GETTING DIRTY
A MASS DEBATE ABOUT CYCLING INNUENDOS.
II CYCLED HURRIEDLY AROUND THE CORNER. DAVE, MY FELLOW COMMUTER, WAS WAITING FOR ME, LOOKING IMPATIENT. “WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?” HE ASKED. “I JUST GOT BLOWN OFF,” I REPLIED.
As the words spilled out of my mouth I realised what I’d said, but life doesn’t come with a Control-Z function (yet) – and even if it did, I wouldn’t have pressed it. I have not progressed past the juvenile-humour phase, of making whatever I can into something smutty. Who needs an Xbox when you can play Innuendo 101 – and say ‘as the actress said to the bishop’ or ‘ that’s what she said’ after every suggestive chirp made in innocence.
“Lucky you,” said Dave, as I climbed on my Anthem X (‘I have a Giant between my legs’, har de har) and not even the 65km gale-force wind we were riding into could wipe the schoolboy grin off my face.
Who hasn’t had a snigger when a fellow rider mentions his bike’s nipples, or says, ‘It was hard last night, but now it’s soft. This has never happened to me before.’ (He’s talking about his tyre. Probably.) With cycling, you sometimes have to go deep (‘ that’s what she said’). And don’t start with the rigid fork, the soft tail, and mountain bikers liking it rough.
When you think about it, giving your tyres a pump ( he said ‘ pump’ – har de har!) is actually a blow job… well. Anyway.
I could go on. You can ‘ bonk’ on a bike. But unlike off-the-bike bonking, your ending won’t be happy. Fortunately, on every ride – no matter how long it is – you will eventually ‘get off’.
Cyclists get a lot of flak – mostly from people who have issues with us parading our assets in skintight Lycra – but in the innuendo stakes, we’re not the worst. In cricket, players ‘ score’, and there are ‘golden pairs’, and bowlers can have a ‘ full toss’ in plain sight – and they’re eager for a ‘good length’, and desperate to ‘ put it in the block hole’. It’s also a game where we ‘ watch the umpire’s finger going up’. And commentator Brian Johnston will go down (as the actress said to the bishop) for the innuendo of innuendos, for his quip: ‘ The bowler’s Holding, the batsman’s Willey’.
Speaking of commentators, there’s a story about a commentator discussing golfer Arnold Palmer’s game: “One of the reasons Arnie’s playing so well is because before each tee shot, his wife takes out his balls and kisses them...”
Golf is innuendo- heavy, with swingers, threesomes, four-play, and advice such as ‘ you can either bang it in the back or slip it in gently’. It also has the ultimate innuendo, with the ‘ hole in one’.
Other sporting contenders are boxing, where opponents trade blows, and rugby, where players make passes, hookers run amok and there’s always someone shouting ‘a little more pressure in the rear’.
Then of course there’s rowing, in which people who like a good stroke pull their cox down the river.
Weightlifting takes the cake, though. It’s a sport that boasts both men and women grunting while they perform a clean and jerk (for hygiene’s sake, surely a jerk and clean would be better?) and if you’re lucky, you get to see the perfect snatch (as the actress said to the bishop).
My new year’s resolution is to give up innuendos. But it’s hard. It’s so damn hard.
It was hard last night, but now it’s soft...