NIGEL

When I was still at an age when I snapped young whippers, I often used to visit my cousins at their home in Darlington, Co Durham. They lived in a large terraced house and the walls between the houses were rather thin.

In the house next door lived a large and rather rowdy West Indian family, including a young man called Nigel who was a Rastafarian, much to the displeasure of his Christian father.

It was often possible to hear some quite spectacular rows coming from next door and Nigel and his old man were the champions at it. Many times one of us kids would hear a row brewing and quickly gather all the others into the best room to hear all the juicy details.

One row went down in history. I cannot recall what the row itself was about. It went on for a good half an hour at least at the end of which there was a short silence and Nigel's father spoke this immortal line in a broad Jamaican accent:-

"Nayjell, you ees a greeeat beeg shit!"

(Translation: Nigel, you are a particularly large turd!)

From that day forth the word Nigel became synonymous with the word shit in our family.

"I wish I hadn't had that kebab, now I'm dying for a Nigel."

"I wouldn't go in there for a while if I were you, I've just had a thoroughly stinky Nigel."

"How did England get on in the cricket yesterday?"

"They were absolutely bloody Nigel!"

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