Despite the fact that I was an international criminal and probably
quite high on Interpol’s most wanted list, I managed to cover the three hundred
and thirty miles between Ipswich and Tenby without incident. I even slipped through the Welsh border
control without having my car searched and the modern electronic gadgets
removed as the Welsh still regarded them as evil. Anyone with a digital watch was considered as
being a practitioner of black magic. We
were all meeting in a pub in the centre of Tenby and would then descend en
masse on Tim’s father’s farm. Had such a
group of people met on exercise, or in altered circumstances, there may have
been a different atmosphere, but we all got on so well together it was
fantastic. As we were having a party we
had of course brought fireworks. The local
Welsh population were probably unsettled with so many bloody foreigners in their
midst for why else would they call the police.
We were simply having fun and letting off a few fireworks as
we were all in a party mood. Perhaps
because we were using military grade fireworks, which are a little louder than
your standard squib, which not only gave you the required flash, bang, wallop,
you expected from fireworks, but they rattled most of the windows in a one
hundred yards radius too. Luckily for us
many people who leave the armed forces join the civilian police force. Most civilians may have seen a group of
drunken louts, but the head copper, the head ex forces copper, saw a group of
eighteen or twenty nut cases who could have successfully invaded Argentina over
a bank holiday weekend and still have time for a party, he simply asked us to withdraw
to a place of safety.
Well; that’s not what he said, although I’m sure it’s what he
meant. In fact he said something along the lines of, “Get out of my town and don’t
not never come back.” Terrible grammar these soldiers, ex or not. It’s bad enough being an international criminal
but being asked to leave small Welsh walled seaside town is humiliating to say
the least. Well, it may have been humiliating
if we actually cared. It was dark when
we arrived at Tim’s father’s farm. We
couldn’t have got a warmer welcome and we were all invited in and the party
really began in earnest. At one point it
was realised that the high rate of consumption of booze was diminishing the remaining
alcohol stocks so two fellows were dispatched to Tenby to buy more booze. I can remember that one of the guys was Peter
Browne; I can’t remember who the other fellow was.
Most of us could drink our own body weight in alcohol and
would probably attempt to do so a couple of times over the weekend but Peter
was referred to, by us, as a ‘lightweight’ when it came to the demon drink That is not to say the fellow was an angel,
if you remember this was the fellow who got me in so much trouble at Watton
when he forced me, at gun and knife point, to steal all the knickers, and one
suspender belt, from the WRAF block at Swanton Morley. This was the same Peter Browne who had got me
into a fight with thirty angry locals in the Trearddur Bay hotel in North Welsh
Wales. This was no angel, which is probably
why we decided to surprise him when he returned.
It would be safe to say that we were all quite drunk; even
Tim’s father was joining in with the craic.
We saw the taxi turn into the lane and drive towards the farm
house. As it stopped and Peter and the
other fellow, it could have been Martyn Strachan, I’m not sure, but as they
began to alight the attack began. The commandos
had brought some excellent thunder flashes which I had never seen before. These were multiple thunder flashes, like the
old German stick grenade and probably more effective. There would be half a dozen thunder flashes
on one stick which you could lob toward your enemy. To tell you the truth I don’t think the local
Welsh taxi driver had seen them either, and I think he was in a state of shock
as he found himself in the centre of his very own Hadron Collider. I think it would be safe to say that he probably
went straight home and changed his trousers after that.
With fresh supplies of booze secured a ceasefire was called
and we all returned inside and focused on the serious business of getting
hammered. Tim’s parents were wonderful hosts
and Tim’s father was a real laugh. He
was the focus of the party and we caroused ourselves into a stupor before we
all got into one bed and passed out. I
actually woke up in a bed next to Peter Browne so the first thing I did was check
that I had both sets of eyebrows. I
suppose in the forces you were used to sleeping with men, there was nothing
funny or strange about it. Peter assured
me the following morning that he wasn’t homosexual. Well; what he said was, I’m not gay but I
think my boyfriend might be.
We all dressed up in our finery and had a liquid breakfast
which we held in place with a tray full of bacon butties. You can see how spectacular we were with the
photograph that accompanies this blog. I
know we probably look like something along the lines of Reservoir Dogs and such
an inference would be spot on. The good
looking fellow, I know we all were, but the good looking fellow in the centre
with the gay moustache is John Clancey. The
now head of security at the Manx international airport on the Isle of Man. This is perhaps one of the most evil men on
the face of the earth. John and I used
to go around telling people that we were twins, separated at birth. John had a strong London accent, in fact when
John starts speaking you immediately begin looking around for his pearly suit; I
of course spoke with dulcet Irish undertones.
I’m taking the photograph, but you can get an impression of what I
looked like, as I looked like John, except I was much more handsome and still
had the best looking legs in Ireland. And
even though I had slept with a man the previous night I still didn’t sport a
gay moustache.
Behind us you can see the navy and marines in their best
uniforms. This is as we arrived at the
church, but don’t think we left the farmhouse and drove straight to the
church. Someone thought it would be a
good idea if we went for a few scoops in a local pub before the service. For sensible people this may have been a good
idea but for a group like us it would only mean that the high jinks would start
early. And begin early they did. Most of us were quite good at mental
arithmetic when it came to drinking. I of
course am a bit of a nerd when it comes to mathematics as I love quadratic
equations and the like. But that day there
was someone there who was even more into mathematics than I was.
You know how it works; you walk in to a pub, it’s seven
minutes past eleven o clock in the morning.
The church is twenty three minutes away and you have to be there at five
minutes to one. You can comfortably drink
one pint of beer in sixteen minutes, while still participating in an interesting
conversation, how many pints can you have before you leave for the church? And you thought heavy drinking was for mindless
louts. Well; put your calculator down, the
answer is five pints of beer and one large vodka, with no ice and that’s as
long as you don’t have any crisps. It
was when we fell out of the pub and got in to our cars and headed off for the
church that I realised there was a genius amongst us, for someone had bought a
bottle of whiskey. Even I still cringe
at what happened next, for as we sped off toward the church, the bottle of whiskey
was passed from car to car as we hammered along the narrow Welsh country
lanes. I suppose that song ‘Get me to the church on time,’ would have
been most appropriate for the occasion but
none of us were sober enough to stand never mind sing.
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