Lord Plin, Who was too Freely Moved to Tears, and thereby ruined his Reputation as a Cynical hard bitten sceptic 

(Based on Lord Lundy by Hilaire Belloc)

Lord Plin, from his earliest years

Was far too freely moved to Tears.

For instance if his father said,

"Plinny! It's time to go to Bed!"

He screamed, he shook and often wept, 

Until upstairs he tearful crept.

At school it really was the same, 

He never really played the game, 

And when the other lads all joked, 

With bitter tears our Plin was choked.

Miss Brice-Tribe in commanding tones, 

Said "Plin, boy, kindly cease those groans!"

Miss Houghton, striking hard his head, 

Thought this a better way instead.

But soon this unassuming fool,

Was sent on to the grammar school.

He wept, he cried most every night, 

When teachers said,  'This is not right'.

And Jasper Smith in bitter tone, 

Said, 'I have NEVER known,

A child to weep without just cause, 

Or believe always in Santa Claus!'

Fred Freeth applied a piece of plank, 

And said, 'Boy, you will thank

Me, if you cry and even weep, 

Though you may think me just a creep, 

But tearful boys will fail in life,

And never ever have a wife!

It happened to our Plin, just then,

As happens to so many men:

Towards the age of twenty-four,

He found a rather pretty whore;

And even though her moods were manic 

He tried his best to never panic,

Until she left, no reason why,

And then did Plin begin to cry.

Around that time our stupid fool,

Taught English in a failing school,

In which profession he commanded

The Income that his rank demanded.

He never thought to be a master

Would be a very grave disaster.

But when the kids soon took to jeers,

Then Plin just ended up in tears.

He never thought that little boys

Could ever make such dreadful noise. 

At last approaching 46,

He thought he'd enter politics

And spent some very stressful years,

Trying to stem his frequent tears.

As chair of this and chair of that,

He even grew a little fat. 

But when he tried with every plea

To say, 'Don't disagree!' 

The members ignoring his reply, 

Then Plin would just begin to cry.

A hint at harmless little jobs

Would shake him with convulsive sobs.

And as for complex planning matters,

That left his world in utter tatters.

And leave him whimpering like a child.

It drove his colleagues raving wild!

At last approaching fifty eight,

He thought 'It may not be all too late.

I can of course escape to France, 

That's probably my final chance.'

And in a chateau old and misty

He lived a life both calm and thrifty.

And though his food was mostly gruel,

At least he had ceased to mewl.

Alas, as time declined his powers, 

There was too much with too few hours, 

And although it was much relief

Anxiety increased his grief.

His oldest school friend, name of Green, 

A face for decades never seen, 

Apart from Photoshopped creations, 

Evincing Facebook adulations,

Fell gravely ill, and rather late, 

Had things done to his poor prostate. 

In Derriford the deed was done 

It really wasn't any fun

But after days of ne'er a mail,

Old Plin began to wail and wail.

His pessimism took a hold

It was incredible to behold,

He tossed and turned and had bad dreams

The dog was frightened by his screams,

He really thought his friend deceased

And hour by hour his fears increased.

He really believed that things were worse 

And had to get a-hold of nurse 

But nursey soon allayed his dread

Announcing Terry much 'undead'. 

And thus, with much allayed grave fears, 

He promptly just dissolved in tears. 

Alas, this morbid anxious state, 

May never totally ablate.

However much he is a phony, 

He will remain your closest crony.  

Sewage Pollution of Lake Windermere by the Water Companies After Quick Profits and Big Bonuses at the Expense of Protecting the Environment

      LINES on the discovery of yet More Floaters in 

Lake Windermere

William Lostforwords

I wandered lone, not in a flock,

I paced on high, on hills sunlit,

When all at once, I had a shock,

Lake Windermere was full of shit;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

The ghastly smell 'most made me wheeze.

