Trying to be nice...

Today I was late leaving the office and by the time I’ve called in at Toys R Us to pick up the last of the Christmas presents for my niece and nephew (spent far too much as ever!), it’s nearly 9pm. Sitting in the car park waiting for the windows to de-ice, I phone Stewart who by the sound of his recent texts is having an even more stressful work time than me.

Unsurprisingly he’s still in the office and he fills me in on the nightmares that have unfolded at his work. He sounds so miserable. It’s a horrible situation, he’s stressed beyond belief and feels he has to work every waking hour he can for the foreseeable future preparing for meetings with lawyers and so forth. Tonight he’ll work until gone 11pm and tomorrow he’ll leave work at 9pm come to the gig with me and then go back to work.

I tell him that this is ridiculous and he’ll make himself ill working like this. His response is that this is his job, his responsibility. I argue back that this is BS, he’s not employed to work 14hr days, day on day on day, jeopardise his health and have no personal life. I also try to get him to see that however personal it feels, this person is taking legal action against the organisation, not him.

As ever I feel my words fall on deaf ears.

I head wearily home and the thought of cooking is too much, so I pop into Paradise for a lovely chicken shish kebab (grilled meat, salad, fresh bread – it’s almost healthy!). I’m worried about Stewart who not only won’t have paused from working since first thing, but in typical fashion will not have eaten a thing. So, on the spur of the moment I decide to try and cheer him up by dropping off his favourite donner (ugh!) kebab at his office for him. Meals on wheels if you like.

Taking kebabs to Rusholme feels a bit like taking coals to Newcastle. Worryingly when I get to his office the building looks ominously closed up and dark. You see this is why I don’t do spontaneous!

There’s no answer from his work line or his mobile and so I leave a message and start to head home (trying to ignore the demon of distrust in my head that says "working late eh?"). I haven’t gone more than 200 yards when he calls back very clearly from a train.

As it turns out, it seems my earlier phone call has proved the catalyst for him saying "f**k it" and rushing to catch the earlier train home.

Boy do I feel stupid now!