Gorgeous George Clerihew

Tags

clerihew, George Osborne, Gorgeous George, MP

(9/11/2015 hm-treasury.gov.uk:

[ erstwhile] Chancellor of the Exchequer

Rt Hon George Osborne MP

Author: HM Treasury)

 

George Osborne,

you seem to be attracting scorn

because people think that only a japer

would think they could be an MP while editing a London Evening paper.

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Blue Murder

Tags

Boris Johnson, Brussels, Bullingdon club, David Cameron, George Osborne, Gove

Brassica laughed, It’s the English teacher in you.  You

can’t stop relating everything to literature.

I know, but hark at this.  Et tu, Brute and all that!

I pushed my scribblings over the table, for her to read.

ACT 3:3

Boris:  If there be any in this assembly,

any dear friend of Cameron’s, to him say

that Boris’ love to Cameron was no less than his.

If then that friend demand why Boris rose against

Cameron, this is my answer:

Not that I loved Cameron less,

but that I loved Britain more….as he was

valiant, I honour him: but as

he was ambitious, I slew him.

Here comes his corpse,

mourned by those who shall receive

the benefits of his dying:

a place in Parliament.  With this I depart,

pleading that I slew my Bullingdon pal,

for Britain’s good.

Citizen;:  This Cameron was a traitor.

Osborne:  Friends, MPs, Countrymen, lend me your wallets.

The noble Boris hath told you Cameron was ambitious.

If it were so, it was a grievous fault

and grievously hath Cameron answered it.

He was my friend, faithful and just to me,

but Boris says he was ambitious- and Boris is an honourable man.

Cameron brought favours back from Brussels,

whose ransoms the general coffers might have filled.

When the poor have cried, Cameron hath wept.

You all did love him once, not without cause.

What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?

O judgement!  thou art fled to brutish beasts

and men have lost their reason.

Citizen:  I fear there will a worse come in his place.

Osborne:  Yesterday the word of Cameron might

have influenced the world; now lies he there.

You all know Gove and Boris are honourable men.

And here’s a parchment with the seal of Cameron.

Let but The Commons hear this testament.

Some may go and kiss dead Cameron’s wounds-

yea, beg a law of him for memory

and, dying, mention it within their wills,

bequeathing it as a rich legacy unto their issue.

I fear I wrong the honourable men

whose daggers have stabb’d Cameron.

Citizens: They are traitors!

Osborne:  Boris, as you know, was Cameron’s angel,

so this is the most unkindest cut of all.

Citizens:  Let’s hear his bequest!

Osborne:  To every British citizen he gives 75 drachmas.

Citizen:  Most noble Cameron!  We’ll avenge his death.

(Revolution ensues)

Osborne: Now mischief, thou art afoot.

Take what course you will.

 

Act 4   tbc

 

DEPARTURES

Tags

Beijing, carp-shaped kites, Chengde, Daoist, Deng Xiaping, firecrackers, Five Pagodas Gate, Forbidden City, George Osborne, Great Wall, Guanzhou, Heze, Hong Kong, Mao, Putuo Zongcheng, Qin Shi-huang, Simatai, Sir Ben Ainslie, Taoist, Tiananmen, venue of Eternal Peace, Wanfaguiyi, Yangtze, Year of the Ox

(..uploaded by Rabs 003)

I could hardly make out what Brassica was saying, as the skoosh

of the coffee machine, coupled with the background animated

conversation in Costamuchamoulah must-seen cafe left me

exhausted with the intense concentration which was necessary

to filter out the brouhaha , as well as the baristas’ choice of radio

station.

(Photo from HM Treasury)

I was talking about George Osborne and his Chinese fascination,

she shouted.  You went to China once, didn’t you?

Twice, I mouthed.  In the mid to late nineties.  It was a college trip.

What did you do? she asked.

Em, the first time, we mainly stayed in Beijing and went up to

Chengde to the Mountain Resort.  It was a summer getaway for the

Emperor- but it was February when we went and there was snow.

The students had a free day in the town, but I hailed a taxi and

went to the Putuo Zongcheng Temple, to see the golden roof of

the Wanfaguiyi Hall and the Five Pagodas Gate.

Did you go to The Forbidden City?

Oh, yes and the Wall at Simatai and Taoist and Daoist temples.

We had Sir Ben Ainslie with us.

Was he promoting Olympic sailing?

No, he was in my Form Class and was a very pleasant

young man.  He was only eighteen, but already well focused.

So, what did you do on the second trip?

Look, I can’t hear you very well.  I’ll e-mail you something

tonight.

A poem?

Wait and see.

DEPARTURES

(Portrait by Zhang Zhenshi and a Committee of Artists)

We filed past Mao before we left Beijing

and wondered if he had gone to meet Marx,

or his Maker, in his great leap forward.

