Skip to main content

Bumps and bruises


'Orrible!' mooed Captain Bill, 'absolutely horrible!'

'You're sure you didn't antagonalise them?' asked Bertha.

'Only by breathing,' replied Captain Bill, 'and I've a feeling they would have been happy to sort that out given half a chance! Huge they were! Six foot tall and as wide, knuckles scraping along the ground... and that was just the cox!'

Captain Bill, Norma and Bertha were standing on the river bank bathed in some early morning Sun. Under the circumstances, the Sun had waived all fees.

'I mean,' continued Captain Bill, 'look what they did to me best jacket!'

'We could get it dry cleaned for you?' offered Bertha.

'I think it might be a bit beyond that!' snapped Captain Bill, 'and I lost me best boater.'

'Sorry,' said Norma.

And for a while Norma and Bertha stood quietly by while Captain Bill huffed.

'We know it wasn't easy,' said Norma eventually, 'but the important thing is, did you find out any information?'

'Yes,' replied Captain Bill, 'I bruise easily!'

Bertha was just about to say that this information was already pretty well known, when a timely swish of the tail from Norma pulled her up short.

'Well,' said Norma, 'we ought to be getting along; we've still got lots of training to do... you could come and watch if you like.'

'Might,' said Captain Bill after a while, 'I think I'll let Geraldine finish dusting first though.'

And so Norma and Bertha left him to be dusted.

Comments