Human Resources

It was a quarter past eight in the morning.

‘You wanted to see me boss,’ he said, as I motioned him into my office.
‘Yeah, I did fellah. Take a seat,’ I said.
He pulled up a chair from the corner and placed it in front of my desk. ‘Wassup?’ he asked.
I gritted my teeth at the over casual air of confidence but decided to tackle the question head on, if indeed it was a question.
‘Sorry? Where? You allergic to them then?’
‘Allergic to what boss? I’m not with you.’
‘Wasps. You mentioned a wasp, or am I mistaken?’
‘For a moment his eyes glazed over and then a grin cracked his face. ‘No, I mean, you know…what’s up. It's an expression. What is it?’
‘An expression, huh? So...What’s what? What do you want to know?’ I asked as I leant back in my chair.
His grin disappeared and he leant forward in a sub-conscious body language response to the space that had grown slightly larger by my action. It was deliberate on my part. A conscious decision to pull the strings. Draw the sucker in. You make the puppet dance in this game. He attempted to answer my question.
‘I mean. You wanted to see me. I wondered what for. That was all?’
I leant back over my desk, placed both hands flat across it and stared him directly in the eyes. ‘Yeah, I wanted to see you fella. I wanted to see you about your non-attendance.’ Calling him ‘fella’ de-personalised it. Not for my benefit. I couldn’t give a shit. But he needed to know he was a nobody.
‘Non-attendance? What non-attendance?’ he said, a surprised frown crossing his features. ‘I’ve got a good record. My attendance has been good. I’ve been here every day. Never taken a day off sick in the four months I've been here. I don’t understand.’
Time to fire up a cigar and blow smoke at the sucker. I flipped the lid of the wooden box that sat on one corner of my desk, pulled out a Quai D'Orsay Corona and rolled it between my fingers for no other reason other than effect.
‘Well, let me tell you about non-attendance fellah. The way I see it is you’re meant to be here every day at eight o’clock and leave here at five o’clock. Yeah?’
‘Well, yes,’ he said hesitantly.
‘But the thing is, you’ve been getting here at five minutes past eight…that’s past eight...and leaving again at five minutes before five…yeah? Every single day of those four months.'
I saw his mouth open to respond. I didn’t let him.
‘So you see we ain’t talkin about attendance…your so called perfect, no-sick record. We’re talking about the times you ain’t bin here. That’s what non-attendance is. It’s the time somebody has not bin somewhere…somewhere they’re s’posed to have bin.  You getting the difference now? Yeah?’
He shifted uncomfortably in the seat and glanced towards the window. Another body language giveaway. Looking for help. Then he spoke.
‘My time keeping's not so bad –’
I couldn't help the smile. The puppet was dancing.
‘Time keeping? You call it time keeping? You understand what keeping time is? No? Ok. Let me elaborate.’ I reached for the cigar cutter and clipped the butt end off the Corona in one clean snip. I stared at the cleanly sheared end before continuing. ‘Keeping time. Keepin time is what a drummer does. He picks up the beat and stays in time with the bass and the guitarist. That way the whole band stays tight and in sync. You seeing it now?’
I stuck the cigar in my mouth, and chewed it for a second. Creating space. Creating tension. His fingers twitched as edginess crept in. I reached over to the corner of my desk, picked up the red jet torch lighter that sat there like a mini dumbbell, flicked the trigger and flared up the cigar with a yellow burst of butane. The first cloud of blue smoke wafted across the desk.
'So by getting their arses in to work at the same time and then leaving at the same time…the time that my employees are all signed up to…the whole team stays in sync. But you, you my friend are doin a solo act without the band. You’re a singer with no backing, yeah…cos you ain’t in sync with the team.’ I took a long pull on the cigar and shot a cloud of smoke right into his face.
In an effort at justification or perhaps an effort to gulp some oxygen, he attempted a stuttering response. ‘It’s only five minutes boss. I mean –’
Cheeky sucker. ‘Only five minutes? Is that right? Yeah? Ok…let me explain your five minutes. You, my friend have been stealin ten minutes every day for four months. That's right...stealin. There's eighty-five working days in those three months. That's a total of eight hundred and fifty minutes or fourteen hours that you took. Two of your working days in fact. So, hey, what’s two days in four months you might ask? You wanna ask that?’
There was silence. I blew some more smoke. He stifled a cough.
‘Well do you?’
‘Sorry…do I what?’
‘You wanna ask that question. What’s two days in four months?’
‘No…it’s ok.’
‘Yeah you do.' Ask the fuckin question sucker.
His startled look gave way to another stifled cough as another plume of smoke enveloped his head. I stood up and walked around the desk.
‘You got a cough?’
‘No…no, it’s the…no…it’s fine.’
Yeah sure it’s fine. Suck it up chump. ‘Ok…now you had a question…right?’
‘Err, yes…I did. Err...so…err...what’s two days in four months?’
I rested the cigar on the corner of the desk, turned towards my in-tray and picked up a folded sheet of paper. I opened it slowly. His gaze was focussed on the paper, just as I had wanted. I held it out in front of me and started to tear it into little pieces. Each piece fluttered down onto his lap. His face clouded over in a mix of surprise and curiosity.
‘What’s two days in four months? I’ll tell you what it is. It’s the two fuckin days leave you just applied for this weekend that you ain’t getting cos you owe me sucka. Now get the fuck outta my office.’

