“Did I ever tell you about the time I found that magic paper handkerchief?”
Dermot Kennedy studied Saul, his drinking companion of many a year, sourly.
“I don’t believe you did,” he said eventually.
Saul took another swig from his pint, as though the subject was closed.
Dermot took another gulp of his own pint, He was not a man to be easily out-nonchalanted.
“Saul,” he said, at length. “I must admit, Normally you don’t interest me. Normally, you sit on that barstool and you talk about your Marjorie, little Sean or Ursula. You might make a remark about the footie. You might even express a view about the weather. But you’re not what I’d call an interesting man…”
Saul nodded in a not particularly interesting manner.
“But today, Saul, today you interest me…?”
Saul looked up questioningly, richly puzzled at this turn of events.
“Today, Saul, you sit on your bar stool as normal – but then – in a very un-normal way – you ask me if I’ve heard about the time you found the magic paper handkerchief…and suddenly you interest me…”“
Ah,” said Saul.
“Not to excess, you understand Saul. But I would say my interest is piqued. Somewhat.”
“Ah,” said Saul again, abstractedly sipping his pint.
“So, Saul, if it’s not too much trouble, I’d be grateful if you had a mind to elucidate me further…in your own time, of course.”
“Well,” said Saul, “there was this time I found a magic paper handkerchief…”
“I think,” said Dermot, “that we have established that and indeed my once piqued interest already feels a hint of the wane…”
“Well,” said “Saul, “I had one of them colds…”
“One of what colds would that be, Saul?”
“One of them colds that people catch when it’s cold. A great snuffling, snot-nose of a cold, a great runny head full of mucus sort of a cold…
“Ah, one of them colds,” said Dermot.“And I was at the airport…”
“And what was a man like yourself doing at the airport then, Saul, what with you having one of them colds, an all?”
“Well our Marjorie…”“Ah, Saul, I can tell the details of the necessity of your visit to the airport are not necessarily what you’d call pertinent to your relating…”
“Right you are Dermot, pertinent they were not, never less so,” said Saul, tapping the right-hand side of his nose meaningfully.
“Anyway, there I was on this strictly non-pertinent visit to the airport with one of them colds and the snot was streaming out of me like one of them rivers….Dermot nodded.
“And our Marjorie said that I needed a paper hanky,” said Saul
“She wasn’t wrong there Saul. Smart woman your Marjorie, if not a particularly interesting or pertinent one.”
“Very true Dermot. Never a truer word. Anyway, as luck would have it, there was one of them shops there…”
“One of them hanky shops?” asked Dermot.Saul looked doubtful.“No Dermot, I don’t think it was strictly a hanky shop. They sold newspapers and books and magazines and I think they had some of them DVDS. And I think there was some of those NOBO magic markers on special offer, too.”
“Ah it was one of them John Menzies,” said Dermot.
“Or…” said Saul thoughtfully, “it could have been a WH Smith, now I think of it…”
“Aye,” said Dermot, “most likely…”“Anyway, I went in and asked them straight out for a packet of hankies.”
“And did they oblige?”“Dermot, they did. So there I was, at the airport, with one of them colds and a packet of freshly purchased paper handkerchiefs, nasal relief for the use of.”
“Not a situation I would be envying you of.,.”
“So I opened the packet and blew my nose on the first hanky, all crusty it were. After that is, not before. And I was just about to throw it away, when it spoke to me…”
“It never…”
“Sure as I’m sat on this stool sipping this pint that you kindly provided, it spoke to me.”
“And you never thought to mention this before…”
“Well, Dermot, the moment has never seemed right.”
“Well what did it say to you, you there with that cold an all?”
“It said: ‘Don’t throw me away….’”
“It never…”“Sure as I’m sat here on this…”“I think I gather how sure you are Saul. What else did it say to you in that airport there?”
“It promised me riches, Dermot. Riches beyond the ken of mortal man. It promised to give me that Claudie Schiffer for a wife and it promised to make me irresistible to all women and make me the happiest man in Christendom…”
“And what was to be your part of the bargain, then Saul?”“All it wanted in return was that I didn’t throw it away, cast it aside, like a…”
“Like a used hankie?” Dermot proffered.“Very true and very apt,” said Saul.
“So what did you do?”
“Well Dermot, I did what any man would do, I kept it. It was that Claudia Schiffer that swung it, ever since I saw her in the Magic of David Copperfield, I always thought there was a certain…”
“Chemistry?”
“Yes Dermot, chemistry and, I thought, it would be wrong for either of us to fight it further…”
“So you acquiesced?”
“That I did Dermot. And I treasured that used hanky as though it was my own,. Which, in many ways, it was.”
“Well what was the outcome then, Saul? I’m sure it was your Marjorie that was down for the Pub Quiz Tuesday and not the lovely Ms Schiffer and that’s not a mistake a man would make easily…”“
Well, you Dermot. I was sorely misled. I treasured that snotty hanky, gave it everything a slightly-used man-sized ply-fold nose receptacle could crave. It wanted for nothing, but in the end…”
“In the end, Saul?”
“In then end, Dermot, it didn’t deliver. Women still found me largely resistible and the gas bill still goes largely unpaid. I was deceived, cruelly deceived by a Kleenex that was no better than it should have been..”
“You mean...” said Dermot.
“Yes,” said Saul, “it was nothing but a tissue of lies. Same again?”
Wednesday, 14 December 2005
Thursday, 17 March 2005
Shooting Starr
“You only get ten points for a Brockett.” Darren Peers’ crest fell with a clang.
He’d imagined a Brockett would be worth 20 points at least, 25 seeing he’d just had a try-out for his own quiz show. But the Quartermaster’s decision – as ever – was final.
It was doubly galling for Darren. It had been his first day as a full time member of The Club - and then he’d spotted him – Lord Brockett at the pick and mix counter in Woolworths on Marylebone High Street. He’d just been about to scoop his last chocolate lime into his stripy confectionery receptacle when Darren had bagged him. Straight between the eyes.
Two old ladies queuing to buy their grandchildren The Little Mermaid on DVD “tutted” with vague resentment as the aristocrat-cum-convicted fraudster collapsed into the Liquorice & Blackcurrants. “I wouldn’t mind,” one said to the other, “but I’ve already seen that Michael Portillo garrotted at the bus stop this morning, very messy. The No 73 went right over him.” “They won’t like that at the depot,” said the other shaking her head with the air of one who’d been there frequently when the No 73 rolled in bespattered with failed Tory.
