Sometimes I think I am not the right person to be doing this job. And by this job I mean writing about the things that happen to me on the internet. Obviously in many ways I am the most qualified person to write about what happens to me, but that's not really what I mean.
Really, what I should be doing in order to keep this interesting and entertaining is searching out adventures to describe to you or leaping on opportunities that might make an excellent entry. If I was a journalist in a warzone and I heard a battle over the hill I would have to run to witness it and similarly as a diarist, documenting the mundanity of every day life, if an opportunity to do something a little bit different or unexpected presents itself, I should leap upon it.
Especially seeing as according to this website it seems that I spend my entire life drinking coffee, then when something occurs in the Cafe I should be there ready with my pen to get it all down for you.
But I am rubbish and shy and avoid pretty much all interaction with other people where possible. It makes me a rubbish candidate for this task. But through nepotism and essentially being the only person who gets to see all the rubbish things I do, I get the position.
So today in Caffe Nero I arrived around lunchtime, just having a quick coffee before going for a swim (weighing myself earlier in the week was all the incentive I needed). The place was packed and I was looking around for a table, but every single one was taken. As my coffee was being made I could see a businessman taking his last gulp from his cup and picking up his little valise and obviously preparing to go. I hoped the barista would hurry up and finish making my skinny latte, but she was taking her time, ensuring it was all properly made and delicious, the idiot.
And just as my cup got plonked down on the counter and the businessman got up to leave, I saw a woman walking out of the smoking section of the cafe and hovering by the table that was rightfully mine.
I picked up my coffee and walked up towards the table, resigned to having to see if there was somewhere free to sit in the smoking area. But the woman was still standing by the table and not sitting down. Perhaps she had just wanted to sniff the aroma of the businessman, whilst whatever smell he might have had (or done) hung in the air.
I got to the table. She was still hovering and looking around. Her intentions were unclear.
"Are you sitting there?" I asked.
"I was going to, but I don't think I am now," she said mysteriously. I wondered what had changed her mind.
"Are you on your own?" she asked.
I found it unlikely that I was being picked up after such a brief exchange, but then I am a devastatingly handsome man so I always have to consider this as a possibility. However, my assumption at this question was that she had been looking for a table that she could share with a friend and was going to ask if I would mind sitting in the seat she had just vacated, so that she could be with her companion. I would have been willing to make the swap. I am always keen to assist my fellow man and plus, she had really got to this table first.
I told her I was alone and then she said, "We're having a meeting of.." then she named an organisation, that I can't quite recall the name of - something innocuous like Friend Finder, "Would you like to join us? Or are you busy?"
Now I read this situation very quickly, the woman had a strange, slightly distant look in her eyes and was dressed oddly smartly and I realised that although the title of her organisation did not mention religion and sounded like it was concerned with helping lonely people find someone to talk to, that what she was actually suggesting was that I sat with her and her equally suspiciously smartly dressed male friend who I had now spotted and talk about Jesus. Plus the fact was that I was supposedly busy. I was going to try and do some work on my script (not that I managed to, but that is irrelevant). So for these reasons I put my head down and said, "No, I'm busy" and sat down.
But had I been a good diarist and reporter on London social life in the early 21st Century, I would have grasped the opportunity and said, "I'd love to talk with you about whatever your organisation is involved with."
And then I would have gone and sat down and had something interesting to write about, possibly being indoctrinated into a dangerous cult, that I would claim to you was a great thing and that you should join too.
But because of my timidity and pre-judgement, I never found out what Friend Finder was or what the man and woman wanted to talk to me about.
I am useless at this job. If anyone else wants to apply for the position then please write to God c/o everywhere in the world and he might be able to switch my soul for that of someone with more balls.
Maybe they were just looking for friends. That would have been quite nice. Isn't it awful that I assume that they were religious, just because they looked slightly mental and were talking to strangers and inviting them to talk with them? I am too judgemental.
