One of the things I quite like about the place where I do the door is that it’s generally early to start and early to finish. Which leaves plenty of time to get somewhere for last orders, or to get home to see various programmes, or just to get a sensible nights kip.

The problem with it being a fairly predictable early finish is that others know about it too. Hence the following phone short phone call that took place about 90 seconds after I got into the house.

Him: Ed, there’s been a bit of a screw up. X, Y & Z walked off the door in rather nice pub about 300 yards from my house. I know you’re just finished a shift, but I’m really short of bodies. L is already on his way down, could you do the rest of the shift with him?

Me: Fuxache man, I’d just opened a cold one. Is there nobody else you could get?

Him: Nah, Y & Z were my last resort lads anyway, and now they’ve fucked off. Don’t worry, you’d get paltry amount extra.

Me: Nah, really can’t be doing it. Why’d X walk off anyway?

Him: Because he’s X. almost decent amount.

Me: Man, I’m shattered, and I’ve already done thirteen hours today. It’s really not my problem.

Him: preposterous amount

Me: Walking out the door now…

Which is why I got a nice sum of money for not a lot of work at all. And plenty of gratitude from various members of staff.

Still ended up doing a fifteen hour day though. Not as much fun as I remember it.

One of the many tedious tasks that mush be done on the door is the searching of bags; any bag big enough to contain alcohol should really be searched, for obvious reasons. And at pretty much every club in the world, there are signs informing patrons that they’re liable to be searched on entry. Such is the case anywhere I’ve worked, anyway.

In line with this, I asked a young fella to remove his backpack and open it for me. I even went so far as to say please, because I’m just that nice.

Said young fella does as he’s been asked, and his girlfriend opens her handbag (unprompted) for a similar check. Neither of them seem to be carrying drink, drugs or explosive devices, so I thank them and wish them a good night. Again, because I’m just so damn nice. I then back to what I was doing before the couple arrived (the highly important task of talking shite with someone, if you must know).

It took me a few seconds to realise that the guy hadn’t gone about having a good night, and was instead staring at me. So I turned and asked if he was OK. Which was when it got odd…

Him: So when are you going to apologise?
Me: Excuse me?

Him: I want an apology.
Me: For what? You’ve really lost me.

Him: I want an apology. You didn’t need to search me. I want an apology.
Me: No. I have to search all bags coming in; your bag came in, I searched it. I do not apologise for doing my job unless I have to, and in this case I really don’t have to.

Him: I want an apology. You violated my privacy, practically assaulted me.
Me: Wise up. You want in, you abide by our rules. Now we face a decision. You can go in and have a good night, or you can stay out here and keep accusing me of breaking the law, and then not be allowed in.

Him: GET ME YOUR MANAGER I WANT AN APOLOGY
Me: Last chance mate, shut up and go in or keep talking and stay out. Your call.

Him: [prepares to speak]
The Girlfriend: To him*slap* Shut up and get your arse inside. To me I’m really sorry about him.

I wonder if he does that everywhere he goes. Because it’s really quite strange behaviour, especially for something as common as having a massive backpack searched going into licensed premises.

I’m used to working 8am-4pm, with a half hour lunch at 12. This has been good for me, over the years.

Now I’m working 9-6, with an hour long lunch at 1. This is a bit of a shock, seeing as how my lunch is now eaten an hour later and my dinner two hours later.

I’m less than impressed with this particular setup. Hopefully the stomach will readjust quite quickly, because I doubt that the rest of the office wants to hear any more growling.

Back in the day, when I were a lad, etc, etc, there was much fun to be had on school holidays playing at building. You know, mixing a bit of cement, lugging about bits of concrete, trying to be useful and generally getting in the way. It was great craic, as I recall.

Yeah, not so much now. Now it just hurts.

Because of this, I realise two things: a) I’m now old and b) I’m now horribly out of shape.

I care about a; I couldn’t care less about b. And so, back to work…

Tonight, for the first time in years, I worked a ‘corporate'; a shift where the venue was closed to the public and hired out to a single organisation. Which means less churn at the door, more regular faces through the evening and generally a better sort of crowd; someone who is dropping many thousands of pounds on organising a night is much more likely to be selective about their invitees than, say, a hen night.

The down side is, of course, that it’s generally a lot more boring. Oh well, shit happens.

There were a number of things that made it worth while:

• The UV lamps for the checking of attendees facilitated the discovery of quite old graffiti, which provided some entertainment.
• The UV ink provided much in the way of opportunities for mischief.
• Several of the people that were organising the whole thing turned out to be quite good craic.
• Professionalism and opportunism demanded a higher number of staff be on duty than normal, providing further craic.
• Old, well behaved people that don’t usually drink often make entertaining drunks.
• Said old drunks tend to fade out early, mean plenty of time to make it to the bar for a swift half before last orders…

I’ve long held that the world is a smaller place than general believed. This is generally exhibited by various net connections; I’ll meet someone off of the online community and they’ll say “oh, you’re that connection, I’ve a great wee story about yer granny”. Or I’ll mention something to a family member, and they’ll start digging and discover that they think they know the sister of the blog writer I was talking about. Or some other such circumstances.

Today, however, I think that the world is small because of a Real World happening.

I work in a fairly nice wee two storey office building, outside of Belshaft. At least, I did. About three weeks ago, the owner decided that it was actually a three storey office building. And this week, the occupants of the third storey moved in.

And one of them is my aunt. I did not know this until I heard someone calling John down the stairs at me. This could cause confusion; the John is not a name that has been used in t’office before. Oh well. Seems that the world is conspiring to hurry on the onset of my multiple personality disporder.

Anyway, as I say, it’s a small world.

A strange very-busy-but-not-much-to-do kind of evening.

A strange problem with the radios at the start of the night.

A strange wound on a co-worker’s head.

A strange incident close by involving dozens of security and many, many cops.

A strange gent with strange hair regaling us with strange stories.

A strange computer issue resulting in us working a little later than usual.

A strange part of the city on the way home, to leave a guy to his home.

And, at the end of it, a strange redness on the face of the moon.

Yes, there was much strangeness to be had. But it’s over now, and that’s what counts.

While I’m generally one to rant about the state monopoly on self defence and violence, I can appreciate that, sometimes, it is very gratifying to see agents of the state doing their thing.

Like, and I’m picking an example out of the air here, when six fellas take it upon themselves to become violent twats and begin to hit people round the back of the head. An ordinary person, of course, is legally able to restrain said fellas, but nothing more than that in most cases. But an agent of the state, with their monopolistic powers, can turn up, boilersuited and with baton in hand, and do much more interesting things.

Like, and again this is a completely made up example, make the worst of the fellas sit in the corner while a dog sits guarding him. A very loud dog, with big white teeth. Something like this, but a good bit younger. Younger, of course, meaning “more likely to do something rash and unpredictable”.

Or they can turn up and haul remaining fellas into the back of ye olde meat wagon and transport them, post haste, to a long wait before seeing the beak in the morning.

Or, and this is quite impressive and scary at the same time, they can use CCTV to get the registration number of the taxi that several of the (hypothetical) fellas escaped into, use the DoE database to find the company that operates said taxi, get the company to contact the driver, and then be waiting to pick up the several fellas once they reach their destination.

All in, in such a situation, the police can work hard, quickly and efficiently. Pity it’s only a hypothetical example, of course.