Mrs Tara Plumbing

We thoroughly enjoyed the Panto, Aladin, at the Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury (sorry - the local offerings were less appealing) - there are shows for 3 more weeks. The actor Lloyd Hollett was really good and apparently he is from Margate. I got quite close to him as he fell off the stage, into my lap - we were in the front row - was this a part of the show or and accident?

www.lloydhollett.com

The ticket price was a little scary - no wonder the theatre was half empty. When we saw the show, however, we thought it was actually excellent value for money.

Far better to spend the Christmas budget on trips to the Theatre rather than presents no one wants and too much food - I think.

The show was more than 2 hours long (excluding interval). As well as the usual jokes, songs and banter. There were:

acrobats;

amazing magic tricks throughout - I was in the front row, I watched carefully and I don’t know how they did them;

very good impressions.

There is a lot to be said on the subject of unwanted presents - such as how they are upfor auction on ebay - some not even opened! http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article3108159.ece

What about the morality and economics of such waste? To quote another Times writer: Kate Muir “the British nation, have given around £1.1 billion worth of unwanted presents to each other over yuletide. That’s the GDP of Malawi..” http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article3068426.ece

A man saw a burglary taking place in his house whilst he was out, he was able to call the police and watch it taking place via his home webcam. We often think about how amazing this story is.

Apparently people often install these cameras in their bedrooms and broadcast to the whole world over the world wide web. Mr Tara Plumbing thinks this is a great idea and that we should get one too. Why would any one want to watch me tossing and turning… in my sleep. Oh, of course, Mr Tara Plumbing isn’t thinking about sleeping.  He must be thinking about watching the house when we are away. All robbers know that everyone keeps their valuables under the mattress so that is the first place they’d go for.

Anyway, we’ve now got Vista. It does not come with any warning about difficulties loading Lotus - so you need to go to some geek web forum and find out about it if, like me, you would like to continue accessing all the financial records which were maintained on Lotus 123 spreadsheets.

In the Tara Plumbing household we love using technology as a means to an end. We do not love the process of installing and learning to use new stuff… that is why I’ve been quiet lately - we’ve been technically challenged with our PC troubles (not politically (in-) correct).

Finally

Touch Me I’m Karen Taylor. If you missed this debut comedy series you can view it again Saturday night BBC3, I highly recommend it. If you share my humour you will love it. On the other hand you might find it dull, offensive, childish… toilet humour and sexual innuendo.  I think it is very modern, C21 feminist comedy.

To my sister, living in Cheltenham without water since Sunday evening, with 7 people in her house. It’s not so bad for her: she has electricity.  At least they had the great foresight to buy a house up a steep hill, so there is no risk of flooding.  She has a rather large garden which should prevent the risk that they might be swept a way with the rising tide of their own excrement.

When I was much younger and lived in a large squatted house which had electricity but no running water, we buried our poo in a deep hole in the garden. That was in Cheltenham, by coincidence.  This was one of those occasions where I became a supporter of the sexual division of labour. I would rather do anything than empty the poo bucket! And standing a little over 5’ and weighing not much more than 7 stone I was not great at digging the hole or at pushing the wheel barrow on the return journey of the water run. Luckily, the parents of one of the other squatters lived in the next street where water was in plentiful supply.

I think my sister will be going through her address book to see who she can visit in a nearby town for the daily hair washing ritual.

You may have heard on the news about whole roads being washed away by the flood in the Pershore & Evesham area. I heard of people stranded on an island that was Cropthorne. My father has his own funny story about the flood at Sedgeberrow, which is just outside Evesham, on the main road to Cheltenham.

He stopped his car when he reached a stretch of road that was covered by water. A cyclist stopped next to him and said:

“I know you are wondering how deep that is. Well, I live just over there.”  Pointing to the other side of the ‘lake’. “I cycled through this just an hour ago, its really shallow. You can watch me.”  

Half way across the cyclist turned around to wave at my dad, the next moment he was gone.  Completely disappeared.  Seconds later his head just appeared out of the water.

“There’s a **@@** great big hole. It wasn’t here earlier”

How deep is it? My Dad asked.

“I’m standing up,” said the head.

Where’s your bike?

“I don’t know.”

My dad was trying to get home to Cheltenham from work on Friday, he left at 1 pm, and it took him 18 hours!

