Oooh - they just keep coming back to me
Again, after the wavey lines have disappeared........

There is this 'club day' in a town near to where I live that is held every year.

There's rides there - like carny type things - walzta (sp?), hot dog stands, bouncy castles and the like - all about 15 quid a go or something similar.

...and of course all the pubs (or so I thought) usually apply for an extension (this was back in the days of closing at 3pm and reopening for the evening until 11pm).

Anyway, a friend of mine and myself found ourself in one of the pubs off to the side of the main field, as one is wont to do.

Around midnight(ish) we hear the dreaded "ding-ding" of the time bell and then realise that it's a bit later than we thought and we ought to be getting back to the field to find the rest of our mates and see if our collective heads could think of a way to get the 7 miles back home with no money etc...

...only to find, that only one pub that year had applied for an extension...yep, the one we were in. By the time we came out the field was empty, the rides were packed away and the only people left were the lorry drivers whe were sleeping the night in their cabs.

Bugger.

So, we started to walk home. The first part of the walk is a three mile road with no path and no street lighting (I think it might have now, but as I say, this was some time ago).

It's also very exposed and windy. Did I mention that the 'club day' in question is held in November?

It was blowing a gale and was freezing.

As it happened, we spied another couple fo people walking along the road in front of us, so we walked a bit faster and jogged a bit to catch up with them.

Turns out, I knew them both. Both were walking bear footed too????? (bloody hippies!)

(it also turns out that they were a couple, until about a year later when the male half of that duo got with my sister, who he later married, but that's probably another QoTW).

Aha - we heard a car coming from behind us - time to get the wacky-thumbs-aloft in true Paul McCartney style.

Vroooooooooom

Straight past us.

Then, of course, it dawned on us that 4 people were unlikely to get picked up by a hitchhiker-picking-up car driver and that 2 people were much more likely to get a lift, so we split up on the understanding that whoever got a lift first, would ask the driver if he minded picking up their friends too.

About 30 seconds later a car came past, stopped picked them two gits up and happily drove off in the warm to their nice warm beds, leaving us to wander, half-pissed down a truly horrendous road back towards the town in the hope of finding shelter.

About an hour later we realised it was futile and settled down for the night in a piss-soaked, foul smelling bus-stop.

About 2 hours of very, very, very uncomfortable sleep we both got up and moved further into town. Then we heard a milkman. Then saw the postie. Over the next hour or so, we saw a whole small town waking up - it was quite cool really.

Anyway, I suggested that in about another hour, the busses would start again. Of course, that didn't solve the problem of being absolutely skint, so we walked back to the main field of the previous night's celebrations in the hope that as people got more pissed, the less they would notice their change falling from their pockets as they dredged out their dosh to pay for their spawn from hell to ride on the crappiest, most expensive rides (probably) in the world.

...and it turns out, we were right.

We found about 18 quid in coins, that was enough to get something to eat with (later when a shop, any bloody shop, opened) and get the bus home each. Bonus.

However, the finding of things doesn't stop there.

The chap who I found myself stranded with (he's mentioned in a previous QoTW answer of mine in which he ends up in a foreign prison for 4 years, a few years after this incident) had a full pouch of baccy that he'd bought from a bloke in the pub the previous night.

He didn't, however, have any Rizlas or a lighter, and neither did I.

I thought, I know! My ex-gf lives up the road a bit from here, and she'll be walking her dogs in a while, let's wait outside her house for her to come out and we can get her go and get some matches or something.

As it turned out, as we walked to her house, I saw her mother coming out with the dogs.l She hated me when I was seeing her daughter, so thought it wise not to ask anything of her a year after I had broken her daughter's heart.

We sat on the wall a little way back from where she was.

It was then that I looked down, and saw a pound note, weighed down by a stone, slap-bang in the middle of the road on the white line.

A little further along, a small stack of 10p pieces. Then a small stack of 50ps, then some 2's, some more 10s etc....then....a packet of Rizla in a little plastic bag with a clipper lighter with the protective metal bit missing.

I couldn't believe it.

Took out the lighter and it lit first time!

Smoked ourselves stupid after that waiting for the bus to take us home.

Length? Yeah, there's some. Not a lot, but some.
(dchurch bah, Thu 6 Nov 2008, 14:59, 2 replies)

Click!
for the Smash Hits reference :)
(man_d is being watched by experts on, Thu 6 Nov 2008, 15:13, closed)

Well...
...it was around that time, as you could probably tell from the fact that it was a pound note and not a pound coin ;-)
(dchurch bah, Thu 6 Nov 2008, 15:17, closed)