CAKES, CATS, CRACKERS AND CHRISTMAS

I was sitting at the kitchen table, cutting the top of my egg with a chainsaw when Tommy my cat walked in. I looked at Tommy and yelled.
"Hello, you mangy, old flea-ridden excuse for a cat"
Tommy smiled and yelled back.
"Hello to you, you old hump-backed, duck-arsed old slapper"
I smiled and yelled.
"Hello-again, you foul-breathed, stinking, bleary eyed, knock kneed filthy feline"
Tommy stuck his tongue out and yelled back.
"Shut up, you hairy faced, toothless, cross-eyed, pot-bellied, wart covered, ugly, crazy, old bag".
"Well" I said "That's the pleasantries over, but now, down to the serious business, what do you want for Christmas Tommy?"
"I demur" said Tommy, and he did, right there in front of me and he never even lifted his tail."I demur" said Tommy "I think old ugly bags should go first, so-what do YOU want for-Christmas?" I was caught on the hop, I didn't expect to go first, I mused in my muesli, it dilutes the taste of the nuts and replied. "What I would like this Christmas, what I would really, really like, is to appear younger looking". "No trouble" said Tommy "I'll get you a 90 year old man, then when you take him for a walk, you will look-younger"
"Now, that's what I call thinking with a capital-THI" I yelled. "But Tommy, if you do get me a 90 year old man, please make sure he has all his faculties--and elbows, I like-elbows".
"Faculties I can guarantee" said Tommy "But not teeth".
"Don't worry about teeth" I said "He can use my late daddy's teeth".
"Are you not making a lot of work for yourself?" said Tommy, with a worried frown.
"Not at all" I yelled "It's just a matter of getting two shovels, cycling to the graveyard, digging my dead daddy up, opening the coffin and reaching in to get the false teeth. It's simple, even a child could do it". "I suppose you're right" said Tommy. "The hardest part will be getting on to the bicycle while carrying a shovel. Now" said Tommy, clapping his hands, "That's you sorted, now, do you want a bog standard 90 year old man,or would you like the deluxe model?"
"Bog standard" I said "But I would like him to be small and compact, with working elbows that can carry the morning newspaper, none smoker with flat cap and if at all possible, easy on the juice". "I'll just make a note of that" said Tommy and he dipped his finger in soot and began to scrawl on my newly painted jet black wall.
"RIGHT" I yelled, turning to the left and banging my face against the wall. That's me taken care of, now for you, what would you like for Christmas? What would my little Tommy-Pommy like for-Christmas?". Tommy flushed bright red and began to dance from one paw to the other. "What's wrong?" I said "Need a slash?". "I certainly do NOT" yelled Tommy "and I do wish you would stop going on about-slashing and you know, the-other, number two".
"It's a fact of life Kid" I said "as natural as eating, breathing or sticking two corncrakes under your oxters and pretending to be the Queen of Siam". "I know" said Tommy "It's me, I just don't like talking about things like that, I'm sensitive you know, anything to do with-toilets--well, it turns my stomach". "It's a good job you're not George Michael then" I screeched. "Now, come on Tommy, don't be a big girl's twinset, what do you want for-Christmas?" "Oh, I'm too shy to say" giggled Tommy "can I hide behind the curtain and tell you from there?" "If you must" I yelled "But hurry up, that Greek ship docks at ten o'clock tonight and I must be there to greet the little Greek sailors with a smile on my face and a ripcord on my drawers". I stood for five minutes watching the curtain, then, the curtain began to speak. "This Christmas" mumbled Tommy "I want something I have wanted for a long,long time" I heard the hidden feline-gulp then he went on. I want a--Barbie doll, a-boxed-Barbie doll, with blue eyes, a peaches and cream complexion and long, long-blonde hair". I stood there, open mouthed and-transfixed, my trans had been broken for a long time, but now it was-fixed! I felt a thump on the mouth and realised that I had also been-gobsmacked. Transfixed, open-mouthed and gobsmacked I gazed at the quivering curtain. I found my voice under the blacksmith's anvil and yelled.
"And what colour dress should this Barbie doll have?"
"Pink" whispered the voice from behind the curtain.
"And what colour shoes?" I said
"Pink" whispered the hidden voice.
"And what colour--under-things?" I roared.
"Pink" whispered the voice, in a sibilant, sinister Scots/Irish dialect.
"Come out" I yelled "Come out from behind that curtain, you-you-disappointing, discommodious, discomforting, disembodied-dir'tee,lit'le cat".
"Tommy crept out from behind the curtain, with his tail between his legs. I towered over him and yelled, "I have just one thing to say to you, if I let you play with my 90 year old man on Christmas day, will you let me play with your Barbie doll?" "YES" yelled Tommy "Oh, yes, yes, YES!" Then Tommy and I clasped hands and danced the Walls of Limerick to the sound of police batons thumping off little hoodie heads down at the corner. Irish Culture? sure it's all we have left, along with a million pigs that no one wants to eat! Kay-ME-AH-Fault-Yah! Paddy and after you with the shamrock painted PO.

