Changing Room Chuckles

I love it when you go into the ladies’ changing rooms in a department store when they’re busy. You can hear lots of hilarious conversations going on between disembodied voices, but you can also have extra fun with the lady who checks you in and out.

Like I did yesterday.

I went in, whilst the place was in chaos. There was no check-in lady to be seen, so I went in, tried my items on, and on my way out, there was the check-in lady.

“Any good?” She asks in that despairing way that only changing room check-in ladies can.

“No thank you” I said, handed her the items and strode away.

“Errr. ” She said. “Where’s your disc?”

“What?”

“Where’s your disc?” she motions to the items in her hand “Fer these?”

“I didn’t get one” I said.

This is interesting, I think to myself. What kind of powers does a changing room check-in lady have? What’s she going to do about this situation, then? Will I be arrested?

She’s looking at me with a face that seems to say “Could she have stolen something? Does she look dodgy?” She eyes me up and down. I am wearing my work suit, I have a hand-bag and little else about me. Her face brightens.

“Okay then!” she says, and turns away to her racks.

Amazing.

The front line of store security.

Wedding!

Badger and Spaniel Cutting the cake!

Hopefully you can see a quick pic of our wedding.

It was fabulous!

Think you know someone?

Odd things have happened lately which have got me thinking.

As a good psychologist I know that people change depending on the company they’re in, which makes it difficult for anyone to truly know another person. The more time you spend with someone in a variety of different situations, the more you get to know them.

Sometimes you think you know someone, but you end up being shocked by something they do.

• Badger’s cousin T suddenly hanged himself aged 35, ending his battle with clinical depression and debt that none of his family knew anything about. He had always been the most level-headed ‘together’ guy we knew.
• My friend L, a quiet family man who was sacked ffrom his job for fraudulent expenses claims, sky-high mobile bills for sex-chatlines and hardcore pornography on his laptop.

Sometimes you think you know someone, but you end up being shocked by something that other people think they’ve done.  

• D, a quiet and studious man, accused and arrested on suspicion of rape by an 18 year old girl who got drunk, followed him home and fell asleep on his lounge floor.   
• W, a lovely, kind, caring man with children of his own who spent his life caring for others accused by a man with mental health issues of touching him when he was a boy.

Sometimes you don’t think you know someone very well – but you end up being shocked by how much you do know about them, and how much they have confided in you.

My friend A, a genuine, funny, sensible, insightful and caring leader of people. I have spent very little time with him, and yet, when bad things happened in his life and he cut off all communication with his friends and colleagues, for some strange reason he continued to speak only to me. I only very recently realised I knew him better than anyone.

People are amazing.

Passport Rant

I have never heard of anything so ridiculous.

The lady from the UK Passport office rang me today to tell me that there was a problem with my application to change my name.

Really? What’s wrong?

She told me, in the condescending tones of a a civil servant who knows just how idiotic the general public are that I had signed my new application in my old name. She implied a silliness in this action, that was completely absent, and therefore got my back up straight away.

Me: “No, said I – I’ve signed my signature. “

Her: “But its the same as the old one. “

Me: “That is correct. “

Her: “But it isn’t allowed. It doesn’t match your new name. “

Me: “So? If my signature was a meaningless scribble it could say anything and you’d be none the wiser.”

Her: “But it isn’t. We know it says your old name, and that’s not good enough.”

Me: “So, you’re telling me I have to make up a signature just for my passport?”

Her: “Oh no – you have to change your signature for everything. “

Me: “Why? Where does it say that?”

Her: “I can’t really be getting into discussion about this – I’m just telling you the rules”. 

Funny that…. “OK,” says I, “Where do we go from here?”

Her: “We’ll send you a new form which you’ll have to sign properly. “

Me: “And I’m going to have to pay for this again am I?”

Her :”Oh no, you won’t need to pay again, you’ll just need to sign it again. “

Me: “I see. Well I’ll wait for you to write to me then. “

Her “OK, I’ll let Mrs suchandsuch know and she’ll send you a new form. “

Me: “Fine. Goodbye.”  

This, my friends, is the thin end of the wedge.

I’m not giving up without a good fight. When did readable signatures become law? This is preposterous!

I shall wait until I get my new form and letter and complain to someone higher. What utter rubbish.

