Divine retribution.....

It takes many forms, and I'm sure we've all experienced it. But let's all take a collective sigh of relief and consider that there is NOTHING more satisfying that revenge that has been exacted on your behalf by forces out-with your control. Somebody slimy got their commupance, and you were there to love every minute of it...

I'm talking, of course, about divine retribution.

Now, I should point out that it doesn't happen daily, nor as often as you would wish. Nor does it usually happen to the people you actually really really really wish it would happen to - like uhm, that horrible man Mugabe. Y'know, the kind of people who exact massive death-tolls on their own people. Divinity would be hard pushed to find any form of casually inflicted retribution that would match their deeds. Death? I think not - it would just remove one evil, but there are a million wannabe sociopaths and dictators out there desperate to fill their shoes, and more than willing to sacrifice their own kin to achieve 'greatness'. Divine retribution doesn't exist in this lifetime for people like that... and I even doubt it exists in another lifetime for people like that.

No. I'm not talking about the kind of divine retribution that holy texts spout and promise, because they are part of an unknown, untested, unseen world I question even exists. But I do know this - there is some force of retribution that throws out anomalies that let us experience brief but wholly delightful moments of justice. And my divine retribution was, in a way, the most impeccably timed, perfectly executed revenge technique to rival the best Danny Ocean extravaganza. And I didn't plan a thing:

So it was, that in the year 2000, after a long and stressful journey across the Austrian Alps I had finally arrived at the hotel with my bus-load of guests. The fax number for the hotel had been busy on every stop (Of course, coaches don't have fax machines - chemical loos that smell of stale vomit, yes, fax machines, no), the mobile phone reception had been unavailable whenever I got a quiet moment to call, and I had eventually, after trying to call the hotel several times by payphone (Uh-oh, engaged tone...), contacted my boss instead - to pass on the message that could he please please please try to send the hotel the confirmation fax with guest numbers instead of me, because I didn't have time to keep trying to find a place to send a fax from every time we stopped, only to find the number was still engaged. Austria, it appears, does not have an abundance of fax machines. The hotel, it appeared, had left the phone off the hook.

Which meant nothing to the officious little weasel that managed the hotel. Austria, it is univerally accepted, has given the world many lovely things... alpine air (Switzerland has that too, to be fair), skiing (uhmmm, well, also available elsewhere), picture postcard views (yes, quite lovely), and ...the most humourless, pernickitous beauracrats this side of... well, Europe.

OK, so Britain has queues - and a pathological obsession with the weather. France has paperwork. In volumes. That breed... and spawn more volumes. Italy has an abundance of randomly allocated holidays at the most inopportune times. Spain has the longest lunch hours on record. Which is great if you hate your job, but not so great when your only break to do errands is a lunch time. Germany has efficiency that defies logic. "How is it possible that your train arrived before it departed?" "Who knows? But it was a German train..." The Netherlands have.... uhm.... OK, a slightly more relaxed approach to sex and drugs by the rest of European standards. Which just means the rest of Europe has to party there, doesn't it? Belgium has magnificent chocolate. And over 400 types of beer, and yet... it's an allegedly very dull place to live. HOW is that possible? Oh, and the Austrians have dour hoteliers with about as much tact or diplomacy as I have gymnastic skills.

And so the miserable bastard ignored my pleas of faulty phones and faxes and declared loudly that he may not even have enough rooms for my guests since I had failed to send him the DUPLICATE fax with all their details. Note, of course, that I say duplicate - he actually already had a fax with all the aforementioned details - my fax was just the 'confirmation' that such details were, in fact, correct. And, not content with letting me know he was going to make me feel utterly crap about the whole situation, he did it at full volume in front of all the guests. Making me look like a totally inept moron.

I'm no big arguer when it comes to public showdowns - in part because I hate to look like a nutcase, but also because I felt so utterly humiliated that he could imply it was all my fault if front of my guests. Had he not noticed that the phone had been suspiciously quiet all afternoon? Had he perhaps not considered it odd that my usual fax had failed to appear? And had he not thought about investigating why it had not appeared as per usual? Perhaps he had - and was too lazy? Or too busy? Or didn't notice? But he still had absolutely no reason to shout and berate and belittle me in front of my guests... and for that - I WAS LIVID with rage.

God, it would seem, had heard my thunderous rage. Literally minutes after the guests finally settled in their rooms (it would appear the hotel housekeepers, in their infinite wisdom, had considered the unconfirmed fax to be as good as any, and had went ahead and made the rooms regardless of Mr. Jobsworth) the hailstorm started.

It was then I noticed the gleaming sports car parked outside. A brand new, gorgeous cherry-red attempt at a man regaining his youthful vigour. A substitute, or an extension, of some aging loser's you-know-what. But who owned this gorgeous soft-topped vision of sportiness and vermillion? Who owned this homage to a man's futile lust for speed, women and uhm... a personality?

Why - Mr. Jobsworth, or course!

I can't even begin to describe how joyful those hailstones sounded upon the hood. Although I couldn't actually hear them for the storm itself, it's true - I just imagined the most delightful chorus of thuds and plinks and bashes and dings as the unusually large hailstones battered the sports car. When it was over, mere minutes later, Mr. Jobsworth was cradling his beloved. The bonnet looked like it had been attacked by a sledgehammer. The soft-top had been pierced by a few particulary vicious icy bullets. Mr. Jobsworth's eyes were red-rimmed and teary.

I smiled contentedly and went back to the bar.