Radioactive Boots

I was going to throw them out but at the last minute I thought that they may be useful to do the garden in. Well sometimes, even when there is plenty of mileage in them, a pair of old tennis trainers are just that – old. Out of time.  Unfashionable. My other half even referred to them as ‘Moon Boots.’ Well moon boots were good enough in 1969 when the Eagle landed. So I kept them. To my mind thick, sturdy soles with plenty of tractor tyre-style grip still had some use.
She was out shopping when I decided that I couldn’t put off the moss removing job from the patio any longer. I’d get it done, then I’d win the award of being allowed to sit in front of Soccer Saturday all afternoon. I grabbed a bucket and began to read the instructions on the moss removal product. Dilute with cold water, 1:4. That means chuck a load in the bottom and fill the bucket up, in my book. Harmful to plant and aquatic life it said. Do not drink. I hadn’t intended to drink it but I wondered why those two warnings followed one another. It was unlikely a Triffid would come along and want to de-moss a patio and no matter how intelligent they are, dolphins do not build patios. Perhaps that is a mark of intelligence – not to have a patio.

There were several other alarming warnings and scientific terms such as fungicide and algaecide plastered all over the side of the container.  I felt some trepidation as I began to wonder whether I should bother doing the job at all. Wear protective clothing it said. Like what? A radiation protection suit? Do not breathe in. Did that mean I had to hold my breath throughout the whole operation or did it mean I should be wearing breathing apparatus? I dismissed it all. I’d never get it done if I kept worrying about the warnings. Bit like reading all the side effects you can get from taking a medicinal pill. Once you swallow it you think you have them all. Despite my trepidation I unscrewed the cap and poured a dollop (err…1:4, I think) into the bucket. I topped up the level with cold water and dipped the broom head into the mix. For good measure I tipped a small amount of the liquid onto the patio and began to scrub. A soapy, white film appeared first on the patio surface, followed by a thin, wispy trail of vapour, rising almost imperceptibly. My first thought was that I was glad I hadn’t drunk any of the product and my second was, ‘is this meant to happen.’ I carried on, purely on the basis that it would be impossible for moss to continue to live on the creamy, smoking surface appearing before me. Within ten minutes the whole of my once grey slate patio was a smoldering mess of white paste and pale, cloudy fumes rising into the air. A sickening sensation began to form in my stomach, mostly from the worry that I had somehow started to vaporize my garden but probably stimulated by the bleachy, corrosive fumes that had replaced most of the oxygen available in my immediate vicinity. I decided that enough was enough. As my eyes began to water I accepted that moss could not exist on what had now become a hostile environment to any living organism and I considered the job done. I stepped across the alien landscape that I had inadvertently created towards the hosepipe attached to an outside tap. As I turned the tap fully on to wash away the molten grunge that was creeping across the slabs, I noticed my tennis trainers had begun to glow red around the soles. I hoisted my leg up and back to check the sole properly. Sure enough the underside was a glowing red colour but, with the better view of the whole shoe base, I could see two small yellow spots between the toe and the heel that seemed to be pulsing.  Slightly alarmed at what was happening to my trainers I let go of the hosepipe just as my other half was coming through the back gate laden with shopping. The hose bucked and writhed in a powerful coiling motion across the patio, as the water jet erected it into a hissing, gushing snake-like life form, spurting gallons of water from its nozzle directly at the lady of the house. The first burst caught her round the legs but as the hose bounced upwards she got the full spray directly over her upper body and face. Her screams galvanized me into action. As she dropped her shopping I sprang forward only to find that my enthusiastic reaction had caused me to leap clear over the six foot fence that bordered the garden. I landed some forty metres away on a grass mound at the back of the property. I didn’t have time to be surprised. As I looked round I caught sight of an impromptu wrestling match taking place between the hose pipe and my good lady. The hose pipe seemed to be winning despite profanities coming from my other half that I had not heard since our honeymoon night.  I shot forward to rescue the situation only to find that in an uncontrollable blur of speed I crashed straight through the wooden fence, splintering the panel into matchwood as I came to a skidding halt. Somehow I had covered over forty metres of ground in a split second. I grabbed at the hose pipe directing it away onto the grass and managed to switch off the tap.

