Story time thread
27 Jul '19 13:11@Torunn
Once upon a time, lived a very, very old man called Eric, who had lived a most adventurous lifetime. Indeed, his very birth into the world had been one of extraordinary circumstance and it was very near-miraculous that he existed at all. His father was wounded, in a most horrendous accident, involving a German bayonet, during WW1. Coincidentally, at precisely the same time, his mother was also seriously injured in a house fire, barely escaping with her life. They met at a rehabilitation hospital in England where, as luck would have it, their physiotherapist, was a mutual friend of both.
"Fate seems to have wanted you to meet," he had told them, "I wonder to what end?"
In his, now, squeaky voice, Berty said, " Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get".
As it transpired, fate had decided to give them a son, born into the world at a plump 13 pounds and 3 ounces. - Which was a record weight for the hospital and they, Berty and Gert, decided to call him Harold (who would eventually become Prime Minister of Britain). Of course, young Harold had grown up hating his name and had insisted on being referred to by his middle name, Eric.
Eric’s adventures began almost immediately when, at just 18 months of age Gert sat him on the kitchen draining board whilst she did the ironing. His inquisitive nature led to his attempting to climb down the drain, his podgy fingers getting firmly trapped in the process. (It took 3 firemen and a tub of vaseline to free the young chap). This incident was never quite forgotten, simply because it would soon be followed by similar happenings. In fact, only 6 short months passed before our mischievous adventurer was spotted by terrified onlookers, dangling from a 5th-floor balcony. Losing his grip he started plummeting to a certain death when out of panic he started flapping his arms and low and behold he managed to alight softly to the amazement of the heretofore terrified throng. The fortunate tyke having caught the elastic on his underpants on a washing line near the ground floor flats, slow his descent as he gently touched the floor. Fate it seemed had bigger plans for Eric, plans that really showed their hand on his 6th birthday.
It started like any other day - well, not quite as it was his birthday, but it could have been any other birthday, at least that was what his family planned for. Why Berty decided to buy Eric his first pair of roller skates remains a mystery given that their house was situated at the top of “Hill Street” which had a 1:3 incline, or more important from Eric’s point of view a 1:3 decline. He skated in his back yard, along with his birthday guests, but one by one they left, and while his parents tidied up he left through the side gate. Unlike any 6 year old who had ever existed in the annals of history, Eric was absolutely fearless. He eyed up the slope on the road, remembering it was time of very few automobiles, and, setting his sight on the pond at the very bottom of his hill, he pushed off. Too late he remembered Berty telling him to never go swimming in that same pond because it was purported to be the residence of a 14 foot crocodile and as he had little practice stopping he had to think of a way to do so and very quickly as the pond was fast approaching and a set of eyes was protruding at the water's edge. Fortunately for Eric, the crocodile was the product of a fatherly exaggeration, the eyes belonging to a large warty toad visibly discombobulated by his speedy approach. So discombobulated in fact that the toad was almost transfixed, he just had time to turn around before Eric arrived at the waters edge where the toads slimy back acted as a ramp sending him shooting across and over the pond like an Olympic ski jumper.
Young Eric now viewed himself immortal, a self-belief of invincibility that would serve him well, aged nine, when set upon by the school bully. Gordon, the bully, was unaware of Eric's "powers" and said to him, "Gimme your lunch money or I'll make you eat this", holding out what looked to Eric like dog poo, in a paper bag.
"I'll give you one opportunity to walk away," replied Eric, cooler than a cucumber.
Much to nobody’s surprise the bully did walk away, but not before shoving Eric’s head inside the brown paper bag which did indeed contain a dog poo, Eric washed his face in the now familiar pond and stomped home as menacingly as he could in his third pair of roller skates swearing to the heavens that he would never be bullied again! - Ego bruised, but not broken, Eric invented something that very evening that would change his life forever. In his makeshift laboratory, at the back of his mum's garden shed, he took the little piece of skin, he'd managed to get when he scratched the bully from under his fingernail and placed it on a slide inserting it into his electron microscope to see if he was able to get a good bit of DNA...he had and like the mad scientist he'd hoped to become, he cackled at what he was planning to do next. Over the next 3 months, Eric successfully bred a colony of wasps conditioned to respond unfavourably to Gordon's DNA.
It wasn't long before Eric realised that planning evil things made him truly happy. Indeed, the day he finally released the wasps, and watched them swarm off in search of Gordon, was one of the happiest of his life. It started slowly, with the lead wasp searching out its prey, Gordon swiping at the insect with his cricket bat, knocking the first to the floor, but this angered the remaining swarm. Then like a swarm of, erm, wasps they attacked as one and all that could be seen above the cloud of flying agony was Gordon’s weakly held and wavering cricket bat until that too disappeared beneath the swarm along with his high pitched screams just as his twin sister turned the corner on her way home from her volunteer shift at the orphanage.
