Lessons with Combustibles: or, Idiots With Matches!
... stories with a moral!
Stories involving fire are myriad, usually regarding some idiotic exploit, told in third person narrative about a character of Wilt-like proportions. The reasoning behind the 3rd person narration is often due to the embarrassment of owning up to such stupidity yourself. Nobody in their right mind would admit to being such a numpty. Having said that, I am about to relate stories in both 1st and 3rd person. All are true, honest!
Many of the following tales have been told before in howffs, dosses and bothies, or sitting contented at a camp-fire. I’ve even been known to tell them to myself in some wild and lonely places when the safe world has shrunk to the limits of the fire-glow and leaving it for a Pish is to step into the unknown, where all sorts of dangers lurk, both real and imaginary.
These tales I will put into two categories. Sober Wans and Drunk Wans.
Sober Wans;
I was once the proud owner of a wee Optimus Svea petrol stove which, like myself, was just a bit temperamental. It was a bugger to get started on a cold morning and often needed a helping hand from another stove, ie; sitting it on top of the said other stove in order to get some heat into the fuel before it would go. Astonishingly, I can think of no incidents as a result of this maniacal practice but that was because of a period of exceedingly good luck which lasted for over a decade until I discovered that you‘re supposed to clean them. When my wee stove got going though it was a different matter. It would boil enough water for 2 brews in a nano-second and made a terrific pulsing, roaring sound with the burner jetting like a Tornado Bomber, earning it the nickname of The Doodlebug. It also had other nicknames which nobody dared call it to its face, “Lochaber No More” being a particularly sinister one that The Neebs gave it after an incident at MacColl’s “Red Squirrel” campsite in Glen Coe.
We’d arrived late in the afternoon and after getting the tents up it fell on me to get a brew together. I produced The Doodlebug, shook it to see if there was enough fuel in it, set it firmly on level ground, opened the fuel-valve and held a lighter at the burner. My memory of the following few seconds is a bit hazy. I seem to recall a gout of flames about 10 feet high, but my over-riding memory is of running straight into a tree at full pelt.
We tried to laugh it off but that seemed to do nothing for the confidence of those camping around us. A short time later came the arrival of the good Mr. MacColl who was set on confiscating the offending article. The Neebs sent him away with a rusty old Blue Gaz stove, which he’d (mis-)appropriated from somewhere, and everyone’s confidence was reinstated until I produced The Doodlebug again the following morning and a similar thing happened. I was prepared this time though, so a rapid open-close flick of the wrist meant that there was only a 6 foot gout of flames. Mr. MacColl was quicker on his game that morning though and kicked us off the campsite but not before most of our neighbours had packed up and moved to a safe distance, or left.
Four or five of us arrived at Staoineag one Saturday evening with the intentions of walking down to Corrour Halt to get the train to Tulloch, where the car had been left. No-one had thought of checking train times however, so my nephew, Archie, and me walked to Corrour to get the times for Monday. When we got there it was lashing rain and we quickly checked the timetable before heading for the platform hut for a brew, where a middle aged couple with two black labs were waiting for the next train. They were lovely, friendly, affectionate dogs with those big appealing brown eyes.
I got water from the tap, pulled The Doodlebug from my rucksack and fired it up. As the stove got into its stride and started roaring, the dogs grew obviously more apprehensive and moved away from me. By the time The Doodlebug’s pulse had grown to its crescendo, the dogs were cowering in fear behind their owners. In fact, the owners didn't look too comfortable either.
Turning off the stove didn't seem to restore the other party's self-confidence however, and my last memory after we'd drank our tea and packed to go is of the dogs, cowed and shivering with fear, and the big eyes of the owners and one of the dogs. The other dog didn't even dare look and lay with its head on the woman's lap with its paws covering its eyes. Young Archie couldn't resist a parting comment, "That's what you call feckin a stove."
