Tea and Their Pots

Dear reader, 

At a mere glance at tonight's title, you may be thinking, "...okay..." but I promise you, I have good intentions. Half the people reading this may not even drink tea, but after reading this may agree with my hate of using pathetic teapots, and the process leading up to them. 

So you're sitting down perfectly happy when all of a sudden you hear those dreaded words, "Put the kettle on, love?" Em, no thanks?! Believe me, I have tried to wiggle my way out of it by just sitting there after saying, "Ugh, fine!" but no. Parents, they forget pocket money month after month. But when it comes down to their cup of tea, it's ridiculous to even consider the possibility of them not realizing you haven't yet moved.

You then slump off the couch and drag your feet along the carpet on the way to the kitchen, huffing and puffing as loudly as possible so that they just might see that you're struggling to build up the effort to care enough to make a decent cup of tea and take over. Word of advice, don't hold your breath.

As the message finally reaches your brain telling you that you are infact going to have to do this yourself, you boil the kettle. A painfully slow process in which you sit there hoping that if you stare at the kettle for long enough, it might just hurry up. Yes I am a rather lazy person and have no patience whatsoever but the worst is yet to come, my friend. After boiling the kettle, pouring a splash of milk into each cup and popping two teabags into the pot, you pour the water into the dreaded teapot...

As I previously mentioned, I contain no trace of patience within me, and so instead of waiting for the teabags to release their... their... um... tea, I fish out a spoon and stir it, pressing the bags against the sides of the pot. Now, the time has come... to pour... the tea. You knew that this was coming, and take a slow, deep breath as you lift the pot, hovering it over the mugs. You tilt it slightly, and soon enough tea begins to flow through the spout. You smile, so far so good. But then again, you know it's too good to be true, and sure enough BAM!!! Disaster strikes. The stream of tea suddenly turns to a pathetic dribble, and thats when you know that that's the way it will stay until you finish pouring the tea. You groan, and silently abuse it from inside your head. Attemping to move the teapots from blocking the exit, you turn the pot to the right and swivel it around. You try again, fail, abuse, turn and swivel. This is how your actions will go for the next 5mins. Good luck.

But seriously, if you're planning on producing and selling your own brand of teapots, will you make sure that they actually WORK?!?!?! That a decent, constant flow of tea will exit the pot and land satisfyingly into the mugs?!?! It's really not that much to ask!!! God. I personally love a good cuppa tea, but the idea of going throught all that frustration and annoyance and stress makes me not want to bother. Oh, and you may be reading this thinking, "Is she stupid?! Just take out the blooming bags!" well haha cos I did and it makes no difference. The awful design of the pot doesn't allow me to easily prepare this delightful beverage, no matter what I do. So BOOM.

Once again, I'm sure that I'm not the only one in this situation. So please, comment at the bottom and if you like what I write, feel free to follow me using the wee thingymebob on the right. ---------------->

Liv.

Show me the money!

Dear reader,

I'm deeply sorry that I didn't write anything last night, I spent the whole day at my Gran's and then sorted out my bag for today. What was this bag for you ask? Well, that leads me onto today's topic.

The whole of S2 took a trip to Edinburgh Zoo today, as part of biology. Well, I think that's what is was for, we were meant to attend a lecture on primate behaviour as part of the trip, but... um... we um... missed it. Shame... :S Anyway, we had a brilliant time walking round, admiring bored animals and surrounding them with cameras. And of course at the end we went to the gift shop. Ah the gift shop, more often than not it's the child's highlight of the day out. You walk in, squeal at the sight of cuddly toys and stationary that you know you will probably never glance at again but nevertheless like the colour. Then, you grab your favourite item and then suck up to mum and dad to convince them that if you don't buy this you will simply DIE.

The problem is, even as a fourteen year-old girl, I still feel that way. Knowing that you have a tenner burning a hole in your pocket is unbearably tempting. So naturally, I thought, "I'm here, I have to buy something." My mind then flew back home to my brothers: Fraser brought me something back from his trip, so it's only fair, and Elliot (being 5) would scream the place down if I got Fraser something and not him. Okay. Sorted.

Next problem - what to get. Nothing too big or fancy, but nothing rubbish that would be pointless to buy. They have to like it. I looked at around and settled for two magnets which suited them perfectly. Pleased, I checked the prices and I swear down I had to read the label twice. Now, not so pleased. £2.50... EACH. For both of them I would be paying a fiver on my brothers. A bit much perhaps, but those were the only "cheap" gifts I felt they would like. Sighing, I went on patrol for a little something for myself. I found a bookmark and a panda key-ring, totalling up to £9.50 altogether. And thank God I still had enough for the bus home.

Here comes the real question: why on Earth are they priced so high?! Well, in all fairness, Edinburgh Zoo profits go to charity which I think is fandabbydosey, but in general, costs for little bits and bobs at the teeny wee gift shops are ridiculously overpriced. I know it's all stupid stuff like, "Oh, people will pay anything these days, besides, we need the money," or "Ah, they won't mind. The public love the museum." Yeah, keep telling yourself that mate, cos after viewing the prices, they might not be so keen on spending that much on a pencil, meaning that you lose money. Ha ha HA.

I mean, it makes sense, doesn't it? If you bring the costs of things down, more people would be comfortable about buying them, meaning that you would possibly - in theory - get more money. It's a win win situation, no?

Comment your opinions, I'm certain that I'm not alone on this one. ;)

Liv.

The reason it's harder to have a social life.

Dear reader,

Ah, the time has come for me to talk about the ultimate topic: homework. The thing is, where do I begin? There's just so much I could bang on about that it would be boring. So let's keep it short and simple by saying what every 5-18 year old person thinks when the teacher walks up to the board and begins to write the task you've to do for the next time you encounter each other - NOOO!!!!!!!!

Teachers have come up with all sorts of crap for you to do, and I swear they sit down with a cuppa tea at night and think to themselves all the ways in which they can make our nights endlessly essay-filled whilst rubbing their hands together and laughing.

But not only have they come up with all sorts of crap for us to do, they have come up with stupid reasons as to why they're giving it out! Some examples include -

- so that you're parents can see what you're doing in class. (if I wanted them to know I would tell them)

-so that you can practise more of what you've been doing in class. (oh please, as if we want to sit down and do more equations)

- so that you can go over what you've done in class and anything you find tricky. (yay! more school!)

To be honest they're not bad points to make, but as a typical teenager I frankly don't care. But the thing I really hate is when they dish out bundles of exercises to do over the weekend. Are they trying to make us hate school? Do they want to ruin our weekends so that when we're out having a jolly good time we can't help but worry about the four pages of English we've to write?

Sometimes I don't think teachers realise that we have a life outside school. We have other commitments that also take up our time. For example, my entire Tuesday night is blocked up because of things I do. I literally have about 45mins between the time I arrive home after school and the time I need to leave again. During that time I have to change, possibly shower, eat something and make sure that I've got everything I need to go out. I do not have time to do maths, or history, or physics. By the time I come home at 9, I'm tired and want to watch a bit of T.V. before going to bed. But no. Instead, I have to wander upstairs  and sit at my desk for the next hour and a half working.

Unlike my previous posts I think you may have found this one interesting, and that you may relate to this post in the fact that you too hate homework.

Keep reading!

Liv.