Married

Yes – we had a perfect day!

Back soon to update you all. xx

March

Frantic, busy, not much time to check wordpress.

Covered in eczema patches, probably stress.

Work is busy – many many nutters – too many to tell you about.

Wedding in 15 days time.

Aggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Will be back soon.

After Mauritius, Edinburgh and calmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

DS

Something in the way she moved….

I ventured into Lakeside today, the large shopping mall in South Essex which seems to be staffed entirely from unhelpful girls with appalling gutteral accents who would rather chat to their friends than serve customers. But that’s another story I’ll not bore you with right now.

 As I walked along the busy mall, passing fairly close to the front windows of brightly-lit shops advertising their hugely-discounted sale items, other shoppers whizzed past me, overtook me, jostled and hussled for space and momentum, and were gone; off beyond my field of vision, going about their business, but quickly replaced by a hundred others all doing the same sort of thing.

As I walked along, something caught my eye. A tall brunette-come-redhead, heading towards me, eyes low, hugging the shop-fronts as she made her way along. She was clutching her bag with one arm, and I noticed that her outdoor jacket was dark and largely shapeless, part-covering a knee-length brown skirt and 4-inch plain black heels. 

There was something about the hair. I looked back at its odd colour, and realised how thick and lank it looked, catching the bright halogen lights but reflecting rather flatly.  There was no natural shine to that hair, and not a lot of shape to it at all. The words ‘badly cut’ sprang to mind, but that wasn’t it. Why was I fascinated by it? What was wrong?

As we got nearer to one another, she came into focus, and I tried to make out her features. Her face was turned down, the gaze of the self-conscious, the unsure. I couldn’t see her face properly, but it was made-up, pale under a heavy fringe with striking eyes, and a hint of blue-grey around the mouth. Odd.

After a few seconds, I had regarded her gait and stride sufficiently to realise what had been so wrong. This was not the leggy, meander of a woman enjoying her feminine heels, nor was it the tottering, unstable stagger of the inexperienced lady trying to walk in heels a little bit too high for her.

No. Her steps were wide apart; long and heavy, but perfectly balanced despite the high heels. I watched her lope past me, then stopped and turned around to see her enter a shoe-shop. Her hair didn’t move at all as the breeze from the shop’s door-heater blasted as she went in. No, the hair didn’t move as it should, and neither did she.  

It was definitely a man in a wig.

Two and a Half months…..

Its two and a half months until Badger and I get married. I cannot believe how quickly the whole thing has snuck up on me!

Most of the organising is done, and in my normal laid-back way, I’m not letting the final preparations stress me out….. but it is very exciting!!

Regular readers may already have picked up that this is my second marriage, and it contrasts with the first one in so many ways.

But I’m running behind in two quite important areas:

I have no wedding shoes yet. Why do shoe designers think you want to be tottering about on 4-inch heels and nasty pointy shoes on your wedding day? 

I’m too fat. My wedding dress is never going to fit me.

Meh.

Filling time?

I went to the dentist this morning.

Its amazing how much time has elapsed since I was last there 13 months ago. 13 months. Wow.

They’ve got a new extension to the practice.

They’re making far too much money.

I’m not scared of the Dentist, but I am marginally suspicious of their motives. Their sports cars tell me that there’s more to their caring nature and code-speak than there first appears.  

Anyway – the Dentist, Mr Peach, (who should have a picture on his ceiling to look at while you’re lying back in the chair of destiny) told me that he was ‘concerned’ about several areas of enamel in strategic points in my mouth, so he sent me for a few X rays.

I will never know whether the Xrays were truly necessary, but I went along with his game, anyway.

2 out of 3 areas were absolutely fine after all – but one area looked a bit ‘concerning’ and so I have to go back for a flling.

I’ve asked for a white filling this time because its near the front of my mouth, and while the molars remind me of knackered old cars in a scrap-heap, my front teeth look fine, and I’d like to keep it that way, thanks.

So I’ll be back in January for the second episode.

God knows what that’s going to cost me.

Cheating?

Is doing all your christmas shopping on-line just cheating?

Or should I have to fight my way through the shopping centres, the screaming children and the unpredictable old-folks in order to appreciate the full magnitude of christmas?

You tell me……….