It had started with a bit of confusion. A government health statement on the eve of the London Marathon had been put out on the danger of “Blisters” and how to effectively get rid of them. In a bit of comic typography it had accidentally been rendered as “the dangers of B-listers” and how to “effectively get rid of them.”
Initially the government had scrabbled to get out a correction but when, in the first half an hour Bobby Davro had been eviscerated, the entire cast of Phantom of the Opera had been crucified either side of Tottenham Court Road and Max Boyce had been defenestrated, they’d realised what a potential vote winner they had on their hands and, quite frankly, couldn’t be arsed correcting it.
However, when Dame Judi Dench was killed by mortar fire outside her East Dulwich home, it was decided to at least regulate it. Thus a Special Government Committee – the first ever to be over-subscribed by applications for membership to the tune of 1028 % - was set up to rule on what constituted a B-lister and what constituted an A-lister.
Some were easy. No-one, for instance, who had ever appeared in Hollyoaks survived the first week. Some were debatable. The jury was out on Ben Elton for instance – until, tragically, that same jury won complimentary tickets to Queen the Musical. Traces of Ben’s DNA were found in a rotary mower only four days after the ruling.
Some who thought themselves firm “A” listers, Billy Connolly for example, were surprised when then found that open season had been declared on them. Quite frankly that was nothing to do with the Royal-friendly jobbie-gagster’s celebrity status; it was just that everybody agreed he was a bit of a twat. Perhaps happily for the loving couple, the mortal remains of Pamela Stephenson and the Big Yin were found in a bear trap round the back of his estate less than 48 hours after his change in status had been agreed.
Meanwhile the government soared on a wave of popularity quite unrivalled, whilst coverage of Dale Winton hiding from beaglers made News at 10 three nights running. Life had never been better – apart from on the day that Jim Davison was fed to a cougar on Radio Five live. However, one devout B-lister had managed to avoid the fate the whole nation agreed he richly deserved. Many had debated whether Jade from Big Brother really deserved to be spit-roasted (traditionally that is, not in the News of the World fashion).
Some had even put forward an argument as to whether eight series back-to back of Family Fortunes really meant that Les Dennis had to be hung. drawn and quartered. A lone dissenting voice had even suggested that perhaps it wasn’t entirely necessary to shoot David Dickinson out of a giant catapult straight against the side of the Natwest Tower. However, one thing united the country as seldom before – Comedy Nazi Freddie Starr Must Die.
Not since the 1672 Act of Compulsory Mutual Flagellation or the cancellation of El Dorado had the British People spoke with one voice to such purpose and commitment. It had not simply been one rendition too many of “Starry Starry Night” by the Liverpool-born unfunny man. It was just that he was…eh...a complete git, a one-man reason for rewriting the DNA code and Tippexing out the bit that said “Freddie Starr”.
However, with a guile born of many years of dodging short-changed audiences, Starr had remained elusive. There had been rumours of a badly sung version of Memories here or an unfunny spoof version of Mastermind there, but overall Starr, the Holy Grail for B-List assassins had stayed ahead of the baying crowd. Until now.
A disconsolate Darren was trudging wearily away from the Club House when a familiar goosestep caught his eye. There on the Zebra Crossing, dressed in amusing Nazi tunic and humorously contrasting boxer shorts with a lipstick motif was the fugitive Starr – complete with deliberately unconvincing Black Adhesive Hitler moustache.
Darren sighed. Sometimes he almost felt sorry for them. It was this desperate craving for publicity that always undid the B-listers. In one memorable sting 14 former Eastenders had been mown down when a fraudulent casting call for a TV product endorsement had been staked out. I
n the end they all cracked. With Starr’s dangerous mirth-inducing pseudo-Nazi salute arguably a danger to traffic, Darren viewed it almost as a mercy killing. One carefully aimed shot caught Starr straight between his Third Reich lapels and he fell to the pavement, still feebly horizontally goosestepping as his lifeblood trickled away.
Darren blew the smoke from his barrel, satisfied with a job well done. Bagging a Brockett was nothing compared to this.
Back at the Club House, the atmosphere was electric. Grizzled members of longstanding grudgingly shook Darren by the hand, only the eyes of the Quartermaster remained unreadable.
“Well done, lad” he said, as Darren turned to shake his hand, “you’ve bagged the Big One.” Darren shook his head, affecting modesty at his envied kill. “However,” said the Quartermaster, “you know what that means….?” Darren shook his head again, this time clearly puzzled. “Well,” said the Quartermaster, “it makes you're a bit of a celebrity…”
Darren blanched.
“But, you’re a good lad. We’ll give you quarter of an hour start…”
He’d imagined a Brockett would be worth 20 points at least, 25 seeing he’d just had a try-out for his own quiz show. But the Quartermaster’s decision – as ever – was final.
It was doubly galling for Darren. It had been his first day as a full time member of The Club - and then he’d spotted him – Lord Brockett at the pick and mix counter in Woolworths on Marylebone High Street. He’d just been about to scoop his last chocolate lime into his stripy confectionery receptacle when Darren had bagged him. Straight between the eyes.
Two old ladies queuing to buy their grandchildren The Little Mermaid on DVD “tutted” with vague resentment as the aristocrat-cum-convicted fraudster collapsed into the Liquorice & Blackcurrants. “I wouldn’t mind,” one said to the other, “but I’ve already seen that Michael Portillo garrotted at the bus stop this morning, very messy. The No 73 went right over him.” “They won’t like that at the depot,” said the other shaking her head with the air of one who’d been there frequently when the No 73 rolled in bespattered with failed Tory.
It had started with a bit of confusion. A government health statement on the eve of the London Marathon had been put out on the danger of “Blisters” and how to effectively get rid of them. In a bit of comic typography it had accidentally been rendered as “the dangers of B-listers” and how to “effectively get rid of them.”
Initially the government had scrabbled to get out a correction but when, in the first half an hour Bobby Davro had been eviscerated, the entire cast of Phantom of the Opera had been crucified either side of Tottenham Court Road and Max Boyce had been defenestrated, they’d realised what a potential vote winner they had on their hands and, quite frankly, couldn’t be arsed correcting it.
