"In an urban society, everything is connected"
Before I heard those words, I knew only joy, afterwards, I knew only fear, as this is the intro line to Threads, the BBCs attempt to brown the trews of an entire nation in the mid 80's.

I saw it for the first time in 2006, and spent the next fortnight Weeping and lying awake at night waiting for the flash, and this was 15 years after the cold war ended, had I watched it when it was released, with the reds at the Rhine, a cowboy filmstar in the whitehouse and a pasty-faced Bodiciea wannabe in number 10 I think I would have pooed my self to death.

The Horror : www.google.co.uk/search?tbm=vid&source=mog&hl=en&gl=uk&client=safari&tab=wv&q=threads&sa=N
(tyrefire2001 Is it a fast ship?, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 18:05, 2 replies)

Dirty B3ta Stalker terror-related fun!

Earlier today, a 'pub-buddy' of mine just popped her posting cherry (who from now on shall be known as ‘nikg33’ for that is her username). Please take my word for it that, other than a bit of lurking, she ‘was’ an absolute newbie to b3ta and the general fuckedupness that it entails,

Some of us Coventrian B3tards know her, and upon hearing some of her stories in person, we suggested that she should perhaps post something. Now, I don’t want to admit that we may have put her under any pressure at all. Sure, I may have commented: ‘It would be nice if you posted something’, Todj agreed, and did that ‘grunting thing’ that he does so well. Even Captain Placid took the time out of his busy schedule to glare at her, prod her firmly, yet repeatedly and threaten to ‘snap her like a twig until she pulled her thumb out of her arse and wrote some funny shit down’. You see? No pressure.

Eventually she wrote something.. .it meant a lot to her, I’m properly crap at links, if you want to go look for it, knock yourself out, this isn’t really about the post, we’re moving on….

You B3tards are a wonderful bunch. Before she knew it, she started to receive replies, and they were in the positive. Yay! She thought, possibly not realising that you were all endeavouring to encourage her into the dark, seedy underbelly that is B3ta, masked with a welcoming smile and the odd encouraging comment. (It’s just like what happened to me all those years ago…)

Now, it’s not for me to say that such encouragement went to her head. Oh no. That’s not right. I’m sure her feet were planted firmly on the ground and all that. However, (and this may just be a ‘woman’ thing) when she received replies, she wasn't content with just nice comments…oh no. She wanted to find out who had replied, what they did, and proceeded to dig up as much info as possible on any stranger who happened to have the good taste to like her contribution.

One of the unwitting participants of said replies was none other than The Mock Turtle. Don’t do it yet, but once you’ve finished reading this, check out his profile. (Oh, go on then, do it now, if you promise to come back, because actually it might make more sense in the end)

Before I proceed - Now, I can't state enough, nikg33 is by no means a programmer or coder of any kind. To put it mildly, in computing terms, she is more wet behind the ears than the hair gel on an overly vain haddock in mating season. So...she's feeling all proud and confident and she's checking out the profile of The Mock Turtle. 'Oh that's clever,' she thinks, admiring his skills...'Oooh that's good' she continues...in fact It goes on until: 'Oooh, th...WHAT THE DANGLING HORSE BOLLOCKS IS THAT!?!?!'

Unfortuantely, she has stumbled across the now classic picture with the mongoloid declaring “NIKG33 MAKES ME MOIST”

She pauses, recoiling in her office chair and reminding herself that because she is at work, it’s entirely inappropriate to freak out in the middle of the office. She then disconnects that logic chip and decides to go batshit mental.

Instantly, she starting texting me in a panicked frenzy, convinced that the Mock Turtle was some crazed stalker who had designs on B3ta virgins. It all made sense!

The texts started flying in to everybody: “CHECK HIS PROFILE NOW! “ she ordered, So I did, and upon seeing 'Pooflake makes me moist', I chuckled, and replied 'what about it?' before putting two and two together and realising she thought the worst…that ‘this time…it was personal’

Before I could explain, a veritable barrage of texts began to pour onto my phone. ‘Look at this picture!' 'You think that's fucking normal do you?' ‘Oh, you think it’s funny?’ ‘'Do you know him?' 'What does he want?’*

I don’t use the term ‘officelol’ lightly, but I think I may have ruptured a groin or three howling out loud at the supreme misunderstanding that I was currently bearing witness to. Wiping the tears from my eyes, I managed to explain the situation to her..just before meeting up with every one of the aforementioned B3tards in the pub (apart from The Mock Turtle obv) and engaging in a quite monumental piss-taking session that still hasn’t finished.

