Rounders
Fucking hated it with a passion. As all ball games, only started enjoying them at the tender age of 15 when I realised you could go on the field, and kick the shit out of people you hated, or throw the ball at them.
I diverse.
At middle school, hated all that shit with a passion, but had hand-to-eye co-ordination- a requisite for rounders. Who got picked last for the first game? You have the answer. Waited for a good while, 2 innings, and then whacked the ball out the field.
Did I run? Did I fuck. At 11 years old, why try and impress the school bullies and cool kids, that usually take the piss in the playground? I could do something well, but I hated reflected glory. So I walked off and sat down.
Boy, did I get a pasting.
Regret it? Fuck, yeah, but I was trying to be militant to blokes with big fists.
I learnt a big lesson then- if you do it well, don't try and be a rebel.
( Duke Of Belmsford has got 99 records, but Jay-Z ain't one, Fri 20 Apr 2012, 0:59, 2 replies)

Bit of a crossover from last weeks QOTW...
When I was a kid, I LOVED football. I loved playing it, watching it, reading about it... loved it. I was (and still am) a Manchester United fan (go on, boo), and collected anything I could that was to do with United.

Despite how much I loved football, I was never particularly brilliant at it. Actually, I'm shit at football, I make no bones about it. I have skills in other areas, but football I have always been shite at.

Anyway,

Around the age of 7, and still completely besotted with everything football, I joined a local Under 9's team run by a bloke called Bryan. He was a good bloke. He once gave me the man of the match award, despite my being shit, just because I was the only player who hadn't won it yet.

At the end of the season I was kept in the Under 9's team, as I was the youngest in the side and not really meant to be there. The new team was run by a bloke called Steve who, for the record, was about 40. He was a twat.

As the manager of a team of 8 year old children, he acted like he was the manager of a premier league side. He took everything far too seriously and would stand on the sidelines, getting physically agitated, and scream and swear at everything that didn't happen the way he wanted. At children. As well as that, he felt it was ok to single kids out in front of the whole team and explain why that person was shit, and was the reason we had lost that day. He once singled me out and announced to everyone that I shouldn't play football, because I "kick like a girl". This went on all season.

Throughout all this my Dad, a 6'3 foot ex-boxer working as navvy, would quietly observe proceedings and occasionally tell him to calm down when he got too colourful.

My last game for that side was when we turned up on the saturday morning, only to find the other team was down a player. Steve said they could have me. I said I didn't want to play for the other team. He said I wasn't going to get a game otherwise. I was pretty devastated.

I went back and my dad asked me why I wasn't getting changed. I told him. He went over to Steve and asked him why I wasn't playing. He said I'd be better off playing for the other team, because he wasn't going to play me today anyway, because I was shit.

At this point, my dad walked me back to the car and told me to get in. I climbed onto the back seat as he shut the door behind me. I then watched as he calmly walked back to the touchline, tapped Steve on the shoulder, and then hit him with one of the hardest right hooks I've ever seen. He dropped like a sack of shit. My Dad turned around, walked back to the car and got in.

"You're not playing for that team any more".
( PMGT -Bacon., Thu 19 Apr 2012, 23:57, 11 replies)

I once got roped in to an impromptu donkey derby
We lined up on our trusty steeds, gee'd them up into a canter across the sand, I won by a short neck.

But could I remember how to get the fucker to stop?
( wakeupandsmellthebacon, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 23:50, Reply)

Rugby.
Our school had two forms of rugby.

The first was normal rugby. Normal rugby is fine, as there are rules and limitations on what one player is allowed to do to another, and they mostly cry foul at anything much beyond the level of ordinary playground roughhousing.

Then there was touch rugby.

In touch rugby, you don't have to tackle your opponent, you just touch them. This sounds fine, but under the sadistic or possibly merely inattentive eye of a PE teacher, anything is a touch. The gentle, effeminate tap the designers of the game had in mind? Touch. Punching the asthmatic kid in the gut, leaving him rolling on the floor trying to wheeze the word "inhaler"? Touch. Disemboweling a child, spreading their guts across the sports field while their decapitated head rolls lumpily across the grass to rest against the goal post? Yeah, probably a touch.

For the smart, touch rugby boiled down to two very simple rules.

1) Avoid the ball.
2) If you fail at (1), run like mad.

