The gate crasher.
When we lived in another suburb of Nottingham, in the 80's, we decided to have a BBQ as it was a lovely evening. We quite often used to do this, whenever the weather was good. On this occasion, we had a friend from Yorkshire visiting us, Yvonne, she was great fun, and a friend of my son's - Helen and another couple of people (can't remember their names!). We had our barbecue and were sitting in the garden chatting and having a laugh, then somebody decided to have a water fight ! During this fracas, Yvonne was the one who was squirting most water around at people, so she was grabbed and hauled upstairs to the bathroom, put in the bath and the cold tap turned on ! It was really hilarious! I thought that Yvonne needed an ally so I tried to 'rescue' her and kept turning the cold tap off, and helping to pull her from the bath. We succeeded in the end! But we were all a bit damp, particularly Yvonne ! All of us were crowding in the bathroom, then there appeared a strange young man, dressed in smart casual clothes, at the bathroom door ! I thought it was one of Helen's pals, but it soon became apparent that nobody knew this guy ! I wondered how he had managed to get by our Doberman mongrel dog, but realised that the dog must have thought the guy was a friend, as there had been so much milling about during the evening.
Chris, my hubby, said that he had got the wrong house and escorted him down the stairs. This guy didn't say much, except that he was insisting that this was the right house, and when we all got down stairs into the hallway he suddenly decided that he wanted to go back up the stairs ! I realised that he was either drunk or under the influence of drugs, and I squeezed past him, as did my 15 year old son Andy, to prevent him from returning up the stairs (better to be on the ground floor if anything should kick off !), while Chris held his attention by asking him who he was and where he needed to go. Andy and I sat on the stairs about half way up (the soonest we could achieve our block).
The guy started saying loudly that he was 'the boss', that he was 'king' and we were all nothing. He tried to squeeze by to get beyond us up the stairs, but I managed to get him to sit down between Andy and me, and he asked us our names - we told him, and I asked him his name - he said forcefully that he was 'Boss', he was the 'King'......... OK I thought, and got close enough to his face to catch his breath. My heart fell as there was no smell of alcohol at all - he was high on drugs of some sort. I realised that we had to be ultra careful with him.
He said, again forcefully, that he had a knife in his pocket and that we would have to behave for 'the Boss'. God, I thought, how do we get out of this one? Our telephone was in the hallway and well in view of this guy. All the others must have heard what he'd said about the knife, because there was a look of great concern on their faces. I started 'chatting this guy up', a bit of flannel, a bit of muttering nice things about him in his ear, while I carefully slid my hand into his pocket and gently held his hand ( I thought that if he had a knife, I would prefer a bit of warning if he was going to pull it out on us !).
All this was interspersed with various rantings from the guy, who was obviously halucinating, and it must have been terrifying to him, his eyes sometimes widened in fear at what he thought he saw.
He said that Andy was earlier in the alphabet than Gill, so it would be Andy that would 'get it' first, if we didn't do as he told us. My blood ran cold then, and I decided that if he tried anything, I would use every ounce of strength to kick him down the stairs, and hope he crashed his head into the radiator in the hall, I noticed that Chris and the others were standing to the side and had left the hall immediately at the bottom of the stairs, totally clear. Perhaps they may have been aware of what I was thinking. At this point I did notice that Helen appeared to be not there! I briefly wondered where she was, as I could see everybody else. I had no idea of the passage of time, as I was totally focussed on the slightest move this guy made. He was about to pull his hand from his pocket, so I started to caress his hand and said that we all knew that he was 'the Boss', he relaxed his hand and kept it in his pocket, still saying yes he was 'Boss' 'The King'. I tried to carefully and gently feel around in his pocket, pretending to be soothing his hand, but trying to locate any knife, but without success. Maybe he didn't actually have a knife - but I wasn't about to put that to the test.
It was so tense, frightening...............a very critical situation - I had no idea how to treat this character, except to humour him. To avoid upsetting him at all costs. I was racking my brains to think of something to do that would immobilise him. I knew that he had to be rendered unconscious, otherwise he could well be like a raging bull, and God knows how the incident would end then!
