» Eccentrics

TPFKA MattDP reminds me
of my days working in a pub in Dover when I too got the reputation for being, as my boss put it, a 'mongol magnet'. You could guarantee that when I was working a shift some weird bum/real ale nutter/escaped lunatic would come in and generally baffle us with their strange tales/odours.

This was truly confirmed one day when this sweaty little guy with a wild, unkempt beard showed up at the bar and asked me for a lemonade. My co-workers were already starting to pull faces at me from behind him when he sighed and started to talk to me in his thick french accent.

Crazy bearded Frenchman: 'Tired'
Me: 'Why's that then?'
CBF: 'I walk here'
Me: 'Oh right, how far?'
CBF: 'From France, costa-costa-costa (while saying this he moved two of his fingers to indicate walking) around Spain, Portugal, Spain again. Then England, costa-costa-costa, Wales, Ireland, Scotland, England then I come here!'
Me: 'Riiight'

Turns out he wasn't lying. He had been on the road for two years and was aiming to walk round the coastlines of Europe (costa-costa-costa) for World peace! And if that wasn't eccentric enough he had taken his bed of nails along for the ride! We didn't believe him until he took us outside and showed us. We asked him about his travels and he produced a scrapbook full of newspaper clipping of him in various places performing with his bed of nails. I meantioned I was from Glasgow so he rooted through his scrapbook until he found a picture of him out on Sauchiehall Street sandwiched in his bed of nails with one of Glasgow's MSPs standing on top of it!

So in exchange for dinner and lodgings he agreed to do a performance that night in the pub which was fantastic. I did take loads of pictures but it was before the digital revolution so I can't post one. I did find this on the net though it was taken during his time in Ireland:



I can't remember his name and I never heard if he finished his epic quest. He told us he planned to finish on the Champs Elysees about five years after I met him so I presume he's done by now. Pity about the whole lack of World peace thing. We met him in late September 2001 when the outlook was bleak. He was determined not to let it get him down though. Don't think I can say I've met anyone more eccentric.

Length? Nothing compared to the combined coastlines of Europe!
(Mon 3rd Nov 2008, 13:05, More)

» Pointless Experiments

Aaaargh!
I know that due to my chosen career I should have loads of these but I have so many I can't think of them right now!

The most recent that springs to mind is that I bought a pedometer (I said pedometer) to determine which was the most effective walk to work. I started by just walking to work as I normally did which gave an average score of about 2300 steps.

It was then I created the technique I call 'apexing' where you you attempt traverse your route in a straight line between obstacles and corners. This was however subject to traffic as I would find myself walking across roads the long way and would have to judge the best time to retreat to the pavement. On a good day i.e. not in tourist season and before 0830 hrs I could get this down to 2100 steps.

I then experimented with different routes until I stumbled across the one which involved the least crossing of roads and was just that little bit quicker. The average score for this route is currently at 2000 but I still have the record written on the whiteboard above my desk.

*glances up*

1947

So what did I learn? That I'm lazy enough to spend £10 on a pedometer and measure my movements for three months just so that I can take 600 or so less steps to and from the office each day.
(Thu 24th Jul 2008, 13:01, More)

» The worst sex I ever had

Just over a year ago
I was at drinking straight gin for some reason when my memory went. By all accounts I started talking to this girl and within the hour had dragged her back to mine to have my wicked way with her (I'm quite classy when drunk).

Around the undressing stage my memory had started to return and I was wondering how on Earth I'd gotten myself in this situation. In my mind there were a few questions that needed answered, firstly, who the Hell was this person in their underwear that I was groping.

I asked her name. She looked rather annoyed and replied in a rather husky voice with what sounded like "Brian".

Cue panic attack.

Turns out she said Bryony but I still shat myself something chronic for a minute until she clarified that she wasn't a guy. She went on to attempt rather painfully to suck my testes off.

