I had real bad sh*ts on a 10hr bus journey in Thailand once. the bus stop on route had me sprinting to the bogs, only to find a trough with a dirty bucket. Screw that! Fortunately they also sold bog roll, enabling me to kill the cockroach infested bus toilet. Serves me right for drinking mine and my wifes chilli margarettas before the journey 🙂

During a stay in a salubrious Blackpool hotel – yes they do exist.

I’d been on the Pleasure Beach and indulged in some fast food from the nasty kiosks. We had a pleasant evening meal back at the hotel and were enjoying a cold Peroni in the bar when my lower back became rigid and my gut was suddenly at 5 bar pressure. My eyes went all Marty Feldman in abject terror as I knew I had seconds to make a move.

Fortunately, there was a toilet in the bar area so at least I didn’t have to attempt to get to our room.

I didn’t say a word to Mrs.S. There was no time. I don’t recall the walk to the loo but it was swift. My ass made contact with the seat and I evacuated in less than a second. The sound was that of the anti-missile gun, Metal Storm* on its highest setting. How my a-hole wasn’t ripped asunder, I’ll never know.

*Google it.

I was in the bar at my hotel in Lagos and chatting with a bloke from Warwick Uni who was there recruiting students (business class accommodation for him!) when he suddenly got up and dashed for his room, coming back 20 minutes later to explain what had happened. These days I travel equipped like a mobile pharmacy so I was able to give him my Ciprofloxacin, which sorted him out very quickly. Amazingly he was travelling without anything for emergencies, not even Lomotil.

I’ve come back from Africa trips with some interesting guests inside me, once it was shigella, which attracted some attention from the Public Health authority who wanted to be sure I wasn’t in the catering business.

After my Indonesia experience I think I lost about 5Kg in 3 weeks, it was a bit scary.

I can beat that.

Few years ago I had glandular fever. I lost 2 stone in just over a week, went from 11.5 to 9.5st. I’ve never been so grateful for a bathroom which had a washbasin directly facing the toilet, so I could sit and rock forwards and back depending on which end was going to violently purge next.

The Roger Mellie “Shit Yourself Thin” diet is very effective.

Driving to Morzine this year. As we arrived in Calais early AM I jumped in the car and felt a twinge in my stomach. Then some pretty horrendous cramps. No explosion at the exit port but over the course of the next few hours my stomach would go into brutal cramps every half hour like clockwork. Stopped at a couple of rest spots but again no pebbledash action.

Finally after about 6 hours of driving, it was time. Pulled quickly into what turned out to be the busiest service station in France. Sweating bullets by this stage but I parked up and did the ministry of funny walks into the service station.

I made a beeline for the toilet and discovered two problems.

a) It was communal
b) It was queued out the door with at least a dozen people in front

In a blind panic I opened a random door and found myself in some behind the scenes staff only stairwell. At least it was private. I resigned myself to shitting in the stairwell but at the last moment i gritted my teeth, tensed up and made a dash for the door. I could see the petrol station through another door and prayed they had a toilet in there too. Stumbled over there and to my joy discovered a pristine, empty disabled toilet where I proceeded to launch Defcon 5. Most satisfying.

Hah. I was in a queue for the bogs at a gig and someone behind me was going “scuse me- can I push in please? Sorry- can I push in?” Finally he shouted “AM GOIN TAE SHITE MASEL! FOR THE LOVE O GOD LET ME IN”. How could you resist such an appeal?

So for everyone else confronted by a queue- you can always depend on the kindness of strangers, because nobody wants to stand in the queue with a man who just shat himself