How thrilled I was to receive the latest outpourings from your mighty organ which against all the odds has managed to penetrate to the very end of my rutty back passage way through the tiny aperture in the rocky fissure of my bushy dwelling up in the wilds of the Highlands of our Bonny land. I do love a good read followed by a raucous belly laugh and the sight of your little bit of bull landing on my doorstep excites me beyond credulity!
Whilst happily reading away, hanging on every word and dribbling in expectation of the next exciting story (albeit with a teeny weeny bit of pro-Europe bias in the story content, context and editorial policy but hey, no-ones perfect as they say) it suddenly dawned on me……Balance, that’s what’s needed as I almost fell off my stool reaching for a top up of a particularly fine Burgundy that a really nice chap I know brought over from France with him recently.
Anyway I digress, I thought to myself old Jolly John’s readers might benefit from a little rendering of a cautionary tale that I experienced recently after helping to organise a little pre Christmas office shindig for the ‘troops’ (boys only you know, its no good taking the office squeeze with you when travelling away on a bender with the chaps is it now!)
Well, long story short as they say (don’t want your readers nodding off halfway through do we?) Not that I ever nod off reading ‘The Bull’ as I like to refer to it. No Sir!! It’s far too thrilling for that and I most certainly DO NOT wish to cast any aspersions on the weight of your co-respondents views (although a more evidence based editorial policy would only make ‘The Bull’ an even more thrilling read)
Now, where was I? Oh yes, organising the old Christmas bash. Well’ I thought, where can we go that we haven’t already been to? Can’t travel abroad at the moment as too many restrictions are in place. So thats Germany and the Low Countries out of the equation I thought. A pity as well as fine destinations both and they could certainly do with a bit of a lift from us good Scottish types bringing our Bon amie and good cheer with us. My French chum suggested Paris and another ex-pat chum from Cork suggested Dublin but you know what its like for us young, lusty chaps, been there, done that, worn the kilt etc etc
So, where to go? And then it struck me like a bolt out of the blue. Glasgee! Of course a perfect destination. I quickly checked on my travel guide and yes Glasgow is in fact on the green list! Hurrah, I thought. Now at this point I must confess. This brainwave was not entirely an original thought. No, I had got this germ of an idea from somewhere else. Can you guess, gentle reader?……..No?………keep trying……….it’ll come eventually………no, still nothing?……….Okay then (I actually thought you’d have got this given the average IQ of ‘The Bulls’ readership) Why, Jolly John Bull of course! God, keep up boys, keep up!!
Quick chat with my chums from the office to secure agreement (we’re quite good like that we always get a consensus of views before we book anything up, makes sense really, doesn’t it?) Now, we did have the odd dissenter, What do we want to go to Glasgow for? I’ve been there and its dirty and smelly and full of old people and some of the really old people are foreign and dirty and smelly (sorry, covered that bit already)
But I persisted and I can be quite persuasive at times even if I do say so myself, comes of being a Lord I’m told but I just think its all down to my natural good looks and manly figure and success with the ladies and knowing my way around a wine list and my experience of foreign travel and culture and excellent friendship group and stuff like that but who knows……..
Anyway, wandered a bit then, never mind. So, the ace up my sleeve during our discussions came from good old Jolly John Bull! Because, and here’s the good bit. I remembered reading in an earlier edition of ‘The Bull’ about a readers experiences in Glasgow whereby some German horseman had turned up one night (sounds dodgy in itself doesn’t it, sneaking about at night, just the sort of stuff you’d expect of a German. Wouldn’t catch good Scotchmen acting in such an underhand fashion. No Sir!!)
Anyway, the Hun descended in an ungodly fashion at an ungodly hour to surprise the local night watchmen going about their lawful duty of keeping good folk safe asleep in their beds. Such was the effrontery of the German horsemen that when the watchmen doing their duty tried to calm down the rowdy Bosch they were immediately rounded up by them, had ropes passed around and secured to their necks and then unceremoniously thrown over the side of a bridge to dangle there slowly strangling themselves to death. I think the correct term is ‘to be bloody well hung’ or something similar. Well, when my chums heard this they were beside themselves. We must go to Glasgee they cried in unison, to see if there is any truth in this strange and macabre tale. Cos, lets face it, we’ve never seen a hanging, let alone a bloody well hanging and it might be a spectacular event for all we know.
So, after further deliberations taking many weeks we set off attracting quite a crowd as we went. Many good folk enquired as to our intentions. Naturally I regaled them with this short explanation which caused many to ask if we had any spare tickets. We gave out as many tickets as we could until eventually we had no tickets left and the multitude wept openly at such a disappointment. “We want to go to the hanging” they all wailed over and over again. In the end I could no longer stand it and along with my chum from France and my other chum from Cork and various other chums of Scottish descent we cried aloud “Look, just come along anyway and gatecrash the event. The capacity of Glasgee will only be about a quarter of what the city can hold due to the restrictions put in place by the foreign government” the people rejoiced at this news and pledged to come along in their dozens to ‘come see the spectacle’
So, off we went and finally got to Glasgow.
You can imagine our disappointment, gentle reader. No Germans! No hangings! No nothing! We all gained entry into the fair city and had a look around but it is a bit dirty and it is a bit smelly (no-ones even cleaned up the German horse shit yet) and it most certainly is full of old people (someone told me that it is the preferred resting place of the old and infirm looking to see out the last of their lives) All I know is that everything was very expensive. One tavern owner told me that the “Hanoverian incident” had put off visitors and what with ‘the restrictions’ trade had been awful for months and months and so he was having to put up his prices to get some money back that he’d invested in something called PPE and special measures whatever they are.
So there you have it. Hearing all this, our group took off in a sprightly fashion, never to return many say, over rated others say, too pricey some say. And even worse, as the latest offering of ‘The Bull’ reports, Glasgee is now once again full of bloody Germans……..(hope they’ll be cleaning up the dung though)
Well, I won’t be going back there, rest assured on that!
Many thanks for your indulgence
Lord George Murray of Atholl