We now pretend not to recognise each other if we pass in the street.
(Sat 16th Jun 2007, 17:39, More)

» Tales of the Unexplained

Enough to give you goosebumps
Back when I was fresh out of school I started working in this pub down the road from me in Dover. The owners actually lived upstairs from the bar and would often regale us with after-hours stories about the resident spirit (the pub was apparently one of the oldest in the country) known to previous owners as 'George'. Over the first few weeks working there many mundane occurances were attributed to this phantom such as glasses randomly falling off shelves, strange creeking noises (the type you aren't surprised to hear in such an old building) and other easily explained phenomena. Little was I to know how malevolent the bastard really was!

So for some reason I've forgotten the owners were going to be away for the night so they asked me to open up the pub in the morning and suggested that I spend the night in the guest room to facilitate this. This was the very night that our chef had finally come good on his promise to roll me a massive fuck-off spliff for me to take home. So after closing time we set about preparing the pub for the morning then I waited for the owners to leave before venturing on to the patio to get well and truly munted.

Once blazed I climbed the stairs to the very top of the building and promptly prepared to pass out in one of the spare beds. Then the noises started. The general background creaking had already set my still spinning head on edge. This soon transformed into abject terror as the loud crashing of what sounded like objects being thrown around downstairs began. Occasionally it sounded like breaking glass. Then it was gone. I put on my headphones and tried to forget about it and get some sleep. But ten minutes later it started up again. I looked across the room and an eery red light shone up the stairs between the iron railings at the top and the noise appeared to be getting louder. And then it was gone. This continued every 10 to 15 minutes for what must have been two hours before I could bear it no more. Tired, petrified and still pretty baked, I summoned the courage to leave my pillowy sanctuary and confront whatever it was...

Grabbing a screwdriver from the nearby chest of drawers I held it above my head as I decended the stairs in the silence. In the dim red light of the smoke alarm I entered the kitchen when from behind me louder than ever came a crash. I jumped round and found myself face-to-face with... the ice machine. It was refilling itself by dropping the icecubes it had just made into its container. So I took a moment to reflect on how stupid I was and went to bed. The ice machine was subsequently named George.

I apologise for nothing.
(Tue 8th Jul 2008, 14:39, More)

» Shit Stories: Part Number Two

Needless suffering
I have a lot of stories involving poo. Here's a recent one:

OK, I was in a pub in Edinburgh watch the rugby with some friends when I felt a rumbling from down below triggering a brown alert. I had been a bit ill for the last two days so I knew this wasn't going to be pleasant. I made my way upstairs and to the bog where things proceeded without incident. Sure things were smellier, stickier and slightly stingier but no more so than you'd expect after a night of drinking Tennant's. Sure I pitied the next user of this cubicle but it didn't bother me too much. Now all I needed to do was wipe up and wash up and leave. And this is where the nightmare begins.

NO FUCKING BOGROLL!!!

No matter, surely the cubicle next to mine would have some. I carefully pulled up my trousers making sure the sticky mass clinging to my ring piece and the surrounding area didn't come in to contact with my boxers and John Wayned it round the corner, only to be confronted with another empty toilet roll holder. So down come the kecks again as I sat down to come up with a plan. Aware that the longer I left it the more red-raw the stinging shite sauce would leave my arse-crack, I remembered the old adage 'If you had no toilet paper, use your finger as a scraper'. So I did. And there I stood, hunched over with a hand full of putrid, warm shit and my trousers round my ankles. And still my arse was not clean. I had to wash my hand and go back for another swipe. I don't know if you've ever tried to pull up your trousers with one hand whilst trying to keep your bum from touching said trousers but it ain't easy or pretty. I waddled out of the cubicle and disposed of the brown mass down the sink before breaking out the soap, which failed to completely remove the smell meaning that I had effectively stink-palmed myself, and then returning to the cubicle to repeat the cycle.

After washing for the third time and preparing to have another go something jogged my memory. Last night I had been at another pub and had felt a little sniffly. So I asked the barman for a handful of napkins. I still had them in my back pocket.

Bollocks.

Anyone want a chocolate-covered pretzel?
(Tue 1st Apr 2008, 21:05, More)