Let The Sideshow Begin

In the current financial climate, when the going gets tough the tough get going on a hunt for cheap entertainment. For instance, it costs nothing to be entertained for hours by Facebook or Twitter where a female friend of mine landed in deep water this week by posting “I just got paid”, only to discover that her fat fingers had typed “paid” with an L instead of a P.

You’ll be pleased to hear this week then that I’ve found a safer and better way to spend a few hours and be royally entertained at the cost of absolutely zero.

Now I do realise that when I say “royally entertained” you may be worried that I’m going to suggest something boring and turgid like the Royal Variety Show where Her Maj almost certainly pays an aide to dig fingernails in to the royal palms to keep her awake. If anyone ever says The Queen doesn’t earn her money just mention the dreadful shows she has to sit through, smiling, as doddery old variety turns, all as topical as a Leo Sayer tribute act, suck up. They’re Old Boring Entertainers, OBEs hoping to get an MBE. I went to one of these shows once and I’ve had a more fun evening scalping dry skin off my feet.

So no, my free day out is not as boring as the Queen’s social calendar. This free day out has entertainment by the barrel load, but I advise you to wear comfy shoes as there will be standing room only.

If you’re one of the lucky ones who says “what credit crunch?” these days and are still coasting along buying Ferraris and Sunseeker yachts to make your holiday home in Portofino look flashier, then good luck to you and the bank you work for.

A quick walk down any high street today tells a gloomy story as one shop after another lies empty, usually with a sad notice in the window thanking customers for past loyalty. Landlords have not woken up to reality and are desperately hiring out their places to charity shops, cheaply, just to avoid paying taxes on empty property. I’m going to open a cafe called Paul and avoid high rent by telling the landlord it stands for Protecting Animals Using Latté. They’ll snap me up.

As a serious aside, I noticed a very large fish and chip restaurant in Wimbledon is closed with notices in the window saying it’s because one of the family has a brain tumour. It’s all the more poignant because the family has arranged all the get well cards from customers on the restaurant floor, and they stretch as far as the eye can see. There’s always someone worse off isn’t there?

Looking at empty high streets just now even the good old post offices have suffered, with two I regularly use closing recently. This is personally sad as I got to know the families who ran them very well. But, if you look very hard, there is a bit of a bonus, and this brings me back to my free day out.

Yesterday I went to one of the few remaining post offices to post a parcel and, because so many have closed, the line of waiting customers was out to the street. I had no option but to wait in the queue feeling annoyed. But once I had resigned myself to fate, it turned out to be the most entertaining day out I had had in a while. Forget the surly people who work there. They’ve been told in training that if they smile they’ll contract malaria, and if they apologise for your waiting time then they’ll get a Fast Lane ticket to the bad fire. It can only be a matter of time before someone re records those post office queueing announcements to say “Cashier Number Four Will Belittle You Now Please.”

Anyway, as I stood there (see why I said standing room only?) I became engrossed as the man behind me took a call from his wife. I only heard half the conversation, of course, but he was so apologetic I think he must have done something really, really bad. He ended it with “ok, I’ll give you five minutes and do my married duty tonight”. I can only guess what that means!

Then I overheard a girl buying Jamaican dollars who couldn’t quite get the hang of the buying and selling prices quoted and thought it was a choice. “I’ll just take that one”, she said as the cashier tried to explain the difference. A baby in front of me started giggling and we bonded. One guy sang out loud unaware, because of his earphones, that he could be heard, another told his mate a funny joke about football, a well dressed woman had a sack full of risque underwear to post as she ran an E Bay site, and so on. By the time I was served I was disappointed the free show was over.

So next time I have to stand in line, instead of being wrapped up in what I’m doing I’ll open my eyes and ears and see that the motley collection of strangers brought together by queueing really do provide great entertainment.

It’s a bit like Twitter and Facebook, but with real people.