It's been a bad day which I insist on sharing with you. I have manflu, and have managed to have two encounters with traffic wardens during the course of a cold day spent in an office heated by two light bulbs the boss man considers are heaters. I toyed with the idea of coming in late, but on account of the fact that I've forgotten the colour of my desk over the last two weeks thought better of it. The law of sod dictated that the computers were down until 11.30 am. During the computer crash I had spotted a traffic warden eyeing up my badly parked car (I told my passenger he could walk to the pavement from here), and placated the warden by promising sincerely not to attempt parallel parking in future since I'm just a girl.
By the time I left the office to collect the Little Darlings from school my normal, barely adequate psychic defences were hardly monitoring on my Giveashitometer. When I rocked up customarily late at the school there were no free parking spaces parallel or otherwise on account of a nearby building site which helpfully placed no parking bollards where I normally abandon my car. Since I was anticipating a quick turnaround I parked right next to the school gates on zig-zags. I know it's a sin which has been depicted on tv ads as an invitation for children to throw themselves in the path of oncoming vehicles. It was a case of finding a legal space, being late and incurring the wrath of the Head of the Juniors, or take a chance. My Giveashitometer was, by this time, flat lining so I took the latter course of action.
Cue second Nazi in a traffic warden's uniform. Boychild came out first and ran to the car after throwing his bag at me. He came back a few moments later and told me there was a man in a hat that was writing my number plate down. I ran back around the corner to the warden, and through gritted teeth asked him politely not to give me a ticket. He said since I'd parked on zig-zags rather then double yellows he had no choice but to give me a ticket with a patronising, if a little gleeful, "more than my jobs worth" way. Jack, observing, asked me not to swear in front of his friends who were watching. I stifled my initial reaction enquire what's it like to have a job with no fucking prospects, and instead suggested that his contribution to the community would be far better served by stopping the self appointed traffic warden bully boy builders blocking a number of parking spaces that I would have otherwise utilized (even though it would have involved another crack at parallel parking). While he could be at that, he could also suggest to them that driving oversized forklift trucks at speed down a narrow road with a school on one side and a nursery on the other might be a more auspicious use of his valuable time than slapping tickets on cars. But he does't get paid commission for that now does he? The gradually rising and more hysterical tone of my voice during this one way conversation (badmother code: never let a man -especially your husband and son- get a word in edgeways if you can avoid it) had drawn a crowd, a band of similarly angered mothers. I believe he sensed he was outnumbered, and muttered ok ok ok while backing down the road to the building site.
As I was shoehorning the twins into the car he returned, and in a very manly voice, loud enough for all the mums to hear said that he had given the foreman at the building site a jolly good talking to. There's nothing more pleasing that gaining the moral high ground than evading another packing fine.