The digital countdown in Tiananmen

displayed in red a hundred and thirty

days, till Britain would quit Hong Kong’s harbour.

The sleeper to Guanzhou arrived on time.

Some minor official’s car drove along

the platform.  His compartment was the same

as ours- First Class.  The red carpet was out.

We settled in our bunks and asked our guide

if the Chinese ever tried to de-bunk

their leaders.  Did they wait till they were dead?

No, not really, she insisted, for Deng’s

‘one country; two systems’ helped our peasants:

1.3 billion poor, to be precise.

She looked over her shoulder and we laughed.

At dawn we stopped at some dismal station.

Black market rail tickets were being sold.

Uniformed females with loudhailers quelled

a near punch-up.  We watched behind lace nets.

A man with torn shoes, grim smile and cake box

seemed resigned to his unsuccessful bid.

The next train would be in twenty four hours:

not a good start for The Year of the Ox.

We crossed the Yangtze where it was averred

macho Mao had swum to the other side

to show prowess..  The pink agapanthus

and formaldehyde had not fragranced him-

those floral tributes on sale, re-cycled,

we had thought, as none rested on the glass

against his tomb.  We felt we’d seen it all:

The Forbidden City and The Great Wall;

the dear-departed father figurehead.

We even speculated Deng was dead.

Our guide told us when Qin Shi-huang had died,

his courtiers were so afraid, they’d tried

to mask his corpse’s stench with crates of fish.

That whiff of death came with us from Beijing.

Peasants in Heze watched a meteor shower.

The entire sky became a vivid red.

They felt a dynasty was going to fall:

and fall it did.

Yet, contrary to what was said, some joked

when Deng departed later that same week.

Outside the Wax Museum, someone said,

Deng may be dead, but you can see him here

before 3.30, if you pay ten yuan.

A carp-shaped kite played in the sky above

Tiananmen, while yellow stars fell to earth,

from a venerated flagpole: a scene

so different from 1989,

when student posters said: The wrong man’s dead.

We were in the clouds when bold headlines screamed:

Deng has massive stroke; in Arrivals

when the news broke; had opened our brandies

by the time Beijing had been prepared

for the incineration of Xiaping.

(ROC govt, 1937.  Uploaded by Tholme)

As the smoke ascends, we watch his rival.

All over China, nervous firecrackers

exorcise demons, calm jittery nerves.

And the man on the platform, with stale cake,

wonders if he’ll get a ticket this time;

wonders if there will be a departure

from what he has accepted as the norm.

A hundred thousand line The Avenue

of Eternal Peace, while a minibus

travels through white blossoms on leafless trees.

Image- 2010: Austalian Cowboy talk)

The Scottish Play

Tags

banquet scene, Boris Johnson, Braveheart, Cameron, epilogue, Farage, George Osborne, Macbeth, Miliband, Mrs Thatcher, Omeprazole, Salmond, Scone, scotch'd the snake, SNP, Sturgeon, The Scottish Play, Theresa May, Tony Blair

Mrs Connolly, the housekeeper, was chopping some root vegetables

for a hearty broth.

This’ll stick tae yer ribs, she promised.

I was thinking a salad might have been more appropriate in this

clement weather, suggested Diana.

Never cast a cloot till May is oot.  There could be snow yet, Mrs

Syylk.  Aye, we could have a blizzard before the elections.

And how will you vote? Mrs C, asked Diana.  Who impressed

you in the televised debate?

Well, the wee lassie certainly wiped the flair wi’ the lot o’

them, she opined.  But jist because she could handle

hersel’ in the verbal, it disnae follow that she’s no’ speakin’

a load o’ sh…Sugar!

Mrs Connolly!  Please.  I get your drift and I must say that

I do agree with you regarding the policies she endorses.  As

for UKIP…

Pardon me, Mrs S, but Ah canna abide that Lavage mannie.

Farage, corrected Diana.  Lavage is a type of gastric

irrigation.

Mair like gastric irritation, Mrs C riposted.  Ah huv tae take

an Omeprazole efter hearing ony o’ his drivel.  Och, don’t

get me started!

Diana didn’t think she had.

Tell me aboot yer night oot wi’ Mr Syylk. She attempted to

change the subject.  All this havering jist gets me doon.

We went to see a production of Macbeth at the local school.

You should call it The Scottish Play, warned Mrs C.  She

stirred the broth as if she was First Witch: All hail McSturgeon

that shall be queen hereafter! she cackled, revealing her very

sound Scottish Senior Secondary education from The Sixties.

Diana laughed: Salmond still lives.  Why does she dress in

borrowed robes? Treason’s capital…[will] overthrow him. 

Is execution done on Miliband?

Nothing in his party would become him like the leaving of it,

quipped Mrs C.

