Nazis plan invasion from University sanatorium base (Rousse)

N and I were such good friends that she gave up her place in bed with S for me and slept on the sofa. The following morning I was up bright and early to welcome ECM on a long-anticipated trip north. We hadn’t seen each other for years, and I was keen to show her my latest creative outputs. I was incredibly disappointed when she dismissed my efforts – she was particularly rude about my stationery designs – and I was glad when she announced that she was leaving early.

My next appointment was the University sanatorium. The sister of AJ (one of my graduates) had been beaten up and left for dead in the street. Fortunately she had been rescued just in time, and was expected to make a full recovery. The Dean’s PA showed me into the ward. I wondered at the number of babies stacked up on trolleys along the central aisle. One rolled off the top shelf of a trolley and I only just caught him (or her) before he (or she) hit the floor. The undergraduate mothers of these poor unfortunate children lay still in beds nearby.

There were several other visitors gathered around AJ’s sister’s bed, including E, who was showing off her new diamond and emerald engagement ring. I wasn’t sure that I trusted everyone there, and my instincts were proved right when a sinister man in a long black coat appeared and grabbed the jewel. Other strange men appeared and I could tell that we were in danger. We had no option but to run to the woods and hide: this was a Nazi invasion.

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Messy David Morrissey (Belle)

I was fuming when I saw the mess in what had previously been a very tidy back garden.  The culprit was obviously my father and I waited for him to come home so I could give him “what for”.

However, when the key turned in the lock and the door opened, it was David Morrissey who ‘came home’.  Not only did I instantly forgive his untidy ways, but I also leapt into his arms and snogged him for a whole Saturday afternoon.

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Slade’s original line-up is back on the road again (Rousse)

Dave Hill stuck his head from under the tarpaulin on the back of the tour truck.

“I’m afraid that Noddy is indisposed”, he explained. “He’s struggling with the band’s paperwork”.

This was unsurprising given that this was Slade’s first tour in its original line-up since the early 1980s.

Meanwhile up the road my nephew and niece played field hockey under the watchful eye of their maternal grandparents.

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Poor business etqiuette at Oracle acquisition (Rousse)

Since it was the graduate sales training manager of Edge (an Oracle acquisition) who had dragged me all the way down to London to “discuss possibilities”, he should have understood that he was obliged to turn down my offer to pay for the cost of lunch for me and my assistant. When KW weighed in and instructed me to “settle with the receptionist on the way out”, I decided that I would simply forget to do so. It was none of my business that the company had not yet made a single sale. Having invited us as their guests (who had travelled far to join them), they should have taken better care of us.

As we were leaving my assistant’s glove got caught up in the lift mechanism with my hair and we almost suffered a fatal accident.

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An unexpected radio obituary (Rousse)

I couldn’t understand why the radio announcer was discussing XY’s father as a “relation of the deceased”. Then I noticed that A and B were crying. PQ was dead, and this was his obituary.

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A claustrophobic attempt to decipher a grass message (Rousse)

A window on the landing of a stairwell on the south side of Edinburgh’s East Claremont Street would be the best vantage point for the message in the lawn of the Claremont Crescent garden.

I crossed the road, pushed open one of the doors on the first East Claremont Street building that I came to, then walked through the narrow hall to the stone staircase at the back. My companions were keen to climb up the stairs but I had no option but to bottle out.

I was completely overcome with claustrophobia and couldn’t take a single step further. I’d just have to go back across the road and try and make out the message in the grass from close up.

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A crummy night’s sleep (Rousse)

I spent an uncomfortable night amongst chocolate brownie crumbs trying to sleep on an airport departure lounge seat.

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Preparations for a stag party in Dublin (Rousse)

Dublin - by Brendan MacNeill

Dublin – by Brendan MacNeill

I was honoured to have been invited to JG’s stag party in Dublin, along with KA (how did she know JG?), and AG. I congratulated the latter on her weight loss and enduring beauty.

I had to tidy my office before I set off. It was a strange day at work because the admin staff were on strike. However, rather than picket the campus, they were all forced to sit at their desks in the school office and stared into space all day. I offered KT a book to read, and she was tempted to borrow it, but this was against the rules.

University pals GW and HP (still teenagers) helped me clear up the mess of my room. By the time we finished we had hung new (to me) heavy pale blue curtains (donated by VJ) in the window, and made up two beds – a single and a double – to match. In the course of our work I found numerous souvenirs of former students, including several pairs of tiny dark metal ear-rings from Africa. I was going to throw them out, but instead packed them up for KA in case she wanted to wear them to JG’s stag party.

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Return to the staff room (Rousse)

Since we’d all been brought together in one big open-plan office I was much happier at work. I particularly enjoyed working more closely with the PhD students. Best of all, PC identified a small area that would become a staff room for us all. This is something that we had been begging for for years.

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Floating flood victims ruin summer idyll (Rousse)

HJ was the first to wander over to the window and look out to the river below. It was a beautiful June day and the water glinting back at us in the sunshine looked very inviting – until we spotted the rotting corpses drifting downstream, victims of the recent floods.

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