Boxing Day with the Tap End lads
Chris returned to his 24th year in 24 Years at the Tap End for a recent Boxing Day tradition. Every member of the group was expected to attend, with the rule banning girlfriends and wives established before most of them had either. After a quiet family Christmas and a breakfast made from leftover turkey and pork, Chris headed to Watford’s match against Cardiff and upgraded his half-time meal to a gourmet chicken curry pie.
He then joined his friends at their old school, where former pupils were completing an annual football match. Sardossa came on as a substitute, ran across the pitch to take up his position and immediately doubled over from the effort. Four minutes later he was substituted again, having concentrated on his music rather than his fitness. His friends still gave him a standing ovation.
The clubhouse party included end-of-year awards, karaoke and Chris’s annual performance of Westlife’s “Flying Without Wings”. The show staged its own impromptu players’ player vote, ending in a tie between Beccy and The One That Doesn’t Speak. Scott and Chris received no votes, which left the two people speaking on air to contemplate how little their own team valued them.
Walking to Bel Air
After a curry in Pinner, the group travelled to Harrow for a night out as snow began to fall. Chris listed a large cast of old friends, including Chinese Dave, Chango, Cantonard, Dugsie, Webbo, Chazza, Moriarty, Gilly, Jono, Sardossa, Lensky, Gilbert and a man known only as the Convict. Scott immediately wanted to know more about the newer names, although the Convict’s history was not considered suitable for discussion.
The snow stopped taxis from collecting them at the end of the night. Gilly had lost his coat and was struggling in the cold, so Chris played Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “The Power of Love” and tried to reassure him with the lyric about protection from the hooded claw. Chris had always misheard it as the “wooden claw”, creating a much less threatening enemy.
The group were staying at Sardossa’s house, known as Bel Air. Chris picked Gilly up and helped carry him through the snow, comparing their journey with The Snowman. They eventually reached the garage, where Gilly collapsed onto a mattress and Chris went to bed exhausted but pleased that the annual gathering had survived another year.
The live performance goes silent
The first live performance of The Perfect Christmas Single took place during Frisky and Mannish’s packed show at KOKO. Scott was away, so Brian Belo represented him, while Chris waited at the side of the stage for his one line. The live band began, the venue introduced him with suitable drama and he walked out holding the microphone.
Chris immediately stood on the microphone lead and pulled it from the handset. By the time somebody ran on to reconnect it, “not a free reindeer” had passed and there was nothing left for him to sing. He remained on stage with a working microphone but no further solo, so reverted to the dance from The Inbetweeners while everybody else continued.
Brian, who had struggled with both words and melody during rehearsals, delivered his part correctly. When Beccy’s rap arrived, The One That Doesn’t Speak unexpectedly ran on, took a microphone and performed it in his own style. For once he had genuinely spoken, but only the KOKO audience had been there to hear it live.
Chris asks for a third chance
The failed line gave Chris an unfortunate stage record. During his earlier Edinburgh appearance he had been sick after the chicken-nugget challenge; at KOKO he had become effectively mute. He insisted that neither incident proved he could not perform and revealed that his ideal role would be Jean Valjean in Les Misérables.
Scott found the ambition excessive for somebody who had yet to complete a line on stage, but offered to investigate a third, more manageable opportunity. Chris heard this as a promise that he would be cast as Jean Valjean. The team made no such guarantee, although they accepted that he needed one more attempt to demonstrate that he could walk on, speak or sing, and leave without being sick.
Real or No Real
Ninety per cent of people who had affairs really did say the person they cheated with was less attractive than their partner. Nick Clegg had not been a pioneer of hard house under the name Nick C, but seeing an illuminated light bulb really could improve a person’s problem-solving ability.
NASA had not invented the toasted-sandwich maker, despite Beccy remembering the similar myth that non-stick pans emerged from the space programme. Male ostriches did not moonwalk to show dominance over rivals. Chris and Beccy ended level on 30 points, while Scott’s cold failed to produce the involuntary fizzing noise from his nose that he had warned listeners to expect throughout the show.
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