You know you’re a townie when…

One of my favourite sections of the Self-sufficientish forums is 101 Things, which currently has a thread on “You know you’re townie when…”

The thread really fired the imaginations of the Other Half and I as we’ve lived in both cities and the countryside.

We spent quite a long time over dinner remembering real moments that defined people as townies.

You know you’re a townie when:

1. You’ve never seen a star.
2. You think nothing of paying £4 for a pint of beer.
3. Going to the Beach means trying the new club.
4. You believe in Heaven - it’s the gay club down the road.
5. The local park is nature and nature is best avoided after dark.
6. You have several dozen home-delivery menus next to the phone.
7. You’re suspicious when strangers smile at you.
8. You’re on first name terms with the police at your local nick - as a victim of crime.
9. You have the business cards of six detectives stuck to your fridge.
10. You’re pleased when your suburb gets three mentions on Crimewatch for street robbery - house prices will be on the up because six months ago it was a murder and a race riot.
11. You get the taxi to the gym.
12. You spend £50 buying groceries - to take back to the office for lunch.
13. Your door has two locks, a spyhole, a chain, a security camera and a multi-bolt mechanism that takes 10 minutes to de-activate.
14. The horn button on your car is worn smooth.
15. Your 4×4 has low-profile tyres.
16. The only dirt to touch your hiking boots is dog dirt.
17. Half a dozen flakes of snow fall and the whole place shuts down amid screaming panic.
18. You complain about hosing down your garden - it’s a scrap of bitumen with a few pots.
19. You work in an office, but after taking the tube, train or bus home you find you have black lines inside the collars and cuffs of your shirts.
20. You keep £20 and a couple of cancelled credit cards in an old wallet for street robbers, then hide your real cash and credit cards in different pockets.
21. Fashion matters.
22. Sex is either a perfume or a band - but you can’t remember which.
23. You keep half a brick in an odd sock under the bed.
24. Your car has never been out of third gear.
25. You’re on nodding terms with the flower lady at the bus stop - after five years.
26. You see more of the flower lady than you do of your wife.
27. You stand next to Elvis Costello at the urinal in a pub - and think nothing of it.
28. A London specific one - you step over people when they collapse and die on the Tube. Saw this happen three times.
29. Mercedes is the transexual in your local pub.
30. Nobody talks to Mercedes, not because they’re bigoted but because s/he is a registered informer.
31. You’re within walking distance of three Tescos, an Asda, a Sainsburys and a Morrisons - but they never have what you want.
32. Despite being within walking distance of six supermarkets and a high street, you still drive to them - it’s cleaner and safer.
33. When you meet your neighbour Derek at the station, you rush home and check the locks. He’s out on licence.
34. You’re not surprised when you’re at the local playpark with your toddler and one of a group of teenagers pulls out a handgun to show his mates.
35. As a foreigner in a street full of foreigners you still stand out as a member of a minority - you’re the only white person.
36. On a dark night with the streetlights largely out, you can still tell whether the bloke on the other side of the street has a mobile phone, a knife, a gun or just a hand in his pocket.
37. Phishin is something you do on the computer.
38. Fresh air smells weird when you do go to the country.
39. You believe the BBC is representative of Britain.
40. You’re horrified to discover than eggs come out of chickens’ bums.

Any more?