Overall, she may say that she was scared, but I firmly believe that she may be suffering that strange mixture of relief combined with that slight stalker disappointment that you get. You know, when you realise that you're not actually being watchedby some mental internet freakbag, but for a brief moment you acknowledge the fact that at least they put a bit of effort into it.

*At this point I Gazzed the Mock Turtle and told him about the situation. His reply was funnier than my entire post, and both he and nikg33 kindly gave me permission to write this story about it.
( Pooflake braces for an onslaught..., Wed 11 Apr 2012, 17:39, 25 replies)

6 years old.
1st year of infants.

Break time.

Some of the girls in the class want to play a game and grab a few of us boys.

The game of choice is..... kiss chase.
(ParaSitius is an Optimistic Pessimist, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 15:25, 5 replies)

Booze and sex are bad mmkay!
Many years ago when I was lithe of body and loose of morals, I'd sometimes go out and get rat arsed and pick up a guy for some of the sexeh. I was hanging out with a couple of younger women from Hartlepool, (this should tell you how loose my morals were), and on this night much booze was drunk and we met up with some friends of theirs. These guys were of afro-caribean descent and one of them was a bouncer. I only mention the race as anyone who knows me knows I only fancy white geeky men. I even like gingers ffs.

Anyway, we were all having a laugh and the bouncer and I was chatting and he was good fun. He was a bit shorter than me, bald and in no way attractive.........so then why the fuck did I agree to go home with him? My beer goggles must have been supercharged that night. Off we go in his car to fuck knows where in Manchester and pulled up to a block of flats. Still happy as Larry, I toddle off with him into the building and to his flat. As yet I haven't even kissed him on the cheek. We go inside and down the corridor to the living room whereupon a switch turned in my head and I suddenly became truly terrified. I didn't want to sleep with him. Why the bastarding hell was I here. The room was spartan, a small gas fire stuck on the wall and a ratty sofa bed. I went from pissed to sober in the blink of an eye and burst into tears. I told him I wanted to go home and he was obviously a mite pissed off about this. He said we didn't have to have sex, I could just lay down with him and he'd rub himself on me and wank off. Ew : /

I was shit scared. I didn't know him or where I was. I'm a pretty big women but he was a fucking bouncer, with muscles and everything. I really thought that this was it and I was going to be fiddled with against my will. I cried and cried and told him I wanted to go home. Luckily for me and probably why I went home with him, he was a decent, albeit angry and frustrated guy and immediately took me home. I was sobbing hysterically and apologizing all the way home and trying to convince him I did like him but not that way.


And to save you the trouble, yes I do realise what a stupid cunt I was. I can't even put it down to youthfull stupidity. I was thirty.
( girlinthehole, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 15:03, 15 replies)

Oh the shame...
It was a long time ago (80's) but I actually went caravanning in France.

The scary bit could easily have been the driving we witnessed, but no...

My friend owned the caravan, and when he suggested a trip away he neglected to tell me until we had parked up at our first camp site, that I'd not be sleeping in the actual caravan. If the beds in them weren't bad enough, he'd relegated me to sleeping in the awning.

Now the awning is really just a big tent zipped to the side of the caravan, with an integral ground sheet. Inside this I had a smaller "sleeping tent" on which I had a inflatable mattress.

The first night I heard an animal snuffling around outside, but being big and brave thought nothing of it. Probably a fox or something.

Then the snuffling sounded pretty much like it was INSIDE the awning. How could that be? It's all zipped up...

Then the snuffling was coming from inside MY sleeping tent, which definitely was all zipped up. I could just about make out my things on the floor moving about in the dark.

As far as I recall, I was desperately trying to think of what could pass so easily through two canvas walls when something poked me in the back.

WTF and a cold sweat ensued, until the ghostly animal drifted away.

The next morning I discovered the site had moles, and the little bugger had been under the canvas all along.

I don't like moles.
(Kliper Filllets Getting noticed by twats on the internet since, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 14:56, 2 replies)

HE'S GOT A FUCKING ZIP FOR A MOUTH!!!



A ZIP!!! FOR A FUCKING MOUTH!!!!!!
( PMGT -Bacon., Wed 11 Apr 2012, 14:09, 4 replies)

Door
Until I was 8, I lived in a split level flat on the basement and ground floor. I was absolutely terrified of the door leading out of the basement to the steps outside.