But seriously, everyone was saying ‘What bloody woman is

that? after the debate continued Diana.  She unseamed them-

all the knaves, all the chaps; and made as if to fix their heads

upon her battlements, screeching: ‘Ay, in the catalogue ye go

for men!’

Aye, and the ither females were jist her chamberlains.  All were

too weak when faced wi’ the Braveheart lass.  She dares do all that

may become a man and some of they wumman politicians look as if

they are halfway there..  Aah, I feel faint at the thought. Don’t get

me a sturgeon, though.  After a dramatic pause, she probed: Whit

aboot that big jessie, Cameron?

He’s too busy echoing the lines: We will establish our estate upon

Boris, Theresa or George, I fear.

So, she’s tae get away wi’ pouring her sweet milk of apparent

concord into hell and causing uproar to the universal peace,

confounding all unity on earth and…

…instigating yet another bloody referendum! shrieked Diana.

Oh, Scotland, Scotland.  Fit to govern?  Even Alex has banished

himself. Mind you, we have scotch’d that snake, but no’ killed it.

O, my breast… (here she pounded her poitrine with the wooden

spoon) …Thy hope ends here.

Diana was becoming over-enthusiastic.  She stood up on her

kitchen chair.  Yes, and then Miliband says, It looks like rain

tonight…

But it always looks like rain here, Mrs S.

Suspend your disbelief as Nicola has instructed you, prompted

Diana.  Let’s fast-forward to the banquet scene.

Scone? Mrs C wrinked her brow.

No, I’m not hungry, Diana said.  Oh, I see what you mean-

No, she’s already crowned herself.

Ah hope there’ll no be ony ghosts, Mrs C wavered.

We’ve had the spectre of Blair already, but everyone pretended

he was invisible, Diana assured her. Now, like Mrs Thatcher…

God rest her soul! Mrs C bowed her head.

…The First Minister is already adopting the Royal ‘we’.

Ourself will mingle with society? queried Mrs C.

Precisely.  Then she says to herself:’Be bloody, bold and

resolute and laugh to scorn/ The power of men.

We’re into Act 4 now, nodded Mrs C., keeping her eye on the

broth.

Diana, still standing on the chair, surveyed the landscape from

her kitchen window: Scotland has not foisons enough to fill her

will.

Nor oil reserves, added Mrs C.

Diana nearly fell off the chair as there was a sudden sound of

applause.  It was Murgatroyd, who had returned early from an

auction.

Oh, but how will we end it? Diana was disappointed to be

interrupted.

Can I have the epilogue? asked her husband.  You know, the last

word that I rarely have the pleasure to express.

Go ahead, replied Diana and Mrs C sat down and mopped her brow

with the tea towel.

Murgatroyd took a deep breath and intoned:

This murderous shaft that’s shot

Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way

Is to avoid the aim.

Ah take it that ye’ll no’ be votin’ SNP then , Mr Syylk? observed

Mrs C.

You have hit the nail upon the head as usual Mrs C.  Now,

is there a bowl of broth for a hungry man?

And Mrs C reverted to her housekeeping duties and forsook

her thespian tendencies- for the moment.

Nae bother, sir.

Bingo!

Tags

Andrew Graham-Dixon, Baltic cruise, Basingstoke, Beam me up.., bingo, Bradford on Avon, Bridge, Bridge Mints, Catherine the Great, cribbage, Dame Edna, David Cameron, deviation, Estonia, Faberge, fly fishing, geophysicist, George Clooney, George Osborne, hesitation, Inner Hebrides, ISA, Jeremy Paxman, Kit-Kat, Knights in White Satin, Lamborghini, Madge, Martini, Missing Amber Room, Neil Oliver, Nick Clegg, pasty, Poleconomy, Potemkin, Putin, religious affairs broadcaster, repetition, St Petersburg, Tallinn, The Hermitage, Tuck shop, Waldemar Janusczak, White Nights, Winter Palace

Diana Fotheringay-Syylk was feeling like the fishy guest who putrefies after

three days.  Not that Sonia had hinted that she had a sudden need to reclaim

her spare rooms, but it was just that both women required their own space.

Diana felt that it was a bit like sharing The Winter Palace with Catherine the

Great, and it sometimes felt like a similar temperature too.

Diana’s estate agent was frantically sending her texts, reporting on the

positive viewings on her cottage in Bradford-on-Avon.  Prospective buyers

adored the quaint windows- as far as she could recall there were none.

Couples loved its tranquil position in a quiet village.  ‘Bustling town‘ was how

she would have described its location.  And why did they mention the river

after the worst flooding in a century?  She was in an elevated position and

hadn’t had a teaspoonful of groundwater in her cellar.  So far there had

been no second viewings.  Still, it wasn’t Easter yet.

