Burly man-hugging and other adventures

So...it's Monday morning. I'm in the arse end of Blackpool and I'm bobbing up and down in a swimming pool with my legs wrapped around the waist of a burly rigger called Louis. I avoid eye contact as much as possible. The lights above us suddenly take on whole new meaning and inspire deep fascination. For a split second I wonder if now's the time to give him a cheeky wink. What exactly would happen? I forsee a quick and painful drowning. I give that option a miss. So we float and listen attentatively to the instructor.

"Now - that's how you conserve body heat and keep yourself alive. If there are more of you - form a group huddle. Lock arms and huddle close."

Weirdly - it's quite relaxing. Life-jacket inflated hard against my body and pressing up against my face - I finally realise what it must be like to get a hug from Dolly Parton. It's not bad.

We splash about for a bit and practice rescue techniques - we swap partners and I get a diver. How good is that?! He's like flipper on steroids and drags my attempt at being an unconscious dead mass across the pool in seconds. When it's time for me to rescue him - holy crap - I feel inadequate. I paddle backwards - arms flailing like a wounded Walrus. Eventually - after many hours in the bermuda circle that is "the bit of the pool in the middle" - eventually we make it to the other side.

"Sorry about that..." I apologise.

"What you need to do is co-ordinate your strokes. Make them bigger. Big strokes - more power."

I am in awe of this man. He battles North Sea currents and certain death against jagged jacket legs of ageing platforms - he is a man made of steel and of the sea. I am a man made of jelly and cheap wine.

After a while we jump in a raft and they winch us up to the 10metre dive board. The wire looks decidedly thin. I wait til the fat man in front of me has gone up.

"Good. If it can take him. It can take me..." I think. Same as everyone else on that raft. Except...except...what if he just exposed an inherent weakness in the winch. A fatigue in the system. Think of that chlorine...day in...day out...corroding...corrupting...that b*stard element chlorine. I curse your chlorine-like properties. I wonder briefly about bromine and why that's not used in pools. And then it's clear why I never did A-Level Chemistry.

Then it's the HUET dunk. Into the cage - a vague replica of a chopper. And the whirring of winch once more as half a tonne of metal lumbers above the pool. Dripping like some sort of metallic beast monster that's just swallowed 4 blokes whole.

So this is how it feels to be Jonah. Well - it's not all bad. I get a rebreather. Which is basically like your own personal air tank. Now - just remember. The pilot's just announced you're about to crash "brace brace brace!" so - just before you bend over to kiss your sorry *rse goodbye - don't forget to delpoy your rebreather.

We tumble upside down, I stick the mouthpiece in my puckered lips, pop a valve and start to breath under the water. Coooooool....this is really cooooool. How good is this?! I'm breathing underwater using my own air - dumped into a plastic bag with my last breath before I go under.

What a great invention. I dig it. I really dig it. Of course - will I remember to follow any of that in a real situation? Maybe. Now was it valve popped in and breath? or valve popped out and breath? Oh Crap...

And then it's out of the pool and into the fire - well - firefighting. I could do with warming up. It's minus one outside after all. But noooo....it's all gone a little bit PC. Fire is now just a little bit too dangerous to wander around in the dark rescuing people. So - we get disco smoke instead. Nevertheless - I enjoy breathing through my smokehood and practicing my Darth Vader impressions. My sons would be proud.

We put out a few fires. I particularly enjoy the Foam extinguisher - messy. Coool. And then we witness the full-on effects of a chip pan fire coming into contact with a pint of water. Wow. It's like being in the film Backdraft. Even the fireman looks a little taken aback. Somehow we get a double explosion as the gas vapour in the room also reignites and flashes a roll of thunderous flame and destruction across the ceiling and over our heads. Fire. I know it's dangerous but be honest - it certainly pulls hard at the pyromaniac in all of us!

Finally it's back to the classroom for first aid and CPR. (Not us - Annie the CPR dummy).

A Bolton lad - hard as nails - shaven headed - deadpan - points at the dummy and says to the medic teaching us....

"CPR's the last of her worries - she ain't got no f*ckin' legs or arms!"

He has the room in stitches. It's a good point. We save Annie a few times and then it's time to go home.

Home. I fling open the door and attempt to dazzle the kids with my wild tales of crazy rescue attempts and daring do. I impress my three year old with tale of great fireballs and danger...of thunder and lightning and such like (somehow - even with all the genuine daring of the day - I feel need to embellish just to impress him).

He stares at me, clambers to the top of the couch and non plussed says..."Yes Daddy....and I'm Fireman Sam and I jump off couches!". And off he jumps. I guess nothing can compete with that. I smile and we dance (baby on my shoulders) on the couch to Herp Albert for ten minutes before bedtime. A nice calming bedtime routine....

