The Wasp Man
My shared house was a crumbling four floor Victorian relic in a provincial university town. Our front door was always open (the hinges were rusted through), so we had our share of waifs and strays come visit over the time we were there.

One of them, a fat and greasy sort of chap, Simon I think, was a regular. No one could remember who's mate he was, he'd kip on the couch for days at a time - but he had a steady supply of decent weed, so his presence was tolerated.

His personal hygiene left a lot to be desired. Once he slept on the floor when the couch was occupied - despite the fact that the entire house had recently had a haircutting session and were yet to hoover up. 'The hair will be like a mattress', I recall him saying.

One dreary afternoon, four of five of us were sitting around smoking Si's weed. We had one of those water bongs - where the weed was placed on a gauze and incinerated as the user inhaled the smoke through half a litre of water. This method was very effective. Straight to the system. And pretty soon we were all wrecked.

Trouble with the above is, the weed gets caned pretty damn quickly and Simon's stash was gone within 20 mins. 'What else is there to smoke?', he asked. Having gone through the ritual of trying banana skins and nutmeg etc in the first year, we were fresh out of ideas. But then Simon had a new one. He drifted over to the window-sill and came back with a perfectly preserved wasp corpse, held gingerly between his fingers. 'What about this?', he enquired, 'could be interesting'. We watched open mouthed as he placed the insect on the gauze and fired up his lighter.

The wasp crackled and burned instantly and Simon took a huge hit of blueish, dried-wasp smoke into his lungs. He held it indefinitely and then blew the same coloured smoke back at us. Then he jumped up and ran to the window, found two or three other carcasses, loaded them up and inhaled them too.

'Feeling anything?', we enquired excitedly as we sat in astonished wonder, genuinely thinking that some kind of metamorphosis was about to occur. And something did happen! His skin took on an odd, green pallor and suddenly he barfed into his mouth. Cheeks full, he tied to choke back his sick - and pretty much succeeded, albeit for the fair amount of drizzle that seeped between his hands.

But unfortunately he didn't turn into a wasp, nor did he take on any wasp-like characteristics. Which was a great shame. We didn't see him much after that. But the Wasp Man will live long in our memories.
( Albert Marshmallow is a completely irredeemable cunt, Fri 7 Jan 2011, 13:09, 4 replies)

.
Nice story!!
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Fri 7 Jan 2011, 13:19, closed)

nnnnnnnnnnggg
I thought Iain Banks' THE WASP FACTORY was the most gruesome and nasty tale I would ever read involving those evil little stripy bastards.

I thought wrong.
(Rise and Fall of the Atomic Cabbage Haven't you heard of suspension of disbelief?, Fri 7 Jan 2011, 21:54, closed)

A new world record!
I thought I'd seen it all when a "mate" rolled a spliff using a crumbled-up paracetamol... but Wasp Man is the new hero!
(moon monkey is busy making memories worth repressing, Mon 10 Jan 2011, 16:47, closed)

I often wonder
if maybe something waspy did happen to him later on in life. But if so, knowing his luck, he was probably twatted with a rolled up newspaper within seconds!
( Albert Marshmallow is a completely irredeemable cunt, Tue 11 Jan 2011, 12:14, closed)