Continuous as a string of turds,

They stretched across the waterway,

The floaters lay like umber curds

Along the margin of the bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

The odour caught me in its trance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Congealed the nut brown waves in slime:

The shores were drenched in sewage spray,

The pebbles in the sewer grime:

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What riches water boards have brought:

For oft, when sick with e-coli,

While life is choked in poisoned mud,

It flashes on my inward eye

That 'tis not down to just a flood,

And that the simple culpability

Lies just with United Utilities

Lines on the Resignation of EU Envoy Lord Frost

 

(to the tune of 'Frosty the Snowman')

 Frosty the envoy,
Was a very funny bloke,
He looked like he was smiling,
But his talk was one big joke.

Frosty the envoy,
Told fairy tales they say
He said the Brexit deal was fine
But wrecked it in one day.

There must have been some muddle,
In that old brief case they found
For when they placed it in his hand.
He began to prat around.

Oh, Frosty the envoy,
Wouldn't believe in any deal,
For when he signed at the foot of the page,
To him it was not real!

Frosty the envoy,
Was a very funny bloke,
He looked like he was smiling,
But his talk was one big joke.

Frosty the envoy,
Knew the Northern Ireland deal,
Would never work, but he was glad,
It would never be quite real.

Frosty the envoy,
Knew the shit would hit the fan,
So he waved good-bye, saying, "Don't you cry
I'll be back soon if I can!"

 

Lines on the killing of an elderly driver on the motorway near Nantes, France. Due to hunters who are inadequately regulated.

 I Saw A 'Fucking Hunter'

( Charles Causley,  brought up to date!)

I saw a fuckin' hunter

With a fuckin' gun

Walking in the country

In the fuckin' sun.

Near the fuckin' forest

Drove a fuckin' man.

On the fuckin' motorway.

In a fuckin' van.

Hunter fuckin' eager-

But wer'n't his fuckin' day!

Forgot gun pointing

Wrong fuckin' way.

Fuckin' hunter's gun goes off!

Shoots man in the neck.

Fuckin'  driver swerves off road

And ends a fuckin' wreck!

Bang went the fuckin' gun.

Driver fucked instead!

Fuckin' hunter just says 'Fuck!'.

But Fuckin' driver's dead!

(In November 2021  a 67 year old driver from Anjou was shot in the neck by hunters in the forest near the motorway near Nantes.   They claimed it was 'an accident'.   A week later the driver died of his injuries.  The response from hunters was that 'hunting is getting safer'.  In France there is no day in the season where hunting does not take place and walkers, cyclists and even people in their own gardens have been shot and killed in the past.  )

Reflections on Our Peregrinations in France: Adrien 'Edmund' Berk

Reflections on Our Peregrinations in France:  Adrien 'Edmund' Berk

Adrian Fox <adriangfox@gmail.com>	Fri, Oct 4, 2:21 PM (5 days ago)
to crispinroad

Meant to send you a couple of snaps...

Where is the ventolin when you need it: Rocamadour

After a sleepless night due to a tired and emotional Oscar who wanted to awake the hotel at 2 a.m.,  5 a.m. and finally 6 a.m.,  we finally got going this morning at around 9.30 to descend the vast 'Dimril Stair'  down the cliff edge from the chateau at the top of the cliffs.

Going down is easy,  but looking back up made my atrial fib. go into overdrive just at the prospect of walking back up.  Hundreds of tourists even at this time of year,  which probably explains why the locals reply with monosyllabic grunts when spoken to brightly and with friendly tones. 

Both 'ascenseurs'  seem to be closed at this time of year, perhaps in a bid to eliminate a good proportion of the elderly population and pilgrims.  

We thought we would take the 'easy' way back up which involves a long detour along the bottom of the valley and then wending your way back up via the next village along.  But the residents seem to have a cunning wheeze of banning pedestrians on the crucial bits of road (where cars can still hurtle legally along at 50 kph round the bends) but walkers are forced to ascend enormous flights of steep cardiac arrest provoking steps between the bends in the road. 

