Diary of a Grumpy Old Git

by Tim Collins

TUESDAY 9TH APRIL

  Three strange emails were waiting for me when I got in this morning. All a little worrying, but I’m sure I can get through it with my positive attitude. The first was from Sarah, warning me that if I come anywhere near the house or try to contact Brad again, it would be a police matter. I replied that I was very sorry about my behaviour, but I’d eaten an out-of-date ready-meal and it had made me violently ill.

  The second message was from Trevor, inviting me to another meeting on Monday morning. Now he’s got that email to blackmail me with he can make me do what he likes. I’ll probably have to go through with the Kit Kat thing this time.

  The third email was from Jen. She wants to meet me alone at half eight tomorrow morning. I’m guessing this has something to do with that weird memory I have of snogging her on Saturday night. I expect she’s going to sue me for sexual harassment.

  All this seems utterly horrendous, but I’m sure it’s fine. Everything’s absolutely brilliant.

  They were having a seventies night in one of the pubs on the high street tonight. I know this because I saw loads of people wearing Afro wigs and bright floral shirts. Unlike any of them, I was alive during the seventies and I seem to remember most people wearing dull nylon shirts and corduroy trousers rather than white satin suits and gold medallions.

  If they really want a seventies night, I’ll give them one. I’ll go in there and induce an authentic seventies power cut. Then when the lights come back on, the lava lamps will be replaced with overflowing bins, the only items on the menu will be mince, spaghetti hoops and Angel Delight, the entire place will be fogged with cigarette smoke and anyone who isn’t white, male and heterosexual will have to put up with jokes at their expense all night.

  But I’m not going to, because I’m still in positive mode. Must stay positive to avoid mental collapse. Seventies nights are just a harmless bit of fun. I hope they all have a great night dancing to ABBA.

  WEDNESDAY 10TH APRIL

  Jen was waiting in the meeting room when I got in. She was standing in front of a flipchart and clutching a green marker.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘What exactly is this about?’

  ‘It’s about what happened on Saturday,’ she said.

  I sank into the nearest chair. Time for the sexual harassment lawsuit, no doubt.

  ‘Yeah, about that,’ I said. ‘If you could give me a quick recap of exactly what…’

  Jen blushed. ‘As you’ll be aware, there are a number of options open to us at this point, and I thought we could brainstorm around them.’

  She scribbled the words ‘Enemies’, ‘Friends’ and ‘More’ on the flipchart and drew circles around them.

  ‘The first option, which I’m keen to avoid, would be animosity. The second would be to return to the previous S.O.P. and pretend nothing happened. The third option, which I’m keen to explore, would be to consider other… things.’

  We were silent for a couple of minutes.

  ‘So,’ she said. ‘Throwing it over to you…’

  ‘I’m slightly confused,’ I said. ‘Are you asking me out? With a flipchart?’

  Jen bit her bottom lip and nodded.

  ‘Thanks and everything,’ I said. ‘But the very fact that you’ve made the effort to do it this way proves we’re too different. You’re efficient and you work hard and you like everyone whereas I’m a complete fuck-up. But we can still be option two, can’t we?’

  It’s now one in the morning and I’m really stalling in my efforts to be positive. I feel worse about today than anything I did on Saturday. So what if I made an idiot of myself over a younger girl? Every middle-aged man is allowed to do that once. So what if I threw up on Sarah? I wish I’d done it at the altar. So what if I insulted Trevor? It’s not like he didn’t deserve it. But I think I really upset Jen today. And she’s not a bad person. She’s an annoying person, of course. But I’m starting to think she might be rather a nice annoying person.

  THURSDAY 11TH APRIL

  Jen’s typing and muttering got louder and louder all day until eventually she hit her keyboard with both hands, shouted ‘Fucking thing!’ and ran out of the office. Jez and Jo both folded their arms and looked at me. They seemed to be expecting me to do something about it.

  I found Jen standing in the pile of cigarette stubs outside the main entrance. ‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘I just need a minute.’

