Coffee and Tarts

I visited a coffee shop in town for a mid-morning chill and an escape from the mayhem that is Christmas shopping. It was busy in there but I'm a patient sort of guy and waited my turn in the queue. 

I have almost made it to the front when the bloke ahead of me orders a coffee and then begins to browse the cakes and pastries. He stares at the glass display case, his head moving back and forth as if he’s at the Wimbledon men’s singles final. I’m getting a little impatient now, the queue, the shoppers out there, and I’m a little peckish too. Who browses cakes as if they are going to make a major life changing purchase anyway? 

The assistant is waiting patiently for a decision, aware that she has a queue of eager people waiting who have already smelled the coffee. The bloke looks up at the assistant and says, “Uh... I think I’ll...” He stares at the display again, his gaze taking in the wares... “uh, yeah... I think I’ll... let me see... I dunno...” His indecisiveness is starting to get on my nerves. I’m thinking, ‘Mate, you’re a bloke, not a seven year old. Choose a frigging cake and let the rest of us get on with our day.’ He then makes a decision, but it's still tinged with vagueness. “I think I'll go for the... uh, yeah... a mince pie.” The assistant reaches for one but is interrupted. “Sorry, no. I’ll try a custard tart.”

I’m pretty irritable by now. This should not be such a significant transaction. I want to tap him on the shoulder and say, “Mate, you can’t try a custard tart. You either buy one or you don’t. What you gonna do? Ask for a gift receipt and if you don’t like it after you’ve chomped into it, take it back and get a refund? Nah, just make your frigging mind up, choose something and go sit down somewhere.” But, instead, I just clench my teeth and feel justified in my developing rage. I mean surely the point is you don’t need to tell the assistant you are going to TRY the product. You just order one and if you don’t like it, you leave it on your plate. The assistant is hardly going to resell it after you’ve ‘tried’ it. And if the guy had stopped fannying about and just ordered a coffee and a custard tart without embellishing his order by telling the assistant what he was going to do, I might have got served sooner. 

My order was simple... “A tea please and one of those cakes.”

(For the attentive amongst you, yes, it was a coffee shop, but they sell tea too!)

 

Car Boot Sales

Warning: Contains adult language

Somebody suggested I might like to go to a car boot sale. No, I wouldn’t! As a bloke, to put it mildly, car boot sales have never been high on my agenda. As far as I’m concerned a car boot sale is a scam where people try to offload their unwanted junk to the public and make the suckers pay to take it away! Okay, so maybe once in a while somebody finds a rare ancient Egyptian artefact, rescued from a Pharaoh’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings, that’s somehow made its way down the ages to the rickety trestle table that some scammer has set up in a farmer’s field, and they are oblivious to the fact that the item is worth a small fortune so you pick it up for one pound fifty. But mostly a car boot sale is a jumble sale for the middle classes! (I should note here that I have nothing against the middle classes, if indeed they actually exist these days. I use the term only to depict a section of the great British public. Interestingly, isn't it strange that there is a mentality out there that rails against the so called ‘class’ system but sings the praises of the ‘working class’ loud and clear?)

Anyway, car boot sales! Not my ‘cup of Early Grey’ but I have to confess I have been to one - as a seller. No, I am not being hypocritical. I wasn’t selling junk. It was suggested to me as a good way to part with unwanted ‘stuff’ when I was ‘downsizing’ from a house to an apartment. No matter how attached you are to your belongings, sometimes they ain’t going to fit a new property. So they had to go. But, what a nightmare experience!

First of all, I was told I had to be at the location at 5:30 in the morning to set up, hours before the public was allowed access. No idea why, but I complied. I pulled in, unloaded my trestle table and then opened the car boot. Out of nowhere, it seemed, a throng of people descended on the car (fellow sellers, it transpired) like vultures. They crowded around, pushing forward as I started to unload my things. Some even had the cheek to pick up items from the boot and examine them. I tried to back them off by manoeuvring from one side of the rear of the car to the other. I felt like a lion trying to keep a pack of slavering hyenas away from the carcass of my kill. I couldn’t understand it. I knew I didn’t have a boot full of crap trinkets but I wasn’t packing Tutankhamen’s Saturday night 'going out' jewellery either. As I tried to keep one side at bay, someone would creep up on my blind side, pick something out of the boot, examine it and ask how much.

“Mate, I ain’t selling. That’s my wheel brace, ya dick!”

So, you’ll be thinking the idea is to get rid of ‘stuff’ and make money. Don’t matter who’s buying. Maybe, but when I’m doing anything I like to do it properly in an organised fashion so I keep control of what it was I set out to do. I just wanted to get my table set up, arrange the things I was selling in an orderly fashion, know where everything is and then do the selling when I was ready. I didn’t want the hyenas snaffling bits off the carcass in a chaotic frenzy.

