Wednesday, 17 September 2014

Wonky Wardrobes & Offended Oldies

Dear Whoever Built The Wardrobes That Were Finally Delivered To My House Nine Weeks Post-Order Date Today (And Four Months Post-Flood That Necessitated Said New Wardrobes),

My husband and I did not pay a substantial sum for what is very shoddily built pieces of junk with maybe 25% pine, with the rest consisting of ply and compressed sawdust, okay?  The 'lid' doesn't even fit the top of the wardrobe, the hinges stick out like the engorged testicles of an aroused Irish wolfhound, the doors shifted unevenly when they were stood upright.  I understand a solidly constructed piece of furniture should not have that movement.  The back of this laughable item is as flimsy as a house of cards.  I was wondering had we accidentally received a movie prop - you know, where a chair is whacked over someone's head in a bar fight and said chair comes apart?  This is simply not good enough.  My husband and I (to quote the Queen) are at this point in time exhausted and furious.  We will be contacting the outlet through which we purchased your scungy piles of kindling, and letting them know our displeasure.  Whoever you are, you are seriously the world's shittiest carpenter.  It took us ages to get the fucking wardrobes here, so long in fact, I wondered were you actually building an ark to stuff two of every animal onto instead of building or wardrobes.  Before the articles arrived, I had been looking forward to getting my clothes packed away tomorrow, instead of hanging around in washing baskets in the house and making my house look more shambolic than it needs to look.  But now my house is even more cluttered because I have two useless bits of furniture, courtesy of you.  I am on holiday this week, and my holiday is ruined because I am in a state of extreme piss-off. 

Holiday did start spectacularly well, caught up with family and friends in Sydney.  It was with resignation I realised I can no longer rock and roll all night, and party every day.  I am not sure wine is my friend anymore.

Holiday continued pleasantly enough yesterday, when I was invited to speak to a few senior women about writing, and books, and publication.  I enjoyed my little chat, and I think they did, too.  But at question time, I had to fight not to roll my eyes.  One woman told me she gets out the large-print books for her mother (I sat there in amazement; her mother must be older than God), and she asked me why it was necessary for large print books to have the F-word in them.  Her mother, as it happens, finds this offensive.  I pointed out that if the word was in the original book, then it is not going to be removed just because the font size has been changed, and suggested her mother might want to consider other authors.  The woman demanded to know why it was necessary to have swearing in books (shit, should have read her some of 'Silver Studs and Sabre Teeth'!), and I said that although I find commonplace swearing annoying myself (I'm swearing in this post because I'm cranky, and that's different), the fact is people do it, and if I believe one of my characters would swear, then I will have that character swear and offer no apology about it, when it's important for the integrity of the art and character.  Lucky I didn't give my talk after the delivery of my wardrobes, because I think my response would have been a tad more base.  Something along the lines of, 'A work cannot be changed just because one person finds a word troublesome, and if your mother has a problem with this, tell her to read Enid-Fucking-Blyton!'  Seriously, would you put a pair of underpants on Michelangelo's David?

So what will tomorrow bring?  I will crawl off to bed and find out soon enough, I guess.  I have truly had enough tonight.

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