One-Way Ticket To Mars

 One-Way Ticket (to Mars)

I was looking for a new challenge:

Something to banish senility’s fears,

When I spotted the advertisement,

A good way to spend my retirement years.

 

It said they were looking for astronauts,

To head on out into deep space,

So I signed myself up for the training,

And made my entry into the space race.

 

They had a great vision for mankind:

It was a mission to colonise Mars!

We’d be blasting off from the Earth,

And journeying towards the stars.

 

Yes, we were setting off for the Red Planet,

To establish a colony, or a base-camp,

Like the pioneers in the days of old,

I felt like Columbus as I mounted the ramp.

 

The blast-off was truly spectacular,

As our rocket rose towards the night sky,

And Mission Control raised a big cheer,

As they sadly waved us good-bye.

 

Then we pulled out of Earth’s gravity,

And, as we carefully avoided The Moon,

It hadn’t yet even occurred to me,

That I’d become a hostage to fortune.

 

You see, when a man settles down for a while,

And there’s no alcohol on board, no drinking,

His thoughts turn to existential matters,

And that’s when I got round to some thinking.

 

If we’ve dropped all of our boosters,

And we’re voyaging in this tin can,

How are we going to get back from Mars?

Won’t we be stuck there, to a man?

 

I voiced my concerns to the captain,

And mentioned it to the rest of the crew,

But they all just fell about in their laughter,

And said that they thought that I knew!

 

It turns out that this is a one-way journey!

I’ve been issued with a single ticket!

There’s no possible way to return -

Well – I mean – that’s simply not cricket!

  

I knew that it would take a long time,

If mankind was to make his mark,

But I didn’t realise just how final,

That day when I’d turned up to embark.

 

We’re to be the first of our species,

To land on Mars – that is our fate,

And if we survive our arrival,

Our next job will be to pro-create!

 

Now I’ve had a look round at the rest of the crew,

And there’s none I’d want go out with on a date,

So it could be a long, lonely existence,

If I’m the only one not taking a mate.

 

There’s one girl who’s been looking at me,

And paying me lots of attention,

I think I know what’s on her agenda,

I think I can spot her intention!

 

So here I am, trapped in this spaceship,

With only the Sun’s gravity to tow it,

Heading off to a fate worse than death –

It’s space, Jim, but not as we know it.

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Drivel From Devizes - Dateline Sunday 30th August 2020

 Drivel From Devizes: Dateline – Sunday 30^th August 2020

 

Here is our weekly round-up of events from D-Town:

                                              

1.      Preparations are being made in D-Town schools for pupils to go back next week.  Measures to ensure the protection of pupils and teachers will include: the wearing of burkhas by all pupils (trimmed in blue or pink to indicate gender), the serving of prepacked lunches (featuring such dishes as casserole of face-mask, served in a lemon sanitiser sauce), the burying of those that succumb to the virus within school grounds to minimise contamination, and having a one-way system for smokers at the back of the bike-sheds.

 

2.      And the current mayor of The Vize formally accepted the Gammon Old Party (GOP) nomination for the next mayoral election in November.  This year’s GOP Conference was held online, and it is thought that nearly seven people may have attended.  The mayor focused his address on what would happen if his rival were to be elected, which he illustrated with visions of lakes of burning fire, sewage flowing ten feet deep through the streets, apocalyptic storms in the skies, biblical plagues of boils and locusts and (worst of all) slight delays in the timetable of the 49 bus towards Trowvegas on Wednesday afternoons.

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

 

Mission

 Mission

We left upon a high tide

Of love and hope and enthusiasm

That pushed us gently off from home

Out into the starry night

To travel upon waves of faith

And the best of our technology

 

We embarked upon the journey

In our silvered ship of dreams

Carrying deep within the belly of its hold

Supplies and building blocks of life

Essentials for the colony

And a fragile early settlement

 

And now we can only wait

And voyage on regardless

Tracking our co-ordinates

On our pre-determined trajectory

A long-distance one-way ticket

Through cold and airless space

 

There will be no return

No coming back across the void

From this long-term venture

To a dry and dusty planet

With its darker horizon

Orbiting further from our Sun

 