I didn’t get to watch Soccer Saturday. It cost me a few hundred quid for a new outfit to replace her soaked one. The patio came up lovely eventually. No more moss. I repaired the fence. I found out that my neighbor had borrowed the bucket and had left a small amount of Hydrofluoric acid, something he had been using on glass. I discovered that my old trainers contained erradiferticulatesulphate acid as part of the sole. A rare chemical reaction between all substances had clearly taken place. Unofficially I hold a new world record for the forty metres. The trainers still glow. I kept them.

All the Trimmings

I saw the sign on the outside wall of the bar. Sunday Roast. Lamb and All the Trimmings. £10. Perhaps it was because I was hungry that it had some appeal. Or maybe it was just that the bar seemed clean, fresh, airy and welcoming. I went in, ordered a drink and sat at one of the tables. Before too long a waitress approached, menu in hand. ‘Are you having lunch today,’ she said, as she handed the menu to me.I took it from her but I had already made my mind up. ‘I thought I might try the roast…the lamb,’ I said, ‘but tell me…what are the…err, trimmings?’
She smiled. Almost condescendingly, I thought, but a smile was a smile at least. ‘That’s the bits that go with it,’ she said.
‘The bits?’ I queried.
‘Yes, the vegetables. It comes with vegetables.’
‘Vegetables,’ I said, ‘so vegetables are the trimmings then…the trimmings as advertised on the board outside?’
The waitress curled her bottom lip fractionally, an involuntary response to my question. Perhaps it was an unusual question but not a particularly taxing one and, since the expression ‘trimmings’ didn’t really explain a lot, I didn’t think it too unreasonable, as a diner who was about to be fed trimmings, that I should ask what they might be.
‘Well, yes, I suppose so,’ she replied.
She supposed…presumed…considered. That suggested that she wasn’t certain. A worry for me if I was to order trimmings.
‘Sorry, you suppose so? You mean you don’t know?’
‘No I do know,’ she said, ‘I didn’t mean it like that. I meant that you definitely get vegetables with the lamb.’
‘Well yes, I know you do. You did tell me. But you said that the trimmings were vegetables. So, tell me, what vegetables do you get?’
She folded her arms for some reason before she replied. ‘Peas, carrots and broccoli, Sir.’
I wondered why she had started to call me Sir.
‘So just three different vegetables then?’ I opened the menu. ‘But your menu says that you have peas, carrots, broccoli, sweet potato, cabbage, parsnip, kale, sprouts, runner beans and cauliflower. So when you say that the lamb comes with all the trimmings, which you did say are vegetables, it actually comes with just three, not in fact all of the vegetables you have on your menu. So really your board should say, roast lamb with three trimmings then? Oh and I could say that if the trimmings are indeed vegetables and you say it comes with all of them, then in addition to peas, carrots, broccoli, sweet potato, cabbage, parsnip, kale, sprouts, runner beans and cauliflower I might reasonably expect to get spinach, turnip and cabbage too, wouldn’t you say.’
I was certain that I saw her roll her eyes. ‘No, Sir. It doesn’t mean just vegetables –’
‘But you said it did.’
‘It means that it comes with other things. The trimmings mean other things. Not just vegetables.’
‘Well, I did ask you what the trimmings were and you said vegetables.’
'I’m sorry. I thought everyone knew what trimmings were.’
‘Did you? Not everyone does. Why would they? If I was in France and it had snails advertised with toutes les garnitures would it not make sense to ask?’
‘Snails Sir? I don’t understand.’
‘Never mind. So the trimmings, as advertised, are not just vegetables?’
