ICED FARTS
Well call us as daft as a very daft thing gone dafter but we were bereft of a log for this trip so this little chronicle of our weekend away to commemorate Clive’s birthday will have to be done from memory…
FRIDAY 26/01/96
By the time we grouped at Joy’s house in the late afternoon some of us had already experienced a day full of incident and excitement. Trev, for instance, had already been propositioned by a young lady in Soho after he responded to her kind comments about his coat and this was before lunchtime!
Our mode of transport was to be Clive’s Astra once again and, with Trev having deposited his ‘Millie the Mini’ on Joy’s driveway for the weekend he, Clive and Joy set off towards rural Burghfield in search of Linda the Boogie Bitch.
We had a very smooth passage (so to speak) and arrived at the pre-booked bed and breakfast in Swanage in good time for dinner. The girls seemed content with their single rooms but the boys were rather perturbed when shown their twin room as the two single beds were pushed together:
“If we wanted to be this close we’d have asked for a double bed”, remarked the Ginger One.
Now, the south of England was experiencing it’s coldest weather since the previous summer and many a gale and blizzard warning had been given by the likes of Bill Giles and Suzanne Charlton but, hey, we’re the Four Farties: we laugh in the face of snow and spit at the gales (hence the mess on our jackets).
Those of us with bollocks froze them off as we strolled around Swanage in the dark looking for somewhere to eat. The first pub we found wasn’t serving food and we didn’t find this out until we’d bought a round of drinks. We eventually found food in a friendly restaurant where we were taken upstairs to the dining room and basked in the heat of a real fire.
It was whilst having dinner that Joy furnished us with two of those comments that only Joy can:
On tucking into her food;
“Hmmm, it taste like Trevor’s”.
Oh realising that she’d forgotten to pack her toothbrush;
“I guess I’ll have to make do with my finger tonight”
Our sides split asunder with mirth. Almost as much as they did during the ‘Star Trek’ incident. What? You don’t know the ‘Star Trek’ incident? WELL, there we were in a cinema in London’s West-End watching ‘Star Trek: Generations’ some time in early 1994. Oh screen Patrick Stewart turns to Whoopi Goldberg and says;
“What’s it like inside the Nexus?” (the Nexus being some sort of a mysterious “energy ribbon”).
Whoopi looks wistfully into the distance and says;
“It’s like… it’s like being inside joy…”
We didn’t stop giggling for a long, long time. People were tutting us in abundance. Anyway, back to the plot…
Hot drinks and bed were agreed. Trev was unsure where to rest his new, thermal hat and decided that atop the beside lamp would be a good enough place. The trouble was that he left it there when he turned the lamp on and the room was soon full of noxious fumes and, inside, it’s fluffy lining had a small, round, bald patch.
Clive had to assist Joy with her troublesome heating system. Oh yes.
SATURDAY 27/01/96
We pottered around Swanage and had a photo session on the sea front and took in the shops: Joy wouldn’t have to resort to using her finger again tonight.
Corfe Castle was the first tourist spot that we hit. Many a photo was taken and many a cream tea devoured for lunch.
We then drove to Studland Beach which was very remote and peaceful. We strolled along the beach collecting shells, dodging the horse riders and taking in the scenery and the very cold air.
Lulworth Cove was very impressive and Trev, being Trev, dragged everyone westwards along a coastal path. The views and tranquillity were well worth the effort and we rewarded ourselves in the local café where we partook of chips and tea.
We returned to the B&B to thaw out and hit a local Indian restaurant for dinner before having a beer and retiring to bed.
Linda went to sleep.
Trev watched a ‘Carry On’ film.
Joy still had trouble with her heating.
Clive assisted. Oh yes.
SUNDAY 28/01/96
We checked out of the B&B and did our best to cram in as much sightseeing as we could on the journey home. Our first port of call was Chesil Beach where we behaved very childishly and slid backwards on our rears down the gravel slope going arse-over-tit in the process. For one scary moment Trev’s head was almost in collision with Joy’s butt which was in the descent. None of the passers by seemed to understand our merriment.
Goodness knows where we stopped for lunch but stop we did so in a very nice pub where we amused the locals by playing a stupid game which involved miming the titles to well-known films. Trev’s take on ‘Titfield Thunderbolt’ was dubious to say the least.
Cerne Abbas. We pulled over to marvel at the size of the Giant’s genitalia. It was very given how cold it was.
Sherborne was our next stop. It possessed a very nice Abbey and Sherborne was where we did a pub dinner. The lady behind the bar looked like Enya.
Shaftesbury was our final stop. This was to generally have a look around and have a gander at Gold Hill which didn’t look as lovely as it did in the Hovis adverts. The view was rather spoilt by the tacky, giant, plastic Hovis loaf at it’s summit.
Next stop was, unfortunately, home. Stonehenge may have looked moody in the evening gloom but not as moody as we did.
The briefest of Farts was over.
The thought that this might be our last ever Farting hadn’t, as Douglas Adams would say, even begun to speculate about the merest possibility of crossing our minds.
FOURPLAY 