Jack Monroe #543 All her pasta recipes scream ‘run to the bog’ more than ‘come to bed’

Status
Thread locked. We start a new thread when they have over 1000 posts, click the blue button to see all threads for this topic and find the latest open thread.
1
MurielSnark said:
Late in the night, I was down an internet rabbit hole and I read something that gave me pause. When the novelist Anita Brookner won the Booker Prize in 1984, she said in her speech that she might treat herself by re-soling a pair of favourite shoes.
Click to expand...
Brookner was sailing perilously close to Pratchett's Sam Vimes and his boots theory. Careful now, Brookner. We do not speak of quality footwear here 😉
 
YerDa said:
One of the things that gets on my nerves is that blatant lie about guest’s parents sharing a can of cold baked beans because they definitely do NOT have a scarcity mindset, obvious from their purchases, holidays etc and there is no way under the sun that they would have been in a position with multiple kids where they couldn’t afford a hot meal for the two of them. She co-opts problems that are deep trauma for other people - she has never experienced them and she has no personal concept of the impact. It’s offensive.
Click to expand...

She talked about how she realised at school that her family must be poor because they didn't go abroad for foreign holidays like her classmates. That could well have been because Dave 'n' Eve spent a lot of money on the costs of fostering which, as he said, included extending the house and buying a bigger car. However, they were still spending that money and their choice to spend it on fostering rather than flashy goods doesn't change the fact they were middle class and quite well off. And somehow guest turns this into "sharing a tin of cold baked beans between them," "had nothing until my grandfather died relatively young" ... in 2012, at age 75, by which time your dad had spent over £100,000 on fostering by his own admission
 
Add to the abundance/scarcity thing the issue of what she deserves herself vs others. She has spent at least £160,000 on her stuff, and labelled all the spenny things she received, while posting proudly her awful Oxfam haul of xmas gifts for family and friends. Especially where her child is concerned.
eg I have just dropped £80 (reluctantly I admit) on the kid's winter shoes but the boots I wanted were too expensive... at £80. So I have the £12 pair.
Ditto I took out my first credit in years to get him a new laptop that he can do his animation on etc ... my laptop is a 2nd hand basic job.
I think most parents have the same mindset?
She's a Cowbag.
 
witchofwestbyfleet said:
She talked about how she realised at school that her family must be poor because they didn't go abroad for foreign holidays like her classmates. That could well have been because Dave 'n' Eve spent a lot of money on the costs of fostering which, as he said, included extending the house and buying a bigger car. However, they were still spending that money and their choice to spend it on fostering rather than flashy goods doesn't change the fact they were middle class and quite well off. And somehow guest turns this into "sharing a tin of cold baked beans between them," "had nothing until my grandfather died relatively young" ... in 2012, at age 75, by which time your dad had spent over £100,000 on fostering by his own admission
Click to expand...
There's something a little off (for me at least) that Big D is on record about having spent all this money on fostering.

Because they also will have been paid quite a lot to take in kids over the years, right? Maybe it's not enough and maybe you do always end up spending more on your fosters if you're a good and caring person but why go on about it?

Maybe some kids were destructive but I'm pretty sure Big D would've been filing all those receipts and making sure he was recompensed.

They may have spent money to upgrade their house BUT they also added value to that property that will be realised when they sell it.

I can see how Big D totting up his sums may be helpful in making a point about the fostering system, at an institutional level, but how must those foster kids feel, knowing that their childhoods were being accounted for like this?

From what I can see, Big D and Mammy E made a choice to become foster carers that may have been based in an intention of doing some good in the world but they also didn't do it out of martyrdom. They've still held onto a good lifestyle, with comfortable middle class trappings like holidays abroad, motor bikes, fancy watches and gifts of cameras etc to their children. I reckon fostering was a good income stream for them that enabled them to keep earning two wages when E decided to stop nursing.

They've done well for themselves, materially speaking, for two people working in the public sector. No doubt they are savvy about investing in property etc and they've had generational wealth passed down to them too.