Note that rule 2 doesn't specify running toward the touchline at any point. If you were next to it then this may have been a good strategy, but otherwise it was where everyone expected you to run - and if team selection was anything like my school, getting a half-hearted sigh from one of the geeky kids on your team (who didn't care and would rather be programming in the computer room) after you'd "accidentally" run the wrong way up the field and veered off the pitch was better than the 15 finest jocks and self-appointed hard lads intercepting you spurred on by the knowledge that a "touch" was pretty much anything that didn't leave the victim in liquid form.

The PE report for the year we played touch rugby says something along the lines of, "Timberwolf is good at identifying game strategies but does not always apply these in a way that will help the team to victory." My superior skills of self-preservation are sadly not commented upon.
(Timberwolf, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 23:18, 1 reply)

Cricket
It was summer, and I was Year 9 or 10. As was usual for the summer, out came the cricket equipment. I used to enjoy this time as, despite finding no enjoyment in the game, the teacher tended not to mind so much if you just dossed about fielding.

So there I was, minding my own business, kicking my feet and watching the birds fly overhead, when LO! The ball came hurtling toward my area. I went for it with less-than-obvious enthusiasm, but, as was frankly expected with my athletic prowess, I didn't make it. I picked the ball up and prepared for the long throw back to the wicket-keeper.

I pull my arm back, the sun glares in my eye, they close, and with all my might I hurl the ball in my team mates direction. I open my eyes again. Everyone has stopped moving, and is staring at me. Why hasn't he caught the ball?

This is when the hysterical laughter breaks out. Even the opposite team has stopped and is joining in the giggle. I look around. About three feet behind me, sat gloriously in the dry summer heat, was the cricket ball.

Yes that's right. I threw as hard as I could, and the damn ball ended up three feet behind me.
I hold this as a strange point of pride.
(TheSconeMan Overlord of Doom, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 23:10, 2 replies)

2nd day at high school
PE lesson. That strange, mystic event known as 'circuit training'

"right lads...Run to this line, then run backwards to the start....then run to THIS line and run backwards to start...etc..."

So... off we go...Larry makes it to the first line and back, makes it to the second line and back, then on his way back from the third line, he trips...

And as he's running backwards he has no way of arresting his fall.

Head hits floor hard.

Hands hit even harder. Something goes 'crack' and as he lifts himself from the floor he realises something is very wrong.

I took the record for the fastest school injury when the hospital X-ray revealed a very fractured wrist.

Running backwards???

Fucking idiots.
( Larry Death Anger Pain Fear Aggression, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 23:08, Reply)

Pre-emptive
I hardly ever post on B3ta but I keep a constant eye on the QOTW for amusement when stuck working abroad

(Note: laughing hysterically to yourself in the corner of the airport departures lounge = slight disturbed fellow passengers and security staff. Note 2: upsetting the later has dire consequences in terms of body cavity searches. I have also discovered there is no point in trying to explain the concept of finding something in written form funny as 1. They can't read, 2. The powers that be appear to have given them all a sense of humour bypass upon hiring).

However this question called out to me.

This year I will attempt the Midnightman Ironman triathlon to raise a bit of cash for Leukaemia and Lymphoma Research.

Therefore I am pre-empting my sporting woe.

My aim is to complete the course and not require hospitalisation. Having given it some thought (it took approximately 30 seconds) I've come to the conclusion that my target may be slightly on the optimistic side. Therefore I have decided that I will consider the whole idiotic escapade a success if I manage to avoid dying. After all I don't want to set the bar too high.

On the plus side it's in Dartford and if anything is going to make me keep cycling\running it's the thought that if I slow down I'll be caught (and beaten to a pulp) by the Kent based chavs (not too worried about the swim though because they seem to be scared of water).

P.S I know what you're thinking. The chavs won't be able to recognise me as an aforementioned pasty faced shut-in when I'm dressed in sports stuff, but they seem to be able to identify me from 500m even when wearing a tracksuit. How they manage to pick me out in a crowd of runners remains a mystery.
(tillyecl Tilly, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 22:53, 1 reply)

Rugger buggers
On going up to secondary school, I discovered that the ball was now oval, and could be picked up. Fair enough, I'd always been a bit of whippet and if I got to it I could get a fair distance.

In my second term, Radgie arrived. You know the type: permanent scowl, hair trigger temper, a biter as well as a kicker.

We very quickly learned that if Radgie got the ball, he kept it. Not even the moose-like early shavers dared tackle him; he'd drop the ball and start punching.

One day late on in the game, Seamus Flynn got it in the line-out and started running. Radgie tackled him and Seamus must have thought "fuck it, just one try", and shrugged him off. Radgie gave chase, couldn't catch him, and Seamus touched down. Final whistle.

