Every few days it would happen. Jimmy would buy his lunch from the café, put it in the fridge in the kitchen at work and come back at lunchtime to find that one half of his sandwich was missing. Not his crisps, his drink or even the odd apple – just his sandwich.
He had tried different fillings, even buying two sandwiches; it made no difference.
“Do you know what’s going here?” He said, one day to his friend Sheena. “I’ve tried everything. I’ve experimented with different fillings.”
“Really?”
“Yes, pickled onion and cheese. I even tried something really smelly like sardines.”
Sheena smiled and said nothing.
Jimmy thought about it for a few days and then hit upon the answer watching a TV program about rodents:
“To catch a mouse, you need a trap!”
The following day, having carefully set and buried a mousetrap in his sandwich, Jimmy found a hidden spot to lurk nearby.
Soon he heard the tell-tale ‘Snap!’ and a gasp of pain from the kitchen.
He strode in angrily to find Sheena with the trap caught on her fingers.
He was mortified.
“It’s not what you think,” she said.
“It can’t be anything else.”
“Let me explain. The pub? After work this evening?” she said. “Please?”
Jimmy sighed. “All right.”
“So,” he said, as they sat down in the pub later, “why did you do it?”
“Oh, Jimmy. If you must know, I really fancy you.”
“You have a funny way of showing it.”
“Yeah, I know – look. I did it because I wanted you to be just a little bit slimmer when I eventually shagged you.”
*
“You ever see that film?”
“Which film?”
“To Catch a Thief. You know with Grace Kelly.”
“What a beautiful woman!”
“I bet she never had sandwiches for lunch.”
“Sandwiches are for working people, like you, George.”
“I like to have a proper lunch at least two days a week,” said George. “I think the French have got that one right.”
“That may be the only thing they’ve got right.”
“As an Englishman, I have to consider that France is the Promised Land in so many areas. But then again, there is always Italy to consider.”
“Be’,” said Giorgio, considering the question, “France would be a better place if the French were not so superior in their attitude.”
“You Italians!”