However, when Dame Judi Dench was killed by mortar fire outside her East Dulwich home, it was decided to at least regulate it. Thus a Special Government Committee – the first ever to be over-subscribed by applications for membership to the tune of 1028 % - was set up to rule on what constituted a B-lister and what constituted an A-lister.
Some were easy. No-one, for instance, who had ever appeared in Hollyoaks survived the first week. Some were debatable. The jury was out on Ben Elton for instance – until, tragically, that same jury won complimentary tickets to Queen the Musical. Traces of Ben’s DNA were found in a rotary mower only four days after the ruling.
Some who thought themselves firm “A” listers, Billy Connolly for example, were surprised when then found that open season had been declared on them. Quite frankly that was nothing to do with the Royal-friendly jobbie-gagster’s celebrity status; it was just that everybody agreed he was a bit of a twat. Perhaps happily for the loving couple, the mortal remains of Pamela Stephenson and the Big Yin were found in a bear trap round the back of his estate less than 48 hours after his change in status had been agreed.
Meanwhile the government soared on a wave of popularity quite unrivalled, whilst coverage of Dale Winton hiding from beaglers made News at 10 three nights running. Life had never been better – apart from on the day that Jim Davison was fed to a cougar on Radio Five live. However, one devout B-lister had managed to avoid the fate the whole nation agreed he richly deserved. Many had debated whether Jade from Big Brother really deserved to be spit-roasted (traditionally that is, not in the News of the World fashion).
Some had even put forward an argument as to whether eight series back-to back of Family Fortunes really meant that Les Dennis had to be hung. drawn and quartered. A lone dissenting voice had even suggested that perhaps it wasn’t entirely necessary to shoot David Dickinson out of a giant catapult straight against the side of the Natwest Tower. However, one thing united the country as seldom before – Comedy Nazi Freddie Starr Must Die.
Not since the 1672 Act of Compulsory Mutual Flagellation or the cancellation of El Dorado had the British People spoke with one voice to such purpose and commitment. It had not simply been one rendition too many of “Starry Starry Night” by the Liverpool-born unfunny man. It was just that he was…eh...a complete git, a one-man reason for rewriting the DNA code and Tippexing out the bit that said “Freddie Starr”.
However, with a guile born of many years of dodging short-changed audiences, Starr had remained elusive. There had been rumours of a badly sung version of Memories here or an unfunny spoof version of Mastermind there, but overall Starr, the Holy Grail for B-List assassins had stayed ahead of the baying crowd. Until now.
A disconsolate Darren was trudging wearily away from the Club House when a familiar goosestep caught his eye. There on the Zebra Crossing, dressed in amusing Nazi tunic and humorously contrasting boxer shorts with a lipstick motif was the fugitive Starr – complete with deliberately unconvincing Black Adhesive Hitler moustache.
Darren sighed. Sometimes he almost felt sorry for them. It was this desperate craving for publicity that always undid the B-listers. In one memorable sting 14 former Eastenders had been mown down when a fraudulent casting call for a TV product endorsement had been staked out. I
n the end they all cracked. With Starr’s dangerous mirth-inducing pseudo-Nazi salute arguably a danger to traffic, Darren viewed it almost as a mercy killing. One carefully aimed shot caught Starr straight between his Third Reich lapels and he fell to the pavement, still feebly horizontally goosestepping as his lifeblood trickled away.
Darren blew the smoke from his barrel, satisfied with a job well done. Bagging a Brockett was nothing compared to this.
Back at the Club House, the atmosphere was electric. Grizzled members of longstanding grudgingly shook Darren by the hand, only the eyes of the Quartermaster remained unreadable.
“Well done, lad” he said, as Darren turned to shake his hand, “you’ve bagged the Big One.” Darren shook his head, affecting modesty at his envied kill. “However,” said the Quartermaster, “you know what that means….?” Darren shook his head again, this time clearly puzzled. “Well,” said the Quartermaster, “it makes you're a bit of a celebrity…”
Darren blanched.
“But, you’re a good lad. We’ll give you quarter of an hour start…”
Monday, 14 February 2005
Russian Steppes
Ah, greetings from Sunny Minsk, where we are being mostly big fans of your English popular music.
Oh yes.All your English popular music instrumental groups would be finding great welcoming should they be obliging us with rock and roll extravaganzing at the lovely Minsk Apollo (two floors, 500 capacity full and dancing till 9.30 in our executive Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill, oh yes.)
We, here in Minsk, are the biggest fans of your stellar stratosphere popular musical groups. Many people here are proudest possessors of 1972 ticket stubs from Showaddyway sell-out live performancing. Les and his musical collaborators proved so populist that there was no feet of the tiger available for purchasing this side of Siberia! Lots of limping tigers that year – great Minsk joke, no?
As well as Les Gray’s Showaddywaddy, Minsk has also been hosting many other great decadent western rock icons – your Joe Dolce, your Goombay Dancing Band and your Baccara (Yes sir, they can boogie in beautiful Bielarussia, boogie woggie all night long – and night can be very long indeed in not necessarily sunny all the time Minsk!)
But greatest excitement of all was when beautiful rock chicken Dana came to Minsk in 1974. Such great mounting excitementness sent Minsk, rock and roll capital of former Soviet Union, into Rock Around the Clock type frenzying. Many seats were ripping when Dana belt out great rock anthem, All Kinds of Everything.
Very quiet day at tractor collective next morning, with Minsk moshers missing quarterly quota by 2.3 per cent (seasonally adjusted). But when beat hits crazy Minsk people, tractor quotas go out of the window.
After great tumulting with legendary rock chicklet, Dana, rock and roll music banned from city of Minsk by local communist party officials and Dana Fan Club of Minsk forced to hold secret meetings in underground baserments, where much discrete dancing to Everything Is Beautiful and other throbbing power hot tunes!
Finally, with falling of Berlin Wall and smuggling of bootlegging Baywatch David Hasselff compacted discs, Minsk once again bopping and pogoing to your decadent western rock monsters. Sadly Dana no longer available – as she is working on tractor quota bill in your Eire Republic of Ireland Parliament Tractor Quota Legislation Department.