Goodnight.

Face-melt and giant canary fat suits - the lengths I will go to just to get some sleep

There was a point - standing on the helideck of the platform in the middle of the Irish Sea - dressed in a bright yellow michelin suit, my hands rapdily turning blue and my face losing all sensation as 40 knots of icy wind blasted into me - there was a point where I thought. I really need to win the lottery...or buy me a pair of warm gloves and a big hat!

Still - life stuck on a big lump of metal in the middle of the sea away from the day to day normality of the rest of the world does have it's benefits. There's no baby to change offshore. No nappies to place in vacuum-sealed radioactive bin bags. No bottle feeds at 3am in the morning (I'll gladly take a muster at 3am over a bottle feed!).

And you actually get to sleep for 4 maybe 5 hours in a row. Yep - in a row! This is brilliant. This is great news. I never thought I'd be at my desk feeling fresh and lively at 6:15 in the morning. Though - when your PC is literally ten yards from your cabin - this is probably quite achievable. If I could convince them to install a PC in my cabin - right by the bunks - then we've made it. Eutopia. I could actually work from bed. I could possibly even train myself to work in my sleep - or some sort of hybridised state between wakefulness and sleep (I think this state is generally called parenthood and is a form of zombiefication) - but it is worth a try.

I shall investigate and report back my findings.

The Big Freeze of Doom

5 inches. That's all it took. 5 inches. And we're brought to our knees. Elsewhere in the world - eight, ten - twelve inches and they don't even bat an eyelid. It's enough to give us a complex!

Yep - nearly a foot of snow and our country implodes under the strain. You know it's bad when a special government panel in charge of the country's road salt is wheeled out to ration distribution. And these guys existed before the Big Freeze - but they never made the 6 O'Clock news back then. Only wives and mother's of proud "salt cell" members knew the great unseen work they did. I can just imagine the minutes at those monthly meetings...

Summer 09 - "So Mister Chairman - how's our salt mountain doing these days?"

"200,000 tonnes stockpiled - enough to salt the M25 and the M1 for 3 months. Goddammit - we could grit the entire moon ten times over! Ten times I tell you - if only they'd let me...!"

"Great news Bob - great news....Now next on the agenda...will one snowplow and three gritting lorries be enough to grit the entire country for the winter?"

"Who cares Michael - think of the Moon - think strategic - think...intergalactic...."

"Okay - moving on...I'd like to table a motion to move our annual summer Salt Cell Barbeque to Aunt Winnifred's House in Cornwall. Any takers? She does a mean apple pie?..."

Anyway - five days of snow and black ice and it's begining to wear a bit thin. I've already made my pathetic excuse of a snowman in the front garden. But I've been outdone by the neighbours. They've made entire snow familes and snowmen eight feet tall (like some sort of freakish Sumo basketballers - but with carrots for noses).

On the upside - I've got to throw some absolute snow ball beauties at my defenseless three year old boy and my wife. I stopped short of pelting the baby (but the temptation was there!).

"Thwack!"

"That's for the lack of sleep...."

"Thaboom!"

"That's for crapping on the couch..."

Ahhhh but his smile melts me...how can I?

Still - if nursery persist in blaming the snow for staying shut...there will be words (that's all we have these days...just words...no more).

So...I pray for snow-melt and warmth - my younger self would be ashamed of such an act. Do I want the office to reopen for God's sake?

Right - I'm off to cake my son in a bath (yes - a bath!) of porridge oats and redibrek (we're not sure which is more effective of the two) in a futile attempt to lessen the unbearable itchiness of his bout of Chicken Pox. My wife's network of friends assures us that this will work (either that or it's the greatest practical joke of the year so far!). If it fails - I'm adding some sugar and jam and grabbing me a spoon...waste not want not in these credit crunch times!

The previous practical joke winner was the one I emailed Sarah from the middle of the Irish Sea yesterday - just as the bout kicked in. "Sarah - the chopper has an electrical fault, I doubt I will get back onshore before the weekend..." Reply...."You are Sh*tting me? You better get your arm bands on and starting swimming now..."

And somehow - somehow - I knew she actually meant it....

Son's Mega Vomit Academicles 7 - Hapless Dad FC - 0

So - a week of vomit doom in our household. I'm only just back from Houston and I'm jetlagged to pieces. Ready to crumble. So...what better way to start the week than with a bucketful of vomit. First off, the baby unleashes a few test puke salvos and promptly falls into the "too ill to go to nursery but you still have to pay us anyway" category. And then, then it's his older brother.

His older brother - at the grand old age of three - can at least walk, talk and give us approximately 2.3 seconds warning before the inevitable carrot puree scatter gun is released across the walls, floor, carpet, bed covers, cars across the road and distant galaxies within his range.