But we may survive for long enough

To thrive and procreate the species

To build a tenuous foothold

Upon the rocky surface

Where we can stand defiant

And watch the Earth rise once again

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

You're So English

 You’re So English

You’re so English

You can’t escape from your past

With your William Shakespeare and your Winston Churchill

Your standing-in-queues and terribly strong tea

Your fish-and-chip suppers, your roast beef and Yorkshire Pudding

And your stiff upper lips, it’s so easy to see

 

You’re so English

It’s pointless pretending you’re not

With your Wimbledon tennis fortnight and your Cliff Richard

Your Bobby Charlton and your Dame Vera Lynn

Your HP Sauce and your Mother of Parliaments

It’s hard to know where to begin

 

You’re so English

You can’t avoid what’s obvious

With your Beatrix Potter and your Blackpool Tower

Your jellied eels and your beans on your toast

Your Jerusalem and your Rule Britannia

And your lifeboats all round the coast

 

You’re so English

It’s so simple to see

With your four-day matches of cricket, and your football

Your pork pies and your pints of best bitter

Your National Parks and your walkers and Ramblers

And your beaches piled up with their litter

 

You’re so English

You’ve got nothing to hide

With your Folk Music and Morris Dancers with hankies and sticks

Your crumpets and scones with jam & cream at High Tea

Your libraries and National Health Service

And your public schools, who else could it be?

 

You’re so English

It’s as plain as the nose on your face

With your Beatles, your Rolling Stones and your Who

Your Anglican High Church each and every Sunday

Your Royal Family, and your God Save The Queen

Then Corrie and Eastenders on Monday

 

You’re so English

The case is completely conclusive

With your steam engines and Cockney Rhyming Slang

Your copies of The Beano and your branches of Greggs

Your York Minster and your Tower of London

PG Tips at breakfast and soldiers to dip into your eggs

  

You’re so English

What more proof do you need?

With your Florence Nightingale, and your Sir Christopher Wren

Your art galleries, your castles and your museums with shops at the exit

With your independent spirit and your splendid isolation

Now you can sail into the sunset, because you all voted for Brexit

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Glutney Chutney

 Recipe for: GLUTNEY CHUTNEY

 

Ingredients:

 

• 1 kg of marrows or courgettes, or whatever glut you’ve got
• 1 kg green tomatoes
• 500g cooking apples, peeled, cored & diced
• 500g onions, peeled & diced
• 500g sultanas
• 500g light soft brown sugar
• 600ml cider vinegar or white wine vinegar
• 2 tsp chillie flakes
• Pinch salt
• Spice bag (50g fresh root ginger, 12 cloves, 2 tsp black peppercorns, 1 tsp coriander seeds) tied in muslin & whacked with a rolling pin

 

Method:

 

1. wash & chop all the vegetables – (see below)
2. put all the ingredients into a large pan & bring slowly to the boil, stirring occasionally
3. let the mixture simmer, uncovered, for 2 ½ - 3 hours, stirring occasionally
4. it’s ready when it’s thick, glossy, rich in colour & well reduced, but with chunks of fruit & veg still clearly visible.  It should be thick enough to draw a spoon through to reveal the  bottom of the pan for a second or so before the chutney closes back over
5. pot the chutney into warm sterilised jars, patting down with a spoon & making sure that there are no air bubbles trapped
6. seal & label, leaving a couple of months to mature

 

What else you need to know:

 

1. Chopping the fruit & veg to the same small size gives a good texture to the chutney – it’s a bit time consuming, but worth it
2. Don’t rush – long slow cooking will produce a smoother, more mature result.  Undercooked, crunchy chutney is not very nice.
3. Good for using up most kinds of garden glut – this is a basic, generic recipe

 

Socks Without Partners

 Socks Without Partners

I’ll tell you a story of heart-ache and loss,

With a happy ending that’s a heartener,

Of a garment that was lost in the washing,

The tale of a sock without a partner.

 

Tootsie, for that was the sock’s name,

Suddenly found herself lonely and lonesome,

Carried off in the basket with the rest,

But realised she was all on her own-some.

 

They’d gone, as usual, in the washer together,

Then her other half seemed not to be there.

How had they managed to drift apart,

When they’d always been part of a pair?

 

She’d found herself in with some dirty types;

Their filthy behaviour caused her to wince,

And she found herself turned inside out,

When she finally came out of the rinse.

