this week’s writephoto prompt is
‘Oh. Good morning. My name is Charleston and…’
‘You’re not one of them Jehoshaphats, are you? Can’t abide them, trying to flog me a water tower, when I have a perfectly adequate cistern…’
‘Do you mean Jehovah’s?’
‘That’s what I said, didn’t I? Jehoshaphats.’
‘Witnesses. They’re Jehovah’s Witnesses.’
‘Well, I ain’t seen nothing and no one came make me say I did. I was working, or degreasing the wife’s archipelago.’
‘I think we are drifting away from the purpose…’
‘So are you flogging me a water tower or not? Cos I ain’t inclined to buy, not from any old Tom Dick or Harriet who comes barging their way in, without so much as a by your leave, like they own the place, all high and mighty and la-de-dah.’
‘La-de-dah?’
‘Oh yes, bloody elitist, I call it, like yer BBC and yer Grauniad, smug bastards, come over here, taking our marmalade…’
‘I really do think we’ve drifted away from the purpose of my…’
‘So how much is it?’
‘Is what?’
‘Yer water tower.’
‘I’m not selling anything. And I think you’ll find it’s a watch tower, not a …’
‘You spying on them, communistics at number 48, are you? That why you need a watch tower? Cos it’s about bloody time. I’ve been telling Petunia for years that the way he grows his marrows is dead dodge, all that manuring in the third trimester…’
‘Marrows don’t have trimesters.’
‘Expert is you, cos I’ve had just about enough of your experts and correspondents and what have yous, coming over here, taking our…’
‘Yes, you said. I need to know…’
‘That’s what I told Petunia, last week, during Bargain Hunt. It’s all need to know these days. You know, the other day I was at the greengrocers – odd fellow, that Simon Sayes, walks like a cucumber has invaded his…’
‘Please… this won’t take a moment. I was told to come to the red front door…’
‘Why come here then?’
‘You have a red front door.’
‘No we don’t.’
‘I’m sorry but your front door is very clearly scarlet and…’
‘No it ain’t.’
‘Isn’t.’
‘Isn’t what?’
‘I’m sorry, I have a very specific urge to correct grammar.’
‘Well, I’m with you there, Pal. My Gramma was a right old didact, correcting my aitches and telling me the Prime Minister was an alien. But if I corrected her… oh my! She went off like a Saturn Five on a cabbage diet.’
‘About your front door…’
‘Serbian larch. Very knotty, them Serbian coniferouses. Not easy to cut but you try breaking through it. Bloody near impossible. Go on. Give it a kick. Try and damage that, Mr You Have A Red Front Door, why don’t you?’
‘But you do have a red front door.’
‘It’s green.’
‘I… no, it’s not. It’s red.’
‘Ah well, see, you may have a proper heducation unlike me but you don’t know your sages from your scarlets. You’re not the first, mind.’
‘I’m not?’
‘Nope. You won’t know this… why would you, unless you have a passion for the history of the Little Tittweaking women’s caber tossers.’
‘Tossers?’
‘Well, I imagine some were, but most were housewives with biceps like granite outcrops and energy to burn.
‘How…?’
‘It’s the sweat, see.’
‘The sweat?’
‘Creates a miasma. Makes them what’s not used to it colour blind. Seeps out of the rocks, so it does. They’ve done tests.’
‘Tests?’
‘And hexaminations and hanalysises and whatnots. So when you see red, as it were. You see what I did there?’
‘Sadly…’
‘Anyway, you see red when its green and vicar verses. You want no. 48.’
‘The communistics?’
‘As it happens.’
‘And their door is red?’
‘Green to you. But, naturally, being communistics, they’d want it red.’
‘Right. Well, I’d better…’
‘Word to the wise.’
‘Yes?’
‘They’ve got a water tower. Bought it from the last chap. Probably not worth mentioning it.’
‘Thanks.’
*
‘He’s gone then?’
‘Yes.’
‘Tea?’
‘Yes, please. Any red bush?’
‘We’re out. There’s some green…’
‘Why not? You can hardly tell the difference…’
TanGental 
Great stuff. Glad our new front door is going to be white………….. I think!
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Very wise. We had a red front door many years ago which ran and every time I let myself in I saw the telltale dribble. Drove me battty
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What a brilliant conversation
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The sort I seem to have a lot these days…
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It’s an art to write what you think. One can almost see it happening
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Yes sometimes I don’t even have to think and still I write. Now that can be revelatory!
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Yes, that’s true. I can imagine you writing for a sitcom 😂
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Very funny!
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Thank you. Sadly true to life, at for me…
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Hahaha – very clever Geoff, and with a touch of truth: I knew someone who was indeed colour blind, the school were concerned that in his doodles he drew everything on fire, turned out to be just grass! Definitely felt like a touch of the Two Ronnies to this in sections 🙂 Thank you for a marvellous #writephoto entry. KL ❤
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That’s a high comparator… possibly with a smidge of Fawlty…
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I’m sure he went off to find a way to forget this conversation. Well done.
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I think he probably regrets his career choices…
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😁
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Have you been sold red paint that appears green to some people, or vice versa? You may be entitled to conversation!
Well done Geoff. I can’t use superlatives because I’ve run out!
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They have a shorter of ests in Taiwan where I believe they make most modern superlatives
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That would explain it!
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You haven’t had experience running a call centre by any chance have you? That conversation sounds strangely familiar.
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It does verge on the surreal ‘have you been in an accident’ category
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Pingback: #WRITEPHOTO – The Red Door by geofflepard – New2Writing
Great tale, reminded me of my Father, he’d talk rings round anyone
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That was brilliant, and very funny!
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Thank you
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You’re welcome.
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