Giles Brown
AUTUMN is upon us. The season of ‘mists and mellow fruitfulness’ that comes as a welcome relief after the summer madness.
Americans call this time of year Fall, which is somewhat appropriate as that is exactly what I did last week, with painful consequences.
I had just left a friend’s house – they were out – and was walking back up towards my car when ‘BAMM!’ I tripped over two very small steps and went sprawling face down.
I realised straight away that I’d gone about 120 degrees over on my ankle and couldn’t get up.
I was, to put it mildly, in pain.
In the circumstances, my only option was to shout out for help.
Perhaps it’s a peculiarly British thing, but whereas our Mediterranean friends would yell and scream and generally startle wildlife all the way up to Ronda, the British way of calling for help is generally done in an apologetic way so as not to disturb anyone
Fortunately a Danish friend happened to pop her head out of a nearby window, and asked what I was doing.
I stoically informed her that, not being in the habit of lying face down on pavements of a Wednesday evening, I had fallen over, and was in some distress (the best answer ever to that question by the way, was from vintage Glasgow comedian Chic Murray who, when asked ‘did you fall?’ replied ‘no, I was trying to break a bar a chocolate in my back pocket’).
My friend helped me to my (very painful) feet and plonked me on her sofa to recover.
The resultant nerve damage and bruising means that I’m writing this column with a set of crutches by my side, but the positive angle is that I should be an expert on them if anyone needs a Long John Silver for panto this Christmas!
