'Hold on,' you say to Roy, 'as luck would have it there is a rubber bathing-ring in the shape of a dappled green sea-horse at hand. I will throw it to you and you will be enabled to float on the encroaching waters.'

'That is fortunate,' says Roy.

But little do you suspect what is about to befall...

For! As you go to pick up the bathing ring in the shape of a sea-horse, it lashes out and bites you! Because it is not a bathing-ring, but a coiled-up MONSTER!

As it sinks its fangs into your hand and poison courses through your system, you have time for a last rueful consideration of where things went wrong... When you plumped for the flashy charms of the too-convenient so-called bathing-ring instead of considering a more sensible course of action? When you ventured off the beaten path? Further back, when you turned down the chance to join your Uncle Herman in his solid but uninspiring haulage business as your friends advised you and instead formed a skiffle-band with yourself and your terrapin?

Whatever, the choices you made were yours and it is no use blaming anyone else. Now you are DEAD and your aged white-haired mother will grieve for you and your work-colleagues shake their heads mournfully and then ransack your desk. Jurgen at the next desk has had his eye on your eraser for months and will also purloin your luncheon vouchers.

'Whyyy??' you moan. 'Why? Dying... Aaargh...'

Go back and try again if you dare.