We arrived home late from our sojourn up in the frozen North. The good lady was a little quiet and introspective. It hadn't been the best visit. Her family is a large one and a great percentage of them are somewhat difficult.
As we dragged our stuff in from the car I asked if she was ok.
Well. if I had could have seen the future I wouldn't have bloody bothered going up.
I sympathised and bustled around to make her a cup of tea. Tea solves every ailment in the UK. As I watched the kettle boil her words played in my head.
If I could have seen the future...
It took me back a number of years. To when I was in my twenties. A slightly naive young lad gadding about the world. I had left Uni and gotten a job. The novelty of getting wages paid to me every month was still quite new.
It was a Saturday and I was going out for an early afternoon session of beer madness before going to a Metal gig. I had arrived in town a bit earlier than all my mates and I had half an hour to kill. Not one to sit in a pub playing with my podger, I walked around town for a bit to pass some time.
After a few minutes, I walked past a sign.
I stopped. Hmm. Should I have my fortune told? I checked my watch, plenty of time so sod it, why not!
I went inside the doorway where the sign was and wandered up a flight of stairs. A door had a handwritten sign.
Madam Maura - World Famous Psychic - in here.
The door pinged as I went in. I was in a small anteroom. It was empty with a few chairs dotted about. I was about to take one when another door opened and a slightly plump lady in lots of black flowing clothes stood there.
Are you here for a reading with Madame Maura?
She sounded quite breathy as if she was awfully horny or was having an asthma attack. I nodded. Suddenly feeling a little shy.
She made a pouty face and beckoned me into the inner sanctum.
I went in and sat where I was bid across a table. The lady in black wafted over to the other side.
Now love. Are you interested in a reading?
Erm yes.
She looked extremely satisfied as if she had known that this would be the case. She read out a list of prices. Some of them were mind-bogglingly expensive to a young man of my means.
I selected the cheapest one, a tarot reading.
She looked extremely disappointed. She pulled herself back from it though and pulled out a giant deck of cards. She then bade me choose what seemed like fucking hundreds of them.
She laid the ones I had chosen out in a cross shape, scattering some at random and started turning them over.
You have a girlfriend yes.
She looked at me knowingly.
Why, yes, yes I do.
Except I didn't. I totally did not have a girlfriend, I didn't really want to admit that to her though. Possibly because I was a young guy and she an older, exotic woman and I wanted to look all James Bond'y in the hope that she would suddenly just grab me and shag me to death.
The next ten minutes were a stramash of increasingly wrong assertions about my current situation and how it was going to pan out. Eventually, having learned that this girl, who didn't exist, was most likely the one and that we would have several children whilst being quite financially secure the session came to an end.
Despite it all being horseshit, I was slightly distressed at the sheer mundanity of it all. Where were the dark deeds? The blood and the intrigue?! Knife fights and rooftop chases!? Foolish Maura.
She smiled.
That will be fifteen pounds then my lovely.
Of course, of course.
I pulled out my shiny visa card.
Oooh, we don't take card love?
She made a squeee face as if her pee-pee was nipping a bit.
Oh, bugger. I didn't realise.
That's ok love. There is an ATM just downstairs. Just go get the cash and pop back up. That's no problem.
Phew, cool. No worries.
I got up and left to get the cash and thanked her profusely as I did for the sheer bilge she had spouted at me. I exited the building and squinted in the sunlight. There it was beside me. The ATM.
I looked at it, then I looked behind at the sign for Madame Maura. I looked at the ATM again. A sleekit snake of a smile formed on my face.
Ah fuck it, I headed away to the pub without going to the ATM. As I walked away, I couldn't help but think.
Didn't see that in the cards did ye love.
oh, bad boomie! But what a dope to not have had a sign that said cash only! On the other hand, perhaps she detected your ruse in the cards, so that's why you got the mundane and did not hear of dark deeds, blood and intrigue!
But on yet another hand, sounds like she got it all just right...your lovely lady, a few children, financial security...sounds kinda familiar ;-)
Hahahaha, she did hint of such things but said they were to be with the current girl! What an easy one to guess though looking at the fine piece of man beef that had walked into her chambers :OD
These ads used to play here in the United States back in the day all the time.
HAhahah, thats quite hilarious. I dont think we have ever gone as far as that kind of thing in the UK!
The commercials were on all the time to where they were making fun of it on Saturday Night Live and stuff and I think she ended up getting sued for false advertisement or something and then the commercials weren't on the air anymore. It was pretty crazy!
She never seen that comin! :OD
Hi @meesterboom! You have received 0.1 SBD tip + 0.02 SBD @tipU
from @dswigle :)
Check out new tipuvote! feature :)
Maybe you had decided you had received exactly what you had paid for. Lol!
