Giggling Kids

I will never forget the times that us lads in our summer holidays would venture forth on our trusty and rusty old bikes to the ends of the earth, namely Boxley Hills.

Over the years we built camps, tripped over electric fences and generally made nuisances of ourselves. We would on occasions stop at the water pumping station half way up the hill asking the attendant if we were able to obtain water.

The attendants were always kindly to us yobos and took us around the station to show us the workings of the station, always with the same request. PLEASE do not touch the brass hand-rails, which always shone like gold.

It was just too good an opportunity to miss hence we always left dirty finger marks over the highly polished and cared for hand rails.

It was on one such expedition that we found what looked suspiciously like a bomb. DONT PANIC Mr. Mannering I hear you say.

In those days perhaps it was not so unusual and we were always told to find an adult and let them deal with it.

We were fortunate indeed to find a bald headed man walking with his children, now remember the bald head.

He hastened over to the bomb and kneeling down beside it let out a great sigh saying yes, yes, i'm pretty sure its only an incendiary. Smart arse.

Much to our surprise he leaned forward and picked the bomb up between his finger and thumb and holding it at arms length said in a commanding voice "I'm going to bury this in an old rabbit hole so stand well back"

We followed him at what we thought was a safe distance which would in the fullfillment of time save us from a good belting. First he looked to the left and then he looked to the right and decided, head for the bushes and trees.

He managed to duck under the first branch but somehow didn't see the second, it took him completely by surprise knocking him to the ground. I still wonder at the mans ability to rise to his feet still holding the bomb at arms length but now with a very blooded forehead.

Yes I know it was an unkind thing to do but the sight of this bald headed man with blood flowing from his head and an extremely dazed look about him was too much to bear. What were a group of small boys to do, we just burst out laughing uncontrollably.

It took the poor bald headed man several seconds to regain some sort of composure, we knew he was not amused when he finally arose and told us to EFFFFF off. Needless to say we did not hang around.

Oh Happy Days