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And if your cat-or indeed-dog asks for a doll this Christmas, don't worry, it's just a sign of the times.

TOMMY THE CAT USES "MY" LITTER TRAY!

In the run down, condemned hovel I call-home, Christmas was in the air. A Festive extravaganza of coloured crepe paper, bells, bows and tinsel hung from the sagging ceiling. A big Christmas tree stood in the corner, decorated with twinkling lights and dangling condoms. I had some job getting the fairy up on top of the tree. He said,he had places to go to and people to see, but I slipped some Temazepan into his eggnog and he soon became pliable and less obstreperous. I love everything about Christmas. Santa Claus creeping into your home, followed two months later by the bailiffs. The feeling of-goodwill in the air, "Let go of that teddybear you tube, I saw it first". Carol singers, drunk drivers blowing into tubes, the little children-so excited, parcelling up stones in festive paper, before they throw them at the corners. The magic feeling of hope on Christmas day, the heavy feeling of constipation on Boxing day. But the thing I really love about Christmas is-Santa! Ah, dear old Santa Claus, the white beard, the red rosy cheeks and the massive expanse of red cloth, covering his ding-dong, merrily on high. When I was young, about 27 or 28, some naughty children told me there was NO Santa Claus!, they said it was my daddy.
But I proved them wrong, on Christmas Eve night, I crept softly into my parents' room and nailed both of them to the bed, with six inch nails. And Santa still came to me! On Christmas day I got a ride in a police car and a lovely assessment from the chief cook and bottle washer at the loony bin. No Santa? Kiss my ass, that's what I say! You tell me there's no-Santa, I tell you, "Go kiss my black ass-fool!"
I was softly humming--I really must get a bar of Lifebuoy soap, when Tommy my cat came in with a balloon tied to his feline tail. I looked at Tommy with love in my eyes and fleas in my drawers and said, "Well Tommy, old son, Christmas is coming." Tommy flashed a big, wide smile like Christine Blakely and cried, "And the goose is getting fat." In the awful, terrible silence that followed, you could have heard a jumbo jet crash through the roof. I said-nothing. I grabbed Tommy by the arm, led him outside, out the Lisburn road for seven miles,turned down a narrow, winding lane and stopped under a rare Atlantis fig tree. Under the spreading fig tree, I looked all around and whispered, "Tommy, this is for your own good. The reason I have asked you to meet me here tonight is--well, it's embarrassing, but it's for your own good. I looked all around again, lowered my voice and whispered, "Earlier tonight, I said to you, "Christmas is-coming" and what did you reply?" Poor Tommy, shook, trembled and shivered and whispered, "I don't remember.""Well, let me refresh your memory," I whispered. "When I said-to you, "Christmas is coming, you replied-and I quote, "And the goose is getting fat." "What's wrong with that?" whispered Tommy, "Lot's of people say, "And the goose is getting fat." "Tommy, Tommy, Tommy," I whispered, "It's such old hat, it's out of fashion. How can you sparkle and be the life and soul at cocktail parties with out of date sayings like, "And the goose is getting fat?""I had no idea," stammered Tommy. "Oh my God, all my fly comebacks are out of date. I'm so sorry, so terribly sorry." "Easy lad," I said, patting his furry head. "It's not a putting down offence--THIS TIME, but you really must work on your add-libs and fly answers.""I will," spluttered Tommy, "I will, I swear I will." "Good boy," I said, "Now let's go home, have a nice cup of Oxo gravy and never talk about this again." As we walked up the long, winding lane, Tommy looked at me and said, "What would you say, if I said to you, Christmas is coming?" Quick as a flash, I replied, "I know, I see the Easter eggs are in the shops." Tommy looked at me with-awe, in fact he said, "I can't help it, I'm looking at you, with-awe." Just then, and not a minute before or after, Jim Rodgers leaped out from behind a whin bush screaming, "Nigh-Nigh-NIGH! Christmas is coming and the goose is getting fat""Tommy and I grabbed Jim and headed back towards the fig tree. At half past two in the morning, I had 97 people swarming round the fig tree, as I tried to drill into their thick skulls, that in today's modern world, the fly answers of our fathers and grandfathers, just won't do. Poor, poor Jim Rodgers, the best he could come up with was, "Christmas is coming--I know-Hi, It's coming-NIGH, so it is." How did that man ever become Lord Mayor? He must know wild high up people-NIGH!
And with that I return you to the studio, where Mark Carruthers, has stripped down to his red socks, for Slappers In Need Night.
Get Rosie Ryan's letters to Gerry Anderson at all Eason shops and below.
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Oh, if you're passing my little house at Christmas, just keep on going!