But seriously, stop wittering on about how much your foster kids have cost you. It reduces them to transactions in a debit/credit column. Kids in care have so much to deal with, including the feelings of being cuckoos in the nest of a family, without making them feel guilty about the cost of their gruel.

Andt's not hard to see why Jack spouts her resentful bumph about SB being a burden on her finances and freedoms when she's probably grown up hearing this from her own parents.
 
RandomFishOils said:
Two replies from a squig to a Twitter post, with very sensible advice, and she’s exhausted. How she manages to get through her 300 hour working weeks is beyond me if she finds that two minutes to read them and tap out a couple of snarky replies on her phone is exhausting.
Click to expand...
And she spent 4 months in rehab? No wonder her kid doesn’t live with her.

She also said her parents lived in a place that was so small that it was not big enough to be described as a dwelling at one point didn’t she? Under the hedge with the brambly mice perhaps.
 
MavisBeacon said:
That's why guest's claims of being in fear of not having enough due to THE POVERTY and her TERRIBLE DEPRIVED CHILDHOOD just don't ring true. None of her actions back up that narrative at all.

It's become very pertinent as Mr Beacon's dad has just been diagnosed with terminal cancer literally the same month he finally retired. Luckily his parents had already done a lot of traveling and bucket list things, as they also have an abundance mindset.

Obviously, there's a balance. it's important to save up for things you want/need like a house or a holiday or a wedding or university or kids etc etc etc and one shouldn't spend irresponsibly or beyond your means (or grift off strangers with pov tales and fake legal action to fund your lifestyle, Jack...) But also there's no point hoarding money for a rainy day when you don't need to. Mr Beacon has helped me a lot by going through all my finances and putting together a proper budget so I know how much I do have to spend, rather than just knee-jerk squirreling everything away in fear.
Click to expand...

I think she’s lying about her pov 100% but I just wanted to offer a small counter to this.

I grew up in poverty and I didn’t grow up with a hoarding money for a rainy day mindset and neither did quite a few people I know. If you got money, you spent it because the idea of saving for a house deposit or having enough to ensure you’d be fine if disaster struck was as laughable as someone asking you to climb Everest right then and there. If my parents got money, it was spent because there were always bills waiting to take it. Any savings would be eaten up quick sharp so nobody bothered and if you didn’t have the savings then actually it was fairly difficult for anyone to take them - the electric company would have to make a payment plan with you etc whereas if you had £500 in the bank they’d want that. It’s perfectly possible to be spending money on something tangible as a treat while also worrying about paying other stuff/not having enough - the worries tend to be on a far grander scale than the purchase is IMO and the logic breaks down to “Well I’m going to struggle either way but at least this way I’m struggling with X item” - which I think is what the stereotype of big screen TV is rooted in tbh.

I’ve had to do an awful lot of work as an adult to try to over come the “money comes in, spend it” mindset and to work out what a sensible amount to spend on various things and save on others is. I’ve still not quite mastered it tbh though I manage it enough to be ok now.

I don’t believe in Jack’s case the spending money as soon as it comes in and compulsive weird purchases is anything to do with poverty, she’s just Jack - but it is a valid reaction to poverty that many people have, just as much as the saving saving saving is.
 
MurielSnark said:
There's something a little off (for me at least) that Big D is on record about having spent all this money on fostering.

Because they also will have been paid quite a lot to take in kids over the years, right? Maybe it's not enough and maybe you do always end up spending more on your fosters if you're a good and caring person but why go on about it?

Maybe some kids were destructive but I'm pretty sure Big D would've been filing all those receipts and making sure he was recompensed.

They may have spent money to upgrade their house BUT they also added value to that property that will be realised when they sell it.

I can see how Big D totting up his sums may be helpful in making a point about the fostering system, at an institutional level, but how must those foster kids feel, knowing that their childhoods were being accounted for like this?

