• About

NiftyFiftyShades

~ Failed Domestic Goddess

NiftyFiftyShades

Category Archives: Personal stuff

My First Job

18 Wednesday May 2016

Posted by niftyfiftyshades in Midlife, Personal stuff, work

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

cinema, teenage, women, work

imageOff to town to get a job.  The Green cinema on St. Stephen’s Green, an old Irish institution had a sign ‘Staff Wanted’.  It was a lovely old theatre, the only cinema in town boasting ‘love seats’ – two seater seats for couples.  A family run affair, two sisters despite being octogenarians were still holding the fort.  Mrs. Daly and Miss Noone, both favoured pleated tweed skirts, twinsets and pearls. When it opened its doors it boasted state  of the art technology, some seats equipped with a Fortephone apparatus which enabled patrons suffering from deafness to hear the soundtrack. By the 1980’s it looked a bit tired but that made it all the more appealing.

imageOn a day off school school with my friend Mary, we called one afternoon looking for a job.  Yes, they could take us both on that Saturday evening, but a training day on Friday was necessary to acquaint ourselves with the mysteries of usheretting.  I was apprehensive but Mary fancied the guy in the projector room.. offer duly accepted.

 

 

imageMiss Daly, one of the sibling propieters, handed out torches.  Tooled up, training commenced.   As the complexities of torch holding were explained, it became obvious that there was more to this showing people to their seats business than meets the eye.   ‘Keep the torch low’ Miss Noone commanded, flicking the torch discretely along the aisle’s edge as she walked.  Only after a couple of hours training had we adequately mastered the level of torch holding skills required to be fully fledged usherettes.

image.jpegDespite having to wear a kimono type overall, the sense of empowerment my torch brought made up for it.  ‘This way please’, ‘No smoking in rows 10 to 14’.  I was beginning to enjoy bossing adults about (well I was only 15).  There was a real problem with people buying standard seats trying to get into the premium love seats.  Observation skills and a sharp eye were required to patrol the aisles.  The power could go to your head, ejecting punters attempting to commandeer a love seat without the proper ticket.

image
image

Overly amorous couples in the love seats fell into Mrs Daly’s area of expertise.   ‘Stop that carry on now’ she’d prod some unfortunate spotty teenager in the shoulder with her torch.  This work required a bigger torch than mine.

image.jpegA horror film called “When a Stranger Calls” was showing.  I got to see the first 40 minutes of it each night, but never got to see the happy ending as my shift finished at 10pm.  So I’d watch until I reached a level of terror that turned me to a quivering wreck, but miss the bit at the end where calm is restored and your heart rate returns to normal.   I invariably left the cinema looking over my shoulder.  Once home, too scared to go to sleep  with the light off.

 

 

 

image.jpegWe worked there for the Summer and left when school started back in September.  Mary went off the projector guy anyway.

Blindness by Blogging

02 Saturday Apr 2016

Posted by niftyfiftyshades in Beauty, Humour, lifestyle, Midlife, Personal stuff, Uncategorized

≈ 8 Comments

 

imageOptician:   That comes to  Eur 638.75

Me:             Are they 24 carat solid gold?

Optician :  No

Me:              Are the diamond encrusted?

Optician:   No.

Me:              Have they been hand crafted by nymphs.

Optician:    No.

Me:              Have they been lovingly buffed by French nuns.

Optician:    No

Me:              But they are nice and designery…

Optician:   Yes.

imageMmm!! Which to choose.  Blindness or spectacles

imageMy blog is almost three months old.  It began as a technical challenge, playing about with WordPress, trying different themes, mucking about with plugins, most enjoyable.  Now that I’ve acquainted myself with the wondrous mysteries of the Twitter machine I’m addicted.

image

Only problem is, my eyes are sore.  The dreaded day has arrived, I must wear spectacles full time.   I’ve managed until now with glasses just for reading.  I’m perfectly happy to go about my business half blind rather than cave in and wear glasses full time .  It doesn’t bother me one iota if I can’t make out the number of an approaching bus.

Alas, things have taken a sinister turn… headaches, eye strain…this blogging business has left me with ‘tired eyes’ .   I must confess, I’m tempted to choose blindness and headaches over spectacles, vanity over common sense.

imageFocus on the positive..

