Monday, January 30, 2006
Hamish McShanks Secret Diary - Part 74
BeepbeepbeepBeep …. BeepbeepbeepBeep … Bee- ‘whassat?..fngsssmm-‘ pBeep ‘aw for fnnn’ I slapped at the alarm until it ceased it’s infernal noise. Heaving myself upright with a weary grunt I sat on the edge of the bed alternately rubbing my bleary eyes and my itchy knackers. You have to do it alternately it’s like rubbing your stomach and patting your head, it just requires too much coordination.
Speaking of stomachs (you were worried there weren’t you) mine was grumbling noisily and not in a ‘feed me I’m hungry’ sort of way, oh no, this was more of a ‘oooh aaah ah’m not feeling very well’ kind of way. I gave my knackers a rest for a moment and gingerly rubbed my stomach. It was rather hot, in fact lets be honest, it was very hot. I quickly removed my burning hand and placed it on my now thumping forehead. This was cold and clammy. Whilst soothing to my scorched skin it was a worrying contrast. I mulled things over. ‘Hmmm I seem to be burning up and freezing cold at the same time? That’s not usually a good sign’. I’d only lain down for a short snooze prior to heading to the pub what on earth had happened to me?
Struggling upright I tottered off to the bathroom. My arms were flailing about the walls for purchase as I lurched nearer the cludge. I decided to have a wee pit stop at the door and clung woozily on to the handle, all the while panting like a bulldog on a hot summers day. ‘Okay Ham you went for a wee pensioners nap and now you’ve woken up sweating ice water, you have a small furnace in your sixteen pack, a dwarf appears to be hiding inside your cranium and playing the fandango on your frontal lobes, otherwise your fine’
The thumping inside my head was getting more incessant preventing any efforts at rational thought ‘Ach feck it, lets see what things look like in the mirror’….. ’Aah’ After the initial panic of thinking I was a small red fishing boat tied up in a harbour I took a step to the right and looked in the mirror instead. ‘Ooh’ The fishing boat was looking better by the minute. Think pallid, think clammy, think ashen and above all else think haggard. I was making David Blunkett look like a beauty queen.
‘Ach I’m just a wee bit dehydrated’ I mumbled as I pitched sideways towards the bath, catching myself on the wash hand basin ‘I just need a wee glass of water’ and I’ll be right as rain. My hands groped around for the glass tumbler as I tried to focus through my bloodshot eyes. I’d like to claim I was showing a stiff upper lip and not letting a little discomfort ruin my night. But the fact that I could barely consume a small glass of cool clear water without my stomach growling in protest should have indicated a quiet night in was the more appropriate choice.
I donned my hat and gloves and strode manfully out the front door. The cold air hit me like a slap in the face ‘Oooh that’s bracing’ I whimpered as the arctic wind whipped round my ears. Again the feeling that an icy phantom had just ripped out my lungs and was slapping them against a roughcast wall should have suggested that a stiff upper lip is a poor substitute for a warm bed and an early night. However that kind of attitude never won us a war! Never mind the tactical ineptitude of Hitler opening a second front in Russia and the Japanese bombing of pearl harbour forcing the Americans into the war, it was us Brits and our stiff upper lip that won the day! Forget your body armour my rigid top lip can repel any bulletaarrghhhgurglegurgle
That’s the kind of mentality that makes you head out for a night in the pub when you’re clearly unwell and in no fit state to imbibe alcoholic beverages. Oh but I went.
Even the ‘stoned out of his tree’ Jakey at the bus stop was in a better state than me. I’d managed to walk the 500 yards without collapsing and was feeling rather self satisfied as I sat in the bus shelter wheezing and puffing. I noticed that my neddy friend was examining the timetable in great detail whilst occasionally glancing across the street, then at his wristwatch. All of a sudden he dived across the road causing a number of cars to screech noisily to a halt. Unperturbed by their loud jeers he dived into the local kebab shop. Ninety seven seconds later he emerged clutching an extremely large carrier bag and repeated his frogger dash back to the bus shelter.
Fair play to him he timed it perfectly as the bus arrived twenty seconds later. I boarded first and took a seat near the front, he headed to the back after thanking the driver profusely for being able to drop him at his desired destination. If I hadn’t been feeling so low I would probably have piped up that this is what normally happens when you board or you’re on the wrong fecking bus! I doubt he would have noticed anyway his eyes were rolling around like the reels on a pugee machine.
I tried to settle down for the ten-minute journey in to town and forget about my churning stomach and thumping headache when the worst happened. Mr Buffalo soldier in the back seat couldnay wait till he reached his destination and started wiring into his munchy bag. Normally the smell of chicken pakora and lamb dopiaza would have had me drooling with envy. Not tonight though. Tonight the aroma of saturated fats and hot spices was turning my stomach. The rumblings were become closer together and louder in volume. I didn’t need to be a seismologist to realise an eruption was imminent ‘Ah’ll just get off here thanks’ I squealed at the driver ‘but wur no-‘, ‘HERE!’ I bellowed.
It could have been the pleading tone in my voice or possibly the terror in my eyes, it may even have been the simple good nature in the man that convinced him to let me alight at an unofficial stop. Personally I think it was the diced vegetables coming out my nose that carried the argument.
Now a mile from home and feeling worse than ever my stiff upper lip wobbled, in fact it crumbled ‘Ahuuu huu huu huuuuu’ I sat on a wall and bubbled and wailed. ‘I want my muuum uhuu huu huuu’ Conscious of the fact my mother now lives two hundred miles away and I’m probably too old for a tummy rub anyway I realised I had little option but to pull myself together. Therefore with tear soaked cheeks and re-stiffened lip I staggered home, arriving in just enough time to catch the porcelain bus (I got an all-night ticket too – what a bargain)
There something painfully cruel about waking up with your arms wrapped around the toilet and your stiff upper lip stuck to the porcelain by a piece of desiccated carrot when you know you haven’t had a drop of alcohol in a week.
Doei