Sonia kept wanting to play Cribbage, Bridge or a variety of Bingo every

evening.  Diana didn’t care for these games and would have been happy to

provide the canapes for the occasion, if only George Osborne, or

Nick Clegg could have dropped by, so that she could sit the session out, like

some kind of Madge to Edna’s grande dame.  She had a sneaking

suspicion that Sonia would have eaten the politicians up as efficiently as

she disposed of a box of Bridge Mints and that she would probably have

preferred Potemkin to drop by unannounced for a game of Poleconomy.

Apparently the Chancellor and the Deputy PM love Bingo– so much so that

they were right behind tax reductions of 50% on the game. (David Cameron

was less enthusiastic. He prefers a night in with a pasty.)

Just as well that Sonia had given up driving, after she embedded her car in the

frontage of Costamuchamoulah, must-seen cafe.  Otherwise she might have

been tempted to cash in her annuities to purchase a Lamborghini to roar up

High Street.

Diana could imagine other old biddies, such as Ginevra, being all too keen to

make a black hole in their pension funds in order to subsidise a Martini habit,

or worse.

It wouldn’t take too many cashed-in ISAs to buy a toy boy and it would

probably be more short term fun than having to fund an Eastern European

carer.

Diana was beginning to realise that she wasn’t as young as she had been.  She

had been planning a Sagbag cruise to somewhere culturally interesting, such as

St Petersburg.  It would have been something to look forward to after the

house sale and removal stresses.  She quite fancied listening to some minor

celebrity rabbiting on about Faberge eggs, or leaning over the deck rail with a

George Osborne lookalike..(No, she meant Clooney, surely?), night after White

Night, or Knight after White Knight, not necessarily in white satin, or even

statins.

Now Putin had put paid to that Baltic fantasy.

Really someone should put the ‘Ras‘ back into his name.  She held him

personally responsible for preventing her from viewing The Hermitage.  How

one small man could spoil everything was very irritating.  If he had been a

pupil in her class, she would have told him not to be so greedy.  The lion’s

share was not his to grab.  She would have made him put it back and go to

the end of the queue.

He would have to have said, Thank you, Mrs Fotheringay-Syylk, with no

repetition, hesitation, or deviation.  And if she had detected any hint of

sarcasm or impertinence in his tone, then he would have been the last to

leave the classroom and may have even had to stay behind to help her

tidy up Lost Property. (But how do you tidy up Crimea?)

Sanctions!  She knew all about them.  Charging round the hockey pitch

twenty times would have sorted him out.  As for the Tuck Shop– out of

bounds till the end of term!  Or maybe till the end of time.

She absent-mindedly bent down to pick up the mail from the doormat.

There were two letters, both addressed to herself.

There was an envelope stamped with the estate agent’s logo.

She ripped it open. She was being offered a record price for the cottage!

Bingo!  Drusilla had been right.  It had flown away.

She opened the other missive.  It was from Sagbag Cruises and included a

published list of floating lectures.  Geophysicists, Religious Affairs

Broadcasters….

Where was Bendor Grosvenor?  That was what she wanted to know.

Maybe he didn’t do Sagbag. What about Neil Oliver?

Oh, wow!  Waldemar Janusczak on The Missing Amber Room.  A cruise to

Tallinn. Sign me up, Scotty! she screamed.  I’m definitely going for that one,

whether he was born in Basingstoke, or not.  I must ask Drusilla if she wants

to go too.  I mean to Estonia, not Basingstoke.  Imagine sailing round all those

roundabouts!  You’d feel seasick!

I can’t understand why Dru prefers Andrew Graham-Dixon.  He showed himself

up on University Challenge.  No, even Jeremy Paxman giving his fly-fishing tips

on a nautical jaunt round the Inner Hebrides isn’t as good as Waldemar on a

Kit-Kat wrapper.

And by the look of the price offered for my erstwhile humble abode, I can

treat my dear daughter too.

By George-bingo!

Celebrity Sightings

Tags

Boris Johnson, Caribbean, celebrity sighting, doppelganger, Edward Scissorhands, George Osborne, grog, hoop ear-rings, Jack Sparrow, Johnny Depp, Keira Knightley, Kirstie Allsopp, kohl, New Forest, Phil Spencer, Pilate, Pugwash, Somali pirate, True Cross, Ugg, walking plank

Scheherezade and Tiger-Lily were still on their Easter break from school.

They’d decided to go to their favourite coffee shop, Costamuchamoulah,

to be seen and to give autographs to any members of the Lower School

who might happen upon them.

But suddenly-Aaaaagh!!! Did you see who that was? shrieked Tiger.

Yeah, I think that was him, verified Sherry, hot-footing it down High Street

as fast as her Ugg boots would permit.