Photos of Flooding in Thanet, many years ago:

http://birchington.blogspot.com/2007/07/flash-flood-73.html

It was hardly surprising that I should fall in love with Mr Tara Plumbing - from when we first met, we had so much in common:

• he told me he puts his hands down peoples’ toilets for a living;
• whereas, I was interested in all things related to toilets.

The internet makes it easy to feed my fascination.

It will not surprise anyone to know there are sites which review public toilets - complete with photos! http://www.crappersquarterly.com/reviews/england.htm

of similar interest: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3919973.stm

where are the public loos of London?:

http://www.lastrounds.co.uk/public_toilets.html

I think most people only use public toilets if they really have to, or if they are hoping to meet a certain type of man. I suspect Mr Tara Plumbing always carries his autograph book in case he should be fortunate enough to run into George Michael… or any other super star.

There is a monetary incentive to visit the public toilets of Japan, however. It has been reported that a mystery person has been leaving gifts in the toilets - read on without fear - packages of money with a message.

http://www.examiner.com/a-823764~Money_Found_in_Toilets

160 years ago Vegetarian Society was founded, in Ramsgate of all places. There is an event on Saturday 7th July organised by local Veggie folk, not the national society (I think).

See my page for more details and links:

http://mrstaraplumbing.wordpress.com/whats-on/

Some people imagine Vegetarians to be pale, weak, humourless characters, who live on state benefits and can not afford a proper collar for their dogs. Their responses are slow because their brains are trying to conserve energy.

Strange - I’ve met that man as well, he’s NOT veggie, he’s a druggie! I love the jokes about vegetarians, they tend to be surreal.

Does meat make you strong (virile, manly)? Well - it takes an awful long time for it to move through the intestines & digest.  There is a study which found meat-eaters’ poo takes 6 months to disintergrate, whereas a vegan’s poo decomposes in hours. Infact, it would seem likely that the person who eats only meat & wheat, with no fruit & veggies is more likely to be sloath-like in their behaviour.  I’m not sure about mental functioning but there is no reason for a planet based diet to be lacking in the omegas.

If you love eating, as I do, then it makes sence to eat a vegan diet: high fibre, based on fruit, vegetables and grains.

1. The food passes through you really quickly and sometimes still looks the same on the way out as when first consumed! So you can rapidly move on to your next meal.

2. Most vegetable foods are not so calory dense, which means you can get a lot more food on your plate at each meal time.

I committed the name of this funny lady to memory when I saw her in 1999, she was an unknown, doing 5 minute standup slots for no pay (she was also incredibly sexy and flirtatious - perhaps that’s why I remember her - see pic at bottom).  I’ve seen hundreds of ‘new’ acts and remember the names of very few.  I do remember Jimmy Carr from those days, too. He also stood out from the rest, from the start.

It was quite by chance that I found this TV programme whilst searching the BBC website for something else.   http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/karentaylor/ 8 years later, here she is appearing on plasma screens across the UK. 

 I have only seen one episode, it did not disappoint. Her comedy is funny, clever, original and up to date (I was thinking ‘contemporary’ but that word triggers sensitive reactions in East Kent).  I would highly recommend anyone with a sense of humour to see the repeat on Saturday - BBC3 or episode 5of 6 Monday BBC3 (10/10.30pm).

If you need or want to know more about Karen Taylor: http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2006/02_february/22/taylor.shtml

Or this: 

http://www.paramountcomedy.com/comedy/comedians/comedian.aspx?id=387

To be honest, not all reviews are good, I came across this:

“Several sketches fall back on cheap sex/toilet humour.”
But that’s what makes Mrs Tara Plumbing laugh!

It is Mr Tara Plumbing’s birthday this month.  The only thing he wants are new pants, he says.

He normally buys his own and I do not want to venture into that area of M&S (not M&S not S&M!), I’m sure to get it wrong!

Should I buy him Extra Large - will he be flattered with the suggestion that he has something extra large to put in his pants?  Or insulted buy the implecation that his stomach is too big!

You know a man’s ego!

I can’t buy Medium - that’s like saying what’s in his pants is mediocre!  I remember that I never heard the last of it when I once commented that he was adaquate!

If there is one thing he definately isn’t it’s SMALL!

