Nottingham Part 2: Even GP Taylor can't stop famine

After having become accustomed to having clothes washed so soft they felt like angel wings and silk and stuff, I now had to prepare to face a lots of old people in a charity shop surrounded by lots of old books and other-such junk based items. However, the Oxfam shop on Bridgeford Road Nottingham was nothing like what I expected.

"A keen eye for a priceless bargain, Torquer?" Well no, in fact. I was to be volunteering at this shop for the best part of two days, simply to add an extra row to the 'volunteer work' table of my CV. Ah, it was nothing, no need for any heartfelt applause readers.


I was to be assisting my perfectly able-bodied and communicative grandmother in this extortionate second-hand book and trinket shop. So, as I stepped through this ordinary looking shop frontage, it became clear that this was no traditional charity shop, full of other people's crap for 25p a time. Instead, there was a float to initialize, till to power up, lights to turn on (really!?) and an excruciatingly complicated banking system of record books, money bags, multi-columned paper and number writing.

For some reason, due to my obviously thieving nature, I was not allowed anywhere near the till, unless to wipe it with a dishcloth as grimy as Robin's hair after playing tennis with him. My generous pleas of "Let me help you with that dear Grandmother" where overruled by shouts of "Get in the back and sort them expired road atlases into equal piles!"

After being forced to purchase an over-date Fair-trade smoothie for one pound bleedin' thirty-nine, I was given the task of filling a box with books that had been out on display for more than 6 weeks. I duly took all the books marked 'Wk 4' (for it was now week 10 of their pointlessly complicated stock control system) and placed them gently into the dusty fruit box I had been thrown by an old man with a yellow shirt who smelled of cement and urinal cakes.


My Grandma then charged into the back of the shop when I told her that I had finished, scooped up the box, opened the fire exit door to the alley behind the shop and lobbed the crate into the dumpster.

Horrified, I stood and gawped as some books that I was going to buy at the end of the day where now mixed in with the remains of Monday night's kitchen waste from the trendy wine bar next door! Sigh, I could have fished them out nice and clean: if only it was still a Natwest.


The second day started even earlier than the first and we were the only people in the shop again. Thus I began the pointless task of selecting which books to dumpsterate, and which to keep, making sure that my personal pile was safely stowed away from slippery-fingered volunteers, behind I large mound of unsold GP Taylor novels.

After a frankly boring and fruitless day on the my mother's Penguin classics book collection expansion front, I followed my Grandmother home on the bus to the rare occasion when my Grandfather prepare the dinner. Sainsbury's really do make half-decent ready meals.

I have since established that Oxfam (and like probably many other 'charity shops' nowadays) is certainly not one of those small charity shops with a low turnover, shelves of battered old books and deserving local cause. It is instead a national organisation that just so happens to accept donations of strictly 'saleable' items, just so happens to be run mostly by volunteers (they were recruiting two paid full time staff for other branches in Nottingham) and just so happens to give some of its profits to famine stricken countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The rest it spends of wages, shop fittings and various sheets of coloured paper to remind people to turn things of when they leave and notices explaining that it is against conduct to attempt improvisation.

Furthermore, they insist on sticking f***ing sticky labels on everything! Any book that has a paper cover in any Oxfam shop across the country has now been completely ruined. I tried to remove some from my purchases and even a generous lashing of WD-40 failed to budge it or the slimy residue they leave behind. Strewth!! Dammit!!

Nottingham Part 1: The Home of Gang Warefare and Lace Museums

Well, here it is, the first part in a trilogy of four. I arrived in school on Friday 6th July to gasps and cries of disbelief. No, I didn't have exams or lessons to go to, for they had finally terminated long ago. Instead, all students in the year had to return their text books to school.

As I arrived, an exasperated teacher asked why I was wearing 'casual' clothes.

"Because," I told her (him? I'm not altogether sure actually), "I am getting a train in half an hour, and don't, forgive me, particularly wish to travel on a three hour journey across the country wearing my school uniform."

"But you're an ambassador to the school," she stressed earnestly.

"But I don't really care, miss," I replied, pushing past into the canteen where they had decided to stage this horrific event. Perhaps I should have addressed it as 'Sir'.

After meeting all of my teachers and exchanging books for signatures, I had to take the form (on blue paper for no apparent reason) to the school office to have it signed again and any outstanding bills paid.