I'm sure I was scared of it anyway but the nightmare I remember having where the door grew nasty grasping fingers that tried to grab me didn't help much.
(BearWithLittleBrain, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 12:59, Reply)

A few mates drove to a local abandoned hospital
for a smoke (there were loads of cool outbuildings and a proper creepy main building like something from the shining). Anyway, it was getting dark and they were getting fairly caned. The guy in the driver seat had a freddy krueger mask in his pocket and for a laugh quietly put it on. He then turned to my mate in the back who took quite a while to adjust to what he was seeing. He screamed and punched freddy straight in the face. He broke the other guys nose.
( DumbMonkey The penis mightier than the sword, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 12:50, 2 replies)

Scary dream...
Only last night I dreamed about Sir Terry Wogan, and none other than Mohamed Al Fayed's little know brother (who also bizarrely shares the same first name as Wogan). Anyhoo, they were in tanning spa where Mohamed’s brother murdered Mr Wogan by locking him inside a sunbed and putting it on full blast!! The bastard! One was Terry Fayed, the other was Terry Fried.

/coat
(King Nightmare, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 12:25, Reply)

I have nothing of real note to add apart from this.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwEkZCDoQDc

It shit me right up when I was a kid but ultimately assisted me later on in life.

It was playing through my head when I lost my 'V' plates and made me last a full 28 seconds longer than I would have otherwise.
(oneinthepink is at your cervix m'lady, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 12:04, 1 reply)

Ice Cream
massive generic pearoast.

when i was very little, maybe three years old, the Ice Cream Van scared the shite out of me. specifically when it played the tune greensleeves.

my mum would find me hiding behind the sofa whenever it came by.

ive have done some silly things over the subsequent 32 years, but i have never ever been that scared since.
(magictorch, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 10:48, 2 replies)

I was the Pope once
About the most sacred I've ever been, IIRC.
(retrac fumble in the jungle, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 10:42, 1 reply)

Two spring to mind...
I lived in Vegas for 3 years in my early twenties and my housemate was a parole and probation officer (no, not mine...) He drove a big typical American classic caddilac and thought he was a bit of a smooth operator, despite being a lovely guy to boot.

We'd just had a game of tennis and were driving home when two young Mexican lads cut him up at a junction. Mike honked his loud horn at them and we continued on our merry way. Two minutes later as we pulled up outside the apartment they blocked us in the drive and pulled a gun on us. Mike luckily didn't panic and pulled his badge and they did a quick U-turn and fled.

Then I went to change my pants.

Secondly, as a 10 yr old my sister and I were taken to some freaky holiday resort called Fort Regent's in Jersey. They had all sorts of cheesy things such as a pretend submarine where you were attacked by some giant anglerfish on a screen, and a shark area where you'd walk along a corridor and see them all hanging up behind netting and every so often one would swing out to 'grab you'.

I got lucky and they swung down a giant Great White Shark to 'just miss' my skinny ten yr old frame. I was so scared my legs actually collapsed underneath me and my sister ran out of the place screaming blue murder while they tried to scrape me off the floor. As far as real sheer terror, that still wins funnily enough.
(Galahad is out of his gourd on yellow bentines, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 10:40, Reply)

Ok, be honest
Who amongst you has:

a) Actually said 'Candyman' in front of a mirror three times,
and b) Not had even the slightest glimmer of doubt before saying it the third time?
(King Nightmare, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 9:36, 13 replies)

I was Terrified
This is my first post and I have Captain Placid and Pooflake as my friends so I think I’m pretty brave for writing anything at all to be honest- be gentle with me...

The most terrifying thing happened to me about 20 years ago when living the life of a surf dudette - in fact actually generally bumming around, not doing a lot.

I was living in France and working for various holiday companies, teaching surfing, what a great life, at the start and end of the season we had to set up campsites and take them down again- Montage and Demontage… a great life working in the sun all day drinking beer, partying all night, more beer, Pol Remy (50p a bottle sparkling wine) and the occasional recreational MASSIVE drugs...

