Oh hi … you’re still here?

Odds are you’re not.

Oh my life (I sound like my ‘old’ best friend – the woman known as Ladds…) – it has been YEARS since I wrote here. Well ok, maybe not years. But it’s been a while.

One of my pet hates is loud people. On a general level, I’m not too keen on ‘people’ as a whole. When stupid ideas come together in groups, you just know witch-hunts and government legislation to tax the elderly are afoot…

But loud people crunch it for me. I’m trying to read or sleep on the train, or work on an article and there’s always one person who insists on holding a very loud conversation on the phone. But it’s not just to the receiver of the call, is it? No; it’s to the whole damn train.

As a writer, I should be thrilled that it’s so easy to eavesdrop on the personal life of Tracey and Paul, who have recently had a run-in with the Jobcentre because Tracey forgot to mention Paul lives with her and now Paul is up the creek because he ‘twatted that p**** at the pub’…

The drama and local dialect is abundant and flavoursome but my patience isn’t. If you know what it’s like to be interrupted whilst reading, then you know how infuriating it is to read the same sentence over and over because it refuses to sink in. It takes a great deal of restraint and character to stop yourself from launching the book at the source of your distraction.

Even worse is when I’m writing and I have to put up with a running (and dim-witted) commentary about the journey I’m on from the passengers behind me. Which is what happened when I last paid a visit to Cornwall. I never thought it possible to keep a flatulence reference alive in the same conversation for two hours but obviously, I was wrong.

Loud people are everywhere. What astounds me is how groups of ‘loudies’ compete to ‘out-loud’ one another, no matter what the situation. Is it really that important to hold the floor? Does the behaviour of your genitalia after a warm bath really make a difference to the lives of everyone who now knows about it because you can’t help but shout?

Perhaps I’m an unusually quiet person, or perhaps I just have good social etiquette, but I tend not to yell in order to be heard. But then how can anyone hear me when everyone is shouting? Easy.

Mime.

That’s a crowd stopper…