Middle Class Problems

Like it!

Funny.

There's some comfort in knowing you're not the only one suffering

Actually the fashion for wild samphire in fine dining restaurants is causing it to disappear fast - which is actually an ecological problem for some species of birds- rather than for the middle class. Top chefs are calling for more protection and responsible behaviour in picking wild plants to excess. (but yes, lol)

People have always used samphire as a sea vegetable, picking it on cliffs and rocky places or on marshes, depending on which type and which location. It is good food for the poor because it is free. Neither rock samphire nor marsh samphire (glasswort) is a grass. People are just stupid sometimes.

It's been going on since "the servant problem" reared its head in the 19th C.
That irritating and very middle class young man who does programmes about herbs and foraging on TV has a lot to answer for. Leave the countryside alone and stop encouraging the tearing/digging up of rare plants why don't you.

But the parking at Waitrose....................... I mean!!

gracesmum Tell me about !! It's soooo difficult to park my big black SUV. Which of course I need so I can carry all the champagne I need for the weekend house party!!

And problems of getting the grandchildren into the 'right' schools. Problems, problems!!

No to mention when the nanny 's car breaks down on the way to pick them up from nursery/Mandarin lessons/ Baby Latin/Pony Club camp (delete whichever is not applicable)

I have a feeling we had a very funny thread on this subject last year but it is worth another!
Does anybody remember those sketches with Harry Enfield with middle class people at dinner?
When I was younger, middle class people were purported to say 'Of course we don't watch the goggle box, but I think there is one in the servants' hall'.

Round the kitchen table at DD's just a year or so ago, with DD, SIL and DD's friend from 2 doors up and the conversation was about Ocado, the cleaner and nursery! To give her her due, DD's friend said that if she could have heard herself like this 20 years ago, she would have hated herself ! Not always fair to mock is it?

Tangentially....Didn't Wordworth write a poem about a samphire gatherer, risking life and limb?

The only time I had samphire, I had a very memorable and very quick reaction, which I wouldn't wish to repeat. [yuk emoticon].
Ariadne, I can't find samphire in Wordsworth though that doesn't mean he didn't write about it! There's a reference to it in King Lear - I think it's in the scene where Edgar is describing the clifftop scene to his blind father: 'Half way down hangs one that gathers samphire - a dreadful trade.'

Demonising one group is OK, demonising another is not? Why?

Most mums I know who employ a nanny do so because they work very full-time in very difficult jobs- not because they want to go riding a horse or having their nails done after the gym - or taking kids to holistic ballet....

My daughter drives a strong solid car because the lanes where she lives are very narrow and drivers crazy. When she had an accident in her previous car, it was demolished - and thank goodness the kids were not in!

Thinking about 'class' is the problem.

I think this is the middle class having a laugh at itself! It makes a change from 'comedians' like Michael McIntyre putting on a bad Lancashire accent!

I was going to say the same thing Greatnan. And it echoes the fact that, on another thread, someone mentioned that is ok for we slightly older people to laugh at ourselves too.

Well of course but stereotyping is rarely helpful is what I am saying.

Our local Morrisons sell samphire, it's delicious. (Waitrose doesn't! )
When we lived in Norfolk, everyone living within spitting distance of the coast sold samphire at their gate at certain times of the year.

But granjura that survey we had a while ago told me I was middleclass but I've never eaten samphire And, although I have a cleaner [because I'm a lazy slut!], I've never had a nanny or an Ocado delivery!

Granjura - not demonising - just a wry chuckle? As they say in German "Selbsterkenntnis ist die beste Erkenntinis"

gm

How many ticks on a list = middle class???

Nanny N

Eat samphire N

Occasional Ocado Y

Weekly cleaner Y

Big Car N

Holiday home N

Fancy extra curricular classes for kids N

Private education for kids /DGC N

Damn..failed again!!