‘You could wear a short-sleeve shirt today.’ Suggests my
wife, gazing out the window at unaccustomed morning sunshine. You’d think she’d
know me better by now, but they still try to mould you, however mouldy you are.
‘Short-sleeve shirts are for computer engineers and door
to door salesmen.’ I tell her snootily.
‘You are sort of a door-to-door salesman.’ She retorts
with a twinkle in her eye. She’s not getting me that easily, especially as I’ve
already showered and don’t need to get hot under the collar…
It’s a long-running argument. I accept it might be more
comfortable to wear casual sports wear on the few days we get any decent
weather in this rain-lashed island, but you are just going to look like Alan
Partridge or one of those dicks that run their own estate agency as if it’s
their front room. Sitting there in slacks and a tank-top jumper, with some
wheezing Labrador lolling on the office carpet as if it makes the whole
operation homely. And don’t even start me on the knobs that wear designer polo
shirts, loafers and artfully battered £200 jeans – it’s just distressing.
‘I just think you’d be more comfortable.’ She persists
over breakfast, as youngest son raises his eyes to the heavens. He’s going to
get a prematurely wrinkled forehead if he stays at home too long.
‘It’s not about feeling comfortable.’ I tell her absurdly
as I pick at the dusty muesli she insist will help my girth and not necessitate
that long-delayed move into the next waistband size, and a whole wardrobe full
of new suits.
‘What is it about then?’ My wife presses. ‘You don’t want
to be turning up in people’s homes hot and sweaty. I wouldn’t instruct an agent
that smells of body odour.’
I take a surreptitious sniff under my shirt armpits. My
son increases his frown line damage and moves a step nearer to
early-application Botox. I’m fresh now, post shower and with the liberal use of
under arm deodorant but come mid-afternoon, two sales fall-throughs, a duff
survey and my third abortive valuation I might be a bit stale. Not stale enough
to look like an antipodean bank manager though. Those television programmes
where they follow families thinking of relocating to Australia or New Zealand
still make me shake my head in bemusement. I shouldn’t watch them, but anything
property related has a masochistic attraction. There’s always one partner
driving the move on the back of some drunken gap year when they didn’t have
three kids, a heavily mortgaged house to flog and limited career options. You
should never go back. Bruce or Sheila have moved on and are probably bald or
saggy and property prices are no longer in your favour. If you can’t make it in
the UK it’s a fair bet you’ll do no better just because the sun is shining and
you can barbecue nine months of the year.
‘It’s all about how you present yourself.’ I tell my wife
as I gather my briefcase and pull on my jacket, already too hot, but refusing
to compromise.
‘As sweaty and overheated?’ She replies, kissing me on
the cheek with about as much enthusiasm as a blunt-beaked woodpecker.
‘I just know what I feel comfortable in.’ I tell her
doggedly. Hoping the air con in the car doesn’t need topping up again. Is there
a bigger racket than that industry? Apart from estate agency, obviously.
It’s my armour, I think, as I drive in to a slowing
traffic queue and see the orange flashing lights of that bastard in a JCB
digger who delights in travelling at peak rush hour time. I feel protected in a
suit. It gives me that 100% wool carapace to keep the public at bay. To
maintain a veneer of professionalism when sometimes I’d like to just tear off
my shirt and go toe-to-toe with the latest time-waster, liar, or deal-wrecker
that comes across my path. Like an anonymous Blog, the two-piece mix and match
from Marks and Spencer keeps me at – long-sleeved – arms length from my life
stripped bare. I don’t have to show the real person as long as I remember to do
my zip up after pissing.
‘Air conditioning is leaking again.’ Announces assistant
manager T when I hurry through the door red faced and damp with perspiration,
mid afternoon. I’m not the only thing dripping. A bin sits in the middle of the
office collecting the run-off from the overhead unit. T is sat at his desk,
sleeves rolled up untidily. B, the lettings lush, is in a vest top and busty S,
my comely negotiator, is just about wearing a flimsy blouse. The temperature
continues to rise.
And I used to think I was cool.
---------------
Chill out with the property e-book here:
4 comments:
That's a very kind and subtle wife telling you that you do have a real problem with male perspiration (B.O.). Best take note.
Except in the depth of winter, I prefer short-sleeve shirts. Then again, I am an electronics/physics geek. I can't be doing with my arms being encumbered!
By the way, what do you reckon is the subtext behind "Agents Note: Cash Buyers Only Please" on a house-ad?
Is it likely to mean they think a mortgage-co's surveyor will see through the superficial makeover job, and value it well-below asking?
More likely the agent's note about cash buyers only is because the home is not-mortgageable with structural problems at a guess. Electronics/physics geeks have to wear short-sleeves don't they..?
S.A.
Your suggestion of structural issues looks highly probable. I've just been past again and noticed that the upstairs (concrete) windowsills are distinctly wonky, and the light of a good torch reveals the pattern of the bricks and mortar behind the white paint on the front wall... and there's definitely some tell-tale evidence of substantial mortar-infill along zigzag lines where bricks have parted in the past...
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