Broke

On Friday, I went for a drink after work. I got talking to a man who showed me some official papers, issued to him on his release from police custody earlier that day. He'd damaged a door. "I don't drink that often, but when I do I lose the plot," he said, setting his new pint of Stella before himself.

I didn't rush my pint, but made it my last; bade him farewell, and wished him, insincerely, good luck in his trial.

I was intercepted on my way out by the first person ever to speak to me in that pub after starting the job in ----. He was sitting with a man who half an hour earlier had lent me his glasses, as he saw me squinting at my bank card. My account is still frozen -- originally with £490 in it, but now, with payments that are being dropped down the same well, is holding around £850. I needed my account number in order to apply for a loan from Bank of Mum.

James told me about breaking off his engagement after he bumped into an old flame and transferred his affections. His fiancée found out, and at their last meeting threw his pint over him.

James has regressed into teenagerdom, showing me farcebook posts about her I didn't want to see; but I enjoy these kind of stories. Sometimes I miss the gossip and scandal of a small town.

On my scooter ride home, I got to within a couple of yards of my front door, tried to ride up the kerb, and came clattering down. At that moment, a car slowed down and pulled over. Wanting above all to avoid the driver's solicitations, I stood up quickly and gaily smiled and shrugged, trying to indicate that I'd rather she carried on her way.

The pain that night was some of the worst I've ever had, but I thought that if I could just bear it for a few hours it would go away. I was awake all night, then at the hospital the following day, I was told that I'd broken my wrist and my elbow.

I was delighted to read, in the leaflet they gave me when I was discharged, that I'll probably be in plaster for about four weeks; but worried about what my manager would say at work when he returned my call. The phrase I feared hearing was "alternative duties".

To my surprise, it was all over in a couple of minutes. He said that there were no alternative duties available for me, and wished me well and to keep in touch.

I put the phone down, shouted, and did a victory punch with my good hand. "You have turned that phone off, haven't you? cautioned Mel. The phone was indeed off, and a radiant vista of a month of paid leisure, riding on Tramadol, opened up before me.

On Thursday I received an invite to a competitive online geometry-themed arcade game, one of the bizarre recruitment practices the railway industry uses as the gatekeeper at the citadel in which the better jobs are kept. I have unambiguously failed before at this test, but that might prepare me better for it this time round.