Anger Management?

My first attempt at a blog was entitled "The Angriest Man in Shire", modeled after the character of David Carr in Nick Hornby's novel "How to be Good." It was short lived, firstly because I didn't think it was a particularly original idea and secondly, although I am indeed the Angriest Man in the Shire, usually by the time I reached the keyboard my furious temper had gone cold. It's that old adage of sleeping on a complaint overnight, instead of simply dashing of an angry letter. In this case it didn't work, because once the fire was gone, the writing became flat and lacking in real emotion.

Anyway this was the introduction:

Okay, let's be clear about this from the start. I'm an angry guy! Always have been. In fact I'm probably the most consistently vexed person I know.

My friends would probably say I am perpetually irate, annoyed, cross, vexed, irritated, exasperated, indignant, aggrieved, irked, piqued, displeased, provoked, galled, resentful, furious or enraged. But that would really just be trying to present a rosy picture.

Some days I'm infuriated, in a temper, incensed, raging, incandescent, wrathful, fuming, ranting, raving, seething, frenzied, beside myself, outraged. But of course no one has the energy to be at their maximum limit every minute of every single day. If you did you would simply boil over and leave a nasty mess on the lino.

Take today as an example. It's been a typical quiet Sunday and at very worst you could say I've been in high dudgeon, irascible, bad-tempered, hot-headed, or choleric. All right, I grant you that this morning I might have been a bit splenetic, perhaps even dyspeptic but not really, really apoplectic.

Tomorrow is Monday and the beginning of a new week so I'll probably start the day a bit tetchy, testy, crabby and waspish. By mid morning I might become hostile, antagonistic, hopping mad, wild, livid or even boiling. This is the time of day when the junk mail starts to drop through the door and I get a bit bent out of shape.

Around lunchtime I like to take a break and watch BBC News 24. That's usually enough to get me riled, hot under the collar, or up in arms. Of course some days Tony Blair isn't in the news.

Then I'll probably just make a sandwich and spend the afternoon getting steamed up and in a bit of a lather about the amount of housework that needs doing, or the mess that the refuse collectors have made in the street.

I might be feeling particularly aggravated, which could result in a narky telephone call to the Council to make a complaint. If I'm really on the warpath and foaming at the mouth then I might dash of a stroppy letter to the bank or scribble a few lines to pour scorn on AA Insurance, NPower or some other useless, contemptible and faceless corporation.

By mid afternoon I generally try to get settled down to some work on a magazine article or my novel. Depending on how successful the writing has been, I might be in a bit of a paddy by the time my wife gets home from work. This could result in me being snappy and shirty until dinner. Ratty if it's my turn to cook. Over our Sainsbury's organic wotnot (bloody supermarkets) I'll tell the wife all the narky things that have happened and generally justify why I'm a bit ticked off.

For the rest of the evening I'll flick irefully through the channels on the Sky remote, getting increasingly peeved at the lack of good telly on these days. Eventually my eyelids start to get too heavy and I slope off to bed in a bit of a bate because I'm too sleepy to read a chapter of whatever is by my bedside.


Let's not beat about the bush any longer. You get the idea. I'm usually a bit pissed off.