Stupid tricks.

I woke up in a pipe once, long time ago of course; I don’t do that sort of thing nowadays. I can’t remember exactly when it was but it must have been during my no fixed abode period, at a time when I was between wives. I know it was about then because it was one of the stupid tricks I got up to just before I got up to the most stupid trick of my whole life. All the other stupid tricks which by the way would take an IBM super computer to catalogue pale in comparison to the most stupid trick of my whole life. Which I will tell you about another time

The pipe was of the kind that carry water or sewage underground, thankfully it hadn’t yet been buried, it was still above ground on a building site somewhere in Manchester city centre. It was about twenty feet long and three foot in diameter. I don’t remember taking up residence, in fact I don’t remember the night before, or how I got there, But I do remember a chap in rather large boots with a red chest complaining to me that I was holding up work and could I please piss off. His language was a little more colourful than that and loud enough to wake the dead, which I surely would have been had he not spotted me fast asleep in his pipe.

I crawled out bleary eyed and stretched my arms and legs and must have looked for all the world like a holidaymaker greeting a new morning on his hotel balcony. This cavalier attitude to his remonstrating seemed to annoy him further because he put one of his large boots right up my arse. I decided to put as much distance between myself and the red chested large booted chap as I could, but this was easier said than done. One because the ground was a foot deep in mud so my feet were being sucked into it and I found it very difficult to walk let alone run, and two because I was feeling the effects of something other than a night of heavy drinking.

My journey from the pipe to what appeared to be the edge of the building site took some time, imagine wearing an old fashioned diving suit, having your legs tied together and walking up a down escalator and you will get the idea. As I neared the fence that surrounded the site I saw an old black woman in a rocking chair knitting and rocking back and forth to the sound of music. Don’t ask me where it came from, it was just there, I asked her where I was, she just stared at me and carried on knitting, I asked her again mentioning that I was rather the worse for wear and a little confused. She stopped knitting and looked me in the eye “are you married white boy” I replied that I probably wasn’t but could be, I wasn’t sure. She dropped the knitting and exposed her breasts, at which point I hurriedly walked away to the sound of her laughing loudly. I climbed through a gap in the fence and as I looked back noticed that she had gone, god knows where, there was nowhere to go.

I walked the streets for ages, I didn’t have a clue where I was, I reasoned that if I could get into the city centre I could find my bearings. I asked several passers by where I could catch a bus into Manchester, but they just recoiled and looked horrified. I gave up asking and instead studied the front of the buses for their destinations and numbers, none of which I recognised, I saw a café and decided to have a hot drink and revive myself before continuing what seemed to be a pointless journey. I didn’t even get a chance to order before the chap behind the bar screamed at me to get out, “we don’t serve your kind in here” he said this in a very thick foreign accent. I left, I was tired, I was getting nowhere and my legs were aching.

I walked a little further aware that people were staring at me, before giving up and sitting down on the step of a shop. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a scruffy looking chap advancing toward me looking very angry, “Oi, you” he snarled “this is my patch, clear of or I’ll kick yer arse” he grabbed me by the collar and yanked me up. I was beyond caring now and very tired and as I had already had my arse kicked that morning, wasn’t about to let it happen again.

He pulled his fist back to punch me, but tired as I was I wasn’t too tired to give him a Glasgow kiss, which connected very nicely and rearranged his conk. His eyes glazed over and still in the position he was in when I made contact, he slowly crumpled to the ground like a cardboard cut-out. By now we had attracted quite a large crowd and two rather stuffy looking policemen who completely ignored the lump on the ground and began firing questions at me. I didn’t really care, I couldn’t be bothered answering, it was all too much. I was just about to start crying (that sometimes works) when a familiar face pushed through the crowd and began talking very quickly to the coppers; it was an old friend of mine who had been passing on his way to work from the council depot. I couldn’t make out any of what was said, but it must have worked because the policeman gave me into familiar faces custody.

The crowd parted as I was led away by my friend and introduced to a vehicle you don’t see on our streets these days, It has a rounded top with sliding doors and smells to high heaven. The dustbin lorry, I was heaved into the back by my friend and his sidekick and transported at break neck speed to my parents house, they were horrified by my appearance, and devastated that the neighbours had seen me arrive home in a trash van. I was covered from head to toe in several different types of mud, as well as blood and a collection of leaves and twigs, not to mention the rubbish that I had acquired on my ride home.

I vaguely remember taking a six-hour bath and then sleeping for several days. The reason for all this was that whilst out with my friends one of them decided to spike my drinks, this he did several times unaware that another of my responsible friends had also had the same idea, but instead of using alcohol, he had used acid. The combined result of which was a Lewis Carol adventure that could have been the end of me. This was the third of three times I had taken acid, the other two were unfortunately just as unproductive, still its something to tell the grandkids when the batteries in their gameboys run down and they are BOOOOOORED.