Heavy irony not lost on Dana Rock and Roll Fan Club of Minsk!Then in 1998, great liberal reform sweeps former Soviet Union with grand civic re-opening of Minsk Apollo by Alvin Stardust – with first notes of My Coo Ca Choo setting the nation state rocking, Minsk rock and rollers hear the sound of freedom. Sadly lovely Liza Goddard is not rock and rolling with Alvin Stardust but is in pantomime in Godalming and so misses re-birth of Minsk rock nation whilst at the top of one of your comedy beanstalks!
Following Alvin Stardust rock and roll renaissance, only one of your musical groupings can top that! People of Minsk send out heartfelt impassioned plea for rock and roll super-group Steps to be headlining at 1998 Belarussia New Metal Festival.
Sadly powerful music quintet Faye, Lisa, Lee, H and Claire cannot travel to Minsk for new annual Trash Metal festival as H has chiropody problem – another victim of decadent rock and roll park your Rolls Royce in Municipal Swimming Pool lifestyling no doubt!But rocking and rolling Minsk population is nothing if not resourcefulness!
Pretty damned soon Russian Steppes, world’s first Ukranian tributing bound is formed – Olga, Ivan, Ivan, other Olga and Cyril Ik (H name not translatable into Russian alphabet but is great wacky joke by Minsk Rock and Roll fan club, no?)
Sadly, due to oversight on very careless assistant airport petrol pumping comrade at Volgograd International Airport, Tupolev T-16 Badger carrying Russian Steppes crashes into Siberian ice mountain. Is Tragedy like of which English supergroup Steps makes top smash hit record with.
All members of Russian Steppes later found by highly trained ice mountain rescue team of East Siberia – tragedy again – all frozen together in icing cube and no longer able to Keep on Moving, like great rock and roll classic contemporaries, axe heroing S-Club 7!Russian Steppes now top only exhibit in Minsk Rock and Roll Museum (formerly Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill!), where every day, as top man curator, I am dusting them off and turning heating down.
Russian Steppes, unlike Engish supergroup namesakers will never split – not without utility of top quality Minsk ice axe! Rock and Roll forevering!!
Oh yes.All your English popular music instrumental groups would be finding great welcoming should they be obliging us with rock and roll extravaganzing at the lovely Minsk Apollo (two floors, 500 capacity full and dancing till 9.30 in our executive Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill, oh yes.)
We, here in Minsk, are the biggest fans of your stellar stratosphere popular musical groups. Many people here are proudest possessors of 1972 ticket stubs from Showaddyway sell-out live performancing. Les and his musical collaborators proved so populist that there was no feet of the tiger available for purchasing this side of Siberia! Lots of limping tigers that year – great Minsk joke, no?
As well as Les Gray’s Showaddywaddy, Minsk has also been hosting many other great decadent western rock icons – your Joe Dolce, your Goombay Dancing Band and your Baccara (Yes sir, they can boogie in beautiful Bielarussia, boogie woggie all night long – and night can be very long indeed in not necessarily sunny all the time Minsk!)
But greatest excitement of all was when beautiful rock chicken Dana came to Minsk in 1974. Such great mounting excitementness sent Minsk, rock and roll capital of former Soviet Union, into Rock Around the Clock type frenzying. Many seats were ripping when Dana belt out great rock anthem, All Kinds of Everything.
Very quiet day at tractor collective next morning, with Minsk moshers missing quarterly quota by 2.3 per cent (seasonally adjusted). But when beat hits crazy Minsk people, tractor quotas go out of the window.
After great tumulting with legendary rock chicklet, Dana, rock and roll music banned from city of Minsk by local communist party officials and Dana Fan Club of Minsk forced to hold secret meetings in underground baserments, where much discrete dancing to Everything Is Beautiful and other throbbing power hot tunes!
Finally, with falling of Berlin Wall and smuggling of bootlegging Baywatch David Hasselff compacted discs, Minsk once again bopping and pogoing to your decadent western rock monsters. Sadly Dana no longer available – as she is working on tractor quota bill in your Eire Republic of Ireland Parliament Tractor Quota Legislation Department.
Heavy irony not lost on Dana Rock and Roll Fan Club of Minsk!Then in 1998, great liberal reform sweeps former Soviet Union with grand civic re-opening of Minsk Apollo by Alvin Stardust – with first notes of My Coo Ca Choo setting the nation state rocking, Minsk rock and rollers hear the sound of freedom. Sadly lovely Liza Goddard is not rock and rolling with Alvin Stardust but is in pantomime in Godalming and so misses re-birth of Minsk rock nation whilst at the top of one of your comedy beanstalks!
Following Alvin Stardust rock and roll renaissance, only one of your musical groupings can top that! People of Minsk send out heartfelt impassioned plea for rock and roll super-group Steps to be headlining at 1998 Belarussia New Metal Festival.
Sadly powerful music quintet Faye, Lisa, Lee, H and Claire cannot travel to Minsk for new annual Trash Metal festival as H has chiropody problem – another victim of decadent rock and roll park your Rolls Royce in Municipal Swimming Pool lifestyling no doubt!But rocking and rolling Minsk population is nothing if not resourcefulness!
Pretty damned soon Russian Steppes, world’s first Ukranian tributing bound is formed – Olga, Ivan, Ivan, other Olga and Cyril Ik (H name not translatable into Russian alphabet but is great wacky joke by Minsk Rock and Roll fan club, no?)
Sadly, due to oversight on very careless assistant airport petrol pumping comrade at Volgograd International Airport, Tupolev T-16 Badger carrying Russian Steppes crashes into Siberian ice mountain. Is Tragedy like of which English supergroup Steps makes top smash hit record with.
All members of Russian Steppes later found by highly trained ice mountain rescue team of East Siberia – tragedy again – all frozen together in icing cube and no longer able to Keep on Moving, like great rock and roll classic contemporaries, axe heroing S-Club 7!Russian Steppes now top only exhibit in Minsk Rock and Roll Museum (formerly Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill!), where every day, as top man curator, I am dusting them off and turning heating down.
Russian Steppes, unlike Engish supergroup namesakers will never split – not without utility of top quality Minsk ice axe! Rock and Roll forevering!!
Ilkmoor Parish Council was unique among the 472 local residuary bodies that constituted the self-sustaining moral high ground of much of Middle England.
It wasn’t that it failed to share, with its 471 fellow committees, the single-minded conviction that people of other cultures, classes or pigmentation would never really be happy in its own leafy environs.
