The Little Shop of (Chester) Horrors

My goodness, but Chester is a rough place to be when they are turfing out the punters after a day at the races. Unfortunately, Friday was one such day, and thus Andy and I did find ourselves surrounded by men in dubious (i.e tasteless, tight and so much polyester you could hear them crackle) suits and women in wholly unsuitable frocks and hats, most of whom were completely rat-arsed at 4 p.m. The air was rank with the stench of after-shave strong enough to rip the lining from your lungs and our eyes were assaulted by the sight of women of all ages, shapes and sizes wearing ‘foof’ skirts. I had to explain the term ‘foof’ skirt to Andy, and for those of you feeling similarly confused, a foof skirt is one that is soooooooo short you can almost see the woman’s who is wearing it foof, a.k.a lady garden, a.k.a vagina. It’s not a good look. For any woman. And whilst I am all for any human being having the right to wear whatever they darn well like, I’d rather they didn’t do it near me. I am a polyester and foof skirt-free zone. 

We decided to escape into WHSmiths, which exuded a terrible smell of brandy. Their basement department consisted of many large plastic storage boxes filled to the brim with end of line books and other assorted tat, the department being named the ‘Bargain’ section. There was more floor space than space filled with plastic boxes, which rather lent a desolate atmosphere of deserted scrubland to the place, the sort of landscape you might find yourself being attacked by a poisonous lizard and ending up dying behind a wall of remaindered Jeffrey Archer novels and Hairy Biker cook books. I was worried about being trapped in there overnight, so I grabbed an Alexander McCall Smith novel (£3) and we scuttled back upstairs to pay. The checkout lady was rather keen to sell me a bottle of water for 50p, which I declined mostly because I am trying to avoid extraneous plastics these days. I worry about WHSmiths. Whoever is in charge has clearly lost their way in the retail jungle. 

The Chester weather was odd, too. It flung itself between bright sunshine and heat, when I wished I hadn’t put on my hooded parka coat, and chilly flash flooding, when I was glad I HAD put on my hooded parka coat. We flitted then, in and out of sheltered areas according to the weather. We stopped for a break in an Italian Café place. I had a cup of tea and an apple and cinnamon muffin which was okay once I’d found the apple bits (stopped it tasting quite so ‘sawdusty’) and Andy had a cappuccino and a chocolate and orange ‘duffin’. A duffin, for the uninitiated, is a cross between a doughnut and muffin. There are some crossbreeds that should never happen and a duffin is one of them. Also, we decided that a better name for it would be ’muffnut’. At least it’d raise a puerile snigger or two. 

Outside, we got caught behind a tour guide who appeared to be very angry that she was being followed by a group of people who persisted in asking her stupid questions. We stopped in a fish and chip place for an early pre-theatre dinner and sat upstairs in the industrial-style eat-in area. I was entertained enormously by the waiter appearing suddenly and shouting, ‘Large chips, small sausage!’ 

and delivering a tray of food to a couple on a nearby table, the woman of which proceeded to eat 

every forkful of food topped with a teeny dot of mushy peas. I really shouldn’t watch people eating because I generally find something of annoyance to raise my blood pressure. Usually it is people 

holding their knife like a pen. But many other things also. I could write a book about dining etiquette, really I could. 

Eventually we escaped to the Storyhouse which is a theatre/cinema/ restaurant /community hub and also houses a library with the longest opening hours in the universe, like until 11 at night. It was an oasis in a Chester storm. Only one foof skirt spotted. I was a little worried that after the show finished (it was an excellent production - fun, loud, bouncy) we’d have to negotiate our way through many drunken ruffians, but then I remembered I once worked in a behaviour school and had been trained to physically wrangle difficult human beings so we’d probably be okay. As it happened, it was fairly quiet when we emerged, plus we had moved the car to a closer car park which was only two minutes walk away. I could have run the distance if needs be. 

I suppose I always expect Chester to be a genteel and sophisticated kind of place, because of its historical and cultural background. But then the Romans were a bit of a drunken debauched lot, weren’t they? But I bet if they came back now they’d be livid that all their lovely straight Chester roads have been messed up by a plethora of confusing roundabouts. I bet they’d properly kick off in their foof togas.