(aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2856 by Angharad Copyright© 2015 Angharad
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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
“She’s turning into a really lovely young woman,” I said to Simon as we cuddled in bed.
“Which one—there’s a few to choose from?”
“Danielle—I was just talking about her.”
“You didn’t actually say which one though.”
“I’m sure I did.”
“Well I’m sorry but I didn’t hear it.”
“Right, well I’m talking about Danielle, okay?”
“Sure, fire away.”
“She’s turning into a really lovely young woman.”
“You already said that.”
“Well it’s worth repeating because she has come on so much in the last year or so.”
“The soccer makes a difference.”
“How d’you mean?”
“It gives her a focus outside the family or school.”
“That’s very insightful, dear.”
“She’s my daughter, we talked on the way back from Reading.”
“What with Trish and Livvie in the car?”
“They were sitting in the back playing with their iPods or whatever they are, singing along to music, I think, it might have been someone neutering cats without an anaesthetic.”
“I know Trish is a bit off perfect pitch...”
“Perfect pitch? If she was a tent she’d be pitched half way up a bloody tree.”
“She’s not that bad.”
“You didn’t have to suffer her singing for two hours each way.”
She can make a journey seem rather longer than the actual mileage.
“Anyway, what did you talk to Danni about?”
“Lots of things including her situation, what she’d like to do as a career and so forth.”
“What did she say about a career?”
“Well obviously if she gets a few more caps she should be a bit more saleable in terms playing for a club side. At the same time she realises she needs something else as a proper job as soccer won’t pay her a living for many years or she could get an injury and it stop suddenly.”
“Did she say what she’d like to do other than play for England?”
“Yeah, play for Reading or one of the big clubs—they pay more and teach sports science.”
“I told her biology would go well with sports science.”
“I’m sure it would and she said you’d suggested it but she’d rather do geography.”
“That’s up to her, biology would mean less work but if she wants to do geography, so be it.”
“Don’t be so dismissive just because she doesn’t want to do your precious biology.”
“I’m not, I don’t mind what she does as long as she does her best and preferably gets a degree because there’ll be so many graduates out there by the time she’s competing for jobs.”
“You don’t rate sports science, do you?”
“Can’t say I know that much about it but it’s a relatively modern course.”
“Which doesn’t count for much academically?”
“I really don’t know, Simon, because I don’t know what it involves.”
“You think it’s like media studies, don’t you?”
“I don’t know but then I teach ecology and some feel that’s a pseudoscience teaching the bleeding obvious to girlies who haven’t got the brains to do physics or maths.”
“Is it true?”
“What?”
“Ecology is a pseudoscience?”
“I don’t think so and they only say it because the course has twice as many girls as boys on it.”
“Is it easy?”
“Not if you do it properly.”
“You seem to find it so.”
“Sometimes.”
“Come off it, Cathy, you are extremely good at it—the mammal survey shows that.”
“Surveying is important but it’s only one aspect of ecology if you’re trying to understand the relationship of an organism to its environment. You have to understand populations and for that you need base numbers.”
“And you have to find ways of counting them.”
“Or things which represent them if you have some sort of benchmark for that.”
“Like what?”
“Well sometimes the subject species is very hard to see—like otters. So you look for spraints and if you have the facilities you can do DNA tests on those to see how many actual animals you have.”
“I hate to ask but is a spraint what I think it is?”
“It’s poo.”
“I thought it might be, so you go round counting otter poo to say how many are in the area?”
“More or less, yes. Otters are mustelids, the badger family and they have special scent glands near the anus and they’re effectively leaving a scent marker to declare a territory.”
“That must smell lovely, fishy and badger—delicious.”
“The ones I smelt weren’t too bad.”
“You’ve actually gone around sniffing otter poop?”
“Yes, why?”
“Don’t tell me all in the name of science.”
“Yes in both senses.”
“Both senses? I’d have thought only one sense was involved, that of smell.”
“You usually find them by sight then sniff them to see how fresh they are. The smell has been described variously as ranging from fresh mown hay to fishy and musky. The age of it is obviously a factor in that. I remember years ago listening to a chap from the Vincent Trust talking about sniffing spraints and he got a fish bone stuck up his nose—ended up at hospital who were intrigued about how it got there.”
“I’ll bet the average casualty officer has seen stranger things stuck in human orifices than a fish bone.”
“That sounds interesting, do tell more.”
I could feel him blushing even with the lights out. “I think it’s pretty obvious, don’t you?”
“Uh no, that’s why I’m asking.”
“I think you’re winding me up.”
“Would I do a thing like that?”
“Yes.”
“Oh ye of so little faith.”
“Look here, Missus, just ‘cos you’re married to an aristocrat and spot dormice at a thousand yards or sniff otter poo at a closer range, don’t mean you aren’t into taking the piss on occasion.”