Suddenly, there was a knock at the front door, directly along the hall in front of us. Chris asked if it was alright to answer the door and the guy said that it could be more of his subjects so they had better be let in ! My heart sank even further at the thought of more like him arriving.............................
When Chris opened the door two big policemen stepped over the threshold ! The relief was amazing !
They must have been warned that the guy was high on drugs, their approach was very careful and friendly towards this guy. They gradually persuaded him to come along and let 'these good people enjoy their evening while they helped him to find the right place that he was looking for'.
They quietly escorted him out of the front door and away from the house, and down the road.
We didn't actually see where they went, but we were just so relieved that the incident was over and nobody was hurt. I was particularly relieved that he hadn't gone for my son, I knew I would have gone berserk if he had !
All of us taking deep breaths, and I was shaking, I think everybody was! I went to put the kettle on for a much needed cup of tea and coffee.
It turned out that Helen, bless her, had realised we would not be able to call the police from the house, so she sneaked off and ran to the police station, about 400 yards away from our house round the corner at the end of the street. However, the police station was closed but she was able to use the emergency phone outside the police station front door !
Thank goodness for people who have a bit of imagination and common sense !!
However, it did not end there !!!!!!!!
We had been relaxing and chatting in the kitchen for about half an hour when there was this face appeared at the window ! Our dog sounded off, making us all jump ! (he was a mongrel, a cross between a Doberman and possibly a labrador!). Yes, that guy had found his way back to our house !! The police must have just escorted him to the end of the road, then gone back to their car! Unbelievable ! Priceless !!!
Chris said to close the door quick and lock it! Which was done, but the window (the old type slide-up sash windows) was open about a foot at the bottom and he was trying to get in there, but the dog was the other side of the window growling ferociously at him, so he held back. Helen did her sneaking off trick again, not sure where to this time as Chris was ringing the police from the hallway.
We were hoping the guy wouldn't smash the windows ! So we all stood either side to avoid flying glass. The dog was keeping him at bay, barking and growling at him, which seemed to freak the guy out - God knows what he could see in front of him, in his drugged state.
After a few more minutes there was quite a lot of noise outside, and I could see a lot of young guys surrounding this fella. Helen appeared with them and told them not to do anything unless Chris said. A sort of stand-off. The guy was ranting about being 'Boss' and for them to get away from him, they were all devils etc. The lads kept their distance, waiting for a signal from Chris. Helen apparently had run round to another nearby road where she knew some lads who were living in a half-way house, just having been released from Young Offenders Institutions. Helen was a sort of voluntary mentor for them, and they thought she was a great girl.
This went on for about another 5 minutes and the police arrived. They looked at all these lads, slightly apprehensively, but the lads made no moves but just kept an eye on Charley boy. This time the police collected the guy and put him in the police car, thanked us for our patience and assistance and drove off.
I offered the lads coffee, but they said there were too many of them. We thanked them for helping us out of a very sticky situation - thanks to the first police non-effort. They said they were pleased they could help, and that Helen knew where they were if we needed them again. They waved cheerily and made their way back to their own house.
Peace broke out, and we knew then that we would not see that guy again that evening.
The next day, on the lunch time local radio news, was a report that a male student was found hanged from stairs at his flat in the same suburb as us! That was horrifying. We couldn't help but wonder if it was the same young man who had gate-crashed our barbeque, the night before. We never did find out.
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
-
fuzzywuzzy
- Posts: 6596
- Joined: Mon Feb 02, 2009 5:35 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
I guess you did well . Poor thing sounds like he was quite disturbed.
-
Clodhopper
- Posts: 5115
- Joined: Mon Feb 25, 2008 5:11 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Utterly terrifying. And you are entirely justified in being terrified. It was a very dangerous situation. You reminded me of something sufficiently similar that it bears repeating. It didn't happen TO me, but to people I knew and I became peripherally involved.
At the time I was starting the long climb back from a bad place. I was working in telemarketing - anything to pay the bills - and there were perhaps 50 of us in an open plan office. Most of us knew eachother vaguely as a result of after work drinks, and there's a certain camaraderie in the really lousy jobs. Many of them were young and just getting first jobs so it could be quite lively, too. Good, bad and indifferent, as you always get.