Having said this about The Doodlebug, the wee thing caused harm to no-one, would always light… eventually, and I was fond of it to the extent that I felt naked and vulnerable without it, especially in winter when it had saved my bacon on more than one occasion. I was heartbroken when it was nicked out of my shed and spent the next few months keeping an eye out for someone with half his face burnt off.
Using petrol to light camp-fires must be one example of the potential stupidity that we’ve all had issues with in the past. It’s always a surprise when, after having struggle to get a fire going on a cold day, a dash of petrol will transform the scene from one of hopeless shivering futility to one of mindless, eyebrowless, panic measuring 10.1 on the Frichter Scale, to the aroma of burning petrol, singed hair and excrement.
I’ve derided myself enough for once, so will recount the time when The Neebs and I were camping down in Glen Etive one January.
We’d been out with the car the night before and collected fire-wood enough for a couple of nights. A red headed bloke with a glorious fringe like a Highland Coo had arrived on a push-bike and we rendered a brew before asking if he wanted to join us on a wood gathering expedition, to which he agreed. When we got back, he started making his own wood-pile and took about 1/3 of the wood, fair do’s. He made his fire and we made ours, had a few nippy sweeties and went to our beds. The guy kept his own company and we respected that.
Next morning The Neebs woke me with a brew and we sat wrapped up, brewing, smoking and chatting for the next hour. The lad in the other tent 20 yards away got up and he was treated to one of The Neebs’s hot, condensed milk brews, for which he thanked us and proceeded to attempt to start a fire. It must have been about 15 minutes later that I heard the WHOOOOSH, felt the heat on the back of my neck and heard a loud splash. I turned to see what it was but there was no sign of our neighbour, just a pall of black smoke and a few licks of flame coming from a very prettily set out hearth. I turned to The Neebs, to discover that his face was contorted in an attempt not to laugh out loud. When I turned back to The Mysterious Scene of The Disappearing Camper, our next door neighbour was emerging, saturated from behind the river bank, minus his formerly resplendent ginger coo’s fringe and eyebrows.
In the words of Robert Duval, “I love the smell of Napalm in the morning!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCT8ZpHEF5w&NR=1&feature=fvwp
I could go on for hours, I’m sure, but am restless to get into the crème de la crème of fire-raising…
Drunk Wans;
Some of the following, again, involve incidents highlighting my own capacity for imbecility, but I will concentrate mainly on the blazing brainlessness of others, as theirs always seems more spectacular somehow. After all, we rarely have a ring-side seat at our own come-uppance.
I was walking along the banks of the Tummel approaching Pitlochry, heading for civilisation and looking for a nice camping spot with open aspect on the riverside view and ease of access to and from the pubs, when I came across a very strange sight indeed. Three smouldering circles about 8 feet in diameter with a smaller one in the middle. It looked for all the world like something not of this earth, but belonging in an American “B” sci-fi movie from the 1950’s. On closer inspection I concluded that the camp-fire had spread and set fire to three dome tents. I went on my way when I was sure that there were no casualties and that whatever had caused the devastation was no longer a threat.
I soon found a braw wee spot to erect my tent, got my gear stowed away and headed for the pub for the remaining hour before closing (1970’s, 14.30 if my memory serves me right.) and had a couple of beers. It was after last orders and when I was leaving The Fisher‘s that I heard three lads with a good swallie in them declaring that they were away back to their tents down along the river where they had the stovies on the gas at a low peep.
At Barrisdale one night, a good fire going and a good deal more sitting at the bleeze than the three of us who had hunted up the brae-side and along the shore for wood. A number of stravaigers had arrived in the dark from Inverie and there were a couple of older fellows in the bothy. Airchie, true to form, got blootered. Naethin wrang wi that. But then he got blootered some more and was having extreme trouble getting to his feet at bed time. Myself and Pete helped him up onto his feet but then made the mistake of letting him go when his legs took over and he did an expert double pirouette before landing butt first, smack in the centre of the glowing embers.
They’re not called glowing embers for nothing, you know!
