Yesterday was a difficult day. I decided to leave for Brixham quite early in order to visit the NatWest Bank in Paignton (there is no longer a NatWest branch in Totnes) to deposit a sum of money, and then to stroll around Brixham harbour prior to fulfilling an appointment I had in that town.
Before leaving home I was about to make a phone call to a prospective client when my MacBook Air laptop asked me if I would like to update the IOS operating system on my iPhone. I agreed and started the update. I was given a message that there were items in my iTunes folder which could not be transferred because they had not been purchased from Apple. I pressed the “continue” button and at that stage my phone froze and I was no longer able to access it, or the data stored in it. I could have coped with this until I got expert help but unfortunately I had promised to call my prospective client and his telephone number had been on my iPhone. I didn’t want to let him down so I walked quickly to the lower end of town and sought help from the mobile phone shop there and from Quay IT, the computer company in Totnes. Neither could help me. I was now running very short of time but since the EE shop which provided me with my mobile phone and its accompanying contract is in Paignton and since I intended to visit my bank there and that it was on my way to Brixham, my final destination, I decided I would risk taking a few minutes to pay the shop a visit.
My original intention had been to make the journey by bus but I remained determined to make the phone call to my prospective client and the only way I could keep on schedule was to look out for a taxi to take me to Paignton. I almost ran - the last time I actually ran was about 20 years ago - to the taxi stance on The Plains at Totnes. A car was parked there. The driver, a woman, didn’t seem interested in me as a potential customer so impatiently I opened the front passenger door and made to get into the car. I was about to tell her my destination when I saw how horrified she was. “Oh! You’re not a taxi are you?” “No,” she replied and after a moment or two she seemed to see a funny side to what had happened. I apologised and slunk off in a high state of embarrassment.
If you know Totnes you will be aware there are two parking bays on the Dartmouth Inn side of The Plains, one is for taxis and the other is for the public. You've already guessed which one I, in my anxiety, had landed upon. After a few minutes of waiting, I boarded a legitimate taxi at the proper taxi stance.
I was becoming fearful of being late for my appointment in Brixham but was still determined to try to do all that I had hoped to do. When the taxi driver dropped me off in Paignton I rushed to the EE mobile phone shop on the pedestrianised Victoria Street, burst into it, and pulled out my phone and asked an attendant if she could help me fix it. At that moment I spotted numerous pairs of spectacles displayed around the walls and it came upon me that I’d entered the wrong shop. I was in Specsavers which is adjacent to the EE shop.
At least those who witnessed my inverted take ("he did go to Specsavers") on the "should have gone to Specsavers" television advert, appreciated the comic nature of the incident and when I did get into the EE Shop, a young man there gave me good advice which allowed me to fix my phone when I returned home. Though I didn't have time to saunter around the harbour, I got to the bank, fulfilled my appointment in Brixham, and I was able in the early evening to contact my prospective client and arrange an appointment. All lived happily ever after.
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| Easy mistake to make. |
On further reflection about what happened yesterday I was inclined think my missing the target represented further evidence of a speedy decline in my mental acuity caused by advancing years and that may well be so.
Yet I was consoled by a boyhood memory of being driven home (probably from Arbroath or Broughty Ferry) one Saturday afternoon or Sunday afternoon. I was about eight years old and my parents stopped the car across the road from our favourite fish n’chip shop Soave’s on Lochee High Street. They told me to get two fish suppers for themselves and two thruppenny bags of chips for my sister and me. I was urged to “hurry up about it”. I dashed swiftly across the road through the double doors into the shop, ran up to the high counter and cried, “Can I have two fish suppers and two thrupenny bags of chips, please?” As the words came out of my mouth, bursting out around me was the laughter of men who were sitting at tables scattered around the room. Another man, who also seemed to think me worthy of amusement, was standing leaning against the counter and I noticed he and the others were drinking from glasses containing an amber coloured liquid. The man behind the counter said to me, “Sonny, ye’re up the wrang dreel, try next door.”
I’d never been in a place like this before but I was informed later I had run into a pub: The Burns Bar. Aware that I had blundered I sheepishly left the licensed premises, looked across the road to our car and saw that my parents and my sister seemed to think my discomfiture was very amusing. I went next door to Soave’s, got the fish n’ chips and when I’d returned to the car I handed them, and the change, to my Mummy.
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