Then one day a lass I knew began telling me about the weird behaviour of one of her flatmates who also worked in the same office. It seems that aside from a disconcerting habit of wandering around a (mixed) flat in his underpants, he'd just recently pulled all the appliances - washing machine, fridge, etc - exactly 1 foot from the wall and created the same intricate design out of tangerine peel on the exposed top of each. He'd ignored questions about what on earth he was doing, and then just gone to bed.
This rang enormous alarm bells with me, because I'd not long completed a psychology course and what she described with the peel patterns is a symptom of (amongst other things) schizophrenia. I'd had an interesting game of pool with the guy in question a week or so earlier and had noticed a certain amount of paranoia, though not anything that couldn't be explained by a bad mood. However, adding it to this more recent information changed things entirely. I warned the company that he could be violent but of course they couldn't act without some clear evidence and the tangerine peel incident seemed perfectly explainable as a young man being too drunk to an HR department that had to deal with a lot of young men who drank too much. I told the girls to be very careful and to lock their doors. I was worried, but I didn't know he was mentally ill. I'd done a postgrad course in psychology. I was (and am) not a psychologist, and a little knowledge is a dangerous thing...
A week later a silly row in the office involving him escalated to violence and he punched the guy opposite. He was instantly fired and escorted from the premises.
A short while after that, I heard from his flatmates that he'd been found by the police wandering in the road outside his house, stark naked and confused. Last I heard he was in a mental hospital diagnosed as schizophrenic.
So it's very possible your gatecrasher was not drugged, but mentally ill.
At the time I was starting the long climb back from a bad place. I was working in telemarketing - anything to pay the bills - and there were perhaps 50 of us in an open plan office. Most of us knew eachother vaguely as a result of after work drinks, and there's a certain camaraderie in the really lousy jobs. Many of them were young and just getting first jobs so it could be quite lively, too. Good, bad and indifferent, as you always get.
Then one day a lass I knew began telling me about the weird behaviour of one of her flatmates who also worked in the same office. It seems that aside from a disconcerting habit of wandering around a (mixed) flat in his underpants, he'd just recently pulled all the appliances - washing machine, fridge, etc - exactly 1 foot from the wall and created the same intricate design out of tangerine peel on the exposed top of each. He'd ignored questions about what on earth he was doing, and then just gone to bed.
This rang enormous alarm bells with me, because I'd not long completed a psychology course and what she described with the peel patterns is a symptom of (amongst other things) schizophrenia. I'd had an interesting game of pool with the guy in question a week or so earlier and had noticed a certain amount of paranoia, though not anything that couldn't be explained by a bad mood. However, adding it to this more recent information changed things entirely. I warned the company that he could be violent but of course they couldn't act without some clear evidence and the tangerine peel incident seemed perfectly explainable as a young man being too drunk to an HR department that had to deal with a lot of young men who drank too much. I told the girls to be very careful and to lock their doors. I was worried, but I didn't know he was mentally ill. I'd done a postgrad course in psychology. I was (and am) not a psychologist, and a little knowledge is a dangerous thing...
A week later a silly row in the office involving him escalated to violence and he punched the guy opposite. He was instantly fired and escorted from the premises.
A short while after that, I heard from his flatmates that he'd been found by the police wandering in the road outside his house, stark naked and confused. Last I heard he was in a mental hospital diagnosed as schizophrenic.
So it's very possible your gatecrasher was not drugged, but mentally ill.
The crowd: "Yes! We are all individuals!"
Lone voice: "I'm not."
Lone voice: "I'm not."