I think we must have doused his erse in the burn or something, then got him inside his tent. I was wakened intermittently during the night to the sound of someone moaning, “Oh, Ah’m cauld.”, and discovered the next morning that it was Airchie who hadn’t made it into his sleeping-bag. I bet his derrière was warm enough though.
Myself and The Neebs came out of the Brig o’ Orchy Hotel the worse for wear one night into the pissin rain. We ran across the road and into the tents, which we had pitched doors facing each other, and got on a brew. I then decided that a bacon sannie was in order and was diligently blethering away, brew in hand, when the old Primus Parrie stove flared up. I cupped my hand under it and expertly flicked it out of my tent.. and into The Neebs’s. You can picture my expression when the yellow fire-ball came hurtling straight back at me!
Camping at Vickie Brig once with two friends and our kids, 9 of us in all. The kids were tucked safely in their beds, the fire was crackling away and the Uisge flowing like… wine. We were having a rare sing-song as Muriel had brought her guitar and is a fair crack at it, with a lovely voice. There was an old Australian couple who were walking the WHW and had gone to their beds. We kept our voices down for a while… until the benefit of the whisky set in and the old boy got out of bed to berate us on our choice language. We apologised and I gave them a round of “In South Australia I Was Born” and we never heard a peep from them for the rest of the night, although they did emerge late and looking knackered in the morning.
One of the advantages of whisky over beer is that you don’t need to pee so much. One of the disadvantages is that you can sit talking Scheiße and singing for longer without having to think about trivia like foot to eye coordination. I stood up to go for a pish and promptly took off running backwards into the river. Muriel still tells the story of the loud splash and the voice from the dark saying, “Watch it folks, as soon as you stand up, the rules change!” Seconds later, a Drookit Dug o’ a thing came steaming back out of the burn and fell, face down over the top of the fire, extinguishing it and signalling, to the relief of the Aussies, bedtime.
Well, that’s all for now, folks, but I may add to this wee gem from time to time as my failing memory has its lucid moments.
Camoan baby licht ma fayaaaar.
(Jockie Feliciano)
ps; I'd love to hear your fire-raising stories!
... stories with a moral!
Stories involving fire are myriad, usually regarding some idiotic exploit, told in third person narrative about a character of Wilt-like proportions. The reasoning behind the 3rd person narration is often due to the embarrassment of owning up to such stupidity yourself. Nobody in their right mind would admit to being such a numpty. Having said that, I am about to relate stories in both 1st and 3rd person. All are true, honest!
Many of the following tales have been told before in howffs, dosses and bothies, or sitting contented at a camp-fire. I’ve even been known to tell them to myself in some wild and lonely places when the safe world has shrunk to the limits of the fire-glow and leaving it for a Pish is to step into the unknown, where all sorts of dangers lurk, both real and imaginary.
These tales I will put into two categories. Sober Wans and Drunk Wans.
Sober Wans;
I was once the proud owner of a wee Optimus Svea petrol stove which, like myself, was just a bit temperamental. It was a bugger to get started on a cold morning and often needed a helping hand from another stove, ie; sitting it on top of the said other stove in order to get some heat into the fuel before it would go. Astonishingly, I can think of no incidents as a result of this maniacal practice but that was because of a period of exceedingly good luck which lasted for over a decade until I discovered that you‘re supposed to clean them. When my wee stove got going though it was a different matter. It would boil enough water for 2 brews in a nano-second and made a terrific pulsing, roaring sound with the burner jetting like a Tornado Bomber, earning it the nickname of The Doodlebug. It also had other nicknames which nobody dared call it to its face, “Lochaber No More” being a particularly sinister one that The Neebs gave it after an incident at MacColl’s “Red Squirrel” campsite in Glen Coe.
We’d arrived late in the afternoon and after getting the tents up it fell on me to get a brew together. I produced The Doodlebug, shook it to see if there was enough fuel in it, set it firmly on level ground, opened the fuel-valve and held a lighter at the burner. My memory of the following few seconds is a bit hazy. I seem to recall a gout of flames about 10 feet high, but my over-riding memory is of running straight into a tree at full pelt.