Johnny Depp had reputedly bought a house in The New Forest and several

local publications had printed “evidence” of his having graced local sylvan

hostelries in his quest to quench his thirst with some grog.

If all these sightings were to be summarised then they would far outnumber

the multiple venerations of the True Cross in Medieval Europe and would,

no doubt, be as authentic.  It was fantastical to think of any unities of time

or place in these much vaunted protestations of having witnessed a real

presence.

No, mum, I swear it was him, hyper-ventilated Tiger.

Maybe it was a doppelganger, teased Carrie.

What’s that?

A double, someone who looks like him, suggested Carrie, peeling some

potatoes. She wondered if Keira Knightley peeled vegetables and what

hand cream she would use if she did.

Sherry added: The Daily Mail reported that it might have been Johnny Depp’s

son who was with him, although the boy spoke perfect English.

And what would that sound like, man? laughed Carrie.  I thought that the

prescriptive idea of language was old hat. Everything in linguistics is organic,

like these potatoes!

I bet his son’ll go to a private school, said Tiger dreamily.

Anyway, interrupted Sherry, two reporters from The Suttonford Chronicle

cornered him- Johnny, I mean, but he made a getaway by going into Tesco

Express.  He came out carrying a 12 pack…

..of beer? asked Carrie.

No, Andrex. Actually it was a 14 pack, as there’s a special offer on at

the moment and you get 2 rolls free. 

I wonder what the reporters were asking that so annoyed him?

mused Carrie, making a mental note of the special offer, especially as

she had a double points coupon that needed to be cashed in by the end

of the month.

They had got a little confused, explained Tiger, taking the peelings to the bin,

in an uncharacteristically altruistic action which was completely for Sherry’s

benefit.  Sometimes Carrie felt that she was expected to be Edwina

Scissorhands with all the domestic chores with which she was

burdened when the cleaner was on holiday.

Johnny wasn’t the only skilled thespian on the planet. Tiger wanted

to look good in front of her friend, so she put on an Oscar-worthy

performance of a dutiful daughter.

They thought he was a Somali pirate and that they had some sort of Channel

4 scoop, she elucidated.

Carrie typed in “Depp” and “Suttonford Chronicle” and sourced the article on

her tablet.

Oh look, she commented, they can’t spell Caribbean! Ah…they say

that he also has a thirteen year old daughter called Lily-Rose.

I bet she’ll be coming to our school, breathed Sherry.  She’ll probably be in

the year below us.

Well, said Carrie astringently, he’d have to be a Somali pirate to afford the

increase in fees.  If George Osborne has anything to do with it we will all be

walking the financial plank over shark-infested seas. Let’s hope Captain

Sparrow has the vital pieces-of-eight.  Oh, it says that he is going to return

  to the role in 2015.

Wow! enthused Tiger that means…

Yeah, interjected Sherry, that kohl, bandannas and hoop ear-rings are

going to be mega!

Tiger regained the conversational floor: And everyone will want to go to

Somalia for his/her gap year.

It’s not in the Caribbean, lectured Carrie.  Honestly, what did they learn in

Geography now?  Pupils seemed to be out and about doing street surveys

on celebrity sightings, but most of the kids couldn’t distinguish one

international shopping mall from another and didn’t know if they were in

Dubai, or Doncaster. They seemed to know as little about location as

most of Kirstie Allsopp and Phil Spencer’s clients.

On second thoughts, she didn’t think the students she knew would be

familiar with Doncaster…

She had seen past articles in The Guardian and The Sunday Correspondent  on

Captain Pugwash, where journalists affected confusion over the names of

cartoon pirates and simply fabricated the facts- and were sued.  (Maybe

Boris Johnson had learned a trick or two from them about sexing up details.)

She sincerely hoped that the girls would be able to distinguish fact from fiction.

But, as Pilate said, What is Truth?  And he had had its prime example standing

right in front of him.  Still, veracity was an educational objective, surely?

Who could tell? Had it been Johnny Depp in Suttonford, or was it a case of

mass hysteria and mistaken identity?

Hogwash/Pugwash?  Nowadays it was increasingly difficult to distinguish

the two!

No Mansion Tax

Tags

Deborah Meaden, drovers' inn, Duncan Bannatyne, George Osborne, Hilary Devey, Kate Moss, Kirstie Allsopp, mobile phone mast, Phil Spencer, Prosecco, Ready Brek, Suttonford, Vladivostok

Clammie has had to hop over to Well-Shod, the Suttonford cobbler, rather a lot recently.  She has the heel of her Coltsfoot nude patent court shoe re-glued every few days.  Well, she will stand on the metal grille over the log chute outside Shelley’s Estate Agency, gawping at their revolving carousel of desirable properties, which are actually well out of her reach.

