Here is a little anecdote for you. I had to buy eight pints of milk for the school's fayre last Saturday. To pour in coffee and tea (patently absurd in tea, but I digress). I thought it was too much milk for what we needed, but since I was tasked to do it, I did it. So I stopped at the local Sainsbury's in the morning. They were out of semi-skimmed milk bottles of the right size. So I asked one of the employees there. He asked me to give him less than five minutes and in the meantime, he told me where the find the other bits and bots I had to buy. A really helpful guy. I thought he would come back late telling me they were completely out of stock, but no. Within five minutes, on the dot, he was walking with the milk bottles. As I always like to show my gratitude for helpful staff, I told him he was a man of his word. he replied: "If I was not a man of my word, what kind of man would I be?" Which I think deserves to be a new great unknown line. I might use it in my writing one day, in any case I thought I'd share it on the blog. But yes, eight pints of milk was way too much.
Oh, that employee absolutely nailed that response! You are so right "If I was not a man of my word, what kind of man would I be?" sounds like it belongs to a rugged hero in a classic movie, not someone fetching semi-skimmed milk at a local Sainsbury's on a Saturday morning. That is an absolute goldmine of a line for your writing! It's always such a great feeling when you encounter staff who actually care and go the extra mile, especially when you're already in the middle of the pre-fayre rush. I completely agree with you on both counts: putting milk in tea is a questionable life choice, and eight pints is so much milk. Did you end up having to lug the leftovers back home with you, or did the school find a way to drown everything in tea and coffee?
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