"Ahhh!" screamed Dale, her angelical works meaningless to the wasps who locked on to her DNA. Dale, who Gordon had always bullied growing up, had for some time now always carried several cans of Mace in her purse, protection, or so she thought against anyone who would "mess with her". The mace held the swarm back long enough for Dale to make it to the pond where she utilised a discarded ‘Pringles’ tube as a snorkel to stay submerged long enough to put the swarm off her scent. Once rid of the wasps she found herself gone from the frying pan and into the fire, the object of a certain 'crocodile's' attention. - Eric, of course, staged a dramatic rescue, plucking the grateful Dale from the murky water before the 'crocodile' (aka large warty toad) could do anything uncharacteristically sinister or slimy.
Dale looked to Eric, her eyes still watering from fear, and smiled at her new hero, someone who she would share the rest of her life with. Eric's lip curled, in a sneering kind of way, as terrible thoughts entered his mind and although this excited him it also caused him to think that maybe, just maybe, he was losing it. Something had certainly snapped in Eric, and as the years passed by a cold darkness took hold of him, taking him down a path of no return. It was, in fact, a one way ticket to "Palookaville" and he knew, in his heart of hearts, it was the beginning of the end for him.
"Put down the ray gun Professor!" shouted the officer, to the now 27 year old Eric. "We have the place surrounded and we'd rather not have to use cruel and unusual force to end this standoff...but if need be we will, why we might even call your mum and you surely don't want to have to deal with her wrath".
"Please, not that, not my mum, anything but that, she will kill all of us." Eric's words, of course, were plump with sarcasm, for not only was his mother a virtual pussycat, she was also on holiday in Magaluf. (Unknown to Bert, Gert had met, during Bert's recuperation from the bayonet wound, a Spanish doctor, Juan Ortega, who had been involved in Bert's surgery and she had shown Juan just how much she appreciated his efforts, the result of which turned into a rather long and amorous relationship. Or so he thought...Passion being a decidedly fickle thing, she had soon moved on to cake decorating,...but we digress).
Once upon a time, lived a very, very old man called Eric, who had lived a most adventurous lifetime. Indeed, his very birth into the world had been one of extraordinary circumstance and it was very near-miraculous that he existed at all. His father was wounded, in a most horrendous accident, involving a German bayonet, during WW1. Coincidentally, at precisely the same time, his mother was also seriously injured in a house fire, barely escaping with her life. They met at a rehabilitation hospital in England where, as luck would have it, their physiotherapist, was a mutual friend of both.
"Fate seems to have wanted you to meet," he had told them, "I wonder to what end?"
In his, now, squeaky voice, Berty said, " Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get".
As it transpired, fate had decided to give them a son, born into the world at a plump 13 pounds and 3 ounces. - Which was a record weight for the hospital and they, Berty and Gert, decided to call him Harold (who would eventually become Prime Minister of Britain). Of course, young Harold had grown up hating his name and had insisted on being referred to by his middle name, Eric.
Eric’s adventures began almost immediately when, at just 18 months of age Gert sat him on the kitchen draining board whilst she did the ironing. His inquisitive nature led to his attempting to climb down the drain, his podgy fingers getting firmly trapped in the process. (It took 3 firemen and a tub of vaseline to free the young chap). This incident was never quite forgotten, simply because it would soon be followed by similar happenings. In fact, only 6 short months passed before our mischievous adventurer was spotted by terrified onlookers, dangling from a 5th-floor balcony. Losing his grip he started plummeting to a certain death when out of panic he started flapping his arms and low and behold he managed to alight softly to the amazement of the heretofore terrified throng. The fortunate tyke having caught the elastic on his underpants on a washing line near the ground floor flats, slow his descent as he gently touched the floor. Fate it seemed had bigger plans for Eric, plans that really showed their hand on his 6th birthday.
