Phone update: Nope.
Last night the girl at Safeway kept staring at me while we were queuing at the checkout. Personally, I can’t help notice these things, in fact I usually think someone’s staring at me when nobody is. She definitely was though.
What could it be? Had my double been on Australia’s Most Wanted the night before? Was there a security bulletin about me in the staff room? Wanted: Bowen, Daniel. Suspected terrorist and shoplifter. Approach with Caution! Were they looking out for me? I started to feel guilty. I hadn’t felt this guilty since the one and only time I was asked, in the same supermarket, to open my bag so they could look in. (I’ll tell you, that hasn’t happened once when I’ve been wearing a tie!)
She kept looking back at me. Uh oh, could it be she … Hey, don’t chat me up now, my wife’s here!
But she asked "are you somebody famous?" I don’t consider myself even the remotest bit famous. Okay, so my face is plastered over my web page to frighten away children and small animals, but the site is hardly setting the world alight, and I have yet to meet anybody I didn’t know who’s actually seen it.
I told her no. She looked again, and then said "don’t take this the wrong way, but have you heard of The Wiggles?" We’ve got a two year-old, of course we’ve heard of The Wiggles. There’s probably not a single parent in the country that hasn’t heard of them, despatched large amounts of money in their direction in return for their videos and CDs, and perhaps even taken offspring to their concerts.
"’Cos you look like Greg."
I look like Greg?! No way do I look like Greg! Sure, I can impersonate his slightly squeaky voice when I take the mickey out of his piss-weak magic routines ("Hello everybody, I’m Magic Greg" – it’s the only blot on an otherwise spotless performance), but I no more look like Greg than Greg looks like me. From a distance of three miles in a fog, as seen by a short-sighted eye-patched pirate, perhaps I do look like Greg. But seen by a checkout-chick from three feet away in a well-lit supermarket, no way.
So who was on Australia’s Most Wanted the other night, anyway?
