Wool Shop Part 2
By Canonette
- 1381 reads
“So you see, sweetheart, I had to chuck ‘em all in the bin. Bent as my elbow they were. Not that I’m ungrateful, mind. I bought the old dear a box of chocolates. It’s just that I couldn’t knit on them.”
Darby and Joan are back. She thrusts a pair of 5mm needles across the counter, as she finishes her story. She seems affronted that her elderly neighbour gave her a box of dodgy knitting gear, but they were probably donkey’s years old, what does she expect?
Blimey, I can’t take my eyes off her fat lip. I wonder if Darby gave it to her? Or is it some sort of skin cancer? She looks like one big cockney purple blister. Prune and plum - bum. Oh bugger, I’ve forgotten what change to give her now. That’s always happening; my mind wanders and then I have to surreptitiously check the till receipt.
“That’s three pounds and a penny change. Thanks.”
The pair exit with an exaggerated display of friendliness; like they’re my long lost cousins or something.
Barbara rolls her eyes and hands me a ball of yarn. “Would you look at the state of this?”
It’s really evil looking stuff with an Italian name – brown wool with flecks of silvery grey mohair.
“Good grief. It looks like the hair on a witch’s clunge,” I say and Barbara starts choking.
Sandra can’t resist walking over from the dress fabrics to investigate. She’s not impressed. She checks her back to see if there are any customers, but it’s as lively as the Mary Celeste this afternoon. “That bloody buyer – I don’t know what she’s thinking. She buys this discontinued stuff cheap and then we have to flog it.”
“I know,” I say, turning the ball over in my hand, with a sneer of disgust. “I don’t even know what it knits up as – the ball band instructions are in Italian.”
“I hate to tell you this,” Sandra continues, “but she’s introducing a gift range for Christmas. There are half a dozen boxes of mugs in the stockroom. I’m afraid you’re going to have to move some yarn baskets over to make space for them.”
I’m livid at this snippet of information. “Over my dead body,” I say and storm off to tidy the shelves until I calm down.
It’s a slow afternoon. I prefer it when we’re busy, especially if the customers need me to make suggestions. It gets the old brain cells working. I sell a couple of balls of our cheapest wool to some pensioners who knit bobble hats for charity. It’s nice of them, but I wouldn’t touch that stuff with a barge pole. One hundred per cent acrylic on your head – imagine the static electricity. My hair would look like a seventies afro wig.
Sandra rushes over to open the door for a customer. It’s a regular on her mobility scooter. I wouldn’t let them in, if it was up to me. Wheelchairs, pushchairs and granny mobiles; they’re a bloody menace. They always knock my wool off the displays as they pass.
“I’m just off to the stockroom,” Sandra shouts over to our end of the shop and so Barbara goes over to cover on the dress section. She’s good with the customers and chats to the Wacky Racer about her aunt’s hip operation, while showing her the new jelly rolls that have come in. They’re bundles of patchwork fabric done up like a swiss roll. The old dears like to see what’s in fashion, but they always stick with the tried and tested in the end.
Meanwhile, I watch Sandra shifting my baskets of Bonny Babe 4ply over, to make room for an arched shelving unit. I don’t say anything. I just glower at her from behind the till and hope she doesn’t look over. She checks the gangway to see if there’s room for the customers to walk past and then goes off to the stockroom again.
While she’s out of sight, I nip over and push the shelves across a few inches, out of my yarn area. Why should my customers have to make room for flaming Christmas mugs? It’s always the same. They’ve put tapestry kits next to the knitting needles now. I could have used that space for display garments.
Sandra lugs heavy boxes on to the shop floor. I’d offer to help, but she’s built like an Amazon and I’ve got a bad back. She holds two mugs up for me to see, one in each hand.
The first one is tasteful, sprigged with rosebuds. “Buyer on her medication,” Sandra says.
The other is decorated with a hideous psychedelic owl. “Buyer forgot to take her medication.”
We both laugh. Sandra’s right - I think the buyer must be on something.
I look at my watch, there’s only half an hour of my shift left, so I do a spot check for yarn to stock up on. I enjoy stocking the shelves and making sure they’re tidy; in fact, I’m a bit OCD about it. I tut as I notice that the posh lady from this morning has mixed all the Debbie Bliss Angel colours together. Some people are bone idle, they expect you to tidy up after them. At least I can sit down on the floor, while I sort tangerine from apricot, and duck egg blue from jade, and stack them in neat piles. It’s good to take the weight of my feet.
There’s an intermittent beep coming from over by the mug stand, but I don’t take much notice; Barbara and Sandra are both around. My brain doesn’t register what it is, but then I realise with a buzz of adrenalin, that it’s the reversing signal of a mobility scooter.
I duck my head and wait for the the sound of cascading china.
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Comments
oh dearie, dearie, not hard
oh dearie, dearie, not hard to uravel this one a china mug smash up on the fast lane - and going backwards too. Thanks for chung, never heard of that kind of dish. Might knit one. Keep knitting this it could turn out to be a nice fitting Xmas present for someone.
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Mrs Slocombe had a pussy -
Mrs Slocombe had a pussy - nothing so vulgar as a clunge. She'd be turning in her grave... I hope there's more to come Cannonette?
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'She looks like one big
'She looks like one big cockney purple blister.' The times I've had the same thought about lip mauve. This is delightful - funny and refreshing, thoroughly enjoying it.
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Such a warm and cosy read, I
Such a warm and cosy read, I do like wool, looking forward to more.
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