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Many years ago now, just after I'd graduated*, I went to work in the fundraising department of the Christie Cancer hospital in Manchester. I half expected to be rattling a tin on street corners, but instead I ended up working with their corporate fundraising team, helping set up events and deals with major company sponsors.
Every year the Christie Hospital ran an attempt upon the world co-ordinated Tap-Dancing record. It was called the Tapathon, and it was supported by Roy Castle (although he died a few months before the one I was involved in) and Norman Wisdom (mock as you will, but he turned out to be an astonshingly nice and funny bloke in person). After a bit of pushing and shoving on the part of the appeals dept McVities (whose factory was based only a mile or two away) became the major sponsor of the event, not only giving the hospital a big pile of money, but also generously donating a mini-pack of Jaffa Cakes for every single one of the estimated 10,000 Tapathon attendees.
The day of the event rolled around. It was in the G-Mex centre, a large hall in central Manchester, and I was there bright and early to help out; setting up chairs and tables, directing traffic, checking the stockrooms.
It was whilst I was checking the stockrooms that I had a small accident. I was making sure of the storage of the freebies from McVities when there was a click from behind me. I turned around and realised that someone passing had obviously seen the door left open and, presumably intending to prevent anyone stealing anything, had shut it and put the latch on. I had a moment of worry - fleeting visions of my dessicated corpse being found months from now - and then sanity resumed. The event was that day, so I was unlikely to be in there for that long and not only that but there was a tap in the room so I was hardly going to dehydrate.
But, most importantly - and you can imagine the expression on my face as the realisation dawned - I was locked, alone and unsupervised, in a room containing Thirty Thousand Jaffa Cakes.
It was a disaster waiting to happen.
I was only in there for about twenty or thirty minutes, but it's astonshing the damage you can do to a pile of Jaffa Cakes in that time. And I think that the people who I worked with considered me being violently ill a short while later punishment enough.
*In whatever subjects they used to do when I was a student. Pterodactyl Studies? Basic Fire making? I can't remember, it was so long ago.
Every year the Christie Hospital ran an attempt upon the world co-ordinated Tap-Dancing record. It was called the Tapathon, and it was supported by Roy Castle (although he died a few months before the one I was involved in) and Norman Wisdom (mock as you will, but he turned out to be an astonshingly nice and funny bloke in person). After a bit of pushing and shoving on the part of the appeals dept McVities (whose factory was based only a mile or two away) became the major sponsor of the event, not only giving the hospital a big pile of money, but also generously donating a mini-pack of Jaffa Cakes for every single one of the estimated 10,000 Tapathon attendees.
The day of the event rolled around. It was in the G-Mex centre, a large hall in central Manchester, and I was there bright and early to help out; setting up chairs and tables, directing traffic, checking the stockrooms.
It was whilst I was checking the stockrooms that I had a small accident. I was making sure of the storage of the freebies from McVities when there was a click from behind me. I turned around and realised that someone passing had obviously seen the door left open and, presumably intending to prevent anyone stealing anything, had shut it and put the latch on. I had a moment of worry - fleeting visions of my dessicated corpse being found months from now - and then sanity resumed. The event was that day, so I was unlikely to be in there for that long and not only that but there was a tap in the room so I was hardly going to dehydrate.
But, most importantly - and you can imagine the expression on my face as the realisation dawned - I was locked, alone and unsupervised, in a room containing Thirty Thousand Jaffa Cakes.
It was a disaster waiting to happen.
I was only in there for about twenty or thirty minutes, but it's astonshing the damage you can do to a pile of Jaffa Cakes in that time. And I think that the people who I worked with considered me being violently ill a short while later punishment enough.
*In whatever subjects they used to do when I was a student. Pterodactyl Studies? Basic Fire making? I can't remember, it was so long ago.
