Odd Couple Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon did not play for Forest
Odd Couple Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon did not play for Forest
During the course of a nine month football season, unprecedented male bonding can occur. Consecutive wins, on-pitch battles, the trials and tribulations, we share it all - together.
Then one of our team mates fal ls on hard times, or simply feels he is too old to remain at home with mum. So, time to fly solo, to demonstrate to his parents that he possesses all those adult qualities which determine, and justify, a new found independence.
But, he's a potless bastard, and later this becomes more apparent. In the meantime, a playing colleague who may already enjoy the freedom of property ownership/occupancy offers the young pretender the dubious opportunity to become 'a lodger'.
For the remainder of this page we shall refer to our heroes as Steve and Roger. Roger cannot control his excitement, and Steve is too wrapped up in the company of his new soulmate (cellmate?) to realise that by going out every night of the week, drinking 10 pints and abusing ther local tandoori, has left Roger deep in debt.
In trying to keep up with the landlord (who is already £200 a month better off) Roger has placed himself at the mercy of his mentor for the rest of his days. Rent money becomes harder to find each month as Roger starts his month on pay day with a bank balance of 0.00 or worse. But more of the monetary side later.
On the domestic front, the novelty of having Roger in the house wears thin - rapidly. We are all rather set in our ways, it is human nature to form 'habits', good or bad, with which we are comfortable. And even if Roger has been housetrained to perfection, all the usual rules no longer apply, apparently.
Maybe it is ignorance, laziness, or a deep rooted desire to rebel and act like a complete slob, thinking that Steve won't mind like mum & dad would have. Specifics? Why not.
Steve searches the kitchen high and low for a clean mug or cup (or anything) from which to drink coffee. After tearing the room apart he spies, festering in the sink, a washing-up bowl overflowing with crockery, drenched in cold, once-soapy water, with a degree of oily scum floating on the surface that even Spaniards would find offensive.
With sleeve rolled up, teeth gritted, stomach turning, he rescues a mug from its watery grave. But lo, in a fit of anger, and once the nausea has gone, Steve washes up the entire load. Then gives Roger a good old nag, befitting his much-missed mother. Do you remember the spare bedroom? That newly decorated 2nd bedroom placed, always between your bedroom, and the bathroom. Steve wakes in the night, not really knowing why, goes to visit the toilet, and Roger's door is ajar. What is that smell?! Nothing could smell that bad, could it? And even more remarkably, he1s got a woman in there. Has she no nose?
Now Steve knows why he awoke, the drunken groans of passion, Roger grunting in time with the bed frame (the bed frame that was yours!) his quarry panting and gurgling, above all, stifling the urge to vomit at the stench. Makes you wonder, doesn't it? Next day, the chivalrous Roger returns his conquest to the reptile house from which she came, and Steve, his curiosity abounding has to see for himself what has happened to the spare room.
The windows are shut firm ('I feel the cold') the long lost cups and plates lay helpless on a tray populated by summer's bluebottles, and there are items of clothing walking around the room in search of a washing machine - a self help group for socks and pants meets in the corner of the room and Steve overhears, 'My name is Derek, I am a pair of boxer shorts, and I am very dirty.'
Waves of desperation follow, Steve prays that the new found love will propose to Roger on the way home, and thus rid Steve of his nemesis. Self respect has already forced Steve to take drastic action in the bathroom, where Roger, a butch jock if ever there was one, has tried to begin a pubic hair collection in the bath.
Toothpaste is randomly available around the wash-basin - in a variety of flavours, the most popular being 'just spat out with the remains of a chicken tikka, and skin fragments of last night1s reptile-woman'. And Roger's bath/shower towel, which hasn't been washed since he brought it home from the January away at Barns Green fixture, where it must have been used to wipe down the changing room floor, sprawls across the radiator in a futile attempt to dry. Enough is enough.
The rent is overdue, he eats all the good stuff, the phone bill has soared, his room stinks, and if cleanliness is next to Godliness, then it appears that Steve is living with Satan himself. He has to go. Roger returns with that slack-eyed, 'I've just pumped the neighbour's cat' look on his face. And he's such a nice bloke.
This is when Steve struggles to vent his frustration on the novice, who is so full of his experiences last night, that they both drink coffee (from the newly washed up mugs) and talk dirty - what was she like? She was an old dog, but that doesn1t matter. No nice girl was going to make love in that room!
But having sunk to the depths of despair, and after hearing about Roger's latest flesh trophy, Steve plucks up all the courage required to suggest that the co-habitation simply isn't working. Before he can say anything, Roger waxes lyrical about how much fun it has been, and that he would love to stay longer but he has absolutely no money, and it wouldn't be fair to doss down free of charge so, would Steve mind if he moved back home to his mum's for the summer? Just until he gets himself straight again, etc etc. One week later: 'Hello, is that Rentokil? Yes, I've got a bedroom that needs a little attention.'
Inspired by hellish stories told in the bar by Steve Russell, and this reporter1s personal experiences of unsanitary mates.