Nyoh (Curry Chips)

This is a cautionary tale of what happens when public transport contrives to bring two volatile elements into close and perilous contact.

Let's just say that I commute from one side of the city to the other. Let's just say that I have a love/hate relationship with my morning bus ride, since it brings me that little bit closer to my fellow basket cases.

This morning, as I attempted to leaf through a history of Attila the Hun, a nice gentleman (let's refer to him as "Mook") sat behind me and took twenty five minutes to really get going on an apple. Allow me to don my Sherlock Holmes hat. Golden delicious, I'll wager, due to the amount of emergency slurping which followed each bite.

Mook did make the effort to eat it quietly, but that just exacerbated the unpleasantness. I would also wager that Mook was suffering from a nasal blockage since HE CHEWED WITH HIS MOUTH OPEN (i.e. plenty of "nyoh nyoh nyoh" instead of "nyom nyom nyom").

Me [reading] : "Priscus then tells us that Attila went to the hedge and consulted his blackberry before deciding to catch the 11.40pm ferry across the Danube to catch last orders with Aetius before-"
Mook: [crrrronch]
Me: "..."
Mook: [snork]
Me: "...before..."
Mook: [slurp]
Me: "...before finding that the tavern had in fact shut at 11pm and-"
Mook: [nyoh nyoh nyoh]
Me: "...ah....and..."
Mook: [cronch]
Me: "...deciding to lay waste to the tavern and the surrounding townhouses with an earth-digger that a Visigoth building firm had carelessly left with the keys in the ignition. Aetius strove to prevent Attila from levelling the local church, but-"
Mook: [crronch]
Me: "...fuckin' hell...
Mook: [nyoh nyoh]
Me: "...but..."
Mook: [slurrrp]
Me: "SATAN'S ALMIGHTY GUSSET!"

At this point, I stood and turned to address my masticating nemesis.

Me: "WOULD. YOU. EVER. SHUT YOUR FUCKIN' PIEHOLE!"

This wasn't in Mook's morning plan. His mouth fell open. Well. It fell even more open than it already was.

Mook: [nyoh?]

He wasn't going to play ball. He was the innocent party, I was the clearly unhinged aggressor. People stared at me. Mook had won public opinion in less than a second. Crafty bastard.
Still, I had nothing to lose so I made hay by clouting him across the face with the book. A clump of golden delicious flew from his gaping maw and hit the window. He cowered in his seat and waved half the remaining fruit at me, making plaintive "nyoh" noises. I went downstairs and held Attila in one hand and a pole in the other.

Me: [deep breaths] "Priscus then tells us that Attila went to the hedge..."