".. and I'll blast off their kneecaps"
I think I attract nutters. I don't know by what mechanism, or whether I'm just getting a bit paranoid, but having been approached by a guy who claimed to have a warrant for my arrest, a guy who thought I was a male prostitute and several oddballs who have insisted on having lengthy but incomprehensible conversations with me on buses, I think there's some evidence which requires a theory.

Of these bus-ridden oddballs, some I have felt sorry for, some I have just kept nodding politely in the hope that they'll alight at the next stop. (And most of them, I seemed to encounter on the same bus route...) One, however, sticks in my mind because I was fucking terrified.

I was in the window seat as the bus pulled away from the ASDA near Wimbledon Common/Putney Heath and this chap sat down next to me.

"It's a beautiful day, isn't it?" he ventured wistfully as the bus drove along the side of the Common.
Politely, I agreed.
"Not like some of the ones I've seen."
Oh dear. I'm going to get a sob story. It's at least another twenty minutes up to Putney Bridge and I bet he stays on here and talks at me for most of that...
And so he told me his story...well, he mumbled it. From what I can make out, it was a tale of a difficult life somewhere in Africa, and I did feel quite sorry for this fellow. He blamed his home country's government, and he blamed the British government.
"...you can complain all you want, they don't listen to you.They don't care about me. They just tell you to fill in forms and write letters. I'll make them listen...I'll get me a shotgun...march into their offices...and I'll blast off their kneecaps." - and in case there was any ambiguity about this point, he mimed a double-barreled shotgun and made a couple of gunshot noises.
Oh jesus. He's a nutter...
"Blast off their kneecaps and hold a knife to their throats...then they'll listen to me. Then they'll listen to my story."
That's ok...I'm listening, I promise...
And I honestly didn't know what to say. At least with all the others nutters it was easy enough to nod politely, look sympathetic and reply with the occasional "I'm sorry to hear it." But what do you say to a man who's just unfurled his Master Plan, his Final Solution to make the Bastards at Whitehall listen to His Story?

As he continued in this vein - mostly repeating his promise to "blast off their kneecaps" - the bus started to head up the Richmond Road. I was almost drawing in the breath required for a Sigh of Relief, in the knowledge that Putney Bridge was only a couple of minutes away, when:
"I got this book from the library," he said, as he reached into his bag,
"Oh?"

The A4 hardback he produced had various pictures of guns and artillery pieces adorning the front cover. My suspicions that the book's contents were similar were soon confirmed as he flicked through the book,
"I gotta get me one of these...then I'll give them what they deserve..."
Well, it would have been rude not to look. He was pointing at a picture of a Howitzer. A fucking Howitzer. Sorry to hear about your misfortune, mate, and good luck with your one-man shotgun coup, but I doubt even the Texas branches of Wal-Mart are likely to sell you a fully functional artillery-piece.

I've never been more grateful to see Putney Bridge. I think I even managed to stutter out, "well, good luck with it. Nice talking to you..." before making a very rapid break for the doors.

Length? Don't know, but the bore was 155mm...
(LongJohnBaldry, Sun 28 Jun 2009, 23:23, Reply)