Nor was it that it had proved to be any less enthusiastic in its belief that there were few social ills, locally at least, that would fail to be solved by a really good whist drive. However, this solidarity nonwithstanding, there was one area where it diverged from its fellow flocks of vicars' wives, former postmistresses and men in slacks.
Street lighting.
Provision thereof.
Mrs Valerie Dwyer, second cousin, twice removed (once forcibly) of the Archbishop of Pym had made the abolishment of all forms of freely-funded public illumination “a pivotal plank” in the night of the not-terribly-long-but impeccably-polished-bone-handled knives that had swept her ever so becomingly to power.
She was now alderwoman of Ilkmoor’s traditional parish council, a parish council that could trace its roots back to 1972 and the back room of a grocer’s shop owned by Mrs Dwyer’s late father, Gerald Halboard.
“Pivotal planks”, although explicitly banned under sundry provisions of the HSE, were nevertheless something a draw among the concerned enfrachisees of Middling England and saw Mrs Dwyer enjoy a groundswell of support, seldom seen since that her of predecessor and sire.
It was Mrs Dwyer’s unwavering belief that individuals obliged to have recourse to electrical means of brightening, funded outwith the public purse, were up to no good – particularly with regards to matters of flaunting the male member in a way her late father had graphically and religiously described to her each Sunday over nutmeg tea and scones.
Any stouthearted yeoman obliged to nocturnally traverse Ilkmoor’s sundry floral byways would surely ensure suitable illumination from from his trusty tinderbox or the dipped headlights of his Nissan Frontier, she argued to the muted, but enthusiastic cheers of an audience of three (not including the ethereal but abiding presence of the late Mr Dwyer, whose passing on had enhanced neither his unobtrusiveness or loquacity).
And so, under the enthusiastic tutelage of Mrs Dwyer, one by one, the lights went out on Ilkmoor village.
The sundry discomfiture occasioned to the general populace of that fair borough was as nothing to that inflicted specifically and individually upon one Bernard Hockley.
If Bernard Hockley had had any friends, they might have referred to him as “Old Bernie” or even “Hockers”, but, as he had none, the matter is one of mere conjecture and speculation.
To himself, for no good reason that he could discern or recall, he thought of himself, (as he did frequently, if not exclusively) as “Mr Whimsy”.
It was his habit, as with many others of his persuasion and bearing, to refer to himself solely in the third person – as though wishing to express some degree of separation, no matter how flimsy or self-evidently untrue, from the sordid and unpleasant individual even he perceived himself to be.
As with many others in the area, Mr Whimsy could trace his lineage back for countless generations in Ilkmoor. But whilst other more noble families signalled their passing through wedding banns and property transactions, the Hockley’s would have been better served by using their sense of smell to uncover the unpleasant spoor of their own historical passing.
The DNA code of the Hockleys, if ever cracked, would spell “dysfunctional” in seven foot high flashing neon letters visible from orbit, but the good folk of Ilkmoor had no need of genetic fingerprinting to know a “wrong’un” when they saw one – although, indeed, matters more olfactory in nature were more a testament to the the proximity of a Hockley.
The persistence of the Hockley gene within this rural locale was a mystery of considerable import to the burghers of Ilkmoor. It seemed highly unlikey that anything with any degree chromosomal compatibility or sentience would deign to procreate with a Hockley. And indeed, countless years of “keeping it within the family" threw considerable uncertainly over the fecundity of any resultant off-spring.
Moreover, the likelihood of the recombination of any of its currently constituent gametes producing an entity capable of stereoscopic vision seemed low.
Just as the predominance of “Farmers”, “Smiths”, “Coopers” and “Fletchers” in the area’s strictly limited edition of the Thomson’s Local, testified to the proud professions bestowed surnameanouysly upons subsequent generations, so too did “Hockley” bear witness to the pre-occupations of Bernard’s own forebears.
In times mainly Mediaeval in nature, a “Hockley” had been a derogatory term for any male villager prone to exposing his pizzle to a female resident thereof without prior invitation or solicitation. It was a name and tradition that the Hockleys had borne, proudly, yet covertly, since Wednesday June 22 1722 at about four O’clock, although stories differ.
Bernard’s not so great, great, great, great, great, grandfather, Jasper Hockley, had been something of a pioneer in the business of the furtive pizzle presentation. Had the ingenuity which surrounded his bids to ensure high levels of pizzle visibility in a post-dark situation in a pre-electric age been usefully employed elsewhere, the Hockley’s heritage might have been best sought in plaques on public buildings rather than in the residual snatches of medieval bawdy baladeering still employed in the shower room of Ilkmoor RFC.
It was Jasper that pioneered the technique of holding aloft a flaming torch of goat fat in one hand whilst successfully negotiating the complex unfastening of a smock with the other that was de rigeur among the pizzle exhibiting cognoscenti until well into the nineteenth century.
Among his lesser known achievements – and largely due to the failure of his early experimentation with the use of goat fat as a mean of genital illumination - he was also among the first to invent the flame-retardant merkin.
Little did Thomas Edison suspect in 1878 as he uncovered his invention of electricty to a grateful toasterless world, that it would prove an equal, if not greater boon to that section of the community that wanted to unfurl their male members in an iridiscent environment, although it was also to sound the death knell of the goat fat industry.
For nearly 150 years those of a penile exhibitionistic tendency had cavorted and frolicked in Bernard’s home town, free from the centuries old worry of sustaining injury from dripping ruminant remnants, jigging in their long coats and bicycle-clipped trouser bottoms as their engorged manhoods proudly reflected the street lights of Ilkmoor.
But now, the one woman “lampdown” of Alderwoman Dwyer had put the cause of the village’s todger toreadors back into the dark ages, literally and figuratively.
Perhaps it was the purity of the bloodline that coursed, albeit lumpily and hesitantly, through Bernard’s veins that drove him that night.Perhaps it was some medieval contretemps between, the Halbards, the alderwoman’s paternal forebears, and the Hockleys, that had yet to be played that out led her take the wheel of her Nissan Frontier that night.
On thing though was for certain - the closure that night of the A698 bypass on the outskirts of Ilkmoor was no co-incidence borne of the malice of ill-resting Medieveal spirits with a score to settle. It was, in fact, the direct results of a coachload of inebriated tourists on the return leg of a visit to the nearby Strangepool Distillery and Gym colliding with the annual Muckle-by-the-Barbie Young Farmers Combine Harvester Stock Race and grill.
