Confessions Of a market trader

February 1983 - November 1984

Song:- Modern Love

Artist:- David Bowie

Artist:- Heaven 17

Song:- Temptation

NEW BEGINNINGS

February 1983

After the best send off from wirlderspool painters one could ever have had,

arranged of course by our resident painter, Mike knob head, and nicely executed by his Randy friend, brandy ( not sure that was ever here real name) and except for twelve weeks of work with another local painting firm, ( Winstanley's, which turned into a horror story) I procured a position as a fully fledged market trader, care of a good friend Wayne Lewis,

you see I needed a job and I needed it quickly, I was made redundant (or let go depends on what one believes, sacked is also there in the mix) and of course I had never been out of work, and although I was only eighteen, I was a new home owner, and with a mortgage hanging over me, responsibility came,

so that’s where Wayne’s dad came in, his name was John, ( no not that John Lewis) in-fact John was quite a wealthy fellow in his own right, who owned a pie factory, the brand name was rowleys pies, fucked if I know why Rowleys, but there you have it, and he had recently recruited a couple of fish mongers as partners in the new enterprise, they were market traders, trading under the family name of V Reardon & sons, (Mike & Vincent jnr are the sons) and they stank to fucking high heaven of fish,

and this little side project for Mr Lewis would also introduce his frozen pies to the people of Warrington for the first time,

so if you haven't guessed it yet , this project was selling frozen foods at reasonable prices for the working classes,

and the name of it was so fucking original, Market frozen foods, well I never,

I did hear there was a board meeting in the lion hotel that lasted over a week to come up with that name,

MARKET DAY

7am Saturday

My first day working on the market started on a Saturday morning at seven am prompt

I had rarely been awake before seven o'clock in the morning any day of the week in my entire life, never mind actually being at work for seven, and especially not on a Saturday, well maybe except for when I was a baby and it was my duty to be awake from around five am, oh and when my mother made me go out working as a window cleaner, and oh yes when I work with my uncles on the motorways sand blasting,

and when I started on the party circuit, so I may not have even got in before seven, so I guess that doesn't count? but apart from that I definitely was not an early bird,

and I can assure you that I had no desire to be up so early on this particular day either, but as I’ve said a mortgage was needing to be paid, and a social life was waiting to be had,

I arrived with Wayne at seven o’clock on the dot, and on arrival I was taken to one side and informed that I would have to go through some very rigorous training by Scouse paul,

Scouse paul was the manager of this frozen food establishment and known for his peculiar sense of humor and strict adherence to rules., which had half a dozen other employees all women except for myself and Wayne, and apparently Scouse paul was very meticulous in his training methods, so stage one of this training began with step one, which technically constitutes to theft, you grabbed a trolley, any trolly you could find on the market, rob one if you have to,

step two, take said trolly and ram the two big fuck off rubber doors leading to the staff area, until you reach the other side, there you’ll find two big yellow industrial lifts for access only to market traders, step three enter one big yellow lift, but only when the doors are open of course, then politely press basement button on the inside of the yellow lift, this will take you on a ride of a life time to the depths of market life, where all sorts of goings on occur, step four you navigate to the end of one of many corridors (full of market traders contraband) where there stands the metropolis,

the white palace was a giant walk in freezer where all deliveries were stored, and where a lot of dodgy deals were done,

So now I’m at the entrance of the freezer the temperature drops dramatically, and this is where the final step comes in handy, you get wrapped up in gloves hat and scarf and you go in hard and quick before the cold freezes your cock and ballocks off, you follow a list you’ve been given by one of the girls, and you fill your stolen trolley up with all sorts of frozen goodies, and then repeat all the steps in reverse till you are back at the stall, and you then unload and start filling the freezers, god what a fucking simple job, I’m thinking I’ll fit in very well here, the one small problem was Scouse paul, being only five feet two, he had developed little man syndrome, he also looked like hitler which didn't help, and he sure as hell acted like fucking hitler,

ONE WEEK ON

I've done my first week as a market trader, and I'm fully equipped to carry out all sorts of market duties, I'm well versed In market policies, and I've acclimatised to the fucking overwhelming stink of rotting fruit and veg, stale manky meats and the piece de resistance, fish and sea food which is the worst fucking smell of all, and it's supposed to be fucking fresh! What's that all about.

So after the initial week of gagging as I entered my work place I've finally settled into my role, and into my stomach,

and my next training session begins with the till, and once I'm up to scratch on that piece of equipment I will be let loose onto the public, and will be allowed to help out serving customers when busy,

as part of my interaction training I had to study my two mentors at work, little fucking hitler of course and Wayne, and I'm afraid to say if anything what this taught me was to be the complete opposite of these two fucking idiots when dealing with the public, because those two made me want to vomit, what with there awkward slimy and somewhat perverse banter, well not really Wayne, he was a mate, but he just looked so awkward and lost when talking to the public, using phrases for example like, "that will be five pounds chief", or me old china, even boss man, (I'm sure he did a nineteenth century course on how to speak) it was so robotic, anyway I chose a different approach, it was called flirting, no matter the age, or gender, but my other strategy was to try to avoid serving the men at all cost, and it served me well, I was getting loads of attention in those early days, plenty of female customers coming back on a regular basis, some maybe two or three times in a day, granted not one of those fuckers had a tooth in their head and all had blue rinse haircuts, accompanied by the obligatory walking frame or sticks, so my girlfriend really had nothing to worry about, that was until we were invited to an evening out with little hitler and his wife, believe me I did not want to go, but I was starting to enjoy my job, and at that time I would do anything to keep it, well as it turns out not anything!

