Save Me…… from strange measurements by hand

I swore that when I started writing this blog I would always be brutally honest, even if that meant, at times, personal embarrassment or direct and provocative opinions. Here’s where that commitment is put to the test.

I had a very strange, surreal and bizarre conversation with my wife the other day. It was all to do with poo. So when I told her that I wanted to write about it, she was, perhaps understandably, mortified. So much so, in fact, that she said if I did put pen to paper, so to speak, she would kick me in the bollocks.

Now, my wife is Spanish and has a quirky sense of humour, which is why I loved this particular conversation we had and why I was so keen to write about it. She can make me laugh out loud often with her humour and sarcasm. I’m not saying all Spanish people have a quirky sense of humour, but she does. Also, as she’s Spanish, she’s can be quite fiery at times – that old saying “fuego en la sangre” (“fire in the blood”) is very true in this case. And I do love her and don’t want to cause her unnecessary embarrassment and mortification. I also don’t want to get kicked in the bollocks.

So, to assuage her anger, the following conversation takes place between me and my Spanish friend “Pedro”.

I had the most bizarre conversation with my Spanish friend Pedro the evening we got back from holiday recently. We’d collapsed on the bed in our little flat in Seville, totally exhausted from a full day´s travelling by car, bus, train and taxi, and he turned to me and totally straight-faced, said: “I did a really big poo on the train. It was bigger than my hand.”

For a moment I lay there, wondering what to say in response. Thoughts flashed through my mind of him rolling up his sleeve, reaching into the toilet, pulling out the offending turd and holding it up against his other hand to measure it. Did he do it with his left or right hand, I wondered? Was it done upright or did he put it down on the side next to the tiny train toilet sink before measuring it? Then I thought, what the hell am I thinking?

So, after a considered few seconds, I decided to continue with the surreal nature of the conversation and, paying homage to that woman off the telly – if you’re not from the UK, then google “Gillian McKeith” and “Channel 4” and “poo” - who gets people to poo into a plastic box before examining it and telling them how unhealthy they are, I asked Pedro: “So what colour was it then?”

“Brown, of course,” was his answer, as I realized the stupidity of my question.

“No, I know that,” I said, recovering quickly: “What I meant was, what shade of brown was it?” I was starting to really get into this now and was keen to see where it would go.

“It was dark brown,” he said, matter-of-factly.

I tried to remember what the poo lady off the telly had said about dark brown poo. Was it good or bad? Did it mean Pedro had too much roughage in her – sorry, his - diet, or not enough? Or was it just that he was eating a lot of dark brown food perhaps?

I also found myself assessing the state and shade of my own poo in the last week. After all, it had been a holiday week and, boy, had we eaten a lot of holiday stuff in that time. Most of it was sea food, ice cream, peanuts, sweets and other rich foods (we were on holiday, after all). Maybe that was the type of food that produced dark brown poo. In which case, then surely it must be bad, I thought.

“I think that´s not a very good shade of poo,” I said, “It probably means you´ve eaten a lot of bad things recently.”

“Well, better out than in then,” said Pedro. He had me there. Good point, well made. We lay on the bed, quietly contemplating what we had learnt about poo.

I then realized, I still hadn´t quizzed him on how he’d come to the conclusion that his poo was bigger than his hand. But by then the moment had passed.

Think I might still be in for a kick in the bollocks, though.