“But I’d have thought that anyone who was daft enough to marry an aristocrat wouldn’t have a clue about casualty officers because their imagination wasn’t up to it.”
“According to Stella, her wot is my sister, like; she said stupid people stick carrots up their bums or fannies and the stalks tear off and because they’re lubricated with all sorts of things they can’t grip them to pull them out.”
“Ugh—I hope they don’t try to eat the carrot afterwards,” I screwed up my face as there is only one thing I allow to probe my newest orifice, which is attached to about fourteen stone of human, it’s not likely to get stuck especially as I’m not a vixen.
“I doubt they’d want to eat them after they’d been up...” he gave a slight cough which made me want to giggle.
“Might give it more body,” I suggested and he groaned.
Our conversation had deviated somewhat from Danielle but it had been a bit of fun. I think Stella told me of her time as a nurse in A&E and the strange things they encountered, from men having car accidents and found to be wearing stockings and suspenders under their suit trousers to those who had candles in strange places which had broken and they were frightened to pull on them just in case. Humans are strange creatures at the best of times.
Comments
At Least They Didn't Go To Sleep Mad
Nice end to a nice day. Yes, Danni is going to be interesting. Now, to open a bottle of prosecco.
Portia
Strange things.
My wife's best friend was wedded to a doctor and during his time in Manchester Medical school a lady arrived in Casualty with a bust of Napoleon inserted too far up her - 'ahem'. He did not find out how it got there so consequently neither did one of us. It has however confirmed by some of his medical friends at a party.
There's no'wt so strange as folks. LOLOL
Still luvi'n it Ange.
Well it could be
The guy who shoved it up there was trying to bone a part.
Well it could be
Ooooo...... Now that was two thirds of a pun. P and U..... LOL
Amazing souveniers
Gastroenterologists can be a bit anal if you get my drift. My X once worked for one that had his own little chamber of horrors ...
Gwen
Penguin poo doesn't smell…
… until you come off the ice and back into the warm which is a good reason for leaving your boots outside the igloo (deliberate N/S mistake). I think it was Danni who had trouble extracting her dilator so penis captivus might be a danger for her especially as from Cathy’s description Danni is growing up to be a foxy lady.
Rhona McCloud
Where do you find time for research like this ?
All in all, This doesn't seem too bad, unless the husband just drove up in his car, early from work ! 8-)
Kevin
Nice banter between the two
Nice banter between the two lovers. You can always tell that they are indeed in love with each other, regardless of tiffs they have on occasions.
Have a very close doctor friend who told a bunch of us one time that she was examining a bum; and said it was the first time she ever had one look back at her.
Seems the man she was examining had actually swallowed one of his glass eyes.
Now that would be a most interesting sight.
Interesting pillow talk in the family
I also have no idea what "Sport Science" is but I'm hoping it's not a program designed for athletes to get minimal GPA to stay eligible. Sniffing otter poo doesn't sound too pleasant to me but if you're into it.....
It depends on what is being
It depends on what is being taught, it can be anything from management(sports agents, consultants, coaching etc.) to nutrition, to physical therapy and personal training. She can do rather well in any of those fields especially the training and therapy ones.
I'm told STFU more times in a day than most people get told in a lifetime
Reminds me of the Mafia fable. A man goes to the Emergency
Room complaining of abdominal pain. After investigating, doctors remove a large cucumber inserted up the patients rectum, placed inside the cucumber was a note "If you don't pay-up, Next time It'll be a WATERMELON." Ah, well.
Nice to see Simon really being a father to Danielle. Too bad Trish still sounds like a fire alarm.
I think Cathy might be
I think Cathy might be allowing her ignorance to direct her there, a little research into sports science might find that she would need biology for some of the degree work especially the parts that deal with physical therapy and training. Given how athletic she is this might be the best field for her if she ever hangs up her football kit.
But then again Cathy should be thrilled that Danni is thinking about her future beyond football in the first place. She may not be bright light Trish and Livvie or focused on one single career like Sammi, Phoebe, and Julie, but at least she is thinking about possibilities at her age.
One thing that concerns me though is Danni is happy to talk with Simon about this but didn't try to talk with Cathy even though she had plenty of time to do so. I hate to think that there is something deeper going on that Danni hasn't addressed with Cathy yet, something that prevents her from opening up to Cathy the way she can with others. It does not seem to be like your typical daddy/daughter talk, this scares me a little.
I'm told STFU more times in a day than most people get told in a lifetime
Good to see Danni
has given her future some thought , Too many teenagers these days pay little attention to what happens after school, Thankfully for Danni she has a few options, Obviously football would be her first choice , But even those who are very talented do not always get what they want , Whilst womens football is growing at a very fast rate the money on offer to play it professionally for the fairer sex is not even on the same planet, Maybe in time it will change , But i suspect Danni will long be retired before it does.... Teaching seems a sensible option the pay in comparison to football is poor but in terms of job satisfaction it can be very rewarding ...
Kirri