  ‘I’m sorry about yesterday,’ I said. ‘It just freaked me out a bit. With the Venn diagram and everything.’

  ‘It wasn’t a Venn diagram,’ she said. ‘The circles didn’t overlap.’

  I tried to work out what was different about her voice and I realized she’d stopped talking in questions.

  ‘And I’m not efficient,’ she said. ‘I’m just as much of a fuck-up as you.’

  ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Don’t do yourself down.’

  ‘It’s true. My flat’s even messier than your desk.’

  ‘You’re just saying that to impress me.’

  ‘Come round if you don’t believe me.’

  ‘All right,’ I said. ‘Are you free on Saturday?’

  FRIDAY 12TH APRIL

  Josh called me into his office this afternoon.

  ‘I need a word about the TC Waste Solutions account,’ said Josh. ‘You’d better close the door.’

  I might have known Trevor would grass me up.

  ‘Sorry about that,’ I said. ‘Someone hacked into my email account. I suspect this guy called Brad.’

  ‘Of what?’ asked Josh.

  ‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘So what did you want to talk about?’

  ‘We’ve been offered the DDS Waste Solutions account,’ said Josh. ‘They’re the biggest suppliers of industrial bins in the south-east, so it’s a great win for us. The trade press are coming round later on to photograph me on the fire escape. The only problem is, they won’t give us the business unless we resign the TC Waste Solutions account. Now, I know you’ve really taken ownership of it…’

  ‘I’m happy to sacrifice it,’ I said. ‘For the sake of our business.’

  ‘Good man,’ said Josh. ‘I’ll call Trevor.’

  I pretended to consider this. ‘I’ve got a meeting with him first thing Monday. I could give him the news face to face, if you like. To soften the blow.’

  ‘Excellent call,’ said Josh. He held his hand up and this time I high-fived without any hesitation.

  SATURDAY 13TH APRIL

  I’m a bit nervous about going round to Jen’s flat tonight. I’m not sure I want to try anything with her in case she gets her flipchart out afterwards and gives me a formal appraisal.

  Having said that, I’m nowhere near as terrified as I usually am before a date. I’m just trying to get round to laying the decking and watching my Sopranos box set like usual. It makes a change from my usual self-fulfilling prophecies of disaster and humiliation.

  SUNDAY 14TH APRIL

  Jen’s flat was exactly the kind of tip she’d promised. She lives on the top floor of a house conversion, with Paul Klee prints Blu-Tacked over damp patches and fairy lights twirled around metal shelves. Everywhere I went I seemed to knock over a pile of handbag-sized magazines with cumbersome free gifts or novels with champagne flutes on the cover. I made her promise she hadn’t deliberately messed it up for me, and cleared myself a space to sit down.

  When I first met Jen, I’d imagined that she lived in a penthouse apartment with a river view, a chrome kitchen island, and a focus group employed to give 24-hour feedback. But now this mess seemed to make sense.

  Even I wasn’t prepared for the lasagne, though.

  ‘This is brilliant,’ I said.

  Jen looked puzzled. ‘Really? People don’t often compliment me on my cooking.’

  ‘I wasn’t complimenting you on your cooking,’ I said. ‘It’s horrible. But the fact it’s horrible proves that you weren’t lying about being as shambolic as me. No one truly efficient or professional could ever have made this. That’s what’s brillia
nt.’

  MONDAY 15TH APRIL

  When I got to Trevor’s office this morning, he was sitting behind his desk and grasping a yellow tennis ball.

  ‘I take it you were under the influence when you wrote that email?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Well, I will hold it against you,’ he said. ‘But I won’t tell Josh. Not if you play ball.’

  He threw the ball at me. It bounced off my forehead and back on to his desk, and I rubbed the spot it had hit.

  ‘Fifty points,’ he shouted.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Don’t tell me you don’t remember “Trevor Chalkley Dodgeball”,’ he said. ‘You invented it. Everyone had to throw a tennis ball at me and I had to try and dodge it. You got ten points for hitting my arms or legs, twenty for hitting my body and fifty for hitting my head.’

