Diary of a Grumpy Old Git (13 page)

I went to the supermarket on the way home to stock up on ready-meals. When I told the woman behind the counter that I needed plastic bags, she gave me such a scowl that I opted to buy yet
another organic Fairtrade ‘bag for life’. I must have about twenty of those things now. I want to get rid of some, but ‘bag for life’ sounds too much like a threat. I expect
some sort of carbon-neutral hit squad will come round and finish me off if I attempt to bin one of them.

No time to think about all that now. I’m off to bed early tonight. I need to be at TC Waste Solutions at nine tomorrow for my briefing. I feel like I ought to do a decent job after all
that applause.

When I got to TC Waste Solutions this morning, the receptionist showed me into Trevor’s office. I was hoping there might be a few people in the meeting, but it was just
the two of us. I shook his hand as quickly as I could and looked down at my notebook, hoping he wouldn’t recognize me.

Trevor launched straight into one of his monologues about bins, and I thought I was safe. Unfortunately, he stopped after just a couple of minutes.

‘You think I’ve forgotten, don’t you?’ he asked.

‘Forgotten what?’ I asked.

‘You’re Dave Cross from Oakland Comprehensive School. You invented that whole “Chalky Balls” thing.’

I hadn’t realized I was the one who’d come up with it. I felt an odd surge of pride.

I looked up at Trevor and tried to sound surprised. ‘Jesus, is that you, Trevor? It’s been so long. How are you doing, mate?’

‘We weren’t mates,’ said Trevor. ‘You made that clear at every single opportunity. Don’t think that I’ve forgotten that barrier of books you used to build if
I ever sat next to you. So you wouldn’t catch Trevor germs.’

Trevor pointed to a framed picture of him standing next to a bin. ‘I bet you wish you had caught Trevor germs now. Then maybe you’d have your own business rather than working for
someone who wasn’t even born when we were at school.’

He dragged a photo of a plump woman wearing too much eyeliner out of his wallet. ‘Look at my lovely wife.’ He followed it with a picture of two glum girls. ‘Look at my
children. This one has been predicted straight As in her GCSEs and this one has Grade 8 in the cello. Has your daughter got Grade 8?’

‘I don’t have a daughter,’ I said. ‘Can we get on with the meeting now, please?’

‘Don’t tell me what to do,’ he said. ‘From now on, you obey me. And if you question anything at all I’m going to fire your shitty little agency and blame it all on
you. Do you understand?’

‘Fine,’ I said. ‘Whatever.’

Trevor pulled a packet of chalk out of his bag. He took out one of the pieces and crushed it with his stapler.

He pointed at the pile of chalk dust. ‘Rub that on the front of your trousers.’

‘Oh, come on,’ I said.

‘I’m serious,’ said Trevor. ‘I’m calling your boss if you don’t do that in ten seconds. Ten … nine … eight …’

I scooped up a handful of chalk and rubbed it across the front of my jeans.

‘Happy?’ I asked.

‘It’s a start,’ he said. ‘It’s a start, Chalky Balls.’

I think it was a mistake to go down the high street this afternoon. I find it stressful enough at the best of times, so attempting to get down it after yesterday’s meeting
was asking for trouble.

Pavements are just as important as roads. Why don’t pedestrians have to pass tests and get licences? And why can’t we punish people who use pavements incorrectly? I encountered a few
I’d have banned for life today.

First I was stuck behind a woman who was texting as she walked. Does this multitasking really save any time? Can’t she just wait at the side of the pavement, text her friend and then
continue at a normal walking pace? Or is she unable to stop texting at any time?

Next I got trapped behind a young couple walking hand in hand. And there was a pedestrian barrier at the side of the pavement so I couldn’t even overtake them. I’m guessing that the
barrier was there to prevent accidents. Well, it nearly caused one today. It would have caused a couple of fatalities if I’d had an assault rifle.

Finally, my path was blocked by a woman with a pram who’d stopped to talk to her friend, and had for some reason chosen to park it across the entire width of the pavement. Now, I’m
all in favour of people having children and sustaining the human race. Actually, no I’m not. I don’t have to be in favour of it if I don’t want to be. Let’s all stop
procreating and let the grey squirrels take over the planet. You can tell they’ve got their eyes on it.

So all in all, it wasn’t a good day for a woman in a fluorescent tabard to leap into my path and ask if I wanted to help some donkeys. I told her that I didn’t give a fuck about
donkeys. They don’t have to use banks, wait for trains or worry that their phones are out of date. And, more to the point, if she gave a fuck about donkeys, she’d be down the stables
tending to them rather than getting an hourly wage to bully direct debit details out of vulnerable pedestrians.

There was a boy at our school called Alex who used to block your path in the corridor and charge you 10p to get past (50p if you were Trevor). We all thought he was acting weirdly because he
came from a broken home. Little did we know he was simply ahead of his time.

I’m definitely going to lay the decking in the garden today. Decking will make everything better. Decking will fill the void.

In the afternoon I called Brad on his mobile and pretended to be a property developer. I told him I was interested in buying the most expensive house he had, but I was only in
town for a day, so I needed to see it this afternoon. You could tell he was weighing up the inconvenience of working on a Sunday against the possibility of a big fat bonus. His greed got the better
of him and he arranged to meet me outside the property at five.

I wanted to go and watch him slapping his dashboard in frustration as he realized no one was coming. But then I worried that he might bring Sarah along, she’d point me out, and he’d
come over and beat me to death with his BlackBerry. So I stayed at home and imagined him getting angry instead.

I’m not sure why I feel the need to annoy Brad like this. He took Sarah off my hands. I should be thanking him. But there’s something about those dead eyes I saw on Facebook that
makes me want to keep picking on him. Even Sarah isn’t punishment enough.

I was woken up by a car alarm at six this morning. It clearly didn’t wake up the owner of the car because they didn’t come out and switch it off. How are those
things supposed to prevent theft? The only thing the alarm announced was that no one who gave a shit about the car was within earshot, so you might as well go ahead and nick it. I was considering
breaking in myself, just so I could drive it into a canal.

I seem to live my life against a constant backdrop of alarms now. My new microwave beeps every minute until I take the food out. Heaven forbid that I should leave my carbonara inside until
it’s cool enough to eat. The only effect these arrogant little gadgets have is to make us block out all alarms, so we ignore the important ones like the smoke alarm in the orphanage. Thanks,
microwave. Hope you’re happy with yourself.

Amazingly, things got even worse when I dragged myself out of bed and attempted to eat some corn flakes, as I’d run out of granulated sugar and had to use caster sugar instead. Why do I
buy caster sugar? Do I ever find myself overwhelmed by the urge to bake fairy cakes? No, I just use it as a disgusting substitute when I run out of proper sugar. You might think that a simple
solution would be to buy two packets of granulated sugar next time, instead of one of each kind. But I know I won’t. I can guarantee I’ll have exactly the same problem again in three
months’ time.

With two major annoyances before 7 a.m., I decided to write the day off and go into work early. I was so tired I couldn’t even enjoy Scrabble, so I made a start on the brochure instead.
But here’s the weird thing. I kept going until I finished it. I didn’t even stop for lunch. I don’t know what came over me. Maybe I’ve caught workaholism from Jen.