LUCKILY NO POP
IF SOMEONE ASKED ME TO DESCRIBE IT AS BREAKFAST CEREAL, I WOULD SAY IT WAS TWO‑THIRDS RICE KRISPIES: SNAP AND CRACKLE. LUCKILY NO POP.
I am the person who lacks any sense of embarrassment or shame. When I was younger, I had my fair share of critically acclaimed shit shows of embarrassment. So over time I’ve built up quite a portfolio, and now nothing I do will ever reach the same level I got to then. You may be thinking: what on earth could you have done to produce such a stale state of affairs? Well, here’s one story for you.
During my Bronze DofE practice, I had an unfortunate incident on day two. And if you can’t win at a practice run, you don’t have any hope in the later stages, and that should have been my sign or warning to never set foot inside a Duke of Edinburgh event. But anyways, we move.
On this bright, luscious morning, after everyone complaining about having blisters and stopping every ten minutes the day before to apply a plaster that never works, only for me to wake up with my feet covered in blisters, as I had that can‑do attitude every scout needs to do anything in life, after dealing with the enormous pain, I went on my way. I would say we, but there was nothing teamy about my team.
We had two people who were method actors. Not normally, but for this one trip they decided to impersonate turtles the entire time. Every time we stopped, they would fall directly backwards onto their backs like blue whales and proceed to stay there whilst everyone else sorted out the route.
Two problems here. The first being one of the turtles was our chef. He was carrying all the food, and in doing so, every time he would lie down he would pop something in his bag, which meant on day two we woke up to a soggy fry‑up of bag residue and decapitated sausages. He also managed to burn pasta.
The other issue being we were stopping every ten minutes to check the map, as my team was inept at walking in one direction.
Then it comes to my stupidity. I, on that morning, decided to tie my trousers a little bit too tightly, which meant come midday I was bursting for the loo. I couldn’t get my trousers off. I was struggling. Luckily, because of the location, I was able to find a nearby sheep farmer and had my trousers cut off by shears. They were my only pair, so I was wearing a tyre I had found on the side of the road for a good couple of hours.
So from that point on, I can’t be embarrassed too much.
This happened on a Friday, the end to a good week and the start to a pretty boring weekend of sleeping. I went to play a sport and I sprained my ankle. If someone asked me to describe it as breakfast cereal, I would say it was two‑thirds Rice Krispies: Snap and Crackle. Luckily no Pop. But anyways, the true fun came as I had to get home from this sports field via at least one pub.
The pub had been selected, and to try and make myself seem less weak, just in case a mugger was looking for a new target, I put all my effort into walking like a normal person. Sadly, my walk looked like someone who had been hit by a bus and then had 14 pints of almost pure alcohol. I was waving around like one of those weird balloons at a petrol station, the ones with an open top so you never fill it up, just wasting air. That was me.
When three different people ask you if you are okay, that’s the time to maybe give in and just limp. So I did. My limp was like I was walking the high road and the low road, and the low road was made of jelly. It wasn’t gracious.
We made it to the pub. I didn’t have anything to drink, someone said it might help with the pain, but I wanted to have my wits about me trying to navigate London. I put some ice on it and waited maybe five minutes before thinking I should just go. I had an hour and fifteen minutes left of this journey.
I used a lift for the first time trying to get to the Tube, and for some fucking reason chose to stand up the entire Tube journey, which was very painful. I kept it elevated by lifting it up, but I’m almost certain when they said keep it elevated, they didn’t mean why not take up cheerleading.
I made it into London Bridge with a burning desire to just sleep, but not yet. I had to tackle the biggest twat of them all: the bloody escalator. Which, for someone walking on two levels, is rather difficult. I sprinted up the stairs and was in line with the escalator where I made the executive decision I wouldn’t walk up it. Thinking that’s a smart thing to do. I then thought, well I’m not standing, as I would be becoming the person I hate on an escalator. They are moving stairs. You wouldn’t stand on non‑moving stairs. They help you get up, not do all the work for you.
I decided the best bet was to channel my inner ape and crawl up the stairs. You know I did it elegantly, as every so often I’d kick my leg up in pain. I had no one overtaking me as I think they were physically scared of me. Which is fair enough. I looked mental, but if they knew the chain of events that led to this, I’m sure they might see reason.
I arrived at the top of the escalator and pulled all my years of being shit at gymnastics and attempted a roly‑poly, and that didn’t work. I just smushed my face on the floor of London Bridge. I should not have been that optimistic.
A sprained ankle is truly the most inconvenient injury. No one seems to care, and if it’s minor you aren’t wearing a brace, so it’s just bare ankle. And therefore is there anything wrong there? Well, not in the eyes of everyone else. The only way they could know is if I told them, and I’m not going to bless them with my problems. They are saved for that stranger I meet at the work Christmas party of a random crowd I think I might have met before. I could never be a bearer of bad news.