Hero?

A weird thing happened to me at the weekend.

I was standing at my car outside a hotel in a silly little town in Belgium, waiting for Mr Hotel to come out with a key for the parking, trying to ensure Mr Plod didn't come first and tow me away.

Anyway, a chap came rushing up, swinging a handbag. A lady was screaming "voleur" or something similar, which I believe means "thief", and luckily she didn't shout it in Flemish, or I'd assume she just wanted a drink, and I assumed chap had snatched her bag. Like a twat, I lurched in front of said chap and sort of got in his way, I think. So he dropped the bag.

"Brilliant," I thought to myself, "now he'll run away and she can have her bag back." Like you do.

So chap pulls out a knife. I laugh. I laugh because I think I've probably shat myself and the only thing you can do when you've probably shat yourself is to laugh. It wasn't such a big knife, to be honest, I've eaten an apple with a bigger one than that.

So, chap puts on his best "grrrr" expression, I put on my best deathwish face and ask "do you speak English?"

He nods. I assume, as he was quite white, that nod meant "yes", as opposed to in these strange countries where it means "no", and that as he responded at all he understood the question.

"You've got one go," said I, because I'm brilliant at saying the right thing. Then I take a deep breath, wonder what it's like being properly dead, and another chap comes up behind knife-wielder and clonks him on the head, whereupon he falls down and the new arrival sits on his head, accompanied by two of his mates, and the Plod are two minutes behind. Bird gets her bag back and all is well. Plod don't want to interview me, presumably because they're Belgian.

So I park the car.

Then I go to the pub.

Does that make me a hero? Does it fuck. It makes me stupid. I suspect that if the opportunity arises I won't do it again. Not unless I've got spare pants.