Tackle Shop

My local tackle shop is so full of stuff that there isn't room for more than three customers at once. It is an intimidating place not just because of the smell of strawberry and coconut flavoursed maggots, but because you are expected to know what all those fascinating bits-and-bobs are for. After a few minutes I'm lost: I can't remember what I came in for and no longer know my Arlesey bombs from my coffins. My fellow customers, wearing full match gear with bibs and overalls, are curt and demanding, both grumpy old men. Could they be hiding the fact that they are simply out of their depths like me?

After ten minutes poking around carp boilies and pole rigs I was relaxing into the experience and almost remembered what I came for when the third customer entered. He was different. He was wearing a suit, and talking loudly into his phone. He bristled with agitation and didn't seem to know we were there. At the counter, and still on his phone, he asked for his order of worms.

YOU CAN ORDER WORMS? I was flabbergasted. The idea had simply not occurred to me. Until that epiphany I was sure that to get any worms you had to a) crawl round the lawn at night with a torch; b) turn over rocks and logs on the river bank or: c) dig your neighbour's allotment.

Calamity! The expected order of worms had not arrived. The "worm man" (I'm not making this up) was late. Customers One, Two and me had the pleasure of listening to Customer Three complaining down his phone while the shop owner talked to Worm Man on his.

It was a stalemate. Customer 3 was going ballistic and was obviously supposed to be somewhere else. Meanwhile his worms were stuck in a steaming white van on the A14. What could any of us say? I was about to offer him a spade and the use of my garden, but thought better of it.

Then I had one of my great thoughts. It could make me a fortune. If you can get all your tackle made up for you and even buy your worms; why not buy the fish as well!