Covert Cheryl

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It's Sunday Scribblings time again! This weeks word is Covert .

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I’ve got this friend called Cheryl. She’s got several jobs including one as a Special Needs teacher at my school. She also works behind the bar at the Bicycle Arms a couple of sessions a week, but the reason I’m telling you about her is that she also has a little job as a Mystery Shopper! You know, those sneaky covert people who walk into businesses pretending to be a customer when they are actually doing a secret appraisal of their hapless victim.

When she first told me about it I imagined her disguising herself by wearing a false beard and stuffing a cushion up her shirt in case she got recognised, but they usually send her far away from home so it can’t happen.

I thought she would get a voicemail which started "Your mission, should you choose to accept it..." But she doesn’t. She just gets phone call asking to go here or there and pretend she need a new cell phone or something.

She gets all manner of assignments. I get to go with her sometimes. The other day I went to a shoe shop with her and a few weeks ago we tried a restaurant! What A great job!

The funniest one was a weekend at an upmarket camp site. She had to take two friends with her for a whole weekend and stay in a holiday home which looked like a trailer but it didn’t have any wheels. Julie made up the three of us.

Soon after we got settled in Cheryl filled out her forms about the reception we got, the cleanliness of the home, what we thought of the bar and those sorts of things. Then it was time to party!

She popped down to the village and got some essential supplies. Cheryl came back with a take-out Chinese meal, chardonnay, champagne and chocolate (Gosh look at all those words beginning with ‘ch’! Ch ch ch ch ch - I sound like a steam train!)

A couple of hours later a party was in full swing. We turned the music up, (maybe a little too ‘up’) and that attracted a couple of guys who persuaded us to let them join in. Actually they were Australians and one of them was called Steve just like Whitesnake – you know, the bloke that leaves sarky comments at the bottom of my posts?

Anyway they brought some grog with them, a case of long necks, and in no time at all they were zonked. Then there was a bang on the door. Steve opened it and there was a sheila outside. She was a bit of a grizzle and told us to go bite our bums. Steve said she was bloody galah but probably bangs like a dunny door!

The upshot was that in the morning we were asked to leave the site. Not surprising really! I asked Cheryl if she’d get the sack, but she said of course not because the site owners thought she was a private customer. Between us we filled in the remaining forms, guessing about the standard of things like the entertainment, the swimming pool and the shop so her boss thought we'd stayed all weekend! How naughty! We had a ball and Cheryl got paid! Reeeeesult!
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