If You Took A Holiday - Monday

‘You need to get up.’ Urges my wife’s voice through a sleepy fug. Now that causes some confusion to my jet-lagged brain, as I wonder what day it is and if the instruction is some encouragement for early morning action?

‘The Germans will have bagged all the sunbeds anyway.’ I tell her drowsily, once I’ve realised you only get pre-breakfasts sex, before the first wedding anniversary.

‘What are you talking about?’ Replies my wife curtly. And an unpleasant realisation hits me just as I realise there is no embryonic sunrise-warmth colour-washing the walls. Instead that inane couple from the local radio breakfast show are jabbering the usual nonsense, urging any loser with no life and a mobile phone to ring in and talk to them. Anyone.

‘We’re not on holiday any more are we?’ I state rhetorically, as I glance at the bedside clock and realise I’m late already and that it’s dark outside.

‘You can’t have forgotten the flight from hell.’ Says my wife nudging me in the direction of the en-suite, with one leg.

As I stand unsteadily and empty my bladder, something it proved hard to do on a plane journey where the sole aim of the cabin crew seemed to be to flog over-priced drinks and perfumes while blocking your route to the toilets, I realise it’s Monday. And I’m due back at work.

‘That week went too fast.’ I tell my wife, after a hasty shave where I managed to scrape off two days worth of sunbathing, then nick myself on the neck in a place where it will probably still be bleeding when my shirt collar needs to be buttoned.

‘Tell me about it.’ She says with a yawn, padding off in her dressing gown to put the kettle on. She could read the Blog, but doesn’t show much interest in truth.

‘Can I have some honey in my tea?’ I call, as I gaze in disinterest at the array of ties I’d rather not wear.

‘Diet starts today.’ Comes the reply in the negative.

That’s the problem with holidays and an all-inclusive package. You need a lot of self-restraint. I mean, if you want to dispel the convenient notion that your morbid obesity can somehow be blamed on genetics, just take a look at where the biffers head for once the breakfast buffet opens. It’s not the fresh fruit counter.

‘I’m exhausted before I start.’ I tell my wife over a soggy bowl of bran, with that opaque fully-skimmed milk I’ve avoided for the last seven days.

‘It didn’t help the holiday operators dumped us at the airport  three and a half hours before our flight.’ She reminds me.

If looks could kill, the airhead rep on the microphone, who gaily informed us as we trooped off the coach, that the queues would be extra long for check-in, would be getting gushy memorials on her Facebook page by now.

Quite apart from their woeful plumbing arrangements and a propensity to avoid paying taxes, you can see why the Greek economy is going down the pan. The charming service we enjoyed at the hotel evaporated faster than gob on a hotplate, once we entered the airport. Surly doesn’t even begin to cover it. Those grumpy security staff and sullen passport control people will empty your goodwill, faster than a Transylvanian hooker.

I’d been feeling quite upbeat after a week of limitless food and alcohol. With only one lapse, where I foolishly looked in a Greek realtor’s window. But four hours with a screaming kid two seats behind and an intransigent woman in front who kept trying to recline her seat, despite my knees being wedged so deep into the seat-back pocket I was nearly taking her up the arse with one patella, took its toll. 

‘Try to have a good day.’ Urges my wife, as I do the customary peck on the doorstep. Then I’m passing the same faces in the traffic congestion again and suddenly I’m walking towards the office. Two  more fantasies dashed - it hasn’t burnt down and the window display hadn’t changed much either.

Think I’ll go to the travel agent at lunchtime.

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Seasons In The Sun - Wednesday

‘You feeling alright?’ Asks assistant manager T as he becomes the first staff member to arrive at the office - twenty minutes after me.

He doesn’t often sense moods that acutely, until I shout at him or thump the desk in frustration, but I’m guessing he’s noticed my washed out appearance. I’ve been awake, coughing and sneezing since about 4.00am. My eyes are red-raw from rubbing and crustier than a bakery floor.

‘I’m okay.’ I lie wearily.

‘Only it looks like you’ve been crying.’

Terrific. I’ve three valuations today and the sympathy sales pitch never lasts past the moment you tell them how much their home is really worth. The fee discussion is not to be sneezed at either.

‘It’s the pollen count.’ I tell T with an unpleasant sniffing sound resembling a badly blocked drain clearing.

‘Hay fever?’ Asks T with head to one side.

No, another survey the bean counter boss wants to do, I feel like saying sarcastically. Similar to a board count but with more bronchial mulch.

‘I never used to get all these allergies as bad.’ I tell T mournfully. The whole office knows about my reaction to dog and cat hair, never a good ailment when you are constantly entering homes where delusional pet owners think their house doesn’t smell and it’s okay to have felines on the kitchen work surfaces, and canines lying on the bed.

‘Maybe it’s an age thing.’ Muses T, sitting at his desk with a thump and firing up his flatscreen. No chance of making me another cuppa, I think tetchily? The half-full mug beside me has gone cold and I don’t fancy swigging the slightly bitter, grainy dregs of another tepid LemSip  I wonder if you can overdose on over-the-counter snot-busters? There must be cheaper ways.

‘You’d think you’d build up an immunity after half a lifetime of animal hair and tree pollen ingestion.’ I tell T, who doesn’t appear to be listening any more. I thought you could check your Facebook on your phone.

‘Says here the pollen forecast is very high today.’ Announces T. I’ve maligned him unnecessarily. Luckily it wasn’t out loud this time and in any case I’m beyond blushing now - coughing, sneezing and choking yes, but beyond blushing.

