O.M.G.

I've gone weird.

I'm hoping it's hormonal or something else equally minor that's gone a bit batty inside me but in a very temporary fashion.

But, as I presently stand before you, I've gone a bit odd.

When it comes to the opposite sex, that is.  For you see I keep getting these urges/yearnings.

Not the sort where I want to drag them home and hump them.

O no.

The kind where I'll be sitting opposite the odd chap, say, on the tube, or walking past the occasional one down a street, and I'll suddenly find myself ... `mooning' ... over them.  And it's driving me insane.

I should point out here that I'm very happy with the Chuppies, goddammit, but if a damnably attractive swarthy looking dude passes London-Lass at the moment, it's pound to a penny that she'll be staring at him all googley-eyed and making a fool of herself.  Even worse than this is that occasionally the chap will look back at London-Lass (in, what I hope, is a similarly appraising way) which leaves me feeling shocked and starts up a mantra in my head along the lines of : `I love my Chuppies, I love my Chuppies, I love my Chuppies...', although a tiny part of me yearns to rush back home and write down in a diary :-

"Saw cute guy in London today.  He smiled at me.  O.M.G.  Awesome!!"

Take this morning's encounter in Boots.

I'm at the self-service checkout and about to price up some items.

And, yes, I know we're supposed to hate self-service machines, but I bloody love them.

Mebbe it's cos they give me that feeling of `control' (which is minor, brief and soon forgotten once you get one of their `Please seek assistance' errors) or perhaps it's cos as a nipper in the 70s I nursed an ambition to be a check-out girl (this was when you actually punched in the item amount in to the till's number pad which looked to me, as a kid who loved pressing buttons, or doorbells in DIY stores, great fun).  Or it might even be to do with the fact that you havent got some arsewipe standing right behind you tutting and sighing as you take one millisecond too long to take your change at the regular checkout.

But whatever it might be I was at one this morning and about to purchase a few items - wetwipes for my desk, chewing-gum for my mouth, sponge for my morning ablutions, drink for my office colleagues and contact lens solution for my eyes - when I noticed at my self-service checkout that the bags that were hooked up and waiting at the side to be filled were tiny.  In fact so small were they that, if you dropped in a coupla packs of gum and a packet of handkerchiefs, you'd have no space left at all.  Next to these (well, OK, dropped on the floor next to my self service checkout) lay a pile of Boots bags so enormous you'd be tempted to use one as a suitcase (if not for the fact that it's flimsy, bound to fall apart when joining the rest of the airplane's cargo and you'd probably get looked at as a bit of a loon on trying to check it in).  Anyway, faced with these options, the Boots suitcase had to do but, after picking one up, and hooking it on the bag hooks, the self-service checkout wasnt happy and asked me to remove the item from the bagging area and try again.

Turning round, I spied a handy self service checkout attendant and beckoned him over.

"Hi ... erm, sorry," I began, being my usual clear and forceful self, "but I was just wondering if you had any regular sized bags."

"Regular?" the checkout attendant questioned, looking down at my till.  It was at this point I noticed he had deep, brown eyes.

"Yes, well, er ... " I faltered on, immediately regretting my choice of regular but struggling for another word, "you see, these bags are tiny-"

I held one up to show how tiny they were, although not sure why I did this as the bags were evidently small from their perch next to the till.  I think I was just trying to make amends for the word `regular'.  I was also very aware at this point that he had spikey gelled black hair.  And a delightful pinch of aftershave about him.

-"whilst these are huge."

Again, I was doing the picking up the bag thing, but in my defence the large Boots suitcase did need picking up and, it was whilst doing this I noticed that whilst the bag was large it was a very awkward shape, all long and thin - suitable for transporting, say, a small piano keyboard, but not really appropriate for a handful of Boots toilettries which would leave a large part of the bag all flappy and weird looking.

I also noticed at this point that the Boots attendant had come in close - in a sort of huddled semi-rugby type fashion - and almost looked like he was going to put his arm around me.

But then didnt.

Goddammit.

"I'm afraid there arent any other bags.  Ridiculous isnt it?" he began, whilst I marvelled at his general swarthiness, "them being a multi-million pound company ... "

"Ahh ..." I responded, in an attempt to be understanding, sympathetic, savvy and ironic all at the same time.  But probably coming across as a very short, rather old woman, with very little to add to the conversation, other than being slightly, and rather unsettlingly, love-struck.

"Yes, hardly any bags for the customer ... " he carried on, still standing very close, in a suave olive-skinned type way, "and not enough till rolls for the checkout girls either."

It was at this point he laughed slightly.  Allowing me to check out his teeth.

No fillings, no food between teeth, no cheese breath.

The man, in short, was a god.

"O really, " I breathed, mere centimetres from his lithe latin youthfulness.

"Probably best if you just price your stuff up and then bag 'em at the end, " the assistant finished.  Whilst smiling.  Into my eyes.

"Ok thanks," I sighed, as he walked away back to his post, whilst I quickly priced up my items and bagged up the goods at the end.

Although that didnt actually happen.  Suddenly all a-fluster was I with the assistant's recent closeness, that I knocked all of my items on to the floor, managed to then not pick up any of them with grace or speed, and then rolled them once again on the floor as I attempted to do the final bagging up.

However, due to other customers joining the self-service area I believe this all went unnoticed although, on leaving my lane, I had to hide the fact that my skirt had now become half-hitched in my knickers (this had been somehow achieved during the items rolling round everywhere process and which, with a pair of recently sweaty hands, I was now unable to un-hitch).

Anyway, in order to leave the area I had to walk past the assistant's post and I was almost fearful to look at the Latin love god in case he blanked me, kissed his lips or rolled his eyes.

But he was looking at London-Lass.

O yes.  And smiling too.

So I smiled back.

And he winked.

Which I shall record in my diary later with lots of love hearts, poetry, simpering lines of text and yearning thoughts.








Blimmin' heck what's wrong with me?  I'm nearly 40, not 14.

(reckon it must be the house-moving business)