A Knock on the Door

Well, it wasn’t exactly a knock.

It was the sort of crashing that I imagine a police swat squad makes as they force their way into a crack house. (In fact if I’d known in advance I’d have sent them down the road to Number 103.)

So I ran at high speed down the stairs and leapt at the front door (which was still on its hinges), thinking that some terrible emergency had happened.
Imagine my consternation to see a man from Scottish Gas. Before it occurred to me to ask why he was so far from home, I asked him if there was a major gas leak.

“Are you the home owner sir?” “Never mind that" I said, “give me a meter box key and I’ll turn the gas off”.

It dawned on me that he wasn’t showing the sort of urgency I’d expected from the manic knocking at my door.

He was a s-a-l-e-s-m-a-n.

Because of the plague of salesmen round here who want me to buy gas and electricity at twice the price of my existing tariff, and the ones who want me to replace my very serviceable wooden framed double glazing with naff plastic double glazing; I have a large sign on the door provided by the Crime Prevention people
It says “NO COLD CALLERS”. The purpose of it is to discourage annoying twats from interrupting me, especially when (as was the case) I’m replastering a ceiling.

I pointed out the sign. The salesman said he wasn’t selling anything.

Strange that! Was he being paid to go house to house in a competition for the most disliked non-salesman of the week? Sounds like a cushy number as long as you don’t knock on Number 103’s door. They respond to unwelcome interruptions with something akin to a scene from “Apocalypse Now”.

I bade him farewell………….well perhaps I didn’t....................my second word to him was “off”.