 

There’d been too much of a crowd in the basket,

With bras and knickers she’d been forced to mingle,

And it was only as she hung on the line,

That she realised that she was now single.

 

There was no-one to meet her or match her,

She started to rue, her anxiety grew,

She knew she was useless on her own,

There was no purpose unless there were two.

 

Then a kindly old night-shirt took pity,

When he saw that Tootsie was crying.

He made a suggestion to the young sock:

There was a way out, something worth trying.

 

“There’s a special support group,” he told her,

“Where singles can meet with a view to dating:

Goes by the name of Socks Without Partners,

Where the lucky ones may end up by mating.”

 

“But I’m too old to find anyone now,

With my ticking biological clock,

No-one will want some-one as washed-up as me,”

Thus wailed the little pink and white sock.

 

“They’ll see that I’m neither modern nor new,

My stitching’s all bobbled and sunken,

My colour has faded, my pattern’s all shaded,

And my elastic’s completely shrunken.”

  

The night-shirt replied, “it’s time that you tried,

By putting forward your very best foot.

And, of course, you’ll need to be on your toes,

If you want to get yourself out of this rut!”

 

“They don’t hang about in these places, you know,

If it’s a partner you’re after catching;

You only get two minutes for chatting,

It’s a new thing they call speed-matching.”

 

So Tootsie was thrown in the airing cupboard,

With no-one to love her, nobody to care,

When, just for a moment, somewhere in the pile,

Was that a flash of pink she could see there?

 

The colour wasn’t perfect it seemed,

The patterns on them differed some ways,

But they found that they had plenty in common,

To team up together for a few days.

 

The other old sock had lost his partner too,

And had been left long in this cupboard’s heat,

But they decided they could walk out together,

And, as a new partnership, they could meet.

 

So the moral of this story’s quite clear:

If you’ve been abandoned, don’t cry and moan -

There’s always some-one out there that’s for you,

Never give up if you’re left on your own.

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

At The End Of The Pier

 At The End Of The Pier

The gaps between the weathered planks underfoot

Left tantalising glimpses of the drop

Down to the restless sea boiling beneath

The waves slapping hard against the piles

Barnacled and seaweed-strewn

A watery world, above which we were held aloft

On the bracing breezy boardwalk

Heads down into the wind

Eyes hooded against the slanting light

Along the corroded iron-girdered structure

A jaunty finger jutting out from land

Edged around by rusting railings

Their corroded layers of leaded paint

Flaking in the sea-salt onslaught

Of many stormy seas

And elemental winters

 

The pier’s attractions sheltered in the middle

Clustered tight together in serried rows

Harbouring sweet and sickly smells

Of sugared rock, ice-cream and candy-floss

What-the-butler-never-saw machines

And pulsating penny arcades

That held the promise of a prize

The seafood stalls set out their wares

Of cockles and crab-sticks

Pinky prawns and pin-hunted winkles

And shops that touted windmills

Flags and buckets and spades

Kiss-Me-Slowly cowboy hats

And revolving wire stands

Of saucy seaside postcards

Picturing pot-bellied punters

That had lost their little Willie

 

Then beyond the chevroned deckchairs

The booths and bandstand of a bygone era

Faded relics of Edwardian grandeur

Out towards the final destination

And an end of walking

The promenade’s pointing prow

With but a single heavy telescope

That cost a silver sixpence

To let the gormless gaze out into the bay

Before bowing to the inevitable

And setting out upon the journey back

That could never be as thrilling

As that first stroll out into the sea

And towards a setting sun

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Oh! Mr Weatherman!

 Oh! Mr Weatherman!

Oh! Mr Weatherman, you’ve done it again,

You said it wouldn’t get any wetter,

But when I look out of my window,

I can’t see that it’s got any better!

 

My violets are all shrinking,

There’s a line that we’ve not crossed,

It’s chilly and miserable and windy,

And tonight there’s a threat of more frost!

 

What happened to Spring and to Summer?

Why are your isobars clustered together?

Aren’t we due for a warm front now,

And a promise of much better weather?

 

The shoots in my garden are shivering

My onions look like bunions

My spuds seem to be duds

The peas think I’m a tease

Cabbages creeping, parsnips not peeping

The kale has gone pale, I think it might fail

And oh golly, just look at my caul!

