The Saturday List #455 - Ten things I used to love, but now I can't stand!

 As I do every Saturday morning, I awoke to a lovely cup of tea from my wonderful wife and the sounds of Dr Carrie Grant and her hubby David on BBC Radio London. Every week Carrie does a throw out on Twitter, asking for feedback from listeners. This was her throw out this week

This week on BBC Radio London @BBCLondonNews Saturday Breakfast show @DavidGrantSays and I asking:
1. Do you limit your Social Media use? Do you use SM too much? How much is too much? 2. Songs/lyrics/bands with the word STOP in. pic.twitter.com/uEXe7XTuCR

— Dr Carrie Grant MBE (hc) 💙 (@CarrieGrant1) September 28, 2024

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I posted the following reply

To be honest I’m bored of social media, present company excepted. Too much spam on @facebook  and hate on @x   - only still on mostly to promote blog & band

I find Facebook incredibly frustrating. All I ever see is ads and I miss most of the content that I want to see. It's only when I think "What has Dave been up to?" and I check, I find that he's been up to all sorts, but Facebook has decided I'm not interested and shown me adverts for Ocado, invites from porn stars and toys for cats ( I don't have a cat). As for Twitter, or X as it's now known, Elon Musk has decided that I want to read tripe from the likes of Elon Musk, Isabel Oakeshott and videos of other people assaulting each other, rather than the people I actually follow. At least they give you the option to switch the view, far too often I forget and find myself looking at Nigel Farage spouting bilge. If I wanted to see what Farage had to say, I'd follow him. Mr Musk has decided that the way forward for his platform is to charge people to access it, or they get lumbered with bilge and paid for content. 

On both platforms there's still loads of great content, but because of the policies of the owners, I rarely see it. Whereas I used to enjoy looking at the sites, now it mainly just irritates me. If I didn't write a blog and have a band and feel the need to keep in touch, I'd knock the whole thing on the head. There is a little part of me that would much prefer to live in a cottage in John O'Groats, cut off from the world, living on potatos grown in my garden and lobsters and crabs caught in the sea. In reality I'd get bored and go insane after a couple of days, but that is how I feel.

Anyway, Carrie's post and my thoughts on the matter got me thinking "What can't I stand now, that I used to love?".  It seemed like a great subject for a Saturday list,

1. Driving. I can remember when I passed my test. I was so pleased that I drove to Northampton for an unannounced cup of tea with my sister Cath. It was a joy. Now? I can't stand it. Drivers have become so impatient and aggressive. If you delay someone for more than a second at a traffic light, they beep you. If you need to change lane, they don't let you in. If you break the speed limit, you get flashed and have to do a 'speed awareness course'. You can't park anywhere, you are constantly stuck in traffic and if you want a nice motor with a bit of style, you'll get clobbered by the Mayor for owning a gas guzzler. I hate driving now.

2. Chocolate. When I was a kid, there was nothing I loved better than a nice bar of Chocolate. I ever starred in adverts for both Galaxy and Cadbury's chocolate bars. I was delighted to get a case fill of chocolate bars as a thank you for doing such a great job (sadly my Mum gave them to the church bazaar, something I still resent). I haven't got a particularly sweet tooth but recently, if I have a bar of chocolate, it tastes of nothing. They have lowered the cocoa content and it tastes a bit like a bar of soap. There is a Turkish shop at the bottom of my road, that sells a German chocolate bar with Hazelnuts, which tastes good, but the chocolate's that I used to love have been completely ruined.

3. Heinz Baked Beans. Heinz baked beans used to be an integral part of my Saturday morning fry up. Then they changed the recipe. Again I'm biased as I starred in a Heinz beans advert. Like Cadburys, they gave me a case of beans. I wasn't quite as excited. I loved beans, but they changed the recipe. Now they taste disgusting. Oddly, when we went to Australia in 2017, the beans there still taste great, but now I really can't stand them. 

4. Queen. I remember when Queen first appeared on TOTP playing Seven Seas of Rye. I thought they were great. Proper rock and roll. Punk hadn't reared it's flem covered head and there was nothing much in the charts. They became my favourite band. Then they released Bohemian Rhapsody. Everyone loved them, my mates would have long debates as to the genius of Freddy Mercury. The only problem was that I hated the song. I felt let down and betrayed. They got ever more pretentious. Occasionally, they'd catch my attention with a proper rock and roll ditty like "Crazy little thing called love", buit my snooty mates would say "That's a rubbish pop song, they should do more stuff like A night at the Opera". I met Brian the guitarist once. I was chatting to his Mrs, Sir John Geilgud and Stephen Fry at the studios where The Tichborne Claimant was being shot. He was incredibly rude and unfriendly.I could see that Anita, Stephen and Sir John felt extremely uncomfortable, so I moved on.  I later had a cup of tea with Sur John, who sniggered and suggested Brian was a bit miffed as Anita seemed to be enjoying our chat. She was really nice, but I didn't like her hubby at all. I was a bit disappointed as he's a fellow guitarist. That was the final straw for me with the band. Oddly, my Dad used to know Roger Taylor, the drummers Dad. I met him once and he told me that he was a bit embarrassed as he'd always nagged Roger to get a proper job, as being in a band wasn't a proper job. His Dad seemed like a nice bloke. 

