The Magnificient Irish Seven

Great show yesterday kid. A great show which made the wizened denizens of the Betty Boop Old Folks' home form an impromptu conga line. Poor old souls. Age has indeed withered them and the years condemned. Everytime they put their right foot in, they had to have an injection of steroids before they could shake it all about. Poor old dears. Only for the Monday and Wednesday strip poker nights they would have nothing left to live for.
Tommy my cat, adjusted his paisley-patterned cowboy chaps and said, "Did you see them? Did you see Dana lead out the Magnificent Seven in Dublin? They were all there," said Tommy. "Dana, Gay Mitchell, Martin McGuinness and Senator Steven Norris bringing up the rear. Gay Mitchell took off his hat, wiped his brow and said, "I don't like it. It's too doggone quiet out there." No sooner were the words out of his mouth than Martin McGuinness threw back his head and sang, "The Town I Loved So Well."
"That's not fair," screamed Dana, "I'm from Derry too, so I am!"
"Dana darling," gushed Steven Norris, easing himself up on the saddle. "Do us all the exquisite honour, my dear, of singing that little ditty so near to my heart "All Kinds Of Everything."
That was when the Mexicans appeared! It fell to poor Steven Norris to make the mistake of offering the Mexicans-badges! Well, you know what happened next. Why do Mexicans get so angry when they hear the word-badges?
"BADGES??? We don't want your feelthy-badges!"
"I say old chap," began Steven Norris, but Martin McGuinness roared out, "RAWHIDE!!! Head for the hills!"
"Let the Gringos go!" yelled a swarthy Mexican. "Seven rode away, but only one will return".
Then the Mexicans lay over their horses and laughed for 39 minutes. Once upon a time in the West, in the days of John Huston and John Ford, when one Mexican laughed-all Mexicans laughed. Then, along came football and the Mexican laugh, turned into the Mexican wave! Meanwhile, the magnificent Seven are camped at Big Fork, fearing tomorrow will bring, blazing saddles.
You couldn't make it up!!!

Money For Old Rope

Great bald show yesterday kid. All over Ulster, slap-heads broke cover like snipe and poured their hearts out about their lack of thatch.
"At last," cried old, baldy Joe Pate, "I have found closure! No more sticking my head up the chimney when visitors call."
The exuberance of wee Kenny from Larne was beyond description. Wee Kenny pulled off the dry, dusty, ginger wig he had worn for 35 years and ran down the street yelling, "GO TO WORK ON AN EGG!"
All over Tyrone yesterday, old men could be seen lying over gates staring into fields. All hoping that Rhianna might turn up and loosen a button. That's what men do in Tyrone before they have a pee. They loosen a button. Zip on your fly? it makes no difference, you still, "loosen a button."
Tommy my cat knocked an arrow off my head with an apple and said,
"The recession is really beginning to bite. I saw a knife-grinder, a rag and bone man and a thin, pale, workhouse urchin today."
"OAKUM!" I yelled. "The future is, OAKUM!"
"What in the name of Rhianna's simmet is Oakum?" cried Tommy, as he launched a paper aeroplane in the general direction of Iran.
"OAKUM," I said, rolling the word round my mouth like a brandy ball, "Oakum is what you get when you unpick a rope. Oakum is fine hemp, just like human hair. Oakum is a sealant. Mixed with tar, or Chiver's thick-cut marmalade, oakum will seal any ship, pipe, or orifice leaking water."
Tommy mused, ruminated, pondered and said, "The word in the hood is, old Jordie stuffs his Christmas turkey with oakum. He says it keeps the juices in."
"Old Jordie is not as crazy as he looks," I said. "Way back in 1947 old Jordie invented the toothless comb for bald men." I went to the window, broke a pane of glass with my nose and shrieked,
"OAKUM! it's money for old rope!"

Water on The Brain.

