...Morrison's. What? Did you really think I was gonna say Tiffany's? The only 'Tiffanys' one sees around here are the orange-hued pram-faces from the local housing schemes. You know the sort: they're built like either Gandhi or Idi Amin, though without the fine dress sense of either of those gentlemen. You could put them in Versace, Dior, or Armani and they'd still look like they bought their clothes from Matalan. You can hear them coming long before you see them: first there's the clinking of the several pounds (that's weight not sterling, although on reflection...) of finest 'Elizabeth Duke' gold tat with which they're festooned (what strange inverse-alchemy has managed to make gold look like base metal?). Then there's the voice: a cacophonous, discordant screech emitted at a volume just two decibels below the threshold of physical pain. This verbal avalanche of invective and profanity is usually directed into the Nokia phone that's permanently fixed (see, cyborgs do walk among us) to the side of that unnaturally orange boatrace, informing Hayley-Chardonnay that Darren's (or Kev's or Tyson's) community service has been extended...for the ninth time. And... Oops, there I go again: not only veering off on a tangent, but also being judgmental about chavs. Not that there's anything wrong with either of those activities.
Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Morrison's. As today's weather proved to be less than clement (why is the forecast always right when it's bad weather? answers on a postcard...), thus kiboshing my plans to go biking and meaning that I'd have to make good on my promise to Art-Girl to start a blog, I figured I'd better fortify myself with a decent breakfast of incipient arteriosclerosis, otherwise known as a fry-up. And, being something of a lazy bugger when it comes to shopping, I didn't have any of the fixings in the house so a trip to Morrison's was inevitable.
So there I sat, a plate overflowing with stuff that had once been pig or had come from the back end of a chicken, feeling all was right with the world (lousy weather notwithstanding). When, suddenly, my morning repast was rudely interrupted by the conversation coming from a man that can only be described as Tiffany's Darren. He was the regulation shade of orange, had a full set of tasteless tats (now don't get me wrong - I've nothing against tattoos per se, after all I have some myself, but in the name of all that's holy if you're gonna get tats please make them tasteful), and the obligatory Nokia growing out of his face. He then proceeded to share with your humble scribe, and the rest of the denizens of Morrison's, half of the rather heated conversation he was having with his mother:
"No Ma, ah cannae talk - ah'm in public in Morrison's". Is it possible to be private in Morrison's? He then proceeded to dash the small crumb of hope he'd given me when he'd said he "cannae talk":
"No Ma, ah'm goin' tae Spain in a few days. Ah dinnae knaw if ah'll be back. Ah've got a few things tae work oot".
"Ma, ah'm nae talking aboot this noo". Alas, he had no intention of making good on that and continued on...and on...and on. Clearly, 'Ma' didn't want her wee boy (who was around 6 foot three and looked at least 25) to decamp to Espana and was employing the sort of persuasive talent that'd make Henry Kissinger look like a yes man. Fascinating though this vignette was, it was interrupting my fry-up. I tried to block out the human drama playing a few short yards from me, but it was no good - I was breakfasting in an episode of "River City".
And just when I thought it couldn't get any worse it did - the Jack Russell started blowing the car horn. Yes, you read that correctly - a Toyota Yaris in the car park contained a Jack Russell who was standing on the driver's blowing the horn. Saints preserve me! Now I had an episode of "That's Life!" happening in the car park (I raised a silent, but fervent, prayer that I'd be spared Cyril Fletcher showing me a carrot that looked like a John Thomas).
At this point I gave up - the breakfast gods were against me. I downed cutlery and headed home, reflecting that I'd encountered a paraphrase of that old Chinese curse about living in 'interesting times': may you have an interesting breakfast. I never did find out if Darren (I've no idea what his name really was, but he didn't exactly look like a Julian or a Vivian) resolved his issues with his mother, or if the police turned up and booked Jack for excessive use of the horn (he could get three points on his license for that). But I'll offer them both - Darren and Jack - my thanks for the inspiration for today's blog post.
