Thursday 12 April 2007

Of easter weekends and my friend Zac

Recently I have noticed several things about myself, not many of them are hugely interesting to the average person but over the weekend I did come up with a marvellous spoonerism. They tend to happen when I am totally distracted, overly-excited, or ridiculously tired. The weekend involved the latter as Zac and I stayed up from Saturday morning, through Saturday night at an all night easter-prayer vigil thing; did church Sunday morning (where everyone seemed far too enthusiastic I thought - it was quite beyond me how everyone didn't just want to go for a nice lie down and a bit of peace and quiet); Sunday lunch with some friends and then back to Oxford for sleep around 6 o clock.

Since we appeared to be on a roll with doing stupid and not well-thought out things no eyelids were batted at the fact that the car was so full that oxygen (nevermind space) was a premium. I imagine it's what living in a Japanese box must be like. Nevertheless armed with a guitar (patronised for my choice of brand by a clearly insane Scotsman) and more toast than you could shake a stick at - we tried, but couldn't find a stick - the evening began.....

My devotion upon the topic of 'worship' seemed to be going well. The audience were enthralled by my story of how all of the chewing gum had fallen out of the packet in my bag, thus rendering me with breath like that of the average vulture; and from there I was on a roll with a tenuous link from The Police to St Paul then contrasting the creator of the universe with the average date (make sure you take chewing gum). Fortunately my ineptitude was excused and one singing lesson later (during which it turned out that my cold had sneakily turned my voice from that of an angel to the sonic equivalent of a meat tenderiser to the face) only my lack of playing ability stood between me and international rock acclaim.
Fortunately Christians are always nice and so everyone said how much they enjoyed it all.

So it was that approximately 11 hours later as we did the last clearing up and marvelled at the lack of stench left behind from 19 teenagers crammed overnight into too small a space (miracles do happen) that I came across this weekend's spoonerism. Observing the water bottle left upon the table Zac said: is that yours?
I reply: no, I thought it was yours. Shall I bin it?
Zac: no I'll take it, it could be useful. [For those interested in such things, it did indeed come in handy on the drive later - another story to be sure]
Me: True. The only problem that you don't really want to share spit with a load of teenagers.
Zac: *strange look precedes laughter*
Me: *review last sentence and realise that I had in fact pronounced that on a youth prayer night you really wouldn't want to spare shit with a load of teenagers* I think that what I meant was...

Not the most exciting thing that has ever happened in my life, but a charming story of the accidental misuse of the english language I thought. It now joins my previous assertion whilst in Australia that it would not necessaily be pleasant to 'share a swag' as one of my favourite miscommunications.

By Wednesday I had recovered - just in time to find three quite attractive girls knocking on my door and offering me a kitten who has been subsequently named 'Sir Reginald the Great'. Odd but not necessarily unpleasant.

Peace out.