Great show yesterday kid. A great show which stopped an angry mob of old codgers from shuffling to the Royal hospital and demanding free catheters.
"Look at our Eli!" croaked an old codger. "His grey, flannel, 28 inch inside leg trousers are saturated beyond redemption." Tommy my cat sat and listened intently as Mr Coyle pulled and yanked at his ear.
"Water on the brain," said Tommy.
"Big red bus!" I yelled. "Mr Coyle's head has turned into a veritable reservoir. Is there NO cure known to man, beast, or insect??" Before Tommy could answer, an old codger took another brick from the wall and yelled, "Stick a catheter up his nose, it did wonders for our Eli!" SO! if you meet a man with two candles hanging from his nose, judge ye not!--it may be Mr Coyle.
I was hunkered down in front of Easons pretending I was very small when the sky darkened, bits of plaster fell from buildings, crows and seagulls took to the air and a hoarse, guttural voice began to roar,
" I am BIG in Tombstone City, I am BIG in Tennessee, I was BIG in Weight Watchers until they got shot of me!"
I leaped to my feet and cried, " Lo, what fat fiend approaches, arrayed in Patrick Moore suit and lavender ankle socks?" A smirk appeared on the vast, barren landscape that was Tubby Nolan's face and the oval one roared,
"Greetings yokel, 'tis I, Tubby Nolan, king of comedy and allround good egg. Riddle me this. What is the difference between Tubby Nolan and the Titanic?"
"I know not good sire," I replied. "What is the difference between the arch knave, Tubby Nolan and the good ship Titanic?"
Tubby tittered, well, it was Patrick Moore's suit and yelled,
The difference between Tubby Nolan and the Titanic is, I KEEP COMING BACK!!!"

Beware Cream Buns And Calpol.

Great shows last week kid.
After the Friday show all the girls who work at the cream bun bakery checked their ovens before they went home for the weekend. A bun in the oven can lead to great agitation and loss of production.
Tommy my cat, not to be confused with the weird, hairy thing that lives under my bed, braced himself, looked at me, boked but did not vomit and made this utterance,
"Little Hugo Duncan had an awful fright last night when he got caught in the cat flap as he returned home from a late night gig."
"Well, I'll be a rhinestone cowboy!" I yelled. "How did they extricate the little warbler from the pussy portal?"
"Stick and carrot," said Tommy. "A family member held a Bounty bar six inches from Hugo's nose, while a neighbour pretended to attack Shorty's rear with a chainsaw."
"Ah the old bounty and chainsaw trick," I said. "Many a miner and pot-holer owe their life to that combination."
Tommy tossed a peanut high in the air, caught it with my mouth and said,
"What a rugged, handsome man Noel Thompson has become. Time, has stripped away all callow youth and left him craggy and worn like an old cartwheel left out in the sun."
"I do so agree," I enthused. "Women of a certain age must sit in front of the TV thinking, "I wouldn't mind a go at that craggy cove."
"And the lovely Donna Trainor," said Tommy, "so beautiful, so elegant, so good at keeping her hands of Noel."
I pulled the curtains, placed a black cloth over the mirror and said,
"Deep sadness lies at the heart of Donna Trainor. At the tender age of six months she won a bonny baby contest, ONLY to see it snatched away again."
"How did that happen?" cried Tommy, biting my nails furiously.
"It came about thus!" I cried. "After winning the bonny baby contest, the gurgling Donna was taken away for a drug test."
"OH NO!" cried Tommy.
"OH YES!" I shrieked. "Full as a kite on extra-strong Calpol, the rosette was torn off her bib and she was banned for life from the bonny baby circuit."
"How sad," cried Tommy, how terribly, terribly sad!"
"There is a bright side," I said. "From that day till this, Calpol has never passed the lips of Donna Trainor."
"BRAVO!" yelled Tommy. "Donna Trainor is a veritable role model for young girls everywhere, just like Kerry Katona!!"

Dana To Stand On What Platform???

Great show yesterday kid. Tommy my cat threw a handful of gravel on the table and yelled,
"I wish to make a statement to the house."
"Resign!" yelled Henry the hoover.
"ORDER!" I roared. "Order in the house!"
"I have been offered and accepted," yelled Tommy, "the post of gopher in Dana's campaign to be the next president of Ireland."
"Too little, too late," chirped Rodger the budgie.
I leaped to my feet and roared, "Would the right honourable cat tell the house on what platform the darling Dana will stand? ORDER! ORDER!" I yelled as Henry and Rodger began to boo, hiss-yes, hiss and cat call.
"They don't want to hear it!" yelled Tommy. "Both honourable members have little, or no regard for free speech."
"RESIGN!" yelled Henry. "Sling your hook!" chirped Rodger.
"In answer to the right honourable ratbag's question," yelled Tommy, "the delightful Dana's policies are, family values, the preservation of the wild mountain hare and sturdy,sensible,flat shoes."
I leaped to my feet and roared, "Where does dainty Dana stand on, all kinds of everything?"
"She's against it!" yelled Tommy. "Dana feels that, all kinds of everything is a charter for low lives, scum bags, hamster lovers and people over the age of 85 living in sheltered accommodation. On the day Dana is elected, she will provide every townland in Ireland with its own Kitty the Hare. SOON! little scuttling women, dressed in black, with shawls over their heads, will leap out from behind fairy trees on dark nights screaming, "Aah! musha-a-lana and Mother McCree!"
The house broke up then for cucumber sandwiches and a spot of grouse shooting.
Tommy sidled up to me and whispered, "HE!!! will be back on Monday. Mr Coyle,the agitator, interrupter and disruptor will be back on black Monday. I had hoped......." whispered Tommy.
"I know!" I hissed, yes! hissed. "I too had hoped that the little sailors from Somalia would have shanghaied old mono eyebrow."
"The word in the hood AND on the grapevine," whispered Tommy, "is the little sailors have-gone."
"BUMMER!" I yelled as the division bell rang to separate the right honourable Catholics from the right honourable Protestants.

