Boyz

@ boyz the staff are unapologetically rude, or camp as a row of tents. The customers seem happy to pay for the privilege of being treated disdainfully: I imagine it's a novel experience for most of them.

This side of the peninsula is home to the dilettantes; the weekenders who "go antiquing" even though all the legitimate traders are long gone. In their wake lie frock shops and cafés, a few workaday book/toy/homewares stores, and the neverending parade of "Where shall we go for (insert meal/beverage of choice)?" in designer jacket, designer jeans, designer sneakers/knee-hi boots, scarf, sunglasses and hat of choice (baseball caps are oddly popular). It's the ubiquitous don't look at me I'm a celebrity style that anyone who wishes they were anyone cultivates.

Of course, most of these morons weekenders eveaporate over Sunday afternoon, to be replaced on Monday morning by yummy mummies in gymwear pushing bugaboos and bemoaning their centimetre of regrowth (where do YOU think?).

Where oh where have the normal people gone?
But that's the problem: why be normal when you can be famous? Why behave like a nobody, venturing out without the camoflage of supersize sunnies and hat, when that gets you nowhere?

I quite like being nowhere. There's reassurance in being anonymous- for instance, I've only been waiting twenty minutes for my newly arrived hot chocolate. But now it's here, undeniably improved by my anticipation. Is this our problem? We're so accustomed to instant (and continual) gratification that our hedonism knows no bounds. More, better, different, NOW. We stuff our faces and our senses in search of that first thrill, which we could replicate if only we starved ourselves a little first. Desired, imagined, anticipated, realised.

I still haven't begun my chocolate. I've eaten one marshmellow and am assisting the other to melt. A little preliminary stirring, then some froth inhalation, I think. And finally, a sip of the real deal. Oh, delayed gratification never tasted so good. Sorry, I have to get my hot chocolate on... Or possibly get it on with my hot chocolate.