All the way back to the changing rooms I could see Radgie working himself up. I didn't see the attack itself; too quick. Seamus sat down and looked a bit white, then we saw the blood. Radgie had wrenched a plank off a bench and stuck it in Seamus's gut. Not very far, but quite enough to give Seamus a fortnight in hospital.

And that was the last team game of any sort I ever played. They beat me, they gave me detention, they even tried talking to me. Nothing doing; that stuff could get you killed.
(all my scars face forward possesses 2.5% of a hyperalloy combat chassis, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 22:46, Reply)

Golf
I struggled with it for two years. The coaching consisted of someone telling us how to hold the club correctly and to keep our heads down. After a kind gentleman told me I had trying too hard my game actually improved a little. It went from bloody hopeless to just hopeless.

Then on a par three hole my drive went about three quarters of the distance. I selected one of the irons, probably a five and chipped in. The damn ball rolled across the green and into the hole. A BIRDIE! Huzzah! HUZZAH!

But it meant my handicap was reduced. Oh, the misery next week.
(Redemption blamed it on the Bossa Nova since, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 22:35, 1 reply)

I support Ipswich Town.

( Amorous Badger NAKED BEA ARTHUR PHOTOS 4U, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 22:26, 13 replies)

Another hockey story....
but only tangentially.
While on a hockey training weekend with college (before I discovered the violent joys of playing in goal - it's one of the few sports you are allowed to use violence as long as the ball is somewhere near) we went for an afternoon's swimming in the local leisure centre. Some (mostly girls) went up to the spectator area, so obviously us lads began larking about in an attempt to impress them (in advance of the drunken party planned for later).
The pool had a proper springboard, so a diving competition ensued. In a fit of over-confidence, I decide a somersault would impress the ladies.
Sadly I had no idea about diving, still less somersaulting, and thus didn't realise that one has to tuck oneself up in order to rotate quickly enough to........yup, I landed flat on my back in the water from about 10 feet up. Apparently the splash was spectacular.
Not sure which hurt more, the gales of laughter from the public gallery or my back, which felt like. a truck had hit it.
I did get a little sympathy later. ....when the hysterical laughter died down.
(localboy purveyor of pisspoor puns, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 21:59, Reply)

Golf.
A simple 9 hole game, par was 27 but that was so easy I'd beaten it by the third hole. My final score was a staggering 81, higher than anyone elses by more than double and the bastards still had the nerve to say I'd lost.
(Woodlouse say it with flowers. Send her a Triffid, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 21:18, Reply)

The paralympics
is PE gone mad.
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 20:47, 3 replies)

Dyspraxia
The post two below reminds me - my mother in law once accused me of being dyspraxic because I burnt a roast beef and once dropped a mug and broke it. I thought no more about it, but recently googled "phobia of working class" (I've been having some work done in the house) and dyspraxia is one of the top results. Weird huh?
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 20:36, 2 replies)

A couple of weeks ago the QOTW was about the outdoors, this week is about sport.
Has everyone forgotten who the audience of this website Is?

Would you like a question about Sci Fi next week to make you all feel more comfortable?
( Fucking hell Jeff I am not a robot, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 20:34, 1 reply)

Comprehensive school sport
Here are a few happy, sunny memories of PE:

the javelin dragging along the floor behind me as I took my run-up, only to land on the ground with me still holding it (school record short distance);
doing the long jump and not making it into the sand pit, grazing my chin;
doing the frosby flop and, when I'd landed successfully on the crash mat, trying to do a victory somersalt only to land on my head almost breaking my neck, and then being told I had flopped under the bar, not over it;
a football whistling past my head as I sat near the goal mouth "in defence", making daisy chains;
the school 5th year hippy slowing down to a halt halfway through the 100 metre sprint, letting go of his shorts to light a joint, and his shorts falling down (he still finished the race, Chariots of Fire-style);
and my only true victory - shitting down Richard's back in the piggy back race.
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 20:32, Reply)

Oval rule pwn4g3
At school I was the classic overweight, NHS-speccy geek. Always at the edge of each game of playground football, picked last for everything. My scholastic sporting career is best summed up by the oft-repeated phrase: "Oh fuck, we'll take Calgacus but you've got to give us an extra player."

To make matters worse, we had to play rugby. I was put into the Dyspraxia XV with the halt and the lame and the otherwise incapable. As the shortest, least mobile member of the team, I was made hooker with a view to minimising my contact with the ball.