She has kept her eye fixed on the housing market ever since the recession, as keenly as she used to follow the ball in Under-15 lacrosse championships in her schooldays.  Should some old biddy pop her clogs, thus vacating a property, Clammie will strike as efficiently as a cobra.

Unfortunately, she has not yet sold her own house.

Basically, she is after a double-fronted, Georgian town house in the best street in Suttonford.  Garaging would be essential, so should one with an attached carriage house come up, it would be a-ma-zing, darling.

When her husband, Tristram, drags himself in from work and sets to in the kitchen, she offers to lay the table and, pouring him a Prosecco,  she begins her assault, as carefully planned as the logistics for an Everest expedition.  The only difference is that he has no Sherpa support to aid him with familial burdens.

But, Clammie,..he expostulates, we can only just cover the mortgage and the school fees for our beloved bratlets.

Don’t call them that, she counters swiftly.  Look, I can always do a couple of days in “A la Mode” to help out.

But you’d just spend everything you earned on their stock.

Yes, but I’d get a staff discount, so think what that would save you.

I don’t get your logic, her husband sighed.

Well, if I worked there, a scout might see me modelling the designer gear and may just see my suitability as a Kate Moss stand-in.  Then think what I could earn. You know I enjoy spending, so I could derive gratification from seeing other people spend their husbands’ salaries.

Ah, but if you are going to be out all day, then why do you need a bigger house?

To store all my clothes, silly.  It’s a false economy to have to stuff all my outfits into wardrobes that I can’t easily access and have everything creased to kingdom come.  I can never find what I actually possess, and so I end up buying last minute alternatives.

Tristram sliced his finger while chopping an onion:

Ouch!  Will you get me a plaster, please?

You’re just not listening and probably cut yourself deliberately, whinged Clammie.

She burst into tears.  She didn’t know if it was the onion that had precipitated the flow, or her own thespian tendencies.

Look, said Tristram, sucking the bleeding digit, stop crying.  You don’t even know if anything on the High Street has come on the market at the moment.

Oh yes, I do!  Clammie was triumphant. The eight-bedroomed house in the middle of High Street- the one that was a seventeenth century drovers’ inn- was in “Shelley’s” window this morning.  It’s cheap because it sits on a geological seam which has something to do with radon.

I’m not having the bratlets develop a “Ready-Brek” glow, Tristram shouted, waving the knife rather dangerously.

It’s no worse than the mobile phone mast in their school playing fields, Clammie countered.  And it is a small price to pay for social cachet.

Then she realised that the au pair was in the adjoining study, Skype-ing her friends in some Eastern European city.

Please to keep quiet. Alyona glared through the open doorway.

Clammie backed down immediately.  Sorry.

Then, turning to Tristram, she continued, but in a more subdued tone:

But will you at least consider it?  After all, I have asked Kirstie and Phil to meet us there tomorrow, at seven, after you get back from work.

What!  Tristram forgot Alyona for once. I’m not having that Allsopp woman patronise me and expose my lack of compromise on prime time tv.

No, you are perfectly capable of exposing your own lack of compromise, Tristram.  Actually, Kirstie and Phil have been really helpful and even have a first time buyer in mind for our place.

Oh yeah, he was becoming sarcastic and hypoglaecemic.  You mean, a ninety year old who has had a lifetime to save up a deposit.  Don’t be naïve, Chlamydia- ( he always used her full name when he was annoyed)- we haven’t even had a survey done.

Oh, suit yourself, but Duncan Bannatyne didn’t get to where he is by missing opportunities.

No, his trip to the top of the greasy pole has given him the ultimate reward of a cardiac arrest and the chance to spend a lot of time with Hilary Devey and Deborah Meaden.  Lucky man.  But at least he had the sense to start small and kicked off his entrepreneurial activities with the purchase of a clapped out ice cream van.

Ooh, you are so bitter, Tristram. By the way, the risotto’s burning!  Take it off the heat.

Well, will you take me off the heat, if I just go along for peace’s sake?

Okay.  But you’ll be on my back burner if you don’t and Alyona says if we don’t go for the house, she will ask her syndicate to buy it and then I will probably end up looking after her kids.

Simples, mouthed Alyona, without even removing the headset .  But I let you rent the carriage house. Boyfriend with Mercedes has deposit. He say me not just pretty meerkat.

Tristram knew the battle was already lost.  He’d be working till he was seventy five, or would have to emigrate to Vladivostok.  George Osborne had a lot to answer for by not pursuing mansion tax, as a husband’s ultimate get-out clause with over-aspiring wives.

All Things Are Possible

Tags

Alistair Darling, George Osborne, husband, Katherine Jenkins, Shakespeare, spiders, Summer 2012, swimming, The Tempest

Saturday.

Too darn hot.

