Sycamore

After a few polite and sociable beers in Liverpool with Wife and friends, we decided to round the event off with a trip to China Town for some food:

Very nearly home with wife driving (fizzy pop for her for the day), friend snoring in the back, I suddenly started to feel all discombobulated in the digestive region; this wasn’t the normal grumbling nauseousness one might expect after a vodka and coke too many (and then a shed full of noodles). Nor the mild stomach curdling that can be laid to rest by sipping a cup of tea and slipping into something more comfortable, like unconsciousness. No, this was full-on, oh dear I think the noodles are coming back. My temperature rocketed, my sinuses closed up (a curiousness of my physiology when I’m about to throw up), my eyes began to water and I sat bolt upright, better to aid the full on lip flapping that was about to take place.

My wife spotted the signs and said, ‘Are you going to be sick?’

To which I replied, ‘Erm, good chance… I think I am, let me out, take Phil home, I’ll walk from here,’ which was a lot to get out in the space of screeching to a halt, undoing my seat belt and then throwing myself out of the car.

As I flopped myself down onto the bench we had conveniently pulled up aside, the only things I was aware of where the sound of the tyres of my wife’s car squealing into the distance, the thumping in my ears, how bloody cold it was given the sweat was slicking off me and the almost deafening silence that is our village in the early hours of a Sunday night. The silence did not last as the inevitable came upon me; adopting the ‘feet as far apart as possible’ splash control position I proceeded to throw up the contents of the day onto the pavement.

It was glorious, it was epic, it was loud; it was a Jackson Pollock the like of which I’ve not undertaken in a long time. Some might say that I have a weak stomach, however I am quite confident I can throw the contents as far as the next man, and there aren’t many who make as much noise as me when it comes to disgorging and retching.

I am sure I woke up a good portion of the village, or was in some way intrusive on their dreams (of mating walruses with full on sound effects). Having roared, coughed, spat and cajoled the last remaining flecks of my dignity up, as the splash echo faded into the night, I wiped my eyes and looked about the deserted streets.

I found myself sat on the bench next to the patch of grass which leads down to the village green. Next to the bench are two plaques both commemorating previous years when we won the ‘Best Kept Village in the UK’ – ironic, I thought to myself that I should barf on such a grand scale at the foot of these plaques – I wondered if vomit on pavements would be considered a negative point when the Judges came around. Looking to my right I noticed another irony of the situation, the road leading away from where I was sat was ‘Sycamore Close’ – proving that God does have a sense of humour and also works phonetically.

Rising up on my trembling legs I proceeded to stumble the short walk home, by the time my wife came in, I’d downed a pint of water and was just about pulling the duvet over my head. A further 2 trips to the ceramic pot that night to squeeze every last quart of juice from stomach left me sipping water on the sofa for the next 2 days, to weak to even lift the tv remote. If I could remember the name of the Chinese restaurant we went to I’d make a point of not going back.