Great Expeditions - With "Rugged" Robbie Doyle

Bong thang city dwellers. I’m “Rugged” Robbie Doyle, outdoors entrepreneur and wilderness survival guru. The other day, a pasty urban guy named “The AddingMan” approached me and asked me to push buttons on a shiny box so that I could share my experiences with people on an Intro Net. I think he was off his tits on some sort of city drugs, but he was very persuasive and offered me some items of value in exchange for my wisdom. He gave me two brass circles engraved with a woman’s face, and a necklace made of heron’s beaks. How could I say no?

Over the years I have overcome some of the most treacherous terrain, withering weather, cretinous critters and alluring alliteration. What’s the worst that’s ever happened to you, concrete sucker? Did your wheel fall off your trendy scooter one time? Poor little bastard!

You couldn’t comprehend the stuff I’ve endured. Have you ever caught gonhorrea from a beech tree? Didn’t think so! Have you ever been dateraped by an elk? Well I have, and it ain’t pretty! Actually, it was kind of pretty, which I think was a large part of the problem.

The main story I want to tell you though is the tale of how I got this fuck-off scar across my scrotum. It was a dark, gloomy night, and I was surviving like a hero as usual in the outback at a place called Thorny Bottom. You wouldn’t have heard of it being the white-bellied house-lover that you are, but suffice to say its one uncomfortable motherfucker. Bear Grylls once went there and turned up several days later without a shirt, half his head shaved, and all the money in his wallet replaced by pictures of a guy’s asshole.

This is what outdoors looks like

As I was creating a hut for the night out of the hundreds of woodland animal skeletons I’d collected throughout the day, I heard a terrifying roaring noise. This wasn’t any run of the mill electric brontosaurus, or a tiger/spider mutant hybrid. No, this was something worse. I decided to investigate and either tame or slay this beast, as any good humanitarian would.

Creeping through the piercing darkness (and this was the type of blackness that could actually pierce your flesh like a needle. That is, unless you toughen up your skin with a fresh application of buffalo sperm), I strode forward, listening intently as I tracked my prey through the soggy undergrowth.

Suddenly, I fell into a deep chasm. This was unusual as I have the area mapped out on my internal GPS, and a hole should not have been there. This hole was obviously freshly made, but what made it? I picked myself up out of the mud and began to feel my way around the walls of this pit.

Just then, a bolt of lightning illuminated the surroundings, setting fire to an overhanging tree and giving me a full view of the horror I was facing. This appeared to be a nest of some description, piled high with slimy, quivering egg sacks. They smelled suspiciously like egg sandwiches, and tasted like charcoal. ‘Whatever laid these deserves to die in the most horrific circumstances’ I thought to myself as I steadily shit my pants.

Pulling out my trusty rifle, I began to tip toe around the perimeter, trying to find an exit to this devil’s lair. Then I heard that roar again. The shit that I did earlier retreated from whence it came, and I wanted to follow it. It sounded closer than it was before. Much closer. I felt a draught of air on my neck, and my nostrils filled with the scent of rotting corpses. It must be behind me!

In a blind panic, I swung round and unloaded several rounds into the darkness, hoping to hit something. Each shell hit the dirt wall with a soft, disappointing thunk. Nothing there. I composed myself, then reloaded and started to resume my search for a way out.

A bolt of lightning revealed the creature before me. It was at least 10 foot tall, human shaped, but with a seagull’s wings on it’s back. It had 100 pairs of eyes, and 50 pairs of designer spectacles. It had 5 knees, but no nipples, and was completely covered in marzipan.

I tried to scream, but my scream must have been frightened of being eaten, as it failed to emerge. I instead opted for the usual approach of shitting my pants.

You may think that my reaction was cowardly, but I’ll have you know that, as an experienced woodsman, I’ve never come across anything so terrifying in all my years. After the time I gave a polar bear a prostate exam, there’s very little left on earth that can frighten me anymore. But this thing, it exuded pure undiluted death from it’s eyes. Something inside me told me that I would be lucky to survive this encounter.

That’s when it moved. Tilting itself towards me, it breathed out a purple cloud of toxic gas, rendering me unconscious in seconds. This was quite a relief, because I’d rather not be awake for whatever this demon has planned.

I awoke dazed and confused outside the gents toilets on Hampstead Heath. Judging by the star patterns, I reckon I lost at least 12 days. What the creature did with my unconscious form during this time would have been a mystery were it not for the scrapbook it made of our time together. Judging by the photos, it spent nearly a week and a half putting novelty hats on me and making me wear ballet skirts; the ultimate humiliation for a manly man like myself.

So let this be a lesson for all you townies. If you ever get a hankering to visit the great outdoors, remember what lurks out there. Until I capture the beast (I have a suspicion that it likes Hendersons Relish, so I’ve been smearing it on myself and shouting “Eat me, you bastard!” every night) it isn’t safe to venture out of your brick huts. You just sit tight eating your frozen, processed shit until your bellies get soft, and leave this to rugged people, like me.