Don’t get me started!
A busy supermarket checkout. Beside the conveyor belt someone has dumped an unwanted roll of sticky tape. Adrianna - behind the till – serves an acquaintance, a middle-aged man in shorts who is buying beer and compost.
MAN: Oh don’t get me started! Oh no! I’m not saying a thing. You’d better give me that tape there.
The man clamps his hand over his mouth.
MAN: No, no I’m not saying anything that’s going to get me into trouble.
ADRIANNA: So has your mother met him?
MAN: Oh yes – you know what she calls him don’t you? Clock.
ADRIANNA: Clock?
MAN: She calls him a clock.
ADRIANNA: She calls him a clock?
MAN: Yeah a clock. She says ‘oh him, he’s a clock.’ Don’t tell him I said that!
ADRIANNA: Oh don’t worry I won’t. I’ll have to use the tape!
MAN: Yes you will! Oh and do you know what she wanted this morning? She only wanted to go to Milton Keynes.
ADRIANNA: Milton Keynes? Why did she want to do that?
MAN: Oh she just decided this morning. Rang me up and said she wanted to go to Milton Keynes.
ADRIANNA: Ooh but she’d have to get up early to do that!
MAN: I know! I know! Honestly… So how much is that darling?
The man hands over twenty pounds and then turns to the Woman in the queue behind him.
MAN: Sorry to keep you love. We know each other. We were just talking about my mother-in-law. Oh don’t get me started on my father-in-law. A least they don’t live together.
WOMAN: Oh. So you only get one at a time.
MAN: Yeah. Look I’m going before I get started. Bye Adrianna! Remember the tape!
He leaves. Adrianna waves cheerily until he’s out of sight then her smile falls into a sneer.
ADRIANNA: Sorry ‘bout that. Sometimes I think when people are so quick to judge others I think they should start with themselves do you know what I mean?
WOMAN: Mmm.
ADRIANNA: Me I think you should judge for yourself what the other people are like. Take my husband. He left me after 23 years! My mother-in-law… She died god rest her soul. Me, I’m all alone… I don’t mind though. It’s not so bad.
She gestures in the direction of the departed man.
ADRIANNA:
I think I’m better off without a husband.