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The early riser
Aug. 24th, 2005 07:18 amOne of the advantages of scouring the news in the early morning as part of your job is that you see snippets that might be of value. The news that McGrath might miss the fourth test after sustaining an injury was enough to make me check out the price on England. It doesn't look to me as if this has filtered through to the 4.1 available, so I had a small interest, with the intention, of course, of trading it back before the game starts. Be interesting to see how important McGrath is rated, given his ineffectiveness in the previous test.
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This morning London seemed to set a record for degeneracy. It used to be that my walk from Charing Cross to work at 6.40 was a peacful journey. No Longer. Today we had two screaming drunks on the platform as I arrived, plus another comatose drunk being loaded onto the train by his friends. Then there were three or four nutter drunks outside the 24-hour Chinese restaurant on Wardour Street ("established 1997", it says, proudly, in neon), and then the final coup de gras, a scamster just north of Oxford Street. Conversation went like this.
"Excuse me"
"Excuse me".
I turn to listen to the 25-year-old or so Asian guy.
"It's okay, I'm not going to ask for anything" (At this point I know that this is a scam. The rest is just entertainment).
"I've got money" (waves five pound note). "But, the thing is. I was getting really worried. You're the sixth guy I've asked and most of them have ignored me, and ...."
"Look, what you are doing is trying to quickly establish a relationship. You have one second. Why are you talking to me?"
"Well, I've locked myself out of my car, and ..."
"No problem. That happened to me. We'll go to the police station and they have keys to help you out".
"I've already tried that."
"So how am I meant to help you when the police won't?"
Scamster gives up, walks across street in search of another mark.
"It's a scam, mate, Ignore him."
Just one final strike from Pete, there.
Fortunately I made the last 200 yards to work without seeing one drunk, con artist, drug addict or psychopath. Quite an achievement, really.
+++++
This morning London seemed to set a record for degeneracy. It used to be that my walk from Charing Cross to work at 6.40 was a peacful journey. No Longer. Today we had two screaming drunks on the platform as I arrived, plus another comatose drunk being loaded onto the train by his friends. Then there were three or four nutter drunks outside the 24-hour Chinese restaurant on Wardour Street ("established 1997", it says, proudly, in neon), and then the final coup de gras, a scamster just north of Oxford Street. Conversation went like this.
"Excuse me"
"Excuse me".
I turn to listen to the 25-year-old or so Asian guy.
"It's okay, I'm not going to ask for anything" (At this point I know that this is a scam. The rest is just entertainment).
"I've got money" (waves five pound note). "But, the thing is. I was getting really worried. You're the sixth guy I've asked and most of them have ignored me, and ...."
"Look, what you are doing is trying to quickly establish a relationship. You have one second. Why are you talking to me?"
"Well, I've locked myself out of my car, and ..."
"No problem. That happened to me. We'll go to the police station and they have keys to help you out".
"I've already tried that."
"So how am I meant to help you when the police won't?"
Scamster gives up, walks across street in search of another mark.
"It's a scam, mate, Ignore him."
Just one final strike from Pete, there.
Fortunately I made the last 200 yards to work without seeing one drunk, con artist, drug addict or psychopath. Quite an achievement, really.