The emergency services and the county’s crack farm-equipment recovery unit had long departed now, leaving only a brightly twinkling parade ground of solar-powered LED flashing beacons (Model R247) in their wake.
Enjoying the silence and darkness as well as the occasional satisfying crunch of under-wheel wildlife, the Alderwoman’s four-wheel driven Japanese psuedo-jeep nosed towards destiny. A keener sense of smell would have seen it recede quite rapidly.
On the side of a hill, by the wrecked remains of the A968 bypass, her nemesis took several intermittent pisses and a swig of cider.Bernard Hockley staggered up to the top of the rise and into neon nob nirvana…
Mentally clocking up her eighth ex-squirrel of the trip, Mrs Dwyer gunned the motor as the bypass loomed.
And suddenly there was a brightness, a brightness that her own by-laws had specifically prohibited. And out of that brightness lurched a figure, a figure struggling to undo its heavy topcoat even as one and a half tonnes of imported motor vehicle careered towards him.
In a second it was over. And so was the Nissan, with Bernard, last of the Hockley’s, embedded in its windscreen.
The Alderwoman was found alive some two hours later and proved no longer capable of advocating planks, pivotal or otherwise and, indeed, no longer capable of enunciating anything more distinct than an occasional sad despairing whelp.
Strangepool’ s fire chief, Brannigan O’Hare, raised his protective helmet briefly and scratched his sweaty scalp. He could just about understand how the poor man had managed to end up with his nether regions jammed upside down in the alderwoman’s front windscreen.
And he could possibly imagine that the unfortunate’s trousers and underwear had been lost in the impact, but what cruel twist of fate had secured a still twinkling accident beacon so firmly to his exposed member?
“We’ll have you out of there soon, love,” he said to the still-trapped Alderwoman. “And we’ll get him moved as soon as possible...”
Mrs Dwyer, for her part, sat, her mouth opening and clothing silently, her gaze never wavering from the intermittently illuminated object dangling scant inches above her forehead...
It wasn’t that it failed to share, with its 471 fellow committees, the single-minded conviction that people of other cultures, classes or pigmentation would never really be happy in its own leafy environs.
Nor was it that it had proved to be any less enthusiastic in its belief that there were few social ills, locally at least, that would fail to be solved by a really good whist drive. However, this solidarity nonwithstanding, there was one area where it diverged from its fellow flocks of vicars' wives, former postmistresses and men in slacks.
Street lighting.
Provision thereof.
Mrs Valerie Dwyer, second cousin, twice removed (once forcibly) of the Archbishop of Pym had made the abolishment of all forms of freely-funded public illumination “a pivotal plank” in the night of the not-terribly-long-but impeccably-polished-bone-handled knives that had swept her ever so becomingly to power.
She was now alderwoman of Ilkmoor’s traditional parish council, a parish council that could trace its roots back to 1972 and the back room of a grocer’s shop owned by Mrs Dwyer’s late father, Gerald Halboard.
“Pivotal planks”, although explicitly banned under sundry provisions of the HSE, were nevertheless something a draw among the concerned enfrachisees of Middling England and saw Mrs Dwyer enjoy a groundswell of support, seldom seen since that her of predecessor and sire.
It was Mrs Dwyer’s unwavering belief that individuals obliged to have recourse to electrical means of brightening, funded outwith the public purse, were up to no good – particularly with regards to matters of flaunting the male member in a way her late father had graphically and religiously described to her each Sunday over nutmeg tea and scones.
Any stouthearted yeoman obliged to nocturnally traverse Ilkmoor’s sundry floral byways would surely ensure suitable illumination from from his trusty tinderbox or the dipped headlights of his Nissan Frontier, she argued to the muted, but enthusiastic cheers of an audience of three (not including the ethereal but abiding presence of the late Mr Dwyer, whose passing on had enhanced neither his unobtrusiveness or loquacity).
And so, under the enthusiastic tutelage of Mrs Dwyer, one by one, the lights went out on Ilkmoor village.
The sundry discomfiture occasioned to the general populace of that fair borough was as nothing to that inflicted specifically and individually upon one Bernard Hockley.
If Bernard Hockley had had any friends, they might have referred to him as “Old Bernie” or even “Hockers”, but, as he had none, the matter is one of mere conjecture and speculation.
To himself, for no good reason that he could discern or recall, he thought of himself, (as he did frequently, if not exclusively) as “Mr Whimsy”.
It was his habit, as with many others of his persuasion and bearing, to refer to himself solely in the third person – as though wishing to express some degree of separation, no matter how flimsy or self-evidently untrue, from the sordid and unpleasant individual even he perceived himself to be.
As with many others in the area, Mr Whimsy could trace his lineage back for countless generations in Ilkmoor. But whilst other more noble families signalled their passing through wedding banns and property transactions, the Hockley’s would have been better served by using their sense of smell to uncover the unpleasant spoor of their own historical passing.
The DNA code of the Hockleys, if ever cracked, would spell “dysfunctional” in seven foot high flashing neon letters visible from orbit, but the good folk of Ilkmoor had no need of genetic fingerprinting to know a “wrong’un” when they saw one – although, indeed, matters more olfactory in nature were more a testament to the the proximity of a Hockley.
The persistence of the Hockley gene within this rural locale was a mystery of considerable import to the burghers of Ilkmoor. It seemed highly unlikey that anything with any degree chromosomal compatibility or sentience would deign to procreate with a Hockley. And indeed, countless years of “keeping it within the family" threw considerable uncertainly over the fecundity of any resultant off-spring.
Moreover, the likelihood of the recombination of any of its currently constituent gametes producing an entity capable of stereoscopic vision seemed low.
Just as the predominance of “Farmers”, “Smiths”, “Coopers” and “Fletchers” in the area’s strictly limited edition of the Thomson’s Local, testified to the proud professions bestowed surnameanouysly upons subsequent generations, so too did “Hockley” bear witness to the pre-occupations of Bernard’s own forebears.
In times mainly Mediaeval in nature, a “Hockley” had been a derogatory term for any male villager prone to exposing his pizzle to a female resident thereof without prior invitation or solicitation. It was a name and tradition that the Hockleys had borne, proudly, yet covertly, since Wednesday June 22 1722 at about four O’clock, although stories differ.