 

This cold can’t continue

Ever more rain, is more than a bane

It’s causing me pain, again and again

I know what it means, for my haricot beans

And it gives me the freaks, when I look at my leeks

And I’ve called off all bets

When it comes to courgettes

 

Outside it’s all drear and wet

It’s the worst season yet

I’ve started to grouse, and crept like a mouse

Inside of my greenhouse

I’m avoiding the slugs and the bugs

But even here there are foes

But that’s how it goes

With snails among my tomatoes

 

So, please Mr Weatherman!

This forecast of yours sucks -

Let’s get some new heart into your chart

Cause we don’t want the weather for ducks!

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Drivel From Devizes - Dateline Sunday 23rd August 2020

 Drivel From Devizes: Dateline – Sunday 23^rd August 2020

 

Here is our weekly round-up of events from D-Town:

                                              

1.      Citizens of D-Town are becoming increasingly confused regarding the rules on travel and the need for quarantine.  Travellers from Trowvegas must self-isolate, but only if they arrive on the 49 bus.  The Sham was on the list, but now isn’t, but might be again next week.  Potterne has not yet been on the list but is on the watch-list to be on the main list.  Urchfont wasn’t on the list but now is, except on Thursdays.  Visitors from Poulshot need only isolate if there is a “y” in the day.  And bears in the woods have been requested to remain self-isolated for the foreseeable future.

 

2.      With only a week or two to go before D-Town schools re-open after the Covid outbreak, there have been expressions of fear, worries about social distancing & the wearing of masks, concerns about the resumption of bullying & anti-social behaviour, expectations of punishment beatings, and a general desire to simply not go back at all.  And that’s just the teachers.  Parents are terrified that there will be a Covid outbreak and that they will again have to look after their little horrors.  Pupils, on the other hand, are extremely keen to get back in order to resume their power struggles, victim-shaming and drug-dealing activities.

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

(It's All A) Conspiracy

 (It’s All A) Conspiracy

We are the Illuminati

The Deep State that controls your mind

Dominating world governments

Suppressing the whole of mankind

 

The power we wield is enormous

Our manipulation of humanity’s deep

The methods we use are countless

Treating the population like sheep

 

We are the paedophile network

A secret society set to retain power

Through manipulation & indoctrination

Cometh the day, cometh the hour

 

Everything you see is not what it seems

It’s all for a secret and sinister use

To protect our embedded position

And cover up our wide-scale abuse

 

We are accountable to no-one

And none can penetrate our base

We’re millionaires & billionaires

A shadowy organisation without face

 

We are the Freemasons and we run The System

Bezos, Musk, Zuckerberg and Gates are the names

Capitalism’s part of our total dominion

A veritable modern Hunger Games

 

Our methods are many and varied

Spreading disease and viruses obscene

Worldwide it keeps the populations sickening

Desperate to buy up our vaccines

 

But of course it’s not a real pandemic

Like many of the threats that are arrayed

The press are completely in our pockets

It’s all manufactured and completely man-made

 

We’ll inject you with who knows what

Once with our fear you’ve been gripped

We fit it quite neatly under your skin

Soon every person will be microchipped

 

We are the capitalists that control the world

Technology suppression’s one of our tasks

We’ve got you all running quite scared

Wearing your face-coverings and masks

  

There’s no escape from our surveillance

Big banks and corporations are the nails

That fasten down every person’s coffin

And that’s without mentioning the chem-trails!

 

We are the New World Order

We own the patents on all the science

We decide what technology we’ll allow

In order to further your compliance

 

We faked the moon landings and 9/11

Global Warming isn’t going to be final

The science labs are on our payrolls

We’re in full Climate Change Denial

 

The Earth is actually flat, and Shergar’s still alive

And aliens visit often – you’d be aghast

We’ve got complete track and trace

Through our network of 5G masts

 

Everything you hear is propaganda

Your minds all fogged like a mist

You’re all being brain-washed

There’s nothing you can do to resist

 

If you think all of this is ridiculous

If there’s any detail you’ve missed

Just join the weirdos on the Internet

And become a conspiracy theorist!

