It's A Bad Man, Daddy!
Scuse the annoying amount of backstory, but behind my parents house is a little bit of a field and the continuation of a bridle path that cuts the entire estate in half. This used to be a quaint little rutted path virtually overgrown with bushes and trees that all the locals used to walk their dogs along. Until the council had the genius idea of concreting the bastard and turning into a shiny, six foot wide super charver highway. Now the people walking dogs have mostly gone, replaced by drunken teenagers, gangs of hoody wearers and the occasional pikey twat on one of those hair-dryer powered mini-bike things that make a noise like concorde taking off. Now along the length of this path, many of the houses have back gates to allow access which, after it was covered in tarmac, basically became the preferred entrance for pikey burglar scum. As a result, almost everyone, including my parents, have locked up their gates, pulled out the homemade steps and let the weeds and nettles overgrow the little bank between them and the path to hide from the charvers.

Right. Now I've covered myself in excuses in case the police are still looking for me, I can get on with the actual story.

Being that no damn charver scum is going to interfere with my laziness, I came out of my parents house and headed for the back gate on my way to the pub (natch). As I was unlocking the gate I heard something both wonderous and weird. There were voices to be heard from the path, not those of charvers though, but of an actual human family. My heart rejoiced. As I was taking off the padlock I heard the father warn his daughter (oddly named Irana, no idea if that's how you spell it) not to wander too far away. Good for him, I thought. It was starting to get dark and you never know what kind of weirdo you're going to run into on that path. Silly me. With the gate finally opened and then closed behind me I did a quick reccy of the state of the hill down to the path. It was only about six foot but, from what I could see of the places the nettles hadn't overgrown the top step was still there, the next one consisted of one moss covered housebrick and the bottom step had disappeared completely and had been replaced by a mini mud slide. No problem, I thought, first is easy and enough balance on the second to be able to jump over the mud and nettles should see me safely down. I readied myself and promptly tripped off the top step. Excellent, I thought as I tried to land on the second 'step' and succeeded in doing nothing more than catching my toe on it and tipping myself face first into the mud. Splendid, I mused as I did a barrel roll through said mud. But Hooray, I thought, as I at least managed to get my hands up in front of my face to protect my eyes even though it meant stinging the hell out of my arms on the nettles as I did so. But, even better, I somehow managed to commando roll the last bit and spring up onto my feet.

It was about then that the screaming started.

"IRANA. GET BACK HERE. NOW!!!" I heard the man shout in angry terror as, twenty feet up the path from him, a mud covered pervert seemingly jumped out of the bushes right next to his beloved little girl, rubbing his arms at her furiously and muttering a constant stream of swearwords. I could only look at him, shocked and bemused. My attention quickly turned back to Irana, however, as, after getting over the initial shock of me looming out of the bushes at her, had clearly decided she was having the time of her life. She pointed at me and shouted, oddly, in a voice totally filled with excitement. "Look Daddy! It's a bad man! It's a bad man, Daddy!" As if she'd heard about these bad men but never thought she would ever actually get to see one. And now she had she sounded as if all her birthdays had come at once! I didn't have a fucking clue what to do at this point so did my best to flash a reassuring smile at the father. Due to the agony of my battered, mud covered body, however, I've got a horrible feeling it probably looked more like a sneer. Sensing there was little I could do to improve this situation, I simply waved and walked off, leaving a bewildered family, huddling together, the father noticing the gate from which I had come and hopefully figuring out what the fuck had just happened and not ringing the police. That didn't stop me sitting at the pub, covered in mud and shitting myself the entire night, waiting for them to come and arrest me like.
( Gleeballs is mostly made out of chocolate and hate., Sat 19 Aug 2006, 9:50, Reply)