Legal but under suspicion?

Picture this: It's a quiet Saturday night in my hometown of Coleshill. My best friend Ray has just driven me (for the first time) to Sutton for a scrummy meal, and we have retired home to a local pub to wile the last few hours of the night away, in a happy, friendly place.

Glass of wine in hand, me and my Boo chat away, when suddenly the door bangs open and a fierce looking police officer marches in and demands to see our IDs. He is ruthless; studying our driving licences as though I had just told him I was 85 and President of Geneva. Then he proceeds to scrutinise every aspect of our being - our hair colour, eye colour, height, chosen attire for the evening, and even enquires about my tattoo. And the whole time this farce is going on, the entire pub watches with bated breath. Atrocious, mortifying, simply humiliating...

Ok, so maybe it didn't happen exactly like that. The cop was actually only a few inches taller than me, and was more than friendly when asking about our ages, but still, you get the point.

I will say this again as I said it last night (27/11/10) : I have no problem being asked to prove my age. Hell, I'm not stupid, I'm aware I look 15 on a good day, and - having worked in the pub trade since I was 16 - I'm also aware that plenty of youngsters look far older than they actually are these days. I'd ID myself if I didn't know any better! But what I do object to is having my details taken - and in great detail at that - in front of a pub full of my friends and colleges, when I have already proved that I am twenty-one.

It really was a tad embarrassing, and everybody was looking and laughing - I genuinely did feel as though I was doing something wrong, and it certainly looked that way to everybody else. Silly as it sounds, I was a bit miffed at being treated like a criminal when I am legal to drink and have been for the last three years.

And what exactly does he need my details for anyway? Oh, why yes, they're going to go into a big database and will be stored for the rest of my life. God forbid that I should get a bit crazy in the January sales, and elbow a fellow shopper trying to reach for the last size 8 River Island dress that's down from £40 to £3. "Yes officer, it was her. Has she got purple hair and an anchor tattoo on her wrist? Yes then it's definately her." Two taps of a keyboard and I'll be sent down for assault!

I don't think the whole charade went down too well with the locals either. There was lots of overly-loud conversations about "Haven't the police got anything better to be doing on a Saturday night other than bothering two nice little girls?" and "Why aren't they out catching the real criminals?". One member of the pub club even threw a bag of pork scratchings at the officer in question and was hauled outside for being drunk and disorderly or something of the like!

I say, who would have thought a sleepy town like ours could be at the centre of such a dramatic police raid? And with little old me at the heart of all the drama? Oh, what an anecdote ay!