Anyway, I managed to back them all off by shutting the boot, standing with my arms folded and leaning against the car with a defiant ‘sod off’ expression fixed on my face. Eventually they decided there were easier pickings elsewhere and left me alone to get my table set up and my wares displayed just how I wanted.

Then the public showed up!

I swear to God ninety percent of the people who think a fun morning out us sniffing around other people’s tat are professional scavengers. It was an eye opener. There’s me thinking that this would be a civilised, professional sales process but I soon discovered that I was being a naive dickhead. They mill around your table, pick stuff up and examine it like they are all experts from Sotheby's. Then put it down again with a disdainful look, as if they were doing me a favour by even approaching my table.

A woman picked up a whiskey decanter that came with four whiskey tumblers.

“How much?” she asked.

“Uh, five quid the lot,” I replied.

“Will you take twenty p for the decanter?” she replied.

I’m thinking, ‘Twenty p! No! I won’t. Where can you buy anything at all for twenty frigging pence? Are you off your trolley? You can’t even buy a bar of chocolate for that.’ But, hoping to make my first sale, I said, “It’s Dartington Crystal.” It was! An unused and now unwanted wedding gift since the wife had buggered off with some gym freak she met, ironically, at a church charity jumble sale. “It’s part of the set. I’ve even got the original boxes.” I reached under the table to search for the boxes which were in a bin liner. I halted when she increased her bid.

“Twenty-five p,” she said.

My mind was racing. Who, on the planet, increases their negotiating position in five pence increments? What was wrong with this woman? “Uh, look, I’ll take four quid for the lot, tumblers and all, okay? It’s quality stuff. I’m not selling no… you know… uh, crap.”

“I don’t want the tumblers,” the woman said. “Thirty p, take it or leave it.”

Take it or leave it? Who’s doing the selling here? I took a deep breath and tried to apply some logic even though I knew I was getting tetchy. 

“Look, just a point worth thinking about. If you buy a whiskey decanter presumably you’re going to put whiskey in it, and then the whiskey needs to be poured into tumblers…” I tried a touch of lightness, adding with a smile, “...unless you’re going to give your guests a straw each and ask them to suck up your fifteen year old malt fishbowl-style like a bunch of teenagers on an Ayia Napa stag do. So, as a deal…" I did a quick calculation based on my customer's own grasp of economics… fifty pence per glass, so two quid subtracted from my original generous pricing… “Call it three quid, decanter and glasses. Bargain for a genuine Dartington Crystal set.”

Her expression didn’t change. “Thirty pence, my final offer.”

I smiled, a kind of rueful, ‘What the fuck, you for real,’ smile. Our valuations were significantly at odds.

“You know what?” I said, “I’m with you. I like the word ‘final.’ This is my final refusal.” She scowled and walked off.

And it went on like that. The wheeler-dealers operating in pence! I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t sink to that level of small mindedness. My ‘stuff’ was good quality. I don’t buy junk! I’m a Capricorn, after all. By the end of the morning, after hardcore negotiation, I’d sold five items and made five pounds and seventy-five-pence! I took home most of the stuff I’d turned up with. Maybe I was being bloodyminded - I guess the point of the sale was to get rid of things you no longer need, but I just couldn’t cope with the petty penny pinching.

Anybody want to buy six Dom Perignon Baccarat flutes? Offers over twenty five pence!

Coffee Pods

I think I’ve developed a strange addiction to coffee pods! I keep buying them even when I don’t need any. However, I think I’ve worked out why. I don’t actually buy them for the flavour. It’s the colours! I like the colours and the patterns they make when stacked up. I’m sure I can get help. I mean there’s support out there for most addictions, isn’t there?

I can just imagine my first session at ‘Addictions Anonymous’…

“Hello. My name’s Pa… uh… I mean, erm… Zbigieneski Satan-Crank and I’m addicted to -"

“You Polish?” says an attendee sitting opposite.

“Sorry?”

“I said, you Polish?”

“Polish? Uh, no. Why?”

“Just wondered. A lot of Polish people got names beginning with ‘Z’. Not all, mind, but y’know.”

“Have they? No, I'm not, uh... it’s just a made up name because, well, it’s meant to be anonymous here, isn’t it? Anyway, erm… I’m addicted to -"

“You from the Channel Islands then?”

“What? The Channel Islands?”

“Yeah, y’know. Jersey, Guernsey and that.”

