Eleven Plus Shopping

It is simply time to dream again.

You are in the supermarket with your family. Your children say to you:

“Mum we can do the shopping? You go and sit over there. Have a nice cup of tea and one of those cream cheese cakes you love. We will sort it all out.”

Your thoughts go round and round.

Is there something dodgy going on?

What do they want?

Can I trust them with my list?

How can we pay?

My feet do hurt. I would love a cup of tea and a cream cheese cake.

Then you say those fateful words:

“Oh all right then. Thank you. I will be over here.”

You sit down at the table and sink back into your chair. The tea is wonderful. The first nibble is squishy. You are in heaven.

You see an eleven plus paper sticking out of your child’s bag. With a sigh you pull it out and start looking at question 34 again. The answer in the back simply can not be right. A strange woman leans across and says: “We can’t do that one either. We think that the answers are wrong.” Two other mothers, also complete strangers, lean over.

“We tried that one last year. We could not do it. My husband and I had a fight over it.”

The other mother says: “I creased to be a yummy mummy when we tried that question. I got so cross that I wanted to belt my child. Of course the answer in wrong.”

The chat then moves in different directions. All five mothers are listening and talking at the same time. Your child runs up to you. He greets the other women and informs you that the shopping is finished and you have to go to pay. Before spinning away he glances at the paper and says: “I know how to do that now.”

There is a chorus from the assembled mothers. “How?”

My friend’s nine year old sister worked it out. It is a rotation as well as a transformation. See?”

One of the mothers says: “You are so lucky.”

Another says: “And they did the shopping!”

The third mother, the one whose child passed last year, asked: “But what did he want?”

The fourth mother remarked: “Out of the mouth of babes.”