Slaying the Beast...

[Author's Note: all names have been changed in order to protect the identity of those concerned.]

Tying in nicely with the 12 Labours I have set myself in 2008 is this little mythological anecdote recounting the unexpected fall from grace of a fearsome warrior. This is...

The slaying of the mythical beast known as........... Mimon Saguire.

To put the man's propensity for mayhem and destruction into context, I will boldly declare that Mimon is to the artistic field of wanton debauchery what the Wright brothers were to aeronautics or Alexander Fleming to medicine: innovative, groundbreaking and light-years ahead of anyone else.

Plenty are the people privileged enough to have watched - in blind fascination - Simon, er Mimon brutally bulldoze many a weekend into more carnage and devastation than the trench warfare of World War I, razing entire cities to the ground on his renowned three day rampages. He could go many months without sleep and eat nothing but the foil from bottlecaps to fuel his burning engine of destruction. Nothing could stop this last man standing amongst hedonists.

Or so we thought...

As Achilles was brought down by his humble heel, so too did Mimon buckle and fall, slain by a much fiercer adversary than the sword: the mighty absinthe.

Any form of liquid alcohol banned across 19 European countries for over ninety years for having "psychoactive and hallucinogenic properties - © Wikipedia" is probably not recommended for a Sunday afternoon picnic in the Hammersmith sunshine. And certainly not four large shots in twenty minutes. Yet that is what our hero did, and the price that was paid was neither headache nor hangover, but his aura of invincibility.

Within a mere half-hour of the final herbal drop descending into his gullet, our hero was babbling incoherent groups of random words with his head lolling about like Churchill on crack (the insurance advertisement dog, not Winston) and eyes looping in opposite directions like inversely magnetized ball bearings. Battered into instant submission, he slowly dragged his failing body into the lounge and onto the sofa, where into a deep coma he fell.

The glory of any such psychoactive and hallucinogenic properties is that their grip on the mind continues even beyond the portal of sleep. Within ten minutes of having lost consciousness (for sleep it was not), Mimon began to recite a string of telephone numbers to the great delight of his bemused audience. Thus "0-2-0-8-7-1-4-9-6-3-3" followed swiftly after "0-2-0-7-4-1-1-8-5-2-5" before giving way to several short yet profound philosophical ramblings along the lines of "I must have more self-respect...".

The whole borough was then subjected to a snoring sonata of such violently epic proportions that all lumberjacks in Canada and Russia united in putting down their chainsaws as a mark of respect.

So there you have it folks. Let this be a marker in time of this memorable moment. More efficient than any silver bullet or wreath of garlic, I officially proclaim the distilled form of a common mountain herb to be the most effective slayer of this fine beast we have the pleasure of knowing.

The beast is dead. Long live the beast.