Merry Costumes of a Bathing Nature

Hello my little 1st editions of something exciting!
I am dreading the arrival of my sister Aunt Bench, and her strange and rather calamitous daughter Folly.  The last time Folly stayed, she played with some cotton reels and powerful explosives in the garden and blew her own feet off.  You see why I am vexed. Aunt Bench is no better, still single, she is frustrated at the lack of communication from a certain member of the Toad Sexing Society.  She is moping about with a face like a dropped pie.  I am humbug personified.

So I decided to descend down the track in my new abode to the Temple where there is some sort of local event going on.  A swimming event. Who knew in the rolling beautiful hills of Gloucestershire there was so much myth and magic?

Apparently, the custom in Clapton St. Mandrill is that on Christmas Eve, every eligible belle in the village dons a dreadful brown knitted swimming costume and endeavours to dive into the lake and fish out another contestants husband who is tethered to the lake bed.  Each have a card with a number that correlates to the man underwater.  The curiosity is, this competition is madly popular with women who've struggled to get a divorce.  And all the contestants seem to get on so well. They can't be very good at what they do, as no men were retrieved.  Until that is, by a coroner a few hours later. It is said by locals that the women divers are Witches, and spend time spitting brandy into fires and throwing coffee mate into the flames for that magical puff effect.  I must find out where they drink...

This is the photo of Lord Admiral Butt-McCracken telling the authorities to keep away for their own safety.  The power of these women was so strong that one man, 50 miles away suffered a fit sudden onset laughing death.  Another just cacked himself. One decided to exit his car on the M5 and lie down.  He is now entirely flat.
The moral of this story is clear, never, ever, fuck with a woman in a brown knitted bathing costume.  It may cost you your life, or your bits and bobs.
Right, my cherry pips, I'm off to feed the bats and tuck the toads into bed.  Enjoy Christmas, don't drink too much nettle wine, and go careful on the wattle yeast.

Motor Cars, Grey Hairs and Geese

Good Evening readers of the local events in Trebollocks.

It's been an interesting time, I've been absent for a long sabbatical to follow my passion for healing the sick.  I am now gleeful to announce that I am a fully qualified Leech Putter-Onner and Taker-Offer.  The healing properties of leeches have long fascinated me since I fell in a ditch with a case of cow pox, and came out with a case of whiskey.  I am now Leech Master. With suck marks.

However, all has not been shiny.  As you know, I live in a hedge, with meagre possessions.  A bloody modern motor car flew through the shrubbery on a Sunday evening, just as I was dishing up nettled toad. I have to had to move out into a rented abode for the duration of the works. Since there is no estate agent criteria for a single, warted woman with toads, bats, a plethora of woodlice and a small buggered hedgehog named Clive, I put my magic to work and asked the great bearded Goddess of the Covered Chin to come to my aid.  She came up trumps.

I am now residing in a mansion - and I have geese.

Geese

Geese

You don't need Police

Gobby long necks

And beaks and no peace.

Web footed gobshites with beadiest eyes

Patrolling the courtyards in farmyard guise.

Geese 

Geese

Will the noise ever cease?

In a word....no

So, there's my poem.  But on a lighter note, the woman at the local W.I., who didn't like my version of hedgerow bakewell tart (bitch, may she be wrapped in custard) has fallen from a height of 50ft while putting the fairy on the village tree.  The Christmas switch on has never drawn such a crowd...after.  

I must leave you now, Aunt Bench has been on the yoghurt pot phone, she's fallen out with Aunt Girda after a particularly agressive gin-fuelled game of Snap.  So that means I have Folly staying with me for Christmas.  Lord help me. 

Toodle Pip

New On The Family Tree - Great Aunt Cloaca

Dear All,

I do hope this winter weather is in keeping with your idea of a fresh outlook each day and a lack of toes.  Splendid.  I have some exciting news, Captain Pilchard has been tracing the family tree and he's come up with two new people.  Great Aunt Cloaca and Great Uncle Chigger.  It all came about as CP was crime fighting near the Public Records Office, and decided to take a tea break in there.  At first it didn't go well.  Walking up to the first woman he saw, he said 'Put the kettle on, bitch and get me an egg banjo.'  She wasn't pleased, but seemed to calm down after he slapped her a few times.  

