Dont mess with the beardy one
When I was at school, there was a tramp that moved into the underpass between the school and the estate, nobody really bothered him and all the usual rumours had been flying about, failed professor, broken marriage etc but including one that he was in the SAS (and in 1970's Northern Ireland that's not something you made jokes about)

One day these two blokes walked into the underpass and proceeded to give him a hard time, calling him names and generally making a fuss, the chap just sat there staring at them, and politely asked them to go away.

The two lads just kept going, and eventually one of them took a swing at the tramp.

what followed next was like something out of a Kung Fu movie - the end result being the two lads being stretchered off to waiting ambulances with multiple fractures and bruising. Of course the tramp was arrested but with 10 witnesses all willing to testify he acted in self defence he was soon let out.

Nobody bothered him again, and he was gone when we returned the next year after our summer holidays. I often wondered if he really was in the SAS, he certainly knew how to handle himself.
( TBL I posted this on, Thu 2 Jul 2009, 22:23, Reply)