How to start a fight! All you need is one ‘off’ potato

TIP NO 1: If you know how to start a fight or how one starts you are halfway to knowing how to stop it.

shopping cart

You find yourself in the supermarket in the queue when all of a sudden you are hit in the back by a trolley. You turn around and see a man whose trolley is still very close to you. You say you just hit me in the back and he says it barely touched you.

You have a back injury and the trolley caught you just where it hurts but you let it drop.

Then you see your potatoes are off so you tell the cashier that you are going to get another bag as you are still a way off it being your turn but low and behold when you come back the cashier has moved to another till and the back stabber has stolen your place in the queue. You say you were there before him but he says he waited but you took too long.

Then you say you took my place and you hit me in the back with your trolley.

You’re a bit angry now and in a big rush. He says he didn’t hit you with the trolley, and you say well it hurts. He says you’re exaggerating and he’s sorry but it didn’t hurt.

So now he’s an expert on how you feel and your body. Then he tells you (because he’s an expert on how you feel and has x ray vision) that you’re obviously in a bad mood today. You say no you’re not but you are in a rush and he says aren’t we all.  Of course now you really are in a bad mood, even if you weren’t before. It could go on for hours!

You let it drop but your blood is boiling not because you have been hit in the back, not because he stole your place in the queue but because he has the presumption to tell a complete stranger that he knows what you’re feeling, and because he hasn’t apologized.

Now you have a perfect alternative destination for those rotten potatoes, up his!≠≠≠≠≠!

Familiar? Or versions of? Hit a communication brick wall?

We’ve all seen these types of arguments between strangers, and between customers and staff escalate into massive rows in no time at all.

It is nigh on impossible and most of the time pretty pointless trying to get someone to change their view of a situation, especially by just telling them yours. You say patatoe and he/he says potato..

We just keep bashing out the same old tune.

Of course because you are in a rush you perhaps are not being very creative or humorous and you’ve allowed him to put your back up – no pun intended. Maybe you should have lain down on the floor writhing with pain. Then jumped up and said now that’s exaggerating – but of course you couldn’t because your back was hurting!