At the end of this particular year I was the area manager; god knows how I got that job. Any hoo it was the demontage of our last campsite all the teams had got together for a grand finale clean up but most importantly ‘End of season Party’

I had despatched some of the lads in the van to get alcohol for the pending party whilst I was working with a Scottish girl ‘Nikki’ who was well known for being a raging alcoholic, she would be pissed no matter what time of day or night but she worked hard... it was 90 degrees and we were working inside tents, otherwise known as saunas! the only answer was to drink ice cold kronenbourg to replace what we were sweating out.. It was at this point it happened. We were both on our hands and knees un pegging the bedroom areas of the tent when we saw it.

As we lifted the canvas there it was half poking out from underneath a big black slithering snake with shining eyes looking right up at us, I don’t know who was more scared us or it….

Nikki screamed which made me scream, which in turn caused us to scream some more, our hearts almost burst out of our bodies at the though of being attacked by the ‘Snake’ we grabbed hold of each other and screamed some more whilst falling over each other trying to make our escape, I was so terrified that I actually wet myself in my haste to escape.

As we fell through the tent door the lads in the van arrived back, seeing the look of terror on our faces they obviously came hurrying to our rescue, barely able to speak we told them what had occurred, Paul a big burly rugby playing lad offered to go and take a look…..

…..imagine how terrified we were when he came out of the tent holding our snake, which was in fact a girl’s head band with sparkly bits on…..

Terrified yes more than once that day, I had to host the end of season party knowing everyone knew I had wet myself over a terrifying ‘Head band’
(nikg33 waiting for the weekend, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 9:21, 8 replies)

Not funny....
One for each boy:
1) Racing to the hospital at 3 am while my wife was desperately trying to keep my 2 yo son conscious.
Fucking Asthma.

2) When my firstborn decided to have a febrile convulsion at 6 months. We honestly thought he was dying. By the time the paramedics arrived (a brilliant 5 minutes later) he was fine again. They had more of a job calming us down.

Kids, eh?
( bierbelly, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 9:16, 2 replies)

I can hardly bear to even type the name
Kiki the frog from Hector's House....

Pure bed-wetting evil.


(SausageWarrior destination Zululand, come on boys jump in the van, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 8:04, 3 replies)

Pearost...
As a young uncurcumcised boy with perhaps one pubic hair, I remember being told about wanking and had a little fumbling fiddle in bed one night. Problem was that I always had a rather tight foreskin (threeskin maybe?) and after a few minutes of fiddling my foreskin retracted and out popped the bell end. I'd never seen it before and so I thought I'd broken my penis. To my terrified young mind it was like an internal organ such as a kidney finding it's way out of my body. I cried myself to sleep convinced God was punishing this little Catholic for his sins. Woke up the next morning and found "it" was back to normal.
(emadex thinks the world will end on, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 5:10, 8 replies)

Road Grader
When I was four years old, my greatest fear was heavy machinery. In particular, I feared road graders. These noisy, smelly machines would occasionally pass back and forth on the dirt road just outside the property, as if stalking the house.



My mother was in the habit of taking a half-hour noontime nap. Not wanting to be disturbed, she would routinely lock me out of the house for that half hour. These days, that sounds terribly negligent, but we lived in a semi-rural area, and what kind of mischief could result?

One noontime, as my mother slept, a road grader passed by. I cowered by the back door (a French door containing twelve panes of glass) and cried in fear.

All of a sudden, the road grader turned into the driveway and approached the house. I panicked. I picked up a brick and busted out one of the panes of glass and crawled through the treacherous shards, to safety.

That was the last time I was locked out of the house. The road grader was apparently just turning around, but I had my doubts, having observed their predatory ways.
(Perv With A Dog had his eyes pecked out by scrub jays on, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 1:57, 1 reply)

Fear
Take a look at yourselves. At ourselves. At the world around us.

We live in a world not of our making, where people's worth is judged not by their actions, but by the fucking clothes they wear, the car they drive, the TV shows they watch, the music they listen to...

No-one ever tries to take a step back and see it for what it is; too content to live within the thin, artifical veneer created for us by soulless corporate entities whose grasp on society tightens with every penny they lever out of our pockets. They dress it up as a privilege and trick you into thinking that buying their products and living your life the way they make you live it somehow equates to expressing yourselves in a meaningful way. It doesn't. I'm not a fucking T-shirt. I'm not my phone, my car, my computer, or any of the other intrinsically worthless pieces of shit I've bought over the years.

That's right, I'm just as guilty as all of you. I've bought into that lifestyle as much as you. I own a phone. I own a computer. But I can't help it. None of us can. We're born into it. 'How would I live without it?' - We don't see any alternatives, because there are none presented to us. And we assume that's right, just because it's the way things have always been.

