To have butterfingers is being a clumsy person, usually one who fails to hold on to something. John has butterfingers.
John: You know what a butterfingers I am?
Polly: What?
John: You know I’m not the most careful of people ... I’m always dropping things!
Polly: Oh, hahaha, yes! You could never work in a posh restaurant. You’d drop food and drinks over all the customers.
John: Exactly!
Polly: If you get married, you'd have to drink champagne from a paper cup, not an expensive crystal glass. I'm not sure you would be trusted with a knife to cut the cake, either!
John: OK! OK! I know! Yesterday I had a dreadful day! I was at my butterfingery best! Two disasters! Two disasters in one day.
Polly: What happened?
John: Once a week since I started my internship, usually on a Wednesday, I call in at a coffee shop near the MTR station before I head to the office. Well, I ordered my drink in a mug as I always do - I hate those paper cups that most coffee places serve drinks in. I won’t buy a coffee if I can’t have it in a mug.
Polly: I hate those paper cups as well. So environmentally unfriendly!
John: That's true, too. So I picked up my drink, was looking for a seat and suddenly - WHOOSH - the mug slipped out of my hand and crashed onto the floor. The coffee shop was packed, and everyone looked up and stared at me. I was totally embarrassed. I felt like such a fool. I just stood there looking at the broken mug and mess on the floor.
Polly: Wish I’d been there to see that!
John: You would have pretended you weren’t with me. The staff were excellent, though. Quick as a flash they cleaned up the mess, and one of them led me to a seat as if I was a hundred years old and brought me another drink. I knew that everyone was looking at me, and laughing behind their hands. I drank my coffee as quickly as possible, and got out. What a great start to my day.
Polly: And that wasn’t it?
John: It most certainly wasn’t. Another calamity was waiting for me on the way home. I’d just got off the minibus and was walking towards my block of flats. I fumbled in my bag to get my keys, and then it happened: I dropped them. I’ve never done that before in the three years I’ve lived there.
Polly: Surely that's not such a big deal. Even if they were in a puddle, you could just watch them.
John: Oh no, luck was not on my side. The keys had dropped down a drain.
Polly: Oh, noooo!
John: Oh yes! I knelt down and could see the keys resting on a ledge about twenty centimetres under the drain cover.
Polly: What did you do?
John: I went inside and told Mr Lee, our security guard. He got his toolbox, and used a metal lever and lifted the drain cover, then fished out the keys with a long pair of pliers!
Polly: You didn’t touch them, did you? They’d been down a drain.
John: Of course not! I put them into a bowl of diluted bleach. The leather keyring you bought for me in Japan is ruined, but at least I didn't have to wait for my parents to get home, or call the locksmith to change the lock! I've got to be more careful!