THE MIND PLAYS GAMES

One Saturday afternoon a couple of months into my rein of market king, I was sat on a stool at the end of our stall just observing, it was a quiet period before the last shoppers arrive buzzing around for any bargains as it was the weekend, and their assumption was what is not sold today will be given away, unfortunately for most of our customers they neglected to factor in that we are a fucking frozen food company and the produce is fucking frozen and will stay frozen until Monday opening, as we do have a big fuck off freezer to store the food. And while I'm contemplating, I realised that the sweet shop man across the way to my left was not there anymore, but was substituted with a lovely blond girl, she was sat resting her elbows on the counter and her head was resting on her hands, and she seemed to be staring right at me, well I think a smile back is in order, and I did, I gave her my best cheeky smile, well this worked a treat, as she sat up straight and waved me over, I thought what harm could it do to go for a chat, but before a could stand Wayne walked past me straight to the girl, they embraced and kissed, well fuck me, I never thought I would see the day, Wayne Lewis with a beautiful girl, well any girl if I'm being honest, it seems they met recently when she was visiting her uncle, the sweet shop owner, they flirted and then they had recently started dating, and her smile and wave was definitely not for me, but for Wayne who had just walked up behind me, ah well I'll stick to the blue rinse brigade,

soon enough my thoughts drifted back to the night out that was arranged with little hitler and his wife, another scouser I believe, I hadn't met her at that point, but at the thought of it my arse started to twitch a little,

I had a bad feeling about the forth coming night, but I don't know why? and of course I had little choice but to go, so I put the thought to the back of my mind, until closer to the time.

,

THE TINY TOWEL

We should have left the moment the tiny towel fell to the ground, Scouse Tracy simulated shock, as she stood there infront of the two of us completely naked, just like in the movies, she fained embarrassment and moved her hands up towards her mouth, and a quiet whoops was released , her eyes looked up to the ceiling and with a sly smile appearing on her face, she spoke for the first time, "please sit down" we both were frozen to the spot, but finally in unison and with trepidation we sat, it was really more like hovering on the edge of their sofa,holding each other closely rather than sitting, but it was enough for mad Tracy to continue, she sat next to me naked of course, her leg rubbing mine, and she went into a long monologue about how she and Scouse Paul have been trying for a baby for sometime now, and going down the ivf route was so expensive, and of course that is the way they will go eventually, once they have exhausted all other avenues, and that is what had led to this predicament that my girlfriend and I are now in, I had think fast, how to get out of shagging my bosses wife while my girlfriend was waiting for me in the room next door, my next thought was how can I shag my bosses wife in the room next door with my girlfriends blessing, a third thought came just a millisecond later, how would I feel when my ex girlfriend never looks or speaks to me ever again? Another thought was how to get my girlfriend to join in , but as quick as all these thoughts came they went, and I just blurted out that I have had a vasectomy and could not father children, well my girlfriend was more shocked at this announcement than mad Tracy , she was sat there next to the two of us laughing hysterically, and Scouse Paul , who had now entered the room with drinks was crying and shaking with laughter, a fucking joke that was all it was! And mad Jackie being a bit of an exhibitionist, didn't mind showing a bit of flesh for a good cause, I would just like to point out she was not actually totally naked after all, she had on some sort of skimpy flesh coloured body stocking on, just about covering her special bits, but with added fake nipped and such, you get the picture, I feel this was a lot of effort for a quick laugh before drinks.

I have never seen my girlfriend friend down a bottle of wine so quickly, followed by vodka, & I must admit I was not far behind her,

suffice to say the meal that followed at the very posh beefeater restaurant kind of got lost in a sea of alcohol,

so the night did not go as well I thought it would, and for the next week at work I was the butt of many many jibes and jokes from the whole of the market fraternity, as Scouse hitler had a very loose mouth

STAFF MEETINGS

Friday afternoons were special in market trader's diary's, this seemed to be the day most of the traders had staff meetings, and the funny thing is it seemed to mostly the male staff that attended, now market frozen foods and v reasons and son always joined up for our meetings and like most of the other traders the meetings seemed to be held in the front bar of the lion hotel, this establishment was just behind the market hall and was a place for many a drinking session, and that is what these meeting essentially were,

Every Friday 5pm we all met up and had a few ales while discussing fuck all about fuck all, and we'd then say our goodbyes and grab a bite to eat on the way home to get a bath to scrub off the stink of the market and get your glad rags on for the obligatory Friday night on the town. Only this one Friday was different, the atmosphere was somewhat dark, it could be because their was a new sheriff in town, this sheriff came in the guise of a stuck up snobby bastard with a silver spoon sticking out of his gob, he was not only the new manager ( Scouse Paul either left or was pushed out, he quickly opened up his own stall ) he was also an accountant and a new part owner, he'd bought out the Reardon boys, they preferred the stink of the fish hall and had no time anymore for frozen food, anyway this prick had concluded after only a few week of observing, came to the decision that the stall did not need the services of all the staff that was currently on the books, so one member of staff had to go, and yes you've guessed it, that was me, the girls stayed as they were all part time, there was only Wayne and myself who were full time, and as the accountant dick was a friend and now partner of Wayne's dad, I didn't stand a fucking chance, so that Friday meeting, the pints were going down an the P forty five was handed out, and I officially ended my frozen food career in the lion hotel,

NOT QUITE THE END

Some weeks later I started up my own stall in the nicer part of the market, selling toiletries, perfumes make up cards etc, as you can imagine this did not go well, as I rushed headlong into it, without a plan or a fucking idea of how to run a business,

but run it I did, I ran it into the fucking ground, and I folded several months later,

so I guess another job is on the cards, and that's when I become a folk lift truck driver without a driving licence.