BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: GUEST,Bobert
Date: 08 Oct 05 - 09:31 PM

Well, Lizzy, I like to think of unpleaant situations as experiences that both make us strongetr but also ones where when we are in need it's okay to say, "Okay, God, you *owe* me!!!"

Makes it alot easier goin' thur bad stuff knowin' that down the road it will even out...

But good on you. You have yer pride... Yer dignity... And yer "Okay-God-You-Owe-Me" card, so life is good....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 08 Oct 05 - 08:54 PM

Foulestrope, who won?

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Charmion
Date: 08 Oct 05 - 01:54 PM

My mother died about three weeks after my 26th birthday. My biggest problem was hiding the grin.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: JennyO
Date: 08 Oct 05 - 11:48 AM

Jacqui C, I totally sympathise with you over your mother. My brother left the country to get away from our mother, and I suffered many years of misery trying to keep her placated and keep my own family going. When she died about 10 years ago, she cut me and my brother out of her will, and left everything to my stepbrother (from my dad's first marriage).

They used my cousin, who was a solicitor, to legally try and prevent me from getting anything. However, I clearly had a case, and at least managed to get enough to allow me to visit my brother in France and have a few nice little things - not enough to get any property though, and to this day, I am still renting.

Needless to say, I never saw any of them again. So it's me, my immediate family, my brother who has always been supportive, and my circle of friends. That's enough for me. As you said, life's too short...

Jenny

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 08 Oct 05 - 08:27 AM

Too right Robin!

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Oct 05 - 08:11 AM

My brother took me to the Supreme Court over our mum's estate...

mmmmmmmmmmm..


What brother?

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 07 Oct 05 - 01:31 PM

My mother got to a point where her attitude and behaviour was having a deleterious effect on my mental and physical health. When it came to the point that I felt that my own family was suffering as a result I made the decision to part company from her. Believe me, it is not something done lightly but I have never regretted that decision. We were a dysfunctional family anyway, the only reason my brother kept in contact was for my professional advice on insurance matters and I'm still waiting for his return phone call to mine in August 1999.

My family now consists of my husband and our families and my dear friends. I'm happy that the people around me care for me, not what benefits they can derive from me. Life's too short, as far as I'm concerned, to hang around with negative people, even if they are relations.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Charmion
Date: 07 Oct 05 - 10:59 AM

The thing about family is that, unless you're prepared to make a major international fuss, you're stuck with the folks who share your genetic material; however, there's no law against recruiting enough like-minded individuals to outnumber the less-tolerable blood relations. That's not only the point of the rhetoric about circles of people who love you, it's also a darned good reason for marriage.

My elder brother could natter for Canada, his favourite (indeed only) subject being himself. When the front door closes behind him, I turn to my best beloved, roll my eyes, and recover with a small scotch and a bracing dose of sensibly sparse conversation followed by blessed silence.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 07 Oct 05 - 09:46 AM

'A family is a circle of people who love you' was the title of a book I saw years ago - the theory (illustrated with cartoony people) was that you can chose to add people to your family, to replace unsatisfactory ones with caring folks or something like that.

bugger, me mind's gone blank, but it was a long time ago - really all I can remember is the title & the pics - people kept joining the circle.

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 07 Oct 05 - 07:56 AM

I knew you could do it Liz. Isn't it nice when it's all over!

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Joybell
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 06:10 PM

Well done, Liz. Clever girl.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 05:40 PM

You shall receive the Distinguished Service Cross with Oak Leaves, Diamond Clusters, and Rampant Squirrels. Well done!

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 04:58 PM

Loud music, gritted teeth and jet lag all played a part.... she should be about a quarter of the way there now.....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 04:14 PM

Were I nearby, Liz, I would buy you a drink. Well survived!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: curmudgeon
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 04:06 PM

Good Show, Liz. Now you can get back to the serious business of herding Santas.

Tom

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Helen
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 04:05 PM

Well done, LTS!

So, tell us the survival strategies you chose. Did they work well? Was it loud music or feeding her vodka, or a combination of all the suggestions above, or just sheer teeth-gritting endurance?

Helen

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Oct 05 - 03:35 PM

IT PASSED!!


450 miles I drove that woman around the country... did she say thank you? Did she offer to pay for any petrol?

I leave it to your imaginations.

But it's worth it to be rid of her for another few years!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 05:40 PM

Only 14 hours to go before she leaves..... it will pass... it will pass..... it will pass......!


LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 04 Oct 05 - 03:26 AM

Oh I wish..... but the nearest international airport capable of taking jumbo jets is Heathrow.... Bournemouth only takes the little jets and is still 40 miles from the funeral. We really did live in the back of beyond, or at least, in the same postal district!

It will pass.... it will pass..... it will pass.....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Skivee
Date: 04 Oct 05 - 01:50 AM

Try this. Get her to change her flight so that she arrives at an airport close to the funeral. The you'll only have to drive her from the tarmac to the church, right?
Tell her it's because of new regulations regarding some arcane something-or-other. You'll get better milage if you aren't driving with her in the car.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: LadyJean
Date: 04 Oct 05 - 12:28 AM

There's a band called Wolgemutt that can drown out anything. You might pick up a couple of their CDs. Now if you could slip her a couple of Dramamine for motion sickness, those will put you right out. Or you could hand her a thermous of something spiked with vodka.
I remember one epic journey I took with my sister. We were on our way to Kentucky. I had just learned to drive, and she insisted I drive the whole way, while she bitched about how I did it. She took over the driving after some dimwitted clerk at a truckstop commented on the way I was handling the car, and like a 16 year old, which she wasn't, she was embarassed.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 06:24 PM

Good luck Liz - we'll be thinking of you.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 05:22 PM

Do give us a full report when it's all over, Liz...

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 03:50 PM

LH - a suggestion that has some merit, but regretably, it was such a collision that resulted in the family funeral in the first place.

It's no use, I can't get out of it.... and it's too late now to arrange extra cover on the insurance (like I'd travel in the same vehicle as her ever again.....), she's already in the air.

It will pass.... it will pass..... it will pass.....

I'm going to calm myself by taking the camera and photographing the changing colours of the New Forest as we go through.. I know a lot of Laybys along there.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 12:07 PM

Insure one for "any driver". Make sure your no claims bonus is insured too (from what you have told us so far).

After sister arrives, invent emergency that takes you out. Leave her a mobile phone.

Phone while out saying that you are absolutely stuck (even a traffic jam would do), she must go on in the other car and you will catch up in the second.

Catch the train and ring her to say the car you had went wrong (even had a puncture and you could not get the wheel off) and get her to meet you at the nearest station at the far end - thus you minimise the time with her. You still have to get back though.

Ah! you get a discount fare on which a return is cheaper than a single, that way you have to come back by train too.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Oct 05 - 06:46 PM

Arrange for a 2-car collision that involves BOTH your cars and puts them temporarily out of commission. The elegant solution! This only really requires one driver, so it's child's play. It's damned easy to hit a car that is not moving, after all.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 02 Oct 05 - 04:43 PM

Won't work... we have two cars. The odds of both of them being out of action is just too astronomical to be plausible.

It will pass.... it will pass...... it will pass.......

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 02 Oct 05 - 03:46 PM

How about sabotaging the car (so you ahv a valid excuse) and going by train in stead?

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 02 Oct 05 - 03:32 PM

Limpit has to go to school (lucky cow) and I've got more than enough character thanks!

I'll get through it, but remembering this thread will help a great deal - with any luck she'll wonder what I'm smiling at!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Hrothgar
Date: 02 Oct 05 - 07:48 AM

It will be character building.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Cllr
Date: 01 Oct 05 - 06:50 PM

Show her this thread...

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: SINSULL
Date: 01 Oct 05 - 11:48 AM

Why not just let Limpit tag along? She can give your sister something valid to whine about.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 01 Oct 05 - 11:33 AM

That won't work. The earplugs will mask the rumble of the car and force her to hear the music better than ever. Not to be alarmist, but justifiable homicide, with Squeak as the victim, could be the result. This depends, of course, on how the sister reacts to Liz's kind of music.
----------------
Once my husband and I were riding in his sister's car. She said, "Have you ever listened to Bruce Springsteen?"

"Not really," we said, meaning, hell no.

She then turned on the most godawful, rackety irritating stuff, but we didn't say a word, listening and trying to give the guy a chance. Pretty soon, however, she saw the white knuckles and clenched jaws, and she turned it off. If she hadn't, who knows what would have happened.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 01 Oct 05 - 08:53 AM

Liz - you've coped admirably with your's and Manitus's medical problems over the past few years. Just keep in mind that this is a few days and it will end!