Glasses suggest intelligence (not geekiness  or nerdiness, no… intelligence).

It’s another way to accessorise, and we all know accessories doth maketh the woman.  I’m thinking cute librarian look.

Will no longer squint to read.

May be mistaken for an Indie rock star  (well, it could happen).

imageGlasses add an aura of mystery, sophistication, serenity.. in manner of Grace Kelly.

image

 

 

 

 

 

 

May prevent domestic accidents, like taking your dogs’ worming tablet instead of an indigestion tablet.

May prevent traffic accident ( I think being able to see is a requisite to driving).

Gorgeous George still gorgeous with glasses……

image
image

I  will NOT  focus on the negatives…

Will lose them every 5 minutes, will spend 3 hours daily looking under cushions.

Will think I’ve lost them when still on my head.

image

Will sit on them resulting in a tangled mess.

 

 

Will get fogged up every time I stand near the cooker (maybe that’s a plus – excuse to avoid cooker).

Will fall asleep with them on and wake up with indents in my forehead.

May be mistaken for Indie rock star.

imageWill need special goggles if I ever get a sudden urge to take up diving, skiing, bunji  jumping, female boxing,  surfing or even just frolicking in the sea.   However, the alternative view could be to my advantage – ‘sorry, can’t go frolicking in the sea today  –  havn’t got the right glasses’.

No longer blissfully unaware of huge pore situation and other facial imperfections.

 

 

Still not convinced.  Might need some other sort of glasses to help me decide…

image

 

Ahh!! Easter Eggs

23 Wednesday Mar 2016

Posted by niftyfiftyshades in Humour, lifestyle, parenting, Personal stuff

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

easter, family, funny

eggsnailsEaster eggs, who could have imagined these sweet treats could have inspired such rivalry.

The ultimate test of supremacy, the definitive battle of sibling willpower and psychological warfare.

Each year, the Easter egg selection would be presented to us a week before the big day.  My aunt worked in Cadbury’s on the north side of Dublin where she had access to staff discount.  The best perk of the job, a shop for staff each Friday where they offloaded bargain chocolate, broken bars, squashed sweets.  A sweet was a sweet, all delicious whether squashed or misshapen.  My nine year old self had lofty aspirations of working in Cadbury’s when I grew up.

Cadbury's Celebrate Creme Egg Season In Covent Garden With The Goo GamesThe weekend before Easter she would bring the goodies.  With a selection of Buttons, Roses, Flake or Milk Tray eggs on offer we would surround her claiming ‘first pick’.    Placed on display like a prized ornament they would adorn the shelf to be admired for a week.  Only after mass on Sunday morning could they be opened.  Very carefully (as the silver paper was to be saved) I would skilfully remove the foil, scoff the back of the egg, replace the foil so that it looked intact, untouched.  This was all part of my game plan.  The prize in this game of psychological warfare was to lord it over everyone else when you were the only family member with remaining chocolate.  That done, the egg would be returned to the shelf to be admired again.   After a couple of hours, myself and my sister would eye each other to see who would last the longest before returning for another bite of the cherry.  If she gave in, I’d allow myself another piece.  The egg at this stage no longer looked untouched, nevertheless it would be put back together again, returned to the shelf to be admired and the test of willpower would resume.  Back and forth, taking smaller nibbles each time.  Eventually, there would be a small piece left and I would sigh and declare “I’m sick of chocolate, I’m saving some for tomorrow”.   This was obviously part of the act, it never lasted until tomorrow.

eggs-funny1My brother always won this game. He was the undisputed king of self denial.  He always had a piece left the next day so that he could wave it in front of us, taking smug to a whole new level.   “Mmmm, don’t tell me yours is all gone”.

 

eggsfunny

image
image
eggnails2

 

 

Ugly Knee Syndrome

18 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by niftyfiftyshades in Humour, lifestyle, Midlife, Personal stuff, Uncategorized

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Fashion, funny, Knees, midlife, women

Ugly Knees anyone?

imageDon’t feel too bad, you’re in good company. A host of celebrities have been outed as suffering from the same affliction.

