Manchester Psychedelia/Maintain A Comfortable Distance

I’d not ventured into Manchester for a while, and so I remedied that one day last week, making the trip with my wife. My timing, as usual, was off.

Throughout the afternoon the rain came and went – but when it came it was torrential.

Scurrying between the covered sanctuaries of bus station and shopping centre, once we reached the latter I saw a store there that I’d never spotted before:

Row upon row of sunglasses, and the shop was absolutely packed with customers.

You’ve got to love Mancunian optimism.

Located near to the toilets, I was waiting for my wife who, you know, needed to go, and someone queuing for the shades-shop took his place right beside me. He was almost stood on my toes.

I used to have an acquaintance who was a spiritual medium, and if ever we encountered each other he would stand close to me -like real close, as we spoke. Have you ever had that uneasy feeling when someone’s invading your personal space? It was like that. Wary of hurting his feelings, I used to fight the compulsion to take a step back to a more comfortable distance.

My wife suspected that his habit of standing so close to me was due to his sexual orientation, I was more paranoid about him trying to pick something up from my aura.

Naturally enough.

You can’t swipe left for that kind of thing.

As I didn’t know this particular shopper I owed him no favours, and so I stepped away just as my wife emerged to sweep me up and carry me in her path from shop to shop to shop.

When I was both emotionally and financially spent, we set off once again for the bus station. On the way we passed by the entrance to the Printworks, and glancing inside I spotted the new ceiling that I had read about. Apparently it’s the largest digital ceiling in Europe, but as we had to get back we had no time to experience it fully, and so I just took a photograph of how it appeared at that moment.

Very psychedelic, don’t you think? Imagine spilling out of one of the bars on a Saturday night into that. You’d think your drink had been spiked for sure.