I'd go along with the idea of telling her not to talk as you need to concentrate on your driving. Then put on your music (loud) and offer her a pair of earplugs if she doesn't like it telling her that the only way you can get through such a long trip safely is by having the music playing. Maybe she'll decide to go back on the train!

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 07:53 PM

just keep repeating to yourself...in a few days, she goes back to **NEW ZEALAND**.....a VERY long way away.

(How did you get so lucky?)

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 06:32 PM

Don - will consider your suggestion... although she used to be in the army so it takes a lot to get her worked up.....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: GUEST,Don the Man
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 02:27 PM

I have the flippin' solution! I will send you a buncha photos of my baby brother Shane (the looser)(who is still in the slammer)(and still AliVe too!) anyway,...I hacve a whole buncha photos of him in the flippin' nude and totally dead dog wasted after a big flippin' all weekend party. he don't klnow i took them, eh? i been waitin' for a chance to use thenm to enbarass him and this is a good one. You jsut send me 5 bucks a photo and i send you the copies. you show them to your sister. She will eether:

Jump outta the flippin' car and puke.

or

Get turned on and forget to talk to you for a long time.,

or something like that,eh

holu flip, I HATE trhios flippin' goddamn keyboard on Lori's compiter. I \t dont' wokr right! FLIP!

Forget it. just forget it.

Don the Man

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: gnu
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 02:19 PM

Wow... that's a long drive. I should think that the more she pisses you off, the more your epinephrine will flow and tend to keep you awake and alert. You are lucky to have such a safety device.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 01:25 PM

Teach her to play Mornington Crescent - long version.

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Charmion
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 01:04 PM

You could try telling her in a firm, officious way that you need her not to talk because you find driving on the motorway very difficult and you would be heartbroken if anything happened to the car. With any luck, she'll be so offended she won't talk to you for days, and by that time Air New Zealand will be whisking her back home and out of your life until the next major funeral/wedding.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 12:10 PM

If she's anything like me, she will be so jet-lagged she will sleep throughout the ride. Keep the car nice and warm and hope for the best.

As for music, I find soft, brubecky jazz and New Age to be most sleep-inducing. What does everyone else think?

Of course, you must avert the danger of falling asleep yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Sep 05 - 10:16 AM

And don't think I haven't tried it over the years.....!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 07:42 PM

Well it was only an idea.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Peace
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 07:38 PM

Rubbish.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 07:33 PM

Keep a stick in your car , tell sister"shut up or i;ll hit you with stick"
if she doesnt shut up-hit her on head with stick.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 07:13 PM

This isn't the A1 though, it's the M4/M3/M27 with possibly a bit of M25 for good measure. I like the idea of loud music, I usually play something anyway when I'm driving... singing along with the windows all open, amusing people in traffic jams.

I'm hoping that jetlag will get her and I'll be able to drive in peace (or at least drown out the snoring and drooling) most of the way.

Guest - I lived with this woman for 18 years. For 9 of those I shared a bed with her. I KNOW I do not get on with her. She has not improved with age, and I have not become a saint.

Kat - regrettably, she is flying in from NZ to attend this funeral and I'm stuck with her... she's already whined via Email about having to take the train if I don't drive her. It also means that as it's our car, she isn't insured to drive it.... and with her record (written off 3 vehicles) I wouldn't even let her put the heater on!

It will pass... it will pass.... it will pass.....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Dead Horse
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 06:21 PM

Listen here you whining bitch, at least you got a sister. I have to do with everybody elses. Huh.
Just play Mr Barker on your tape, and bugger da moosic. :-)
(luvs ya really)

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: lady penelope
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 05:07 PM

Helen, my other brother is an A1 whinger. However, asking him what he's going to do to resolve his problems only leads to a detailed and in depth analysis of precisely why he can't do anything about his problems and a further whinge as to why won't some one else sort it out for him. Logic does not work........

I'm liking the sound of the duct tape. You could just keep it on the dashboard and wait for her to ask what it's for........ :)

TTFN Lady P.

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Don Firth
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 04:57 PM

If there is some sort of beverage or soft drink that she's particularly fond of, bring a good supply of it along. But dose it heavily ahead of time with vodka or gin. Then, hopefully, she'll spend most of her time on the trip either sleeping or sitting there with a silly grin and trying to focus her eyes. Or if that doesn't work, you could perhaps use it to anesthetize yourself.

Uh . . . by the way, who's going to be driving?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Desperate plea - save me from my sister!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 29 Sep 05 - 04:42 PM

Er - oops.