A bit of a pearoast to get me to look at something other than my phone.
One day a couple of years ago Stalker Boy and I were on the train to Birmingham, which was about half an hour away on the train. I went out onto the platform while Mr Transport (he's a travel geek but too much of a snob to take a Leisure & Tourism course as he thinks it's for illiterate chavs) got our tickets. Out on the platform nearby to me is a man on his own, who comes over and announces in a comedy Brummie accent "Cold today, isn't it? I would have worn a jacket but it wouldn't go with my trousers..." "I see."

After a while the comparatively normal Stalker Boy appears. Mr Brummie shows slightly more interest in us, and suddenly announces "I know what you're looking at, mate!" "..." "We're WEARING THE SAME SHOES!" Fortunately at this moment the train arrives. We get on, followed by Mr Brummie and wander to a table, where a random student is sitting on his own. Mr Brummie also sits down opposite us and proceeds to kick Stalker Boy's feet under the table and tell the student over and over that they're wearing the same shoes. It is at this moment I notice the smell of vodka.

At one point he gets up to go to the toilet, and the student asks "Do you know that guy?" "Er, no, he sort of latched on to us at Nuneaton and wouldn't go away."

On his return Mr Brummie tells us the heart-wrenching story of how he lost his job because 'I wanted to take the company in one direction, they wanted to take it in another and they kicked me out...', and how as a result his wife left him and he was going to get revenge on his former employers 'it'd be worth going to prison for', presumably involving flaming death and explosions.

And then the train stops about halfway to New Street, for no apparent reason. Which adds another ten minutes to my stalker hell from all angles. (The student went to sleep on his enormous rucksack.)

After that, I have to say, even a day with Stalker Boy was a picnic, even if the point of the trip had been to get me some "classy" and "elegant" clothes, in other words to drag me into M&S and make me dress like a 40-year-old. Freak.
( Maladicta, Thu 29 May 2008, 16:46, Reply)