Hazards of the Job

Sorry for the lack of action this week - I have resumed getting my balls out on a Thursday evening (i.e. teaching people about birth and babies and becoming a parent - well at least its obvious from the start that I'm not expecting them to aim for perfection....) and the vast amounts of prep combined with two increasingly out of control children (is there something in the air at the moment! DEAR GOD.....I hope it is end of term hysteria or something else which fades soon because at this rate I'm going to lose my voice. And my sanity. Again.) have left me little opportunity to sit at the computer and procrastinate.

Take this morning for example - I have printing which needs doing for tonight and I can not do it at home because I DON'T HAVE A BLOODY PRINTER THAT WORKS.

We have several printers, SEVERAL, but none of them will actually print so much as a full stop. They are, of course, still in the house. This is a recognised hazard of living with a man who works in IT - if you do not keep a firm rein on them your house will rapidly start to resemble a branch of PCWorld - or more accurately a branch of PCWorld in a parallel universe where obsolete computer equipment crawls off to die.

Sometimes my OH does kindly print things off for me while he's at work but a short time ago I sent him some leaflets for printing which instructed women on how to massage their nether-regions in preparation for the birth (if they wanted to, I could never be arsed). The front page gives and intro on the topic and the rationale behind it.

The second page?

Erm, the second page contains a very clear diagram of EXACTLY which part of the lady's bits she should be massaging and just in case she's still not sure it's all clearly labelled - you know stuff like 'CLITORIS' AND 'VAGINAL OPENING'.

Only I had forgotten this.

And I got him to print out 8 copies on a communal printer in a male dominated office in a large corporate company........

Lets just say we are both still lucky he's employed.

So this morning I was reluctant to go back down that tortuous route so I took command of my own printing and took it to Staples. Much better.

Only it's not.

First you have to contend with Staple's staff (sorry if you or your loved ones work in Staples but seriously - are they on some kind of employee incentive scheme whereby you get paid more the ruder and more unhelpful you are to your customers?? You have to beg for their attention and/or help while they have conversations across the top of your head about who does the better sandwich - Subway or Greggs and just what they like to have in it. I DON'T GIVE A SH*T ABOUT YOUR SAUSAGE TORPEDO 'VS' YOUR CHICKEN MELT - JUST PRINT MY BLOODY WORK OUT - NOW!).

Then, to print stuff out in colour you have to accompany the employee to the computer screen and pick out what you want printing.....they then print it out and examine it carefully to make sure it looks good and then they bring it over. So, all in all, they look at what you are printing A LOT.

The first item the young guy brought up was part of a teaching aid to cover birth hormones and consisted of a large star with the immortal words:

STIMULATING HER NIPPLES CAN HELP TO PRODUCE THIS! emblazoned across it.

OH. DEAR. GAWD (it didn't say that bit - that's what I thought as the neon star and bold black writing filled the screen).

To be fair he didn't flinch but he did keep glancing at me oddly when he thought I wasn't looking.

Then there were my A3 posters to laminate. A3 posters of newborn babies. Lovely! Nothing to worry about there, surely?

Well no - they just label the usual things you see on newborn babies which can appear slightly alarming to the uninitiated.

Things like 'SWOLLEN RED TESTICLES!'.

Sigh.

By the time the guy had got to the pic which shows a woman with rather abundant pubic hair spread across his screen I'd told him I'd pick them up later and was just going to look round 'Pets at Home' next door.

But do you know the really odd thing? When I went to pay he whispered that he'd not charged me the £3 fee for 'accessing my files' and winked.

God knows what he thinks I do for a living but I'm loathe to see him again.

Now do I have any volunteers to print my next batch?

p.s. Note to self: ensure all teaching aids well hidden when potential purchashers view the house. We don't want a repeat of the other day.....

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