A Duel For The Irish Presidency.

Great show yesterday kid.
A great show in which old Jordie proposed, YET AGAIN!, leaving out bowls of beer to make snails and slugs blind drunk. "Is there not enough carnage on the roads Mr Tuft? Do you expect our hardpressed emergency services to rush to the scene of every accident involving a drunk snail, or slug? And who will donate the blood needed Mr Tuft-YOU? I thought not! What I say to you Mr Tuft is, go home, light a good fire and prepare for the fire brigade."
"That settled his hash," said Tommy my cat, sitting at the breakfast table, masticating furiously at a turgid heap of Snap Crackle and Pop. Tommy burped, got up, hit me a massive whack on the head with a silver, Georgian teapot and yelled, "Have YOU had an accident recently? Go to Claims Direct and you could get a nice little packet if you are prepared to lie your head off in the witness box."
I punched Tommy up the gub and cried, "Are you embarrassed by loose false teeth falling into your soup at dinner parties? Then YOU need Mrs Fixit's Farrier kit. Just four nails hammered into your upper and lower mouth will secure your dentures. Guaranteed to bite through steel, glass, plastic, wood and very strong, stubborn cardboard."
While I sat down to fill in a Claims Direct form, Tommy ran to the chemist for a Mrs Fixit's Farrier kit.
Tommy came away from the window where he had been counting ginger-haired winos and said,
"I feel it incumbent on me to reduce by 50% the number of people from Derry running for the Irish presidency."
"WHY???" I yelled to the coat bucket."Why is my little Tommy always two steps ahead of the crowd?"
"I propose a duel," said Tommy, "a paintball duel between Dana and Martin McGuinness, said duel to be held in Croke Park and televised by RTE. The first person hit will withdraw and the winner will go on to the grand final."
The coal bucket looked at me with a, "what a cat!" look on its zinc face.
"Tommy," I said, "could you tell me in minute and graphic detail what the President of Ireland does?"
Tommy picked up the Cairo Chronicle and replied, "Nothing! Zilch! Diddly-Squat!"
I winked at the coal bucket and said,
"Hence the stampede seeking the position!"

Too Much Churning.

