ULTIMATE MUG DYNAMICS

This was on my desk this morning.

Sorry about your cup. I broke it. The Cleaner George.

Louise says I should break something of theirs to get even. Well despite the fact that the cup was made for me by my friend Emmie and was uniquely personalised as a thermodynamically suitable receptacle for hot drinks, and is/was an item of which I am very fond, I'm not about to go about snapping mops in half or trashing the cleaning cupboard.

Neither will I be goaded by people quoting 'an eye for an eye' at me, thank you very much.

Actually, despite the fact that 'The Cleaner George' broke my favourite mug, I'm quite pleased that he left this note. Confession is good for the soul, after all.

It's written in an interesting fashion. He clearly started by writing...

Sorry about your cup

which is the central message. He didn't have to write anything at all. The Cleaner George could easily have remained anonymous and my cup could have simply 'disappeared' in a disappointing mystery. I'm glad I know what happened to it.

Then as a sort of afterthought, he must have written

I broke it

... by way of explanation. After all, until that point I would only have known that he was 'sorry about it' - which could have meant anything from selling it to some travelling cup-merchants to accidentally lobbing it into the lake. There's no mystery with the real explanation though. The Cleaner George explained its fate in three humble words.

What happened next was that he looked at this hastily scribbled note and realised that it looked a bit sheepish without revealing the culprit. So he signed it.

The Cleaner

And then thinking about it, his name:

George

Well done George. I might write back.