SWIMMING
I don't like swimming. Never have. I suppose it stems from school, really. Being forced to disrobe in front of the whole class, then thrash around in a mixture of chlorine and piss, all the while being goaded by a frustrated sex-pest that looked like Peter Sutcliffe shitting in a nettle patch.
Hardly inspiring, really.
So why I found myself at the Twentyford Lido last week, in the freezing cold, watching a number of my co-workers splashing about for trinkets is beyond me. Possibly the threat of dismissal may have had something to do with it.
I came that close to being strong-armed into actually taking part. Luckily the hefty piece of masonry drill sticking out of my bonce precluded me, on grounds of being 'differently abled', and thus both an embarrassment and a fire-risk. Claire sat out as well. She'd recently given birth after that whole Jude Law thing at Xmas. Poor thing didn't qualify for proper maternity leave, apparently, but she was excluded for fear that Portuguese Men-of-War may pick up on her current hormonal flux and attack us. (Apparently such had already happened in Belize a few years ago – I had neither time nor inclination to verify this, so if any readers could fill me in I'd be grateful...)
The whole thing was cooked up by Michael Onions, the man who holds the purse strings which hold my purse strings. He likes swimming. Thus must we all swim. In the dead of winter. Word on the grapevine is that he has some weird arrangement with a local swimwear manufacturer. Hence the peculiar, and mandatory, bathing costumes. I'll try and describe them, but please bear with me if I omit anything important. The very thought of it still summons up tsunamis of migraine.
For a start, female participants are obliged to swim topless, apart from two 'nipple hats', held in place by double-sided tape, and embroidered with the winking face of Mr Onions. Male employees wear what could best be described as the bottom half of a wetsuit. At crotch level is fastened a grotesque distended human arm, the hand of which holds a small handbag, also of red wetsuit material, and also embroidered with Onions' gin-blossomed face, with the legend 'I Know My Onions'. Participants of both genders are obliged to wear straw hats, at a precise angle.
Several events came and went. I'm afraid I don't recall precisely what their names were. Frankly, they struck me as identical in every respect. Competitors start at one end of the pool. They swim to the other. One of them wins a stick. All the stick winners are bid stand on a plinth, and all receive a frighteningly long kiss from Onions, who is, I should add, naked with a troubling look in his eye. The overall winner gets a cheque for £3.25 and is given the rest of the day off (this all wraps up at 5:30), and everyone else runs screaming while Onions 'gets his groove on'...
Pointless... Still. It's a day out of the office, I suppose...
Hardly inspiring, really.
So why I found myself at the Twentyford Lido last week, in the freezing cold, watching a number of my co-workers splashing about for trinkets is beyond me. Possibly the threat of dismissal may have had something to do with it.
I came that close to being strong-armed into actually taking part. Luckily the hefty piece of masonry drill sticking out of my bonce precluded me, on grounds of being 'differently abled', and thus both an embarrassment and a fire-risk. Claire sat out as well. She'd recently given birth after that whole Jude Law thing at Xmas. Poor thing didn't qualify for proper maternity leave, apparently, but she was excluded for fear that Portuguese Men-of-War may pick up on her current hormonal flux and attack us. (Apparently such had already happened in Belize a few years ago – I had neither time nor inclination to verify this, so if any readers could fill me in I'd be grateful...)
The whole thing was cooked up by Michael Onions, the man who holds the purse strings which hold my purse strings. He likes swimming. Thus must we all swim. In the dead of winter. Word on the grapevine is that he has some weird arrangement with a local swimwear manufacturer. Hence the peculiar, and mandatory, bathing costumes. I'll try and describe them, but please bear with me if I omit anything important. The very thought of it still summons up tsunamis of migraine.
For a start, female participants are obliged to swim topless, apart from two 'nipple hats', held in place by double-sided tape, and embroidered with the winking face of Mr Onions. Male employees wear what could best be described as the bottom half of a wetsuit. At crotch level is fastened a grotesque distended human arm, the hand of which holds a small handbag, also of red wetsuit material, and also embroidered with Onions' gin-blossomed face, with the legend 'I Know My Onions'. Participants of both genders are obliged to wear straw hats, at a precise angle.
Several events came and went. I'm afraid I don't recall precisely what their names were. Frankly, they struck me as identical in every respect. Competitors start at one end of the pool. They swim to the other. One of them wins a stick. All the stick winners are bid stand on a plinth, and all receive a frighteningly long kiss from Onions, who is, I should add, naked with a troubling look in his eye. The overall winner gets a cheque for £3.25 and is given the rest of the day off (this all wraps up at 5:30), and everyone else runs screaming while Onions 'gets his groove on'...
Pointless... Still. It's a day out of the office, I suppose...
posted by Drill Boy at
00:55
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