Category: Razzamatazz

23^rd December 2006    

Once upon a time when the world was a more innocent place and people were less devious, before the days of New Labour and Tone and his crones, Christmas carol singers would start to sing their carols outside your door then after a few lines (of the carol, not cocaine, these were innocent times remember) one of them would ring your bell. You then had a choice – either to answer the door to them, listen to their merry carolling, then give them a Christmas box and perhaps invite them in for mince pies and sherry, or, much more likely, pretend you weren’t in, thus saving yourself a few bob.

Nowadays this isn’t possible. Nowadays carollers, wise to the fact that you’ll probably try to pretend you aren’t in thus saving yourself a few bob, ring your doorbell and wait until you answer the door before they start singing, thus putting you in the position of having to give them a Christmas box or trundle out some excuse about not having any change and consequently having your front door kicked in or your doorstep shat on or your garden gnome beheaded or some other such act of wilful reprisal.

I have put in some thought over the past twelve months as to how I might overcome this problem and at the eleventh hour – well it was around three-o-clock yesterday afternoon actually, but that doesn’t sound as exciting – I came up with the answer.
The doorbell rang right in the middle of Coronation Street when Jamie was entreating his mother to hightail it to Spain with him. I hightailed it to the door leaving him to it. I opened the door. Four carol singers were without, although not without those Santa Claus hats beloved of bus drivers and football fans at this time of the year. I opened my mouth and began to sing in a lusty baritone – (The lusty baritone turned to me and said ‘Oy, do you mind not singing up my arse’ – no he didn’t, I just thought of that and couldn’t resist putting it in. I should have.) I opened my mouth and began to sing in a lusty baritone –

Good King Wenceslas looked out

On the feast of Stephen

When the snow lay round about

Deep and crisp and even

I sang the carol all the way through. Two of the carol singers looked at me throughout in something approaching awe. The other two eyed me as though they were looking at someone who should be in a rubber room at the happy farm.

I ended the carol and then held out my hand. Either going along with the flow or shit scared that I might attack him if he did otherwise, one of the ones who thought I was mad put his hand in his pocket, produced some coins and gave them to me. I thanked him, wished he and his friends a very Merry Christmas, closed the door on them and returned to the living room. Jamie was still trying to persuade his mother to go to Spain with him. Ignore this if you have already read it. My books Dear Air 2000 and Football Crazy are now in print. They are priced at £8.99 each and are available from Amazon, but readers of my blog can buy them direct from me for £7.50 including p & p. Just send me a cheque and I will send the book/books by return. My address is – 

Terry Ravenscroft
19 Ventura Court
New Mills
High Peak
SK22 4LL

Dear Air 2000   

Football Crazy

 

 

 

22^nd December 2006

I told Atkins Down The Road about our apartment in Turkey and mentioned that once we’ve taken possession of it at the end of October 2007 he and Mrs Atkins Down The Road will be welcome to stay with us whenever they likle.

His reply was immediate and without ceremony at all. “No thanks.”

There was something wrong here. In Atkins we are talking about a man who is as likely to turn down a freebie as Cherie Blair on speed. I asked him why.

His lip didn’t exactly curl but it might well have done from the tone of his voice. “Turkey?”

“What’s wrong with Turkey?”

“You’ll do well to last a month without having your throat cut. You wouldn’t get me within a thousand miles of the place.”

“This is Altinkum we’re talking about,” I said. “A holiday resort on the Aegean coast. Not downtown Istanbul after Galatasaray have just lost at home to Millwall.”

“Altinkum, Istanbul, they’re Turks, and they’re all tarred with the same brush, Turks. Only the amount of tar is different. Vagabonds, murderers, the lot of them; they can’t help themselves, it’s in their blood, it’s the hot weather.”

I was prepared to say more fool you to him then let the matter drop when an idea came to me that if acted upon would test to the full Atkins’ resolve to keep Turkey off his list of desirable holiday destinations. I acted upon it. “Even if what you say is true it’s a risk I’m prepared to take,” I said.  Then I paused for effect before continuing, “If only to sample that sea bass again.”

Atkins’ ears pricked up at once. “Sea bass?”

Those of you who have heard me speak of Atkins Down Then Road before might recollect that he is such a lover of duck that if he is eating out and someone in the company orders duck then Atkins has to order it too as he can not bear to see other people eating duck if he himself is not eating it. Sea bass is it’s Piscean equivalent; in fact if anything he likes sea bass even more than he does duck.