Great shows last week kid. Great shows which bewitched Tom Elliott to such an extent, he ran out looking frantically for a catholic funeral he could attend.
But alas, not all were as enamoured with the great shows as uncle Tom. Tommy my cat has some complaints about the Thursday show. "Come on you pesky feline. Tell Gerry to his face why you didn't like the great Thursday show."
"I'm NOT saying I didn't like the Thursday show," said Tommy. "The Thursday show was a fine show. I'm just saying,in my opinion, there was too much talk about churning and churning is just a hop, skip and jump away from the vile, repulsive subject of--lactation."
I did an Ali shuffle in my Ugg boots and cried, "And what pray did lactation ever do to you?"
Tommy blushed bright red and said, "I was sitting in the dentist's waiting room the other day. Across from me sat a woman with a young baby. SUDDENLY! she opened her blouse and began to,---to,--front feed her baby."
"FRONT FEED!" I yelled. "Who are you, Oliver Cromwell or Sean Coyle? The mother was breast feeding her baby.It's quite natural. Even you were breast fed."
"I was not!" yelled Tommy. "Mummy had a big litter of kittens. I was the smallest and there was no teat for me. Only for United dairies I would have died."
"How odd," I mused. "And yet you support Manchester City! But tell me puerile, Puritan pussy, how did the episode with the lady who was breast feeding, or as you would say, front feeding, her baby end?"
"I told her to put them away," said Tommy, "and she bitch-slapped me across the face with them."
"What a boob," I laughed.
"There was more than one," replied the woe-begone feline.
After a lunch of under-cooked mutton,scallions, gooseberries and two sick bags, Tommy marched up and down beating his German swagger against his candy-pink fluffy,bedroom slippers. With a yell of, "Heil Nigel Dodds!" Tommy swung round and said,
"IF, Martin McGuinness is elected President of Ireland, will he turn it into another Cuba?"
"YES!" I yelled." The first thing Marty will do is shore up our hurricane defences by planting millions of palm trees all along the coast line."
"And about time too," said Tommy. "David "the beard" Ford promised to do that, but never got round to it."
"THEN!" I yelled. "Gallagher's factory will work 24/7 and 365 making giant cigars called, Titanics." Tommy ruminated, as cats do in a darkened corner and said,
"And will President Marty wear a drab, olive-green uniform and peaked cap like a petrol pump attendant?"
"Not only that!" I cried. "President Marty will dig silos in and around Cullybaccy and fill them with Russian missiles. Viva la Castro!" I yelled.
"Viva la Castrol!" roared Tommy.
And people say nothing exciting ever happens in boring old Northern Ireland!

Jordie The Constant Countryman.

Great show yesterday kid. A great show which caused an old codger to yank out his diamante studded catheter and proclaim to the world, "PEE AT LAST. PEE AT LAST. THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, PEE AT LAST!"
Tommy my cat hitched up his heavy-duty, industrial knickers and said,
"What an absolute joy to hear the gritty, hard-as-nails voice of old Jordie again! Old Jordie keeps me-grounded. he is a constant, always there when war looms or swallows revolt and fly upside down to show their contempt for mankind."
I spat on two hands that reached inside the broken window and cried, "Old Jordie is a man of the soil. He desires neither gold or silver. Old Jordie is never happier, than sitting atop a steaming midden sipping an early morning cooking sherry."
"Here's to him, who's like him, since the King of Tongo died!" yelled Tommy.
I got down on my knees on the floor to lower my voice and whispered, "Mind you, old Jordie has been under surveillance for over 50 years by the CIA,FBI,MI5,MI6 and the Legion of Mary."
"Why should these dark forces be interested in a simple countryman?" asked Tommy.
I looked all around,blessed myself, muttered, "Allah is good" and replied,
"Old Jordie is unable to recollect where he was on the 22nd of November, 1963."
Tommy's eyes opened wide, his black face turned white and he gasped, "Eeh by gum. Well, I'll go to the foot of our stairs."
"SHIBBOLEH!" I cried. "Jordie Tuft has no alibi for the day President Kennedy was assassinated!"
"CHEROKEE CREEK!" yelled Tommy. "Could old Jordie have been the figure seen on the grassy knoll?"
"The grassy knoll, not at tall!" I yelled. "It is my hunch that on the 22nd of November, 1963, old Jordie was sleeping off a drunken debauch in a disused badger set."
"I agree!" cried Tommy. "It is a well known fact that when the cooking sherry runs out, old Jordie seeks refuge underground with the rabbits, foxes and badgers."
"Conspiracy?" I yelled. "What conspiracy?"
Then, buoyed up by a strange, hysterical exuberance bordering on Bedlam, I stuck my head up the chimney and yodeled for six hours. Everyone who complained to the police said it was Kenny Archer!