‘No Sir. They are all the things that come with your meal.’
‘Oh I see. So then it must include the cutlery, a napkin, a table, chair, a table cloth, a plate for example? All for ten quid.’
‘No…no Sir…’ She glanced behind her at the bar as if looking for assistance. There was nobody available. ‘…it doesn’t –’
‘It doesn’t? No table, no plate, no cutlery. You can’t mean that the roast lamb, with its three trimmings, is just tipped on the floor in front of me surely? No…you mean I have to pay extra for those then?’
‘Of course you don’t Sir. They are…well…part of the…the deal…free…you get the chair…I mean, you know…’ She brushed her hair away from her face and let out a long sigh.
‘Oh so, they are not part of this mystifying all the trimmings thing then?’ I said.
‘Well…no…I mean. Look, you get peas, carrots, broccoli, roast potatoes, gravy and mint sauce.’
‘I see. Peas, carrots, broccoli, roast potatoes, gravy and mint sauce are the trimmings then. All of them, in fact…as advertised. Is that right?’
She looked at me suspiciously. ‘Yes,’ she said hesitantly.
‘Right. I think I get it now. Trimmings are the bits that go with the lamb.’
‘Well, yes.’
‘So if I wanted a fried egg sandwich I should never ask for a fried egg sandwich with all the trimmings as I would get peas, carrots, broccoli, roast potatoes, gravy and mint sauce to go with it.’
‘Err…no…no Sir. They just go with roast lamb.’
‘Ok. They are just the accompaniments, embellishments, appurtenances with that dish then?’
‘Pardon?’ the waitress said, her face screwed up as if I had begun to speak in an alien language.
I had another question. ‘Don’t you think it would be a little less confusing if you wrote something more specific about the meal on your board, that might tell the potential diner what they are getting instead of writing up some obscure, meaningless word like trimmings?’
She declined to answer my question and instead just pointed at the menu that I was still holding.
‘Would you like to order the lamb Sir?’
‘No, I’ll have the lasagne…and hold all the trimmings.’

The Polar Bear

I was enjoying a few glasses of South African Pinotage by a warm log fire when I heard a disturbance in my hallway. I went to investigate and to my horror discovered that a polar bear had broken into my house. Recovering from the initial shock I tried to escape back into the front room. Maybe it’s psychological but when faced with threat why do we retreat to a place we know? I should have legged it out through the back door but it was too late and I retreated as the huge creature followed me into the room. It is a little known fact but polar bears are left handed or, strictly speaking, left pawed. I backed up but it started throwing left jabs sending me further across the room towards the fire. I tried to counter with right hand leads but it was clearly more skilful than I had anticipated. At ten feet tall and 1,400 pounds the bear clearly had a height and weight advantage. I bobbed and weaved, hoping to confuse it but the jabs kept coming. I took one full on the nose and it momentarily stunned me. I tried another short right below the bear’s rib cage hoping to wind it but my blow seemed to be absorbed all too easily. Another jab caught me on the top of the head scrambling my senses. To give me time to regain my composure I did that thing that heavyweights do. I dropped my hands and shook my head rapidly from side to side to indicate that I wasn’t hurt. I even beckoned the beast forward in a show of bravado. Big mistake. I thought it might dispirit him but he kept coming. He tried to surprise me with a right hook. I ducked and in the bending motion my trousers must have gotten too close to the flame of the fire. I yelped, feeling the first rush of heat on my backside as the flames licked over my clothing.

