sardonic greetings cards & gifts
‘You Never Mentioned You Were Getting Married’ Card
Text reads:
you never mentioned you were getting married.
Cream 300gsm laid card with round edges and black hand rubber stamped text with red Mardy Mabel rubber stamped logo on back of card. Measures 105mm x 150mm. Comes with red envelope and in clear cellophane bag.
£2.99 BUY HERE
‘Jesus Christ You’re Old’ Card
Text reads:
jesus christ you’re old.
Cream 300gsm laid card with round edges and black hand rubber stamped text with red Mardy Mabel rubber stamped logo on back of card. Measures 105mm x 150mm. Comes with red envelope and in clear cellophane bag.
£2.99 BUY HERE
‘I’m a Dick and Forgot Your Birthday’ Card
Text reads:
i’m a dick and forgot your birthday.
Cream 300gsm laid card with round edges and black hand rubber stamped text with red Mardy Mabel rubber stamped logo on back of card. Measures 105mm x 150mm. Comes with red envelope and in clear cellophane bag.
£2.99 BUY HERE
‘Sorry I Missed Your Child’s First Birthday’ Card
Text reads:
sorry i missed your child’s first birthday.
Cream 300gsm laid card with round edges and black hand rubber stamped text with red Mardy Mabel rubber stamped logo on back of card. Measures 105mm x 150mm. Comes with red envelope and in clear cellophane bag.
£2.99 BUY HERE
‘You Chew Loudly’ Card
Text reads:
you chew loudly.
Cream 300gsm laid card with round edges and black hand rubber stamped text with red Mardy Mabel rubber stamped logo on back of card. Measures 105mm x 150mm. Comes with red envelope and in clear cellophane bag.
£2.99 BUY HERE
‘Your Breathing is Annoying’ Card
Text reads:
your breathing is annoying.
Cream 300gsm laid card with round edges and black hand rubber stamped text with red Mardy Mabel rubber stamped logo on back of card. Measures 105mm x 150mm. Comes with red envelope and in clear cellophane bag.
£2.99 BUY HERE
In Mardy Mabel’s second installment in the Public Transport Archetypes series, she looks at the irritating species, The Only Child…
*cough cough; does best David Attenborough voice*
And here we are, at the commuter’s natural habitat: The Train Station. If we just hide behind this broken bin, we have the perfect vantage point in which to see this breed in action during their ritualistic early morning routine. Presently, they all look quite similar: with their venti fair-trade wet cappuccino in hand, many fuss over picking up their free newspapers whilst others sit on benches applying make-up. Some tails twitch, anxious that someone has stood in their regular spot, whilst others keep their cards close to their chest, turning their attention to their iPhone and pretending they’re not a threat. This is the calm before the storm.
The warning horn is then honked as the arrival of the (probably late) train is announced, followed by its arthritic crawl in to the station. Ears prick up and elbows become sharp.
A gentle metamorphosis occurs as we begin to see a differentiation in the commuter species. Whilst some people wait for passengers to disembark, others impatiently force their way to the front of the queue – leaving those who enjoy a good old tutt to sing the song of their martyrdom.
But there’s one type who thinks they’re wily. Not only that, but they also think they’re sort of invisible too. Here we have “The Only Child.” Fueled by their sense of entitlement, this narcissistic creature pushes themselves on to the train as if God made it just for them. Once on, their selfish barging triggers their homing device which zones in on the priority seat and magnetically pulls them towards it. If empty they plonk themselves down like they have the divine right to sit there despite not looking like a fat woman, a woman co-joined with another person or a man with a cane auditioning for “Top Hat” (as the priority seat picture would suggest.) One of the most frustrating breeds of the commuter types, The Only Child began life with the amazing ability to clearly pronunciate the words, “mine mine mine.”
As the train trundles on and slows down at subsequent stations, others will naturally squeeze on to the locomotive – and it’s more than likely that another Only Child will home in on the priority seat and give the occupant a pissed off stare. It’s often an interesting stand-off – like two spoilt children with a Meccano set at playgroup.
