Good Man Down

RIP

Speccy has it better than I can, with a good video clip:

http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/527481/rip-william-fbuckley-jr.thtml

I was planning to tell you about the sea bream I caught in Table Bay off Cape Town this afternoon, but it can wait.

One for The Tuscan Boys

ITALIAN BOY'S CONFESSION

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. I have been with a loose girl"

The priest asks, 'Is that you, little Joey Pagano?'

"Yes, Father, it is."

'And who was the girl you were with?'

"I can't tell you, Father, I don't want to ruin her reputation"

'Well, Joey, I'm sure to find out her name sooner or later, so you may as well tell me now. Was it Tina Minetti?'

"I cannot say"

'Was it Teresa Mazzarelli?'

"I'll never tell"

'Was it Nina Capelli?'

"I'm sorry, but I cannot name her"

'Was it Cathy Piriano?'

"My lips are sealed"

'Was it Rosa Di Angelo, then?'

"Please, Father, I cannot tell you"

The priest sighs in frustration. 'You're very tight lipped, Joey Pagano, and I admire that. But you've sinned and have to atone. You cannot be an altar boy now for 4 months. Now you go and behave yourself.'

Joey walks back to his pew, and his friend Franco slides over
and whispers, 'What'd you get?'

"4 months holiday and five good leads."

The HMS Apollo Incident

Some months after the Argentine surrender in the Falklands, Idle was commanding a settlement called Fox Bay West on West Falkland. This was a relaxing role, as a mile of cold South Atlantic water separated us from the company headquarters at Fox Bay East. I posted a soldier as lookout, and we sprang into action only when a RIB started bouncing across the bay. By the time any boat containing the company commander arrived, we were behaving busily and looking efficient and soldierly. Otherwise, I preferred intense periods of relaxation; we were never more than a fortnight away from a live-firing exercise in the bogs and hills.

One day, at the weekly Orders Group across the bay, the company commander announced that the Royal Marine detachment on HMS Apollo was going stir crazy and needed to come ashore to do whatever it is that Marines do. One officer, an NCO and six men were invited by HMS Apollo to take their place for a few days. This was a plum opportunity to get away from sheep-shearers' accommodation and army cooking, and everyone wanted to go.

The three platoon commanders were invited to give their reasons as to why they should be chosen. I kept shtum until the others had spoken, and then quietly offered the fact that my father had been First Lieutenant on board HMS Apollo about thirty years previously. (Now, this Apollo was almost certainly not the same boat, but a modern destroyer or mine layer or something, but I left that bit out).

To cut a long story short, I found myself one evening playing poker in the officers' mess (they call it a wardroom) after dinner on HMS Apollo, somewhere in the South Atlantic. A knock came on the door, and a Petty Officer requested the presence of the infantry officer in their mess. The RN officers smirked.

As we entered the PO's mess, the fellow asked me my christian name, which struck this Highland officer as unconventional. He said the rules were that I walked in and walked out of their mess as an officer, but niceties were suspended whilst they entertained me.

We got drinking and chatting and I was closely quizzed about my Aberdonian credentials. The Royal Guard at Balmoral came up. Suffice to say that I foolishly backed myself to remember the first dozen heirs to the throne, in order. I got it right, I think, but had to toast every one of them with a shot of navy rum (that dark and pungent stuff, not the delightful golden nectar of Mount Gay or Appleton). Soon, I was gibbered.

At this stage, they said, it was time to play a game. A teaspoon was produced, the end of its handle tied to a length of string. I was instructed to take off my trousers and underwear, and the string was passed round my waist and tied in such a fashion that the bowl of the teaspoon hung about two inches below my dick. Then they stood me legs well apart on a coffee table, introduced me to their mess champion, facing me in the same exposed condition on his own coffee table, and produced two lit candles in their sticks, placed between our legs. Then they blindfolded us (or was it only me?)

On the command "extinguish!", I crouched down and swung my equipment back and forward, in an attempt to douse the flame. Go too far, singed gonads and bell-end. You can imagine it, I'm sure. I swung and missed like a hopeless golfer, and suffered several discomforts. In my panic and confusion, I could hear the click of cameras amongst the roars of laughter. Best of five, the PO won 3-0 and I was reintroduced to my clothes.

I walked out of the PO's mess and embraced life as an officer again, albeit a nauseous one. Nothing was said about my ordeal, not even by my sergeant, who was in the PO's mess throughout.

When I am returned as the honourable member for Chichester, having won a shock victory for the No Nonsense Party, I am sure the photos will emerge, at least in the Midhurst and Petworth Observer, maybe even the Petersfield Post. Until then, my modesty is intact.

Things They Didn't Teach at Sandhurst in 1980

"An officer should be comely, spratly and above all else, confident in his own dress and bearing. He should, where possible, eat a small piece of meat each morning with molasses and beans. He should air himself gracefully when under fire and never place himself in a position of difficulty when being shot at. He should eat his meals comfortably and ahead of his soldiers, for it is he whom is more important tactically on the battlefield and therefore he who should be well nourished. His hair should be well groomed and if possible he should adorn a moustache or similar facial adornment. When speaking to his soldiers he should appear unnerved and aloof and give direction without in any way involving himself personally in the execution of arduous or un-officer like duties. He should smoke thin panatellas except when in the company of ladies where he should take only a small gin mixed with lemon tea. He should be an ardent and erudite gentleman and woo the ladies both in the formal environment and in the bedroom where he should excel himself beyond the ordinary soldier with his virulent lovemaking prowess. These I say to you are the qualities of an officer that set him apart from the lay person and the common soldier."