5. Pink Floyd. I've mentioned this many times. See Emily Play was my favourite song of the 1960's. I loved Floyd, but then they became rubbish. Syd Barratt left. When I loved them, all my snobby friends and relatives looked down and called them a silly pop band. When they started to make turgid, lumpy albums ladened with doom and stripped of fun, they all started to love them. I think Pink Floyd were the band that made me realise that I am not really a lover of boring rock music. I prefer up beat Punk, Ska and Soul. 

6. The Guardian. My mum used to read the Guardian. My Dad read the Express. This reflected their politics. I read both. I liked the sports coverage in The Express and the politcal analysis of the Guardian. The paper had all sorts of features and writers I loved. Martin Walker as the Moscow correspondent, Simon Hoggart as sketch writer, Kevin McCarra as football writer, Steve Bell and Doonesbury's cartoons. I still get both, but I am at the point of cancelling the Guardian. The only writer I enjoy is John Crace. I find most of the articles unreadable. I'm dyslexic and I always preferred the snappier tone of the tabloids, but good writers, such as those listed above transcend that. Bad writers, use lots of long, difficult words, to sound clever, but write dull content. It pains me to say it, but the paper has lost the good things and been swamped by the pretentiousness that always lurked. If I want to watch a film, I go to the ones that they give a bad review to.

7. The Labour Party. I used to be a member of the Labour Party from 1983 until 2009. I haven't changed my  views or politics. I believe that the job of the Labour party is to further the lot of the common working person in the UK. What do I see? I see a party lead by a man who seems to see politics as a means to build a grand collection of clothes, have free holidays and generally sponge off rich benefactors. I really don't care what you say, but rich people never buy influence for the good of the poorest and most vulnerable. There are a whole host of targets for justified tax rises, not least greedy companies, especially energy and water companies, but who gets a kicking? Pensioners. As for the Barnet Labour party.....

8. Having a proper job. I worked in IT for 33 years on and off, mostly as a freelance IT consultant. This tapered well with running my studio and provided much of the funds I needed to build the amazing setup we now have. For the first 20 years, it was great. The people I worked with were intelligent and good fun. The work was interesting, I got to meet a lot of great people. They paid for me to go to all manner of great places, Washington in the USA, Pune in India, Dublin, Edingburgh, Manchester, etc. It worked for me. But over the last 13 years, it started to get worse. The whole industry became wrapped up in paperwork. Jobs were moved out of the UK. The UK has effectively been deskilled. From doing proper development work and innovating, I became a paper shuffler. By the time I finally clocked off in 2017, I'd had enough. It was no fun. I still love running my studio and working 35 hours a week instead of 70 is great.

9. The Premiership. How can you hate something you love? I still love Manchester City FC. I am not blind to what the club is, but once a blue..... I was up there on Tuesday watching them play Watford in the League cup. I could not live and be happy without football, but I hate and loathe the Premiership. I blame the "Big Five" but especially Manchester United and Arsenal. They set up a crooked cartel to line their pockets, keep out upstart clubs and cement their position forever. City were a joke club at the time, so cannot be blamed. They opened the door for dodgy foreign investors (who now own the Premiership). The clubs lined shareholders pockets. Whereas in the 1970's clubs like Derby and Forest won the League, it became Arsenal and Man Utd. Then a cataclysm happened. Roman Abramovich brought Chelsea, Abu Dhabu bought City and more recently Saudi Arabia bought Newcastle. The comfy cartel was smashed. They retaliated by bringing in FFP. This is all about stopping the mega rich upsetting their comfy cartel. Sadly, the horse has bolted. Since 2012, United have been frozen out. They now can't even make the Champions league. I hate the whole bloody thing. I still love City, but I see it all for what it is. I now have a season ticket at Hadley FC in the Southern League. I prefer everything about non league football, except the part of me that will always be Manchester City. The most laughable thing of all is Arsenal fans moaning about City, when they were key players in setting up the organisation that has ruined football. I don't blame their fans though. We are all jus mugs on a bus going nowhere. 

10. Attractive women propositioning me. I never thought I would say this. There is nothing I love more than the company of attractive women, especially my missus. However, more or less every day, I get unsolicited messages from attractive ladies seeking my company. Often they send, what might be deemed rather naughty pictures. I would never have thought that such things would sicken me, but it does. Life is weird. 

There's plenty of great things about the modern world, but there is a little bit of me that years for the simpler times, when you started the football season not knowing if you'd win the league or get relegated, when you could enjoy a drive to Manchester, when you didn't think every unsolicted contact from anyone was a scammer after your dosh, where work was fun and you'd go for a beer with your work mates after. I wrote a song to remind myself of all of this