The only moment I did not find loathsome and humiliating was when I scored a try. The only try I ever scored in six fucking years of that stupid game. I briefly discovered my legs and flew up the wing, past our opponents - the whole of my year's 2nd XV (who could actually, like, identify a rugby ball in a line-up).

There must have been joy when I touched the ball down but it was crushed when the PE teacher refused to give it and gleefully called a line-out instead. He took great delight in showing me the slight indentation where my toe had touched the line. Not gone over it. Just touched it. "If we'd been playing football you'd have been fine," he explained.

Still, I had the last laugh as I can read without moving my lips.
( calgacus Non sum qualis eram bonae sub regno Cynarae, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 19:04, Reply)

our school sports were fairly traditional: hockey and netball in the winter; tennis and rounders in the summer
we always had to bring our swimming costumes, in case we got rained off. those who forgot had to suffer the heinous plight of swimming in their aertex top and disgusting grey gym knickers. if the boys were swimming too, this was nothing short of disastrous.

it was the fate that befell my friend evie one day. actually being keen on sports and therefore not being bright enough to fake a period, she came out of the changing rooms to a round of applause. deciding to make the most of it, she did a big star jump off the diving board into the pool. mid-air her face turned into utter horror. after surfacing, she swam over to me. "i left my real knickers on underneath!" she said tragically. woe indeed.

at the end of the day, we caught up after last period to head home together. i asked her what she had done all day. she admitted that she had spent the whole day without wearing any pants. now, of course there are occasions when this can be sexy. but those occasions are NOT when you are only 14. and stuck in lessons all day. my face betrayed my disgust. evie got all defensive. "well what would you have done?" she snapped. "worn soaking wet pants ALL DAY?"

"noooo," i said thoughtfully. "i would have dried them out under the hand dryer and put them back on..."



i have now reminded myself of the time that we all had to play indoor hockey on another rainy day (this is why you don't go to school in manchester). the sadistic lesbian oberfuhrer who taught hockey announced that the proctor would be coaching that day. "so i hope you've ALL remembered your grey gym knickers," she said, gleefully swishing a hockey stick around. "i'm sure the proctor doesn't want to look at a row of schoolgirls' knickers."

"i'm sure he bloody DOES," shouted out my friend liz. detention for a week.

bet she was right though.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 18:43, 3 replies)

Pea roast (the story that keeps on giving, well for me at least)
I accidentally trod on a rat that chose a rather inopportune moment to leap from a bank onto the road whilst i was out running. It didn't survive. Ruined my time as well, rat blood does not make for good traction on roads.
( number5 has been fighting tramps and losing., Thu 19 Apr 2012, 18:12, Reply)

Pea roast again (the rematch)
Managed to narrowly avoid disfiguring and/or killing the five year old Miss no. 5 with a cricket ball hit from a good fifty yards away. She was fielding and I wanted to involve her a bit more so hit what I thought was a fairly innocuous ball in her general direction. As it bounced twice and then pitched up off a large divot it caught her clean in the middle of the face only to be followed by the pre scream silence that every parent knows means that their child is genuinely in distress and a torrent of crimson. After I had managed to stem the bleeding we looked like we had both been involved in some sort of savage blood ritual. Thankfully no obvious breaks or fractures or death. Mrs No 5 not overly impressed.

I think it can safely be added to the reports section of my file held no doubt by the government on the unusually high injury rate of my youngest and most bruisable of children.
( number5 has been fighting tramps and losing., Thu 19 Apr 2012, 18:08, 1 reply)

Football idiot
I was playing in the Medway Sunday league for The Old George (sadly no longer with us) back in the early 90s. We were hopeless, really bad, a team made up of stoners, piss-heads and squadies from the local barracks that hadn't made it home that weekend.
We played in the bottom league and we usually got the shit kicked out of us every Sunday but for some reason, this season we were enjoying a wee bit of a successful cup run.
I played right wing, but this Sunday in question the manager had dropped me back to right back as the normal incumbent was sick (shagging his sister sick!). Anyway we were holding our own against a team 3 divisions higher than us in the quarter finals. They got a corner and tried to play it short, I ran out to block, put in a good tackle and started to make my way up the right wing with the ball at feet. There big centre midfielder came out to tackle me, spotting a team mate making his way up field I decided to play a long pass to him.
What happened next is priceless.
Instead of pinging off my right foot and landing perfectly in my team mates stride, the ball shot off from the corner of my boot and found its way unaided into my own net.
Gutted was not the word, plus my team mates werent too impressed either.
Lost the game 7-0, and I still get blamed from my former team mates for starting the rot.
Wankers.
(Hammy1801 may have scabies!, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:47, Reply)

We used to play rugby occasionally at school
Not very often though, because football was king at our school.

