Monday 24 February 2014

Number 8



Jesus O'Reilly. I wasn't expecting this one. I laughed on and off all day after opening this, picturing myself in a line-up with a suspected criminal and other 50-year-olds doing the same challenge as me. But there were nerves behind the laughter. What if I get picked out, and the wheels of justice creak into motion? You can't stop them once they've started. I can see myself becoming the Witney One, blinking in the flashlights as I'm released age 92 after serving time for a crime committed by someone who looks a bit like me. Claire assured me, on the basis of no research at all, that volunteers who are picked out can't actually end up going to prison. If this is true, there's nothing stopping me volunteering before going on the greatest crime spree this town has ever seen (breaking the 20-year old record of two broken wing-mirrors and an overturned wheelie bin).
I was also wondering what crime someone who looked like me would be most likely to commit. Fraud and indecent exposure seemed most likely, probably simultaneously – pretty much sums up my face. So at some point this week, once I've stopped laughing, I'll be outside the police station, trying to arrange my face like a criminal's and plucking up the courage to sign up.

1 comment:

Molly Potter said...

I have always thought of your face as a bit 'parking offence' actually. xxx