I am in England at the moment.
I am travelling around the country, meeting coaches in their home training environments. This is part of a three-year project that is looking at coaches’ learning journeys in two sports, cricket and rugby union.
Occasionally I find myself in surprising cafes on my way to or coming back from meetings. There was one of these today.
The back of the menu had a wonderful invitation. It was so delightful I burst out laughing thinking about the opportunities to engage in a substantial discussion with the manager. The cafe went very quiet, rather like a saloon in Western films when a stranger comes through the door.
Try as I could, I was not able stop laughing as multiple scenarios rushed through my thinking about how I might engage the manager with any doubts I might have about either the preparation of the food or any traces of GM in it.
I thought perhaps the ‘fruit loops’ on the menu might be a good place to start. In a more fanciful scenario, I thought about the cafe hosting a reading group on GM issues and perhaps looking at the misperception of risk perception (Gaskell et al., 2004) with the balancing of risks and gains (Hudson, Caplanova and Novak, 2015).
As I was starting to elaborate on these thoughts, my food arrived … and I was not quite sure how I would start to disaggregate the contents to inform discussion.
As I was munching away (not the chips), I wondered what disclaimers my coaches might put in their match day programs for the benefits of spectators.
I started laughing again in the stillness of the full cafe as I thought about who at the ground would deal with any doubts spectators might have.
I finished my meal and walked to the counter to pay for the meal. The manager was there. She asked ‘Was everything OK?’ It was not a time for doubts.
As I left the cafe, I could hear conversation starting up. I am sure I overheard someone say “and what do you think about the Okigbo, Iwube, Putheti and Ramesh (2015) paper?”