That was my thinking!
Hahahaha! I practically choked myself laughing!
Smashing!
LOL! If I didn't know you better, I'd think that was a bit sadistic. LMAO! :P
Hehehe, Yeek, it does a bit!
Just 'sassin' ya' my friend ... still loves me my @meesterboom! LOL~
Lol, I knows that lass!! :OD
That's because she was playing the odds. It's one of the standard tricks of the trade: combined with portentous-sounding vagueness, it makes a handicapper's guess appear to be prophecy.
One other trick (I read about this from a reformed ex-'psychic'): there's a network of those folks, and each keep files on their regulars. They share these files with each other. Consequently, a "client" seeks a reading from a psychic (s)he's never met and he knows "all" about her!
Ah now that info sharing trick is plain sneaky!!
Yeah, I had known about that kind of vague statement type of thing waiting for the rube to jump on it and say yes yes, I did have an aunt who was a woman and had a dog once! It was just unfortunate for her that I was such a ridiculous liar because I didnt want to look like a loser lol!
Oh no! How could you? Were you not afraid of karma? Maybe it was reversed karma! Maybe you were supposed to have a girlfriend by then, but the universe knew you would not pay the poor lady, so it took the girl away from you!
Guess it turned out well for you in the end anyway, but still...
Hehe, if any of it had been accurate. Even the littlest thing I would have paid but from the moment I confessed to an imaginary girlfriend it all went on based on that. I was practically a virgin. I got quite drunk on the money :0)
Well atleast you've got a good case against fortune tellers :D
I would try one again!! Hopefully for a better time lol
I've never been to one. I don't really believe in stuff like that, so for me, my lack of social skills would just turn the whole situation very awkward!
I do think you should definitely visit one again some day! Either to do an extra test, or just to give us more juicy stories ;-)
I don't believe either, I did really want to be convinced though!! hehe. I will do :O)
Boom! I bet she didn't see that coming! Oh, my God.
I totally laughed my butt off. You are such a bad boy. Hahaha!
I think you deserve a tip! for still doing well in life despite shafting the future. ;)
Lol, why thank you very much! Sometimes you gotta be bad to be good! Thats what I tell myself each day :o)
:) Haha! I hope you don't share that one with the little lady!
Boy,
Well, Sbe asked a half affirmed question, and you just might have taken her bait,
Sbe might have been telling you of a woman that you could ligetmently shagged that night lol, if you only spoke the truth....then not paying the reader...you naughty boy! Lol,
I predict you will end up meeting the card readers daughter as she passes over your head in a mosh pit.
You will recognize her, she will have #18 tarot in her hip pocket.
;)
L
Ah the daughter!! She was setting me up all these years down the line!! Well I am game! :OD
Ok...now your going to have that dream come true.
Treat her right and she will make sure you are full after your Pints with your mates;)
She cooks up some hot & spicy fish&chips*
I sees it coming! Its written!! :OD
Hahaha, she knew... that's why she didn't warn you about any of the trouble you'd get into at the pub that night. She knew you'd never pay so made up the most mundane things she could....
It is amazing that not only the fortune teller industry ever started, but that it caught on and still exists today.... they must know something about the future mental capacities of mankind. We might be in trouble.
They know about the gullibility of mankind that's for sure!
I would be surprised if she knew how to get out of her own clothes at night!
Excellent story dear friend @meesterboom, I caught his story from beginning to end, how it could deceive the wise guy, apparently did not anticipate the future at all, to do so I would have warned not to run away with the money of the payment of the section of letters. Everything suggests that you were terrible as a young man
At last I hear someone who has been ridiculed by wise people, usually I hear laments that have lost money in reading letters and nothing is ever fulfilled.
Congratulations dear friend, I wish you a wonderful evening
Thank you for stopping in @jlufer!! It was quite the thing. It just goes to prove the power of this particular one! Or lack of, lol
How the letters didn't tell him you weren't going to pay him. Hahahahahaha
I know, that will learn him!!
The number of times I've had this confusion. Might explain all those slaps across the face. They were weak slaps. Hard to use force when you can't breath.
Hahahahah! I know, so ineffectual! lol
How do you do your awesome title photos? They rock!
I cut a potato in half and rub it on my chin before burying it in garden at midnight ;O)
Lol, just a mix of android apps and magic!
Hahaa, you had me cracking at so many parts in this, that classic British sense of humor.
Love it, it's quite impressive that you actually manage to post every single day and they seem consistently hilarious, daily doses of @meesterboom!
We should grab a beer if you ever find yourself in Paris one day!
Every day, it's mad. It really is. Cheers. I will remember next time I am there!
