A Hearing Test Might be an Idea

Twice a week I take my son on the train into the city with me. This allows my wife to manage his older brothers various therapy sessions without the usual 2-yr old issues of need for attention and the application of the methodologies that come as part of the attention-getting package.

Today the train was very crowded, and as our stop is before the city I had to negotiate myself and the pram backwards through the crowd to the door of the train.

"Excuse me, 'scuse please, watch your toes, thanks very much, excuse me, thank you. . ." and I was out the door. A rather prim lass throws me a 'look' and intones "An 'excuse me' might be an idea".

I had three retorts to my tongue from the bland "ah, I did actually" (which I used), or the mildly sarcastic "Five times excused is not enough for you?" to the slightly sharper throwing her own words back to her as "A Hearing test might be an idea".

From the whithering look I received from my milder reply you'd have thought I used my third option - and perhaps I should have. Maybe she was just trying to teach politeness - well I know the conventions and use them - often suffer at other lack of similar usage, however I choose to believe she was just being a smart-arse.

Maybe next time.