From what I can see, Big D and Mammy E made a choice to become foster carers that may have been based in an intention of doing some good in the world but they also didn't do it out of martyrdom. They've still held onto a good lifestyle, with comfortable middle class trappings like holidays abroad, motor bikes, fancy watches and gifts of cameras etc to their children. I reckon fostering was a good income stream for them that enabled them to keep earning two wages when E decided to stop nursing.

They've done well for themselves, materially speaking, for two people working in the public sector. No doubt they are savvy about investing in property etc and they've had generational wealth passed down to them too.

But seriously, stop wittering on about how much your foster kids have cost you. It reduces them to transactions in a debit/credit column. Kids in care have so much to deal with, including the feelings of being cuckoos in the nest of a family, without making them feel guilty about the cost of their gruel.

Andt's not hard to see why Jack spouts her resentful bumph about SB being a burden on her finances and freedoms when she's probably grown up hearing this from her own parents.
Click to expand...

All very true although I guess at least their kids were living with them. Guest has frequently complained about how hard done by she was despite her son evidently spending far more time with his dad than she said he did (and now, it seems, lives with him full time)
 
VeniVidiVicki said:
And she spent 4 months in rehab? No wonder her kid doesn’t live with her.

She also said her parents lived in a place that was so small that it was not big enough to be described as a dwelling at one point didn’t she? Under the hedge with the brambly mice perhaps.
Click to expand...
Not if we have a say in it.

That hedge is our summer dwelling. We don't want it left looking like her kitchen, and littered with empty sardine tins* and fecking sideboards.

* This is vvv painful - some of our best friends are minnows, and they have sardines who have married into the family. Evidence of a sardine holocaust is just unacceptable
 
witchofwestbyfleet said:
Or just a partner with some money, remember Essexgirl (our poster with inside knowledge) who said that guest has always gone for older, wealthier partners and that between 2010-18 she had at least 6-7 other relationships and another engagement beside Leggy, Louisa, and the policewoman

And even when she found OH who doesn't use social media and didn't know who she was, she still blew it with her theatrics
Click to expand...
She's been engaged more than a wetherspoons bog.
 
Marmalade Atkins said:
The tinned fish era was the worst. It seemed to go on for ever.

View attachment 2471415 qView attachment 2471416 qView attachment 2471417 q
Click to expand...

I find I actually want to take guest's side on this one. If you have any sort of chronic illness or visible health problems any number of people will offer stupid advice that they're sure will fix you up in no time. Have you tried not eating bread? What about accupunture? I'm sure if you'd just eat a banana every day that limb would grow back. It gets very easy to snap at people when they do it, I'd probably have been far ruder myself. In this case both of them are irritating twats. (Hey, have you tried keto for your irritating twit? That should clear it right up, it never fails. Of course, Big Pharma don't want you to know about this.)
 
Marmalade Atkins said:
The tinned fish era was the worst. It seemed to go on for ever.

View attachment 2471415 qView attachment 2471416 qView attachment 2471417 q
Click to expand...

Gosh I had no idea the NHS was so well funded that it could afford to provide nine therapists and sixteen week rehab stays to someone with depression. Last time I saw a GP about depression they literally just asked which tablets I’d like this time and then gave me some links to sites about coping with being sad.
 
streby said:
I find I actually want to take guest's side on this one. If you have any sort of chronic illness or visible health problems any number of people will offer stupid advice that they're sure will fix you up in no time. Have you tried not eating bread? What about accupunture? I'm sure if you'd just eat a banana every day that limb would grow back. It gets very easy to snap at people when they do it, I'd probably have been far ruder myself. In this case both of them are irritating twats. (Hey, have you tried keto for your irritating twit? That should clear it right up, it never fails. Of course, Big Pharma don't want you to know about this.)
Click to expand...
Yeah... I was briefly siding with guest, however well-meaning the squig probably was when they could just wind their neck in. But of course guest has to ruin it all with her WELL ACKSHUALLY I go to seven therapists, have a doctorate in mental health, wrote the twelve steps, discovered penicillin etc.
 
Status
Thread locked. We start a new thread when they have over 1000 posts, click the blue button to see all threads for this topic and find the latest open thread.
Back
Top