Joseph

The pasta's in the pot and I'm on the brink of cracking open a bottle of Casillero del Diablo - the makings of a lovely Friday night. With my housemates out on the town, I could finally enjoy a bit of me-time which might have also included a bit of weed and Netflix. Then the doorbell goes, at 7pm. "Who the f*ck is this?" I ask myself.

I open the front door and I'm greeted by a lanky, hairy, grinning hippy with a Oxfam jacket. Here we ****ing go. "Good evening, sir. I'm Joseph." He points to his nametag and smiles, establishing trust. "How are you today?" Today? It's 7 o'clock pal. It's pitch black. Modify your script. I wanted to just go, "Ugh, yeah I'm grand. F*ck off it's not my fault ISIS are recruiting children in Syria", but I didn't.

He continues: "Listen, I'm not here to give you a big speech - I know it's late - but are you aware of what's going on in Syria?" Ten minutes after promising not to give a big speech, he's still talking about Syria, without me saying a word. I'm there nodding away, trying not to laugh; not because the subject itself is funny, but because laughing would've been completely inappropriate and the thought of laughing is funny. He's also from Dundalk or Drogheda and I find that accent completely hilarious. "Every single day, ISIS are bombing areas like this." I think he meant areas of this size, not uptown Sandyford.

He comes to the end of his speech, and for the past five or six minutes I've had my excuse loaded, ready to fire on him. "Can we get you signed up then?" Here we go. "I'd love to, but me and the other half are struggling at the moment and we don't need the added pressure." There is no other half - the most romantic thing I would've done tonight is **** into a sock - but it makes them f*ck off sooner if it's not solely my responsibility. But he chalked this excuse off. "Well we're not asking for money now. It wouldn't come out until January 1st." He obviously purposely omitted this detail, in the expectation that I pulled out the "oh but I'm broke" excuse. "Yeah, you know, even still, it's just after Christmas and I don't know our financial situation will be like."

I've got him by the balls now. Surely him and his clipboard must f*ck off. "Well will you be able to afford a cup of coffee after Christmas?" he goes. "Well, yeah but...." He cuts me off, a bit rude like. "Well that's all it costs to sign up - the price of a cup of coffee." I'm getting a bit angry now, but I'm also polite. "No, we're going to leave it, me and my imaginery partner. I'm not keen on giving out bank details." He had something for this too. "Oh, well, we're not asking for sensitive information, just your bank account number and sort code." He literally said that. "That's as sensitive as my glans, Joseph. I'm afraid the answer is still a resounding NO." I didn't say that last bit.

The good news is that he went away eventually. The bad news is that my kitchen looked like a foam party when I returned because the pasta had over boiled. But this chap, this Joseph, put a downer on my night a bit. Why is it acceptable to bother people on a Friday night? Why is it then acceptable to try bully them into supporting a cause?