Tag Archives: life

21st birthday bundle

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A few years ago, we were all invited to Danny’s 21st party. It was being held in a  big old pub in Hometowny and the party was in full swing when Richy Rich and I arrived with all the kids. As we walked through the lobby, a strapping young guy leapt on top of Richy and wrestled him to the ground in an arm lock. Me and the kids stepped over the pair of them and made our way to the bar.

“A pint of Carlsberg, pint of London Pride, four cokes and an orange juice, please”, I asked the girl serving behind the bar.

“I think he liked me”, said Richy, tucking his shirt back into his jeans, as he joined us at the bar. We made our way to a table near the disco.

Credits: Thanks to Mary (and Danny) for a great evening.  A sneaky ‘big up’ to My life My Choice..

Chicken bone man

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We live in an area with a lot of very colourful characters.  Hegel Bagel, for example, is probably the world’s greatest Hegellian scholar but hasn’t managed to work out the rules of ‘conventional’ studying, so has his academic discussions in the aisles of the Co-op, on street corners or occasionally our kitchen.  Another guy does an amazing line in make-up which looks great with his long, white hair.  There is a couple whose relationships seem to be based on regular, public, spectacular arguments, and our neighbour, Roger, who walks round to the Co-op, every day, very, very slowly, dressed in a very smart suit, to buy a pasty to eat at 10.15am. Continue reading →

The sperm and the flotation tank

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Right. I’m going to heavily anonymise this one (for obvious reasons).  I LOVE flotation tanks. Now a number of years ago, I went to a local flotation tank place on a Sunday afternoon and had a blissful, relaxing float.  The next day, I went to where I was working temporarily and bumped into Richy Rich who was chatting to some geezer, (Prof) Neville Bunting.  He was raving about his weekend which had included his first experience of a flotation tank. 

“Wow, what a coincidence”, I said, so excited to find someone who liked flotation tanks. “I had a float at Hometowny Float Palace yesterday afternoon”.  “No way!”, he replied, “When were you there?”  “Five o’clock…”, I said. “That’s funny, we must have been in just before you”, he continued.  Er. Back up a minute. We?  “We?” I said.  “Well yes, you know, I gave the receptionist a bit of the old charm and she let my girlfriend go in with me and…”, he said, smirking, “let’s just say, we certainly floated”.

EEEEUUGHH.  That was the last float I had.

A few months later I was pregnant and heard that Neville and his partner were having a baby too. Aaawww.  Bless.  Nine months after the float I gave birth to a lovely bonny baby. Looking out of the window of the maternity ward, I saw Neville walking across the car park with a set of balloons and a cuddly toy.

All true.

Flight Nightmares: The signature

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Rosie and I were booked on very exciting trip to Genova, leaving on her 13th birthday. She got a cow case in advance. A few days before, I couldn’t find my passport.  Panic.

Got accountant mate (anon) to sign the forms to get a speedy replacement (just had enough time luckily if I travelled to passport office the next day and waited for it to be processed). She filled in the form (A) so carefully, then got confused about a box she signed. She put a line through the signature, then filled in a second form (B) leaving the box blank, just to be safe.

Off on the bus to London, queued at passport office for about 40 mins, then handed over the form (B) to the most deadpan person ever. I blathered on about the Genova trip with Rosie, leaving the next day, blah blah blah. 13th birthday, blah blah blah. She gave the form straight back to me and said that mate hadn’t signed the box. ‘Ah, no, here’s another version where she did sign it’, I said cheerfully, pulling form (A) out of my bag. ‘It’s got a line through it, she will need to sign it again’, said Deadpan.  Sob. ‘She works about 10 miles in the countryside from hometowny which is 1.5 hours on the bus, which is 20 mins on the tube from here, it’s not physically possible’, I blubbed. ‘Fuck off you loser’, she replied.*

credits: thanks to Tracy for literally spending a day searching with me

*She didn’t really swear, but said words to that effect.

The terrorist, tagine and toilet

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Here is a convoluted story. Checking in to Marrakech airport last Oct with Richy Rich (RR), I got a bit suspicious of a Moroccan guy in front of us (Red Fox). Just one of those funny instincts, confirmed about 20 minutes later when he passed the passport control matey some cash in his passport.  Had a tense wait at the gate wondering what to do. Board? Raise the alarm with staff? Warn all the passengers? Look a total numpty? RR went off “to tell a guard” about my suspicions . What a relief. He came back five minutes later and said he was joking. He’d been to toilet.

We boarded and sat a few rows behind Red Fox and his mate.  I nearly broke the skin on RR’s arm when the pair of them went to the toilet together. Red Fox was wearing a zipped up, very padded jacket. He waited in the kitchen area while his mate was in the toilet, then they swapped.  They returned to their seats and I scoobied to the toilet to look for a device. I went through the rubbish bin and did a finger tip search of the ceiling panels. Nothing.  I realised if they were going to blow up the plane, it would be over London.

I went back to my seat.  RR was so fed up with me he was feigning sleep so I made a plan.  We had to stop them returning to the toilet once we were over the Channel. There was a tagine in the luggage rack that looked like it could do some damage. RR could throw my coat over one of them and grapple him. We could block the aisle hopefully calling on the support of other passengers. It was a very, very long flight.

Three hours later we reached London and landed.  We shuffled off the plane but the doors into the airport were locked.  We stood in a line in a corridor, people muttering and getting a bit irate. After 20 minutes, the door opened and we walked through to a heavily policed passport area. Red Fox was taken away.

The mystery of half a human poo

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Ok, this is a bit of a random mystery. I was reading in the garden the other weekend, went to make a cup of tea and when I went back outside, half a human poo had appeared on the grass.  I panicked a bit and got rid of it before I took a photo, so I’ve recreated the scene using felt tip pens.

So, A is the poo.  B is where the clear break is. C is the chair I was sitting on. D is next door’s fence and E is evidence of flattened grass.

My first thought was that it fell from a plane. This can happen; (http://bit.ly/heSIdo)

Continue reading →

Making an entrance

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I flew back from Gothenburg last year, arrived in Heathrow, grabbed my hand luggage, speeded through customs, turned the corner just before the bit where everyone waits for loved ones/chauffeurs and skidded on a pile of sick. Slid about 2 metres into the waity bit before losing my balance and cracking my knee.  Everyone rushed forward to help me and make sure I was ok.

Made that last sentence up. Course they didn’t. I just got up and limped to the bus stop stinking of sick. I always thought it was probably some poor mail order bride vomiting before seeing the guy who bought her for the first time, but someone else said it could be someone off a stag do.