Simply Sue: How To Survive, In Yorkshire
The delightful Sue Papworth chuckles at the inanity of survival weekends.
"Did I ever tell you," he said, "about the time I went on a survival weekend?"
We thought he hadn't, and most weekends around here are survival ones anyway, but it was the afternoon after the horse had fallen in the canal, so possibly we weren't at our best.
Whichever, nobody stopped him.
It had all happened by mistake, the way things do, and he'd turned up there along with Enthusiastic Friend, and a lot of other chaps who were trying to look intrepid in boots and jeans with a lot of pockets in funny places.
They were met by this bald bloke in a flak jacket, who'd seen too many action movies. "Tonight," he said, grittily, you're going to Live Off The Land, and sleep rough."
The chaps tried to look even more intrepid, but even now some of them weren't making much of a fist of it.
"Where's your tobacco tins?" he said.
The chaps dutifully brought out their homework - two-ounce tobacco tins stuffed with what they thought they'd need to survive in the wilds of West Yorkshire for 24 hours. Fish hooks, nylon line, magnifying glasses, miniature compasses, things for getting boy scouts out of horses' hooves, the usual stuff.
Until he got to Peculiar Friend. His tin contained two ounces of tobacco.
The flak-jacketed one sniffed a different sort of sniff to the sniff he'd sniffed at some of the tins, and snorted past, muttering.
Peculiar Friend reported it sounded like some kind of appeal to the Deity.
The chaps all spent a while telling each other how they could all snare rabbits and skin 'em with their teeth, barbecue 'em over the fire started with the burning glass, and build a five-star bivouac with the bin-bag from the baccy tin, no probs.
They then stalked off into the night, Action Men every last one.
Peculiar Friend rolled a cigarette from his survival pack, and sat about for a while, whilst Enthusiastic Friend tried to remember his boy scout knots, and wondered how to locate a bunny.
"Come on, " he said, "we're meant to be living off the land here!"
"OK," said PF. "On the way in here, I used my powers of observation to observe a pub just on t'other side of this wood, with a board outside that said both "Pub Grub" and "B&B". I suggest we live off the land in that direction".
So, next morning when a load of wet, hungry, peeved and very trepid chaps staggered back, having been laughed at by the local rabbits and rained on through their binbags, two other chaps wandered in beaming, still full of bacon & eggs, never mind last night's steak, chips and Timothy Taylor's.
Flak Jacket glowered: "What have you two got to be so cheerful about?”
"I could quite take to this living off the land lark!" said Enthusiastic Friend. "It's all a matter of observation" said Peculiar Friend.
