I know some of the 'young' people I work with would certainly identify me more as the 'warm drink and slippers' type rather than the 'party all night' type. But hey, I used to party with the best of them, and I have the scars and bent wrist to prove it.
OK, I have the usual house-wife scars of the hand singed on the grill element and the elbow on the iron (don't ask). But my arm breaking anecdotes are very rock and roll.....literally!
My first trip to casualty with my arm held at a jaunty angle was at around ten-years-old. I had an excellent plan to speed up my paper round by doing it on roller skates. Kids, don't try this at home. The gigantic hi-vis paper bag (that's a bag with papers in, not a bag made of paper) didn't take long to overbalance me, pulling my wheels out from under me and landing me in a heap. Ouch.
But the embarrassment stakes pale into insignificance alongside my late 80s wrist-snapping rave experience. Caught up in this heady drug-taking, lolly-sucking, stranger-loving, dance-your-pants-off era, all was well. Just think of Pulp's Sorted for Es and Wizz and you get the picture. Now, I didn't take drugs (and I'm not saying that just in case my mum's reading), I really didn't. I was designated driver on our trips to raves in Brid, Morley and even Paris on one occasion. I guess you could say I was a conscientious objector, or perhaps a chicken.
However, one night I had just enjoyed my third half of Woodpecker (my chauffeuring services not being required) when it happened. Everyone danced around me high as kites, not a care in the world. Deciding to join a friend dancing on a podium I asked him to pull me up. However, our sweating palms slipped and I headed floor-wards. Crunch; my arm once again did not look exactly straight. Alcohol clearly affecting my logical thinking, I mistook my wrist for a ball and socket joint and pushed my wrist further askew. Ouch.
Ironically, the police presence outside the just-about-to-be-raided rave, saved the day and I was whisked away to the local hospital in a squad car.
I vaguely recollect a kindly nurse covering up my hideously deformed wrist to distract my aghast gaze while I vehemently denied any drug-taking. Again, the irony was that the doctor on call was my friend's dad (it was a small town) and, to throw in a bit of name-dropping, is now chairman of the BMA no less!
I digress. I ended up in hospital a week later for my arm to be properly re-set (double ouch). But on that fateful night, the doc straightened my arm the best he could without knocking me out (due to the Woodpecker) and I actually went back to the dying embers of the rave, well and truly plastered! Now that's rock and roll!!
