Three of Fifty two: Goji Berry Enhanced Free-snaking

Danger: 2/10 (amended to 7/10)

Excitement: 2/10

Satisfaction: 4/10

To be repeated: 3/10 (Unlikely)

Back in the day when I was just a sapling of a boy with access to a couple of well thumbed T’n’A publications, I got my hands on a Penthouse magazine dedicated exclusively to readers letters. It was gold. Not only did it demand a developed imagination and therefore possess a power ten-fold over the glossy photo versions, it was small enough to fit into ones school bag or to smuggle in the elastic in your pants if required, and it was very easy to slip under the ol’ mattress.

I know it was a quality publication because it was the only such magazine I remember from those heady days. (Except for a couple of really rank ones which I’ve been trying to forget for decades). And the stand out letter in this weighty tome o’ smut was about a guy whose new girlfriend convinces him to go out to dinner… WITHOUT UNDIES. It seemed very exotic at the time. Oh, the outrage! The sheer cheek!

I know that the concept of ‘going commando’, ‘free snaking’, ‘dangling’ or whatever you want to call it is hardly the radical concept it was then… Hell, there is barely a Saturday goes by when I don’t find myself picking up a coffee dangling happily in a pair of track-pants with my bum crack and morning breath keeping people as a safe distance. So, it was barely an afterthought when I put going to the office in a free-snaked state on my list of potential new things to do this year.

Basically, it was only on the list to make up the numbers, if need be. I mean, how hard could it be? My office is hardly the kind of place where anyone would notice a man without jocks. (Unlike the restaurant in Penthouse Letters June 1987, let me tell you.) And I was right.

What I hadn’t counted on was the Goji Berry factor.

My boss is a mountain climbing, yoga-embracing type. On Commando Day she wandered out of her office with a strange packet of berries in hand. She was grimacing, cussing and challenging anyone to try her latest health-food. The Goji Berry: the world highest know source of Vitamin C (more densely packed in than matter in a black hole apparently) and a miracle cure for dogs with baldness, cancerous cysts and/or smokers cough. With a rap-sheet that long you know it tastes like crap. But aint afraid of no health-food. “Bring it on, Boss-Lady.”

It tasted as bad as it sounded. To use viniculture parlance it has something of a rank nose with a mid-body that reminds one of pub ashtray and leather, followed by an aftertaste of shite.

Yet it wasn’t the taste that had me worried.

The medicinal qualities of the berries clearly took effect quickly. IN a matter of moments there was a gurgling and spluttering in my lower bowl that murmured ‘flatulence’ to anyone within a couple of feet. But there was more. The gurgling began to sound like… danger. I’d forgot that I’d removed the safety net. And there was movement at the station.

It was a bad place to be, but the free-snake factor made the whole issue doubly risky. The rest of the day was spent praying to the bowel gods. Lord, give me solidity.

You’ll be glad to know that this story has a happy ending. Was I taken by surprise in the backroom by a couple of cougar waitresses? No. However, nor was I taken by surprise by a cornflake and goji berry concoction suddenly appearing in my backroom. A good compromise.

I have since appreciated the peace-of-mind my favourite Bonds Sport Briefs provide, and thank the lords I am not an unhealthy dog who needs to continue on the Goji Diet.