“I know where the Channel Islands are. No, I’m not from there. Why?”

“All right, pal, keep yer hair on. Just thought you might be, on account of that posh surname of yours.”

“My surna… no! That’s made up, like I just -"

“Can we just get on with it mister… Satan-Clarke,” says the session facilitator.

“Crank. It’s Crank… Satan-Crank… well, for the purposes of this meeting it is. Anyway, as I was trying to say, I have an addiction, which is why I’m here." I hesitate. "This is going to sound weird but -"

"We don't make judgments here, Mr...Crank... err, Satan."

"Satan-Crank. Look, that doesn't matter. I'm just here because of the addiction."

"Okay, that's why everybody's here. It's fine. Just let it out."

"Coffee pods.”

"Coffee pods?" replies the facilitator.

"Yes. I seem to have developed an addiction to them."

“Oh, a caffeine addiction. That's not that unusual… unless it’s out of control and affecting your health?”

“No, not caffeine. The actual pods, you know… the capsules.”

“The capsules?”

“Yes, that’s what I’m trying to say. The little metallic pods that contain the coffee.”

“Ah, a material fetish! You like the texture, the feel of the aluminium?”

“No. I just like the colours. Although I drink coffee, I buy them based on the colour of the pod as I like to arrange them so they create a colourful feature in my kitchen. I can't stop myself buying them even when I don't need them."

The facilitator rolls her eyes. “I'm not sure you're in the right place, Satan... erm, mister Clarke-Crank. Have you thought of going to art classes?”

Online Shopping Rage

Warning: Contains adult language.

Anyone else suffer from online shopping rage? I don't mean the grocery buying thing - I've never really done that as it requires planning ahead for meals, I would think. You know, I'm having this particular combination/menu on Monday, this on Tuesday, this one Wednesday and so on. And I'm a bloke... I ain't gonna do that! No, with food shopping I like to visit the shop, see 'stuff' in front of me and then put it in the basket. There is no plan. Consequently, when my provisions are at critically low level, I go to the refrigerator to see what I have left and what might make a meal, and get on with it. I did have to be particularly creative once when all I had left was bread, raspberries, potatoes and mustard! 

But, I'm veering away from the point. So the type of online shopping rage I'm referring to is when you want to buy a product, for example, a camera, a mattress, a jacket or a table, to name a few one-off type purchases. (I was actually looking for a mattress when I had my latest bout of shopping rage!) 

So, you go on line, Google the product you want and up comes a number of sites. You browse as far as the first three - any lower and you think you are going to get dodgy goods - and click on a site. Then it starts!

All you want to do is get an idea of what's out there, at your leisure, so you can maybe make a choice based on what appeals to you. This is just the browsing stage. It doesn't have to be complicated. But, no, it pans out like this:

Cookies - 'This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Do you accept?' 

Instant reaction - "Yes! I do. Everybody uses cookies now. We don't care, yeah? We don't even notice. We're used to our web searches being tracked. And you ain't concerned about me getting the 'best experience.' No, you're only putting that up because the law says you have to and and then you can bombard me with crap I don't want. "

Live Chat - 'Hi. Looking for a mattress? Anything I can help with?'

Instant reaction - "No. Fuck off. Of course I'm looking for a mattress. That's why I'm on the page that sells frigging mattresses. What d'you think I'm looking for? A baby giraffe?"

Discount - 'Get 10% off your next purchase.'

Instant reaction - "Next purchase? I haven't made any purchases yet. I'm just looking! And already you're assuming that I'm gonna make a 'next one'? Anyway, if your mattresses are any good, why would I come back for another one? I'd have one. So, sod off. You're not trying to do me any favours. You just want my email address."

Privacy Policy - A bunch of words that contain things like, '...our services may contain links to third party websites and applications.'

Instant reaction - "I don't care. I ain't reading all that. I just wanna buy a frigging mattress! If I buy one, you can share that shit. Who cares? I'm never gonna deny it! And what d'you mean your 'services may contain links to third party websites and applications?' May? Of course they do. Don't talk bollocks. Just put that, tell it like it is. They do contain links. End of story!

Terms & Conditions - If you do make a purchase then you have the T&Cs to read.

Instant reaction - "Bollocks. Just get me to the checkout. Nobody reads 180 pages of legal waffle that they don't understand and which, if ever I needed to apply, you'd wriggle out of anyway because no doubt it would be me who did something wrong. So, I ain't reading that either. Anyway, I'm buying a frigging mattress, not a baby giraffe. How complicated can it be? 

So, by the time I've gone through this several times, I've lost the will and enthusiasm to shop for anything.

I've decided to sleep on the floor!

