Diary of a Grumpy Old Git (7 page)

It doesn’t take much to set off my grumpiness these days. This morning I felt like I was going to sneeze, but then the feeling went away again. I spent the rest of the
morning brooding about the sneeze that got away. I don’t know why, I just had a feeling it was going to be a good one. Eventually, I convinced myself that other sneezes would come along and I
should put it behind me.

I went to the supermarket this afternoon, and I tried to act on my resolution to be more positive by chatting to the woman at the checkout. I said that the weather was surprisingly nice for the
time of year, although a colder snap was forecast. Unfortunately, I don’t think she understood English very well, because she rang a bell to call out her supervisor. A scowling woman with a
huge cup of coffee in her hand emerged from the back room. I didn’t want to admit that I’d dragged her away from her break just to talk about the weather, so I asked if they had any
charcoal briquettes. I don’t know why. They were the first things that came into my head.

She dragged a 4kg bag over to the till and said it was the only size they had. I then had to lug them all the way home, even though I’ve got no intention of ever using them, as I hate
barbecues. So this is what I get for trying to be friendly, is it?

I got the early train again this morning, as I didn’t want either of the newcomers to nick my chair. In the unlikely event that I survive the redundancies, I don’t
want my screen facing into the office so everyone can see I’m playing Scrabble.

I noticed that Erika had placed a chair at the edge of my desk, so I made a barrier of Post-it notes to mark out my place. I haven’t had to do anything that petty since I made a textbook
barrier to keep out Trevor Chalkley’s germs when he sat next to me in school, but I thought I’d make the effort in case I survive the cull.

Jo was the first of the new arrivals to turn up. She looked like she was in her mid-twenties, though from her dress sense you’d guess she was mid-way through primary school. She had a pink
hair clip, a yellow T-shirt and a pair of black pumps like the ones we used to wear in PE before trainers became fashionable.

She was also wearing thick black glasses frames with no lenses in, which I found odd. So people who need glasses are getting expensive laser eye surgery, but people who don’t need them are
buying frames with no lenses in? Make your minds up, folks.

Jo said hello, took her chair at the edge of Cathy’s desk, opened her thin laptop and put her white earphones in. I think she might be one of those cool people you hear about. Her
little-girl image will get creepy if she sticks with it until she’s my age, but right now it seems to work.

Jez turned up at half nine and plonked himself down on the chair at the end of my desk. He had ginger dreadlocks, baggy purple trousers and a waistcoat with an ethnic pattern. I remembered my
vow to be less grumpy this year and tried my best not to form an instant hatred of him.

‘Hi, dude,’ he said, holding his hand out.

Then I recognized him. He was the little bastard who stole my chair in Starbucks. At least it meant that I could freely get on with forming my hatred of him.

Jez’s wrists were covered with scraps of grubby fabric, and I asked him what they were. Apparently, he’s been to eleven festivals in the last three years, and he’s kept the
wristbands from all of them. He went through them one by one, detailing all the macrobiotic food stalls, sustainable world music stages and costume parades he’d enjoyed. I asked him for the
exact times and places of these festivals so I could be absolutely sure to never go within a twenty-mile radius of them.

Oh well, here goes. I’ve been invited to a meeting with Josh on Friday morning. Imran has his meeting at nine, Cathy has hers at half nine and I’ve got mine at
ten.

Josh clearly wants to get rid of me, so why not do it right away? Then I could scrape the contents of my desk into a cardboard box and piss off without having to hear any more about Jez’s
gap year. He’s being going on about it for ages now and he’s showing no sign of stopping. Is it possible that an anecdote about a gap year could last longer than the year itself?

What is this obsession young people have with travelling, anyway? When I was young, a holiday meant sitting on a pebbly beach with your parents in the pouring rain with nothing but your seething
resentment to keep you warm. Now it means playing the bongos and ‘finding yourself’.

I can’t help noticing that these kids who find themselves always seem to find that they like sitting on warm beaches and living off their parents’ money. Must be such a revelation
for them.

On my way home tonight, a woman handed me an invite to an open night at the local gym. I have no intention of ever signing up to one of those places again. Last time it took me so long to cancel
my direct debit that the four trips I made must have cost about £200 each. But this was a free offer, so I thought I might as well go.

I rushed back home, stuffed my jogging trousers and T-shirt into a bag and ran out. The offer was only valid until eight, so I had to take a shortcut through the council estate. There were some
frightening teenagers on bikes outside the underpass, so I had to forge an alternative route through the estate’s maze of pathways.

I had to leapfrog over three randomly placed pedestrian barriers, sprint past a loose pit bull terrier and dodge several abandoned shopping trolleys to escape the estate, but I managed to get to
the gym just before eight. I dashed into the changing rooms, threw my stuff on and hurried down a corridor into a bright room full of exercise machines.

A man wearing a polo shirt and tracksuit bottoms came over to me. ‘Hi, I’m Jay,’ he said. ‘I’m here to talk you through the facilities. Do you know which ones
you’d like to try first?’

I had to wait to catch my breath.

‘Yeah,’ I said eventually. ‘Do you have a café?’

It’s the end of January now. Time to reflect on how my resolution to be more positive is going.

Not very well, really. A little better than that year I vowed to give up drinking and then remembered about my ‘beers of the world’ gift pack. But overall, I wouldn’t say
I’ve managed to be positive for an entire month.

Does it matter, though? After all, if the Greeks and Romans had sat around grinning all day, would they have bothered inventing civilization? Maybe negative thinking is the driving force behind
all culture. By demonizing pessimism, we’re forcing ourselves into irreversible decline.

Would Isaac Newton have discovered gravity without negative thinking? Would Leonardo Da Vinci ever have drawn a woman with a wonky smile and inspired a crap airport novel without negative
thinking? And would Dave Cross ever have won a bronze award for business-to-business copywriting without negative thinking?