Basketball! Football! Cross-country! History!
PE was always great at my first senior school. I went to a grammar school in Lincolnshire, and we had perhaps the most memorable teacher of my school career. His name was Gerald "Chesty" Nash.

Loud, piss-taking, relentlessly physical and cheerful. Gruff, ancient, strong and horribly fit and healthy.

Highlights include the time I was hit in the face with a basketball, passed to me at somewhere around the speed of sound, various cricketing mishaps, and enforced cross-country in ankle deep snow. I loved his lessons.

He was our history teacher also, and he brought the past to life with a similar force and energy. Hitting students with books, bouncing around the classroom, picking up on all the jokes and attempted misbehaviours.

The guy was a legend around the school. Popular with teachers and children.

He's long retired now, but I like to consider him a key contributor to my developing personality.

Thanks Chesty...
( disasterprone "Pyjamas caused the Holocaust", Wed 25 Nov 2009, 6:28, Reply)