Occasionally we'd have a crack at something exotic like softball or even basketball.

But every now and then the PE Teacher would decide that a bit of variation would be a good thing, and out would come the rugby ball.

As a rule, the game would go quite well unless and until Jamie Gordon got the ball.

I've since gathered that every school has its own version of Jamie Gordon in it; so far advanced physically than his peers that it was hard to believe that he was the same age as us. He'd been shaving since primary school, the teachers kept him quiet by tossing bits of raw meat to him in the back row, you know the kind of thing.

Anyway, as soon as he got a hold of the ball the game would essentially stop, and we'd watch him lumber up the pitch and score his try. Because there was no way on God's earth that anyone was going to attempt to tackle him.

According to the teacher, by leaping full-length at him and grabbing his feet we would stop him running and succeed in getting the ball off him.

As far as we could see, grabbing his feet seemed like an excellent way to get one or both boots in the face, and assuming that he hit the ground as advertised "getting the ball off him" didn't seem an entirely likely outcome. Unless, I suppose, he lost his grip on the ball while he was smashing you in the face with it.

After a period of this the teacher would tire of shouting at us, and it would be back to football next week. Nobody would tackle Jamie there either, but at least you weren't expected to bring yourself into dangerously close contact with him.
(richardm, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:42, 3 replies)

A few years ago,
drunk in a pub having watched the FA Cup semi final, I turned to my friend and said 'When are they having the draw for the final?'
( scarpe We Stole Bikes, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:33, 3 replies)

One punch, two punch
I once accidentally punched myself in the face on a trampoline. The sterotypically maniac PE Teacher didn't have much sympathy as I stood there with blood pouring out of my nose. He yelled at me that I was bloody useless and to go and get myself cleaned up sharpish and then get back and keep doing whatever the hell it was I was supposed to be practicing doing. Thankful not to have him go into full meltdown on me, I headed off to the changing room where I quelled the bleeding, cleaned myself up as best I could and ran back to the sports hall hoping to get back quickly enough to stop him really going off on one at me. Luckily I was quick enough and managed to avoid his his full wrath.

At least until I jumped back on the trampoline and promptly punched myself in the face again.
( scarpe We Stole Bikes, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:21, Reply)

I suppose I'm obliged to post here.
I play hockey. Some of you are aware of this. If so, don't bother reading, you know the story. Two and a half years ago in the Scottish National league close season I offered to play for my club's 3rd team just for a run-out. One of the opposition had a loss of control moment and caught me in the face with his stick follow-through. Broke my maxilla, shattered my pallete, took out 4 teeth with a lot of attached bone. That's taken a couple of pieces of emergency reconstruction on the spot then two bone grafts, two implants, fuck knows how many bridges and 2 years to fix. Just before I had the final teeth put in and was free of hospitals and surgery, I took a ball from a penalty corner strike half-way up my left arm. Snapped the unlna and three weeks of pain later I had a 4 inch plate and 6 screws put in to put it back together. In 5 days time I hope to get the all clear from the final x-ray.

In time to play the last game of this season next weekend.

I'm a twat for punishment. But hey, at least I'm fucking bionic.
( the mighty badger Aphrodite, on a bar stool, by your side, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:20, 10 replies)

A sporting foul
Despite being twins, both of my stepsons have very different characters. Nugget Two can be accurately described as a loveable but lazy little turdling while Nugget One – the star of this particular tale is athletic and fiercely competitive.

However as a wise person once said “success is like farts, you only ever truly appreciate your own”.

By the time he reached year six, Nugget One was the tallest, most athletic and fastest boy in his class. He’d become used to having a small giggling army of pre-pubescent girls staring doe eyed at him on sports day as took the tape at the sixty meters with almost arrogant ease. The same spirit was applied everywhere that required guts, grit and determination, from the local Rugby field to classroom arm wrestling. Nugget One was unbeatable and he knew it.

Life however has a way of teaching a humbling lesson to all of us, no matter how gifted and talented we think we are. A particularly cruel twist awaited Nugget One.

On the afternoon of their last day at their Primary School, chickenlady sat waiting in the car for the boys to take them home. She saw them walking towards the car and noticed that Nugget One looked a little more circumspect than usual. They got in the car and sat down.

