The truth, the whole truth and then some

by John Passmore

Get a haircut,
Collect suit from cleaners
Buy new shaver
Money from bank

Just take a look at the list of things to do and you can tell this was the day of Norwich COP!

The good news was that the list was going to take me into town so as usual I slung my Win-a-Mini clipboard in the back of the car. After all, I’d taken just one call after breakfast so I still had to say my piece five times before people arrived for a lift up to Norfolk – all inevitably saying: “Well, have you got your six?”

And so, chores done, I positioned myself by the car park ticket machine and asked the first person to come by whether she wanted to win a car.

Her name was Rosalind and she said “Why not?” Better still, she wanted to save money and we made an appointment – just like that.

The next two patiently listened to me say my piece but I couldn’t help them. However the last was the most interesting. I wrote his address without thinking and then, when I told him about the club he said: “I already use your stuff.”

Good heavens – I looked at the form again. We’d met before. He was the lodger with one of my very first customers from four years ago! They are still customers today but now they’re moving house and he’s moving to Kent. So he agreed he would get his landlord to call the Home Movers team and when he got to Kent he would give me a call himself.

And then he said something that switched the lightbulb on: “I’m moving down to be near my daughter. I hadn’t planned to retire just yet but circumstances have conspired. I’ll find a little job – just a couple of days a week…”

And so, yes, you guessed it, he’s looking at the business.

In fact everything was looking very rosey – until it started raining before I got my sixth in the bag. The trouble was, the rest of the day was pretty much sewn up: I had an appointment with a potential distributor (yes he joined) and then it was straight back to deliver children to their various after-school activities – and then, without a pause to draw breath- off to Norwich.

But I did do one useful thing on the way back from the new distributor: I recorded into my phone the mobile number of the van in front of me on the A12. When I stopped I dashed off a text to him.

And 40 minutes later, between getting back from the tennis run and my passengers arriving, I got a call back. In fact as John Breadstill arrived, I was still on the phone saying: “…you could say ‘We’ve joined this brilliant club…’”

So when John reads this tomorrow morning, at least he’ll know it’s true.