Saturday, 16 November 2013

Celtic Illumination, part 222, En garde.

I hope you lot are showing some respect, for we are now in church, at a wedding ceremony, where Tim Lort is getting married.  That’s better.  Typical, bog standard, country church, altar, vicar, congregation, organ.  Roof needs repair and there’s loads of dead people lying about outside.  I suppose on a day like this you would hope everyone was ‘Singing from the same hymn sheet.’  Well; two of us were, Rick Stocks and myself shared a hymnal and belted out each hymn as we had been learned how to at school.  Rick and I were probably still thinking that if we didn’t sing at the top of our voices we would be in for a cold shower later on from the Dean.  Well; in my case it would have been the Dean, Rick would have had a Head of House.  Most of the rabble, that’s all the ones in uniform, were at the back of the church, chapel, place of worship, take your choice.
We were all waiting for the ‘word of command,’ which in a wedding ceremony is, as you all know, “You may now kiss the bride.”   Don’t for one moment think that we were going to rush forward and snog the face off the new Misses Lort, no, far from it.  Once the word of command had been given, the rear three or four rows would exit the church.  Once outside we formed up, however, for those military tacticians among you, we formed up in reverse standard military operating procedure.  Normally for military manoeuvres you pummel the target with your heavy artillery and then bring in the close quarters fighting, rifles, pistols, grenades, even down to bayonets.  And by the way, for any entrepreneurs out there, if you ever come across a church and graveyard for sale snap it up, for it would make a wonderful setting for paintballing.  Gravestones give remarkable cover and with the haphazard way they are laid out, allow plenty of scope for attack, or defence, if you have a streak of cowardice running though you.
As I was saying we had opted for reversed standard military operating procedure.  We had the close quarters fellows at the door of the church and the heavy artillery positioned in a semi-circle around the main door of the church.  As Tim and his new bride came out of the church, and yes ladies she looked radiant.  I would have to say she had a classic look.  The dress was a pure, sharp, white with a jewel neckline, cap sleeves and fitted bodice which was adorned entirely with delicate lace. The skirt was made of luxurious satin that draped beautifully off the body.  I’m sorry to say that Tim was dressed in the uniform of a Royal Naval officer, and from this you may have created such a romantic idea in your head, but I felt that the Royal Naval jacket looked and felt more like a donkey jacket.
However, out they came to be welcomed by the arch of crossed swords held aloft by Tim’s brother officers.  The photographers were having a field day and we waited patiently till the photographs were out of the way.  As they stepped away from the formality of the photographs we opened fire with the bazookas.   I understand that some of you may be saying, why on earth would you bring a man-portable, recoilless, antitank, rocket launcher, weapon to a wedding and if you give me a chance I’ll explain exactly why to you.  These were very special bazookas, homemade and reusable.  I’m tempted to explain to you in detail how to make one, in case you have a wedding coming up in the near future and would like to attack the wedding party as they exit the church.  It would certainly cut down on the amount the reception is going to cost you.
I say I am willing to tell you, but I would hate this information to end up in the terrorist handbook or somewhere like that, so I’ll leave certain key details out. That way it will be seen that I am not promoting terrorism or carnage at weddings.  First of all you need a length of drain pipe, about three feet long.  Standard, plastic drain pipe, about three to four inches in diameter, and round.  I will not say what colour you should get, see, always thinking secure thoughts.  Next you need a cap that fits over one end, these are normally a good fit but you need to drill a hole, off centre, so that you can secure the cap, to the pipe, with a pin.  Another hole must be drilled in the centre of the cap.  Now you take a firework, squib, banger type firework, and roll the fuse into a point and slip that through the hole in the cap.  Attach the cap to the drain pipe and secure in place with the pin.
Now push a soft white bread roll into the drain pipe and push it down a good ten or twelve inches.  It has to be a soft, white, bread roll because they’re normally very cheap and taste like cardboard.  Now you can pour in a box of confetti and secure in place with another bread roll.  Place the bazooka on your shoulder and when you receive the double tap on your head, see we are back to battle field signals again; you will know that your partner has lit the fuse.  Aim at the target.  Please, please, please, aim high, because the last thing a bride wants on her wedding day is a soft, white, bread roll, travelling at a fair old rate of knots, in the face.  As long as you have taken wind speed and direction into account, the happy couple, and all those within a twenty yard radius, will now find themselves in a satisfying shower of confetti.  The more bazookas you have in your battery the more better the spectacle will be.  If you’ve ever seen film of a ticker tape parade in New York, then this is the sort of effect you will end up with. By the way, if you are useless with your hands, or an air trafficker, you can just Google ‘Confetti cannon’ and buy one from the interweb.
And don’t forget when choosing your firing positions to try to find a grave with a nice, flat, cement top.  This way you can lay out your bread rolls and boxes of confetti and bangers so that a rapid reload can be accomplished.  Everyone thought it was fantastic fun, well; apart from the vicar who came screaming over towards us.  Being thrown out of a Welsh walled seaside town is bad enough, but being asked to leave a graveyard is something else I shall not be able to tell the grandchildren about.  We held our heads in shame and were leaving; allowing the vicar to witter on about disrespecting the dead when Rhod Cunningham started to say that he hadn’t heard any of the dead complain.  I promise you the vicar wasn’t impressed, we even showed him on the boxes that the confetti was biodegradable, just like the residents of the graveyard, said Rhod, which saw us banned for life from the graveyard and church.
All we had to do now is get to the hotel in Tenby, which we were also barred from, for the reception.  Being highly trained military men this would be no problem.  It was early afternoon, so we couldn’t stay in the shadows and creep towards our objective.  We would have to, as they say, hide in the open, use the natural cover, blend in with our surroundings.  I really do wish that I had one of these new mobile telephones so that I could have recorded just how stealthy we were.  You would have been so proud.  I’ll try to paint you a picture, in words.  Imagine a lovely remote Welsh country lane, very lush and green.  In front of me are two motor cars, side by side, both going in the same direction, so you can assume that at least one of them was on the wrong side of the road.  Hanging out of the cars are people, having a swordfight, with real swords.

I know, ridiculous.  I had a sun roof on my car, so Alex Alexander was standing on the passenger seat of my car trying to hit the duellists with bread rolls which he was firing from his bazooka.  I have to say he’s a top shot is old Alex, beside us is Rick Stocks driving his open top sports car.  Rick had a lovely green, with wire spoke wheels, MG Roadster, from which soft white bread rolls were being launched towards, not just the fellows with the swords but us as well.  As least all the whiskey had gone.  And to top it all Rhod Cunningham is up to his party piece of climbing out the rear window of the car he was travelling in, mine, crawling across the roof and back in through the other rear window and all at fifty miles per hour without the use of a safety net.  Madness?  Not at all.  It was a plan that worked, for we arrived at the hotel, for the wedding reception, without the local police noticing us.  Although I have to say the hotel manager did eye us up somewhat suspiciously as we entered his establishment.  As if we were going to get up to any shenanigans.

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