 

 Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Fielding An Illegible Player

 Fielding An Illegible Player

I thought at first it must be a slip of the tongue

A simple error that anyone could make

But as the marmalade congealed upon my toast

I heard him explain some more about it

And I better understood what it was that he was saying

When he announced that my local club

Would be punished with a points deduction

A reprimand and a swingeing fine

 

It appeared the team had broken the rules

And fielded what he said was an illegible player

Which is a rather different thing

And as the sports reporter’s voice carried on

The breakfast table faded before me

And I was transported back to the touchline

From where I’d watched on Saturday last

And where I’d sought in vain to spot the winger

 

His whereabouts were uncertain, if not obscure

I just couldn’t make him out at all

A pass went out to him, to run down the wing

In an attempt, perhaps, to defeat the off-side trap

But he just wasn’t there, and the ball ran into touch

His position being indecipherable

His off-the-ball movement unreadable

He was totally anonymous in the game

Occupying a lacuna of space out on the right

An unseen presence, missing in action

His role in the side no more than a mystery

The meaning something I couldn’t even guess

 

The room swam sharply back into focus

With the shelf and the radio all present

The toast still soft and buttery in my hand

My mug of tea gone cold and un-drunk

And the announcer now on a different story

Having moved on from the offence and investigation

To the scores elsewhere in the league

I’m still not sure that I’d heard him quite right

But upon more sober reflection

I think he’d used the right word after all

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Leek, Cheese & Bacon Muffins

 Recipe for: LEEK, CHEESE & BACON MUFFINS

 

Ingredients:

 

·        1 leek, washed, trimmed & very finely sliced

·        100g butter, melted

·        4 rashers bacon, chopped (or lardons)

·        300g self-raising flour

·        1 tsp baking powder

·        ½ tsp mustard powder

·        ¼ tsp cayenne pepper

·        2 large eggs

·        175ml semi-skimmed milk

·        150g extra mature cheddar, grated

 

Method:

 

1.      Preheat oven to 180C/ fan 160C/ gas 6

2.      Lightly grease 12 holes of muffin tin

3.      Cook the finely chopped leek in 1 tblsp of the butter over a low heat for 5 mins or until soft

4.      Set cooked leeks aside in a dish

5.      Reheat the pan, add bacon & cook until fat starts to crisp. Drain and add to leeks

6.      In a large mixing bowl, mix sifted flour with baking powder, mustard, cayenne & a pinch of salt

7.      In another bowl, lightly beat the eggs, milk and rest of melted butter together.

8.      Into that, add the cooked leeks & bacon, then the cheese, then the flour mixture

9.      Stir until evenly mixed, but don’t over-do it, or the muffins will be tough

10.   Divide mixture between 12 muffin holes & bake for 25-30 minutes until golden.

 

What else you need to know:

 

1.      Serve for brunch snack, or with soup

 

Lockdown Forecast

 Lockdown Forecast

And now here is the forecast for all of the UK

The expected restrictions in sum

The general direction’s quite predictable

Of the Lockdown conditions to come

 

There’ll be a broad front of sweeping statements

Very stormy early on in the day

Bringing with it some gloom and despair

Mostly generalisations you’d say

 

There’ll be SAGE computer projections

Calculating the rate that is “R”

That may cause conditions of isolation

And prevent us from going too far

 

Later on - the advice may be changing

Occasional sunny spells of good news

Followed by optimism - getting cooler

As the Government changes its views

 

But gradually increased local lockdowns

A warmer downpour of new rules

Scattered and changing regulations

The re-opening of gyms and of pools

 

There may be a shit-storm of new cases

A thunderous second spike if you will

With some localised flooding of wards

The NHS overwhelmed still

 

The longer-range forecast’s not much better

So get used to socially-distant tasks

This fine furlough might last forever

With the lifting and dropping of masks

 

But don’t worry about a hurricane coming this way

The pubs and the takeaways are serving again!

The schools will soon be wide open

So it’ll finally end no-one knows when

 

Can we see the green shoots of a recovery?

And the clear blue skies of a vaccine?

Is there any sign of track-and-trace?

In the stormy predictions we’ve seen?

 

The atmosphere’s becoming quite cloudy

The statistical temperature rising and falling

The outlook is for dark recrimination

A seasonal “new normal” is calling

  

It’s all about the changing climate

The global warming of cause and effect

Then the icy cold of ineptitude and of blame

But hey it’s only a forecast – what did you expect??

