Ruby Granger #5 Counting Her Ad Money With Closed, Grateful Eyes

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Just been having a nosy at Claire's blog, apparently when she was six years old Marfa had her skipping rope confiscated by airport security and began to cry. Luckily Ruby, ever the hero of the tale (who I guess would have been nine at this point?) somehow got them to give the rope back by asking politely. According to this blog airport staff often wish that more passengers behaved like Ruby at security as she volunteers to be patted down or something? And then one time she just randomly sat down on the plane next to some random elderly Australian couple and talked to them for the whole flight...
I bet the elderly Australian couple was thrilled to have a chatty British know it all as their travel buddy for a 20+ hour flight. Especially if Erimentha is based on how Ruby behaved as a child lmao I can just picture them wishing for the plane to crash as Ruby goes on and on about the fauna and flora of Australia
 
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Just been having a nosy at Claire's blog, apparently when she was six years old Marfa had her skipping rope confiscated by airport security and began to cry. Luckily Ruby, ever the hero of the tale (who I guess would have been nine at this point?) somehow got them to give the rope back by asking politely. According to this blog airport staff often wish that more passengers behaved like Ruby at security as she volunteers to be patted down or something? And then one time she just randomly sat down on the plane next to some random elderly Australian couple and talked to them for the whole flight...
Wasn't Ruby like 9 at this point? I struggle to believe she volunteered to get patted down that young
 
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Maybe the security officers caught a glimpse of Ruby's behaviour and thought it best to confiscate the skipping rope, lest Martha tried to strangle her on the plane
 
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Wasn't Ruby like 9 at this point? I struggle to believe she volunteered to get patted down that young
Okay but this sounds a bit odd. Was this on a flight in Australia? If so, I also struggle to believe that the airport staff would pat her down at age 9 because they aren't allowed to do so legally to anyone under the age of 16, and you get scanned over with a wand anyway for random selections and everyone has to walk through a metal detector. If they have suspicions of someone under the age of 16, they have to get the Federal Police over to do a patdown. Legit, my friend once got pulled over for a random selection to be waved over with the wand and the staff member immediately let her go when he asked my friend what was the purpose of her travel and she answered school exchange and mentioned she was 15. Airport staff probably thought she was some weird English kid and probably made a jokey comment.

Also why wouldn't Ruby's parents just ask for the skipping rope back? Why did Ruby do it as a 9 year old? Isn't that her parents' responsibility to do so and also check what their 6 year old had packed/pack her bags?

Also I cannot be bothered to read through Clare's blog but just wondering for anyone that has, do you get the vibe that Martha is the Nathan of the family?
 
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Okay but this sounds a bit odd. Was this on a flight in Australia? If so, I also struggle to believe that the airport staff would pat her down at age 9 because they aren't allowed to do so legally to anyone under the age of 16, and you get scanned over with a wand anyway for random selections and everyone has to walk through a metal detector. If they have suspicions of someone under the age of 16, they have to get the Federal Police over to do a patdown. Legit, my friend once got pulled over for a random selection to be waved over with the wand and the staff member immediately let her go when he asked my friend what was the purpose of her travel and she answered school exchange and mentioned she was 15. Airport staff probably thought she was some weird English kid and probably made a jokey comment.

Also why wouldn't Ruby's parents just ask for the skipping rope back? Why did Ruby do it as a 9 year old? Isn't that her parents' responsibility to do so and also check what their 6 year old had packed/pack her bags?

Also I cannot be bothered to read through Clare's blog but just wondering for anyone that has, do you get the vibe that Martha is the Nathan of the family?
From what I've read it seems that Claire likes having Marfa to relive her youth with...
 
