The minature hero

This blog series is about my experiences volunteering at the Save the Children shop in Nottingham. To learn more about the characters that are mentioned in this blog please refer to earlier editions and in particular “How I started to Save the Children”.

Check out how to volunteer in a Save the Children shop in the “Give Time” section on this very website.

A quick one this week as my landlord dropped the rather immense bombshell that I have a month to find a new place to live.

Therefore I have to prioritise not ending up being homeless and having to spend my nights sleeping in the shop with nothing but a blanket of ragged clothes and a pillow of unwanted copies of Bridget Jones’s Diary.

T was excitable as usual. Not least because his beloved Ayr Utd Football Club will be facing Airdrie Utd this weekend. With all the excitement of a place in Scottish Division One for next season at stake. Live updates on all good football websites from 15.15 on Sunday.

His favourite customer of the week was a lady attending a theatrical soiree who spent over £40. I went to a theatre once, they wouldn’t let me enter but I thought it was a worth a try.

We also spent some time discussing the Sunderland fan’s who had popped in on their way down to Portsmouth to buy some fancy dress items for their Premier League match on Monday .

Most people stop on a long journey to spend a penny in the metaphorical sense but if they’re starting to take a break to spend a few pennies in a charity shop instead I’m all for it.

A man was left dissapointed by missing out on a Thunderbird’s rocket from the shop window that he had seen but yesterday. Not so much Thunderbird’s ‘are go’ as ‘are gone’ unfortunately.

Another lady brought enough children’s books to run her own small stall at a literary fayre at a bargainous £4.65.

My story of the week is without a doubt though the young family who spent a good while on the shop floor this morning.

Mother and daughter (about six or seven years old) stood examining the jewellery for some time.

Brother (about nine or ten) had the look of desperate boredom that I (and I liked to think most of the rest of the male population) have when compelled to shop with an all female entourage.

Eventually mother buys a pair of shoes and daughter a small jewell encrusted watch.

Daughter looks longingly behind me at minature gold clock behind me.

We tell the mother the price.

Daughter and mother enter long discussion about whether her pocket money can stretch to gold minatures in the current difficult financial environment.

Brother, clearly not standing for any more female indecision, walks over to me and plonks £2.50 on the cash desk.

“This is for my sister” he says and hands it over to his younger sibling.

What a minature hero.