Verbal High Fives

Historically I’ve never been all that flagrantly “sporty.” I once managed to successfully fall over and injure myself on a school sports day in the 100 meter hurdles… on the flattest part of the field… right at the beginning of the race... before I even reached the first hurdle. Ahem... I do not know where my unwavering aversion towards sports first began. Perhaps it’s rooted my synchronized swimming years (I so wish I was kidding right now). But I’m probably not keen on sports because the only physically demanding activity I ever excelled in as a teenager was “falling” - my personal best is 3 storeys.  So in my vocabulary, the terms ‘fun’ and ‘sport’ have only once harmoniously coexisted in the same sentence and that was in the summer of 1993 when I asked my school netball coach, “Can’t we just stop playing this sport now and rather do something fun?”  Nevertheless, I recently found myself voluntarily engaging in a sport of sorts. I went Clay Pigeon Shooting. Not b...

Last weekend I went away to Symonds Yat with 24 of my closest friends:– a group of people who are still desperately trying to remember my name. We went away for some much needed R and R – which I believe is an acronym for 'Romping Reindeer' or 'Risky Recreation' because we almost killed ourselves in our outdoor pursuits and I’m certain I heard reindeer prancing on the barn roof at night. On Saturday afternoon I elected to go abseiling in the Royal Forest of Dean which was a little scary because some idiot -- the Symonds Yat Great Outdoors Authorities should really look into this right away -- had placed large quantities of gravity right at the bottom of the 500 foot vertical cliff face! Real abseiling (and I know this information may shock those of you who have never been abseiling before) takes place mainly in the environment which consists primarily of “dirt” and “nature” – a lethal combination that can easily kill you if you do not remain alert and correctly ...

I am one of the many commuters who make use of the United Kingdom’s public transport system every day. Sure, it sounds somewhat tedious and a tad dull but using public transport – particularly the D bus – recently became a bit of an extreme sport. On Wednesday this week I boarded the D bus outside my office which, unbeknownst to me, was being driven by a fairly "enthusiastic" bus driver (I am using the term "enthusiastic" here more in the sense of ‘slightly unhinged’). He was in his early 20s, wore Oakley sunglasses and had no hair on top of his head. That was because it was all growing out of his ears; he had so much ear hair it looked like he’d snorted a Persian cat. And h e drove the D bus that afternoon with all the passion of a man who had a disgruntled Persian cat in his trousers. I knew the ride home was going to be something special when he floored it before everyone was seated. This resulted in a human pile-up towards the rear of the bus. T ...

Today I started my new job. I was merely one of forty eager recruits beginning the company’s 3 week induction course. First, we got our employee photo ID badges on lanyards which we need to wear at ALL TIMES least we forget how good looking we are or how to spell our names. This employee ID badge is pretty powerful. It not only gives me FREE bus rides in town but, if swiped correctly, it also gives me access into the building, the company elevator, the toilets, my office floor, and it enables me to moon walk. If I swipe it incorrectly it locks me out of the building/ my office/ the elevator/ all toilets for 3 minutes while simultaneously transporting me into an extra terrestrial space craft. Therefore I swipe it with utmost care. Part of the induction course is to do extensive in-house training (and by ‘in house training’ I obviously mean that they 'try to break our spirit.') We spent the morning discovering the reasons why group ice breakers were originally invented; to m...

Many people believe that Fridays are the best day of the week because they’re the start of the weekend. Statistically, Fridays are the best day of the week to ask for a raise and buy into the stock market. If days of the week were people, Fridays would undoubtedly be Chuck Norris. Typically the world is just a better place on Fridays – ‘Thank God it’s Friday’ right? But sporadically a rouge Friday comes along; a bad Friday who has been spending far too much time with insufferable Mondays... Last Friday was rogue. It was cold. So cold, that by comparison the inside of my refrigerator could be accurately described as “somewhat balmy.” And I had a job interview which meant I had to venture outside into the cold to catch the bus. It also meant I was heroically wearing high heels in public – footwear I generally reserve for dire emergencies like a date, or weddings, or death. My walking speed in high heels is drastically reduced. As a result I was running late. So I was scampering do...