A new family of spiders has been discovered called Trogloraptor, or Cave Robber.  One of their genus was behind my headboard last night and it definitely had claws.  This is one situation where the husband can make himself useful.

The theme of the summer, i.e. that all things are possible is continued in news items about a limbless Frenchman who is swimming between all the continents and a sixty three year old American woman who is making her 4^th attempt to swim between Havana and Florida, without the protection of a shark cage.  Last time she had to call it off as she was stung by jellyfish.   Mind you, the American probably needn’t worry, as thresher sharks have been seen basking off the coast of Wales, so they may be on vacation and might prefer a nice nibble of Katherine Jenkins instead.  Who wouldn’t?

Nasty weather is spreading from Wales towards the Midlands.  Heavy rain is forecast for Scotland.  Plus ca change.

Alistair Darling has been writing open letters to George, or Gideon Osborne in The People, asking him to change direction.  The problem is that no one knows where the Chancellor is.  He is not called The Submarine for nothing.  He will come up when the coast is clear. At the moment he would be well-advised to stay below the radar.  He certainly should resist any desire to adopt a stovepipe hat and jump on to The Tempest bandwagon, quoting:

If I have too austerely punish’d you…

…all thy vexations

Were but my trials of thy love, and thou

Hast strangely stood the test…

…be more abstemious.. 

If he surfaced with that kind of talk I think a thousand Portuguese Men-of-War would sting him to death.  And they would be of his own party.

© Candia Dixon Stuart and Candiacomesclean.wordpress.com, 2012

Lost in Translation

Tags

Ann Widdecombe, France, George Osborne, Glasgow, Scotland, swifts, Vince Cable

26/7/12

Maybe even hotter, but a high pollen count.

Swifts seem to be abandoning the UK as the summer hath all too short a day and is soaking wet.  There hasn’t been enough in the way of insects for them, so they are returning to Africa, faster than Polish migrant workers are legging it back to Warsaw.

It was reported that a commercial aircraft on its way from France to Glasgow lost communication with Air Traffic control, so a Typhoon was scrambled. I could imagine the lost in translation dialogue with the pilot:

’allo, ‘allo, nous sommes ou?

Right pal, never mind that.  You’re jist aboot tae be hit by a

missile and Ah doan’t mean a stick o’ rock, or an Olympian

caber.  Defence is convinced that you are in cahoots wi’ the

North Koreans, who are bent on nuking us for insulting their

wimmen’s footie team, whitever that is, by flashing the

wrang flag.  Git oot o’ that air space.

Comment?

You had to laugh at Vince Cable trying to outdo Ann Widdecombe in the modesty department, by stating that he isn’t after George Osborne’s job.  He is probably too busy training for Strictly 2.  And he says he has only one job!  He may find out that his costume has 50% fewer sequins in this time of austerity.  If he thinks he can improve on George, or Gideon’s performance, then he’d better consult his Swarowski crystals, as nobody seems to have a clue as to how to kick start the economy.  The Bollinger, Bullingden, whatever Club, might like to lead the way by consuming fewer country suppers, whatever they are.

© Candia Dixon Stuart and Candiacomesclean.wordpress.com, 2012

More Rain…

Tags

Alex Salmond, Coltsfoot, Gene Kelly, George Osborne, GP, Morecambe and Wise, Olympics, Prince Charles, rain, Roger Federer, Serena Williams, Singin' in the Rain, tennis, torches, wellies

It’s all about Higher Maintenance, I reminded myself as I pushed aside half of an unsaturated Skyberry Slice.  My friend had once observed that, at a certain age, it was one’s face or one’s bum.  All those Wallis Simpson types have no reserves when the blubber is really needed.  My friend’s father told me this years ago, and, he should have known, having worked on the Burma railway.

Yes, but I thought blubber was for whales.  I have tried to exercise in all this rain, but when I went out for a power walk, a woman tripped me up with one of those Nordic poles and as there is no tread on my Coltsfoot wellies, I nearly broke my neck.  Also, those items of footwear are expensive, so I don’t really want to get them dirty.  I know my couch potato, rain-avoiding existence is giving me a rear shelf like a boy racer’s spoiler, or like the back view of Serena Williams, but I don’t have her self-confidence to flaunt it in a pair of cyclamen knickers, on the High Street.

Rain has stopped my play over the last two months. I’ve had to cancel several open-air events. My portable candelabra would have been extinguished at Cringe Park Opera and my retro-look, Bisto-ed seamed “stockings” would have run at the Big Band Forties Event.  Dripping gazebos!  Will it never stop?

My only consolation is that my neighbours’ trampoline is so slippery that it is an ‘elf and Safety issue and their swimming pool has been commandeered by a family of ducks.  Kebabs and salad are reduced on the supermarket shelves.  Petrol consumption is down and torrential rain washes off the pigeon poo on my car.  The downside is that I will eventually surrender and put the heating back on.  It is okay if you are a pensioner with a heating allowance.  Then you could be a bit more relaxed about wearing out your designer wellies.  You could afford to replace them.

