not quite sports day
back in the day, when i were a yout', in a vain attempt to interest us primary school children about the wonders of ancient greece, the school organised a greek day.

this must have seemed like a cracking idea to the teachers one evening as they sat in the pub on night. i can see the converstion now. "so why dont we make the little bastards dress up in nothing but a bedsheet, wander round the place looking like poor quality ghosts. they can all wear jesus sandals and look like uttter tossers. instead of letting them have their lovely packed lunches with that tasty ham and mighty white brought from tesco, we will feed them pitta bread and honey and maybe a grape if they are lucky."

the last part of the plan was to hold the "olympics" on our school field. i got given the job of creating both the discuss and the javelin, as my father was somewhat handy with a metal lathe. the javelin was a beauty. made from an old landing net pole (a fishing type impliment) and a skillfully honed spike which fitted the screwthread in the pole nicely. it looked lovely.

the discus however was a different matter. haing spent all that time on the javelin, it got left til the last minute. i know thought my father "ill just cut out a fucking massice disk of 9 layer ply wood. that will do. it will have the size and weight that will allow children to throw it for miles."

the dreaded day came and all of the predictions the teachers had made came true. even the pitta breads tasted like a stale imitation of the jesus sandal i was happily wearing. the afternoon came and hurray the olympics had arrived.

i failed miserably in both the long and the standing jump (jesus sandals arent exactly nike 's best effort and definately not for the explosive power a 10 year old needs to hurl himself a good metre into the catshit filled sandpit)

it was then time for the discus. oh why why why. why did i not look before i threw, why did fat michele not look before she ran across the field in front of me. why when time slowed down did i not look away from what was possibly the most hideous accident id ever seen? who knows. she certainly didnt. she didnt wake up for a good minute after recieving a fairly hefty lump of wood in the side of the head.

she got herself a week off school, concussion and a head CT. i got sent to the headmasters office.

still, it was hard to take a man seriously when he is also dressed in a bed sheet and jesus sandals.

thank fuck it wasnt the javelin

bert
( bertisfantastic bert is a sleepy bear, Thu 30 Mar 2006, 22:51, Reply)