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
That's a very interesting incident, Cloddy. I see your point about that young man you refer to, but at the time of our incident, the young man had very wide pupils, was very forceful in everything he said. He was "King", he was our "Boss". I felt sure at the time that he was having a "bad trip", he was hallucinating, and that is why we all remained as quiet as possible, and spoke quietly to him. Somebody, who had been present, later said that he showed all the hall-marks of somebody who had taken LSD and possibly mixed it with something else, possibly amphetamines. This person felt sure that he was on some sort of drugs, and that we did the best thing by keeping the situation calm and quiet. I, personally, would not have made an assumption that this young man was mentally ill, nor under the influence of drugs. But at the time, I felt I had to assume he was having a very bad 'trip', and act accordingly. I had seen somebody going through a 'bad trip' a while before that, and the behaviour was very similar. The only thing that could have been done on that previous incident was to let the person go through the nightmares until the drug had worn off - some hours, and there were several people around to keep an eye on that person, to keep them from harm. They actually fell asleep and slept for a few hours. When they woke up, they were almost 'normal' and could remember the horrors of what had happened to them during the effect of the drug. Apparently peoples' faces were like skulls, and there were so many other nasty things happening, and the whole scenario was terrifying to them. Needless to say, the whole episode completely put off this person from trying drugs again! So I suppose that terrible reaction that person had, did a great big favour!
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Surely somebody else must have had an interesting 'gatecrasher' happening, funny or not so funny ? :-3
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
-
fuzzywuzzy
- Posts: 6596
- Joined: Mon Feb 02, 2009 5:35 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Yep, a great big german shepard who strolled into our backyard during a family BBQ .
His police handler took 2 hours to find him.:wah:
His police handler took 2 hours to find him.:wah:
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
fuzzywuzzy;1281657 wrote: Yep, a great big german shepard who strolled into our backyard during a family BBQ .
His police handler took 2 hours to find him.:wah:
How many burgers and sausages did he eat ? :yh_rotfl:yh_rotfl
His police handler took 2 hours to find him.:wah:
How many burgers and sausages did he eat ? :yh_rotfl:yh_rotfl
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
-
fuzzywuzzy
- Posts: 6596
- Joined: Mon Feb 02, 2009 5:35 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Don't know , mum got us all into the house. I was 9 or 10 at the time. He layed beside dad and made himself comfortable. I don't know if dad fed him.
Rather exciting day for us kids though. We had a dog !!!! My sister wanted to keep him.:wah::wah::wah: and then went into hysterics because she thought the police van and the people in it were coming to arrest the dog, but they were just picking him up :wah::wah::wah:
Rather exciting day for us kids though. We had a dog !!!! My sister wanted to keep him.:wah::wah::wah: and then went into hysterics because she thought the police van and the people in it were coming to arrest the dog, but they were just picking him up :wah::wah::wah:
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
fuzzywuzzy;1281664 wrote: Don't know , mum got us all into the house. I was 9 or 10 at the time. He layed beside dad and made himself comfortable. I don't know if dad fed him.
Rather exciting day for us kids though. We had a dog !!!! My sister wanted to keep him.:wah::wah::wah: and then went into hysterics because she thought the police van and the people in it were coming to arrest the dog, but they were just picking him up :wah::wah::wah:
:yh_rotfl:yh_rotfl:yh_rotfl
Rather exciting day for us kids though. We had a dog !!!! My sister wanted to keep him.:wah::wah::wah: and then went into hysterics because she thought the police van and the people in it were coming to arrest the dog, but they were just picking him up :wah::wah::wah:
:yh_rotfl:yh_rotfl:yh_rotfl
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
-
fuzzywuzzy
- Posts: 6596
- Joined: Mon Feb 02, 2009 5:35 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
You really want a classic?
Gatecrasher - pregnant friend of my fiancee'.
Party - my engagement.
Yes it turned out to be his.
Isn't he world just a grand place to live in?
Gatecrasher - pregnant friend of my fiancee'.
Party - my engagement.
Yes it turned out to be his.
Isn't he world just a grand place to live in?
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
fuzzywuzzy;1281693 wrote: You really want a classic?
Gatecrasher - pregnant friend of my fiancee'.
Party - my engagement.
Yes it turned out to be his.
Isn't he world just a grand place to live in?
Oh gawd, Fuzzy, I don't think we should hear what happened - I can imagine. I bet you weren't intending to have fireworks at your engagement party ! But I bet there were !
Gatecrasher - pregnant friend of my fiancee'.
Party - my engagement.
Yes it turned out to be his.
Isn't he world just a grand place to live in?
Oh gawd, Fuzzy, I don't think we should hear what happened - I can imagine. I bet you weren't intending to have fireworks at your engagement party ! But I bet there were !
