A grand day out

It was Kevin's birthday yesterday, and we went into Coventry to have dinner and see Cars. Before this we stopped off in Boots so that I could get a few bits and bobs.

When the woman at the checkout scanned through my items, she told me I could choose two free gifts from the N^o7 range since I had spent over £12 on their products. I hadn't seen the special offer, and didn't want to hold up the people behind me, so I said, "Never mind".

"But you've spent enough; you qualify for two free items," she reassured me.

"Come and pick something," chimed in a second assistant standing next to the desk, so I rolled my eyes at Kevin and hopped over to the free items counter to quickly grab something. Nothing really appealed, so I made my way back to the checkout empty-handed, shaking my head at the assistant.

"Never mind," I told her.

"But they're free!" she said, with a big reassuring smile.

"There was nothing I wanted."

She got a worried look in her eyes. "What, nothing at all?"

"Not really," I said, with a sheepish grin.

The two assistants exchanged anxious looks. "Couldn't you take something for a friend?" suggested the second one.

"No, it's fine," I said, getting slightly irritated by now.

"Why don't you just take two body lotions then, how about that?" said the first woman, already standing up to retrieve them.

I gave in.

(I am not making a word of this up.)

When the shops shut at 5:30pm (on the dot, we got locked in Ottakar's) we realised that we had half an hour to eat before the film, so we swallowed our pride and ducked into Burger King. It was like a parody of bad fast-food chain burger restaurants. We stuck to the floor (and we were in the clean section. When I took the tray over to the bin, I could scarcely see the floor for all the grime encrusted on it).

They had run out of a) milk, b) all milkshakes, and c) water. Since this covers everything I am ever likely to drink in a Burger King, I was stuck with a dry mouth, salty food and nothing to drink. They refused to even get me some water from a tap. I suppose I should have asked for an empty cup and got some from the bathroom. Happily my thirst was quenched with delicious Häagen-Dazs icecream at the cinema shortly afterwards.

And then we saw Cars. It was wonderful, although unfortunately the credits contained the biggest laughs of the film. As a bonus, Odeon will give you four hours of free parking in their car park upon presenting your ticket, and we drove out with about three minutes to spare. Perfect timing.