Wednesday, October 24, 2007

OSL

Theresa over on her site has a good rant up on her latest post, that fits my mood today.

We had a new driver on the bus into BCN today, and honest to god, the radio station he had on was absolutely freaking unbearable....they had a huge number of nasal and appalling singers doing covers of Rod Stewart. Now I am sorry, but Rod Stewart is about enough to make me start pulling out my own fingernails, but rendered in atonal nasal screaming!!!!!!! I am left speechless with horror. The radio station then decided to hold some kind of contest wherein women phoned in and faked orgasms live. I am not sure which was worse, but you know what? It was altogether too much before 9am.

The Catalan class is also creeping up my bad side. Not the class itself, but there is one woman there who talks ALL. THE. FUCKING. TIME. I kid you not. Continuously. Every little tiny meaningless thought that flashes across her achingly empty brain pan is shared with every single one of us. If we finish out the course and I haven't slapped her upside the head it will be a God given miracle. Madre Mio. I have taken to sitting in the farthest possible seat from her, and she still comes all the way over and joins into my group for the oral work. AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!

How can anyone be so incredibly thick! There is this giant empty space around her in the chairs because no one wants to be near her. I actually shushed her, you know that librarian shush, several times today, and I was not the only one.

Now unfortunately she has been joined by a compatriot Old Spanish Lady. Some of these OSL's are deeply and profoundly obnoxious - who brought them up? - and this is one. She feels completely free, like the first, to give her opinion on absolutely every mother loving thing. Loudly. Drowning out the teacher.

You know what? I am not hauling my struggling ass into BCN at that time of day for the honour of hearing these OSLs sound off endlessly. Really I am not.

Then one of the young guys got off on the idea of discussing the relative value and merits of Catalan, French and Spanish swear words. After being pointedly ignored by everyone, he even said that we must all find the topic fascinating.

The teacher, thank goodness, moved us on rapidly.

That said - Pollyanna rising up here - there are also a couple of people that are just plain funny, one American guy and I were having a good laugh about the various English phrases that matched the Catalan expressions.

Nonetheless, I wonder what the sentence for boxing the ears of OSLs is.

5 comments:

Beth said...

Sadly, there seems to be no way to shut these people up unless the teacher steps in.
They rant on and on but are incapable of listening to others...
Of course, they've never had you to contend with!
Good luck.

Boo and Trev said...

What's an OSL?
Trev and I were at a restaurant the other day and there were these rather posh ladies who lunch there.
One of them had an annoying carrying voice. Clearly designed to carry across her stately home.
She was driving us mad. At one stage in the conversation she said. Do you know what I think? I said to Trev well the whole restaurant will in a minute. Hey ho some people love the sound of their own voice

Anonymous said...

Why don't you get together with any of the others who hate her sounding off her opinions and stop her bullying you all?
That's what she's obviously doing!
And you're letting her enjoy her sense of power by letting her get away with it.
Don't be polite about it anymore!!!
If nothing else, get up and pointedly move out of the oral group when she moves in.
Do it repeatedly, get others to join you.
If not, take care of your own peace of mind and keep moving.
What's wrong with talking to the teacher about the problem if nothing else works?
Go in for confrontation and action.
Save yourself from getting an ulcer.
Politics in the banana republic of Latvia is moving into a hot and heavy stage.
New demos every day at our parliament building.
We're planning a huge one at the Dome Cathedral Square for Saturday morning.
The Prime Minister has just told the media at his press conference he needs must look into the background of the organizers as they're "obviously not the voice of the people".
That's got everyone's ire up and politics is heading for a steaming confrontation.

Unknown said...

Who is this anonymous person and what is he/she/it talking about?

Looks like I came at just the right time! Cuss words, a Rod Stewart rant! This post has everything!

oreneta said...

Beth: The ones I loathe most are the ones who feel compelled to put in their two cents on every single item on the agenda, at length, at meetings. Though at least that is in English....I am getting mroe and more rude, and I almost fell bad about it. Almost.

Boo and Trev: OSL...Old Spanish Ladies, and we are talking some nasty battleaxes....

GM: Good lord, the politics there do seem wild...are you missing any more e-mails? One of our difficulties in getting together against her is that we all come from different countries and Catalan is the common language, none of us speak it well....the teacher is moderating her a bit, I am going to move out of the groups a bit more aggressively I think...

D: Anon...from Latvia is my Godmother...she's giving me the news from her world as well as commenting...glad you like the swearing, and I take it your not a founding member of the Rod Stewart fan club...