Bernard’s not so great, great, great, great, great, grandfather, Jasper Hockley, had been something of a pioneer in the business of the furtive pizzle presentation. Had the ingenuity which surrounded his bids to ensure high levels of pizzle visibility in a post-dark situation in a pre-electric age been usefully employed elsewhere, the Hockley’s heritage might have been best sought in plaques on public buildings rather than in the residual snatches of medieval bawdy baladeering still employed in the shower room of Ilkmoor RFC.
It was Jasper that pioneered the technique of holding aloft a flaming torch of goat fat in one hand whilst successfully negotiating the complex unfastening of a smock with the other that was de rigeur among the pizzle exhibiting cognoscenti until well into the nineteenth century.
Among his lesser known achievements – and largely due to the failure of his early experimentation with the use of goat fat as a mean of genital illumination - he was also among the first to invent the flame-retardant merkin.
Little did Thomas Edison suspect in 1878 as he uncovered his invention of electricty to a grateful toasterless world, that it would prove an equal, if not greater boon to that section of the community that wanted to unfurl their male members in an iridiscent environment, although it was also to sound the death knell of the goat fat industry.
For nearly 150 years those of a penile exhibitionistic tendency had cavorted and frolicked in Bernard’s home town, free from the centuries old worry of sustaining injury from dripping ruminant remnants, jigging in their long coats and bicycle-clipped trouser bottoms as their engorged manhoods proudly reflected the street lights of Ilkmoor.
But now, the one woman “lampdown” of Alderwoman Dwyer had put the cause of the village’s todger toreadors back into the dark ages, literally and figuratively.
Perhaps it was the purity of the bloodline that coursed, albeit lumpily and hesitantly, through Bernard’s veins that drove him that night.Perhaps it was some medieval contretemps between, the Halbards, the alderwoman’s paternal forebears, and the Hockleys, that had yet to be played that out led her take the wheel of her Nissan Frontier that night.
On thing though was for certain - the closure that night of the A698 bypass on the outskirts of Ilkmoor was no co-incidence borne of the malice of ill-resting Medieveal spirits with a score to settle. It was, in fact, the direct results of a coachload of inebriated tourists on the return leg of a visit to the nearby Strangepool Distillery and Gym colliding with the annual Muckle-by-the-Barbie Young Farmers Combine Harvester Stock Race and grill.
The emergency services and the county’s crack farm-equipment recovery unit had long departed now, leaving only a brightly twinkling parade ground of solar-powered LED flashing beacons (Model R247) in their wake.
Enjoying the silence and darkness as well as the occasional satisfying crunch of under-wheel wildlife, the Alderwoman’s four-wheel driven Japanese psuedo-jeep nosed towards destiny. A keener sense of smell would have seen it recede quite rapidly.
On the side of a hill, by the wrecked remains of the A968 bypass, her nemesis took several intermittent pisses and a swig of cider.Bernard Hockley staggered up to the top of the rise and into neon nob nirvana…
Mentally clocking up her eighth ex-squirrel of the trip, Mrs Dwyer gunned the motor as the bypass loomed.
And suddenly there was a brightness, a brightness that her own by-laws had specifically prohibited. And out of that brightness lurched a figure, a figure struggling to undo its heavy topcoat even as one and a half tonnes of imported motor vehicle careered towards him.
In a second it was over. And so was the Nissan, with Bernard, last of the Hockley’s, embedded in its windscreen.
The Alderwoman was found alive some two hours later and proved no longer capable of advocating planks, pivotal or otherwise and, indeed, no longer capable of enunciating anything more distinct than an occasional sad despairing whelp.
Strangepool’ s fire chief, Brannigan O’Hare, raised his protective helmet briefly and scratched his sweaty scalp. He could just about understand how the poor man had managed to end up with his nether regions jammed upside down in the alderwoman’s front windscreen.
And he could possibly imagine that the unfortunate’s trousers and underwear had been lost in the impact, but what cruel twist of fate had secured a still twinkling accident beacon so firmly to his exposed member?
“We’ll have you out of there soon, love,” he said to the still-trapped Alderwoman. “And we’ll get him moved as soon as possible...”
Mrs Dwyer, for her part, sat, her mouth opening and clothing silently, her gaze never wavering from the intermittently illuminated object dangling scant inches above her forehead...
Friday, 14 January 2005
Russian Steppes
Ah, greetings from Sunny Minsk, where we are being mostly big fans of your English popular music.
Oh yes.All your English popular music instrumental groups would be finding great welcoming should they be obliging us with rock and roll extravaganzing at the lovely Minsk Apollo (two floors, 500 capacity full and dancing till 9.30 in our executive Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill, oh yes.)
We, here in Minsk, are the biggest fans of your stellar stratosphere popular musical groups. Many people here are proudest possessors of 1972 ticket stubs from Showaddyway sell-out live performancing. Les and his musical collaborators proved so populist that there was no feet of the tiger available for purchasing this side of Siberia! Lots of limping tigers that year – great Minsk joke, no?
As well as Les Gray’s Showaddywaddy, Minsk has also been hosting many other great decadent western rock icons – your Joe Dolce, your Goombay Dancing Band and your Baccara (Yes sir, they can boogie in beautiful Bielarussia, boogie woggie all night long – and night can be very long indeed in not necessarily sunny all the time Minsk!)
But greatest excitement of all was when beautiful rock chicken Dana came to Minsk in 1974. Such great mounting excitementness sent Minsk, rock and roll capital of former Soviet Union, into Rock Around the Clock type frenzying. Many seats were ripping when Dana belt out great rock anthem, All Kinds of Everything.
Very quiet day at tractor collective next morning, with Minsk moshers missing quarterly quota by 2.3 per cent (seasonally adjusted). But when beat hits crazy Minsk people, tractor quotas go out of the window.
After great tumulting with legendary rock chicklet, Dana, rock and roll music banned from city of Minsk by local communist party officials and Dana Fan Club of Minsk forced to hold secret meetings in underground baserments, where much discrete dancing to Everything Is Beautiful and other throbbing power hot tunes!
Finally, with falling of Berlin Wall and smuggling of bootlegging Baywatch David Hasselff compacted discs, Minsk once again bopping and pogoing to your decadent western rock monsters. Sadly Dana no longer available – as she is working on tractor quota bill in your Eire Republic of Ireland Parliament Tractor Quota Legislation Department.