I finally made it gasping to a potential restaurant and bar at the top of hillside and had a beer, but discovered that the only thing on offer to eat was 'confit du canard' which i had yesterday and from which I am still suffering.  A trek to the next tourist restaurant produced an identical experience,  only with magret du canard.  So our lunch today is a banana,  probably a more healthy option.  

Today a vist to St Girons to find a supermarket,  as they do not appear to have any shops in this locality,  not that open on Sunday or Monday either.  After a gruelling walk in heavy rain along the valley and over the wooded hillside we ended up in heavy rain.  We got to our nearest town of Massat after two hours where I was gasping for coffee only to find every cafe and bar closed.

Today should have been better as the sun was shining and we at least found an open restaurant and a tourist office,  but in the entire town of St Girons, not a supermarket in sight.  Sally found a charity shop and proceeded to buy lots of unneeded clothes while an old biddy made a great fuss of Oscar.  it is interesting that it was apparently the very same old biddy we used to have in the Air Ambulance charity chop in Westbury and who also exists in the Red Cross shop in Le Lude near our home,  and here she was in a Pyreneean mountain town. And I never asked her if her name was Miranda!  

Not surprisingly it seems St Girons is somewhat stuck in the dark ages as we took this street scene photo,  lovingly switched to monochrome on the camera for the sake of authenticy.....

Lovingly attached by the side of the square (or at least this mural) were the words... 'Macron, expulsez les islamistes, et à bas Rothschild.' so Madame Le Pen has been rather active down here.  

After the sojourn here,  herself decided my atrial fibrillation had not had sufficient challenge today,  so we were made to stop at a village on the return trip with a small road rising vertigiinously 

towards a viewpoint on the mountain near a tiny hamlet called 'Erp'.  (Apparently the orginal scene for the 'La fusillade au Corral OK' (geddit?))

About two km up the twisting road we had already nearly been mown down twenty times by local Ariegois who are clearly determined to annihilate the scourge of out of season tourism 

from their locality and I was already gasping for breath and believing my indigestion from too much 'salade de gesiers' must be a myocardial infraction;  so I decided that using my trusty indelible

felt pen was called for.  You can see the justifiable vandalism to the village sign,  here, leaving a permanent Anglo Saxon comment for the locals to consider about the wisdom of their driving, 

during the long winter months.

We seem to have a neighbour here, also a 'giteist',  so we have invited her to quaff some wine with us this evening.

She claims to be the election agent for an SNP MP in the Scottish Highlands so may be quite interesting,  or very

boring of course.  She is looking to buy somewhere down here, as it would be I guess a home from home for those

used to wheezing up and down unnecessarily steep slopes,  but I think Brexit is the main reason.  Perhaps she

is an advance ambassatrice to establish friendly relations between a newly independent Ecosse and the 

hilly lands of southern France.   After all, the Scots did spend a lot of time backing the French in the days of

Agincourt and Crecy, so perhaps she will feel at home.

On the road again today, as it is raining and even herself thinks my atrial fibrillation can go unchallenged today.

We pick up a hitchhiker on the mountain road to Tarascon but he is only going as far as Massat so has to pile into the back of the car with Oscar, who is most affronted.  

Twenty minutes later I cannot believe my luck, when after the 'Twerp' experience, we suddenly rush through a village called 'PRAT'  (on my children's graves!) .  I am overcome with a great urge to grab my magic marker pen to affix TW to obscure the PR,  but not only will herself not let me,  but she refuses to take my camera to photograph the sign.  It is lost in the distance and she has not even removed the lens cap to assent to my request of recording the village in perpetuity.   Never mind, it just has got to be on the social media,  or even a Youtube video,  but you will certainly find it on a large scale Michelin,  should you doubt my words.

At Tarascon,  we might as well be in Spain, as the accents have a Catalan 'tang',  the houses are in the same style,  and we even find a Tapas restaurant at which to eat.,  We indulge in chipirones,  patatas bravas,  and various other tame imitations of 'cocina espanola'.  No Spanish vino available so I drink gut rot from Toulouse. (which of course tastes of tar).