The Only Child’s tactic to retain possession of the seat includes being very busy and important and supposedly unaware of people’s needs around them by composing important emails on their BlackBerry, being preoccupied as they arrogantly flick through the pages of the Financial Times – and pretending to be asleep.
However, it’s inevitable that there are others aside from The Only Child who want to sit in that seat too. Curiously they are the commuters who actually do look like a fat woman, a woman co-joined with another person or a man with a cane auditioning for “Top Hat”. The underdogs of the commuter world, they nervously hover around The Only Child, feeling vulnerable and as if they cannot ask The Only Child to move the fuck out of their seat. In fact, many wear badges to indicate their entitlement – but this silent voice is often not heard.
*drops David Attenborough voice as becomes more wound up and slightly hysterical*
But, my friends, this is a jungle and you have to roar to stand up for yourself. Be careful about the way you do this, though, otherwise you’ll just end up looking like another commuter twat – like the “Train Prefect” who bellows at others to move down the carriage.
Firstly, try and loudly but calmly ask The Only Child if you can sit in their seat. Point at your ailment to make it a bit obvious. Shocked that someone has actually been brave and opened their mouth, they’ll often just move. And if they don’t then they’ve made themselves look like a selfish twat in front of everyone else in the carriage, leaving you to say something like, “No you’re right – your ego needs this seat more.”
If you’re feeling a bit more belligerent, try one of the below:
(for the women with bulging stomachs)
1) *prefixed with a steely glare* “You really don’t want to mess with my hormones.”
2) “I had sex so I could specifically sit in that seat.”
3) And for those who haven’t been careless with their contraception, you could simply give the Only Child a little slap around the chops and tell them that you know they’re not really sleeping / engrossed in their self-important emails.
4) Or there’s the one I enjoyed using so much recently after I broke my wrist: “Would you prefer it if I sat on your lap?” Try and be slightly creepy with that one too, like you’re really enjoying just thinking about the image.
After this even the most abhorrent Only Child will move, albeit with a huff and some remark about how they’re so tired after having spent the whole day ordering people around to work on their extension in Herne Hill.
Yet still some just stay put.
*sigh*
At least you tried; you’ve done everything you rationally can to justify those empowering expletives which are just seconds from tumbling out of your mouth after the red mist slowly closes down…
An Ode to Sunburn.
Sunburn –
You crimson little fucker,
I thought I’d seen the last of you in Barcelona last summer,
But you hid behind a cloud on this overcast day,
Silently watching me like a stalker, hitting out your cancer rays.
And whilst I (thought I) worked it down there on the beach,
Stripping off my layers to the bikini I got on the cheap,
You mocked my SPF20 and laughed at my English skin,
Boasting how you’d make me sorry with your cocky little UV grin.
So when I returned to the hotel room this balmy, still evening,
I looked in the mirror expecting to see my face all nice and gleaming,
But this was your moment of glee; your masterpiece you did unveil;
To which I spluttered and recoiled, “Sunburn you little shit – I’m off the Pantone scale!”
You’re hot, you’re sore, you’re ugly, you really fucking itch,
You make people slap my beacon arms you irritating little bitch,
You taunt, you laugh, you smirk, you cruelly sodding jeer at me,
Yes, well done, you tricked me again; hurrah for my tan-hungry naivety.
And now I have to brave it, walking around like it’s totally ok,
To have two blonde caterpillar eyebrows nestled on a lobster everglade,
On my mind it weighs heavily: what the hell am I going to say,
Back home at the office whilst doing my smug holiday bray?
I’ll stand there like a traffic cone with fluorescent skin I cannot hide,
My colleagues will rip it out of me – oh what comedy you did provide,
They have the memories of elephants; they will forever give me strife,
You haven’t just ruined my holiday, Sunburn, but also my entire fucking life.
