Ask Amelie: avoiding your Lizard liaison

The Stand’s resident Agony Aunt returns.

Dear Amélie,

My life as I know it has ended. Last week I engaged in some rather drunken hanky-panky with a fellow St Andrean and keep running into him ever since: in the Tesco self check-out queue, the short loan section of the library, that little alley between the Scores and Murray Place…

Please help me avoid further embarrassment, or else I might have to stay in my flat forever (and it smells really mouldy).

Housearrest

Dear Housearrest,

This one is easy. Every student in this glorious little microcosm has encountered this problem at least once, so I will share with you my preferred strategies in the hope that others will learn from your misfortune. I have numerous tactics to avoid running into people I would really prefer to avoid. They are as follows:

1. Stealth get-up

The priority here is to outfit yourself with clothing that is so far removed from your normal wardrobe that if you do run into Mr. X, he will be taken off-guard and unable to distinguish you from the seagulls that patrol Hope Street. A visit to the British Heart Foundation shop on South Street should suffice to make you look like a member of a German 80s tribute band or an Ancient History lecturer; hopefully two looks currently absent from your garderobe. Invest in big hoods, bigger glasses and anything lime green. Hallucinogenic spirograph patterns are a must. If you should stumble upon Mr. X in the library, he will most certainly mistake you for a confused tramp looking for kindling and won’t give you a second glance.

2. Rat-run around St Andrews

This technique is essentially a glorified version of Risk. Chart his preferred routes around town on a huge OS map spread on your kitchen table (see any war film or Johnny English for inspiration) and strategically navigate the streets to avoid enemy territory. Even if this requires climbing over the roofs between VIC and Beanscene, or hurdling the Greyfriars roadworks in the dead of night, no-man’s land is better than a surprise encounter. I would say commando crawling is an unnecessary addition, but it could have unintended benefits, like confirming that you are, in his eyes, bat shit crazy.

3. Join Parkour Soc

Not only will this give you thighs of steel and probable concussion, but if you happen to see him walking towards you along Muttoes Lane you can swiftly scale a wall to escape. With any luck, you will be so physically crippled from your free running experiences that you will resemble Mr Bean following a hardcore circuit training session and he won’t even recognise you. Failing that, he’ll hopefully think you’re a bit mentally unstable for willingly throwing yourself at concrete structures, and will cease all interest immediately.

Good Luck.

Love,

Amelie

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