Heavy irony not lost on Dana Rock and Roll Fan Club of Minsk!Then in 1998, great liberal reform sweeps former Soviet Union with grand civic re-opening of Minsk Apollo by Alvin Stardust – with first notes of My Coo Ca Choo setting the nation state rocking, Minsk rock and rollers hear the sound of freedom. Sadly lovely Liza Goddard is not rock and rolling with Alvin Stardust but is in pantomime in Godalming and so misses re-birth of Minsk rock nation whilst at the top of one of your comedy beanstalks!
Following Alvin Stardust rock and roll renaissance, only one of your musical groupings can top that! People of Minsk send out heartfelt impassioned plea for rock and roll super-group Steps to be headlining at 1998 Belarussia New Metal Festival.
Sadly powerful music quintet Faye, Lisa, Lee, H and Claire cannot travel to Minsk for new annual Trash Metal festival as H has chiropody problem – another victim of decadent rock and roll park your Rolls Royce in Municipal Swimming Pool lifestyling no doubt!But rocking and rolling Minsk population is nothing if not resourcefulness!
Pretty damned soon Russian Steppes, world’s first Ukranian tributing bound is formed – Olga, Ivan, Ivan, other Olga and Cyril Ik (H name not translatable into Russian alphabet but is great wacky joke by Minsk Rock and Roll fan club, no?)
Sadly, due to oversight on very careless assistant airport petrol pumping comrade at Volgograd International Airport, Tupolev T-16 Badger carrying Russian Steppes crashes into Siberian ice mountain. Is Tragedy like of which English supergroup Steps makes top smash hit record with.
All members of Russian Steppes later found by highly trained ice mountain rescue team of East Siberia – tragedy again – all frozen together in icing cube and no longer able to Keep on Moving, like great rock and roll classic contemporaries, axe heroing S-Club 7!Russian Steppes now top only exhibit in Minsk Rock and Roll Museum (formerly Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill!), where every day, as top man curator, I am dusting them off and turning heating down.
Russian Steppes, unlike Engish supergroup namesakers will never split – not without utility of top quality Minsk ice axe! Rock and Roll forevering!!
Oh yes.All your English popular music instrumental groups would be finding great welcoming should they be obliging us with rock and roll extravaganzing at the lovely Minsk Apollo (two floors, 500 capacity full and dancing till 9.30 in our executive Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill, oh yes.)
We, here in Minsk, are the biggest fans of your stellar stratosphere popular musical groups. Many people here are proudest possessors of 1972 ticket stubs from Showaddyway sell-out live performancing. Les and his musical collaborators proved so populist that there was no feet of the tiger available for purchasing this side of Siberia! Lots of limping tigers that year – great Minsk joke, no?
As well as Les Gray’s Showaddywaddy, Minsk has also been hosting many other great decadent western rock icons – your Joe Dolce, your Goombay Dancing Band and your Baccara (Yes sir, they can boogie in beautiful Bielarussia, boogie woggie all night long – and night can be very long indeed in not necessarily sunny all the time Minsk!)
But greatest excitement of all was when beautiful rock chicken Dana came to Minsk in 1974. Such great mounting excitementness sent Minsk, rock and roll capital of former Soviet Union, into Rock Around the Clock type frenzying. Many seats were ripping when Dana belt out great rock anthem, All Kinds of Everything.
Very quiet day at tractor collective next morning, with Minsk moshers missing quarterly quota by 2.3 per cent (seasonally adjusted). But when beat hits crazy Minsk people, tractor quotas go out of the window.
After great tumulting with legendary rock chicklet, Dana, rock and roll music banned from city of Minsk by local communist party officials and Dana Fan Club of Minsk forced to hold secret meetings in underground baserments, where much discrete dancing to Everything Is Beautiful and other throbbing power hot tunes!
Finally, with falling of Berlin Wall and smuggling of bootlegging Baywatch David Hasselff compacted discs, Minsk once again bopping and pogoing to your decadent western rock monsters. Sadly Dana no longer available – as she is working on tractor quota bill in your Eire Republic of Ireland Parliament Tractor Quota Legislation Department.
Heavy irony not lost on Dana Rock and Roll Fan Club of Minsk!Then in 1998, great liberal reform sweeps former Soviet Union with grand civic re-opening of Minsk Apollo by Alvin Stardust – with first notes of My Coo Ca Choo setting the nation state rocking, Minsk rock and rollers hear the sound of freedom. Sadly lovely Liza Goddard is not rock and rolling with Alvin Stardust but is in pantomime in Godalming and so misses re-birth of Minsk rock nation whilst at the top of one of your comedy beanstalks!
Following Alvin Stardust rock and roll renaissance, only one of your musical groupings can top that! People of Minsk send out heartfelt impassioned plea for rock and roll super-group Steps to be headlining at 1998 Belarussia New Metal Festival.
Sadly powerful music quintet Faye, Lisa, Lee, H and Claire cannot travel to Minsk for new annual Trash Metal festival as H has chiropody problem – another victim of decadent rock and roll park your Rolls Royce in Municipal Swimming Pool lifestyling no doubt!But rocking and rolling Minsk population is nothing if not resourcefulness!
Pretty damned soon Russian Steppes, world’s first Ukranian tributing bound is formed – Olga, Ivan, Ivan, other Olga and Cyril Ik (H name not translatable into Russian alphabet but is great wacky joke by Minsk Rock and Roll fan club, no?)
Sadly, due to oversight on very careless assistant airport petrol pumping comrade at Volgograd International Airport, Tupolev T-16 Badger carrying Russian Steppes crashes into Siberian ice mountain. Is Tragedy like of which English supergroup Steps makes top smash hit record with.
All members of Russian Steppes later found by highly trained ice mountain rescue team of East Siberia – tragedy again – all frozen together in icing cube and no longer able to Keep on Moving, like great rock and roll classic contemporaries, axe heroing S-Club 7!Russian Steppes now top only exhibit in Minsk Rock and Roll Museum (formerly Beetroot Beatgroup Ballroom and Grill!), where every day, as top man curator, I am dusting them off and turning heating down.
Russian Steppes, unlike Engish supergroup namesakers will never split – not without utility of top quality Minsk ice axe! Rock and Roll forevering!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)