But scratch away at the veneer, and you reveal a warped and rotten core. A society where people feel so alienated and downtrodden they will riot in the streets. But even that act of rebellion is massively overshadowed by the inherent greed sown into fallow fields of people's desire. Confused, and incapable of turning their anger into anything other than a palpable violent rage, people expressed themselves in the only way they could: they took to the streets and stole designer clothing, televisions and all the other trappings of a modern life.

That's right: while the streets literally burned around them, in the face of violence, arrests and death, the overwhelming greed in people prevailed over every single other emotion on display that night. Shops were smashed, their contents looted in what you called “mob mentality” afterwards.

Of course it's a fucking mob mentality. You create it yourselves. It permeates every single aspect of human existance. And in the modern world you try and manipulate it. Control it. Wield it as power and reap the financial rewards that come with it. And then you act surprised when people act on it when the muzzle comes off.

Many years ago, scientists looking into human mob mentalities conducted an experiment: Five monkeys were locked in a cage together, with some bananas placed at the top of a ladder. Whenever any of the monkeys tried to get the bananas, they were all sprayed with water. Soon enough, the five monkeys learnt not to go up the ladder, for fear of being sprayed.

After a while, one of the monkeys was removed, and a new one put in it's place. It immediately went to get the banana from the ladder, and was attacked by the other monkeys without knowing why. Soon enough, it learned that going near the ladder would result in being attacked, and so it stopped trying.

This pattern was repeated until none of the original five monkeys were left in the cage. But whenever a new monkey was introduced, and it went near the ladder, it was attacked by the others. Not because they feared being sprayed – none of the monkeys now in the cage had ever been sprayed – but because it was 'the done thing'.

And that's us. We're nothing but a bunch of fucking monkeys, locked in a cage, and we attack anyone or anything that might try and do things differently. If someone doesn't fit into our predefined set of bullshit rules and expectations, we attack. We seperate and segregate, label and deride, because that's the way it's always been.

But there is always an alternative, and we could have chosen it at any time but we are so terrified of being attacked that no-one wants to be the monkey that goes to the ladder. We could have just stopped it all, but we won't. We could turn off the television. We could reject this shallow consumer society, but we won't because we won't open our fucking eyes and see what it's doing to us all.

Now we live in this festering cesspool we call society – where we can't walk ten yards down the street without seeing an advert for something we don't fucking need. Where disgusting, collagen-injected, silicone-implanted fakeries and perma-tanned, self-obssessed degenerates with money are held up as aspirational figures to our children. As though these are people we should look up to. As though the lifestyles they lead are in any way conducive to being a decent human being. What kind of future are we building for ourselves?

This is what happens when you build a society on the foundations of greed, accumulation and personal gain, as opposed to any of the things that make you a fundamentally worthwhile person. The whole thing is so fucked it hurts.

We're fucked, because we have fear. Fear that we won't survive if we change. Fear that others will reject us if we go against the grain.


*EDIT*


These aren't (necessarily) my views. Well, some of them are, but not all of them. This is actually a monologue from a short story I'm writing that I thought I'd stick on QOTW to see what kind of reaction it would get. And it was pretty much exactly what I thought - Some people agree, some people start foaming at the mouth.

Not that you give a shit, but the story is about a terrorist who has a bomb that makes people see the world for what it is. The build up to him setting the bomb off deals with different people's reactions to his point of view.

So cheers! You can all calm down now.

Incidentally, I liked the "very trainspotting" comment. That's one of the things I'm trying to take inspiration from (ripping off).
( PMGT -Bacon., Wed 11 Apr 2012, 1:44, 36 replies)

big girls blouse.
I once worked at this family holiday park. Often we would skive of work for ten minutes or so to go on all the rides. One was the haunted house. Crap it was, shitty cardboard skeletons jumping out and a few Styrofoam monsters with glow in the dark paint. Non the less it frightened me having all those things popping up infront of you unexpectedly in the dark. I decided to give it a go, just once. We hopped on the cart and where of.'' Oh Shit what's that.....gaghhh! Fuck that made me jump....ooh smoke....pahhh!''Suddenly something brushed my neck, what the fuck? Turned a corner.....''omygod A HAND TOUCHED ME! ''My mate in the cart just laughed. It happened again just as this dead body jumped out of a coffin. Then SOMETHING GRABBED MY HAIR! A cold hand... I screamed and screamed with my head buried in between my legs. In the mist of the smoke, the noise and darkness something was clawing at my body from unexpected directions.
Soon we where out in the open air and the ride had finished. I removed my hands to reveal my shaking self wet with tears. I looked behind me and saw two of my mates exit the building, laughing their Fucking heads of, as was my mate in the carriage. I wouldn't have been too ashamed, even though I had clearly cried like as baby, but as I stood up surounded by everyone I revealed by crutch and my lovely white shorts absolutely soaked in piss.
(shezam slouching towards nirvana., Wed 11 Apr 2012, 0:55, Reply)

Oh god I've just remembered this...

