Page 123 or page 46?

You know that Chinese Whisper thing? You say something in someone’s ear and tell them to pass it on and when it gets back to you the message has completely changed from the one you launched. Well that obviously happens with meme’s!

Last February I was asked to pick up the nearest book, find page 123, dismiss the first 5 sentences then post the next 3 sentences.


Then a few days ago my dear friend Lucy tagged me with the latest version! I still have to pick up the nearest book, but this time I’m to ‘turn to page 46, write out the fifth sentence on that page, and also the next two to five sentences’ which I assume means ignore the first four sentences and copy the next five!

But I’m lazy, and instead of starting again I’m going to reprint the article I posted back then! I apologise if you’ve read it before, I wrote it back in the days when every article I posted got 20 plus comments and many of the names there are very familiar! How things have change. I keep reminding myself that nowadays it's quality that counts, not quantity!


This is what I wrote.


Unfortunately the nearest book to me was my IKEA catalogue and by following the rules, I came up with ;

Tyosand range. 3 seat sofa £395/ 1seat section £165/ 2 seat sofa with armrest £365. Washable slipcover in polyester.

But I guess that isn’t really the idea, so I reached further away to grab a random book from the shelf, my chair tipped up and the entire contents of the bookcase fell on my head!

Anyway, the first one I grabbed was a recipe book, but I felt that a list of ingredients for Sussex Pond Pudding would be inappropriate!

I picked up the next one which was about the wine regions of Southern France. Undaunted and still laying flat on my back, I plunged my hand into the pile and pulled out a book which looked hopeful.

The required sentence on page 123 started;

’You are making me horny again’. He pushed his fingers..... .....and then I thought better of it.

So I closed my eyes and caught hold of Brand New Friend by Mike Gayle*.

I followed the rules and this is what I read;

That evening Rob and Jo covered such topics as politics (she felt sorry for the Prime Minister because aged so much since he came to power) the Internet (she dismissed it as CB radio for computer nerds) and the Apollo moon landings (she had seen a documentary on Channel 5 that claimed they never happened and firmly believed it was all a big fake). Rob laughed so much he could hardly breathe. Then finally they exchanged life stories.

So I got there in the end! I’ll clear up in the morning.
*A brilliant read by the way. If you like a really funny yet believable story, I cannot recommend it more highly.