I like good customer service but I don’t like those few loud arrogant people who are overly demanding of the staff, have unrealistic expectations and are just plain rude. It never hurts to be friendly and polite - that applies to customers as much as staff. If I’m not happy with the service in a shop, restaurant or other business I usually leave, I don’t return and I may tell every one I know about my poor experience.

Only the other day Mr Tare Plumbing left a shop because there were no shop assistants! Some people were complaining that they had been waiting ages. Mr T.P.’s view was that they must all be crazy, as there were plenty of other shops where they could go and spend their pennies. Obviously, this was not so much a problem of bad service as poor management.

Some people, however, probably receive a poor quality of service due to their own bad behaviour, such as the justice dealt out in the funny, fictional Hotel Babylon. If your complaint about the corked wine is justified it will be replaced. If you are just deliberately being annoying then Gino, the Latin Barman, may just dunk his Balls in your wine before returning it to you in a fresh glass!

I may have been on the receiving end of such treatment in a Beans & Chips Cafe once. I ordered black coffee, when the waiter bought out a mug of white coffee, I said:

“I asked for black coffee”.

My companion looked shocked and told me I was a bit harsh.

Apparently, it sounded as if I had shouted:

“You fool! How dare you come before me with such a beverage. When I demand Black coffee, no other substitute will suffice. Run back to your little kitchen and do not dare to show your face in this room again without bringing a delicious Mug of the finest Instant Black Coffee.” It is not what I intended but that is how it came across.Obviously, there would be no genitals dunking in my hot coffee, but I do remember a study finding ‘foreign bodies’ in restaurant food was very common, the most memorable being semen from a number of different men all in one curry. Yuk! I must add I think the study was in London, I’m sure such things do not happen in Kent.Mr Tara Plumbing says I’m always so abrupt, that’s why he’s scared to take me out in public! As for whether I prefer to swallow dairy products or semen? I never take milk in my coffee as I am vegan!

I’m sure many low paid shop assistants have wanted to say something to the effect of, “I really don’t like you, please leave the shop.”

The nice thing about being your own boss is that you do not have to chase every potential client and worry about being fired. So on more than one occasion I’ve had the pleasure of suggesting that someone may like to find a different company to do the work.

I find it fascinating to look at the statistics behind this blog site. Where have my readers come from?

The two most surprising were both yesterday.

Someone found my site after doing a search for:

 ~ sexy ladies freeview

I suspect that person was looking for something quite different!

The other, I’m not sure how they found ME, but, when I clicked on the link, my entire blog about secondary school education appeared in French, thanks to google (apparently). I wish I could read French to see if it was any good! 

I am typically English, however, my multi-lingual skills are limited to ordering Beer in all European languages. (Invariably, where ever you are in the world the natives will reply in English, I have found).

You may think calculating the price for a quotation is easy, after all we do it all the time. No, if you are seeking a quote from a builder or plumber in Kent, each job is quite unique and the spreadsheet we use has space for the following items:

1.Material

2. Labour

3. Fuel (hour far is the job)

4. car parking (if applicable)

5. a proportion of our overheads (you know, insurance and advertising)

6. smokers in the house? daily penalty for inconvenience. We may decline the work as we have to consider health and safety in the work place and providing a safe work environment for employees.

7. pets in the house? Possible penalty for inconvenience

8. Interesting people with interesting hobbies - price will include a discount - because we are interested in meeting you again and hearing more about your charity work, collection of African wood carvings or whatever (mostly because Mr Tara Plumbing and I are lonely people with no friends!)

9. friendly (sexy) housewife? secures discount of about 10% - the guys will enjoy working there.

10. Over the top sexy housewife who greets the workers in dressing gown or similar - add £100 per day danger money as no man can be left to work alone for his own safety. (Despite appearances, the men are frightened of these ladies!)

11. young children - usually discount - sympathy for sleepless nights, worry, single income household, etc…

12. teenage children - penalty due to obnoxious behaviour and the possibility they may destroy the work we’ve done whilst it is still in our guarantee period.

13. Messy house - may incur penalty depending on work

14. Rudeness on telephone or when we attend the house - huge penalty - we are not keen to see you again so we need a huge incentive to put up with you.

15. Invite us to a swinging couples party in your hot tub! We will come to the party but we won’t do the work in your house!

16. Then finally, add V. A. T., of course, 17.5%

So you see, it is not as simple as it looks.

Note: Item 6 & 7 depend largely on smell and there may be no charge if there is no inconvenience (& no smell).