I want to tell you a story about a little man, if I can. A gnome named Grimble Gromble. And… wait, where did that come from?!

Aaaanyway… Many years ago, when I was still at school, we had a “book week” one time. (The English teacher simply declared that this week would be “book week”. We have no idea what that meant…) As part of this supposed “event”, we had a nobody “professional author” who we’d never heard of come in and give lessons on story writing. (If you can call it that.)

So me and a dozen other 14-year olds are sitting in a circle in this big empty hall with this author and a few other teachers. And she’s yabbering away. And now and then she asks us to write a short piece about this or that. I don’t remember half of it.

Now, I don’t remember why, but I was seriously stroppy that afternoon. I was sulking about something or other, I can’t remember what. I recall I was given a pencil and I chewed and mashed it to pieces, so I had to be given another one. Whatever.

So anyway, this women says “You go to a disco, and you walk in. I want you to write what you see…” And I’m all, like, “You want me to write that? Yeah, OK, I’ll write that. Yeah, sure. I’ll write. Wait till you get a load of this! I’ll show ‘em…”

Ten minutes pass, everybody’s writing. Then they go round the class and get each person to read out what they’ve written so far. And every single damn person sits there and says

“I walked up to the door and I opened the door. Inside was a very large room. There was music playing and lights were flashing, and I saw that people were dancing.”

*yawn*

So anyway, they get round to me, and ask me to read out what I wrote. And so, still in my sulky mood, I leaned forward, and read the words aloud, carefully and precisely, making sure to pronounce each syllable quite deliberately and correctly.

I finished reading my stuff, and smugly leaned back in my seat. And I swear to God, you could have heard a pin drop in that hall.

Seriously.

Everybody just stared at me. They didn’t know what to say.

It was Tarim who spoke first.

Rar, man! It sounds like you’re having a bloody trip or something! Innit?!

[Everybody laughs in agreement.]

Everybody looks at each other for a while longer, and then they move onto the next person and continue with the lesson.

It wasn’t a big moment, and it certainly wasn’t a long moment. But for a few minutes, I had a room full of people hanging on my every word. And for just a few minutes, I made a whole bunch of people sit up and take notice of what I was saying.

Man, it 0wned!

Ah well, anyway…

(I wish I still had that text. It was only short, but it was good stuff! )

PS. 4 respect points to anybody who can identify the quote at the top…