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Hanging On

 Hanging On

The frustration of not being able to get through, to send & receive clearly, on demand, but to be at the mercy of technology, time & cyberspace.

 

I thought it was meant to be progress?

This stuff they call technology?

My smart-phone’s turned into a dumb-phone,

And 4G’sjust a piece of kidology.

 

I don’t want to download, I don’t want to upload,

I don’t want to jabber in code:

I just want to talk to the bloke who lives down the road.

 

This lack of signal’s a pain, I’m giving myself wrist-sprain

I’m going insane, whilst trying to gain

The position to “send” once again

 

I’d be in my element, I’d become a real gent

If this text could be sent

But instead I’m reduced to railing

Cos the damned thing keeps failing

The designer of this should be quailing

If I got near him he’d be wailing

I’d want the bugger jailing

 

I get really riled, each time when I’ve dialled

One of the numbers I’ve filed

When it says it’s unknown, then it fails with a groan

And I can’t find a dial-tone, or enough bars on the phone

 

I’ll admit that I’ve cried, whenever I’ve tried

To follow the User Guide, then I get “Access Denied”

I’ve even tried bending

To improve the chances of sending

It’s my money I’m spending

But the damned things always offending

My hair I’m tearing and rending

The problems are never-ending

And my messages and calls are tending

To a status of “pending”

 

Why can’t I get through? 

What am I supposed to do?

I think I should sue!

I’m clearly stating, that this situation I’m hating

I’m fed up of waiting, the problem’s never-abating

It shouldn’t fail, it’s not the Holy Grail!

Not on this scale, it’s beyond the pale

So I think I’ll give up and go back to email

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

 

Tasting Notes

 Tasting Notes

The world is full of wonderful wine,

So many that it’s very hard to choose.

But you’re supposed to be particular,

Not just knock it back like booze.

 

So I was dragged along to a wine tasting,

Then told to wait patiently and sit,

But the biggest shock I got that night,

Was being told not to swallow, but to spit!

 

Apparently, you can’t just rush in:

You’re supposed to take your time, and savour it.

If you go and drink it too quickly,

You’ll not discover your favourite.

 

There was a method and a protocol,

I soon learnt, that had to be observed,

Although I’d have liked to just get on with it,

From quaffing too quickly I had to be deterred.

 

Firstly they all gazed upon its colour,

Finding words to describe its “shades” and its “tints”,

So I swallowed a few mouthfuls,

And listened to them talking of “hints”.

 

Then there was some swirling around in the glass,

To develop the “bouquet” and the “aroma”:

But I decided to just finish my glass,

Before I slept, or fell into a coma.

 

I thought after that we’d get on with it,

But they started mentioning the “nose”,

So I started sipping a bit more of it -

What they were waiting for, God Alone knows.

 

Then, finally, they got on to the drinking,

And to their palates (that means the taste),

But I was already way ahead of them,

I drank a bit more, no time to waste.

 

They started swirling it all round their mouths,

And rolling their eyes as they savoured,

And sucking in air, and pinching their cheeks,

Was another method they favoured.

 

Then they spit it all out in front of me!

And started describing it as “amusing”.

It was “intense”, some called it “immense”,

But I just found their chatter confusing.

 

Now I can’t see the point of spitting it out,

Once you’ve got the stuff in your gob,

So I carried right on swallowing,

Trying my best not to look like a yob.

 

They were on about it being “floral”,

It was “delicate” I must understand,

And when they said it was “well-balanced”,

By this time, I had a glass in each hand.

 

I couldn’t frown, as I let it slip down -

They said it was “full-bodied” and “smooth” -

But by now I was cursed, with a great raging thirst,

And my drinking was looking uncouth.

 

The “complex notes” passed by their throats,

And there were “distinctive undertones”,

But this “fragrant” medium, had turned into tedium,

As I threw back the Cotes de Rhone.

 

At lasht they were talking of the “finish”,

Of how the “fragrant notes” really shung.

They were lying, to call it shatisfying,

The tashte hung around on my teeth & my tongue.

 

To be perfectly honesht, I’d had enough,

My legsh felt shaky; I went t’wards the door,

Everything looked all kind of doubled;

I needed no more, as slowly I shlid to the floor.

