The work day finally over, he was happy to just plop himself down, on the too soft couch, for some well deserved telly time.
Ian had few very well established joys in his life. ‘I am not a sophisticated man.’, he would reply when asked about his hobbies, of which he had none.
Seeing the distrusting looks he would often feel the need to add: ‘Too busy working you see! No time for anything else except for surviving!’
Maybe what most confused Ian’s interlocutors was his air of contentment. For sure nobody can be content just with watching TV, working and surviving.
‘Do you travel?’
Usually this was about time when Ian started to shut out the conversation and turned his attention to preparing dinner in his mind, or compiling a shopping list.
‘Not so much to be fair.’, Ian was an expert at showing his distraction, which was quite genuine, and this more often than not led to the end of the dialogue.
Ian picked up the remote and turned on the TV. He did not have a plan, he would just flick through the channels until something caught his attention.
For a few minutes he watched some Most Ridiculous clips with people attempting to do sports and failing painfully.
‘Quite ridiculous!’, Ian muttered to himself watching people fall over and over.
Then he watched a bit of news, but it was all so bad that he felt compelled to change the channel.
Ian then took a break to make himself a mug of tea, he hadn’t used cups in ages.
Then back in position on the couch relaxingly surfing the channels.
He stumbled over a strange show of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? with identical twin contestants. That was odd! If he hadn’t seen that it actually was Chris Tarrant presenting, he would have thought it was a prank.
Ian enjoyed watching old game shows, he liked the look of them, the clothes the people wore, their attitude, somehow they seemed a bit more authentic then, nowadays everybody is a star in the making.
The twins Ian catches are at the £16,000 pounds questions. The look of it all is so unusual that he sticks with the channel. As it happens the questions are quite interesting also, and Ian finds himself playing along with the contestants.
They quickly get up to the £250,000 pounds question: Queen Victoria’s father was …
Ian does not know, the twins don’t know, but they can call a friend, Ian could check his phone, but he does not want to, he enjoys the thrill of the game.
They call one of the twins’ wife. She knows, she sounds confident. Ian goes with her too.
‘You have won £250,000 pounds!’
They are happy, Ian is giddy.
‘Now, for the £500,000 pounds question, which you can choose to answer or not.’
‘Which American president’s wife had the same maiden name as her married name?’
Ian is sure he knows this, somewhere in his mind he has stored this at some point. He waits for the options.
‘William McKinley’
No…
‘Lyndon B. Johnson’
No…
‘Richard Nixon’
No…
‘Franklin D. Roosevelt’
Yeesssss!
Ian is 100% sure, Roosevelt, he does not know the name of the lady, but he is sure of it.
The twins are not, they chat about it, they say it might be Lyndon B. Johnson, but they are just not sure, they will take the money.
‘And rightly so! The correct answer is not Lyndon B. Johnson, but Franklin D. Roosevelt married to Anna Eleanor Roosevelt. You have won £250,000 pounds! Congratulations!’
Ian is even happier, he won £500,000 pounds! Not a bad day at the office, he chuckles to himself later on while going up the stairs to bed.
‘The day I won £500,000 pounds! One for the books!’
Ian slept like a rock and the next morning he woke up, went to work, all the time pleased with himself and with his virtual win.
‘What would I do if I did have £500,000 pounds?’, nothing came to mind.
‘Not much, but I am sure I would think at something!’
‘Travel?’
‘What’s for dinner?’
Simple life :-)