Wayfaring Stranger

After about an hour of wondering from bastion of frozen food to another, I came across an independent video store. I had noticed it before and could only shower it in pity; for it was about 50m away from a blockbuster, and in this economic climate it’s difficult to compete.

But I digress. I’m standing outside this shop, looking at the window displays. All I can see are “£1 DVDs! Get them while you can! (preowned)” signs and assumed that people must use the shop if there are people handing in preowned discs, right? Wrong.

As I walked into the poky room, it felt empty. Each wall housed only one rack of discs of around 100 DVDs in each and the rest of the 10x10m floor space was baron. I struggled to fathom why this store still lived; with it’s peeling wallpaper and a smell one could only describe as cigarette-soaked carpets. In short, it was a shit hole.

I wander over to the corner counter where a TV was blaring out 90’s cartoons and I started to see a head emerging behind the worktop. Was this guy a midget? Nope. He was slumped in a leather armchair absorbed into his Android tablet.

This was definitely a time for the infamous impatient cough. I then proceed to ask the vendor if he had any vacancies opening up.

“Nah, we don’t mate. Never much business in here.”

I fucking wonder why.