Two Chaps Talking

My Dear Old Fruit,

Embrace Narcolepsy for it seeks only your comfort. Forty winks here and there are just the tonic for a recovering bon viveur. No matter if you're up before a room full of ingrates at your gainful, or behind the wheel of your BRG run-around. Now close your eyes, you're feeling sleepy, your eyelids are heavy, that's it, yes, let them go, relax, mmm, let the comforting darkness close in.

All the more reason for copious consumption of electric soup more like. Chap knows where he is when he's unconscious by his own hand. Are you feeling sleepy again? There you are, just rest your head, just for a moment, they won't even notice, slip into the stationery cupboard and curl yourself up into a foetal ball using your Super 150's tropical as a pillow.

Now I'll tell you about something that'll keep you awake, and without protest too. An intrepid band of fellow countrymen and I have been popping into The Russian and Turkish Baths (est. 1892) of late. Alongside bloated Russian gangsters, withered babushkas and a bewildering assortment of prime totty we've been boiled, fried, sautŽed and steamed. Imagine us all glistening prettily together in various rooms that afford different ways of cooking a chap. That's chap not chop.

Without my trusty specs I can see very little through the steam, but if I could my eyes would be wide with wonder. Clad in one's swimming cozzy one saunters from room to room, occasionally dousing oneself with a bucket of ice water or taking a plunge in a pool of same. For an extra couple of roubles a chap can be caked in Dead Sea Mud and birched by a muscle-bound Russian matron. Altogether too reminiscent of school cross-country running I swerved this particular delight.

The place is over a hundred years old, steeped in history, seedy and worn but still clean and wholesome, and littered with the fairer in various versions of scant frippery. School showers were never like this after games I can tell you. The plunge pool has many uses, and I think you know what I mean.

Of course life in the colonies isn't all wine and roses, especially when a chap needs a tune-up. Had a regular from the quack of late with the strangest results, some good, some well. You decide. First the medico decided a closer look at the ticker was required. As I was unbuttoning the Sea Island what looked like a well-lubricated 'Intruder' was thrust before me. Fearing the worst I clenched shut my eyes, turned around and thought of England. Imagine my relief when the thing was merely pointed at the offending organ from the outside. The image it generated looked like Elvis and I was convinced he'd finally been found. I insisted upon a picture to show the OB&C. You see, I said, it's not a blackened and empty cavity after all.

Went a bit downhill from there I'm afraid. Next stop was a chap who, no sooner had he shaken hands, offered me the chance to best a two foot length of Do-It-All's finest heavy-duty Easy-Coil Retractable Lawnmaster. Unable to escape I passed through the abyss and managed at close of play to assert a feeling of achievement. To which the waggish quack commended both my wit and my healthy insides. I'm told some do this voluntarily. Beggars belief.

So there we are old top. You with your head on a soft pillow, deep in slumber, dreaming of feather beds and endless lie-ins. And yours truly, an older wiser man than I was this time last week.

Sleep now, all is well.

S.