Here’s the thing: Halloween as a child is one of the most awesome nights ever. But since you got older, the only way it has been socially acceptable for you to enjoy All Hallows’ Eve is by wearing a slutty nurse uniform and getting off with blokes who you hope are a little less ugly underneath all that Incredible Hulk body paint. It goes like this until you have children of your own (shudder) and then you just walk around with a bunch of five-year-olds in a supervisory capacity, making sure the neighbourhood pervert hasn’t inserted razor blades in to his Haribo.
As I’m reluctant to spend the 31st October being groped again and, as thinking about my biological ticking clock is like having a wasp stuck in my head, I’ve decided to reclaim Halloween for my own again. Yeah, you might think a fully grown 30-something year old woman walking around with a swag bag, chirping “trick or treat” is a little weird – but let me explain the joys of doing Halloween as an adult…
Being Part of a Gang
Remember when you were a kid and you and your friends were the coolest gang around? It didn’t matter that you were the runty slightly-bullied member of the group, you felt proud as you all walked down the street, dominating the pavement, shouting all the new swear words you learnt that day from the kids in Year 10. Adult trick or treating can give you that same feeling of belonging. Obviously you can’t do this sort of thing on your own, and I’d advise against tagging on to the back of a group of 10-year-olds, so you’re going to have to find a gang. Perhaps your friends of yore (who have now settled down and have babies) might be a bit reluctant to do this, but you’ll have other friends who entertain that level of crazy in you. Go with that mate who once went to a wedding dress sale with you – despite the fact that neither of you had plans to get married (this bit was fine; having a scrap with a real bride-to-be over “your dress” was not.) Go get your Halloween Buddy, be free and rule the streets together.
Your Inner Fat Kid
Sweets! Sweets! Sweets! Oh glorious sweets! This is confectionary heaven. This is even better than the time you realised that there was a blind spot around the bit in Woolworths where they kept the Pick ‘n’ Mix, inviting you to fill your pockets up and stuff as many strawberry lances as you can down the front of your bomber jacket as you could.[1] Oh sugary goodness. The E-Number high. The fur upon your teeth. Embrace that inner fat kid you’ve tried to shake off since you became slightly obsessed with body image after reading Just 17. Your dentist can go fuck himself.[2] And, as an adult, your mum isn’t here to try and stop you eating them all in one go. Think of the street as your supermarket aisle, and the night as your very own appearance on “Dale Winton’s Supermarket Sweep.” Go go go!
Reviving Knock Door Run
What a brilliant game. How could you have ever forgotten it? Pick a victim’s door, ring the shit out of the doorbell and then run as fast as you can. It’s the buzz of the nervous exhilaration as your legs try to get you out of the vicinity as quickly as possible; it’s the stress of desperately trying to find a dustbin – or anything – to hide behind as you realise everyone else is peeling off and finding hiding stations; it’s struggling for breath as your could-be-fitter body convulses with immature laughter. Whilst it’s a gang game, it is sort of also an individual sport because, if you’re a weak runner, then wobbly Mr Warbuton with no teeth will spot you, gain on you and haul you back to his house where he’ll call your parents and keep you hostage in his fag-ashy living room with his incontinent one-eyed dog.
Doing this as an adult holds all of the same pleasure – with the added perk of being able to blame a group of innocent kids as they’re on their way home, biding by their curfew.
Being Nosey
Now to me, there’s no better perk of visiting lots of households than to have a bit of a nosey over the shoulder of the resident and to make some sharp judgments of their lifestyle and them as a person. If people don’t shut their curtains, then I’m bound to have a bit of a gawp in their window, taking a sharp intake of breath when spotting their hideous sofa cover. I like to call it natural human curiosity, and I’ve often thought about getting a job as a door-to-door saleswoman – and I can totally see the attraction for Jehovah’s Witnesses. But I digress. Trick or treating as an adult is the perfect way to either make yourself feel smugly superior – or like a bit shitting failure – as you get to see the hidden layers of the people who live on your street.
