Mouth Music and Porridge

Great show to start the week Kid. As Frankie from Hoboken might say,
"A Summer wind came blowing in

From across the sea.

It lingered there and touched your hair

And groped your knee."

Ah, old blue eyes. No one can phrase, interpret or put over a song like good old Frankie.

How proud Omagh must be of Frankie McBride and the Polka Dots.

"Let's hear it for the Polka Dots ladies and gentlemen. And I mean that most sincerely."

I looked at Tommy my cat as he hung from the ceiling by a thread. He was pretending to be the peace and justice bill. Tommy looked down at me. I looked up at him. Our eyes met and Tommy said, "Only Gerry would finish a show with a girl singing through a snorkel."

"That was mouth music from the bonny wee isle of Skye," I said. "The inhabitants of Skye, and-aye, there are a few, made their living by spinning wool. But they found to their dismay, aye and chagrin, that it was nigh impossible to play a ukulele while spinning wool, so they invented mouth music."

"Good for them," said Tommy. "It's good to know that the massive government subsidy that goes on porridge is not wasted."

I wiped the sarcastic look from Tommy face with a floor cloth and then washed the floor cloth under a running tap-dancer.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door.

"DOOR ALERT!" yelled Tommy, putting on a gas-mask and slipping into a frogman's suit.

I stuffed an Iranian hand-grenade in the pocket of my knickers and skipped to open the door.

It was little Frank Mitchell. Oh he did look clean, neat and tidy.

"Tommy!" I yelled. "Come and see little Frank Mitchell. Don't he look clean, neat and tidy?"

Tommy came to the door and cried, "Oh Frank, how clean, neat and tidy you look!"

Little Frank came in and sat on the sofa, giving us an inkling as to the purpose of the big piece of furniture.

Frank, still looking, clean, neat and tidy, took out a pen and clipboard and said, "This won't take a minute. Could the both of you tell me ten things you like about me?"

Six weeks later, Frank still sat there, pen poised as Tommy and I scratched our heads. But a terrible change had come over little Frank.

No more was he clean, neat and tidy.

After six weeks, his hair had sprouted up like a hedgehog. Little Frank's hair hung over his eyes and ears. A full beard had appeared on little Frank's face, giving Frank the appearance, of a hobo hanging round a water tank, waiting for a train.

"How many reasons have we given so far?" I croaked.

"One," croaked Frank.

"What is it?" I said.

"The one about how clean, neat and tidy I am," croaked Frank.

"Stall the wedding!" yelled Tommy.

"Score that out, because you're anything but clean, neat and tidy NIGH!"

"Listen Frank," I said, "thinking up ten reasons why we like you is going to take awhile. Could you call back, say in five years time?"

When Frank hit the street, he was immediately arrested for vagrancy by Matt Baggott.

"Chief Constable," yelled Frank, "It's me-wee Frank Mitchell!"

"Listen chummy," roared Baggott, "I may not have been in Ulster very long, but one thing I do know, Frank Mitchell is always clean, neat and tidy."

I mean, you couldn't make it up!.