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17th December

This story is based upon actual events but the names and places have been changed to protect the innocent.


After restarting the daily blog, I didn't really expect that it would change the face of social media. I was right.

So much negativity and hatred permeate all the major platforms through which people ‘communicate’ and I guess my vanity project will just get lost in a sea of awfulness and wickedness.

That’s why I want to say thank you to the 40 or 50 people reading the blog.

It’s nice to be noticed. It’s nice to feel of use.

I hope you will have noted that even when I write about serious issues, there is a whiff of whimsy and a halo of humour that overarch the theme.

I don’t really want to upset people, I do want folk to smile…that’s because I’m professionally nice.

I’d like you to think about that for a minute. How hard it is to be nice to everyone, all of the time.


Just think how many idiots you meet in the course of your day and think about how you deal with them.

Are there times when someone upsets you in some way and you just let them have it…both barrels?

Do you feel better afterwards?

Well I never get that chance. I have to be nice to everyone, all of the time.

Let me explain why.

Imagine the scene; you’re walking across a supermarket car park, carrying your bags, laden with fish fingers and wine (just the essentials) and you are a little confused because your car isn’t where you parked it.

In truth your car is exactly where you parked it, you’ve just forgotten where that was.

Anyway, you’re wandering around the car park like Moses in the wilderness when you suddenly hear the loud and continuous sound of a car hooter…right behind you.


Almost dropping your precious cargo, you stop and turn around and there’s an old fellow in his immaculately clean Toyota Prius. You know, the ones that creep up on you without making any engine noise.

A lady I presume to be his wife is sat neatly beside him. Staring. At me.

I can’t raise my hand to apologise for being in his way, shopping bags prevent that simple gesture. However, he has his hands free and offers a gesture of his own.

Now that was uncalled for, and for a split second I feel like walking around to the side of his car, accidentally banging my shopping bag on his door, before shouting at him to ‘drop dead you miserable old git’.

But then the professionally nice side of my brain kicks in…just seeing his wife sitting there makes me realise that tomorrow I could actually be knocking on her door, to help sort out the funeral of her suddenly departed husband.

So, a nod of the head, you step aside and let the silent car slide by and out of sight.

I cannot tell you how many rude and idiotic people I meet every day, and I cannot tell you how sore my tongue is from being permanently bitten.


I actually don’t mind being nice to people, but there are some that take advantage of other people’s niceness by being extra bitter or cynical.

So is there a moral to this car park drama?

Yes: in a world where it’s very easy to snap and join the tidal wave of hatred flooding into our lives, why not bite your tongue and become the better person?

Then you can be like me.  In your head you’re looking at someone and thinking ‘what a dickhead', whilst a beatific smile covers your face.

You can rise above the idiots and feel totally superior because at least you have the ability to pretend to be nice to people who really need to be electrocuted the next time they plug their bloody Prius in!

Have a lovely day.