I was in Tesco today and wanted to use the toilet. The
notice on the door to the gents informed me that it was currently being cleaned
by a female operative and would I please use the disabled loo. Problem: the disabled
loo was locked, presumably occupied. I prepared to wait.
But then the female operative came out of the gents and I
asked her whether she'd finished. ‘Not yet,’ she replied. ‘What d’you want, just a
quick wee?’
This is typical of the bluntness for which the northern English are rightly renowned, and so I smiled
as I politely remonstrated with her for asking a question which might be
considered indiscreet (it took a little longer to realise that it also sounded like an offer to supply something which lies outside the usual remit of a respectable supermarket.) And then I said 'yes.' She smiled back and I proceeded on my merry way to welcome
relief.
And then I wondered whether, in different circumstances, I would have had the courage to say ‘no.’
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