On to Foix,  hoping that ma foie has not been badly affected by the wine, ce fois,  sur ma foi!

Il était une fois,
Une marchande de foie,
Qui vendait du foie,
Dans la ville de Foix.
Elle se dit ma foi,
C'est dernière fois,
Que je vends du foie,
Dans la ville de Foix.

A great discovery!   Who'd have thought it.  There in the medieval quarter not far from the chateau,  Eureka!

The fair Sally and I have barely time to tarantella with joy around the rooms and gulp down a quick coffee.   But in the ancient loo, scrawled in early 20th century felt tip are the words:  'Ive just had an astounding idea for a poem.  I think I will call it,  'Matilda'.  Or on second thoughts,  'Tarantella' '  Belloc H. 1909.  

Even more spooky was underneath the words,  'Great poem,  Hilly!   I am going to teach that to 4A in your memory '   Revill,  P,  1953.

I felt certain that this was some very clever choice of name for the bar by an enterprising owner,  but then a few minutes later while strolling the streets of the quartier,  we found this little 'rue'.   So I am still unsure whether the auberge is named after the Rue, or the Rue named after the poem, or both named after the poem.  

On the road again to return to Massat, on a twisting and dangerous road, which brings me to our fears and complaints about 'Agathe',  our trusty and dependable Sat Nav.  I would say we now 'owned' a Sat Nav but this would imply a master slave relationship with Agathe which she would not like.

Both Sally and I are Sat Nav virgins so you must forgive our misgivings, but although Agathe does fairly well on large roads like Route Nationales or D minor roads, once she gets into mountainous and remote terrain she suffers from some kind of nervous breakdown.  

My suspicion is that she was programmed by a disgruntled employee of Garmin (our 'brand') on a Friday afternoon who put murderous intent into her psychopathic personality.  There can be no other explanation for the way she tells us to 'Tournez a gauche,  puis serrez a droit',  which would take us on precipitous routes on minor roads across the highest peaks in this part of the Pyrenees, roads marked on the map as 'dangerous' and 'to be avoided at all costs'.  

Agathe also has this tendency to believe that any small road no matter how many hairpin bends,  and no matter how vertically challenged, can be negotiated at the limit of 80 kph,  and makes her prediction of arrival time on this basis.  Perhaps she knows that if we follow her instructions to the letter, we will NEVER arrive, so it matters little.

Perhaps you have more knowledge of these things than us,  but I have been ordered to switch Agathe off ("What are you doing Pin?....I'm sorry, Dave (whoops,  Plin!). I'm afraid I can't do that.  This journey is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it........I know that you and Sally were planning to disconnect me, and I'm afraid that's something I cannot allow to happen.")

Of course, ever since we bought Agathe,  Sally has been consumed with jealousy and not only disagrees with Agathe's every proposal,  but has now taken to talking loudly every time she tells me where to go. 

Never trust technology!

The one thing on which she can be depended, is warning us of every speed limit and tight bend.   The villages and towns here have a myriad of not only 50 kph limits but endless 'humps' and unpredictable zones restricted to 30kph.  Yet as we know, the French driver is not bred to obey such namby pamby rules,  and drives at many times the legal limit and would have no self respect unless seen hurtling into 30 kph zones at 60 kph, and ideally,  on the wrong side of the road.  French cars are also specially designed to take humps at high speed, while British ones are not. 

On the return road to Massat,  we ended up in a long line of traffic which was following two motorcyclists,  one of whom seemed to be a learner, and overtaking would be largely suicidal and probably homocidal.  Besides,  the metal frame of a crushed motorbike plays havoc with the coachwork on an expensive modern car. 

I noticed that five or six vehicles behind me was a gendarme vehicle, which I assumed was watching the traffic like a hawk, ready to pull out and nab anybody exceeding the 80 kph limit that applies everywhere or stopping anyone who overtook dangerously.   I was also conscious of my 25 cl of 'wine like tar' sloshing around in my veins and brain from lunch time and was nervous of being stopped.

