“The chicken in that is embalmed, dried and pressed very flat, and then sprinkled with extra chemicals,” she said. “Too hungry to care,” I said. - Ben Aaronovitch

I wasn't eavesdropping," I said. "I was gathering intelligence.

Back in the summer I’d made the mistake of telling my mum what I did for a living. Not the police bit, which of course she already knew about, having been at my graduation from Hendon, but the stuff about me working for the branch of the Met that dealt with the supernatural. My mum translated this in her head to “witchfinder,” which was good because like most West Africans, she considered witchfinding a more respectable profession than policeman.

As police you can live with the violence, the squalor and the stupidity—it’s the waste of people’s futures that really grinds you down.