The Photo Meme of Mystery

Many thanks, albeit through gritted teeth, to Humdrum Mum for tagging me for this meme. When I first read her blog bio I thought she had said that she worked for sanitary purposes, and I spent 20 very confused minutes trying to figure out why. How did working keep her clean? Was she a teacher of the sacred art of water aerobics? Was she a faulty umbrella tester? Did she, in fact, work in the bubble bath bubble measuring department of a leading bubble bath manufacturer? I had so many questions until I re-read her bio, and reminded myself never to skim again.

Anyway here are my instructions:

1. Open the first (oldest) photo folder in your computer library
2. Scroll to the 10th photo
3. Post the photo and the story behind it
4. Tag 5 or more people to continue the thread.

Well, what to say about this photo? It's of my sister Lucy (and let me tell you, she knows a secret or two?) and my eldest daughter Storm, taken in the pub I used to own before I became a househusband and started housebitching. It was the 20^th June 2006, and as you may be able to tell, it was taken during a football match. It was England's game against Sweden in the World Cup Finals, a game we drew 2-2 that let both teams progress to the knock out phases. I can't tell you much more about the photo because I wasn't there. I was in Brno, Czech Republic, in another pub, watching the same game with 15 fellow stags, all there to celebrate my mate JG's upcoming nuptials.

I guess you would rather hear about that now wouldn't you? Women tend to be quite inquisitive as to what us men-folk get up to on these trips. That's probably because men tend to stick to the 'What happens on tour, stays on tour' code, and after hearing about some hen nights I wish more women would follow that code. All of which mean I can't give you any of the juicy bits, well none that involve anyone else but me.

Although to be fair, as there was 16 of us on the trip you was almost always with someone else. I did one morning decide to go for a bus ride on my own, but that's about the only thing I can think of off. I don't really know why I went on the aimless journey, it's not something I like to do at home, I guess I just wanted to feel like one of the locals. Unfortunately I had to fare dodge as I had thrown all my coins at a mate the previous night. He had decided to start pole dancing in a club we had accidently wandered into, ahem, and he certainly didn't dance well enough to deserve any notes.

The only other story fit for outside consumption would be the morning when me and my roomy No Rent Boy (we all had tour nick-names, mine was Boy Band Wannabe) decided to wake the groom up early. I burst into his room only to find a very naked, and very startled Czech Businessman (he was wearing a bowler hat) who was now wondering why there was two shouting Englishmen in his room. It's hard to sincerely apologise to someone in that situation. Laughing your arse off whilst walking backwards doesn't help, neither does waving his 'do not disturb' tag at him.

I can't tell you who spent so much time sleeping outside the door to his room, we ended up calling him 'draft excluder'. I can't tell you how we run up a bill of 12,000 Czech Crowns in a pub when a pint cost 35 Crowns. And I also can't give you the name of the only stag to insist on booking into a fancy hotel away from ours. I can tell you that we managed to convince him that ours had a pool on the roof. I can also tell you that he wandered into our hotel bar in trunks and a towel, demanding that one of us show him where it was, much to the merriment of ourselves and the staff.

So there you go, a couple of stories within the story that was explaining why I wasn't in the photo that I was meant to be telling a story about. I am also glad I had to pick the 10^th photo and not the 11^th. This is the 11^th and it would need more explaining than it needed editing.

So now to nominate some wonderful wordsmiths I admire, and I know have got way too much time on their hands.

1. Brits in Bosnia.
2. I'll think of a title later.
3. Bringing up Charlie.
4. No wine on Wednesdays.
5. Notes from Lapland.

Good luck folks, I'm sure you will entertain the crap out of me.