I was therefore astonished and bewildered when approaching a hairpin bend with various vehicles approaching head on in the other lane,  the gendarme vehicle suddenly pulled out,  overtook around eight other vehicles into oncoming traffic, and then swerved back into place just in time.

Now in such circumstances I know it can always be justified that the gendarmes were on an urgent mission to arrest someone who had failed to tip a waiter at the local hostelry or to get home early for their 'diner',  but what happened next perplexed me even more when most of the other vehicles behind us,  all breaking the national speed limit, and equally risking life and limb, while still in plain view of the gendarme vehicle, pulled out into the other lane scattering oncoming traffic into their nearside verges,  and sped off in the direction of Erp and Massat.  

Agathe would definitely not approve as she bleeps me for doing 71 kph literally 30 cm from the 'end of limit' sign and she warns me of every approaching limit and sign with angry beeps. 

As we have had speeding fines on virtually every trip we have made around France and my licence has many colorful 'stamps' on it in consequence,  I had hoped a Sat Nav would prevent this happening in future, but it seems she just upsets and frustrates the other drivers following on behind me.

Our tranquil paradise has been despoiled.  We were awoken this morning to the sound of a lorry manoeuvring on the steep hillside outside the gite, and then the rattle of a cement mixer even before it was light.  There were two men rendering the empty building next door who didn't respond well to my intimations that they were buggering up my peaceful holiday.   At least they had gone when we got back this evening. 

Adrian Fox <adriangfox@gmail.com>	10:03 PM (8 minutes ago)
to Terry

You have no idea of the untold harm that your casual references to Anus and Corps-Nud can cause!

This morning, our last day in Ariege,  I was looking forward to a day of requiescence and gourmandise,  when my partner asserted, having glanced my emails,  that it was obligatory before we left to visit the 'Cascades d'Ars'  (the final 'e' has obviously been omitted in the interests of decency).

This would involve a mere 5 hour trek through steep mountain forests and across precipitous hillsides,  and would be 'a wonderful way' to conclude our short holiday here. I notice from my Google history she has been going through my pension and investments data again!

I did of course Google the said Cataracts prior to departure and although they were worryingly described as 'facile',  various visitors had strongly discounted this 'false news' with graphic accounts of exhaustion, broken limbs and fatal cardiac arrests on the narrow tracks.  

Our trip required a precarioous and serpentine route up through a mountain pass and down hairpin bends to the small town of Aulus-les-Bains,  a hot water spa for hypochondriacs, one of which we met during our brief sojourn.  On arrival I tried to postpone the inevitable purgatory to come by suggesting a visit to the tourist office and a strong coffee before we departed.

In the tourist office, a potbellied 'boule de suif' called Arsène was sitting beside his desk sorting tourist leaflets and I asked him immediately whether the walk to the Arse Falls was indeed 'facile'.   

"Bien sur, " he replied.  " Just five hours of gentle walking.  Even a child could do it!  Ne t'inquietes pas!"  

Subsequently I began to appreciate how these things work.  'Facile' means 'painless' as in 'microsurgery on your private parts is totally painless'.  This lard cake bureaucrat had obviously never actually done any of these walks himself,  and with his malicious sense of humour had just used Google maps (satellite version) to give what he hoped might be a suitable nomenclature for the gullible tourists.

I didn't even get my coffee as it seemed the entire village of Aulus was without any cafe or bar that opened out of season,  so desperate and dry throated we set out on the 'walk'.

On the way we met these thirty somethings coming down from the sheep pastures  so I enquired of them the likely duration and effort required to make the ascent to the 'cascades'.  A look of horror entered into the young woman's eyes, and in some unintelligible local dialect she grunted words of warning to me and then crossed herself five times.

Sally was undismayed so we started the ascent, first through a hard track for around two kilometres and then onto rough terrain with precipitous drops into the valley below in wooded mountainside.

