Firstly, I overheard a conversation between two middle-aged women who were swearing like sailors, in Costa. Maybe I've been brought up in an environment where middle-aged women arrange flowers and make quiche, or maybe the world has just changed, but it isn't right that.
I was there to mark some essays, but it was so noisy I ended up just doing a bit of general observation. And by that I think I mean eavesdropping. While the coffee machine foamed and the heavy chairs scraped across the faux-wood floor, couples chatted about the merits of Facebook and Twitter, newspapers rustled, and kids, bolted into their pushchairs like little POWs, stared wide-eyed at the world of false lighting and arty pictures, while their mums supped from steamy lattes and mocha-frappa-skinny-choca-ccinos*.
I think maybe hanging from the eaves of a house, cupping one's ear to the wall in some desperate intent to 'listen in' for the latest bit of juicy gossip, is different to overhearing isn't it? I do hope so. I mean it's quite different when a conversation just encroaches into your life. Take last night for example: I sat on the 17 bus and two gay guys sat in the seats behind me. I wasn't listening out for a broadcast of a day in the life of a homosexual man and his dramatic rollercoaster with curtains, ex-partners, dodgy-nights-out-in-Southampton and The Malthouse*. But that, folks, is what I got. It is quite emotionally complex being a homosexual by the sounds of it.
The second odd event was hearing Yinka teaching in French. Yinka's taken me by surprise a few times recently. The other morning I flicked the radio on to BBC Radio Berkshire and there he was talking about TLG* - I had a chuckle at that and then forgot which lane I was supposed to be in to get onto the M4. Today, I was at his house as he was teaching the young adults from France. Fascinating. I learned some things:
(1) La croissance = growth
(2) Je suis un fils, je ne suis pas une fille (I got those mixed up and told them all I was a girl)
(3) French people don't eat frogs' legs.
The other peculiar thing that happened to me was that I managed to spend exactly £66.66 at Tesco.
"Ooh, that's a bad sign," said the checkout lady. Had I been quick enough I would have glanced at my bulging bags of lovely shopping, and quietly said, "Yep. It's the Mark of the Feast."
In a way though, I'm quite glad I didn't.
Notes
*I made this up. Then, I'm not sure most of the names in some of these places aren't any less ridiculous.
*Although this sounds like the title of a homophobic podcast, I'm not kidding about the content...
*TLG is The Lighthouse Group school, which our church recently set up to help educate students who've faced a crisis point in conventional education.
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