  I picked up the ball.

  ‘I do remember it,’ I said. ‘But I thought the rules were different. I thought you got a hundred points for this.’

  I threw the ball at his face. He ducked out of the way, but his chair overbalanced and he crashed to the floor.

  When he got up again, his face was red. ‘That’s it! The account’s walking! I’m going to call Josh right now and tell him it’s all your fault.’

  ‘Yeah, about that,’ I said. ‘I regret to inform you that we’ve been awarded the DDS Waste Solutions account so we’re going to have to resign this one. But I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for working with us and wish you all the best for the future.’

  ‘DDS?’ asked Trevor. ‘You can’t work for those crooks. They won’t pay you, you know. They’ll leave your invoices lying around for years.’

  ‘I’m afraid the decision has already been taken,’ I said.

  ‘What are they paying you?’ Trevor asked. ‘I’ll match it.’

  ‘You couldn’t afford it,’ I said. ‘DDS are the biggest industrial bin suppliers in the south-east. Bar none.’

  I walked out of the office, and Trevor came scurrying after me.

  ‘Get back here,’ he shouted.

  I kept walking. Some of Trevor’s staff poked their heads out of their offices.

  ‘This meeting isn’t over until I say it is!’ shouted Trevor.

  I felt something whip me on the back of my arm.

  ‘Ten points!’

  I turned round to see that Trevor was lobbing whiteboard markers at me from a box. A crowd had gathered behind him, and some of them were filming it with their phones.

  ‘Twenty points!’ he shouted. ‘Fifty points! A million points! I win! Because I’m a winner and you’re a loser!’

  ‘Course you are,’ I said. ‘Course you are, Chalky Balls.’

  TUESDAY 16TH APRIL

  Josh briefed me on the DDS Waste Solutions account today. There’s a lot to do in a short time, but I’m determined to get through it. I’m going to write a bin brochure so brilliant that all Trevor’s clients will switch their business right away and he’ll go bust. That’s got to be worth working through lunch for.

  I went out for a drink with Jen again after work. We’re trying to keep it secret from everyone in the office, but it’s not exactly difficult for them to guess. Jo complained about Jen’s muttering this afternoon, and I said it was hardly surprising if she was stressed, as she was doing more work than the rest of us put together. Jo and Jez looked at each other, did a childish ‘woo’ noise and burst out laughing.

  I’m sure those youngsters find middle age hilarious and disgusting, but they’ll know all about it soon. It won’t be long before they find themselves grunting when they pick things up, going to the chemist’s just to browse and discovering strange new facial hairs whenever they look in the mirror. And then some smug little bastards will park themselves on the desk next to them and snigger whenever they mention ridiculously antiquated stuff like Facebook or Starbucks.

  Go ahead and laugh, kids. You’ll be here soon.

  WEDNESDAY 17TH APRIL

  I was all set to work through lunch when Jen suggested we go to the Italian restaurant around the corner. I thought about my plan to work hard enough to put Trevor out of business and then I thought about pizza. There was no contest really. I’ll take food over revenge any day.

  When we got to the restaurant, Jen ordered the chicken pesto salad, but requested so many changes to it that she might as well have barged into the kitchen and made it herself. I’m always wary about suggesting changes to chefs. Catch them on a bad day and you’ll find that a side order of phlegm is the only modification you get. They didn’t seem to mind Jen, though. She actually smiles and looks at waiters when she speaks to them, which seems to result in much better service. It’s not something I’ve ever really tried.

  I should have got her to ask them to turn off the background music, which was annoying me. It wasn’t that it was good or bad, it was just inconsistent. In the old days, an Italian restaurant would play a CD of Pavarotti or Dean Martin all the way through. These days all restaurant staff just hook their iPods up to the speakers and put them on shuffle. So today we had pop, opera and rock all jumbled up. It was only the Fellini posters and breadsticks that reminded me what sort of restaurant it was.