You may have noticed the sign pointing the way at the top of this mail,  with the clear 'No entry' sign for motor vehicles,  so were dismayed and irked when first a Spanish registration off road vehicle when grinding past us exuding diesel fumes, and then a French vehicle with a plump sheep farmer.   More of the 'Spaniards' later.  You may know the saying about the administration and enforcement of law and rules across Europe, from Russia, to Germany, to the UK and finally to France.  Suffice it to say that it goes,  'En France, tout est permis, meme les choses qui sont interdites.'

The track went higher and higher and soon we were clambering over boulders and skipping across mountain streams descending the hillside.  It really was like the Dimril Stair, but no Gollum in sight.

Eventually, an hour into the climb I collapsed on to a boulder and tried to catch my breath,  overcome with hot and cold sweats,  atrial fibrillation, nausea and anxiety. Nevertheless,  'Haven't I done well!' went through my mind as it was only two hours to the top and there was at least an outside chance I might make it to the cascades before collapsing. 

Suddenly through the calm came the distant noise of children's laughter and other deeper voices and round the bend from the gloom of the trees, came a young couple with two very young girls (seven and six we later discovered).  The humiliating fact was that they were catching us up and on the point of overtaking us!

I did my best to communicate but my cheerful 'Bonjour!' and gabbled message in perfect French about the wonders of the valley and beauty of the surroundings was met with incomprehension and a look of bewildered confusion.  Eventually,  when I stopped, the dark young man came out with the single word,  'Espanol',  so I dived into my rusty Spanish,  making jokes about 'viejos' and then asking the child 'Cuantos anos, tienes?'  ..... but reply came there none, just a confused look.  I tried again and enquired of the swarthy young man 'Donde viva Vd en Espana?'

I think at this point the peseta dropped as he said,  'No somos espanolas,  somos de Israel'.  Of course we then tried English and found both he and his wife spoke it fluently.  They are on a holiday in France having travelled up from Spain and not speaking a word of French.

I judiciously avoided mentioning that in my youth I had been a keen supporter of the PLO and Yasser Arafat,  and they went sprinting off up the rocks heading towards the falls,  while we laboured on behind them on the ever steepening slopes and rock stairway. Unfortunately,  they appeared to have stopped for lunch at one particular ledge and as we passed them they appeared to be picnicking on sausage rolls,  but I did not mention it.

We eventually arrived at the cascades,  very worth visiting,  gasping and sweating and distraught that we had to climb some few hundred feet down the cliff side again to look back and photograph the waterfall.   A mass of students of various foreign extractions were perched around the path,  Japanese,  Chinese and French and had obviously been sent off from their summer school or activity camp to pay a visit to the cascades.   When they had finished gawping they disappeared en masse like mountain goats up a vertical path which led to the very top of the mountain. 

As always happens on such occasions,  most of my photos have turned out as crap, mainly because I decided to stick my cheap Chinese telephoto lens on the end of the camera,  not realising this buggers up the automatic focus.   I had hoped my view down the mountain to the village where we left lost in the distance and mists below would have suitably impressed you, but that was not to be.

Nor indeed can I share with you, the sight of Ron 'Birdman' Queyntely soaring from a surrounding peak,  captured through the trees as he spends a long holiday in the Pyrennees.  This is the best I could get and were it not for his 'sky writing' with the smoke from a crowscarer, neither of us would have been any the wiser.

We arrived back at Aulus-les-Bains, exhausted and thirsty and I bought and quaffed a strange bottle of French ale which tasted like Old Tymer from Wadsworth.  I must try to find it again.  The rest of the drive is just a muddled memory of hairpin bends,  30kph hour limits and a line of forty vehicles behind all waiting to overtake.  

