Category: Random

I have been laughing a lot recently. By laughing I mean laughing out loud. Explosively. Not just a narrowing of the eyes and a quiet nod of appreciation at an amusing point well-phrased. I mean tea and snot shooting out of my nose.

Some of this convulsing has been caused by blog-reading. There are a lot of funny people out in the gabbling mega-canteen that is the blogosphere. However, a great deal of the laughter has been produced by my reading Bill Bryson’s new book.

Bill Bryson is the best anecdotalist since Peter Ustinov (whom he succeeded as Chancellor of Durham University) and his “Lost Continent” had a profound effect on me: It made me give up any thought I may silently have nurtured of writing anything other than dull books about Law. The book had exactly the tone I had longed to be able to produce and was radiantly funny in a down-trodden self-deprecating way. Every couple of pages was comedic set-piece deployed without apparent artifice and with disarming charm.

I knew, so to speak, that I was beaten. His “voice” was my voice, the one I had been nurturing but mature and natural and funny whereas mine was squeaky and forced.

He moved back to the US from Britain a few years ago (and has since returned) and once, on our way to a holiday in Vermont, we stopped in his new home town for a meal. I decided that we should go visit him. In that crazed way that fans have of seeing their heroes I assumed he would welcome a group of English tourists, freshly full of meat and fries, arriving on his doorstep. Surely the warmth of my regard for him would immediately counter his annoyance at being descended upon and his latent fear that he had finally met the psychopathic reader who would finish him off? I explained my plan to P and my companions who edged away from me on the restaurant benches and explained what “stalking” meant.

Then, one day about 2 years ago, I was walking up a staircase at St Pancras tube station when Bill Bryson appeared at the top of the flight. I immediately recognised his somewhat dumpy ruffled charm. My brain edged up a gear. “It’s him” I thought, superflously. “I should say something to him”. I reasoned that anyone who publishes must appreciate feedback. I know I scour the comments page after every blog entry craving the affirmation that a comment brings. But what to say? I thought hard. Nothing came. I thought harder still till you could almost hear the brain cells squeaking as they rubbed together. Nothing. At that moment I snapped out of it. Bill was now about 2 foot away from me and from the unnerved look on his face it was apparent that I had spent the whole climb staring fixedly at him while my brain tried, unsuccessfully, to do it’s thing.  In a moment he was gone and he and I were spared the torturous embarrassment of my actually speaking.

This weekend was my 11th wedding anniversary. We went to stay in the Sanderson Hotel for the night (the discovery of which I owe to Poggle).

I thought that, in honour of the occasion, I would tell you the story of our engagement. Very shortly after P and I began “stepping out together” (as no-one has put it since 1946), I decided she was the one for me. I enquired politely how long I might be expected to wait before asking for her hand. “Two years” she replied. For men that is a very significant period of time. I don’t think I am giving away too much here if I indicate that for a man “two years” is, for all practical purposes, equivalent to never. “Let’s give it two years before we move house/visit your mother/buy you a new car/have another baby” means “Let’s NEVER do those things”.

However, I waited and plotted. With two years to plan, things became ever more elaborate. I decided that I would propose on the second anniversary of our first kiss (18 August 1992) and booked the day out in my work diary. About a month before the date I was in court and we ran out of time before we finished the case.

Judge: We’ll need to come back Mr Moobs. 18 August seems ideal.

Moobs: Beggin’ your illustrious pardon but I have a prior engagement?

Judge: What?

Moobs: A personal matter.

Judge leans over the desk: That’s the most interesting, indeed the only interesting thing you’ve said all day Mr Moobs. Do tell

Moobs: Er … I was planning to propose to my girlfriend

Judge: Well Mr Moobs, we would not want to stand in the way of romance. Let’s just have half a day on the 18th.

That, unfortunately, scuppered my plan. However, a friend was getting married a few days after the second anniversary of the date we started “going out” (6 September 1992) so I had another thought.