Anyway, while rummaging through a few files he found the direct line of the Trebollocks family, which unfortunately ends with poor Folly - who is as mad as a shit house rat.  But nevertheless, the family mystery of Uncle Colobus' parentage is now solved.  

His mother gave him up for adoption on the discovery that he had three buttocks, and she and her husband sailed away to Ecclefechan on a slack tide.  Her name was Cloaca.  And the man she married was called Chigger.  Neither of them were pretty, although in a femininity contest I still think he had the slight edge on her somehow.

They met at a Tortoise Lovers Anonymous gathering in East Grundy.  It was all very clandestine, which was part of the appeal.  No-one knew where the meetings were held, as the tortoise obsession back then came with a heavy prison sentence.  But on the paperwork it said 2a Flange Street, Lumpton, East Grundy, apparently they still meet there.  

The romance was slow to get going, but once together they quickly married.  They had to, she became trapped in his beard and couldn't afford the medical bill to be removed.  He simply trimmed around her for a while until she fell out, by which time he'd become quite attached to her.  

A year later she was expecting, and not very happy.  The imminent arrival of a sprog meant she'd have to give up the one man band outfit that supported them both through hard times.  The bells weren't good for swollen ankles.  So Great Uncle Chigger was left to do the honourable thing.  He thought of the quickest way to earn a fast penny, and did it.  

At the very moment he was thinking this, a man went past him on his left with a case full of money, and on his  right, an old smelly lady with a large haddock.  He seized the haddock, thwacked the old lady (he didn't want her interfering with his plans), then turned on the man with the money and socked him one around the mush.  It seems it wasn't his day, the money in the case wasn't real, neither was the haddock.  He'd wandered onto an early Victorian set of The Bill.  A policeman arrested him and read him his rights, the old lady hit him with the haddock, and the man with the suitcase hid in it.  Nothing happened as Great Uncle Chigger realised that the policeman was an actor and not the real fuzz, so he gave him a flat bugle and buggered off sharpish. 

That was the last that was seen of him.  

As for Great Aunt Cloaca, the birth was traumatic as she was missing her hairy husband.  It wasn't helped by the fact that next door there was a military enthusiast who set off canons by the hour, one of which penetrated the wall to her bedroom.  At that moment, the baby shot out, hitting the mirror on the dressing table and skidding off.  It was this impact that caused the condition that led to his adoption.  The third buttock.  Great Aunt Cloaca couldn't have a child with a weird arse, so she left to look for Great Uncle Chigger.  According to eyewitnesses, she found him in Leeds, posing as a man on the run from the fake police.  They boarded the first steamer to Ecclefechan and lived a life of luxury, while poor Colobus was left to cope with this three buttocks, with only the help of the Home For Orphaned, Weird, Nut-Nut, Clubfoots and Deviants, naturally situated in Temple Cloud.

So there you have it.  Another family mystery solved.  His next mission is to try and discover why Aunt Mary Jaffa is terrified of satsumas?  What's lurking in her past??

Until next time, my little swim bladders...bye and that. 

Banish Anger & Hormonal Imbalance With Archery

Now, this week has been interesting - visiting the College, we've had a team of archers who are demonstrating the use of a bow and arrow in anger management.  Thankfully, the College paid to have them accommodated as there isn't enough room in my hedge for them all, and I've only just buried the magician so I didn't want to tempt fate.  I don't have space for any other problematic folk.

 

And so it came that the Arrow Loosing Ladies in Support of Menopause and Hysteria arrived to help us all with anger.  Some of the women were rather hoity toity, but most of them had beards so I fitted in nicely.  The Aunts decided to make a family day of it, much to my dismay.  Aunt Mary Jaffa (the one terrified of satsumas) turned up with Aunt Bench, who'd had another traumatic week.  Apparently, Folly had decided to make a scale version of a WW2 canon, and set it off in the garden.  It flattened two of next doors geese.  Aunt Vom also managed to wangle her way into the group, although they discouraged her from using the throwing stars and made her leave her mace in the motor car.

