Reasons why shops should have one-way systems at Christmas

I've had problems with my left leg recently and it's limited my getting around, but things are improving. 'You're limping much better,' someone said on Sunday. It was an odd kind of compliment but I take whatever I can get these days.

I can't ignore the fact that my weight won't have helped. I think I'll release my own pop song about the health risks of being shaped like the largest instrument in the string section.  Come on, sing along.

'Cause you know, I'm all about that bass, 'bout that bass, knee trouble ...'

This is one of the stills from the Meghan Trainor pop video for 'All About That Bass'. I think he's
saying, ''Don't talk to me, People who could fit in my pocket make me nervous.'



Today was my day off school so I went Christmas shopping. I browsed round a shop that would win the Most Items Crammed Into Tiniest Shop in Britain award.  The combination of me - plump and off balance with two bags and a rucksack and a mutinous knee - plus a lady with a baby buggy and a walking excited toddler, plus other customers carrying long rolls of Christmas wrapping paper under their arms, caused a hiatus at one point during which none of us could move anywhere. We endured an almost-group-hug for a full minute before we cooperated in finding ways of escape, one by one, trying this way and that until we found solutions, like doing a human Rubik's cube.

That particular shop holds bad memories for me anyway. I've written before about the time another customer mistook me for an assistant and asked me what the upstairs of the shop contained. I said, 'Oh, it's clothes' but she thought I'd said 'Oh, it's closed' and complained about me to another assistant when she found I'd been lying.

I enjoyed my shopping this morning, despite it all, because I haven't been out of the house much for weeks, imprisoned by the knee, and have had lifts to and from school from teacher colleagues. I've been doing a lot of sitting-down teaching and could-you-wipe-the-whiteboard-for-me teaching and you'll-have-to-come-here-if-you-want-me-to-check-your-work teaching and come-here-right-now-so-I-can-tell-you-off teaching. (The latter has been the least successful.)

So, the outing did me good. Even my struggle down the bus aisle, causing actual bodily harm to irritated people left and right with all my bags and parcels, didn't cast too much of a pall on all the Christmas fun.

Not my Christmas fun, anyway. They didn't look too chuffed.




Fran hoped the bus wouldn't come until she'd found which bag her ticket was in. 




Comments

  1. stephen Hayes10/12/14 09:24

    At least you're keeping a sense of humor about it. Take care.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill10/12/14 11:20

      The day I lose my sense of humour, I'll know it's all finished for me. Thanks, Stephen.

      Delete
  2. Anonymous10/12/14 11:03

    I fear neither of us will EVER fit in someone's pocket!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Friko10/12/14 11:24

    Trust Fran to cause a commotion!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Marty10/12/14 13:01

    This must not be one of my brighter days - I first read "largest instrument in the string section" and pictured a tuba.
    Ah well.

    ReplyDelete
  5. River10/12/14 22:59

    Christmas shopping?
    I suppose I should get started on that. Soon. ish.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:50

      I wouldn't start until Christmas Eve except I think the consequences could be messy.

      Delete
  6. Steve10/12/14 23:29

    This is why I now shop online. Not to avoid you personally but to avoid the unendurable agony of wanting to leave a shop with my goods as quickly as possibly only to find my way blocked by other people wanting to leave the shop with their goods as quickly as possible.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:50

      Yep, that just about describes Christmas shopping!

      Delete
  7. Nicola11/12/14 06:53

    You have made me laugh, Fran. Thank you. I needed that :) I am sorry about your knee though and hope it heals quickly. Have a wonderful Christmas and all the best for the new year. Keep the laughs coming - and the singing. Love it!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:51

      Glad you liked the post, Nicola. Have a wonderful Christmas yourself. Thank you for the permission to keep singing. I will tell my family you said I could ....

      Delete
  8. SmitoniusAndSonata11/12/14 14:44

    My grandmother never carried a rucksack or struggled with plastic bags . She stopped going into shops when they removed the chair next to counters for customers . Thereafter we all got book tokens .
    Sensible woman .
    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:52

      I love book tokens - they're my favourite present - but people just say, 'No, I can't get you that. It's BORing.' Er ... no.

      Delete
  9. Pam 11/12/14 15:38

    Anyone would think you were huge! I've seen you on film and you're really not.

    But I hope the knee continues its improvement.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:52

      I was wearing fourteen pairs of pull-you-in pants on the videos.

      Delete
  10. Janie Junebug11/12/14 15:50

    I have a bad knee, too. Injured giving Harper a shower, and then he died a few weeks later. At least he died clean.

    Love,
    Janie

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:53

      I love your optimistic look on life. And death ... I am hoping Harper is a pet.

      Delete
  11. River11/12/14 21:51

    That last photo reminds me of old women who get on the bus and THEN start looking through every bag and pocket for their ticket, thus holding up all those behind still waiting to get on. The same women who would hold up a check-out line searching every bag and pocket for just the right change.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fran Hill12/12/14 08:54

      You must move to London. Cashless buses there - if you don't have your 'beep beep' ticket, you can't get on. Cruel, but faster.

      Delete
  12. River14/12/14 19:28

    I have my beep beep ticket here (metro card) and wish everyone else would hurry up and get theirs. They will have to soon, the paper pay as you get on tickets are being phased out by the end of this month.

    ReplyDelete

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