Beware the deadly guys.

Twelve things the small boy opposite me on the train exclaimed whilst playing on his Nintendo:


- You can’t stop me!
- Woah, who are these deadly guys!
- Woah, wait up! What are you guys doing to me? 
- Aha! Can’t hit me! Oh, he’s hitting me.
- Oh come on, how could he possibly get up there?
- This is so annoying! I’m not allowed to hit his hands now! 
- How do I beat this guy? What do I have to do?
- Ah! He’s not dead yet! Ah, look at him! He isn’t dead.
- Aha, now I get it!
- Aha!! Oh!! Yes!! Thank you!!
- I beated him!! 
- Oh, he’s changed into a machine.

One thing he exclaimed when his batteries ran out, and he looked out the window at some seagulls in Poole harbour:  


- Birds in the water?! Why are there birds in the water?!

Yet when I said the exact same thing in Tottenham three months ago, apparently THAT'S a criminal offence...

Today, I heard a mother say this to her son:

'Look, a policeman! Go on, run up to him and give him a scare!'

Now, there's an example of a sentence which is only good parenting under certain very specific circumstances. About seven pm on Halloween; in a leafy middle-class bit of London, and when the son is four years old, and dressed as an adorable lion - OK. Pretty much any other time or place... not so great.

The other memorable sentence I overheard on my walk was: 'Ethan! Never mind about your sweets - just put your willy away!' 

First swear in this blog ever, I think. But it's worth it.

Overheard yesterday:

A woman is serving a customer at her flower stall outside a tube station. She greets a friend, a man in his early forties. They both have proper cockney accents - not just estuary, but full on cockney. Yes, I know this is now a story about a cockney flower seller, but I can't help it - that's what she sounded like, and that was her job. Anyway:

Her: Hiya! You alright?

Him: Yeah, yeah, alright. But my Grandad died. 

Her: Oh, love! I'm sorry!

Him: No, he's alright, he's alright. Well, he's not alright. He's dead. 

She breaks off to finish with her customer, then goes back to him, and gives him a hug. 

Her: I'm really sorry.

Him: No, he's alright, he's alright, he's alright. (Pause). Nah, he's fucked. 

Just wait till he sees the escalator at Angel.

Have just shared a lift at St Pancras station with two teenage boys from Yorkshire, who were apparently scripted for the occasion by Alan Bennett. My favourite exchange was:

First Boy: I tell you what: I've never seen a lift as big as this.

Second Boy: (scornfully) Well you won't have, in Bradford.

Obviously I have no way of knowing their relationship or circumstances, but I dearly hope the first boy left Bradford a couple of years ago, made good, and has now invited the other to visit and be introduced to his glamorous new life of London sophistication and massive lifts.

(Since you ask: It was a fairly big lift. I have, however, seen bigger.)