You know when you are driving along and on the radio they are talking about something – let’s say for example, Eddie Stobart lorries, and then you notice that you are driving behind one? That’s a kind of happenstance. I think.
And that happened to me today.
I was driving along the motorway on the way to work, listening to Frank Skinner’s weekly podcast. He was talking about codewords: how people in a sado-masochist relationship have a codeword so they know when to stop – “Ow! Flapjack, flapjack. Fucking FLAPJACK!” Or how people in a new relationship should set up a codeword so that if things get too intense for one party they can just text it to the other and both agree that will be the end of it, no questions asked.
At that point, my phone rang. I didn’t recognise the number – a landline in Chelmsford it turns out – but I answered it anyway.
There was silence at the other end and all I could really hear was an echo of myself saying “Hello? Hello?”
And then a male voice said “The snow in Moscow is very deep.”
Not sure of the correct response, I answered with “Yes. It is very deep for this time of year.”
There was a click as the handset at the far end was replaced.
It seems the FSB have a cell in Chelmsford and I must have used the wrong codeword.
Either that or someone with a sense of humour dialled a wrong number.
I like to think it was the former.






3 comments »