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I'm only just watching Ruby's reading wrap up for January and...well, there's a list:

  • she uses "disjunct" as a noun which is so, so jarring to my ears. Things are either disjunct, or there is a disjunction between them, but Ruby says that the book is about "the disjunct" between something
  • she says On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous is a memoir but it's a novel, memoir is used for non-fiction
  • she says the end of Jane Eyre doesn't "sit quite right" and I assume that's because of the marriage at the end. Personally I didn't find the ending incongruous with the rest of the novel at all, and Ruby also suggests maybe Charlotte Bronte ended the novel that way because "she thought it wouldn't get published if she didn't write a moral ending" but Wuthering Heights was published the same year and there is so much explicit immorality and amorality in that novel that it just doesn't really make sense for Ruby to suggest that. For a self-framed Victorian nut Ruby seems to have quite an inflexible idea of what they were like
  • why did she announce halfway through she was going for lunch? Why not just...go and then come back and carry on with the reviews?
  • on a positive note, her friend Blakeney's book looks so cute! The art is beautiful and that children's book is such an accomplishment, especially when compared to Erimentha 💩 AND all of the profits are going to Feeding Britain - take note about how to actually help and donate to charities, Ruby
  • "precent" 🙄
Re; Jane Eyre, 'Tenant of Wildfell Hall' was another Bronte novel that dealt with topics that were considered 'taboo' for the time, and in great detail. I was looking through her reviews and iirc she wrote about reading it at the age of 13 and loving it? It details domestic abuse, drinking and adultery so it really doesn't seem like her type of thing now, let alone when she was a young teenager. 'Jane Eyre' was one of the happier Bronte novels, and the marriage at the end signifies Jane's actual desire to marry a man of her own accord, after a lot of soul-searching, and although it's moralistic at times it's genuinely cute to see her find happiness as well as a measure of independence. It's not as if the whole novel is about Jane being herself and the marriage is randomly tacked-on at the end; she has a lot of chemistry with Rochester and genuinely loves him, deciding on her own accord to take some time and think about whether marriage is the right choice.

In regards to the content in books of the time, there were a lot of extremely popular 'sensational' novels from the likes of Braddon and Collins - published a bit later than the work of the Brontes but nevertheless, proof that things didn't have to be squeaky-clean to be published.
Ruby tends to throw around random English lit textbook words to sound smarter, but her analysis is rarely above the surface-level stuff you get on Wikipedia. The best reviews are the ones that don't just rely on thesaurus abuse - they actually tell you something interesting about the reviewer's experience of reading the book.
 
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Wasn't Ruby like 9 at this point? I struggle to believe she volunteered to get patted down that young
she didn't volunteer to get patted down, it says that she's well prepared before security so the process goes smoothly ie. she has her liquids packed before leaving the house and takes her shoes/belt/etc off before being asked.

edit: this is the blog post where both of these (seperate) incidents are described
 
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The golden child/scapegoat dynamic they have going on is glaringly obvious
 
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she didn't volunteer to get patted down, it says that she's well prepared before security so the process goes smoothly ie. she has her liquids packed before leaving the house and takes her shoes/belt/etc off before being asked.
Is this an exceptionally thoughtful thing to do? My family always does that, for me it's normal.
 
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Also I cannot be bothered to read through Clare's blog but just wondering for anyone that has, do you get the vibe that Martha is the Nathan of the family?
Not really, Martha seems to have a much bigger personality. I’d guess that Ruby maybe treated Martha like Erimentha treats Nathan, but they seem to have a surprisingly close relationship so they must get on. Nathan’s like the Tracey Barlow of the literary world, he goes upstairs at one point and that’s the last anyone sees of him for about ten years.
 
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she didn't volunteer to get patted down, it says that she's well prepared before security so the process goes smoothly ie. she has her liquids packed before leaving the house and takes her shoes/belt/etc off before being asked.

edit: this is the blog post where both of these (seperate) incidents are described
Christ, Claire comes across as particularly insufferable in that post. Ruby didn't lick it off the ground.
 