“What’s that smell?” asked chickenlady, commenting on the suddenness of the meaty odour that permeated through the car “Does one of you need to sit on the toilet?”.

Denials poured forth from both boys, mixed with some sniggering from Nugget Two.

“One of you has farted!” she continued. Both boys were red-faced, Nugget Two was trying to contain his mirth.

Eventually the truth always outs and in this case Nugget Two spilled the beans.

“Well, George challenged Nugget One to a farting contest and Nugget One boasted that he could fart louder than anyone so he pushed really hard…and then had to run to the toilet” said Nugget Two.

Nugget One looked like he was about to cry. His little bottom lip had begun to quiver as the full weight of the realisation that he’d always be known as the boy who sharted on his last day at school. His attempting to sit on the evidence and adopt a policy of denial was fooling no-one. Upon arriving home, he was hurriedly shoved into the shower room as the salvage operation on his trousers commenced. After twenty minutes under the shower, three cycles in the washing machine and a rigorous sponging down of my car seats the physical damage was repaired. However it was evident that Nugget One now fully understood that it was possible to be both a winner and a loser simultaneously.

Lesson learned.

Or so we thought. Six months later, with the boys were now at secondary school I returned home early from work and headed to the bathroom where I found Nugget One, furtively scrubbing a pair of trousers in the sink.

“What’s going on here?” I asked.

“Farting competition in maths” he said, with a sad and resigned look on his face before he continued “followed through again. Don't tell mum”.

The moral of the tale is that sometimes an important lesson needs to be learned more than once.
(Bicycle Repairman "you're also a bit of a wanker", Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:17, 7 replies)

cricket heroism...
My greatest (only) sporting achievement at school happened thusly:

Ended up in bat against the champion bowler in cricket. Smirking, he took a run up and lobbed the ball. I somehwo managed to tap it lightly with my bat but managed to fall flat on my face in the process. He was so busy cracking up that he didn't notice the ball roll slowly between his legs to hit the stump.
I pretended I'd done it on purpose but everyone knew I didn't and I still got chosen last for team sports.

Please ignore this one - my brain clearly wasn't functioning properly when I typed it. version that actually makes sense here
(teasus likes tea, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:09, 2 replies)

Splash, Splash, Twang, Twang
As you've no doubt guessed due to the fact that I'm posting on an internet forum instead of running up a hill in unflattering shorts, I'm not one of nature's sportsmen.

In fact, thanks to a series of ridiculous growth spurts and childhood/teenage injuries, my joints are pretty much hopeless anywhere with normal Earth-strength gravity.

Which means about the only thing I can do, is swim.

So when 9 of us took a group holiday to sunny Devon, imagine my delight to find an indoor swimming pool, where my sporting prowess could finally be demonstrated after half a decade spent firmly on dry land.

Within five minutes of dropping my luggage, I was in the pool. After a brief warm-up length, I knew it was my time to shine. So I challenged one of my friends to a race. Here to the other end of the pool. Easy.

With the pool being too shallow to dive into, we started in the water - playing to my strengths as my freakishly large legs allow for a push-off that less modest men would describe as knicker-dampeningly explosive.

We took our positions. I waved casually to my fiancee, grinning as only a man assured of certain triumph can.

The signal to start was given, and I kicked off.

Unfortunately, one of my heels slipped, rotating my leg 180 degrees clockwise and tearing one of my knee ligaments. After a spot of underwater screaming, some undignified splashing and an evening spent hopping about pretending I'd not hurt myself, I was packed off to the hospital by an increasingly amused-looking Mrs-to-be. Cue a week of hobbling around the Devonian countryside on crutches, with only a case of Belgian ale to dull the pain.

Length? I managed half the pool before the foetal position I'd adopted created enough drag to stop me dead in the water.
(Psycorp603, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 17:07, Reply)

Walking around the students' union in freshers week, a few years back
My new housemate Gus and I were eating free domino's pizza, picking up free spatulas and generally ignoring the piles of leaflets when we reached the Athletic Union's stands. He made a beeline for the cricket stand and started putting his name down on the sheet while the bored 2nd year behind the desk engaged him in conversation.

"What level have you played at before? School? Club? … County?", he asked. Gus replied "International" while filling in his mobile number. Before the spod could get too excited he added "… for Luxembourg" and walked off with his free fun-size Mars bar. He didn't make the Bristol University team.
( Ungersven would support SpankyHanky's patreon, Thu 19 Apr 2012, 16:52, 1 reply)