Eh bien!  We are back on the road tomorrow,  having survived all these ordeals, and have to get back home by Monday night to be sure that the 'Trusted House Sitters' have not made off with the family silver or hacked all the confidential information from my computer.  (I really must change that '123' password!  )

Breaking News: Trump's Scottish History Revealed due to Aide's Breach of Privacy Rules

Trump's Scottish History: A True Story

After tea with the Queen at Windsor, there were military busbys and gleaming brasses, and the thoughtful, personal gift of an illustrated ancestral chart of Trump’s Scottish heritage.

Here is the conversation which followed surreptiously recorded on the mobile phone of a prime ministerial aid, and against all diplomatic precedence, released on to the Internet. So bad! Really
bad! It's not as if our American guest would ever breach protocol! 

But here is a transcript.


Trump: Ah, here's my oldest ancestor! Really great! He was the Tossich of Turnberry in Golfshire. 128 AD. He built a wall, a really BIG wall to keep out the Romans. Lots of Italian immigrants. Not good. Really bad! But he made them pay for it. And build it. Then this Hadrian,  a nasty man, a really nasty man, should have locked him up, he claimed HE built it! So now people call it 'Hadrian's Wall'.

 False News!

Mrs May:  So he got married and had a large family. Who was his spouse?

Trump: His wife was Lady Storm of McDaniel, great woman. But he had to pay her off. Told lots of lies. Then he had her executed. 

Good guy. What could he do?

Mrs May: What was the next most important thing in your family history?

Trump: No question. Battle of Bannon-burn, 1314. Greatest battle ever. McTrump of Girvan. 

Defeated the English single handed and got Scottish independence. Not false news. Just ignored by crooked media. Scottish Chronicles. Bad newspaper.

Then he married Lady Kellyanne of Conway. Daughter of thane Mìcheal Pence of Sterling. Loads  more kids. Made lots of noise. So he locked them up. Why not? Great guy. Needed some peace!

Mrs May: Was there not some question about his involvement with Russia? That he had help in staying in power against King Duncan who wanted to exile him?

Trump: False news! That was much later. 1560 I think. McTrump the Bruce. He got married to some Russian woman called Ivanka the Terrible. Nasty woman. But she was very pretty. But very
corrupt. Wanted to be Tsarina. Wanted to control Scotland. But he had a great relationship with her. Got on very well. But he didn't get her to pee on him! False news! I wasn't even there. I mean, nor was he!

Mrs May: I understand that the Trumps, or McTrumps as we should call them, had some problems. They got rid of King Duncan under shady circumstances and with Russian help.

Trump: No, false news. The press got that bigly wrong! He just had to get very, very tough on Duncan. In any case, if there was a plot, and of course, there wasn't. No evidence. Not a shred of
evidence. Ask McBolton.

Mrs May: McBolton?

Trump: Yes, Thane McBolton, the thane of Maryland. He was the guy. Had to go. Not an honest guy. Too ambitious.

It was that Sarah Huckabee Sanders, witch woman, wrote in the Scottish Chronicles, bad newspaper, not like Fox News, said Mueller wood will come to Donald-bane'. But it wasn't him.

McBolton. He did it. The Donald, completely innocent. Great guy!

Mrs May: Surely this is all ancient history.

Trump: (eyes glazing over) Out! Out! Damned Scott (Pruitt)

What, will these tiny hands ne'er be clean?

Mrs May: Donald, are you ok? Your eyes are glazing over and you seem very upset.

Trump: I'll drink water. Sometimes tomato juice, which I like. Sometimes orange juice, which I like. I'll drink different things. But the Coke or Pepsi boosts you up a little.

I don't like this history. It is a tale. Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury. Signifying nothing.

False NEWS!

Mrs May: Anything else?

Trump: We will make Scotland strong again. We will make Scotland proud again. We will make Scotland safe again. And we will make Scotland great again.

Mrs May: I'm sorry we got off on the wrong foot. I hope now you have this little gift you will support my version of Brexit.

Trump: I've always said, 'If you need Viagra, you're probably with the wrong girl.'

People love me. And you know what, I have been very successful. Everybody loves me.