It was the late 70's / early 80's. I was but a tiny Pooflake, waiting to watch Tiswas or whatever. Occasionally, to pass the time, I would flick through the 2 other channels available...and I would see this:



Something about it used to just scare the living bejeezus out of me. At first I thought it was merely the sinister look of the kid...up to no good that be-atch I reckon...

But then...look closer - There is a nought and a cross on the blackboard. This suggests that the bastard 'freaky clown thing' is not only alive, but has HAD A TURN AT NOUGHTS AND FUCKING CROSSES!

Honestly, I'd prefer to think that the girl (who isn't even looking at what she is doing by the way...EVIL I tells ya) is some sort of loonball schizo, rather than consider the prospect of Chucky's creepier uncle dabbling with board games on TV. *shudders*

What the moistened fuck were they thinking putting this on?
( Pooflake braces for an onslaught..., Wed 11 Apr 2012, 0:55, 21 replies)

Definitely Not Oz
Last year around this time, I spent my wedding anniversary huddled in the bathroom under a blanket with Clare, my tabby, while a tornado wrecked the neighbourhood and my husband was miles away at work. The wail of the wind and the sound of trees cracking and all manner of things smashing up against buildings is terrifying. I was sure we'd be injured at best, if not outright killed, but we were lucky. Two houses down the roof was missing, and it got worse from there. The fear that my cat and I were going to die while my husband could only watch the storm, helpless, knowing we were alone and in danger, is a feeling I never want to experience again. Clare did die a few days later, but that was from cancer. She was a clever and loving cat, and I like to think she held on long enough to comfort me during the storm.
(louveciennes , Volvospotter, Wed 11 Apr 2012, 0:14, 1 reply)

'Pop' goes the eardrum...
I used to do a fair bit of diving in the mid nineties to early 2000's. I deliberately took a long time in qualifying as I wanted to get as much experience under my belt before subjecting myself to the rigours of exams and practical test situations. My final in water assessment happened in the summer of 1997, and on reflection, there were a number of factors playing out that should have made the marshal for the day say 'Fuck it, let's go home'.

First off the sea was very lumpy; the club boat was anchored just off shore and was pitching about like Glaswegian coming out of a chippy at 2am. There had been some engine trouble before setting off from port, so while the crew set about at the electrics the rest of us got in cars and headed the 30 miles up the coast, where the boat would then come and meet us and we could board from the shore. Not a problem.

So it was that we waded from the shore to the boat with our kit, and attempted to hand it up to the crew. Not easy when the vessel is lurching up and down; I have a hazy recollection of one of the group having the rubber tubing smack down violently on their head... but we managed to all get on board and headed off to our dive site at the Farne Islands.

As soon as I was in the water and making my descent with my instructor, I had an uneasy feeling about things. Clearing my ears was proving to be difficult, so I took things steady, stopping my downward trajectory a couple of times and putting a bit of air in my jacket so I could ascend a little, clear my ears and then then continue heading downwards again. As long as I was careful about this, things should have been fine. Except, they weren't. The pain in my ears was becoming excruciating, and as I signalled to my instructor, who was a couple of metres below me, that I thought we would have to abort the dive I felt a sudden pop, followed by what felt to be half the North Sea invade my eardrum...

I felt like I was spinning uncontrollably at about ten metres below the surface and the sensation began to make me feel quite sick. This all coincided with me about to inject a little more air in my jacket to control my buoyancy, the effect of which was for me to press the inflator valve a little too heavily in my sudden blind panic. Cue one disoriented and frankly shitting-my-drysuit rapid ascent to the surface in a cloud of bubbles, feeling like I'm on the world's fastest merry-go-round. My instructor apparently tried to grab one of my fins, but I'd risen faster than an 80's teenage boy at the sight of the Kays catalogue ladies underwear section and shot out above the surface like a cork just a few metres away from the dive boat.