We set to practice in a large field, and learned some basic skills for the first half hour.  Aunt Mary Jaffa became rather scared and ran into a Victorian outbuilding to hide.  She then realised it was an orangery, at which point she cacked herself.  The picture above shows her being coaxed out of some shrubbery in a village three miles away.  I shot the target, which I was thrilled with, and Aunt Vom shot a Welshman in the thigh (Mr Gwilym Jones shown below after physio).  It angered her as she'd not got time to get used to the bow properly, but after another session she scored a bullseye. Sadly, Mr Ioan Llewellyn died.  The arrival of the police, however, meant she missed the second half of the day.  

 One odd thing was an instructor called Professor Incubus Fletch.  We didn't take to him at all.  His methods of instructing ladies in archery left a great deal to be desired.  He seemed to have a fetish for armpits and decided the best way to learn was to cup the armpits of the student while taking aim.  The fact that he had ladies clothing on was also a worry, he offered to tell us his life story but luckily the young lady, in the picture below, chinned him before he started speaking.   He began to come round after a few minutes, so I gave him a thwack with a plank of wood just to make sure.  

Chinnings, arrests, assault and deaths aside, it was a really lovely day.  The best thing was, none of us were harbouring any anger by the time we had buns and tea.  Aunt Vom, during her single phone call, told me since the incident with the Welshmen, her PMT hadn't bothered her a jot and she sounded in high spirits.  I was feeling calmer than I had done in months, no amount of shrieking had such a soothing effect as archery.   Aunt Bench said her frustrations with Folly were calmed after the groundsman asked her to stop singing so loudly.  It appears Aunt Vom had passed the throwing stars to her when no-one was looking. We've now nicknamed the groundsman 'Spike'.

I can safely say that archery soothes the soul and banishes anger.  Never before have a group of hormonally challenged Ladies been out for the day and known such peace and ultimate fulfilment.  The only problem is, where to get the supply of targets for next time.....I might be writing invites for the Traffic Wardens Social Club.

The Great Grundomanci's Visit

Wintry Greetings, my little Sockettes.  I had the great pleasure of some of you getting in touch via facebook to ask where I've been.  I was very touched, to the point where my triple chin wobbled considerably.  Well, it's been a busy month for me.  Since Yuletide, I've bailed Aunt Vom out of prison twice following an incident with a sharp garden cane and a man asking £4 for a kilo of bird food, and an acupuncturist.  I don't know what the problem there was, and didn't ask.  

Then, just as I had the toads settled and the snow cloth over my hedge, The Royal Weasel phoned and said they had a visiting magician staying and were full up.  Knowing my excellent home comforts, they wanted to know if I'd put him up for a week or so.  I spoke with his agent and informed him politely that if he tried sawing me in half I'd give him a flat bugle and that was understood.  

So The Great Grundomanci came.  He flapped in with a massive cloak, which upset the toads and spiders, but apart from that seemed quite amiable.  The worrying thing was, he had my room, which meant I slept in a box I'd found in the outer hedge.  It was very pretty, with stars on it.  So imagine my dismay when only my bottom half got up to make him porridge in the morning.

Then things went from bad to worse.  Aunt Vom came to stay after a load of hooky kitchen stuff was found in her garage, and she took a dislike to all things magical.  This is the result:

Funny things, magicians.

You have to be on guard.

They have such funny habits,

To spot them all is hard.

No deck of cards was safe,

They find what you have chosen,

Then turn a set of tuning forks

Into finest laderhosen.

Aunt Vom was well pissed off

He took her blunderbuss.

He poked in a tight held hand

And produced an outsize truss.

The neighbours we not pleased also,

He borrowed two white geese.

When they returned much later, 

They were wilderbeest.

