Wherever He Laid His Hat Was His Home

Shopping Trolley gets around. One moment he's in the Magic area, pushing himself past Kroxan, and then he's down by Eroski, lurking under the branches of pines by the Platja d'Or. Not far, in this latter instance, from where Doggo is getting out the ghetto-blaster in the warm early March sun; he'll be bending balloons before we know it. Shopping Trolley must have a good fifteen bags; I underestimated the amount when I mentioned him before. Fifteen, could be more. One of them has a TV in. He was seen watching it once; it had been plugged in to an outside socket. Perhaps he looks for one such when he comes to pitch his tent at night: after all, a chap needs a reliable electricity supply to watch the telly before turning in for the night. The trolley itself has to be pretty sturdy. All those bags. It must take some pushing as well. I once saw him in the old town, just by the church. If he'd ventured up there along the cemetery road that would have been a push and a half - all those bags, some with household electrical goods in them: if only there was a house to hold them.

I used to think that Doggo, the Local Colour, wasn't a Man of Ideas, but I've had to revise that. Last couple of times in Eroski I've seen him handing over coins in return for cans of beer. He is incomprehensible, which is part of the definition of a Man of Ideas. At least the dog seems to know what's going on. I certainly don't. Every time he speaks to me, I haven't a clue. Shopping Trolley though. No, I don't think he has Ideas. I've not seen him with a drink. If he were going to have one, then you'd reckon he'd crack open a can when he was watching the telly, but seemingly not.

A while back there was someone begging by Eroski, someone who had moved in on Doggo's manor. I only saw him once. Maybe there's some honour in this alternative world. Shopping Trolley once took a seat by the sports shop, the one with the Mallorca triathlon beach towel, but that's kind of on the periphery of Doggo's patch. He would have to wait for an invitation to come into Doggo's territory probably, and if he got one it might be by mobile phone. Or maybe Doggo just talks into a phone with no credit. That would seem about right. Not that I wish to do him down. It could be that the phone works, but speaking to an empty mobile with no-one on the other end would be the epitome of Man of Idea-dom. Perhaps Shopping Trolley hasn't got a mobile; put it this way I've not seen him with one. There again, I've not actually seen the TV; I was told about that.

Eroski seems to have got a manager. Well, there's a bloke working there where there used to not be one. A few years back, there used to be another bloke who was obviously in charge, or maybe thought he was. He used to shout after tourist kids who were running in the aisles, and he'd follow men of bellydom to make sure they didn't nick anything. Then he disappeared. No more Mr. Manager; that was in the days when it was still Syp. And for all this time, it has been almost completely female-run. No-one seemingly in charge, a sort of co-operative non-hierarchy that somehow worked; well, usually. But now there's this chap. You might think he would get tough, but appears not to. Doggo was there next to me in the queue yesterday morning, rambling on about something to me, or was it to the checkout girl, or maybe it was to the ceiling. Doggo's dog was sniffing around the checkouts and the café as well. I thought this manager chap would be bound to kick him out; the dog anyway. Said nothing. At least the girls at the checkout don't pick the dog up and give him a cuddle now though.

Maybe I have this all wrong. A few minutes later, Doggo was talking to a chap making a delivery. Maybe he's the manager. No, can't be. And as I drove away, there was Shopping Trolley, sitting. Sitting like he sits all the time, except when he's pushing the trolley. And when he sits, he just stares. Every day, just sitting, the bags of different colours and different sizes mounted on his trolley, tied to each other and to the trolley sides. Just sitting and pushing.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Arcade Fire, "In The Backseat" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpikhegY-Vs). Today's title - one of the great Motown songs, not that the group responsible were that keen on it.

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