Gang Wars
Don’t for once think that you’ll have a monopoly on the trick or treating on your street. There will be others, mooching around with inferior costumes, trying to get sweets out of people before you’ve even got there. It’s your responsibility to defend your territory. Hey, and if it goes as far as igniting a gang war, then so be it. Of course that means entering in to a turf war with a bunch of ten-year-olds, but the real danger is bumping in to the twilight version of yourself; as in a weird version of that scene in Shaun of the Dead where they bump in to their doppelgangers as they’re trying to escape the zombies, there’s every chance you could bump in to another adult who has also made the decision to relive their childhood. DO NOT LET THEM STEAL YOUR CROWN. Pelt them with eggs, shower them with flour, and bombard them with water bombs[3] as you chase them around the back of the bus shelter, crashing them to the ground as you do a weird-never-before-attempted rugby tackle – after which you squash all the rancid strawberry creams in to their face, making them repeat after you, “I am a Halloween bumder.”
Revenge Tactics
There really couldn’t be any better excuse could there? I mean, that twat in the flat below you who plays his music way too loud, that woman a couple of doors down who moans about you not bringing your wheelie bin in, that bloke on the train who shoved you because he seemed to think he needed more space than you so you followed him home just to see where he lives. There couldn’t be any better targets. For these people, you don’t even pose the choice between “trick” or “treat”; you bypass the process, and go straight to bog-rolling their house and egging their door. Then walk past smugly the next day when you’re in your smart, adult work clothes, sniggering to yourself as you watch them all irate, gasping at the immaturity.
Falling Out With Your Halloween Buddy
Inevitably, it was going to happen… right? There’s me, off my tits on E-numbers, thinking I’m the Halloween Bees Knees and constantly upping the stakes with more immature prank suggestions. But really I’m just hyperactive and making a bit of a dick of myself. Which annoys Halloween Buddy a little bit. But, the thing is, she’s also being irritating, insisting on stopping to take Instagram selfies to prove to everyone that we had a really fun night, and you’re quite sure that she’s drunk more of her fair share of that bottle of whiskey we nicked from the first house of the night. So you start bickering, which turns in to a little bit of pushing and hysterical screaming and, before you know it, you’re on the floor on your arse and she’s pegging it off down the street with your bag of loot.
Halloween’s beaten you. Defeated, you remember that you’ve got a meeting first thing in the morning – so you traipse home with an E-number headache, feeling sorry for yourself, sniffling and muttering under your breath that next year you’re going to do Halloween with Fat Carrie[4].
And then you get to your flat… only to discover that your front door is caked in egg and flour, with the words “Halloween bumder” spray painted across it.
The. Fuckers.
[1] Yes, “invite”. I’d even swear that in court.
[2] And stop looking so shocked next time you say something like, “A Wham bar took my molar out.”
[3] You agree to draw the line at spraying silly string in your hair, though, as you’ve both got work tomorrow morning.
[4] She hates Fat Carrie. She’s actually quite jealous of your relationship with Fat Carrie.
One of the most frustrating things which life has dished on to my plate recently has been a bout of increased train travel. Naturally, I’d rather stick hot pins in my eyes than spend such a huge portion of my life in the company of all of the irritating commuters who plague the buses, trains and tubes of our nation – so, in favour of saving my eyesight, I decided to go all Attenborough and undertake a behavioural study of these public transport archetypes.
To start us off, this instalment looks at that loathsome commuter – The Train Prefect…
Hello everyone and thank you for joining this lecture on The Train Prefect. I’ve prepared us a nice overhead projector presentation to clearly illustrate the matter we’re dealing with here.
Hold on one second, just let me switch this on… *fumbles*… here we go…
*OHP bursts in to life and shows a picture of a ridiculously pompous man trying to fit himself on to a train which has absolutely no more capacity*
This, ladies and gentleman, is what is known as the Train Prefect. A species which matures during their school career where their ability to be good at both academia and sport is rewarded with a badge and the permission to be a sanctimonious twat. This type slowly develops over two years where the authorisation to pull other pupils up on running in the corridor, swearing in the canteen and doing hand-jobs behind the art block, provides them with a moral high ground and an automatic sense of superiority.