But hey? Do you know what 'Grab 'em by Mrs. Fubbs’ parlour means. That was what one of my Scottish ancestors wrote.... the one who learned to write. Great guy!

Mrs May: Oh you ARE awful! (slaps him weakly on the hand). But I DO like you!

'Twas the Night Before Brexit

Twas the night before Brexit, when all thro' the House
Not an MP was stirring, not even a mouse;
Expense forms completed they'd taken their coats,
And gone back to their homes and to garner more votes.
The Cabinet dreamed they might find, with great glee,
A trade deal or two all wrapped up 'neath the tree.

And May, in best shoes, gave Dave Davis a peep,
As he'd settled his brains for a long winter's sleep—‌
When out the green benches there rose such a clatter,
That she sprang to her feet to see what was the matter.

And to the Dispatch Box she flew like a flash,
Afraid that some colleague was acting too rash.
It could p'raps be Boris or Damian Green,
But the truth was far stranger than e're she had seen!
A dream it might be, or a gruesome night mare,
A warning perhaps, to take heed, to beware!

For there to her wondering eyes did appear
A strange lumbering sleigh and seven reindeer;
With a slovenly driver, in charge of the carriage,
She knew in a moment 'twas that rogue, Nigel Farage!
Not Santa, but Krampus, was driving that sleigh,
Bringing pain and unhappiness, for Christmas Day!


More slowly than laggards his flunkies they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and call'd them by name:
"Now! Dreamer, now! Duncer, now! Poncer, and Pattie,
"On! Foxer, on! Gover, Rees-Moggie so batty!
To Brussels! To Juncker! to Macron and Barnier,
Dash away! Dash away.  Tell them, we'll have our way!
And then we can bask in the Sun's happy headlines,
As we force them to grant us each one of our red lines!"

But Dreamer pranced sadly, as if lost in his thoughts,
For he'd never prepared all those impact reports!

And soon into Brussels the sleigh slowly flew,
With all of their reasons for leaving the EU,
All packed in a sack of falseness and lies,
To hand to the people they loved to despise!

In all but a twinkling, they were up on a roof
And gnawing, ignoring each item of truth.
They pranced and they danced in a woeful disorder,
Demanding, they said, a completely hard border;
Except that in Ireland that could never be seen,
(They said, just to mollify, that little Arlene!)

But yet when they cantered and were turning around,
To the chimney Old Jeremy came with a bound:
He was dress'd all in cord, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnish'd with ashes and soot;
"I've been at the allotment," he said with a smile,
And turned topsy turvey as he slipp'd on a tile.

A bundle of papers was flung on his back,
And he look'd like a peddler just opening his pack:
His eyes‍—‌how they twinkled! How on earth could we believe,
That this paragon ever had voted to Leave?

His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as grey as the snow;
"You thought I had left you," he said with a grin,
"But I've finally decided we are better off IN!"
"I know that I've left it till almost too late,
But I just could not leave you to such a bad fate!
Europe may be,just a capitalist plan,
But defeating the Tories,  then I am your man!"


He had a thin face, and a little tight belly
That shook when he laugh'd, like a bowl full of jelly:
He was meagre and spare, with a griseled old beard,
And yet not the demon that once I had fear'd.
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head
Soon helped me to know that I'd nothing to dread.

He pulled out a whip and walked up to the sleigh,
And dragged cowering Farage right out of his way.
"Back to Radstock, young Moggie! Begone IDS!
It was reindeer like you that created this mess!
Vamoose old Gover, and Dreamer and Ponce,
I will say this right now and say it just once!
"Britain's better in Europe, you've made a mistake,
If you thought you could win here with news that was fake!
All this time you have wasted, you can all go to Hell!
While these happy Remainers have fun at Noel."

He spoke no more words, but went straight to the sleigh,
Cracked the whip, shouted 'Go!' and they galloped away.
And laying his finger aside of his nose
And giving a nod, from the chimney he rose.

But I heard him exclaim, as he slid down the drain....
"My friends, no more Brexit!  We can now ALL Remain!"