Breaking News

Great show yesterday kid. A great show which caused an old codger to stop and think before sticking a wet finger into an electric socket. The old codger pondered, ruminated and considered. Then with a hoarse yell of, "GERONIMO" he rammed a wet digit into the socket and disappeared in a cloud of smoke.
"It's how dad would have wanted to go," said the old codger's 69 year old son Jasper, who teaches belly-dancing twice a week at the local old folks' home.
Don't blame yourself kid. Just remember, life turned him that way.
Tommy my cat, wearing a lovely, off-the-shoulder cassock tripped gaily into the room and sang, "I'm gonna lay down a little burden, down by the riverside."
"Make sure you kick dirt over it when you're finished!" I yelled.
"I always do!" cried Tommy. "Unlike you, I don't pull the chain, laugh and say, "Well, it's the city's problem now."
With Tommy gone I ran at all four walls with my head, seeking any cracks or structural damage. I had some misgivings about wall No 3, so I lowered my head and ran at it time and time again. When I came round I was able to put a little tick for all four walls.
Just before the big hand reached two and the little hand lay on the broad of its back in the clock case, Tommy came running in, cassock flying behind him and shrieked, "Breaking news regarding old fatso, Tubby Nolan!"
"Do tell!" I screamed, while reclining gracefully on a rusty heap of scrap iron. "Well!" said Tommy, crossing both arms under his non-existent bosom, "Her at No 27, who is married to Manuel Garcia, who owns the Chinese restaurant on Rodent Street, was told in confidence by Maggie Hitler, the would be rat catcher, that Steven Nolan turned up at Ryan air with NO luggage and STILL had to pay for excess baggage.
"I warned him!" I yelled. "I told Tubby that Michael O'Leary issued a bulletin stating, "If Tubby Nolan puts on another stone, throw him in the cargo hold."
"Best place for him," said Tommy. "Should a Ryan air jet get into trouble it will be quite easy to jettison Tubby from the cargo hold. This would give the plane sufficient fuel to make a soft landing in Cullybaccy."
Tubby Nolan is eating in the last chance junk food outlet!

Tommy Delivers The News Stories Gerry Might Have Missed.

Welcome back kid. Now we can face the Winter, warm and snug in the heat that radiates from great shows.
Tommy my cat, burdened down by a heavy, granite, stone slab, staggered to his Ikea, flat-pack, gold throne and gasped, "On this stone tablet I have chiseled all the news stories Gerry might have missed while on pilgrimage to India, where, rumour has it,he frolicked and wallowed like an otter in the sacred water of the river Ganges." I looked at Tommy in shock and awe, what a smart little chiseler he was!
"FIRST!" yelled Tommy. "Norn Iron-Nil, have two more defeats proudly tucked under their belt."
"Nigel Worthington must GO!" I yelled. "Make Jackie Fullerton manager. Jackie would play the old, spare man in the box, one, two and you're in formation."
"Second news story!" roared Tommy. "Margaret Richie, in spite of all her shrill denials, has-GONE!"
"YIPPEE!" cried a bug-eyed cricket from a dark, recess in the hearth.
"The big question is," roared Tommy,"Did dear Margaret jump, or was she pushed?"
"PUSHED!" I yelled. "I saw the palm prints of Patsy McGlone on the back of her brilliant, white, cashmere gansy."
"Good on ye Patsy ye boy ye," chirped the cricket.
"Third!" cried Tommy. "Steven Nolan, Christoper Biggins and Chris Moyle are to open a posh, exclusive restaurant in the West end of London called, "THE LARD BUCKET." Tommy laughed and said, "The only restaurant in London to be awarded three Michelin tyres."
"Tee-hee-hee," giggled the cricket in the hearth.
"Fourth news item!" yelled Tommy. "Paddy Doherty, traveller, bare-knuckle fighter and star of, "My big Fat Irish gypsy wedding" beat Kerry Katona and Jedward in the final of, "Celebrity Big Brother."
"A great day for the Irish," I cried, "but would you want either of the three to live next door to you?"
"Hauld on, hauld on!" yelled the cricket. "That remark is out of order. You should be ashamed of yourself, you old rat bag."
I picked up the poker to knock the Buddy Holly out of the cricket, but Tommy stopped me with a yell of, "Item Five! Jordie Tuft, sage, oracle, vintage sherry drinker and son of the soil is considering running for the Presidency of Ireland."
"On what platform will old Jordie stand?" Yelled the cricket and I in close, Everly Brothers harmony.
"Old Jordie will stand on a platform of pallets!" cried Tommy. "A platform of pallets piled high so the people can see his wee feathered hat, muffler round the neck and the safety pin holding the fork of his trousers together."
"A shrewd move," chirped the cricket. "The safety pin will bring in the women's votes"
"Where does old Jordie stand on alternative fuel?" I bellowed.
"On the broad of his back waiting for the Lough Brickland fire brigade!" yelled Tommy. Old Jordie's motto on fuel is, "BURN BABY BURN!"
VIVA LA PRESIDENTE!" cried the cricket.
"Go home and prepare for CHANGE!" yelled Tommy. "Soon old Jordie shall bring all factions together, under the stirring banner of, "UNITED IN DEBT!"
I went to bed then, but Tommy and the cricket stayed up all night discussing old Jordie's campaign strategy.
(OH! I made no mention of Kelly or Coyle, I will leave that to others)