One Way Ticket to Hull…And Back
December 28th, 2007 James
So, we’re only in July on here and I’ll eventually catch up to present day. That’s when it’ll get exciting as I’ll start predicting future based events to make up for lost time
After I lost the use of an internal organ and came out of hospital, which was a cinematic moment akin to Andy Dufrene escaping from Shawshank, I had a few weeks off work, whilst I realised I didn’t really want to go off. Life was good, my friends lent me all the Star Wars films, an Xbox and I had a shiny new DS courtesy of Tom. Eating happened to be a painful affair, although this gradually became slightly more bearable. I went back to work for 4 weeks as and then left, as planned.
The days after I left were pretty hectic, although safe in the knowledge that work had let me be cheeky enough to take my week’s holiday, despite being on leave after hospital. I left on the Monday, Tuesday I was in London where I stayed at my dad’s for a few days, I had an interview on Wednesday, Thursday I travelled back to Watford and Friday I travelled to see Luke for the weekend.
The weekend couldn’t be anything but epic; I mean, c’mon the new and final Harry Potter book was to be released and there was the promise of a game of Warhammer (which I say I hate, but secretly enjoy). I had the utter pleasure of travelling from Watford to Hull via London and through King’s Cross and as a result, I stumbled by chance on an utterly fantastic sight – platform 9 and 3/4 complete with trolley vanishing into it.
It was my second time in Hull and I was there for just over half an hour and managed to be a bystander in a robbery and was almost mugged, I wasn’t too impressed. Here’s how it happened; I arrived in Hull and as it was raining, I thought I’d go to the local Games Workshop, you know, just to keep dry and not to look at models. Besides, it was only whilst I waited for Luke to finish work and pick me up. There was a young man of the visually unsavoury sort who was lurking behind me and asking me lots of questions about models. The shop shut shortly after and I decided to part with some cash in exchange for a model and leave. Imagine my delight when the shady character sidled up beside me wanting cash in the exchange for mystery goods, which turned out to be a model he had just nicked from the table in the shop. Being the moralistic person I am, I tried to shrug him off, but navigating the streets of Hull when you’ve never been there before, on a Friday evening at around 6pm when it’s utterly dead, as it turns out it isn’t that easy. The guy didn’t understand the meaning on ‘no’ and threatened to put me in an ambulance until the dictionary in his limited brain flicked to the ‘n’ words and managed to decipher the meaning of no. He stormed off, smashed the model, to which I promptly returned to the shop (with no reward, may I add, though I can’t imagine there are much marketing value for a smashed landspeeder, well painted or no). The shopkeeper knew the guy as a bad sort and had even seen the guy nick the model.
Luke was then on hand and turned up and whisked me away to the magical land of Driffield (capital of the world) where you can drink water straight out of the tap and it’s as good as filter water.
Amusingly Luke’s entire family was reading the new Harry Potter book by the rest of the day and Luke and we had to largely creep around the house with hand over our ears for risks of leaked spoilers. That day we played Warhammer, I forget who won, but I suspect it wasn’t me and I also had the luxury of seeing Byrd and Rose mansion (though you need a couple of days to see it all!). It seems that they’d done a lot with the place since they bought it and it looked like a very impressive pad. I was especially impressed with the Sky remote that turned on the lights in the bedroom. I was even half tempted to do a finger clicking celebration that I blatantly nicked off Chris. They had cats too, so I can’t complain. Just goes to show that you can still live a good life without your gall bladder, eh Alice?
We then went to a delightful restaurant, where I ate stuff that I shouldn’t have at the time and would have regretted the pain if the food hadn’t tasted so good. It was good seeing everyone and in a way, it’s a shame that I passed the interview for this job because after Luke, Alice and Chris suggested a cunning idea to find a job in Yorkshire.
Sunday consisted of Luke generously ending my torment of avoiding spoilers and buying me the Deathly Hallows, and me reminding my friend that she was supposed to be coming to visit me in Watford the following day to take my belongings back to Kettering (which I knew she’d forgotten). We also went to see The Order of the Phoenix, which turned out to be really good, even if Tonks didn’t have the accent in the films suggested by Stephen Fry in the audiobooks.