Nice Film!

There I was, stuck in the five o'clock traffic today when my thoughts suddenly pandered to the film Fight Club.

(Yes, Ee Von, this blogging shit is starting to get to me now).

I was thinking about the scene in the basement where Tyler's handing out assignments to all the members, and he's telling everyone to pick a fight with a total stranger and LOSE.

Needless to say, the next part of the film is absolutely fucking hilarious. Everyone just LOSES.

I can't imagine doing something like that. I would never be able to let someone let fly a left hook at me and not cringe or attempt to move out of the way. Not this bonehead, mate.

I've had my fair share of fights and what's curious is that I actually felt a sense of nostalgia about it. The last time I whacked someone propa must have been in high school, where the fights were so violent that they make rugby scrums look like group hugs. There were just absolutely no rules. None at all.

Anything that wasn't nailed to the wall or bolted to a surface could be used as a weapon.

Once you're down, you either get up, or lie still and wait for a hand to appear. If you were lucky, the hand would not go for your nuts and squeeze them like a bag of M&Ms. If you weren't, then you're probably going to have trouble explaining why you can't knock up your missus.

Girls were collateral damage; if there was a chick standing in the path of a projectile, well, too bad. If she was a smart lass, she'd duck. Otherwise we'd just shrug our shoulders and continue pelting each other with dusters, brooms and chairs.

It didn't matter if there was a teacher in front or in the back, if you had to have it on with someone, you would go ahead and clout the fucker for all you were worth. Amazing.

Then there were the "birthday rumbles".

Now, there's one reason why you should never feel the need to share such intimate details like your date of birth with any of the other nutters - we'd mark everyone's birthday on the class calender and you'd hope to God that you'd get sick or your Daddy would come to pick you up before recess.

It was all well sorted; there'd be two guys sitting next to you during the period before recess to make sure you didn't try to leg it somehow. Then we'd wait for the teacher to leave (birthday rumbles are a little bit more sophisticated than regular scuffles, so we would ceremoniously wait for the teacher to leave before the pandemonium broke out).

After that, we'd carefully re-arrange all the furniture so that there was a huge empty space in the middle of the class, and that was where you'd stand. I remember there was at least one smart-ass who would walk around with a blue or red chalk and menacingly scrawl a great big "X" to mark the spot.

There you'd stand and we'd sing happy birthday, or join our hands together as if in a solemn prayer or chant your nickname obscenely loud so that people from the canteen would hear and come and join in.

Then, without further ado, we'd all rush in and we'd whack you. In the ensuing chaos, of course, we'd take the liberty to mark other people we'd been wanting to clobber for ages, and sneak in a flying kick or three. It would go on for as long as there were people left standing, and then everyone would bugger off as soon as a prefect came along, although we did have a few prefects who not only joined in but made sure some people stayed back to clean up the mess.

You'd then either go see the nurse, or spend the rest of the day in hiding just in case you accidentally pissed off the wrong person.

Those were the days. Such glorious, testosterone-fuelled knobheads we were.