually took Friday morning off to go to one of these things - without asking, without having to take annual leave, without ensuring that the people she is supposed to supervise were ok with it - she just did it then waltzed in at 11.30. Nice one.

So let's celebrate all those wonderful, loving, caring mums out there today. If you still have yours, treat her special. Then again, she won't be as good as Connie, but don't tell her that.

And let's celebrate all those skiving bitches who use any fucking excuse to take time out from work so they can go to school sports days, Nativity plays, Mother's Day assemblies. Selfish fucking morons.


NHS job cuts scandal!
The NHS is the UK's publicly-funded National Health System. It is the country's largest employer. Despite having billions of pounds of tax payers' money thrown at it, the NHS continues to slide further into debt - with not much value for money in terms of services.

Many hospitals are now in the position where they're having to make staff redundant and the tabloids are shocked and appalled by this, with headlines such as "Hospital makes 200 nurses redundant and advertises for a £40,000 pa manager!".

Shocking, but 200 nurses cost at least £4 million a year by my reckoning. And then when you take into account the cost of covering Mother's Day assemblies, sports days, Nativity plays, kiddie sickness. And then you get the "professional mother" nurses, who simply see their job as a method of bankrolling their own propagation: they get pregnant, take mat leave for a year (paid for 6 months) - their job has to be covered by somebody, so that's two salaries covering the one job; they come back, work for a year, get pregnant, etc, etc.

Ninety percent of the cost of the NHS is on workforce and it'd be interesting to see how much of that pays for sickness absence, recruitment and the cost of secondment and maternity cover.

So what am I saying, that women can't be mothers and do a good job? Not really, because I've seen far more examples of women who are great at both. But there is a significant minority that is seriously taking the piss and this costs loads of money and affects morale in the workplace.

Think on and look sharp.

Happy Mother's Day to all of those who qualify.


Oh bollocks, a PS
For those who haven't seen it, take a look at this from The Cloned Corpse of Marcus Tal over at Marcus Tal is Dead. I'm not sure what to make of it (I don't understand this sort of thing), but I'm honoured to have been included in this scheme... I think. Thank you.


Another PS: wound update
The plaster stitches came off the other night and the exposed ends of the internal stitches are playing merry Hamlet. To see why, click here.

Always happy to make people gag on their tea.