He did some tricks with moody coins,

My head he tried to sever,

He hypnotised dear Folly,

And I fear now she is clever.

He cured Aunt Mary Jaffa,

Of her phobia of satsumas,

But she's woken up today with warts

And an affinity with pumas.

So Aunt Vom is back in the nick,

In two different cells.

She upset the magician,

So he cut her in half as well.

But the toads and I are fine,

And my hedge is now snow-free.

And, to boot, my chinnigan hair

Is thick as thick can be.

I feel much more attractive,

And went to sieze the day.

He is so bloody handsome,

But he failed to think my way.

Was it my straw extensions?

Or stubbly cheeks and brow?

Or could it be the necklace

I wear, of excrement of cow?

You may turn cloth to fire, But -

You've done it, Daddio,

Which is why I have your cards and tricks,

Cos you're under my patio.

Mwahahahaha!

Seriously, the warning that comes with this, is never bury a magician under your patio.  He popped up a week later and went 'Ta Daaaa!' and got crabby when I didn't clap.  I do hope you're all happy and well.  If you find that you're hibernating more than usual, or your skin is exra dry, or perhaps you've gone off lettuce, please get in touch with these lovely people http://www.tortoiseclub.org/contactus.php.

Sorry, I couldn't think of another way to include tortoisy things.  Blessings of impetigo and bath plugs.

Mary Cowbag-Thing and The Unmentionable Word

I've been considering the core of the world's ills this week and I think I have come to the conclusion that there is one word responsible for every blunder, cover-up, scandal, disaster and crisis. It is a special word that I have had the misfortune to be associated with for almost two years. You see, it is also the cause of male pattern baldness, grey/white hairs (wherever they may be...), nervous tics, punching people, shouting and swearing, excessive pointing and eventual lunacy. This is the first time I've posted since freeing myself of this abhorrent condition.

Look at the woman in the picture on the left. Her name is Mary Cowbag-Thing. She is on a committee, you can see by the way that she is clearly farting about when there is plenty behind her that needs doing. She is looking at the camera and basking in the attention, whilst leaving others to pick up her slack. She will have more cups of tea that others, and talk piffle to appear knowledgable. Her bland clothing hides a danger most horrid.

This is a very good friend of mine who is suffering the devastating effects inflicted by Mary Cowbag-Thing and her kind. Unfortunately, my friend looks like this all the time. We cannot tell which way round she is any more. It's tragic. This all came about from the sheer strain of having to organize the tasks around Mary Cowbag-Thing. Communication is when this horrific kind of symptom is inflicted, and there is no known cure.

The grey hair is excessive here, due to overstimulation of the area of the brain that copes with futility and frustration. The only way this woman could have saved herself was by employing the aid of a cudgel. However, with Aunt Vom in the nick again, no-one heard her cry for help. Bless her - she is in all our prayers.

I will not write the appalling word out in it's entirety, but so that you may guard against this peril, I have made a vertical acronym to soften the blow. Even so, be careful and keep a darkened room and a cool flannel nearby.

Cultivators

Of

Mournfully

Meagre

Intelligence

Throw

Together

Empty

Excuses

Numpties, Arseholes and Dickheads

In Trebollocks this week it's National Numpty Day, and we're invited to vent our spleen on the issue in the form of poetry, creative dance and abstract music. Well, my dancing days are over, as most of me is wooden, and the tortoise hates music, but I'm a dab hand with a quill. This is dedicated to any annoying people you may know, or who may have affected you lately. Feel free to copy and paste this simple, moving poem. Yes, copy and paste it, paste it on someone's front door after they've got up your nose, or better still on their forehead.

It's an awareness week of helping those people who continually talk utter bollocks and get on your tits to really recognise their full potential and leave you alone. Join in, and really let someone know you'd like to hit them with a frying pan today. Because you're worth it.....

Whether you're whingeing or moaning or what,

It really doesn't matter to me, no, not a jot.

Just pass me your nicest most favourite cup

And I'll make you a hot brew of Shut The F**k Up!!'