My close friends will know just by looking at the title of this post that I have had some kind of stressful experience. You see, when things get pressured I find myself singing 'Thine be the Glory' to myself. I can measure how bad things are by how many verses I get through and today I sang all of it and worked my way through most of the rest of 'The Baptist Hymnal' too.
It should have been so simple but it never is. I had taken my son and nephew (that's two separate people just in case you thought things were getting a bit too Norfolk) to the cinema in Cromer, parked the car and went to get a ticket. I knew I didn't have much change on me and soon realised that I didn't have enough to pay for 3 hrs. I am not a risk taker so, rather than just go for 2 hours and take a chance I decided to pay by card. Now, I don't mind things being complicated when they have to be like brain surgery for example, or choosing what to eat on a night out, but buying a parking ticket ffs?
I followed the instructions. Insert card, choose time, key in pin + validate. All I got was a message flashing 'Abort'. I tried the process again. Same outcome. By now people were forming a queue behind me jangling coins and tutting, so I did the decent thing and told them to p*** off. Only joking. I let them get their tickets. After a while the crowds had dispersed so I tried again. By now I must have been gone about 10 minutes, leaving the children in the car to play with the handbrake. What a blessing Norfolk is flat. At this point a friendly traffic warden (unbelievably NO irony intended) came to my aid and talked me through the steps again. Same result. He suggested I use a different card. No good. He suggested I tried a different machine.
On my way over to the new machine I stopped off to tell the kids that I was still alive and to grab a nourishing snack. This could go on some time and I needed to keep my energy levels up. Finally, after three more times of trying it worked and I staggered back to the car brandishing my hard-won prize. It was definitely the hardest I had ever had to try to spend £2.40.
So, Alan Partridge has arrived in Naarch (a roite foine ci-ee) for the premier of his film. I for one am jolly pleased that he eventually decided to show it here first, as it gives me something else to write about. I don't actually have a huge amount to say about Alan Partridge, except that he is very funny, but I saw that he and Norwich were on the news and trending on Twitter and thought, "There's a bandwagon; I'll jump on it". It's a dog eat dog world this blogging lark. You've got to be ruthless.
What I can talk about at some length and with not inconsiderable authority however, is the cinema where the film is to be screened. I went there a couple of years ago with Bryn to watch Horrid Henry. All I can say is I hope they've given it a bit of a clean and a lick of paint recently. Now, I am not exactly house-proud or overly concerned about my surroundings being pristine, but I don't much like it when my feet stick to the floor or my seat gives off a cloud of dust when I sit on it. There were pieces of antique popcorn on the floor of the foyer and the cinema, and the toilets were lavishly graffitied with all manner of interesting information about the sexual predilections of Sprowston High's year 10 girls. At least the pic 'n' mix was cheap.
Anyway, I notice that they have very inconsiderately named the new Prince of Cambridge whilst I've been writing this, so I suppose Alan Partridge is now whatever the modern-day equivalent is of 'tomorrow's chip wrappers'.
It should have been so simple but it never is. I had taken my son and nephew (that's two separate people just in case you thought things were getting a bit too Norfolk) to the cinema in Cromer, parked the car and went to get a ticket. I knew I didn't have much change on me and soon realised that I didn't have enough to pay for 3 hrs. I am not a risk taker so, rather than just go for 2 hours and take a chance I decided to pay by card. Now, I don't mind things being complicated when they have to be like brain surgery for example, or choosing what to eat on a night out, but buying a parking ticket ffs?