It starts innocuously enough - there's a strange burping and rather like a cat hoiking up a furball - out pops this chunk of half ingested apple last eaten two hours before whilst watching a particularly chilled out version of the night garden. Stupidly - incredibly stupidly - I volunteer to stay with him in his bed til he gets better. Thinking this was just a temporary blip on the radar.

I should have known better - my Grandad always said "Never Volunteer". The sound logic being that it was better to be a live coward than a dead hero. But those were different times -volunteering for something during the second world war almost certainly meant a mention in dispatches and a posthumous VC. No thank you very much. Yet - if medals were given out for parenting your sick kids - I'm pretty damned certain I'd be getting a George Cross for my gallantry under heavy and sustained fire. But - like most parents - if we had a medal for every time we woke up with a soiled nappy stuck to our head or we got puked on - well - we'd be on our knees. Metal and ribbons clanking all over the place fighting for a little spare room on our shirts.

So - as I was saying - the apple chunk was just a taste (quite literally) of things to come.

I wake half an hour later with the little one looming over me like some mad crazed zombie undead from the Exorcist. Mouth wide open and the words "I feel Siiiiiiiccccckkkkkkkk...." tumbling out mere nanoseconds before a tonne of apple, custard cremes and assorted chunks power towards me faster than a speeding bullet.

I take an early hit to the shoulders and cheek but I'm able to dive for cover. Just a flesh wound sarge. Just a flesh wound...

I roll and tumble - out the bed - over the plastic roll gate (works a treat! no more floor thumps in the middle of the night!) and I'm gone - outta sight heading for the airing cupboard and racing back with towels, sheets, cloths.

The missus stumbles out of our bedroom.

"Not the good towels! Not the good towels!"

"Ahhh crap - which ones are the good towels?" I start feeling them for texture and quality. This kind of decision-making is next to impossible for a man. Good towels - I never even knew towels got categorised like that?

I'm soon corrected. It goes like this.

Guests get the "Good Towels", the kids get the luxurious so soft you melt inside them extra-fluffy towels, the wife gets the ok towels and I get the sh*te towels that you wouldn't even use to wipe your cats arse. My towels aren't even allowed in a normal wash. A normal wash I tell you! No-one told me about that one either!

All dad washes go into a special high temperature (1000 plus degrees) super incineration wash to combat our evil man musk.

So anyway - I hug and console the poor little blighter through seven more vom destroyed towels (capacity was at breaking point - there was a danger of having to break into the guest towels cache). I believe I may have possibly developed serious arthritis in my left leg - primarily from sleeping on the world's crappest kids mattress ever. And - when I finally give up at 4 am and transfer the puke ball and myself into the spare room - when that in turn gets covered in tuna chunks - I relent to absolute exhaustion and a quesy stomach and sleep face down on my son's own vomit. Whilst he in turn lies sprawled and content on top of me.

Still - I wouldn't swop it for the world. This is what makes us and makes our sepia tinted memories many years from now. So cherish the vomit - cherish the insane exhaustion. Cos it won't last forever and in a strange way - that's just a little bid sad. So I cherish and bottle these moments in time - these turns of phrases that will stay with us forever. Five am in the morning when my son turns to me and says in his most ernest voice - "my mouth's just a little bit crazy".

"Yes. Yes it is. Just a little bit crazy. But it will pass."

All things will pass...

Seriously - I need some sleep

I've spent a weekend mainly drinking beer and lighting a tonne of fireworks far too close to my house. There are large chunks of blackened grass and sizeable craters littering my garden and a skipful of spent munitions that tell me I must have had fun the night before. Arm four men - four responsible mid thirties parents with a lighter and an excuse to blow things up (Halloween is just round the corner and Guy Fawkes is within grasping distance) and add the last crucial element - beer - and you're in for a treat.

Okay - so I tried to convince the missus that "it's for the kids - they love all the colours" but that wore thin after the first half hour. Wore thin when they'd long since abandoned us and headed back inside to watch Monsters Inc and beat each other with improvised torch lightsabres.

But still - we persevered. Despite the horizontal rain, the arctic cold and wind. And it felt good.

I felt alive. Briefly. Doing what men pretty much do best. Destruction!

Needless to say - I woke up with the distinct impression that an elephant sat on my head in the middle of the night and crapped inside my skull - but it was worth it. I also forgot the clocks went back. So did the kids.

Tonight I will sleep. I must sleep. I like sleep...I will sleep soon. But...the children will not sleep - there are other people lighting rockets now. And it's late - bloody late - midnight. "If they wake the sodding kids one more time - I will personally shove that Chinese firecracker up someone's arse!" I declare self righteously. Ahh how the tide has turned...but 24 hours later and already I regret setting a trend to endure for the next 3 weeks.