Still Want To Do It?

My father smoked for many years, my husband smokes (while advising
others not to) and some of my friends do it. I'm against smoking. With
some zillion dreadful diseases waiting to strike us, we don't need any
additional hazards. However, the anti-smoking campaign which has been
taken to near evangelical heights by our previous health minister
wanted, most of all, that our celebrity stars give it up. On screen.
What they did in real life did not matter. The subject of smoking and
the stubbornness of some of them to persist brings to mind this
comical account by Spike Milligan about his days in the British Army
as a lowly Lance Bombardier. Read on.

"One morning a chill of horror ran through the serried ranks. There in
Part Two Orders were the words: 'At 0600 hours the Battery will
asemble for a FIVE MILE RUN!'
Strong gunners fell fainting to the floor, some lay weeping on their
beds. FIVE MILES? That wasn't a run, that was deportation! On that
fateful dawn the duty bombardier bade us rise: 'Wakey, Wakey, Hands
off ----- on Socks.' ((fill in that word which rhymes with socks, if
you please.)

The defenders of England rose wraith-like from their blankets. All
silent, save those great lung-wracking coughs that follow early
morning cigarettes. The cough would start in silence; first there was
the great inhale, the smoke sucked deep down into the lungs, and held
there while the victim started what was to be an agonised body spasm.
The face would first turn sweaty lemon, the shoulders hunched, the
back humped like a Brahmin bull. The legs would bend while the hand
grabbed the thighs to support the coming convilsion.

The cough would start somewhere down in the shins, the eyes would be
screwed tight to prevent being jettisoned from the head, the mouth
gripped tight to preserve the teeth. Suddenly! From afar comes a
rumbling like a hundred Early Victorian Water Closets. Slowly the body
would start to tremble and the bones to rattle. The first things to
shake were the ankles, then up the shins travelled the shakes, and
next the knees would revolve and turn jelliform; from there up the
thighs to the stomach it came, now heading for the blackened lungs.
This was the stage when a sound like a three-ton garden roller being
pulled over corrugated iron was heard approaching the heaving chest.
Following this up the convulsed body was a colour pattern, from a
delicate green at the ankles to layers of pinks, blue, varicose purple
and sweaty red. As the cough rose up the inflated throat, the whole
six colours were pushed up into the victim's face. It had now reached
the inner mouth; the last line of defence, the cheeks, were blown out
the size of football bladders.

The climax was nigh! The whole body was now a purple shuddering mass!
After several mammoth attempts to contain the cough, the mouth would
finally explode open. Loose teeth would fly out, bits of breakfast,
and a terrible rasping noice filled the room. Aweeioussheiough!
Followed by a long, silent stream of spume-laden arir. On and on it
went until the whole body was drained of oxygen, the eyes were
popping, and veins like vines standing on the head which was now
'twixt kees . This atrophied pose held for seconds. Finally, with a
dying attempt, fresh air was sucked back into the body, just in time
to do it all over again. Bear in mind this was usually performed by
some sixty men all at the same time."

Cigarette anyone?