I woke with a start. A burning hot ember had been discharged from the fire and had set light to my trousers where I lay on the polar bear skin rug. I jumped up as I felt the flames burn through the material. I kicked the glowing ember away with my foot and rolled on the rug to douse the flames knocking over the remaining red in the wine bottle. It poured over the rug staining it from its pure white to a crimson blot. In my eagerness to douse my burning pants I hadn’t noticed that the burning ember I had booted away had come to land by the main window and had now set light to both curtains. The blaze shot up the material, caught the wooden pelmet and brought the lot crashing down onto the sofa. It didn’t take long to ignite, first the cushions and then the actual sofa. There was nothing I could do to contain it. I grabbed my mobile and frantically punched in 999.
Most of the inside of the house got caught by the blaze but the quick action of the fire brigade managed to save the property and kept the damage to the neighbouring ones under control. A fireman emerged from the smouldering shell dragging the remnants of the polar bear skin rug. He was showing it to his colleagues and they were staring at me with a mix of awe and admiration on their faces.
‘You musta put up a hell of a fight with this critter mate. You took it out single handed. The thing is covered in blood’.
It may have been shock from the trauma of the fire that made me say nothing but I found myself accepting the praise and wonderment of the other firemen at my heroic battle with the polar bear.

Unfortunately, my moment of elation was short lived. I was arrested and charged with keeping an endangered animal in entirely unsuitable conditions. The magistrate berated me, banging on about how polar bears should be allowed to wander free and not be enslaved. She even mentioned global warming as if my house fire had in some way contributed to the earth's woes. My desire to defend myself by revealing that it was simply a bear skin rug was flattened as the dilemma of my position became apparent. If the magistrate was such an animal activist it would only further irritate her to imply that I was using an animal as a carpet. I stayed silent and accepted my fate.  I escaped with a fine. I look back on it now and wonder if it wasn’t all a dream.

Shopping

There is a difference between shopping and going to the shops. And if both sexes understood that difference the better we would get along.
Let me explain. Women go shopping, men go to the shops. If I go out to buy bread I come back with..... bread. That is because I am a bloke. If a woman goes out for bread she comes back with milk, jelly, carrots, bleach, something for the biscuit cupboard (whatever a biscuit cupboard is) and ... bread, including some for the freezer. And that is just with basic everyday shopping. What about the more complex variety... clothes shopping? If I need a pair of jeans I leave the house with one mission in mind. Go to a shop that sells jeans and buy some. It is a perfectly direct, straightforward commando raid on the shop. Go in. Pick jeans. Try on. If they don’t fit, try another pair. If they do fit, buy. Go home. In, out, done. SAS style without the flashes and bangs. This is called the Direct Approach (Male) and is what I mean by “going to the shops”. On the other hand if a woman goes to buy a pair of jeans it takes on the proportions of day trip to Brighton. To start with they don’t go straight to a shop that sells jeans. They go via a shop that sells candles, or lighting, or furniture. This is often followed by a visit to a cosmetics counter, a handbag shop and a shoe shop. They do eventually get to a shop that sells jeans but not just one shop. Often it’s several shops that sell jeans. And many of them “popped into” more than just the once. This is called the Indirect Approach (Female) and is what I mean by “shopping”.
But .. that isn’t the end of it. On completion of the jeans shopping away day, a woman will return with not only a pair of jeans but a consignment of other stuff that we don’t need in the house and a stack of clothes that will only end up on permanent display in the wardrobe. There then follows a conversation that goes something like this.......

“Hi honey. Did you get your jeans”?
“I did.... but they don’t fit”
“They don’t fit???”
“No. They don’t. I will take them back on Monday”
“Errrrr.... can I ask why you bought jeans that don’t fit?”
“They did fit in the shop.”
“I see... they fitted in the shop that you left half an hour ago but now they don’t fit. What happened? Did they shrink in the car? Or did you put on half a stone on the way home? Did you not try them on first?”
“Yes, of course I tried them on, but now they don’t fit. You wouldn’t understand.”

