Iron Man faints at the gym!

A bizarre title you might say but it was a bizarre series of events if I’m honest.

I’ll make this a quick one as I have already blogged today, but this made me laugh so here you go.

I have a suit of armour in my front lounge. I say front lounge as though I have more than one but I don’t. I have a tiny lounge, and my knight stands in the corner glaring at people as they enter the room. I’m seriously thinking of fitting a little microphone thing inside his helm and saying ‘NONE SHALL PASS’ to whoever comes to visit me.

That would be cool right? But I digress.

A friend and his autistic son came and visited me today to drop off some goat food (Yes, I have goats.) and the young lad was in awe of my suit of armour. He kept poking it which causes my eye to twitch in what I presume is irritation and barely restrained gorilla rage. He keeps poking until it starts to sway at which point I feel the need to ask them both to leave. The father was somewhat embarrassed and I kind of feel bad, but hey… nobody pokes my knight in the groin.

A little while later I receive a text message from the father, firstly apologising and secondly telling me that his son thinks I am Tony Stark, aka Iron Man. Now I found this to be hugely cool. I have never been a hero before, even in my dreams. (Yes, I have been a Jedi.) To make things even cooler, my wife also bumped into them and the son asked her if I was a superhero. Ever up for a practical joke she simply replied, ‘Oh I wouldn’t be allowed to answer that. Superhero’s need to have a disguise, don’t they?’

She said his face lit up as though he were the only one in the world to know my secret. Priceless.

So, I am now a superhero in the eyes of an autistic child. Now, superhero’s need to look pretty super. They have to look all muscular and strong so that the baddies know they’ve picked on the wrong guy, and so I went down the gym. Now it’s important to remember a few facts here.

1. I am now an approved superhero.
2. I have not been to the gym in at least six months.
3. The Olympics is on and they play it on huge screens in the gym, egging you on to greater feats of endurance and godliness.

I only did half an hour and boy did I feel as though I’d run for a week and lifted every rock and stone of Hadrian’s Wall. I left the gym and I have to say I was feeling pretty good until I stepped outside. My wife met me (as she had been swimming) and said that my lips were grey and that I had less colour than paper. I have to admit to feeling rather ill. We drove home as quickly as possible where upon getting in the house I promptly collapsed. My wife tells me I had no pulse at my wrist at this time and had it not been for my pitiful cries I could have been dead. Not a good look. Thank god the autistic kid didn’t see that.

Right, that’s it for today. I need my rest. Hopefully my dignity will grow back as I sleep.

M J

Author: Mark S Thompson

Okay, so these things are kind of hit and miss. If you’re reading this then I am thankful to you for taking the time out of your day to do so. I’ll be honest, when I think of myself as a writer, I kinda cringe. Don’t get me wrong, it is the dream, it's​ just I never really believe it will go anywhere. When I think back to the day that I first knew I loved writing, and I mean really knew, I see myself sitting in an English lesson at secondary school. The school was called Wrotham and is in the county of Kent, England. As far as I know, it's still there. English was far and away my favourite subject. The best bit was when the teacher gave the class a selection of words and asked us to make up a story that either contained those words or was about those words, you know. At other times we would be given the first sentence and then write what happens next. Good times. Many times my work would reflect what I had recently read and it would be okay. Nothing special, just okay. On one occasion though I wrote about a merman called Finchy and can remember going into so much depth and detail about him and the underwater kingdom he lived in. I really enjoyed writing that and it must have shown because my teacher commented on it. She was really impressed and loved the story. That was it for me, my moment. Now when I write I think back to those great times and to that story. Hopefully, I’ll write something that you, the reader, will be moved to comment on. For me, there is no greater elixir View all posts by Mark S Thompson