Unusual activity? Send flowers to my wife for Valentine’s Day

Vladimir McTavish's bank declined a payment and cancelled his card after deciding making an online payment to send flowers back to his wife for Valentine’s Day was 'unusual activity'

If you don’t book in advance, getting a table in a restaurant can be difficult, especially this year with Valentine’s falling on a Friday.

A few years ago, having had a fruitless trudge around town in search of a table-for-two the previous year, my wife and I decided to keep it simple. We went to the pub down the road, got a takeaway curry and jumped on a bus back home. That plan unravelled pretty soon.

At the next stop, a guy covered in blood got on the bus. It was unclear if it was his blood, or somebody else’s. He started aggressively arguing with the driver, who tried to get him off the bus. When he refused, the driver got on the radio back to control and got them to phone the cops. He then stopped the engine and locked the doors. Presumably in case the guy did a runner before the polis turned up.

So we sat, along with several other disappointed couples, as a disturbed blood-soaked man slurred increasingly incoherent threats at the the poor driver who may already have been in the dog house at home for working the night shift on Valentine’s Day. Meanwhile, our curry was getting colder and colder.

The only vaguely romantic note to the entire evening was that the blood-covered man’s face had begun to resemble a bunch of red roses. Eventually, the guy fell asleep, and the driver was able to open the doors and let everyone else off. We walked home by which time our takeaway was stone cold.

Although I am 10,000 miles from home, I was still able to get flowers delivered yesterday. It hasn’t always been that simple. When I was here in 2020, my debit card was blocked on February 12. After approving numerous contactless payments for pints of beer in pubs and booze in liquor stores, my bank declined a payment and cancelled my card because of “unusual activity on my bank account”. What was the “unusual activity”? Yes, you guessed right. I was making an online payment to send flowers back to my wife for Valentine’s Day.