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
-
Clodhopper
- Posts: 5115
- Joined: Mon Feb 25, 2008 5:11 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Yeah, Fuzzy, it is.
Look at the unbelievable beauty in front of you each day.
The fragility, the value of these moments we snatch from the *****.
Oh god, it's good to be alive! :-6
Look at the unbelievable beauty in front of you each day.
The fragility, the value of these moments we snatch from the *****.
Oh god, it's good to be alive! :-6
The crowd: "Yes! We are all individuals!"
Lone voice: "I'm not."
Lone voice: "I'm not."
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
One word: Yikes!
Reminds me of once when I was in college. My fiance and I lived in a small apartment complex. One night we heard a huge commotion. I got up to check it out. The next second, the back door bursts open and I'm looking down the barrel of a 357 magnum! A guy was holding it right in front of my face!
It was our security guard and he had apparently gone off the rails big time. He screamed at me, "Your dog is keeping me awake at night!"
I put up my hands and said slowly and carefully, "We don't have a dog, dude. Calm down. We only have a kitty cat."
He seemed to think about that for a second, then he got a dazed look on his face and turned around and walked back out. The SWAT team came minutes later and captured him. I found out later that he was a Vietnam vet and that he had had a nervous breakdown because he found out he was losing his job, getting evicted, and divorced all at the same time.
I think about this every time I hear about all the combat vets coming back from Iraq with PTSD.
Reminds me of once when I was in college. My fiance and I lived in a small apartment complex. One night we heard a huge commotion. I got up to check it out. The next second, the back door bursts open and I'm looking down the barrel of a 357 magnum! A guy was holding it right in front of my face!
It was our security guard and he had apparently gone off the rails big time. He screamed at me, "Your dog is keeping me awake at night!"
I put up my hands and said slowly and carefully, "We don't have a dog, dude. Calm down. We only have a kitty cat."
He seemed to think about that for a second, then he got a dazed look on his face and turned around and walked back out. The SWAT team came minutes later and captured him. I found out later that he was a Vietnam vet and that he had had a nervous breakdown because he found out he was losing his job, getting evicted, and divorced all at the same time.
I think about this every time I hear about all the combat vets coming back from Iraq with PTSD.
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Gawd, that must have been terrifying ! That poor guy, nearly had a murder on his hands as well ! I bet that made you shake ! Just as well you were able to speak calmly to him. Strange what things we are capable of doing in times of extreme stress isn't it?
I'm a Saga-lout, growing old disgracefully
-
Clodhopper
- Posts: 5115
- Joined: Mon Feb 25, 2008 5:11 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
Saint and Gill: Yeah to both. It's the moment when normality is taken away and we're back to the feral. We're dealing with Other.
G#Gill and Saint: If I said I have noticed the way Time changes at such moments, would you know what I meant?
G#Gill and Saint: If I said I have noticed the way Time changes at such moments, would you know what I meant?
The crowd: "Yes! We are all individuals!"
Lone voice: "I'm not."
Lone voice: "I'm not."
-
fuzzywuzzy
- Posts: 6596
- Joined: Mon Feb 02, 2009 5:35 pm
Gate Crasher - Terrifying ! Have you ever had a gatecrasher ?
G#Gill;1281697 wrote: Oh gawd, Fuzzy, I don't think we should hear what happened - I can imagine. I bet you weren't intending to have fireworks at your engagement party ! But I bet there were !
Nope !!! One thing about me is that when the **** is hitting the fan either emotional or physical or just plain bad I'm quite together about things. I take it as a lady should. Good upbringing in that way. Should always have your head about you when the proverbial hits the fan. It's their disrepect that is shown not yours.
why do you think I post what I do on here ...it's a distraction and relief ...and usually quite fun.
Yeah clod I see it everyday.
Nope !!! One thing about me is that when the **** is hitting the fan either emotional or physical or just plain bad I'm quite together about things. I take it as a lady should. Good upbringing in that way. Should always have your head about you when the proverbial hits the fan. It's their disrepect that is shown not yours.
why do you think I post what I do on here ...it's a distraction and relief ...and usually quite fun.Yeah clod I see it everyday.