I walk across to glance over T’s shoulder just as fat finance fiddler M waddles in to the office, clutching another grease-flecked Greggs bag.

‘Someone died?’ Asks M stopping in front of me.

I raise a quizzical eyebrow and a tear spills down my cheek.

‘He’s got hay fever.’ Enlightens T, as I reach for my last tissue and trumpet a runny venting. Unlike my erstwhile drinking buddy, I refuse to use a linen handkerchief. He’ll happily blow his nose, then dip straight into the communal bag of crisps we’re sharing. I should widen my circle of friends but it’s not easy, being an estate agent.

‘That’s alright then.’ Says M moving away. ‘As long as it’s not one of my policyholders. Reams of paperwork if they croak and I don’t get any renewal commission.’

The property industry took a turn for worse the day insurance companies, banks and building societies started buying up estate agency firms.

‘God, you look awful.’ Says negotiator S, as she comes through the door and glances at me.

‘It’s hay fever.’ Shouts M from his office. ‘He’s not sobbing about the office sales figures.’

‘Have you tied anti-histamine tablets?’  Asks S, waking her computer and also showing no sign of making drinks.

‘I positively rattle with them.’ I tell her grumpily. ‘They are expensive and don’t really work that well.’

‘Like solar roof panels.’ Says T with a hearty chuckle.

Everyone’s a comedian. We’ll see if they’re still laughing when I arrange a leaflet drop for this afternoon. T’s right about the ugly solar slabs though. Not many people want to buy a house with those monstrosities ruining the roofline. Built in obsolescence, in a cloudy country with more rain than the forests we’re supposed to be saving. I sense another mis-selling scandal.

Back at my desk, I check my emails. 

I’m going to need another box of tissues.

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Memory Lane - Sunday

‘So how do you know the happy couple?’ Asks a man in sports casual, with a belly belying the brand. I’m at a birthday bash for one of my oldest friends, curiously his day correlates, quite closely, with his wife’s – but then he had two other spouses before he hit on a match. They have thrown a joint celebration.

‘We used to work together way back when.’ I tell the man, as his considerably younger girlfriend – we’ve already established over watery chilli and cold rice, that he too has been keeping matrimonial lawyers in villa holidays – looks on feigning interest.

The man chuckles voluminously, his vast man breasts jiggling the premium brand company logo distractingly. Still, stops me focusing on his barely legal girlfriend’s tits. I wonder if he stalks his daughter’s Facebook friends’ page to save paying out for dating website’s fees?

‘You one of those property sharks too?’ Asks the man between tracer- bullet-like grains of Uncle Ben’s finest, he’s projectile ejecting in my direction.

I feel my wife’s hand close round my arm in a vice-firm warning not to start an argument. I nod a suitably apologetic confirmation then enquire as to his profession?

‘Ex Royal Navy,’ grins the man pausing dramatically to allow anyone sufficiently interested to enquire after rank, campaigns fought and which of the few remaining ships he might have sailed on. I don’t give him the pleasure.

Slightly deflated, the man warbles something undecipherable about now doing consultancy work using his maritime expertise. Unemployed then, says the inner voice with the big shoulder chip. Juts as well this no-longer-able seaman is unaware we mock ageing ex-service personnel, who insist on adding a long finished rank to their names when registering for property, with something like: Group Captain – insert double-barrelled name – RAF (Retarded). The simple pleasures get you through a day of pompous time-wasters.

‘God he was a bore.’ I tell my wife, straining to make myself heard over a cheesy compilation of eighties hits, at least three of which I’m embarrassed to realise I own – on vinyl though, so they are lurking in the loft. We won’t be moving in a while what with punitive stamp duty and nobody wanting to sell a home to a fellow agent without a backhander. My sons can dump the warped records and toys my wife refused to throw away, when I’m no longer capable of climbing a ladder - or sitting on the mantelpiece in an urn.

‘You dislike everybody.’ Hisses my wife, smiling at another person whose name I can’t recall.

‘You haven’t been to all their homes and pretended to like their children…or pets..’

‘Don’t be stupid.’

‘..or wives.’

That one made her think.

‘You ok mate?’ Asks the host as he wobbles to where I’m sitting morosely. He’s one of the few people who can address me as mate without my hackles rising. He’s pissed, and I want to be. I nod towards the projector screen where a half-lifetime of photographic memories are scrolling through on a loop. It was amusing at first but I’ve seen myself ageing, dropping hair and adding weight for about an hour now, as I dip in and out of my friend’s life through the course of several decades, several children and several – of his – marriages.

‘Yeh.’ He says reading my mind. ‘I thought it would be a good laugh when I scanned and loaded them all.’ He pauses, as what I think is his mother, appears in a faded shot. ‘But a lot of them are dead now.’

We talk for a while, remembering old times before the conversation verges uncomfortably towards maudlin.

‘You know what all the old gits say when I go to value their homes?’ Asks my friend semi-rhetorically.

‘Don’t get old?’ I respond, to a nod of recognition.

‘Yeh, every time.’ He replies, grinning.

‘Alternative isn’t too peachy.’ I say, as a shot of me in a double-breasted suit, with a hint of a mullet hair cut, scrolls by.

‘You okay?’ Questions my wife, as the car buzzes along the motorway and I slump in the passenger seat, several pints too many sloshing uncomfortably in my belly.

Alive and still kicking.

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