The Lake District. I've had a week there. Along with countless coach parties of old biddies, grimly eyeing the Beatrix Potter house and moaning at the walk involved. They've emptied the East Midlands of the over 75's last week. There they were, floral cardies, tweed skirts, queuing at the tea tills like it was bacon week at the butchers in the war, ordering over-priced tea and cake, then grumbling at the cost and the paucity and the weather, and the seats and the Polish girl who served them, smiling at each, helpful. "Blewdy Eastern European, tha'" stage-whispered one as I sat sipping my latte and watching the sun glint on the lake beyond the house. "Ah kna'" said her friend, carefully checking her slice of Simnel cake for traces of sh*t. "Get ev'rywhere them lot, don't they?" said the first lady, bitterly, dunking her flapjack in her tea cup. They lapsed into a depressed silence, punctuated by gummy chews and comments about the walk back to the coach. "'E's parked well away from t'house, the daft booger" said the first lady, as if she was being asked to navigate the Hindu Kush.
I went for a lot of walks. Mainly because I kept finding coachloads of these types of people wherever I went. Day out in Kendal? Masses of them, grouped like parties of schoolkids in a museum, moaning. I walked Helvellyn in blissful peace and solitude, like a vagrant Wordsworth, marvelling at sights and sounds. They infested tea-rooms like chintz; slurping tea and noshing cake and giving everyone that withering look of entitlement as they ate.
I came home via Birmingham on Thursday morning, mainly because an ex-work mate had secured me a ticket for the ICC World Cup semi-final. Hotel (Jury's Inn) on credit card and down to a half-empty Edgbaston in time for the toss and a beer with a bacon roll. Great match it was too. The pubs were rammed after the match, with the familiar refrain of 'Three Lions' being sung by England fans once again. Lucky I did the hotel. I got sh*tfaced.
Tel's OK. The shop continues to function, with the (sort of learning-disabled, and I mean that nicely, I really do) daughter of one of his neighbours 'helping out' for £50 a week and her pick of the chocolate bars nearing their sell-by date. Mrs Tel is hors de combat, a succession of vague 'wimmin's problems' and toilet difficulties hastening her departure from Tendring's favourite newsagent shop. Hence the recruitment of Hayley, the fifty-two year old daughter of Ken and Denise, the elderly couple who live three doors down from Tel. He reckons it was a put-up job. He had no choice. "They came in an' sed to the missus "Could yer use an 'and in the shop?" an' the missus says yeah, an' then ah'm lumbered wiv 'er". Hayley is very nice, by the way, but she talks incessantly, and inconsequentially, about nothing much at all, and does in essence, nothing in the way of work.
An example: Tel thought he'd teach her how to use the till. She watched him, nodding all the time, interjecting with a rambling tale of how her sister-in-law once got bitten by a dog in a newsagents in Manningtree. He worked on this for about a week, then gave her a trial run and she was hopeless. She hadn't taken in a word. So now, she just stands behind the counter and stacks newspapers in 'Leaning Tower of Pisa' style stacks, and they totter and sway dangerously as you walk in, like a massive paper game of Jenga, and you daren't ask for a Daily Mail, not just because it's Tory reactionary rabid rabble-rousing sh*te, but for fear that she'll whip the bottom one out and you'll be left brained by two dozen collapsing tabloids.
She doesn't half talk as well. A simple 'Good Morning Hayley' can leave you reeling away fifteen minutes later, sated with the cautionary tale of the time her Aunt had to have a hysterectomy and couldn't drive for two months after, or the one about her dad's haemorrhoids. Tel's gone from patient politeness, through the barely polite stage and now just disappears into the back room gritting his teeth.
I've been invited to Paula's wedding next Saturday. Tel forgot she'd sent my invitation with his as she didn't know my home address. So, one bright morning at the back end of June, he suddenly said "'Ere, I've got yer invite for Paula's weddin' at 'ome" and then, the next morning, provided it with a brief apology and a smile. I unwisely thought it was just the evening do. "Nah" said Tel in surprise. "Iss all day includin' the weddin' brekfus". We're getting a taxi home. It'll be my last summer report, probably next Sunday. The invite, written in a rounded hand on ivory card with two blueish-grey bears in wedding attire on it, said all day specifically. "I need yer there all day, can't stand bleedin' weddin's " said Tel with pathos and a soupcon of need in his voice. So the suit has gone to the dry cleaners and I've washed all my white hankies.
Tel's closing the shop that weekend. It was that or entrust Hayley with all of it. He chose wisdom over valour. We went for a Chinese last night, me celebrating England's victory over the Aussies, he celebrating getting Hayley to clean the toilet in the shop, arming her with a big bottle of Domestos, a bucket and mop and a full kitchen roll. She didn't realise you had to dilute the Domestos, so visitors this morning cried tears of purest bleach product and probably breathed in as much ammonia as is good for the human body. Still, it smelt clean. And it sort of looked it. True, she'd missed the big patch of brownish looking matter near the sink, but the bog pan sparkled like an afternoon in Pandora. "Had to clean up after me Grandad when he was ill" she told me, buck-toothed and smiling. "He'd sh*t the bed once" she added, unnecessarily. I went back out to the safety of Tel.
Summer is acuming on. See you soon. |  |
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