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I have subscribed to a fashion newsletter and they advertised this homewear and tell me, why can I see Roobee wearing this?
AEAD84BF-8A07-4F3A-A24E-490C1224759B.jpeg
 
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she didn't volunteer to get patted down, it says that she's well prepared before security so the process goes smoothly ie. she has her liquids packed before leaving the house and takes her shoes/belt/etc off before being asked.

edit: this is the blog post where both of these (seperate) incidents are described
Ruby finds it ‘mortifying’ that a suitcase had to be opened in the airport omg that is actually cringe. I’ve got ADHD, several members of my family also have it and when we fly or do literally anything, we’re an absolute mess lol. It’s not mortifying or even deep, she needs to get over herself hahaha
 
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Ruby finds it ‘mortifying’ that a suitcase had to be opened in the airport omg that is actually cringe. I’ve got ADHD, several members of my family also have it and when we fly or do literally anything, we’re an absolute mess lol. It’s not mortifying or even deep, she needs to get over herself hahaha
Legit, she needs to get a grip, just because you travel one way, doesn’t mean everyone else can. Like it’s just the way people function. Not everyone can be super organised or can afford to just pay for extra bags
 
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she didn't volunteer to get patted down, it says that she's well prepared before security so the process goes smoothly ie. she has her liquids packed before leaving the house and takes her shoes/belt/etc off before being asked.

edit: this is the blog post where both of these (seperate) incidents are described
All the stuff Ruby does in that post are what there are signs telling you to do when going through security? Have your liquids in a clear bag, take off belts and big boots, and have electrical items out of your bag in the tray. Why does her mum think this makes her "extra cautious"
 
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Usual disclaimer applies, I would warn readers however that this chapter contains some Golden Child/Black Sheep dynamic at play, it might be triggering to those who have grown up with it.

Erimentha decides to stay home for the day after the PE incident, and they walk Nathan to school. He's not shoved into oncoming traffic but they race to the end of the road, he wins. She patronisingly pats him on the back, allowing this little victory, but soon asserts her authority as the dominant child.

"Did you know..."
He cuts her off. "No more facts!"
Mum, with a few working synapses left, tells him off for 'being mean'. "We love Erimentha's little factoids."

This is all very uncomfortable. It's the reason Nathan will one day change his name to Lewis and lie to his girlfriend that his parents are dead.

Erimentha talks about how her parents met at university during exam season, which is completely irrelevant and Erimentha is very critical of the idea of love (her emphasis). Nathan also finds it cringe, because he's a stereotypical eight year old (yes reader, sadly he is also regressing, by age - although this might be better for him, one day he'll be a random sperm living in blissful ignorance)

Erimentha notes that given her height, she could pass for Year 5 in her old school.

She sees her former teacher - who forgets her duty of care to a classroom of children and chats with Erimentha, and she's convinced something is wrong. She notes that her teacher seems like a maternal figure due to her oversized glasses and wrinkles. Ouch #bekind, Erimentha Wintour! The teacher encourages her to tell her parents or the teachers at the school, but Erimentha seems to think being bullied = weakness.
 
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All the stuff Ruby does in that post are what there are signs telling you to do when going through security? Have your liquids in a clear bag, take off belts and big boots, and have electrical items out of your bag in the tray. Why does her mum think this makes her "extra cautious"
Right? she's praising herself and Ruby for doing the bare minimum!!
and she gently mocks Marfa and her husband, when in reality they are slobs and imo disrespect airport staff (if you know what the instructions are -because you're an upper class family that travels often- make an effort not to make people's lives more difficult?)

For the luggage bit, I don't think strangers seeing your content is the embarrassing in the context, but I would think that if you can't afford to pay for extra luggage you also can't afford to just bin belongings to lighten your suitcase? I was always taught to carefully weight my suitcase before leaving for the airport for that reason
 
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Is this an exceptionally thoughtful thing to do? My family always does that, for me it's normal.
i don't think it's abnormal, i do the same. especially packing your liquids before you leave the house because a lot of airports no longer provide plastic bags. i do think it's a bit odd that her mum is praising ruby for doing all of this, it's the bare minimum
 
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