Yesterday's Man

I went back to my home town the other day. I go back from time to time as I have a lot of history there. Now I live in the ‘sticks’ so when I go back my perception is coloured by my last visit and that history. It doesn't take long to feel at home in the geographical surroundings you are so familiar with, and it's easy to forget that time moves on in your absence. This time I hadn't been back in a while, mostly due to the pandemic that shut the world down temporarily and the fact that life in 'the sticks' is my new normality.

Anyway, armed with the confidence of being a 'local' and familiar with all the usual social haunts, I stroll up to a wine bar that I used to frequent. In the past I'd walk in, no problem, like a Giancana associate, no questions asked. I knew the door staff, they knew me and the geezer at the bar knew my drink, gave me priority. So, I guess I showed up with a ‘don’cha know who I am’ look on my face. As I approach, I realise that I have never seen the guy on the door ever before. He was all black gloves, big overcoat and high-vis lumo jacket, that 'uniform' that's supposed to add some authority to what must be a boring job, standing outside a social venue all night. 

I say, 'hi'. He doesn't say anything, just looks me up and down, perhaps figuring out a response to 'hi' with his intellect and mental agility probably contained in the two pockets of the aforementioned overcoat. It's clear that he doesn't have a clue who I am, and he makes no attempt to step aside and allow me into the venue. 

So, I try charm but maybe it doesn't work on the dim. It doesn’t permeate the pockets.

Then he speaks. “You have to book to get in now.”

I look astonished, mostly because I am. I raise an eyebrow, intent on posing a question. Despite his ‘pocket IQ’, he gives me some bollocks about a new policy (he wouldn’t know what a policy was if it slapped him around his shaved head and left a big P on his skull) and repeats that you have to book, plus, as an afterthought, tells me, "they don’t let single blokes in who turn up as a walk in." As he mentions this only as an afterthought, I consider that it must be a sub-clause to the ‘new policy' that he's just remembered. Do I need to get married, I wonder to myself. And which is it - they don't let single blokes in or you have to book?

So I ask if a ‘single bloke’ can book. Seems like a sensible question! He stutters a bit, not because he has a speech impediment, but because it's the sort of question you might get in a court of law that leads to a devastating point that brings down your whole defence like a pack of Jenga sticks that can’t take the strain anymore. He tells me that a single guy can book provided they mention that they are on their own (which all single guys tend to be), and then the venue will sort out a table for one! I feel sorry for the guy as he is trying to be polite now, but seems to be making stuff up on the hoof.

Anyway, in an attempt to rescue things, I call a friend who lives fairly locally to see if he can pitch up and we might blag it as a ‘gay’ couple. He rings me back and says he’s at a golf club do that he had to attend because he won something that most people do not give a toss about. In fact, nor does he, but he's just trying to do the right thing and avoid members talking about a ‘no show.’ I’m okay with that but then he texts to say it’s an extremely boring event. Mildly irritated already because I'm being questioned about my status as a venue legend, I text my friend as follows:

“Boring! Of course it is! It’s at a golf club! You're probably surrounded by middle-aged geezers who can’t stand their wives so they prefer to talk about how shit they are at golf! And I bet they made that speech about how great the weather was and how fantastic the frigging course was too.”

He doesn’t respond.

At that point I knew I’d have to try to blag the door guy. So I chat to him, pulling out my best moves and eventually he says he will ask his boss if I can come in as I seem like a sensible normal guy. (Not sure his assessment was correct, but I roll with it.) Off he goes. A few minutes later he comes back and says he’s really sorry but the boss won’t let single blokes in. 

"Yeah, but you just said single blokes can get in if they book. Does your boss not know his own policy?" I ask.

He stutters again and then says, "Like I said, you have to book if you're a single bloke."

By now, I'm feeling argumentative and, even though I realise that argumentative has never won over any door staff ever, I say, "Cool. So I'd like to book, uh, for say, five minutes time? That okay?"

He laughs. "Sorry, mate, that's not how the booking system works."

I think to myself, 'isn't a booking system about booking ahead and if I give five minutes notice, that is booking ahead,' but I leave it. I came here for a convivial evening not a debate and just ask how the policy applies to single women. 

He stutters a bit more, glances back through the door, but the boss is nowhere in sight. He then falls back on the 'only doing my job' thing but adds, "if it was me, I'd let you in, mate."

I'm thinking, it is you, but by then, I don't care anymore. 

I wasn’t packing a Kalashnikov nor planning to fire-bomb the place. I wasn't wearing a balaclava and attempting to rob the place. I wasn't even drunk! I was just a guy on his own who fancied a glass of wine. So, yeah, time moves on and so do situations. Nothing stays the same. You are never more than a moment from being 'yesterday's man.' 