We tried to laugh it off but that seemed to do nothing for the confidence of those camping around us. A short time later came the arrival of the good Mr. MacColl who was set on confiscating the offending article. The Neebs sent him away with a rusty old Blue Gaz stove, which he’d (mis-)appropriated from somewhere, and everyone’s confidence was reinstated until I produced The Doodlebug again the following morning and a similar thing happened. I was prepared this time though, so a rapid open-close flick of the wrist meant that there was only a 6 foot gout of flames. Mr. MacColl was quicker on his game that morning though and kicked us off the campsite but not before most of our neighbours had packed up and moved to a safe distance, or left.
Four or five of us arrived at Staoineag one Saturday evening with the intentions of walking down to Corrour Halt to get the train to Tulloch, where the car had been left. No-one had thought of checking train times however, so my nephew, Archie, and me walked to Corrour to get the times for Monday. When we got there it was lashing rain and we quickly checked the timetable before heading for the platform hut for a brew, where a middle aged couple with two black labs were waiting for the next train. They were lovely, friendly, affectionate dogs with those big appealing brown eyes.
I got water from the tap, pulled The Doodlebug from my rucksack and fired it up. As the stove got into its stride and started roaring, the dogs grew obviously more apprehensive and moved away from me. By the time The Doodlebug’s pulse had grown to its crescendo, the dogs were cowering in fear behind their owners. In fact, the owners didn't look too comfortable either.
Turning off the stove didn't seem to restore the other party's self-confidence however, and my last memory after we'd drank our tea and packed to go is of the dogs, cowed and shivering with fear, and the big eyes of the owners and one of the dogs. The other dog didn't even dare look and lay with its head on the woman's lap with its paws covering its eyes. Young Archie couldn't resist a parting comment, "That's what you call feckin a stove."
Having said this about The Doodlebug, the wee thing caused harm to no-one, would always light… eventually, and I was fond of it to the extent that I felt naked and vulnerable without it, especially in winter when it had saved my bacon on more than one occasion. I was heartbroken when it was nicked out of my shed and spent the next few months keeping an eye out for someone with half his face burnt off.
Using petrol to light camp-fires must be one example of the potential stupidity that we’ve all had issues with in the past. It’s always a surprise when, after having struggle to get a fire going on a cold day, a dash of petrol will transform the scene from one of hopeless shivering futility to one of mindless, eyebrowless, panic measuring 10.1 on the Frichter Scale, to the aroma of burning petrol, singed hair and excrement.
I’ve derided myself enough for once, so will recount the time when The Neebs and I were camping down in Glen Etive one January.
We’d been out with the car the night before and collected fire-wood enough for a couple of nights. A red headed bloke with a glorious fringe like a Highland Coo had arrived on a push-bike and we rendered a brew before asking if he wanted to join us on a wood gathering expedition, to which he agreed. When we got back, he started making his own wood-pile and took about 1/3 of the wood, fair do’s. He made his fire and we made ours, had a few nippy sweeties and went to our beds. The guy kept his own company and we respected that.
Next morning The Neebs woke me with a brew and we sat wrapped up, brewing, smoking and chatting for the next hour. The lad in the other tent 20 yards away got up and he was treated to one of The Neebs’s hot, condensed milk brews, for which he thanked us and proceeded to attempt to start a fire. It must have been about 15 minutes later that I heard the WHOOOOSH, felt the heat on the back of my neck and heard a loud splash. I turned to see what it was but there was no sign of our neighbour, just a pall of black smoke and a few licks of flame coming from a very prettily set out hearth. I turned to The Neebs, to discover that his face was contorted in an attempt not to laugh out loud. When I turned back to The Mysterious Scene of The Disappearing Camper, our next door neighbour was emerging, saturated from behind the river bank, minus his formerly resplendent ginger coo’s fringe and eyebrows.
