» Getting Old

"Young Man"
"And what can I get you, young man?" the waitress asked. I made my order.

'Young man,' I thought. I'd recently turned forty, yet was called, by a stranger, 'young man'. And she wasn't especially old, either. I couldn't tell which side of forty she was, but I was sure she was easily within a decade of my own age.

'Young man.'

Perhaps I didn't look as old, to other people, as I looked to myself in the mirror. Could I really look like I was still in my twenties? Surely not. Early thirties, maybe? Perhaps. Merely before forty? Young-looking enough to be called a 'young man', anyway.

I noted another customer, a woman who clearly wasn't young. I tried to guess her age. Late forties? Fifties? Late thirties after years of unhealthy diet, health problems, and a lack of exercise? Possibly.

'Young man.'

The waitress approached the other customer. "And what would you like, young lady?"

Shit.
(Mon 11th Jun 2012, 3:59, More)

» Doctors, Nurses, Dentists and Hospitals

Exciting Swellings
I had an abscess, in my face, due to an abscessing tooth. There wasn't much, if any, pain I can remember, even though my face was swollen and the gum was stretched really tight. There was a bit of watery pus seeping out around a tooth, and I can still remember the taste, which I found sort of pleasant. I really wanted to stick a pin in my gum and burst it, but resisted the temptation.

This led to the start of a course of dental treatment, which eventually led to my very hot dentist gently pressing her breasts against my head.

(Edited because I can't spell "led".)
(Tue 16th Mar 2010, 23:16, More)

» PE Lessons

I Won the Penguin Race!
I was rubbish at PE. Often came last, was usually one of the dregs when teams were picked, disliked it or hated it depending on sport and season, blah blah blah.

In primary school, we had a swimming sports day thing at the local swimming pool. An outdoor swimming pool. Unheated. (Our swimming lessons were usually in an indoor pool of another school.) Being rather crap at swimming, I was in the penguin race. That was the one with the polystyrene floats you held in front of you, because we couldn't really swim, yet. Apparently, I won, because, although I was close to last, I was the only one who hadn't touched the bottom of the pool during the race.

I vaguely remember doing well in an egg and spoon race for a similar reason of not touching the (solid stone) egg.

By and large, though, PE just put me off sports and physical exercise. Except swimming and cycling, but only because I didn't think of either activity as sports or physical exercise. I bet PE is one of the single biggest reasons we have growing long term health problems in this country.

Edited to add: I forgot the following. I'll add it now.

Cross country in secondary school, we ran down a lane, through some woods, that kind of thing. We'd have mud/earth stuck to our rugby/football boots by the end of it, that we'd knock/pick off. Some of mine wouldn't knock off, so I started prizing it off with my thumb. Some of it was a bit strange, though. Not crumbly like the rest of the drying mud. More sort of, well, gooey. And there was a smell, like shit. Like dog shit. Oh, shit! I was prizing dog shit off my boot with my own thumb!

Despite washing my thumb thoroughly a number of times, I spent at least a few days treating it as horribly unclean. Just the thought of having had dog shit in contact with my own flesh was, eugh! I made sure I ate my sandwiches with my other hand.

Eugh. I squeezed my own thumb into dog shit. Hard.
(Sun 22nd Nov 2009, 16:19, More)