The cheeky bitch then asked me to give back my locker keys.

"What?!" I retorted, "Its my own bloody padlock!"

"Yes, but you have to return it because its the school's locker."

After about five minutes arguing over who owns the padlock and key that I purchased from Lidl, one of the more respectful and understanding teachers came along and resolved the issue in my favour. Aside from myself, he is probably the only person in the building with an ounce of common sense about his person.


So, after all this pissing about with books (and Jingo's books as well! The lazy bastard buggered off to China and left me with his list of books to return! Shit that reminds me, he has got an outstanding payment for his Chemistry book he never returned. They won't give him his GCSE results without it. Should I tell him readers? I don't imagine he ever reads the entire post anyway. I never read his all the way through - how boring) I left the school. Bet them brackets confused you for a moment there. Chortle. Aren't I sneaky.

Furthermore, I had a train to catch. What I said earlier about getting it in half an hour was several kilos of army surplus grade bollocks: I had three hours to kill. This journey was surprisingly good compared with what I normally am unfortunate enough to experience.

I arrived in Nottingham to a hearty greeting from my still-brown-haired 67 year-old grandfather and his snazzy new Mazda 3. I'm not sure how the car gave me a hearty greeting though. He dodged in and out of lines of green taxis to get out of the station complex and progressed on wards to my grandparent's home. We also had to dodge in and out of lines of gun fire exchanged between the local gangs, but I'll save that story for another post.

Nottinghamshire County Police Force on patrol

After an excruciatingly slow and painful 10 minute journey back to their house, I stepped over the threshold with my bag into a spinning world of fabric softener, organic vegetables and tasteless upholstery. I've never been more glad to get away from home.

I'm back but not with a bang, just yet. Unfortunately, the Gods of transport have not been kind to me yet again. After a grueling 7 hour train journey I have been too exhausted write anything for the past few days.

What I will write will be an epic however, so I plan to split my trip to Nottingham into 4 different posts over the next couple of weeks. To cap it off - one whole post on the Central Trains disaster. For the time being, you can read some of the previous 'transport' posts on my old blog to wet your already savoring appetite *cough*.


>> Return of the Train Cowboy

>> Chassen Park

Just a quick post to let readers know that I will be away from the comfort of my laptop for the next week and a half. Therefore, I have posted the next post early so try and make the excitement and humour last for the next couple of weeks...

American Pie 2

As I marched tenaciously into Baronjon menswear outlet with my obedient and credit-card bearing mother at heel, a well trained store assistant greeted me on the door mat. Being used to this sort of attention and respect, I merely offered him a nod before progressing to the elevator toward the rear of the store.

Actually, all of this is total bull shit. I was in desperate need of a suit for the end of year prom. This was the last shop in town and my mother was irate, threatening to make me pay for it unless I found something I liked soon. The chinese equivalent of our former ICT teacher frowned at me as I tread mud and rainwater all over his newly installed door mat and looked me up and down in disgust.

I had first groaned at the thought of dressing up in suits and tuxedos (not at the same time of course) just to spend three hours 'mingling' silently with my friends (and enemies), to whom I am already adequately acquainted. The letter from school stated:

"Your son/daughter has expressed an interest in attending the Year 11 Leaver Prom. [various padding] Students will be transported via luxury coach to the presently undecided venue."

Translated as:

"The ugly, dishonest and assertive little shit you call your son/daughter wants you to give us £36 for a ticket, plus £50 for a suit and £5 for drinks on the night. Your child will be bundled into the back of the cheapest, slowest and smelliest twenty year-old double decker bus we can boost. As for the venue, we have no idea where it will be, possibly the school canteen."

After handing over £49 for the first suit I tried on, and swaggering out of the door with a very expensive bag to say the least, my mother and I paid another visit to the 'Tardis Cafe'. Fortunately, I had emptied my bladder twice in the fifteen minutes before leaving home that morning.

The evening itself started adequately. We were all searched - or rather, felt up by some perverted security guard. Security guard? Oh yes. The school decided to pay another company to organise the entire thing, probably costing everyone an extra £5 just to pay for the buffet and champagne at the shareholders AGM.

My prom date this was not. This was not me. Thank God for Google Images Search.