  I managed to ignore it and told Jen about my workload on the DDS account. She said she’d take on some of the work if I wanted. It’s weird. I used to think she worked hard just to crawl to Josh. Now I know her better, I’m convinced she actually enjoys it, in the way that a normal person might enjoy eating pies or watching TV.

  Should I ask Josh if she can take over some of my work? I want to, but I don’t think it’s acceptable to ask your boss for less work these days. It’s like drinking pints at lunchtime. You just don’t do it any more.

  When the bill came, I noticed they’d done that annoying thing of adding a service charge to the total and also leaving a space for a ‘gratuity’. Are ‘service charge’ and ‘gratuity’ different things now? Would you like a tip as well? How about I just hand over my wallet and you grab money out of it until it’s all right for me to stop feeling awkward?

  I suggested to Jen that we cross the service charge off the bill and put nothing in the gratuity section, but she said the waiters were such ‘sweeties’ that she didn’t mind paying both. Probably another reason her food doesn’t get gobbed in.

  When I got back in the office, Josh asked if I could keep my desk tidier. He said it will make things easier when we all start hotdesking. I was hoping he’d forgotten about that and moved on to some other voguish nonsense like constructing a breakout beanbag brainstorming area in the corner of the office. I can’t have my screen facing away from the wall. That would be unbearable.

  THURSDAY 18TH APRIL

  I bumped into my old boss Steve after work tonight. It turns out the old fart is off snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef. I hope they don’t mistake him for an ancient undiscovered species of turtle and stick him in an aquarium.

  I thanked him for telling Josh I was a good worker and he almost collapsed with laughter.

  ‘A good worker?’ he said. ‘Is that what he told you?’

  ‘I thought it was a bit strange,’ I said. ‘What with me being a lazy sod and everything. So why did you suggest that he keep me rather than Imran or Cathy?’

  ‘I didn’t,’ said Steve. ‘But it doesn’t really matter what I or anyone else suggests, the company can’t afford to get rid of you. You’ve been there for over fifteen years. Have you any idea how much redundancy pay they’d owe you? I tried to manage you out by reducing your workload so much you’d feel unfulfilled and go, but it never worked. You’ll be there until the place closes, I’m sure.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I think.’

  FRIDAY 19TH APRIL

  Josh came over this morning to ask how I was getting on with the DDS brochure.

  ‘Not great,’ I said. ‘I think I need an extra week.’

  ‘An extra week?’ asked Josh. ‘To do 2,000 words?’

 
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘In fact, make it a fortnight. And I’ve been thinking about the hotdesking thing, too. I don’t want to do it. I’m happy where I am.’

  Josh tutted, shook his head and went back to his office. I saved and closed my Word document. After all, that Scrabble was hardly going to play itself, was it?

  We went out to the Italian restaurant for lunch again. This time Jen changed her order about twenty minutes after giving it, but still the waiters didn’t seem to mind.

  ‘Can I ask you a question?’

  My neck tensed up. She wasn’t one of those women that talks about marriage after just a week, was she?

  ‘Go on,’ I said.

  ‘How soon did you know you were interested in me?’

  ‘About five seconds after I saw you.’

  Jen blushed and looked down at her cutlery. I didn’t feel guilty because technically I wasn’t lying. I did fancy her five seconds after I saw her. It was only when she started speaking that I became less interested, and that would be incredibly hard to explain during a romantic meal.

  ‘So you can guess my next question,’ said Jen. ‘What took you so long to make a move after I sent you the Valentine’s card?’

  SATURDAY 20TH APRIL

  I went into town with Jen this afternoon. She dragged me around a million clothes shops, and then into a place that sold nothing but soap. They had honey soap, fig soap and even something called ‘sea vegetable’. The pong of it all was worse than any body odour could ever be, and I had to go and wait outside while Jen browsed.

  For some reason, it didn’t make me grumpy. All day I encountered things that should have made me grind my teeth down to tiny white stumps, like buskers, tourists and charity muggers, but I didn’t mind at all. What’s going wrong with me? Maybe I’ve finally taken one of those ‘chill pills’ that Jez is always going on about. Maybe he slipped one into my tea.