I might have been grumpy last night.
Either I was grumpy, or I managed to collect some of the most brainless people who could possibly have been allowed out without a keeper.
When you are grumpy you notice this a bit more, so maybe it was a little bit of both.
I was so grumpy that I actually told one customer that I thought she was an ill-informed, badly behaved young woman, and asked her please to keep her poorly-thought-out opinions to herself.
To my surprise she paid for the taxi anyway.
She did ask me why I thought so, but I told her it would take too long to explain.
She had begun by asking if I knew anything about the criminal justice system. I made non-committal noises, which was all I had time for before she launched into a screechy sort of rant about her friend, who had just been arrested for doing nothing whatsoever, nothing, and taken away in a police van.
I am acquainted with Windermere’s police force.
My experience is that they will go to very great lengths to avoid having to arrest somebody, with all its attendant paperwork and subsequent time necessarily spent handing over to the custody officer. An arrest is an absolute last resort when it becomes absolutely painfully apparent that somebody can not possibly be persuaded to shut up and buzz off quietly.
I suggested that perhaps there might have been some sort of underlying motivation on the police’s behalf.
She assured me, loudly, and squeakily, that there was none. Her friend had been just sitting there quietly when she was victimised by the bouncers and cruelly dragged away.
She added that the police had told her that it was actually an offence to shriek rude words in a public place, and had threatened to lock her up as well if she did not shut up and buzz off quietly.
She did not believe this and wondered if Theresa May knew what abuses of the criminal justice system were being carried out in her name.
She explained that the problem was that the police and bouncers had got nothing whatsoever to do in such a small town, and had arrested her peaceful friend for the sake of something to do. She added that they looked as though they were enjoying it very much.
I said that I doubted this.
She was certain of it. She said that she thought it was quite possibly the first chance that they had ever had in their entire careers to arrest anybody, and that they had done it because her friend was from out of town.
I tried to explain that I thought this was unlikely, but was drowned out by the rising tide of indignation.
She said some very rude things about the police and bouncers, and said that I would not understand about real crime, because I was from such a quiet place. Where she came from, it was quite different. Real crime, she told me darkly, happens in Manchester.
When I turned the light on for her to pay the fare, I noticed that her nose was still crusted with white powder.
I offered my own opinions at this point, and she left in a screeching huff.
It was quiet after she had departed.
My next customer turned out not to be a huge improvement.
She, at least, was quiet.
She got in and immediately commented on my state of being well-wrapped up against the cold, and recommended an excellent brand of thermal underwear that she always wore. She said that I would do well to look for it online and purchase some immediately.
I was interested in this.
She told me that she worked in a shop where the door was open all day, and that it got very cold, hence the need for thermal underwear.
I said that I thought this was a good idea, and supposed that it kept her very warm.
She said that no, it didn’t, she was freezing all of the time, and by the end of the day she could hardly feel her fingers and toes.
She said the brand name of the underwear again as she got out, encouragingly, to make sure I did not forget it.
I was lost for words.
Later on there was the young man who had lost his car keys and wished to be taken to the place he thought he might have left them, which turned out, to my mystification, to be the lid of our own dustbin.
Then there was another young man who insisted that he would not get in taxis with me after I had, last week, been unable to find his house when he rang me to pick him up, and had shouted at him for not having a clear door number. I explained vainly that I do not have a phone number, and don’t accept bookings, and had never, ever been to his house to collect him, or, indeed, anyone else: but he was having none of it.
I am glad the phrase ‘the customer is always right’ is not considered relevant to the taxi industry.
‘The customer is quite often a bit mental’ might work better.