I have bad knees. Bad as in ugly, not bad as in painful, which is something to be grateful for, I think. Have knees the size of Edam cheese rolls. I’d win any knobbly knees competition hands down.

 

imageThey were fine when I was twenty, but sadly have been in decline for some years now. I recently tried on a pair of boots which were tight around the calf. Beautiful rich soft suede leather with 4 inch heels, fit like a glove and very comfortable. Ecstatic at my find, I stepped over to the mirror to admire my choice of footwear. It was at that very moment I caught a glimpse of knee overflow. The tight calf’s seemed to compound this situation. My euphoria was short lived. I had what resembled a case of severe cellulite dimpling in the knee area. The white skin served only to highlight my ugly joint syndrome or Age Related Knee Deterioration which is I think the medical term. I don’t carry excess weight anywhere else(possibly deluded as well) so why God did you have to pick on the knees.

imageI’ve tried wearing ultra support tights popular with grannies everywhere. I’ve attempted fake tanning them to death leading to epic fake tan fail and orange hands. Exercise in the form of weights and cycling, I’m convinced made them worse. Massage, cabbage water diet, all to no avail. A friend has suggested contouring.  I’m not prepared to set aside 3 hours daily for knee painting.

What to do? Cover them up.

Me: “Have knees the size of Edam cheese rolls”.

Himself: “They’re fine, here have a glass of wine”

Me: “Ok, much better, knees aren’t so bad”

 

imageI have become accustomed to keeping them under wraps. I’m not concerned in the least. My knobbles will never see light of day again. My trendy skinny jeans will never give away my secrets.

 

I could resort to knobbly knee surgery but even I’m not that bonkers. I’ve resigned myself to looking forward to a future of age related knee deterioration, with possibly the added bonus of varicose veins.

 

It could be worse I suppose, I have a bit to go before I reach this stage.

image

For the purposes of making you feel better about your knees, I’m including photos of celebrity knees courtesy of The Daily Mail. A little cruel ( I know I feel a tinchy bit guilty). ..Enjoy!!

image

image
image
image

Epic Fails- Part 5 The Shaggy Perm

24 Wednesday Feb 2016

Posted by niftyfiftyshades in Beauty, Hair, Humour, lifestyle, Personal stuff, Uncategorized

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Beauty, funny, Hair, midlife, Personal, women

imageFleetwood Mac’s Rumours had been in the charts for over a year and every teenage girl wanted the look. Stevie Nicks was the coolest. She had the original grungy hippy vibe, in her floaty black garb and her shaggy perm, she was every teenage boys dream. Therefore every teenage girl wanted the shaggy perm. Including me.

Well, as a penniless teenager, how could I possibly afford the shaggy perm. My mother’s purse strings didn’t stretch to a hair cut never mind an eye watering 30 pounds for a perm in one of the salons on Grafton Street. There was of course an alternative, actually my only option. “Eileen’s Hair Creations”. Eileen was a local woman who passed herself off as a hairdresser, and operated out of a salon above the local butchers. I use the word ‘salon’ loosely, as it was a room with a sink, two chairs and a bench. As you rose the stairs to her door, the smell of the butchers gave way to the overpowering stench of Elnett hair spray. In a previous life Eileen worked in the fish factory gutting fish so it’s a mystery how she reinvented herself as a hairdresser. Although about twenty years out of date, Eileen wore her hair in a tall beehive. Allegedly, she was an expert at doing perms, very popular with her octogenarian customers who were offered free a blue rinse alongside the perm. Eileen had never seen the cover of Rumours and in her mind this Stevie Nicks person must have been a man.

 

 

imageNevertheless, I had to have a perm and the only way I was getting it was to succumb to Eileen’s perming skills. I suppose with hindsight the beehive should have been a giveaway, an inkling as to the standard of style Eileen aspired to.

 

I didn’t exactly look like Stevie Nicks when she was finished with me. I think the problem was that Eileen only had one roller size. The ‘little old lady perm’ size. I emerged with little tiny frizzy curls radiating from my head. I suppose it could have been worse, the free blue rinse wasn’t included.