THE CAT WHO DIDN'T BARK IN THE NIGHT

Tommy my cat and I sat at each side of the fire on elephant stools. We were crouched over, drooling, dribbling, gurning and wetting ourselves. We were pretending to be an old couple who had celebrated their 100th wedding anniversary last Saturday. Tommy looked at me, through red, watery eyes and croaked, "Wasn't it nice dear to see our 452 grandchildren, great grandchildren and great, great grandchildren on Saturday?" I broke wind-weakly and croaked, "452 grandchildren, great grandchildren and great, great grandchildren. That's a lot of-children. I bet if you laid all the umbilical cords end to end, they would stretch from here to somewhere else." "Where did all those children come from?" croaked Tommy. "I don't know," I croaked. "Long, long and even longer ago, I remember someone shouting-PUSH, but I don't know if I was giving birth or pushing a fat wombat up a narrow chimney." "My money would be on the wombat," croaked Tommy. "Everyone was pushing wombats up chimneys in the good old days." "I remember," I croaked. "What do you remember dear?" croaked Tommy. "I remember that I can't remember anything," I croaked. "I remember the first time I saw you," leered Tommy. "You were coming out of the outhouse at the bottom of the garden. I remember the sun glinting off your bonny, bonny big fat blazer of a face. You smiled at me like an angel, yes, like an angel and guldered, "If you're going in there, don't light your pipe or you'll be gathering up your arse in a bucket." "I was known for my charm," I croaked. "I was known for my charm and the tapeworm that lived in my large intestine.""We have seen some changes," croaked Tommy. "We have," I croaked, "the first motorcar, the second motorcar and if I'm not mistaken, the third-motorcar."
"Cha-Cha-changes," croaked Tommy, "the like of what I never thought I would see. Aeroplanes, lollies on sticks, open heart surgery and ointment for the pesky piles." "Yes," I croaked, "but not all changes were for the better. Take toilet roll. When toilet roll came in, people stopped reading and became illiterate." "True," croaked Tommy, "But who thought we would ever live to see, Kerry Katona making commercials for Iceland?" "It beats Bannager" I croaked. "It beats Bannager up down and sideways," croaked Tommy. "What's left for us to do?" I croaked, "We have lived through some rare auld times, but what's left for us to-do?" Tommy broke wind, but very-weakly and croaked, "The only thing left for us to do now, is-die." "Well, if that doesn't beat Bannager again!" I croaked ."Only yesterday, or was it five years ago, I scrawled in my diary, "Things to do tomorrow. Get up--with a lot of help, sit on armchair, drool, grunt, sleep, wet myself, drool some more and then-die." "It's a good thing you wrote it down," croaked Tommy, "otherwise we could have been sitting here for all eternity, like two right eejits."
Next morning, after Tommy and I had spent two hours hanging from a tramp's nose, pretending to be snotters, I skipped down Belfast dressed as, a zebra crossing. Its a mistake I won't make again. People walked all over me! I hailed a taxi to take me to a corner. As I walked round the corner, who did I meet but dapper little Mark Carruthers, he of the red socks, don't you know and all that malarkey. "Greetings little Marcus," I yelled, "Whence are you off to, perchance to visit your loyal garrisons in Gaul or Galway?""Neither," sniffed the little man who says, "Lets Talk." "If you must know, I am just out for a spot of lunch." "A spot of-lunch?" I yelled, "A big boy like you? Come, come Markus, you need more that a-spot of lunch. You must keep your strength up, to ward off Donna Trainor. "A spot of lunch is no good for a big man like you. You need to get your snout into a good trough of Irish Stew. Get your snout right in there and root about for mince, carrots, spuds and turnips. But you need to get right into it, put your hands in your pockets and sink your visage into a hot, steaming pile of Irish Stew." "The very thought!" sniffed Marcus. "You must be mistaking me for the tubby person, Steven Nolan." "Nolan gets his grub," I yelled,"but you, Marcus, need building up.What you should do, is hang a bucket of Mrs Baxter's Scottish broth around your neck and get right into it. You have to get right into it," I yelled. "Excuse me," said Marcus, "One is in rather a hurry. May I get past? I have a salad waiting for me and I don't want it getting cold. "Oh, so hoity-toity," I sneered. "A salad waiting-no less. You were not so hoity-toity on Monday night, when you were dancing the hokey cokey-ALONE in the corner of Big Bertha's bar and slash house." "That was NOT me!" yelled Marcus. "It was my half brother-Yasmin. We never talk about-him. Mummy said he is a bad boy.. I spread my legs, folded my arms, knitted my brows, clenched my buttocks and roared, "And I suppose it was half brother-Yasmin who cut me dead at the-Vatican?" "It was certainty not me," cried Marcus."I have never laid an expensive shoe at the Vatican. Noel Thompson gets all the good jobs." I ruminated, shook my leg and said-grudgingly, "I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. It may have been the Pope. All I saw were the-red socks.

Rosie Ryan's letters to Gerry Anderson are available for Christmas, Passover and Pancake Tuesday at all Eason shops or from below.
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And to see what Rosie herself is up to, go to...
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OH, Mark never got his salad, Pat Rabbit from the Free State government got there first!
I don't know about you, but I would call that an-incursion!!!