“While I was over there I had the most marvellous sea bass I’ve ever tasted, fresh out of the sea that day,” I said. “Hanging over the edges of the plate it was, must have weighed a pound and a half at least. It cost me £7, including chips and all the trimmings. In this country you couldn’t buy a sea bass of that size for twice the price from a fishmonger, let alone have it cooked and served up to you in a restaurant that also served up perfectly acceptable wine for two quid a bottle.”

He thought about it for all of a second. “October you say?”

“We take possession on the 31^st of October.”

“Put me down for early November,” he said.

“How are you going to eat sea bass if your throat’s been cut?” I asked.

He thought about it for a moment then said, “We might have let them in the Common Market by then,” as if that were all the reason Turks would need to stop slitting Englishmen’s throats, then made himself scarce before I could query his reasoning.

Ignore this if you have already read it. My books Dear Air 2000 and Football Crazy are now in print. They are priced at £8.99 each and are available from Amazon, but readers of my blog can buy them direct from me for £7.50 including p & p. Just send me a cheque and I will send the book/books by return.

My address is –

Terry Ravenscroft, 19 Ventura Court, Ollersett Avenue, New Mills, High Peak, SK22 4L

 

 

 

Dear Air 2000

 

Football Crazy

 

21^st December 2006

A meeting of BBC TV bigwigs is in progress.

BBC CHAIRMAN: So that’s settled then, Prince Andrew will be BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2008.

BBC CONTROLLER: Making it the third leg of Royal treble.

BBC CHAIRMAN: Following Zara Phillips’s win for Three Day Eventing in 2006 and the Duke of Edinburgh victory in 2007 for insulting foreigners.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Carriage racing.

BBC CHAIRMAN:  Whatever. So all that remains is to select the sport in which Prince Andrew will triumph.

BBC CONTROLLER: How about shagging?

BBC CHAIRMAN: Yes, a possibility, I’ve heard he’s pretty good at that.

BBC CONTROLLER: We’ll pencil that in then.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Er…….?

BBC CHAIRMAN: Yes?

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Well, shagging…..I mean it isn’t a sport, is it.

BBC CHAIRMAN: I suppose not.

BBC CONTROLLER: It’s an indoor sport.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Even so, I don’t think we’d get away with it.

BBC CONTROLLER: How about flying then? He’s very good at flying. Flies anywhere and everywhere at the drop of a hat.

BBC CHAIRMAN: Yes, they don’t call him Air Miles Andy for nothing.

BBC CONTROLLER: And….maybe….?

BBC CHAIRMAN: Yes?

BBC CONTROLLER: Well I was thinking….if he happens to be a member of the five miles high club, which he very probably is, maybe we could give him a double award for flying and shagging?

BBC CHAIRMAN: Excellent. And if he could remember who it was he shagged we could give them the team award too.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Before you get too excited I think we’ve more or less established that shagging isn’t a sport. Nor is flying for that matter.

BBC CHAIRMAN: Well are there any real sports he takes part in?

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: He plays golf. He’s a six handicapper I believe.

BBC CONTROLLER: Excellent. We’ll make him BBC Sports Personality for his golf then.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: He would have to win something though.

BBC CHAIRMAN: Well can’t he win that competition we cover….what is it called?

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: The Open Championship. Actually it’s getting on for the only golf competition we cover nowadays.

BBC CONTROLLER: That’s makes it even better then.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Well it would be – except that Prince Andrew has about as much chance of winning the Open Championship as I have.

BBC CHAIRMAN: Oh I don’t think he’d have to win it.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Zara Phillips won.

BBC CONTROLLER: Yes but she takes part in a sport nobody has heard of doesn’t she. Golf is big time. Second or third would be good enough.

BBC HEAD OF SPORT: Believe me gentlemen if Prince Andrew were to enter the Open he would come in last, and by a long way.

BBC CHAIRMAN: Hmm, I don’t think we’d get away with that.

BBC CONTROLLER: Right, there’s only one thing for it. Take a note Miss Phelps.

‘BBC Grandstand’s coverage of Rugby League, Three Day Eventing and Tiddlywinks will soon be augmented by the popular new sport of Shagging……..’

Ignore this if you have already read it. My books Dear Air 2000 and Football Crazy are now in print. They are priced at £8.99 each and are available from Amazon, but readers of my blog can buy them direct from me for £7.50 including p & p. Just send me a cheque and I will send the book/books by return.

My address is –

Terry Ravenscroft, 19 Ventura Court, Ollersett Avenue, New Mills, High Peak, SK22 4LL

dearair2000/air2000cover.htm”>Dear Air 2000

http://www.topcomedy.co.uk/footballcrazy/crazycover.htm”>Football Crazy