Testing times in practically Woodlands

“Bugger it, I’m going home early today” I declare to the office at large, which in fact is rather vacant due to the majority of its normal occupants having already decided to go home early. It was a Friday after all, I justified (this time in my head in case anyone walked in), and I had had a vaguely productive week so a 4 o’clock finish wasn’t completely undeserved.

Walking home it seemed as if the whole of the city, including the miserable weather that had infected the skies for the past few days, had also decided to bunk off for an early finish. The sun was high and everyone on the streets was cheery and friendly, as if tripping on an unexpected November day’s photosynthesis; even Cambridge St had lost its background radiation of barely hidden menace. As I neared my flat there were kids playing football on the street, pausing to run to the side of the road every time some traffic came along. It was like I’d been transported back to a simpler, possibly even imaginary, time.

My cheery mood and I headed inside to get some food. I had a couple of hours to kill before I was due to meet some friends for that evening’s entertainment, and I had been loaned the film Magnolia recently so I figured that I’d make a start on watching that.

I settled in on the couch and in no time was engrossed in the film’s idiosyncratic storyline. I’d reached the part where the policeman has been called out to a disturbance at a black woman’s house (the woman not the house, it’s not racist to say that is it?). In case you haven’t seen it: the woman gets very agitated and is adamant that there is no-one else in the house, but then abruptly there is a loud noise from the back room. All tense and alert the policeman works his way round doorways and down corridors with his gun at the ready, very much in the manner much that the policemen always perform such an exercise in films (possibly even real life as well, who knows?). It’s well edited though, so I was, if not quite on the edge of my seat, at least leaning halfway forward as I waited to find out what was there.

Then all of a sudden, I hear this massive crash from my living room window and the room is rapidly filled with flying glass! After the initial shock that must have taken years off my life, I completely froze for what seemed like minutes but in fact was probably only a few seconds. During this time it was as if there were 2 people arguing in my head. There was irrational me, made extra hyper by the tension in the film, and was screaming “Hit the deck! Hit the deck! You’re being shot at!” Then there was a more sensible side which was more like “Hold on, it’s highly unlikely that anyone is shooting at you. I really don’t think you have a high enough profile in academia to warrant a hired assassin, or at least not a fee large enough to cover the cost of their ammunition” “This is no time for logic! Hit the deck! Get a hat on a stick to draw their fire!”

As a compromise, and once my limbs would move, I crept slowly along the couch until I was within range of the very bottom corner of the window. Now I’ll admit that there was a bit of a quiver in my legs when finally I worked up the courage to peek out, only to see the group of kids that had been playing outside high tailing it down the road and round the corner, football in hand.

Little bastards. I damn near shat myself when the glass started flying.