Saturday

As you can tell, I’m not here today. Actually, I'm here but I’ve been enjoying a day off after wowing the ladies with my routine last night.

The Green Dragon Tavern was a riot and it was as though the Chipster hadn't been away. The only thing to go wrong was that one lady got so excited that she wrote her phone number on my thigh. She used one of those permanent markers and now the number won't come off. I tried using a scouring pad but I couldn't get past the dial code before the pain became too much.

I also need to make a request:

Could whoever it was that caught my thong last night please contact me. I left the spare front door key in the secret pocket stitched into the crotch and I really don't want to change the lock.

A Sweaty Friday

I’ll be brief. I think that’s what you want and I need after my mammoth post yesterday. I’m really sorry it was so long as I'm sure nobody read it.

To be honest, I don’t have much time right now to write a long essay. I’m dripping with sweat after a gruelling workout since I’m trying to get myself in condition for tonight when I’m making an early return to the stripping circuit.

I’ll be at the Green Dragon Tavern at ten, performing my new routine, which I’m calling ‘Gunboat Diplomacy’. It’s a topical routine, even though I say it myself. It ends with the last bit from the 1812 overture as the canons roar and my thong goes sailing out into the crowd. It’s as close as I get to making an overt political gestures in my act but I’ve had enough of this country being made to look foolish by these Iranians who are, let me remind you, a nation very hostile to the thong and thongdom.

At these times of heightened international tensions, I think all we can ever do is to thong on and never look back.

See you all tonight at the Green Dragon Tavern. And remember: when I shout ‘take aim’, the first person to cry ‘Fire!’ gets the thong.

The Fox In The Chicken Coop

Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes

Henry David Thoreau

I only began to suspect that I’d been misled by the local representative of the poultry industry after I’d arrived at the allotments. There had been little time to give much thought to why I was needed there and my eagerness to see where I’d be staying for the night meant that I when I finally found Gabby’s shed, I hardly expected it to be set in a scene of such utter tranquillity.

Cool yet bright, it was one of those perfect spring evenings. The shed was painted green to blend in with high ivy-covered walls that surrounded it on two sides, while standing beside it, a brand new chicken coop gleamed yellow in the last rays of sunlight. The acrid smell of the weatherproofing had come to rest in the yard and now mixed with those aromas of the fresh oil, still damply oozing on the coop’s clean timbers. Ominously, there was no sign of the hens but for the occasional irritated cluck that came from behind the little door that shut them off against the world. For the first time, I wondered why exactly I was spending the night protecting them when a fox had about as much chance of getting into the coop as I had of getting a good night’s sleep among the shed’s fertilizer and forks.

I put my doubts aside as I dumped my kit in the shed and set to clearing a space for myself in one corner, as far from Gabby’s old still as possible. As you’re probably aware, the processes involved in the manufacture of potato gin leave behind a smell somewhat like a muddy field and petroleum; which are oddly enough, two of the key ingredients of potato gin.

I laid my bed out across the back of the shed with a headboard snugly made up of piled bags of John Innes No. 2 compost before I decided to make a circuit of the yard before closing the shed for the night. As the last of the daylight steamed in through the shed’s door, I checked my emergency torch a final time before I went out to patrol my small protectorate.

There really wasn’t much to see. A wheelbarrow with a squeaky wheel was the cultural highlight of my tour, followed by a patch of ground which hadn’t been turned over since the last potato harvest. The evening was also developing the sort of chill that does nobody any good, least of all a man in a thong, so I was really quite happy to get back in the shed and slide the bolt across the door.

Adapting to life in the shed was surprisingly easy. There’s a comfort to be found away from luxuries. I remembered a quote by Thoreau, who famously went to live amongst the raccoons and squirrels in his local woods: ‘a man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone’. Well, I felt rich enough. I’d abandoned every luxury of the modern world except for a thermal thong, which as I’m sure you’re beginning to realise is one of life’s essentials.

I then thought of another quote by Thoreau: ‘men have become the tools of their tools’. I confess, this had me thinking for quite a while, and by the time I’d finished working it out, a total darkness had descended. Perhaps I too had become a tool of my tools. Or, I suppose, more specifically for a man in my line of work I had become a tool of my tool. I lit my torch and scribbled the aphorism down on the flap of a box of weedkiller in case I forgot it in the morning.

Men have become the tools of their tool.

Chip Dale

Only an hour into my retreat from the modern world and I’d already hit a rich vein of wisdom. Soon, I had another little chunk of the wise stuff ready to note down:

All of life’s answers can be found in a potting shed.