Lt Gen Hubert Worthington, Commander In Chief, 5th Royal Indian Mountain Division, Bombay, 2th December 1907

Honest Aussie Sets Good Example

Australia wicket-keeper Adam Gilchrist has revealed his dropped catch off India's VVS Laxman convinced him to retire from international cricket.

Gilchrist, 36, missed the chance in the final Test of Australia's series win and said: "I knew somewhere between the ball hitting my gloves and the ground.

"That catch - I watched a replay and I just moved really slow.

"I realised I didn't have the absolute desperation that you need to continue to maintain your standards."


Unaccustomed as I am to offering praise to an Australian sportsman, I make an exception for Gilchrist. Not only was he a demonstrably honest man, who 'walked' when he nicked one (never caught on with his team mates, Yes - that's YOU, Symonds!), he was the most entertaining batsman of his generation, which is saying something when Lara and the Indian middle order have been around these last ten years. Good on yer, Gilly!

Read his reason for going, admire his honesty and compare him to the incompetents we come across in all sorts of positions in life who just don't know when to quit, even when honour and responsibility suggests that they clear their desks immediately.

"I knew [it was time to quit] somewhere between Northern Rock/the Armed Forces/the new Wembley Stadium hitting my gloves and the ground" - insert your own disastrous event - and it is a sentence that one simply cannot imagine being uttered by a public servant in this country.

The Leaving Present

Rick, from Zimbabwe, had checked out of the halls of residence at Cirencester Agricultural College, and taken a room with a mate of Idle's, who had opted for mature student status at the college after leaving the army. The Idle mate had a wife and a mortgage and might even have had a child by that stage. Crucially, he had a spare bedroom, a fully-stocked larder, a big kitchen, TV and video, and laundry facilities. Having been raised on a farm in Kenya, he was sympathetic to an impoverished Zim 20 year-old.

Rick didn't pay his rent often, let alone a contribution to the Waitrose and Threshers' bills. It was put on the slate, in the expectation that the tobacco crop would come in at some stage and Rick's father would stump up the readies.

This went on, needless to say, until graduation. In the fog of celebrations, a drunken and morose Rick approached Idle's mate, fessed up that he didn't have a bean, and could he pay sometime in the future? Idle's mate, generous man that he was, said he'd call it quits if Rick could secure him a certain commodity available only in Africa. It was a deal.

Months later, the Idle mates were skiing. They returned to Cirencester after a fortnight and were approached by the shy old spinster from next door, who told them she had signed for a parcel for them during their absence, but "had to put it in the garage, because it was making a dreadful smell".

A soiled package was produced, opened at arms' length with clothes pegs on noses. There, untouched since the day it was sliced from the beast, was a Cape Buffalo scrotum.

"He might have cured it, at least" said Idle's mate. "Jesus!" said the wife "what the bloody hell are you going to do with THAT?"

"Turn it into a sporran", said our man. "It'll be the only one of it's type in the world."

And he did, and it is. A fine and splendid thing it is. My friend particularly likes being approached by aged Scots ladies at highland events who have an interest in this sort of thing. "Excuse me" they say, "but I couldn't help but notice your unusual sporran". To which he replies "How observant of you. I suppose you have already worked out that it is the scrotum of a Cape buffalo". They tend to scurry off after that.

Here it is:

One-Hundred-and-Eiiiggghhhtteeee!

Henry was very proud of his new watch. He hardly ever took it off, and when he did, he kept half an eye on it, from his bathtub, shower, or wherever. He didn't take it to away rugby matches because he couldn't concentrate on putting his knee on the opposing flanker's testicles in a ruck, thinking instead of a dishonest bastard half-inching his Rolex from the Away dressing room.

He made the mistake, however, of taking it on tour to Guernsey at Easter. His mate, captain of the team and scrum half, had a successful father who owned some sort of gin palace, modest but functional. The gin palace was duly motored across to the Channel Islands to provide cheap accommodation and totty pulling power for the duration of the tour. There were bunks for six, including a private double at the front (the bow?), which became the official shagging berth.

Henry pulled on Night One, a lovely balmy evening in late Spring. He got the islander well juiced up, winked at the lads to indicate that the Shagging Berth would be occupied for the next 15 mins, and went below (as they say).

After a few minutes of unrewarding foreplay, Doreen (for it was she) asked Henry to take his watch off, as the chunky strap was marking her back. Gentleman to the core, but briefly forgetting that his first love was his timepiece, Henry unclipped it, put it in his left hand, and reached out for the ledge beside the bunk, without missing a beat in his quest to locate Doreen's ribs with his tongue, via her throat.

The porthole was nine inches wide, barely wider than Henry's knuckles. Did he touch the sides (as it were), as he reached blindly to his left? He did not. Was the porthole open? You bet it was.

Henry opened his grip, and waited for the clunk of watch-on-ledge. Clunk came there none. Instead, a muffled splosh.

Doreen and Henry's lust was not consumated that evening. He sulked all the way through the tour, and cannot hear the name "Rolex" to this day without wincing.

Idle knows this story to be true. The Rolex pictured is - wait for it - a "Sea Dweller".