Back in the day, when I was in sixth form, I had a part-time job at a local supermarket. Pretty standard, right? Except, I genuinely hated it. I only worked there for six and a half months because it made me so miserable. I spent eight and a half hours each week serving customers at peak times, most of the time on the tills.
Why did I hate it so much? Rude customers. A supervisor who HATED me with a passion for no apparent reason. (To be fair, she hated most of the other women, but was all over the men and teenage boys.) Managers who expected me to make a part-time job my main priority instead of my A-Level exams. Oh, and getting paid less than £5 an hour.
Oversharing and overeating.
If you read last week's post, you'll know that I'm struggling to get my Masters application to a point where I'm happy with it. Turns out, ex-lecturers are pretty difficult to track down for references too!
At the rate that I'm going, I may never actually get my application finished, but on Monday, I thought I'd better start swotting up anyway. Hence all the books.
I also found the notepad I used whilst I was on work experience with the BBC last year. Most of the notes above (if you can even see them) were taken when I was answering phone calls from the public and passing them onto the relevant producers. The rest were from writing cues for presenters; which is basically writing down what they have to say. (I still can't quite believe they trusted me to do that!)
Again, whilst taking photos for my blog; on Tuesday, this guy stuck his nose under the lens to get some attention. Such a poser.
On Thursday, we treated ourselves to some lovely fish and chips from King Street Fish Bar in Belper. I can see why it's voted Chip Shop of the Year by Belper News readers. But, there are only two chip shops in Belper, so... it was always going to be 50/50, wasn't it?
Just look at them!! That is a small portion (Yes, really!) Needless to say, I couldn't eat all of it.
And on Friday, I ended up venturing out for a meal with my parents at ASK Italian in Derby (which I'll be writing about soon). I used to go there quite regularly, but haven't been for ages! We tried to take a selfie, but it kind of went wrong...
It's totally worth going just for the wonderful honeycomb cheesecake.
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| Are you feeling hungry now? |
Another thing... I feel the need to vent about this. Very sadly, last night, a 16 year old boy was accidentally hit by a train in my hometown. Unfortunately, some felt the need to write on Twitter about how this inconvenienced them, rather than expressing their sadness or sending condolences. This really annoyed me, because there's honestly no need to be that selfish. People like that make me feel misanthropic and disappointed in humankind.
So, seeing as some people can't be decent, I'll say this: My thoughts are with that boy's family, the train driver and the emergency services too. It's awful and terribly sad.
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Unless you spent your weekend in a wi-fi free cave, you've probably heard of the whole debacle involving the YouTuber, Sam Pepper's, latest 'prank'...
It's worth noting that the video has since been deleted from YouTube, however, it's already caused a significant amount of damage to Sam's reputation.
The hashtag 'ReportSamPepper' has been trending at the weekend on an international scale. YouTubers from across the world have also been vocal in opposing this video. Pepper's even been banned from the huge YouTube event VidCon as a result.
Now, don't get me wrong, Pepper may have made a stupid mistake, but he's in the public eye and any mistake is going to be magnified significantly. The fact that he seemingly uses his position as someone who's 'Internet famous' to force himself on random women is a serious issue that needs to be addressed. There's a sense of entitlement that emanates from his videos: That he gets what he wants because he's Sam Pepper of YouTube.
Maybe Sam has totally misjudged this whole situation and genuinely never meant to cause any harm, but the silence that has since prevailed has spoken volumes. He has completely failed to acknowledge anything or, despite a huge Internet backlash, apologise.
In a self-appointed position of fame like he's in, he needs to stand up and be a responsible role-model. What kind of example is he setting to his viewers? 'It's okay to grope women, as long as you say it's a joke!'
I'll be honest, I'd never even heard of him until quite recently. I saw him as a guest on an E4 panel show and they showed a clip of one of his other videos: The one where he wanders the streets kissing random girls. I was a little perplexed by that and I'm not going to lie, I thought it was a little bit iffy.
We shouldn't be living in a world where it's okay to grope random people in the street under the guise of 'comedy'.
It's not funny that at least one of those women featured in the video was visibly distressed. She uttered more than once that she didn't like it... Yet Pepper still uploaded this footage. Why? I've no idea...
...If this video is deemed socially acceptable then it perpetuates the patriarchal myth that women are nothing but sex objects.
Thankfully, the consequent backlash proves that it's not a respectable thing to do and that it definitely won't be tolerated.
To the people who think this is just a harmless joke, imagine it's your mother, sister, girlfriend or daughter that's getting groped by a random stranger. You'd be furious wouldn't you? So why should it be alright if it's in the name of 'comedy'?
I'll calm down now. I promise.
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