Messing About On The River

Being a boatie is shit.

Yes, yes it is

For the majority of the year you spend 10+ hours a week sitting in a boat in sub-zero temperatures, moving yourself back and forward on a seat fashioned to be maximally uncomfortable just so that you can keep warm.

From this exercise you probably manage to carve out a reasonably decent body, but you can’t use it for any nocturnal activities because you have be to tucked up in bed by ten to ensure that you can be up bright and early to get on to the river again.

Even under the rare circumstances that you are able to get out and see people, you find that you’ve become a social pariah – your entire conversational repertoire consists of the ability to soliloquise at length about your most recent 2k test and how twattish the Caius M1 crew are, restricting your social circle to only those who are able to sympathise with your tales of 6am starts and those fucking novices spinning in the middle of the fucking river at peak fucking time.

Thrilling chat: ‘…and then if we can put the power down on the Reach…’

There is, however, a glimmer of hope for the forlorn boatie. By the end of exam term nobody is able to talk about anything interesting, because nothing interesting has happened for the past six weeks. This puts you on a level pegging with everyone else, offering the faint hope that maybe you’ll be as interesting as the next person.

Just kidding, It’s May Bumps this week, and you’re on a drinking ban. Have fun.