Back home and back to work

I've had a short break from the blog deliberately.  I decided that I wasn't going to just write all my frustrations about the divorce, or lack of it, and in particular my frustrations with simply how unreasonable one woman can be.  Fortunately for my sanity (and that of my very nice man), she has started to see sense and we are making some progress.  I say "we" despite it being nothing to do with me, but it does seem to dominate our lives. 

The break was also enforced by a long weekend in Cornwall.  It was really nice, we were so very lucky with the weather, with one day of slight showers in an otherwise sunny day and another day of glorious sunshine, even catching the sun on my nose – in February.  But the lasting memory I did come away with is that Cornwall is full of people who have an incredibly strong sense of entitlement.  I don't want to offend anyone, and indeed most of this is not aimed Cornish locals or "normal" people, but the people who take a house (or own a second home which they occasionally visit) and spend a week or more lording themselves around the place.  They drive inconsiderately, take up all the path when walking, express their opinions loudly to anyone who is in the vicinity, and generally spoil the place for everyone else.  I will confess that I judge people by looking at their clothes and listening to their accents – and can admit that not everyone who (female) is sporting the Breton look and has a cut glass accent is going to spoil my holiday but it did seem that most of them did.

I think my favourite was the woman who was wearing the stripy top, knee-high boots over skinny jeans and had a short silk scarf tied around her neck.  She spoke very loudly on her mobile phone for the entire journey on the Rock-Padstow foot ferry and announced to everyone how good the hotel was, how much work the builders had done on the cottage and how pleased everyone seemed to be that she'd got engaged last night (hapless fiancé was accompanying her on this trip).  And we had the misfortune to get the same ferry back when she was regaling someone with how wonderful the accessories were that she'd found in Rick Stein's quaint little shop.  I could at least take pleasure in noting that this quaint shop had dispatched her with a paper carrier bag which was nicely disintegrating in the rain.

I shouldn't be judgmental, I realise, but this sort of thing brings out the worst in me.  I'm not poor, at all by national standards, I have a responsible, well-paid job, my views and opinions are sought at work by senior colleagues – but once I'm out of the office, people like this manage to make me feel inferior to them. 

This doesn't mean I'm not going away again – we need to have more nice breaks.  I just might have to invest in my own stripy top first!