Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Sooty and Sweep

Sooty was one of the gruesome Lads in the 6th form at Walbottle Comprehensive School. He was called Sooty because when he was 10, him and his friend both got Sooty and Sweep Magic Sets for Christmas. His friend got called Sweep, but wasn't around any more. The lads had various talents; Tony would burp a bacon-and-egg flavoured burp in your face first thing in the morning; the Gleebs, who studied scientific subjects, gathered in a flock by the lads' lockers and smelled of unwashed adolescent male; Andy wrestled me to the ground, sat on me and stuffed grass in my mouth in front of the lad I had a crush on; most of them pencilled 'double darts' into their timetables at free-study time, and forged 'PD's signature into the timetable space when they were supposed to be in the library (I never did find out what the teacher who used such a forgeable signature was actually called); all of them were good at lifting the table-football machine and turning it upside down so they could shake the ball out of it, and not have to pay.
Sooty's particular talent was awesomely revolting: he could gob a greeny up in the air, and casually pull open the top pocket of his blazer to catch it in.

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