In the words of Robert Duval, “I love the smell of Napalm in the morning!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCT8ZpHEF5w&NR=1&feature=fvwp
I could go on for hours, I’m sure, but am restless to get into the crème de la crème of fire-raising…
Drunk Wans;
Some of the following, again, involve incidents highlighting my own capacity for imbecility, but I will concentrate mainly on the blazing brainlessness of others, as theirs always seems more spectacular somehow. After all, we rarely have a ring-side seat at our own come-uppance.
I was walking along the banks of the Tummel approaching Pitlochry, heading for civilisation and looking for a nice camping spot with open aspect on the riverside view and ease of access to and from the pubs, when I came across a very strange sight indeed. Three smouldering circles about 8 feet in diameter with a smaller one in the middle. It looked for all the world like something not of this earth, but belonging in an American “B” sci-fi movie from the 1950’s. On closer inspection I concluded that the camp-fire had spread and set fire to three dome tents. I went on my way when I was sure that there were no casualties and that whatever had caused the devastation was no longer a threat.
I soon found a braw wee spot to erect my tent, got my gear stowed away and headed for the pub for the remaining hour before closing (1970’s, 14.30 if my memory serves me right.) and had a couple of beers. It was after last orders and when I was leaving The Fisher‘s that I heard three lads with a good swallie in them declaring that they were away back to their tents down along the river where they had the stovies on the gas at a low peep.
At Barrisdale one night, a good fire going and a good deal more sitting at the bleeze than the three of us who had hunted up the brae-side and along the shore for wood. A number of stravaigers had arrived in the dark from Inverie and there were a couple of older fellows in the bothy. Airchie, true to form, got blootered. Naethin wrang wi that. But then he got blootered some more and was having extreme trouble getting to his feet at bed time. Myself and Pete helped him up onto his feet but then made the mistake of letting him go when his legs took over and he did an expert double pirouette before landing butt first, smack in the centre of the glowing embers.
They’re not called glowing embers for nothing, you know!
I think we must have doused his erse in the burn or something, then got him inside his tent. I was wakened intermittently during the night to the sound of someone moaning, “Oh, Ah’m cauld.”, and discovered the next morning that it was Airchie who hadn’t made it into his sleeping-bag. I bet his derrière was warm enough though.
Myself and The Neebs came out of the Brig o’ Orchy Hotel the worse for wear one night into the pissin rain. We ran across the road and into the tents, which we had pitched doors facing each other, and got on a brew. I then decided that a bacon sannie was in order and was diligently blethering away, brew in hand, when the old Primus Parrie stove flared up. I cupped my hand under it and expertly flicked it out of my tent.. and into The Neebs’s. You can picture my expression when the yellow fire-ball came hurtling straight back at me!
Camping at Vickie Brig once with two friends and our kids, 9 of us in all. The kids were tucked safely in their beds, the fire was crackling away and the Uisge flowing like… wine. We were having a rare sing-song as Muriel had brought her guitar and is a fair crack at it, with a lovely voice. There was an old Australian couple who were walking the WHW and had gone to their beds. We kept our voices down for a while… until the benefit of the whisky set in and the old boy got out of bed to berate us on our choice language. We apologised and I gave them a round of “In South Australia I Was Born” and we never heard a peep from them for the rest of the night, although they did emerge late and looking knackered in the morning.
One of the advantages of whisky over beer is that you don’t need to pee so much. One of the disadvantages is that you can sit talking Scheiße and singing for longer without having to think about trivia like foot to eye coordination. I stood up to go for a pish and promptly took off running backwards into the river. Muriel still tells the story of the loud splash and the voice from the dark saying, “Watch it folks, as soon as you stand up, the rules change!” Seconds later, a Drookit Dug o’ a thing came steaming back out of the burn and fell, face down over the top of the fire, extinguishing it and signalling, to the relief of the Aussies, bedtime.
Well, that’s all for now, folks, but I may add to this wee gem from time to time as my failing memory has its lucid moments.
Camoan baby licht ma fayaaaar.
(Jockie Feliciano)
ps; I'd love to hear your fire-raising stories!
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