Precisely. I don’t understand so I leave it at that. If someone wants to spend several hours shopping for a pair of jeans and then wants to take them back again, I guess that’s just their thing.

Now that you can see the difference in the female shopping trip and the male trip to the shops, you are probably beginning to understand why a joint venture never works. Since the approach is entirely different for both sexes, a woman should never contemplate taking her man shopping. It can only end in a mutually dispiriting experience (there is no need to advise guys against taking their women shopping .... the idea would not be imaginable). For a start, once a man has been taken into more than two shops, especially ones he would not associate with the purpose of the shopping spree, he starts to disengage his brain as he loses interest in what is starting to become an alien activity. When his brain has been disengaged he starts to become mono-syllabic at best and uncommunicative at worst and, to relieve the boredom, he starts to look at the other women shoppers legs (this is a natural condition of the disengaged male brain which, in that state, reverts to primeval instincts.) None of this makes the woman feel comfortable. His apparent disinterest in her activity and sudden apparent fascination with other women create the beginnings of a chilly atmosphere. All she wants to do is share the shopping experience with her man and point out all the delightful smelly candles, embossed picture frames and various other junk, sorry... knick-knacks, which are placed on the shelves for the pleasure of the female shopper. However, it is not mentally possible for a man to visualise whether that candle she spotted would look nice in the conservatory, particularly when his mind is preoccupied with the stunners on the cosmetics counter. So, don’t ask. He isn’t being awkward. It’s just that his disengaged brain cannot comprehend the question.
The most harmonious way to visit the shops together, if you have to go together, is to place your man on a seat in one of the many coffee outlets in the high street, give him a strong coffee, a Danish Pastry, a newspaper and strict instructions not to move until you get back. He is happier. He can then read the sports pages and look at all the other woman to his heart’s content without serious risk to his relationship.
What you should also avoid like a seriously contagious infection, is taking him clothes shopping and expect him to be your fashion guru and advisor. Never hold up a top on a clothes hanger against your chest and say, “What do you think?” He doesn’t think. He cannot visualise it. He does not have the ability to pass judgement. And that is not because he isn’t interested. It’s because he has to see the whole picture. He has to see a woman in the top and preferably under low lights in a late night wine bar. Then he can maybe make an assessment, although in those circumstances it may be an unreliable assessment influenced somewhat by his bar tab.
Finally, never ask your man the two most relationship damaging questions you can possibly come up with on a shopping trip - “Does this make me look fat?” and “Does my bum look big in this?” In the first case it is an indisputable fact that if you weigh 19 stone, whatever you put on, you will look fat. If you weigh 7st, it is highly likely that no item of clothing will make you look better than undernourished at best. Anything in between and it’s your judgement call. As for the bum question, a man cannot answer that correctly without condemning himself to everlasting doom. Firstly, guys have a sneaking suspicion that you already know the answer to the question or you would not have raised it in the first place. If your bum does look big in those jeans that you spent several hours searching for after taking back the first pair you brought home yesterday, what can he say? If he says you look great you will be taking them straight back again the next day when it finally dawns on you that your bum may be mistaken for the rear end of the QE2. And not only will he be in the dog house for lying but it could well involve him in yet another unwanted shopping trip. On the other hand he cannot be truthful and say, “Yes, your bum does look big in those”, especially not after you’ve caught him ogling all those other women shoppers.

