Truth Speaking aka Golden Rules Vol. 2 - the Grumpy Edit.

Yup, I feel sick, hormonal and bloated (darn you fertility treatment, should i ever use these eggs, my future children had better be; sweet-tempered, genius, rock-god, bastions of love, peace, the environment and live in the worlds of science and art or I’m sending them back to the freezer). 

I thought this would be a perfect time to reveal more golden truths…. A lot of these revolve around social media, ick. I know I could just not look but a) where is the fun in that? b) some days, it’s my only view to the outside world, please don’t blame me for wanting to make the view better or out another window….

1. Nobody can tell from just looking at you: your mood, your idiot-tolerance level, or how you are feeling mentally and physically. This means you may have to tell them, try and do so politely. I should really get a t-shirt.
2. Only A. can get away with calling you Eric Bana, even he will need to tread carefully.
3. Incidentally, you will now totally get the line in Avengers Assemble, when Mr Bana reveals the secret of controlling the Hulk.  “I’m always angry”. I can only control the ‘Pulk’ for so long, try and read the signs people, save yourselves.…
4. Signs include: one word answers, growling, overly sarcastic comments, no signs of humour - at all, actively ignoring you and lastly, actually walking away - ps don’t follow.
5. It is truly eye-opening just how many ways the universe will conspire to piss you off.
6. It feels really good when you bite your tongue, you generally like people - there have been no rage induced incidents yet. This feels akin to winning the Noble Peace Prize, I am often surprised, I’m not thrown more parades.
7. You are so competitive you will compete with anyone for the title of best patient - it is a self given award, nurses won’t pick sides (you’ve tried) …..
8. …..You will spend many hours wondering how insecure you have to be, to need this level of love from everyone treating you.
9. Dad and A. are titans, saints and wonders. Try to remember not to push them too far, especially not just because you are in a bad mood.
10. Remember your P’s and Q’s, you are not the soul owner of the difficult day.
11. That being said: Please, please, please, reader, think before you write on Twitter or Facebook about your bad day / worst news ever. Really, REALLY? You are STRESSED about a meal are you? Train late, is it? You have a COLD!! - I going out on a limb here but there are worse things happening to people and I don’t even mean me particularly. I repeat - I can only hold back ‘Pulk' for so long…
12. You will sometimes write things on your Blog that will make people concerned that they will say / do the wrong thing. When they tell you this, it will make your heart melt because those who are worried, they are probably not the person it was aimed at.
13. Some people will surprise you in the worst possible way. You will be better about dealing with it for you. ‘Pulk’ will be roaring on A. and Dad’s behalf.
14. To follow up, A, Dad and I are the same people we always were. Please treat us as such, if you count us as honest to goodness friends, don’t get weird on us now. It’s more hurtful than you could ever possibly know.
15. Naps, naps, naps are the elxier of life. Take them often. 
16. Sometimes you are just too tired to do everything you want to do, learn to say No.
17. Just because you are reading this doesn't mean you can’t ring me too. As my friend Miss H says, “I can read your blog or I can ring and ask you how you are, I will always prefer to ring.” This is why she is your friend.
18. You will need to work harder to feel grateful and lucky but you still are, so jolly-well work harder. 
19. The sentence “if you get through this, you will be a stronger than ever” is only ever going to extract a long expletive heavy response along the lines of “ How much stronger do you want me to be?”. 
20. Also FYI not cool to use ‘IF’, you may think it shows your cool, “I’m not going to sugar coat or mollycoddle you” credentials, I will only hear “I am a moron”.
21. Please don’t feel the need to reference everything thus:  “it’s not nearly as bad as what you are going through” or “sorry to rant about something so trivial”. I do want to hear your news, and what’s important in your world but I reserve the right to call bullshit if it really is a storm in a teacup / easily solvable.
22. I am getting bossier and bossier the more restricted I become. It’s like Hitchcock’s Rear Window, but instead of murders - I’m solving peoples lives. 
23. A certain type of selfie really annoys me at the moment. take a picture of something amazing instead or a person you really love. I don’t care if the pout or toplessness is ‘ironic’ - you look like a chump.  
24. The round-robin “post if you know someone with cancer” status up-dates, are weird. They say a lot more about your need for drama than about any cancer sufferers plight.  
25. FYI if we do meet, I am not as grumpy as I seem here, I do not have to talk about it constantly, I will not cry.
26. This summer is meant to be a hot one (yay) - don’t come anywhere near me if you have sun burn. I will beat you. YOU NEED TO APPLY SUN PROTECTOR (Factor 20 or above, yes even in the UK), often several times a day- shock, horror! It works, if it doesn’t, it is user error. Do you really want to be the loser who can’t even put lotion on themselves? I mean that’s pretty remedial stuff right there. I will beat you and then tell you all about my cancer treatments as punishment.
27. Reader, please, don’t let life drag you down. Do just one thing to change whatever it is that makes you feel despondent. I wish I’d done more of this. IF you get sick, you will have plenty of time to think about what you’d have changed and feel grumpy about it.
28. Remember, approx. 98% of the time, it is how uncomfortable you are feeling that makes you grumpy and short tempered. People are not wilfully trying to vex you. Perhaps yelling will help but then they will grumpy and yell at someone else - it’s the snowball affect. Breathe Deeply and Walk Away.