 

 

imageI pulled my hood up, went home and hibernated for three months.

image

 

imageThis isn’t me but bears an uncanny resemblance

 

Ah!! The 70’s

18 Thursday Feb 2016

Posted by niftyfiftyshades in Humour, lifestyle, Personal stuff, Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

family, funny, midlife, women

image

Ahh!! The 70’s
I’m sitting with Himself listening to music in the sitting room at 9pm. The boys are home, but nowhere to be seen. All in their respective rooms doing what they do on their iPads. We may as well live alone.

Why the endless hippy happy reminiscing about the 70’s. Was it really that great? In a word Yes. Despite the fact that our lives were completely dominated by a routine dictated by the TV Times.

I know the whole “Ah! The 70’s” thing has been done before but I’ll add my tuppence worth. Be warned, it will mushy.

imageI am the youngest of ten children. I know it’s regarded as either obscene or selfish to have large families in this day and age, but growing up in the late seventies in Ireland, it wasn’t unusual. Despite what you might think, I had an idyllic childhood. We lived in a tiny three bed terraced house in suburbia, with one TV which we all watched together, in the one room. My mother’s pride and joy, the three piece sofa, managed to accommodate all of us. The sofa alone sat four people on proper cushions, and one on each antimacassared arm. It was a time of learning extreme bladder control. If you got up to go to the loo, your place would be gone. Many a sibling altercation began with ‘that was my seat’.

imageThank God the 70’s was the golden age of comedy as there was no money for any other form of entertainment. Recording your tv programs hadn’t been invented, you had to be at home at 9pm on Tuesday night if you wanted to see Porridge. Top of the Pops the highlight of the week was Thursday’s sorted. TV schedules dictated that we lived our lives in a comforting routine. You couldn’t miss The Generation Game, Starsky and Hutch on Saturday night followed by Match of the Day. You could predict what you would be doing any given Wednesday night at 8.30 based on what was on TV (I think ‘Dave Allen at Large’ was Wednesday or was it The Good Life). Saturday morning Swap Shop. When the TV wasn’t on, the stereo was. My overriding memory of the 70’s is great music and great clothes and great telly.

imageimage

The big difference between the 70’s and present day was that you were never alone in anything. We watched TV together and music was a shared experience. On the very rare occasion when there was nothing on TV, we had scrabble. Bizarre, given that my grown up brothers and sisters joined in. If I suggested playing Scrabble to my boys, they’d think I’d lost it completely, and arrangements would immediately be made to have me committed.

imageWe thought The Waltons was just normal family life.  Nothing unusual there. I wish we could return to the 70’s, when the house was full, the telly blaring and nobody ever worried about diet or exercise.
So many things to remember that I can’t go into all of it now, don’t even get me started on the six sisters in one bedroom scenario (and a Granny for a short time), that’s for another day. As is my mothers story (the original domestic goddess) of raising 10 kids on a shoestring while remaining sane and cheerful.

 

imageGranted there were some things I hated. I’m sure it wasn’t all sugar coated happy families, and I’m sure terrible things were happening in the world, but I wasn’t aware of them. In the interest of balance I have to admit there were things I could have done without.

imageHaving to get curlers in my hair on Saturday night to look respectable for Sunday mass the next day.

Sunday mass, something to be endured right through teenage years, although there was always the prospect of seeing some guy you fancied.

Dressing the same as my siblings. My mother made dresses from what looked like curtains material.

School. I went to a convent school run by the Little Sister of Psychological Warfare.

image
Ahh!!! The 70’s

 

Categories

  • Beauty
  • Books
  • Drink
  • Education
  • Etiquette
  • Fashion
  • food
  • Hair
  • Health
  • Housework
  • Humour
  • lifestyle
  • Midlife
  • parenting
  • Personal stuff
  • Shopping
  • Sport
  • Travel
  • Uncategorized
  • work

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 110 other followers

Instagram

No Instagram images were found.

Some posts

  • April 2017
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015

niftyfiftyshades

niftyfiftyshades
Follow NiftyFiftyShades on WordPress.com

Nifty

Read about my failings as I muddle through midlife

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • NiftyFiftyShades
    • Join 110 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • NiftyFiftyShades
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...