SofaGate...
Not so long ago I calculated that I have lived at no fewer than 26 addresses over the years. Moving house is a (mostly) well rehearsed routine now, although I've been in my current place for about 10 years or so... so doing good so far.

Once incident that sticks in my mind is SofaGate.

Years ago I lived in a bedsit in Reading for a while. The door to the flat was on the ground floor, accessible from the outside. I'd gotten to know the couple that lived in the basement flat. I had somehow acquired (via my mother I think) a HUGE sofa she'd bin-raked from some refurbishment. It was the entire width of the room and doubled as a bed. When it came to moving out, my downstairs neighbours coveted said huge sofa, and it was too massive to go in the van. "Sure. You can have it, if we can get it down those stairs to the basement." The basement flat, you also got to via the outside of the building and was just one long set of steps in a narrow-ish stairwell.

Anyway, try as we might, we could not get this sofa down there. We pushed, we pulled, we tried it this way, we tried it that way. Basically.. it was not going to happen. So we tried to get the damned sofa back out. Unfortunately it was well and truly wedged in the stairwell and would not budge. By this time, we looked at each other and just started laughing at the stupidity of the situation... this sofa...sticking half out of the stairs, wedged. Three of us got to the bottom of the sofa and pushed... HEAAAAAAVEE!.. FOOM! The sofa shot out of the stairwell, pivoted on end for a bit and then toppled over and with an almighty crash went straight through next door's window. I mean... the whole lot.. the frame, the glass, the sash... trashed. "FUUUUUUUUUU..."

Then the lady who lived in that flat popped her head round the sofa and calmly said: "Umm... is this yours?" Like this was some trifilng little issue that happens every day.

All of us of course did the only thing possible at this point, which was to start screaming with laughter.. laughing so much we couldn't breathe, tears rolling down our faces.

Unfortunately the very prim and proper stuck-up landlady whose name was something like Mrs Snooty Harrington-Badgerface that lived next door had heard all the commotion and appeared.

"WHAT ON EARTH IS GOING ON HERE?"

"WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS! YOU ARE GOING TO PAY FOR THIS DAMAGE!!"

The angrier she got, the more we laughed, completely and utterly helplessly out of control. And the more we laughed, the angrier and shoutier and redder she got.

"THIS IS NOT FUNNY! LOOK AT THIS MESS! THIS IS COMING OUT OF YOUR DEPOSIT!!"

"WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?"

I honestly thought I was going to pass out from not breathing.

Needless to say, I didn't get my deposit back for that one.

She came up with some lame excuse like I hadn't washed the net curtains and this was worth the remaining £500 deposit.
(robl, Tue 13 Jan 2015, 11:35, 3 replies)

So Fred said, Let's have another cup of tea."
and we said, "Right O."
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Tue 13 Jan 2015, 13:35, closed)

Was 'e in trouble,
Arf a ton o' rubble,
Landed on the top of his dome!
(eViLegion Chief Commissioner of the Scottish Lunacy Board, Tue 13 Jan 2015, 14:10, closed)

PIVOT
PIVOT
( rachelswipe with a fork, Tue 13 Jan 2015, 17:57, closed)