Chip Dale

I really was quite pleased with myself and I reflected on how this break was so clearly what I’d needed. A night away from the TV, the internet, this blog… I was instead happy to listen to nature as it prepared to nest down for the night. My supper amounted to a few cheese crackers and a can of Tango, which felt oddly out of place in such a rustic setting. Sometime around nine thirty, some large creature visited the allotments and relieved itself noisily in the darkness before sauntering off singing Phil Collins’ ‘You Can Feel It’. My torch lit up for the briefest of moments, just long enough to write out:

Phil Collins makes wise men of drunks.

Chip Dale

With all this mental exercise, I was beginning to feel extraordinarily tired and I decided it was time to get ready for bed. The absence of light drains a man in a more natural way than I would have expected. My mind drifting on the smell of potato gin and linseed oil as I slipped down into the bottom of my sleeping bag. I drifted off to the occasional cluck of the chickens next door.

A noise like a rusted gate opening woke me some time later.

I grabbed my glasses and checked my watch. It was still only three thirty.

I blinked back my sleep and the dream I’d been having about Felicity Kendal. It had been some inspired nightmare about ‘The Good Life’ and I’d been Tom Good, trying to milk a zebra in the in Margot’s shrubbery. I damned my cheese crackers and swung myself out of bed. My torch lay beneath my hand but I stopped myself from turning it on. I was sure there was something moving around outside the shed.

I looked around in the darkness, seeking out something I could fashion into a crude weapon. I then damned myself for not sleeping in my clothes. It hadn’t occurred to me that I might actually have to act and if it was a fox, I didn’t think it wise to chase it dressed only in my underwear.

That worry retreated as I realised that the thing out there was bigger than a fox and with a tread louder than the noise of my heart, hammering inside my skull. Thoughts of foxes retreated even more once the door began to rattle and an anxious voice whispered: ‘Anybody in there?’

‘Who is it?’ I said, now holding the torch like a club, half expecting the bolt to give way.

‘Is that you Mr. Dale?’ said the voice. The anxiety had disappeared and had been replaced with a gruff humour. ‘Aren’t you going to let me in?’

I stood up and turned on my flashlight before I slid back the bolt.

Standing there in the dim moonlight was the figure of a man; the same man who had sold Gabby her hens that morning.

‘I figured you might try to sleep on duty,’ said Mr. Green, gesturing towards my thong. He held up a thermos flask. ‘Thought you might be cold and wouldn’t mind some company.’

‘It’s nearly three in the morning,’ I told him, now a little calmer but considerably more confused.

‘The time all us sensible country folk get up,’ he assured me as he gestured me back into the shed. He followed me in and closed the door. ‘I’ve been wondering if you’ve had any problems with the hens. And then I thought about a man like you, not used to the rough life… I thought you wouldn’t mind a bit of company.’ He looked down at my thong and experience that odd sensation I so rarely feel: I suddenly felt terribly naked.

I was tempted to reach for my pen and write out the new aphorism that had suddenly struck me.

Never strip down to your underwear in a shed.

Chip Dale

‘You know, it gets cold this early in the year,’ he carried on. ‘So I thought you might just like a bit of company. A bit of company to keep you warm?’

And that’s when he winked.

Beware of men bearing thermos flasks in the night.

Chip Dale

I grabbed my pants and had one leg in them when Mr. Green put his hand on my arm.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked.

‘Not what you think I’m about to do,’ I told him and quickly had my shirt on as well.

‘Didn’t I just explain why I’m here? I thought you’d appreciate a bit of company.’

‘So, this is you’ve come for, Mr. Green?’ I asked as I foolishly bent down for my shoes.

‘Well if you put it like that…’ he said and I felt a hand on my leg.

Things had suddenly gone beyond aphorisms.

‘You’ve got a damn cheek,’ I said.

‘You have two.’

‘I came here for the good of my girlfriend’s chickens.’

‘You seen any foxes, then?’ he laughed.

‘Just the one. And I feel really sort for it.’

‘No need to feel sorry,’ he protested. ‘This is Campbell’s soup. Only the best for you, Chip.’

‘Don’t call me Chip,’ I said.

He stepped across to the door and slid the bolt across.

‘At least have some soup,’ he said. ‘Then I’ll be going.’

‘I don’t want any soup.’

‘It’s tomato.’

Tomato happens to be my favourite but I remembered an aphorism of my uncle’s.

A man is weakened by his weaknesses.

Arthur Dale

Which is much more profound than you probably think it is. I had a terrible suspicion that this tomato soup had something more than tomatoes in it.

‘Why not try some yourself?’ I asked, seeing how he’d react.

His eyes widened momentarily before he adopted a look of hurt.

‘I don’t like tomatoes,’ he said. ‘And I brought if for you.’

‘Then you can keep your soup,’ I replied. ‘I’m off.’

‘Please stay, Chip,’ he said, a note of desperation now in his voice. ‘I get so lonely with my poultry. Farming is a sad and miserable life. I don’t have any friends. Nobody really cool and exciting to be around. Nobody like you, Chip.’