Takeaway Coffee

I expect I sound funny when I try my French and Spanish abroad but sometimes it is hard to get to grips with foreign accents in your own locality.I bought a coffee to take away this morning in a well known high street coffee shop. The conversation that followed my purchase went like this.
'You want a lead for that Sir?' I was asked
'A lead?'
'Yes, Sir, a lead.'
'Why would I want a lead? Is it dangerous?' I asked.
'Dangerous? No, Sir. Not dangerous. Fresh ground coffee from beans. No chemicals. No chemicals at all.'
'Why would I want a lead then, if it is not dangerous. I mean I want to drink it now, not walk it!'
'But you said you do want to walk it Sir...take away. Is why I ask if you want lead. If you want to drink in now, lead is not necessary.'
I was getting confused
'I want to take it out...with me...on the street... now,' I said.
'Then you should have lead, Sir.'
'Well if it needs a lead,' I said, 'it definitely sounds dangerous.
'Not dangerous, Sir. It fresh. Hand made by barristers.'
'Barristers? Your coffee is made by barristers?'
'Yes, Sir. Very good barristers. They have two week training.'
'Two weeks? I thought it took years to be a barrister. That is very quick! I wouldn't be happy using them for a legal case.'
'No. No Sir. No legal case needed. Coffee is good. No suing. But you must take lead if you want to walk it.'
By now I just wanted my coffee and was even more confused. I decided that I would take whatever lead the guy had to offer and be on my way.
'Ok, I will have a lead, thank you,' I said.
He handed me a lid. A lid for the takeaway container.
'Oh...a lid!' I said, the surprise showing on my face.
'Yes Sir. That's what I say. A lead so you don't spill coffee. You might sue us if you burn yourself.
'Well, I suppose so, but if you have your own barristers then they must be used to defending any claims you get,' I said, trying to make light of the situation as I felt my cheeks redden at the thought that he may think I had been taking the mickey out of his accent.
'No, Sir. They just make the coffee. Not do suing case.'
'Strange barristers then, that don't do legal work. Must be expensive for the....'
It was then that I saw the leaflet and the line 'hand made by baristas.'
Having appeared foolish enough already I resisted clarifying my understanding with my foreign friend, jammed the lid on my coffee container and bid him good morning.

'Sending' an e-Mail

What’s happened lately with e-mail speak? Yesterday I overheard a colleague on the telephone saying that he would ‘bang’ an e-mail over later. Earlier on a female client had told me she’d ‘pop’ me an e-mail and yet another colleague tends to ‘ping’ e-mails! What’s that all about? What’s the obsession with delivering emails in a flurry of perceived uproar or commotion? Maybe I am just old fashioned and haven’t got past the ‘SEND’ option for emails yet. Mind you, I can hardly be blamed for that since my e-mail software does not yet have a bang, pop or ping option as the method of delivery. I have to say, if someone tells me they will be ‘banging’ me over an e-mail I usually take precautions and sit well back from the computer monitor prior to its delivery.

Perhaps the psychology of it all is to make a relatively innocuous task seem a lot more important by applying an onomatopoeic noun to the deed. The aforementioned colleague has also been heard to say that he would ‘bang out’ an e-mail. I do worry for his IT budget if his keyboard takes such a hammering. Maybe it makes the, dare I use the word, ‘sender’, seem more crucial to the process as if the action of applying pressure with a single finger to a keyboard button demonstrates some contained power. A bit like the President of the United States hitting the nuclear button! It could even be that, in the mindset of the sender, the use of more powerful words imparts much more significance to the content. So, the more badly written and the more lightweight the content of the e-mail, the greater the need to use a powerful noun to imply gravitas. For example if you were to write ‘ hello mate. Hows ur weekend. I will get the parcel of to u in the morning’, you would need to explain to the recipient that you were going to ‘explode’ an email over to him in order to create importance and consequently engender any anticipation.

Having said all of the above I now feel some pressure to up my game in the e-mail vernacular stakes. I may well stop using such a passive and uninspiring word as ‘send’ to denote the method by which I will be providing information to you via cyber space and look at something more descriptive. The fact that communication goes via cyber space therefore lends itself to space related terminology and in future I may warn you that I am about to ‘launch’ an e-mail - as in, 'I will launch you an e-mail shortly, mate.' As the pressure increases to express the importance of my e-mail communication I may then resort to more explosive nouns and I may propel, thrust or even blast you an e-mail. I have decided though, that for reasons of decorum, ejaculating an e-mail may not be interpreted in the truest definition and therefore I will avoid that one, as indeed everyone else should!!!