I now needed to get the permission of the Venerable P père. I bought a new fountain pen, a new bottle of ink and a new package of linen paper and sat down to write. Having composed my note, I washed out the pen and put everything away in the drawer with a view to never using them again so that they would have had a single purpose: winning me P’s hand. 11 years on I used them again; to send P a love letter on our 10th anniversary.

Permission granted, I approached my friend and explained that I needed him to suborn his wedding to my plans to propose. Specifically I wanted his bride to be to ensure that Penny caught the bouquet. Then, leopard-like (ok, Koala-like) I would pounce. He was, God bless him, willing to help. I then booked a night for two in the swishest hotel I could find. As I am a miserable and infrequent driver, the plan depended on P driving us there so I had to make sure she was persuaded to drive to the wedding itself.

The night before the big day we were at the movies. P teased me, asking me when I planned to allow her to do me the honour of accepting my proposal. Being a whale-sized knobhead I saw an opportunity for some mischief. In order to “throw her off the scent” I replied curtly that I wished she would let the subject drop as I didn’t appreciate the pressure. P went quiet and stared ahead. Inside my head I chuckled at my masterly grasp of psychology. Inside her head, I later learned, she was wondering whether she should ditch me there and then or give me one last chance.

The next day I sat through the ceremony, right leg jiggling to the beat of an inaudible and manically fast drum. As I  vibrated the pew with my muscular spasm it occurred to me that there was a problem with my plan: I had no idea at what point the bride threw the bouquet. The first moment this might happen, I reasoned, was when the newlyweds climbed into the Roller for the short drive to the reception. As they made their way to the vehicle, P spotted a friend and drifted off. Terrified I would miss my chance I dragged her back to the kerbside by the arm insisting that we see the bride and groom off. I then stood, nose to car window waggling my eyebrows expressively as my friend spent the first few moments of his married life wondering what the heck I was doing.

At the reception I was all nerves. I slipped away for a pint and confessed to some friends what was up. I asked them not to tell anyone. One person they certainly did not tell was Sarah, one of P’s friends.

P: I’ve told Sarah I will give her a lift back to London when the do is over.

M: Er … ok

I waited until P and Sarah had caught up and then bundled Sarah away and explained that if she climbed into the car she was most likely going to be spending the evening sleeping in the bath of a grand hotel. Having explained it all, I asked her not tell anyone. She promised.

As the last dreadful stutterings of the Disco died out the married couple announced they were leaving and that the bouquet would now be thrown. This was a sensible move and had the desired result: I stopped stalking them about the reception dragging a bemused P beside me just in case they decided to deal with the whole matter spontaneously.

As they climbed into their getaway car, I pushed an pulled P until she had a clear space around her. The Bride made sure where P was, turned her back and tossed the bouquet over her head like an East German throwing the Hammer. The flowers smacked P on the forehead and bounced into her arms.

P looked embarrassed, no doubt recollecting our conversation of the previous night.

M: Looks like the subject just won’t go away

P: Guess not

M: Let’s go for a walk.

I took her into the gardens and said:

“P, will you marry me”. I produced the ring I had bought.

“Are you serious?”

I had played the scenario out many times in my head preparing myself, I had thought,  for every eventuality. This was not an answer I had factored in. I stood, frozen, ring held in my outstretched hand.

M: Does the diamond ring not sort of give it away?

P: I will marry you.

We hugged each other and over her shoulder I could see all the guests who my friends had promised not to tell jumping about and waving their arms at the hotel window.

I told P about the swish hotel I had booked elsewhere and suggested we head straight there. P was in a kind of shock and so, once underway, we drove through the early autumn Sussex lanes at a steady 18 miles an hour, bound for Cuckfield and thence to matrimony.

Bah! Work is cramping my blogging style again so the latest episode in the long running drama “I Anecdote” will have to wait till the weekend.

In the meantime, tell me if you’ve ever told the truth and then regretted doing so.