Upon receiving their GCSE results (which they would have passed with flying fucking colours), they’re released in to the wider world to live a life where the prefect ethos will always be at their core. As such sanctimoniousness is an abhorrent character trait, they learn to hide it well. But, beware, it can rear its ugly head at any point…
You might know someone in adulthood who you really hit it off with. Let’s say its Clare from work. Oh God, she’s a laugh, isn’t she? So witty and always up for a giggle; you two just really click. You’ve gone for after-work bevvies with her and you just know that, wherever you end up working, you’ll probably always remain friends. But then you have reason to get the train together – and, like a werewolf changing in the full moon, she’ll undergo an ugly metamorphosis which will make you question your judgement on anything in life. Remember: be careful, they walk among us.
So, you’ll be on the platform, and it’ll start with a few tuts coming from Clare’s direction. Which, you know, you can kind of understand because there’s some stupid cow sodcasting The Saturdays whilst rooting around in her cheap handbag, jabbing you with her bony elbows. Then the train will come along – and it’ll be absolutely rammed. Clare’s blood pressure rises as she grabs on to the train door handles and hoists herself up in to the train. There’s no room for her, clearly. And then, before you know it, she’s bellowing in self-righteous tones:
“Can you move down the train please?”
The bile begins to rise in your stomach as the horror that you’re friends with a prick of a Train Prefect dawns on you.
Then, as if by some sort of magnetism powered by twat points gained from possessing long-term travel passes, other Train Prefects appear, gravitate towards one another and rush in to support. Well, they’re actually technically Deputy Train Prefects – because they wouldn’t have ordinarily have had the guts to shout out in the first place, but are more than happy to put their two pennies in once a Train Prefect has set off the initial flare. These are the type of people who were only good at academia (not sport) at school, hence being slightly lower down the prefect pecking order.
So, anyway, the Deputy Train Prefects start chirping in, one by one, slowly gathering confidence, “Err yeah – move down the carriage.” Some of them even gallop down the side of the train, manically thumping on the outside of the windows like a foaming diseased from 28 Days Later, moaning the mantra in near-unison, “Move down the carriage. Move down the carriage. Move down the carriage.”
But the thing is… there is no room you short-sighted twats.
Granted sometimes there’ll be someone inconsiderately taking up the room-space of two other people as they stand in the aisle, idly flicking through their phone, pretending that they can’t see they’re in the way – but more often than not THERE GENUINELY ISN’T ANY ROOM. Can’t you see everybody has their face squashed uncomfortably up against someone else’s face, inhaling their dog shit morning breath?
There ensues some awkward shuffling from commuters as they try and accommodate the Train Prefect pricks who still can’t control themselves, smugly shooting out other comments like, “We’ve all got to get to work you know”[1]. This shuffling might allow one or two more people on to the train – and the Train Prefect will then stand there smugly for the rest of the train journey, thinking they’ve won the battle.
My advice? Don’t move. In fact, try and make yourself as big as possible by inching your feet out a little bit further, puffing your chest out and standing at an awkward angle with your elbows jutting out. Stand on that spot like a stubborn limpet just to prove a point. If possible, turn around and fix the Train Prefect with a dead stare. If the moment takes you, feel free to spit back at them, “Make me. And no I won’t go and eat my crisps in the playground”. I guarantee you that they’ll be so shocked that anyone has finally stood up to them that they’ll just stammering like a muted wreck. And maybe they’ll turn around and target someone else. Someone weaker. But if we all do this – yes, even you shy train types – then we can drive this species out. There’s power in numbers, my friend. And I’d do anything to see the Train Prefect extinct.
In the next instalment of Mardy Mabel’s Public Transport Archetypes we’ll take a look at “The Farter.”
Or maybe not. Someone else might have pissed me off more by that point…