On trying to pass my weight belt up to the boat, it slipped from my grasp and sank rapidly, never to be seen again. A quick check by one of the club members confirmed that I had indeed perforated an ear drum; over the next few days I would experience a sharp pop every now and again and my ear would fill up with what can only be described as 'gunk', including once at work, mid client interview - "Excuse me a minute", I had to say to him, "I just need to go and empty my ear..."

The rest of the trip went equally badly, with another member finding herself shooting to the surface from twenty metres, upside down as a result of air getting trapped in her drysuit boot. Then the boat engine failed again as we tried to get everybody back to the surface and to shore. My fellow diver probably got the raw end of the deal as she was whisked off to the decompression chamber for the night with a suspected bend, but, fuck me, for a few split seconds I was about as scared as I ever have been.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Tue 10 Apr 2012, 20:24, 7 replies)

Warning: Contains Massive Drugs!
I suppose I ought to add my own story then.

Now, having balls of steel, I'm very rarely terrified. However, recently I have had two rather terrifying drug related experiences. The first was an amphetamine overdose - which I was pretty certain was just too much booze, not enough sleep, and caning the sticky goo of intense concentration a little too hard. It was a Saturday and I occasionally provide the 3 hours of weekend cover in the lab at work. Off I stagger to work, most likely still drunk and off my tits. Just keep telling myself "Only three hours..." Fall over the barrier in to the lab. Fall in to the contamination shower. Rapidly go down hill. This is like no other comedown or morning after experience I've ever had, and I'm well known for caning it HARD. Shaking begins. I'm trembling uncontrollably. I can't even hold a pen any more to sign off the time sheet at work. Breathing starts to go a bit weird - jagged, rapid gasps as my heart feels like it's going to explode. I can hardly walk. I managed to drag myself to the bus stop and start to call people - I'm beginning to think maybe I ought to get to the hospital. I can hardly speak as I choke on my own gasps of breath, hardly dial the numbers I'm shaking so hard. Long story short - nobody free to come with me to A&E. I end up on the phone to my friend who is a nurse for most of the afternoon, as I refused to go to A&E alone. I ride it out. I honest to God thought I was going to die, I thought my number was up and I'd finally pulled that last straw and pushed it too bloody far this time. I didn't touch speed for a while after that one.

Second involves the powdering of my nose with Colombia's finest. I'm picky, the once in a blue moon that I do indulge, I indulge with the finest quality money can buy, as cheap crap tends to make me claw at my nostrils until they bleed. Well, this time it was my birthday and I went a wee bit too far. I spent far too much money on far too much product, and caned it for far too many consecutive days. Bam. Nose explodes. Blood streaming from my nose. 'Damn' thinks I, and mops it up, expecting it to stem in a minute or so, as is usually the case. Nope... half an hour later, still streaming good and heavy. An hour. Two hours. Three. Fell asleep. Woke up. Rang out pillowcase like a sponge. Can't feel my fingers and toes now, freezing cold, trembling. Blood EVERYWHERE. My house looks like a slasher movie set. Still bleeding. I've never seen so much blood in my life. The fear kicks in and I start to think it's actually never going to stop, and it's my own dumbass fault. Six hours later it stops. I lost approximately 20% of my blood volume. Took a good 3 weeks to start feeling normal again, after spending almost a week in bed. Has that stopped me abusing drugs? No. I think that's the most terrifying thing, really...
( Bathory, Tue 10 Apr 2012, 18:42, 7 replies)

Sleep paralysis. The one and only time I’ve genuinely been terrified.
In my late teens, I was a bit of a raver. A social partier, shall we say. I’d go out once or twice a week and do my bit to earn my place in the chemical generation. And to poorly paraphrase the late, great Bill Hicks “didn’t lose a job, didn’t hurt anyone, had a great time”.

But there was one unforeseen consequence: sleep paralysis. I didn’t notice it at first, encroaching like a tide. Every now and then, I’d wake up in the middle of the night and wouldn’t be able to move for a few seconds. But it’d pass and I thought no more of it. Hell, I was 19, nothing worried me.

But… it happened more. And more. And more. Until every week, often several times, I’d wake up a prisoner in my own body. Utterly frozen, locked down, unable to lift a finger, twitch a muscle… or even breathe.