The original letter from school stated that we would enter the venue on a red carpet. Ha! This was the most pathetic, threadbare, maroon 3 metres of Carpet Right off cut that I have ever seen.

Professional photographers were supposed to be at the event to take individual and group photos. What I saw was some fat woman in blue jeans taking group snaps with some crappy little HP compact camera. Apologies, but after having recently purchased an Canon D-SLR (oh yeah!), I am afraid I am above novice photography. The fat woman actually had a key ring machine that put the photos into some low-grade, clear plastic key ring. I refrained from wasting my money on this, although my friends decided that £2 was good value from some badly framed, awfully lit and microscopic 3cm x 2cm image embedded in scratched plastic. Phew!

The evening was rounded off with a slideshow of photos of everyone from Year 7 and the current Year 11 side by side to see the comparisons. Chortle! You should have seen Jingo five years ago. I've hardly changed a bit though. Others were almost unrecognisable, but some people had an empty box with 'Insert Clipart Here' written in it!

So we all squelched off through the mud at midnight and went home as sober virgins. Hardly American Pie.

Stomach Complaints

Next time I will gorge my face thoroughly before setting off. After visiting Jingo in his squalid house the other day, I left with distinct stomach complaints, still reeling from only eating a third of a micro-waved pizza in the space of 8 hours. When the terms 'Jingo', 'his house' and 'food' are all mixed together, expect one disgusting dish to result.

I arrived after a long but enjoyable walk from mine to his (only about 30 minutes at super-quick Torquerama pace: 45 minutes for everyone else). Approaching the front of his house, I noticed that there were a large number of wasps entering and leaving the eaves just below the roof. I nervously rapped on the door, hoping they wouldn't notice me. Jingo scrambled down the stairs: he looked rather handsome through the warped effect glass of his front door. It opened with a creak and a big ugly face beamed out at me.

"Torquer? What time do you call this?" Jingo groaned.
"I call it eleven o'clock, the time you invited me to come over."
"Ohhhh. There's Nick now," he pointed behind me.
"Hi guys! Sorry I'm late," Jingo's Chemistry GCSE rival chirped, "I slept in a bit."
"Slept in?" Jingo questioned, ever the nocturnal being.
"My alarm clock must be broken. I only woke up at eight o'clock."
"Strewth," I said, "Try not to steal all the day light hours."

And so we ventured inside, into the murky innards of a fairly normal looking detached house (rich bastard), filled with interesting artifacts from Jingo's travels. Or perhaps just eBay. Yep, just eBay it turns out.

We went straight up stairs the Jingo's bedroom. We just played Command & Conquer OK. Turns out my skills lie only with driving and shooting games on the PS2 (someone buy me a PS3 please). Nick and Jingo completed the missions in no time: I routinely failed.

"So what's for lunch?" I asked the hostess, staring fearfully at Jingo's unmade bed, for I swear I saw some kind of insect scurry beneath the roughly strewn covers.
"Pizza and carrot cake," he replied, with an air of pride - like he had made it himself.

But it turns out Jingo's skills lie only with Command & Conquer. When it comes to cooking, he actually has minus 4 Michelin stars. We were supposed to be eating pizza:

"Right, then. What do we do with this then?" said Jingo inquisitively, holding the pizza upside down.
"We need to preheat the oven and rack to 200 degrees, and then cook for 13 minutes," I replied, after righting the box.

While Nick amused himself playing with fridge magnets, I wrenched open the oven tenaciously... and nearly fainted. On the inside edges of this ordinary looking Hotpoint oven was a layer of grease so thick it looked like our good friend Robin had washed his hair in it.

"What the bloody hell is going on in here? Where on this oven does it say you can use it as a sideways chip pan?" I screamed, making one of the magnets fall off the fridge.
"Err, we don't use it that much really," Jingo sulked.
"Strewth on a stick. How are we supposed to cook this?" I said waving the frozen pizza about.

It turns out that Jingo's crappy Sanyo microwave does not have a convection oven setting (unlike my Sharp). I was going to suggest cleaning the oven, but I thought they might not have any cleaning fluid in the house, given the state of the bathroom. Nick was also starting to pine hungrily, so I gave in to his persistence and microwaved the pizza.


After all the tribulations we ended watching Dara O'Brien doing live standup on DVD while slowly chewing our soggy pizzas. My slice didn't even have any chicken on it.