How come she didn't see that coming? I was just about to write regarding what you could've done, and I am pleased to find that it's exactly what you have done. Oh, Boomfield, this is why I never question why we get along so famously. I would've done the exact same thing!
I like how you diverted our attention to the story about the fortune teller. We never even knew if your good lady liked the tea or hated it. Did she sip it in one go or let it linger until it became cold? Were scones involved? What was the exact cause of her malaise, and did the liquid cure it? So many questions! But, like the esoteric madam, it's all shrouded in mystery. Good one, bro-nado! Again, something that I would've done as well haha!
I can never put one past you because you would do exactly as I would!!
Here's hoping that it is just us that think this way and it's not everybody.
She liked the tea ;0)
That's the hope! Or else we won't get any views on our posts anymore haha!
I'm glad she liked the tea :D Tea solves everything. Bad day, world hunger, running out of gas..
Hope you're not considering having your fortune told again, Mr. Boom. She may come back and haunt you! She probably saw you stiffing her in her crystal ball! lol
She's never saw a thing!!
I wish I could have afforded a more expensive reading now hehe!
She should have said that you'd have that in the future, in a "close" future and it wouldn't have been utter bulls*hit ain't it? haha. Poor Madame Maura, maybe her mystical magical eye was a little clouded, maybe that's why she was al breathy? hmmmm
I think the breathiness put me all in the wrong footing!! Hehe
FIFTEEN pounds???!!! My cheap soul cannot get past this.
It was so expensive at the time!! And that was the cheapest one!!
I've met plenty of charlatans in life, but I have met a few that made me change my mind about "physchic" possibilities... When I was contemplating going into the arts for instance, someone I never met before stopped me in the streets and said, you need to go to the artacademy and walked off, 2 weeks later I was at the last call for for artists at the last academy still accepting applications for the imminent new school year in the Netherlands... And I actually got in...
In this case, with her spouting hogwash at you, I think it's fair enough you pulled out the "free card" though.
What are your spiritual views? Do you think we are all connected and all part of a larger organism? (Like cells in a body) Or all individuals having a singular YOLO experience?
See thats cool I like hearing about things like that. It makes you believe there is something more.
Sometimes I like to believe that there is something, some force of some kind that connects all and everything and is capable of things we cannot comprehend... Other times I think its a load of shit and there is nothing out there beyond the cold reality of our dull and dead lives :OD
Uncle Boom has been around for a long time, hasn't he.
Even in his youth, he was screwing the poor, downtrodden, and needy [greedy?]
Hahah, you are right there!!
perhaps her odd facial expressions were the result that she foresaw " the accident?"..... lol
Lol, maybe more likely she foresaw us making the streaky bacon!!
I would absolutely LOVE to hear a new stint at Madam Maura's in the 'today' world of the good MB. You would no doubt mess with her predictive sensibilities till the cows came home to roost. It would be the stuff of legend. Or make her quit the biz and take up selling life insurance or timeshares.
I would probably put the moves on her and turn everything she did into a flirt until I got thrown out lol!
LOL - Great way to avoid that whole 'you owe me some coins now' dilemma. Then again, she might like it, and propose. Then you gotta explain it it all to the family. That might be awkwards...
If no, I can imagine my dad's face of I married a fortune teller!
But just think, she could support you. You could hang up the spats and green visor, retire...and work full-time as a humourist.
laughed really hard at the exotic woman shagging you to death! LOL Your stories really crack me up. Thank you.
Hehe, yer welcome. Its those mad things you think when young. That fervent hope that she will just throw herself at you and you will have to give in!
wow that's a little disturbing for me, wouldn't try that
Personally i like this story, and blog so good. all the best my dear
Good on ya!
wow! what a story beautifully written. you have got a unique pen style . I loved reading it. thanx for sharing.
I shall spank you roughly with my hand and a glint in my eye
And this is why I read your posts all the way down to the last commenter. It's like watching the movie until the credits have all run then getting to see the bloopers.
Hehe, sorry, I just noticed this one! Yes indeed, its a shame they languish at the bottom! :OD
Very nice story...thanks for sharing this with us.
For some sharing is a burden for me it is a gift. Although usually it's my jizzum I share. So that is a bit different
Tea solved every ailment in the U.K
Hahahaha really my goodness ah so if I keep having tea in the UK I don't get any problems?
Amazing write sir, hahaha
Every problem!! Solved!
Give me a cards :)
I deal a mean hand! :O)
Good read ^^. Thanks for sharing
nice post thanks for sharing
i give this post my best post for today
The best one!!
I had a look at your comments. You say this a lot, so sssshh. This flag won't hurt a bit. You will just feel a bit of a prick..
Cheers