Mr BC and I get on the train at Truro. Presently, a well-spoken lady comes up to where we are sitting.
WELL-SPOKEN LADY: (indicating seat next to Mr BC) Is this seat free?
MR BC: I think s-
FLORID GENTLEMAN: (having just arrived on the scene) No, that's my seat.
ME: (indicating seat next to me) This one's free.
WELL-SPOKEN LADY: (with evident disdain) Oh, I couldn't possibly sit there, back to the engine. I would be sick.
MR BC: Me too.
FLORID GENTLEMAN: Me too.
ME: (inwardly) Why, you shower of lily-livered weaklings, honestly. Look at me, I've clambered out of a river gorge in Africa in the beating hot sun, not to mention battled with killer flies* in the Venezuelan jungle and swum in the cold North Sea on New Year's Day, and you can't even contemplate sitting on a train looking backwards? What's the country coming to, I don't know, tut tut, blah blah blah....
Outwardly, I give the well-spoken lady a disapproving frown.
Later:
MR BC: That was Jenny Agutter.
Crikey. I wonder what the karmic retribution is for frowning at a National Treasure.
* Well, I *thought* they were killer flies. It was only after our guide had shouted 'No pican!' at me for about the 80th time that it dawned on me she wasn't shouting 'Run for your life!'** but in fact 'They don't bite!'.
** Or, more cryptically, 'No pecans!'.
Friday, December 21, 2007
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13 comments:
Since Jenny A was in The Railway Children, surely she gets free travel?
Yes, but only if she ties her pants to a stick.
"A boy and girl face the challenge of the world's last frontier. Dangers they had never known before... A people they had never seen before..."
Walkabout, starring Jenny Agutter.
I prefer travelling backwards, and it's safer that way.
Admit it, you didn't recognise her with her clothes on.
Is that old urban legend about back to the engine still going?
I know someone who stood behind Jenny A in WHSmith in Stratford upon Avon. She was in King Lear, stabbing someone in the eyes. He had erotic fantasies about her (probably still does) - from being in a queue behind her, not the blinding that is!
Geoff: That's all very well, but walking about backwards near a railway line with no clothes on and your pants on a stick is just asking for trouble.
Tim: It's true I didn't recognise her, but I didn't recognise Ruby Wax either that time she asked me and ex-Mr P for directions to the Parliament Hill Lido, and I'm pretty sure an absence of nudity didn't have anything to do with that.
Llewtrah: What's the urban legend? And ooh, this might get like that time it turned out everyone had an anecdote about Jimmy Savile.
I apologise if none of my above comments make any sense. It's the Lemsip playing havoc with my brain faculties.
FLASHBACK: EXT. OXFORD - DAY
Self walking through college with pretty blonde girl. Student approaches, walking towards us and smiles.
STUDENT: (TO GIRL) Hello.
Girl goes red. (Not completely.) Self waits for a hello. Receives none and turns, student having passed.
SELF: (SILLY AND SLIGHTLY AGGRESSIVE VOICE) Hello.
No reaction as student continues walking away.
SELF: (LOUD) Bugger off, then.
THE SAME - MOMENTS LATER
GIRL: You know who that was, don't you?
SELF: No.
GIRL: Prince Andrew.
FLASHBACK ENDS.
Not gay, then.
Oops.
That was Prince Edward. Sack the script editor.
Leaves, sacked.
Hmph. I get very vomity if I have to sit backwards for even a split second so I'm vicariously offended by everybody's lack of sympathy for Ms Agutter.
Speaking of not recognising celebrities, I walked past the Arctic Monkeys at Glastonbury twice without noticing (well, theyr'e pretty non-descript) and, more idiotically, Stephen Merchant.
Devolutionary: Hm, I wonder if Prince Edward got into Oxford on academic merit.
Spin: It's all an act. I may have battled with killer flies in jungle regions in the past, but now I'm so agoraphobic I can't walk round a National Trust garden without crying hysterically and having to have my hand held. I too wouldn't be able to recognise the Arctic Monkeys (I also managed not to recognise Noel Gallagher *or* Dustin Hoffman recently), but even I think I might be able to recognise Stephen Merchant.
Just to clear up a possible ms conception, I didn't go to Oxford. Not to study, anyway. I was in Devon with Mr Footman.
Totally understand about Noel Gallagher. I saw him on Marylebone High Street and he was tiny. As was Dawn French. And Wendy Richard (who the imdb tells me has a collection of over 1,000 ornamental frogs).
Ah, with Mr Footman and me, then. And him out of Radiohead. And that other chap.
(Unless you *are* that other chap, in which case, yes.)
Had they all gone shopping together? Maybe for tiny teacups?
And that Potter woman.
Almost certainly not that other chap. Always been this one.
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