It started like any other day - well, not quite as it was his birthday, but it could have been any other birthday, at least that was what his family planned for. Why Berty decided to buy Eric his first pair of roller skates remains a mystery given that their house was situated at the top of “Hill Street” which had a 1:3 incline, or more important from Eric’s point of view a 1:3 decline. He skated in his back yard, along with his birthday guests, but one by one they left, and while his parents tidied up he left through the side gate. Unlike any 6 year old who had ever existed in the annals of history, Eric was absolutely fearless. He eyed up the slope on the road, remembering it was time of very few automobiles, and, setting his sight on the pond at the very bottom of his hill, he pushed off. Too late he remembered Berty telling him to never go swimming in that same pond because it was purported to be the residence of a 14 foot crocodile and as he had little practice stopping he had to think of a way to do so and very quickly as the pond was fast approaching and a set of eyes was protruding at the water's edge. Fortunately for Eric, the crocodile was the product of a fatherly exaggeration, the eyes belonging to a large warty toad visibly discombobulated by his speedy approach. So discombobulated in fact that the toad was almost transfixed, he just had time to turn around before Eric arrived at the waters edge where the toads slimy back acted as a ramp sending him shooting across and over the pond like an Olympic ski jumper.
Young Eric now viewed himself immortal, a self-belief of invincibility that would serve him well, aged nine, when set upon by the school bully. Gordon, the bully, was unaware of Eric's "powers" and said to him, "Gimme your lunch money or I'll make you eat this", holding out what looked to Eric like dog poo, in a paper bag.
"I'll give you one opportunity to walk away," replied Eric, cooler than a cucumber.
Much to nobody’s surprise the bully did walk away, but not before shoving Eric’s head inside the brown paper bag which did indeed contain a dog poo, Eric washed his face in the now familiar pond and stomped home as menacingly as he could in his third pair of roller skates swearing to the heavens that he would never be bullied again! - Ego bruised, but not broken, Eric invented something that very evening that would change his life forever. In his makeshift laboratory, at the back of his mum's garden shed, he took the little piece of skin, he'd managed to get when he scratched the bully from under his fingernail and placed it on a slide inserting it into his electron microscope to see if he was able to get a good bit of DNA...he had and like the mad scientist he'd hoped to become, he cackled at what he was planning to do next. Over the next 3 months, Eric successfully bred a colony of wasps conditioned to respond unfavourably to Gordon's DNA.
It wasn't long before Eric realised that planning evil things made him truly happy. Indeed, the day he finally released the wasps, and watched them swarm off in search of Gordon, was one of the happiest of his life. It started slowly, with the lead wasp searching out its prey, Gordon swiping at the insect with his cricket bat, knocking the first to the floor, but this angered the remaining swarm. Then like a swarm of, erm, wasps they attacked as one and all that could be seen above the cloud of flying agony was Gordon’s weakly held and wavering cricket bat until that too disappeared beneath the swarm along with his high pitched screams just as his twin sister turned the corner on her way home from her volunteer shift at the orphanage.
"Ahhh!" screamed Dale, her angelical works meaningless to the wasps who locked on to her DNA. Dale, who Gordon had always bullied growing up, had for some time now always carried several cans of Mace in her purse, protection, or so she thought against anyone who would "mess with her". The mace held the swarm back long enough for Dale to make it to the pond where she utilised a discarded ‘Pringles’ tube as a snorkel to stay submerged long enough to put the swarm off her scent. Once rid of the wasps she found herself gone from the frying pan and into the fire, the object of a certain 'crocodile's' attention. - Eric, of course, staged a dramatic rescue, plucking the grateful Dale from the murky water before the 'crocodile' (aka large warty toad) could do anything uncharacteristically sinister or slimy.
Dale looked to Eric, her eyes still watering from fear, and smiled at her new hero, someone who she would share the rest of her life with. Eric's lip curled, in a sneering kind of way, as terrible thoughts entered his mind and although this excited him it also caused him to think that maybe, just maybe, he was losing it. Something had certainly snapped in Eric, and as the years passed by a cold darkness took hold of him, taking him down a path of no return. It was, in fact, a one way ticket to "Palookaville" and he knew, in his heart of hearts, it was the beginning of the end for him.
"Put down the ray gun Professor!" shouted the officer, to the now 27 year old Eric. "We have the place surrounded and we'd rather not have to use cruel and unusual force to end this standoff...but if need be we will, why we might even call your mum and you surely don't want to have to deal with her wrath".
"Please, not that, not my mum, anything but that, she will kill all of us." Eric's words, of course, were plump with sarcasm, for not only was his mother a virtual pussycat, she was also on holiday in Magaluf. (Unknown to Bert, Gert had met, during Bert's recuperation from the bayonet wound, a Spanish doctor, Juan Ortega, who had been involved in Bert's surgery and she had shown Juan just how much she appreciated his efforts, the result of which turned into a rather long and amorous relationship. Or so he thought...Passion being a decidedly fickle thing, she had soon moved on to cake decorating,...but we digress).
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