Beer, Sex and Joe's Golden Ticket

As a man, there are certain situations where you'll need to step up and take one for the team in aid of one of your buddies. Its like compensation for the endless insults and cheapshots against them that form the basics of male bonding. Men are emotionally incapable of declaring they enjoy each others company in any way, unless they're gay, in either case you keep your damn mouth shut. Yes we're good buddies, but we needn't discuss it.

In one such case, some years ago I called on Joe, as one of my oldest and dearest friends to take on the most honourable mantle of "Wingman".

Long story short, I was due to meet the lovely Miss Beckie, who had stuck her phone number on my face on a post-it note some 10 days earlier as I lay half concious with Frampton performing impromtu covers of Jerry Lee-Lewis' classic hit, Great Balls of Fire. This I attribute to the fact that we had been drinking.. heavily, the aim was Vodka and Coke, bizarrely we had no problem purchasing alcohol despite being totally underage the only issue was we could afford the cola, and we could afford the vodka.. but not both. Thats a no-brainer then.

So, as many British teenagers discover, neat vodka makes girls cry and guys sing badly. Obviously I sang badly in an attractive enough way to attract the attention of some passing ladies who stuck their phone numbers upon our carcasses, probably to testify against us for our inevitable drunk & disorderly charges after the stomach pump has been put away.

We'd arranged to meet with her and one of her friends, who quickly settled herself nicely into the top spot on my "People I can't Stand" list. Bluntly, she wasn't to my taste, but as Beckie was to my taste, I had to rely on Joe to engage the annoying one so I would have air superiority for my bomb run on the nice young lady.

All went swimmingly, we watched "28 days later" I believe, although I only saw the end credits, which given the circumstances, believe me was a very good thing. Joe on the other hand, made the ultimate sacrifice.

He never really recovered for some time, he "went native" as stockholm syndrome set in and began exhibiting bizarre and alarming taste in women, he'd jabber endlessly and nightmares were frequent.. "No! Just buy a razor! No!" I felt truly terrible, you can have no concept of how awful it must have been to be engaged with this girl in any such capacity, well not until the end of this piece at least.

Guilt ridden, I did the only thing I could to save my friend.. I endlessly and mercilessly ripped into this harpy that had chained him down and made him weird. Frankly, she probably wasn't such a bad person deep down, but I couldn't let that small detail get in the way and my long campaign of attrition began, and after my inevitable victory I put him on my patented "Hardcore programme" of intensive drinking and late nights out with strange women, which I can say proudly, he excelled at.

However, then it came; "You owe me one for that.", he sounded like a Mafia Godfather. I began to wonder when his boys would be round to break my fingers. Years passed and nothing, then the other day I thought the call had finally come. Joe had been asked out for a pint, now this isn't what you think. My commitment to Mrs. Hardcore severely prohibits me flying any wingman missions, and I've been near enough questionable young ladies in my time thanks very much. I'm long term grounded.

Joe had been invited for a pint by a person who, without beating around the bush, is a sex offender of some description. I can't say too much, but thats ok because I couldn't really articulate how hilarious this situation is and how much of a stereotypical paedophile we're talking about. Its amazing he was under the radar so long frankly. "Right", I thought, "I'll join him on this so he isn't there alone, because he can't get out of it and we'll be even". Joe had different ideas, "No way, I'm saving this favour for something truly special, you owe me BIG".

So there we go ladies and gents, thats how bad this girl was, so bad that even a date with a sex offender doesn't even things out. A final word of warning too, don't make my mistake, one day something truly awful will come up and as a man of my word I'll have to take the bullet as is stated in the unwritten "Man Code". Never ask your wingman to "leave the landing gear", suicide missions such as that one, never end well for either flyboy.