Chillax

There have been a series of radio commercials advertising some sort of bath product - Radox, I think - that tell people to take a "selfish hour" and relax with Radox products in a nice bath or shower.  The adverts are targeted at women, but that goes without saying because we all know that men spend the entire day sat around doing bugger all and they don't deserve some "me time".  Accompanying the ads were a few testimonials from some women who described what they'd do with their Radox "selfish hour".  Using my qualitative research skills, the main themes drawn from this sample of three or four, I'm guessing, white English women are:

• A hot bath with lots of bubbles


• Fizzy wine of some sort


• Mobile phone off


• Telling lies about true location


• Candles


• Gossip magazines


• Detachment from reality


• Abrogation of responsibility

So basically, given the choice of spending a nice hour doing whatever they like, women would want to get pissed in the bath and not be able to call anybody for help when the candles set fire to the shower curtain because their phone's turned off and everybody thinks they're at work or the dentist or some such.  And women fought so hard for the right to vote.

I have many selfish hours each day, I think... or perhaps I don't.  I don't have the responsibility of being a parent, except to my dog.  I have some responsibility towards my parents and other family members.  I don't have to look after my partner's needs during the week, although I like to make sure I'm available to talk to her for about an hour each evening.  I don't have the responsibility of being a home owner, although I am a householder.  I do have responsibility for myself and for the little dog.  So after I get home from work and spend a bit of time with the bouncy puppy, doing a bit of tidying up, emptying the dishwasher, preparing my meal, preparing the dog's meal, talking to my girlfriend on the phone, checking in on my folks, eating my tea, tidying up, putting washing in, taking the dog for a walk... all that's left is an hour's selfish time before going to bed.  I do not want to waste that hour getting wrinkly and bored in a bath.  Anybody who does should be made to do voluntary work for one evening a week, preferably emptying my dishwasher.

I HEART my dishwasher

After a bed, somewhere to sit, something to cook with, the first thing I'd absolutely ensure having in my home is an automatic washing machine: the singular most time-saving device of the last 50 years or so.  Second to this is the dishwasher.  I've always liked them, always liked the fact they get dishes so clean and use less energy and water than I do when washing up.  I appreciate them even more since my girlfriend persuaded me that she needed to buy me one by using every single implement, chopping board and pan while cooking something that I can usually do in one pan with one knife, a spatula and a chopping board.

Having a dishwasher means that you have to acquire new skills; 3D tesselation being the most important.  I also had to acquire new pans - shiny stainless steel ones to replace the wonderful hard anodised ones that had served me so well.

Stuff

I LOVE acquiring new things and I've been going into overdrive recently.  It's all due to my latent need for gadgets.  What happens is this:  I decide that I need a new something expensive (this time it's a Canon Powershot G11... I think), but that I can't afford it; my need for new stuff must still be sated, so I buy loads of less expensive items; within a week or two, I have spent the equivalent of a Canon Powershot G11 on stuff that I didn't really want as much as the original object of my desire (I went through this with a coffee machine a few years ago).  So, recent purchases  include:

• Two pairs of Adidas Superstars


• Two Victorinox Swiss Army knives (one for me and one for my dad after he played with mine when it arrived)


• A TENS machine (although this is useful for my bad back)


• A 120GB iPod (because I like to use my iPhone to play on the internet while I listen to music)


• Replacement pads for my TENS machine (because I will need them)


• Windows 7 (because the release candidate was going to die on me)

The list goes on and still the Canon Powershot G11 looks at me from the eBay pages.

I might go and do some whittling to take my mind off material things.