 

Sho take the moral of thish shtory;

And lishen to me when I try hard to shpeak:

Don’t drink too fasht, try and make it lasht,

And – shorry – I’ve to dash for a leak!

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Drivel From Devizes - Dateline Sunday 16th August 2020

 Drivel From Devizes: Dateline – Sunday 16^th August 2020

 

Here is our weekly round-up of events from D-Town:

                                       

1.      Schoolchildren in D-Town are on the march against the education authorities after many of them had their expected “E” grades downgraded to an “F” or a “who is this person please?”  Many parents, unaware that their darling offspring had even been due to take any exams, expressed their surprise at all the fuss, since they weren’t expecting their sprogs to do anything with their lives anyway.  The Local Health Authority, however, has taken up this new approach with gusto, allowing them to increase the amount of virus testing exponentially – so now you don’t even need to have a Covid-19 test: they simply predict whether you would have been positive or not.

 2.      Meanwhile there was an unseemly scramble to get back into the borough before 4am on Saturday morning when new quarantine rules came into force.  The last 49 buses from Swindon and Trowvegas were packed with people trying to escape the pubs in those resorts, and to get back to D-Town before last orders were called in MartinSpoons.

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

 

A Different Country

 A Different Country

Things were different way back then

We accepted different things

How our heroes sailed before the mast

And behaved the way they did

Because no-one knew to stop them

But today we’re ready to talk about the past

 

Seeds sown so many years ago

Lain dormant, suddenly awaking

Tear-watered, flourish fast

And grow into monstrous shapes

Cast long shadows on the guilty

And leave the public full aghast

 

A long, long shameful silence

Brooding on bottled-up emotions

And how history’s since been cast

Now emerging into light of day

And moved to naming famous names

How could they expect such lies to last?

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

 

Killer In The Village

 Killer In The Village

There’s a killer in our village

And he’s not been brought to justice

He’s out there right now

Walking round a free man

Because no-one knows

About his guilty secret

 

There’s a killer in our village

He’s just an ordinary guy

With a wife and children

Worrying about his credit card

And his hefty mortgage

Perhaps the same as you and I

 

There’s a killer in our village

And everybody knows his name

They see him down the pub

And he plays on all the local teams

They’ve been known to pat him on the back

When he makes a winning score

 

There’s a killer in our village

Who knows how to hit a target

He’s top gun at computer games

With hand/ eye co-ordination

Second-to-none, rated excellent

For a special military job

 

There’s a killer in our village

Yet no-one lives in any fear

He drives over to the airbase

And he works his every shift

Then he passes through security

And descends in to his bunker

 

There’s a killer in our village

But no-one’s after him

He peers into his monitor

Yet he’s never in any danger

A pilot who always stays at home

And flies the drones in Afghanistan

 

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2020

Honey & Mustard "Ketchup"

 Recipe for: HONEY & MUSTARD “KETCHUP”

 Ingredients:

 ·        2-4  medium onions, peeled & very finely chopped

·        4 cloves garlic, peeled & very finely chopped

·        2 tblsp oil

·        2 tblsp light Muscovado sugar

·        2 tblsp honey

·        4 tsp English mustard powder

·        1 tsp ground cinnamon

·        2 tsp turmeric

·        1 tsp salt

·        1 tsp fresh-ground black pepper

·        6 tblsp cider vinegar

·        4 tsp wholegrain mustard

 Method:

 1.      In a large frying pan, gently fry the onions & garlic in the oil until lightly golden (do not brown)

2.      Add the remaining ingredients, one by one, stirring all the time over a gentle heat

3.      Cook slowly until the mixture thickens slightly

4.      Keep tasting, adding more mustard or honey (and salt) to taste

5.      Whilst cooking, sterilise suitable glass jars (by washing then heating in the oven), ready for the mixture when it’s cooked

6.      Using a plastic funnel, decant the mixture into the jar (s)

 What else you need to know:

 1.      You can change the flavour by adding more honey (sweeter), more mustard powder & pepper (spicier)

2.      You can change the texture by straining the mixture through a sieve, keeping back some of the solids, if you want a smoother mixture.  Or you could use a hand-held liquidiser.