The lesson I've learned? I need a ‘backup girlfriend’ on speed dial to make me look like a 'couple' at such times. Not sure how I should approach that. Women get sensitive about being appendages.

Sausages

I cooked sausages last night. I tried a new method with the oven grill. A new method, that is, for me, you know, instead of frying them. In my enthusiasm I even got the oven handbook out to make sure I understood the grill settings. I put them in and killed time by playing guitar. I checked on them about seven minutes later intent on turning them over to ensure even cooking, but found that one side was incinerated beyond recovery and looked like space modules that had tried to enter the Earth’s atmosphere without the benefit of a heat shield!

I pulled the tray from the oven and immediately two smoke alarms went off with that banshee screaming sound that sets your nerves on edge and makes the neighbours think you are sacrificing a lamb or something, but are too worried to check on what’s happening in case you are indulging in some ancient ritual and they don’t want to impinge on your rights. 

Anyway, I flapped at the smoke alarms (which were in two separate locations but had now tuned to one another’s frequency like some demented version of a rock choir on hard narcotics) with a tea towel in an attempt to silence their high-pitched cacophony, when what I should have done was shut the oven door where black smoke was belching into my home like George’s dragon in its death throes. Eventually, I silenced the screeching, opened a couple of windows and turned my attention to rescuing the sausages. 

Rescuing was, perhaps, optimistic and probably inspired by the fact that the other side was still uncooked. I lowered the heat, put the tray down a shelf and crossed my fingers. No, the sausages didn’t improve. When I pulled them out of the oven some minutes later, they looked like the remnants of the incident in Pompeii - but I ate them anyway! A geezer that lives on his own and is hungry rarely has backup options! 

Small Talk

I'd dressed up. I looked smart, I thought, even if I'd made that assumption myself from several glances in the mirror. It was a first date. I hadn't been on one for a long time so I was keen to make an effort and a positive first impression. As I approached the bar I felt the anxiety rising. I was early so ordered a small glass of wine. Dutch courage, perhaps, but I wanted to get this right. I ran through a number of conversation topics in my head but then decided that it was best to be spontaneous, unrehearsed, it would be much more natural. And anyway there was enough information on her profile for me to be able to show interest and have a conversation without any rehearsal. 

She was on time and I liked her instantly. She seemed a little tense, probably the same pre-date nerves that I had experienced. After the formalities and ordering drinks I decided to break the ice with a nice, relaxed chatty approach. Maybe it was 'small talk' but no need to go into any in-depth stuff straight from the off.

“So, how long you had the saloon?” I asked.

“Sorry? Saloon?” she replied, frowning.

“Yeah, it says you run a saloon on your profile. Seems pretty cool job,” I said with  smile.

“A saloon? No, a salon. A beauty salon. You must’ve misread it.”

Thoughts of free beer vanished immediately. I shuffled uncomfortably in my seat and tried to recover. Maybe small talk wasn't my forte! “Oh, sorry. My mistake. Uh, I don’t s’pose you really get much opportunity to use it yourself?”

Her frown grew more pronounced. “I beg your pardon? What’s that meant to mean?”

I shuffled in my seat again. “Nothing. Uh, I meant, you know, erm… you probably don't get time to take advantage of... you know, what with, err - ”

“No, I don’t know. What’re you trying to say?”

I realised I’d fallen into a trap of my own making. I took a large gulp of wine, thinking how I might retrieve the situation. “I just meant that as you own it... the saloon... sorry, the salon, you probably don’t get to use it… uh, not that I think you need to use it… you look fine without any… without all that beauty treatment thing… uh, make-up, stuff.”

She leaned forward, the frown emphasised considerably. “So, you think I look plain?”

I never said that, I thought, but I didn’t get a chance to respond.

“For what it’s worth, I’ll have you know I made a great deal of effort for our date tonight. I didn’t expect you to be so dismissive.”

Dismissive? “Listen, I just… there's a balance between a lot..." I hesitated. I realised I might be digging a deeper hole for myself. "Look, your make-up looks great. I can see you’ve taken lots of time over it and - ” 

“Oh, I see. So you think I have too much on then?”

I opened my mouth to speak but was cut off, as she stood up abruptly.

“Let me tell you, mister. You’re no oil painting yourself so don’t be going around commenting on other people’s appearance until you sort your own out.” She turned on her heel and headed for the door.

So much for checking my own look in the mirror! I slugged the rest of my wine, beckoned to the barman for a refill and considered that perhaps I should book an appointment with a life coach before I contemplated another date.