Rain, rain,

go away.

Come again

another day.

The hosepipe bans have been rescinded.  Good, because if any of those sou’estered kids squelch on that trampoline once more, they will get the full force of my water cannon.

Dr Foster went to Gloucester

in a shower of rain.

He stepped in a puddle

right up to his middle

and never was seen again.

It was probably a sinkhole caused by road subsidence, showing the short-sightedness of local councils neglecting the infrastructure and drains. This costs us all more in the knock-on effects of reduced medical services.  It is probably the explanation as to why, for ‘elf & Safety reasons, you won’t get a GP out on home visits if there is a spit of rain forecast and that effectively means that you will never get a home visit. You couldn’t reasonably expect the medical profession to endanger their lives- not even on their current salaries.  So, if you are experiencing resuscitation attempts from near drowning, after being rescued from your rooftop by lycra-clad firemen in kayaks (you wish), don’t expect a GP to make himself available for the signing of your death certificate.  That is, not unless there is a cremmie fee due.  Then you would see them swim, larded up like David Walliams, just to get their waterproof nibs on the dotted line.

Also, don’t expect a traditional burial in a churchyard.  The coffins all floated away in the flash floods and spiralled out to sea, via some estuary or other.  So, it looks like Full Fathom Five we all will lie. Quite poetic really.  Better than Ilkley Moor and its worms.

What can one do in all this rain?

I thought that a musical might be distracting.  But not that one.  I prefer Ernie Wise to Gene Kelly and know how Eric Morecambe must have felt with gutterloads of rainwater gushing over him, like The Horseshoe Falls.

Apparently Gene Kelly had researched and practised his seemingly effortless routine so much that he almost contracted pneumonia from dancing in his permanently waterlogged woollen suit.  GPs take note: not all medical conditions can be put down to viruses.

Probably by the Autumn, I cogitated, we will all have inhaled so many mould spores that the authorities will run out of flu vaccines and the old lady’s friend will do for so many of us that George, or Gideon, or whatever he is called, won’t have to worry so much about where all those heating allowances will be coming from. The medics tell us that you can’t contract pneumonia or flu from a chill, or from getting soaked. But surely, it can’t help.  If everything is down to a virus, they do not have to step out of their over-heated surgeries to see you and then they don’t have to ruin their wellies, or break their budgets on antibiotics.

I see a cloud.  It is the size of a man’s hand. It’s like a camel.

Nay, it’s very like a whale.

Stop arguing you two, I thought Ophelia might have said. It’s very big and it’s all over the weather map of Central Europe for August.

The Weather Girl was now wearing her Coltsfoot galoshes, not to mention a Mae West flotation waistcoat.  It didn’t matter what she was wearing underneath, even if it was two sizes too small.

Prince Charles had presented the Weather and you didn’t see him wearing ill-fitting Gieves & Hawkes.  He might be an old buffer, but he has won sartorial awards. His jackets fit like a glove, if you could forgive the mixed metaphor.  Even Camilla accepts that she is no longer a size ten, even though she was never any kind of weather girl herself.  She had other assets, namely that she had the sense never to rain on Di’s parade, though she might just reign over us.

How on earth are they keeping those torches alight- re-igniting birthday candles?  The rain must find its way through those perforations. The Greeks never had that sort of problem, though they have plenty of unrelated ones now.  Maybe they could capitalise on the success of Mama Mia and do a re-make with Colin Firth in a wet t-shirt performing an updated Singing in the Rain number.  We could donate some H2o in the spirit of EU solidarity.  Maybe they could sequel Shirley Valentine and we could send them Ann Widdecombe as an ageing Shirley, though she would probably have to be told it was Shirley Williams that she was to portray.  Still, she is fairly good at rocking the boat and would enjoy the attention.

Somewhere I had heard that Federer might be toting one of the torches.   The Greeks used to transport the flame au naturel, but I didn’t dare to hope that he would oblige, noblesse or not.  If he did, the whole of Europe would unite, not to say ignite!

I found it hard to imagine Andy trailing a torch through dreich Dunblane, even if Alex Salmond was cheering him on and the Perthshire Pipe band were playing I would walk five hundred miles, with soaking sporrans and waterlogged chanters.  No, Andy, accept it: the entire female population of the United Kingdom, minus your mum and possibly the ever-faithful Kim, carries a torch for Roger.

I felt sad for Theo Paphitis. If he was going to take over Robert Dyas, it was a bad year to sell gas barbecues.

© Candia Dixon Stuart and Candiacomesclean.wordpress.com, 2012