But that’s not the terrifying part. That I could just about deal with. It was the others that scared me. The hooded, shadowy figures moving on the edge of vision.

Ever woken up surrounded by things which your brain screams out are going to do you unspeakable harm? I have. More than I care to remember. More than I can forget. Being utterly unable to breathe, speak, move, escape as you realise you’re about to die… wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. Or perhaps I would. But nobody else.

It came to a crux one night, the worst night, the one I remember vividly, yet barely comprehend. I woke up, utterly choking. Unable to breathe. All I do remember is a weight on my chest, a black figure, wraithlike, choking my throat. I felt every kilogram pushing down on me, felt myself slipping away, looked into its eyes and saw my own death.

I concentrated on a fingertip, willing it to move, flexing my will with the drive of the almost-dead. Move, damn it! Move! MOVE! MOVE OR DIE!

Slowly, it woke. My finger twitched, curled, twisted towards my palm. The others followed, balled into a fist. In my mind, I summoned my strength and anger and swing for the creature. In reality, my brain came out of standby, purged my body of the melatonin which keeps us paralysed when we’re in deep sleep and my brain stopped dreaming. The figure turned incorporeal, into dust. Disappeared.

I sat up shivering and with ice-cold veins, afraid of what my head told me couldn’t exist, but my heart told me couldn’t possibly not.

I slept with the lights on.

Soon after I stopped the partying, stopped the recreational Es and, I believe, that was the last time I have ever felt or experienced sleep paralysis.

In my mind, the two are utterly linked. Either way, I don’t plan on kicking the sleeping bear.

I never want to experience that again.

(Fun fact: sleep paralysis is widely believed to be the basis for the folklore stories of the succubus and incubus; demons which copulate with the sleeping and sire half-human offspring. It’s also believed to be the phenomena which explains people’s experiences of alien abduction, as it holds all the same signs: dark figures, being paralysed, fear and lack of control… spooky innit.)
(Miraclefish How appropriate, you fight like a cow, Tue 10 Apr 2012, 17:51, 2 replies)

On a lighter note from my last tale, and reminded by the story below...
My own tale of Morphine.

I had a kidney infection or summat and was sick for days when I was a teenager. The doctor came to my house and gave me some pills for the infection and a bottle of liquid for the pain.

The liquid stuff had me tripping balls. I was passing a disembodied hand around for all to see, thought my stepdad was a pig etc (I don't remember these) but the main one that does stick with me was when I was lying in bed trying to sleep.

All of a sudden I could see through the fabric of the pillow, down through the layers to see all these cogs and clockwork machinery inside. They were black and brass and started to move. Then, as I lifted my head off the pillow, I could see the fabric of the pillow again as a pure white hand seemed to grow out of the pillow, part of it, without any seams or anything.

I ran through to the living room, in my boxers, crying, to my mum and stepdad to tell them my pillow was trying to strangle me. I was about 17... To be fair they've never once taken the piss out of me for it. I would have.

They called out another Doctor who's exact words were "What the hell is he doing with this?!" and confiscated it. I still don't know what it was except that it was morphine based.
( Maffers I flow kinda strange like Spina Bifida footprints, Tue 10 Apr 2012, 17:07, Reply)

Morphine
Whilst being repaired for the below condition. I had surgery on my chest cavity. I was given morphine post op.

For me this usually entales a bit of giddyness, and a bit of sickness. This time it was different, I was hallucinating like a bitch.

The hallucinations would happen in my sleep, so it was difficult to tell what was a dream, and what was reality. I say dream - they were more like nightmares, but cleveryly disguised as reality. As in I wouldnt notice i had closed my eyes, so my surroundings would look the same. - I would dream i was in bed in hospital. Then - out of no where bad things would happen. The man in the bed next to me tried to attack me, then i opened my eyes and realised he was actually quite asleep. Then i began dreaming I had a bottomless corridor behind me (doesnt sound scary at all - but at that moment, it was quite terrifying) I dreamt I would be falling out of the bed. Each and everytime I would wake up - in the same bed, and realise the ward wasnt that interesting and the same safe sound of beeps and footsteps would nurse me back off to another night terror.

I was moved onto Fantanyl after I began to be quite itchy. This funily enough had the exact same symptoms, but in a positve way. I would dream about laughing, and balloons being delivered to patients. Morphine = negative dreams, Fantanyl = positive...
(Dan dan dan They tik urh jerbs!!!, Tue 10 Apr 2012, 16:35, Reply)