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From: Peter Ellis <pjie2@cam.ac.uk> Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett Subject: [F] Oxfrod puntmeet report Date: Thu, 02 Sep 1999 14:43:56 +0100 Message-ID: <37CE7F1C.C97B3610@cam.ac.uk> Hear ye! Hear ye! In the recent past, as some of you may be aware, there was A Meet in the quaint county of Oxenfordshire, for to assemble and make merry, to eat, drink and otherwise carouse, and to mess about on the river in strange things with flat bottoms. At this point, I suppose I should include a brief history of the punt, and a guide to punting, as edification for the geographically- and historically-challenged among us, to wit: Merkins and other flora. ************************************************************************* The History Of The Punt: Once upon a time, there lived a hairy caveman called Ug, who lived by the side of a big river. He was a highly-sophisticated caveman, and was much more up-to-date than all his neighbours, because he had invented a marvellous thing. It was a box. A flattish rectangular box. Made of wood. He used to put things in it. And then, when he was tired of that, he'd take them out again. As you can no doubt imagine, this high technology angered all his lowbrowed cousins from down the road, so one day when Ug was fast asleep, they grabbed him, threw him into his box and pushed him out into the river. He was not amused by all this testosterone-fuelled japery, and took up his wooden spear and tried to throw it at his tormentors. However, he was an uncoordinated oaf, and ended up sticking the pole into the water instead. Lo and behold, to his great surprise, he found that this method, mind-bogglingly inefficient and terminally tiring though it was, had given him a craft wherein he could sail the globe with impunity, and he went on many divers and wonderful excursions throughout the globe, founding the nations of Australia [1], Merkia [2] *and* for some unguessable reason Patagonia. And they al lived happily ever after, including the low-browed cousins -- or they would have done had they not been killed in a freak shower of mammoth. ************************************************************************* A Guide to Punting Stand at the back of the punt. It's not a gondola, dammit. And if you try to do the wussie Oxford thing of standing down in the well rather than up on the end of the punt, be prepared to be sneered at. Face towards the side of the river -- your left ear should be facing in the direction of travel. You don't need to see which way you're going. Trust me on this. You can't steer worth a damn anyway, so why bother *looking*, you'll only upset yourself. Grasp your pole firmly, and let it drop down immediately beside the punt, then give a mighty heave and make like you've got some muscles. You never know, you may fool *someone*. To steer one way, push away from you, to steer the other way, angle the pole under the punt. Or don't bother, because no matter *what* you do, you'll end up zig-zagging like a loony. Best to just put up and shut up Sometimes your pole finds a yielding, squishy bottom, and sinks in an extra six inches with a sort of "glop" sound. This doesn't mean you've struck oil; what it *does* mean is that you have about a quarter of a second to extricate it before you get yanked into the water. Twiddling the end sometimes helps at this point. Now you have the hang of it, thrust away with all your might. If you *really* exert yourself, you might just keep pace with the arthritic old geezer walking his dog beside the river. ************************************************************************ But enough of this, and on with the Meet Report! Those Present: Phantom, doc, Herald, (these three left late afternoon-ish to go to somewhere in Wales. Fools), Anejo, Stewart, Thorin, AfPumpkin, Jamie, Thomas, LoneWolf, Ponder Stibbons, &, co., Barry (evening only), Leo, Arthur the Thinking Brain Tribble, Peter and Peter's Reputation. As you can gather from the above, it has become clear that my Reputation has assumed a life of its own. I'm reliably informed that it turned up to the meet somewhat before I did, and lowered the tome of the conversation admirably. To this, all I can say is that it seems to lead a much more interesting life than *I* do... We assembled at the Head of the River pub -- I managed to be only an hour and a half later than I'd hoped due to magnificent incompetence on the part of the railways... we were half an hour late leaving, then delayed another 40 mins outside Didcot because they couldn't shut the train doors... After a minor carouse and a chance to get my breath back and stop fuming, we headed for the punt hire place, at which point co. declared that she'd stick to me like glue because I knew what I was doing. Poor deluded fool. Still, I managed to disabuse her of that notion soon enough. Four of those present decided to opt for a rowboat instead, which seemed to obviate the point of a puntmeet, but no doubt they had their reasons. Anyway, much inefficient propulsion later, we came to the back end of Magdelene college, and got out for a lie down and a quick breather. Talking happened and quotes were collected, though fewer than usual due to a general policy decision not to collect quotes from anyone too obviously fishing. This means that neither me nor my Reputation were quoted at *all*. Success! Heading back to the punt hire place, we managed to choose a different course from the way we'd arrived, thus allowing us to get lost on a river. This was impressive in and of itself, but more impressive was just *how* long it took us to twig that we'd gone wrong. I'll swear I could smell the sea... *After* asking the way back to Oxford from some rather confused passers-by (who seemed, to my feverish brain to be dresses in sarongs, of Native American extraction, and to be talking in a fluent Punjabi dialect of Welsh -- just *how* lost were we?), we rejoined the others at the Head of the River. After that, it's just the common story of drink, talk, adjourn to a different pub, eat, drink, talk etc. etc. Other various high points of the day included Arthur being handcuffed to a mobile phone, and Thomas flat on his back under the table. But that's not really a story for public consumption... ************************************************************************* The Quotes -- if anyone wants to remember, add or invent some more, feel free. Stewart: Peter's made me vibrate AfPhantom: I'm going to spend all weekend wincing when I shoot Stewart: did you have a white pussy you used to stroke? AfPhantom: the only time I want to spend 3/4 of an hour on my knees is not going to be in front of children Stewart: If I want a big one, I have to organise it 2 months in advance Aņejo: I don't like to actually do anything myself, I just like to lie back and let somebody else do it Thorin: If I have to wake up looking into Peter's face one more time, then I'm leaving afp entirely *********************************************************************** Looking forward to more of the same sort of meet in future, Peter [1] In Australia, his punt pole warped in the sun and bent. He threw it away, and thus, young Padawan, the boomerang was invented [2] Ever wondered why Native Americans has a *pole* as their totem?
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