A London alcoholic has had admitted that the person he was talking to knew far more about a topic than he did.
Dr Monkton of University College, London was seated on a park bench eating a Pret A Manger lunch, when Mr Jimmy Robertson of no fixed abode sat down next to him clutching a couple of bottles and declared: ‘So you’s think you know about people do yer?’
‘Obviously at this point I thought I knew exactly what was coming,’ recounted Dr Monkton. ‘I was already mentally preparing myself for an extended rant from this gentleman but then I thought, what the hell, let’s give it a try, and informed him that I was in fact a Psychology Lecturer at the University of London, that I’d written two PhDs and am the international expert in Freud and Jung. ‘Oh really?” replied Mr Robertson. ‘Well, then I should listen carefully to what you have to say, as you will know more about the subject than myself’.’
Jimmy went on to say that it was very difficult learning anything about human nature when you spend all day sat on a park bench with only the old and the unemployed for company and that the beer and whisky he drank in large quantities was having a generally negative effect on his critical faculties and was rendering it difficult to read about the subject in more depth.
‘I spoke to this man for over an hour,’ said Dr Monkton, ‘and gave him a brief overview of the subject and my area of academic interest. He listened carefully, took some notes and asked intelligent, focussed questions.’
Dr Monkton was so inspired by his debate with Mr Robertson that he wrote a paper about his experiences. Unfortunately, when presenting his findings to his Head of Department, he was told: ‘This is rubbish! Who do you think you are, you ponce!? Think you know so much just ‘cos you work in some ivory tower at University College? It makes me sick. Try going to the University of Life mate; that might teach you a thing or two about human nature, especially when someone lamps you one for being such a middle-class, know-it-all twat!’