‘I thought a man can’t be lonely when he’s got chickens,’ I said. ‘I read it somewhere.’

He backed towards the door. ‘I’m not going to let you leave,’ he said. ‘You can’t leave!’

I had a flashback to a similar scene in coffee shop earlier in the week.

‘You don’t know a girl who looks like Amy Winehouse, do you?’ I asked.

He looked puzzled and I could see that he’d left his guard down as he pondered my question.

‘You mean the singer?’

It was too late. Quicker than he could react, I grabbed the box of weedkiller and threw it in his face before I threw him to one side and grabbed the door.

I blessed the darkness as I ran. The allotment had woken up to our argument but by the time I finally emerged onto the main road, the sound of frightened chickens had faded to silence and I had only the sound of a man, cursing his naïvety in all matters fowl, to follow me home.

This morning, I rang Gabby and told her the full story, as I’ve just told it you. Her immediate concern was for the condition of her chickens.

‘They sensitive,’ she said. ‘They need peace. They need quiet. You should have eaten soup!’

‘But this wasn’t about soup,’ I told her, but she wasn’t for listening to reason.

‘Soup good for you, Chip,’ she said and hung up.

‘And I suppose it’s good for the chickens too…’ I mumbled over the ominous sound of the dial tone.

I Smell of Poultry

Just got back from the allotments and my night spent protected Gabby's chickens. I have lots of things to tell you but need to get a bath and something to eat. I've just checked my email too and thanks for the all the words of support. I really do appreciate it. If I had all your names and addresses, you'd be receiving a signed thong in tomorrow's post.

It's Only Us Chickens

And into the unpublished pile goes the page I’ve just written about why I’m not feeling funny today… You see, somebody sent me a pretty abusive email this morning and it made me begin to wonder why I bother blogging at all. But at least it made me angry. Angry enough to tell you that I carry on because a Romanian girlfriend who thinks she’s a pop star based on a number seven hit with the ‘Hokey Cokey’ is about as funny as life gets. Surely her’s is a tale that needs telling, especially when she comes home with a cockerel she bought from a man she met at her pilates class.

Gabby is mixing with the more unusual side of Bangor society these days and her cockerel is pecking around my ankles as I type. It’s not a totally disagreeable sensation, though having a cock at my ankles is perhaps symbolic of how far my spirits have drooped this week.

‘You like Chippy?’ she had asked the bird as she nuzzled it over my breakfast table. The bird had said nothing but fixed me with its bead of an eye. Fowl are not known for their appreciation of the finer things in life and certainly have little or no regard for a Welshman in a thong at ten thirty in the morning.

‘And where do you intend to keep our guest?’ I asked as I spooned another load of Alpen into my mouth.

‘Guest?’ laughed Gabby. ‘What guest? Only you, me, and bird. Bird is no guest. Bird is family now.’

‘Well Bird must be on your side of the family,’ I told her. ‘No Dale I know of has only three toes.’

‘There’s your uncle Jimmy,’ she reminded me.

‘Industrial accidents are hardly genetic,’ I replied. ‘Or at least they’re not unless you’re from Liverpool…’

‘You’re trying to be funny,’ she said as the cockerel made a noise in its throat. ‘See! Only Bird laughs. I don’t.’

And with that, I accepted Bird as part of the family. I knew, that way, at least one member of the household would find me a little bit amusing in the morning.

Gabby’s reasons for buying the cockerel are actually quite good. She’s going to set up a small business breeding chickens. She claims that she used to do this back in the old country and has been encouraged to start again after reading about Bernard Matthews who started out with only a couple of turkeys. She has ambitions of owning old aircraft hangers, full to the struts with chickens. The enterprise is to begin at the allotments, which is where she’s been fermenting her potato gin these last few months. She has sheds down there and has become something of a pin up for the gardening fraternity. The chickens will have a free run of the ground where she’s been growing potatoes.

At eleven, the doorbell rang. Gabby was in the bath with her cockerel so I answered it.

‘Ah, I wonder if I might have a word with the lady of the house?’ asked a man in blue overalls. He was in his fifties, grey hair had ebbed to leave behind a pale pink tidemark of skin. He also had that style of thin moustache that went out in the fifties. ‘You are Mr. Dale?’ he asked.

‘I am,’ I replied, gesturing down to my personalised thong which reads ‘Chip Dale’ in a hardly discreet font.

‘Of course you are,’ smiled the man, his eyes flicking briefly southwards. ‘May I have a word with your wife, Mr. Dale?’

‘I’m not married,’ I said and again gestured to my thong as though it’s the answer to everything. Which, of course, it is.

‘Oh, but I was told Mrs Gabby Dale lives here…’

I shook my head. It’s not the first time that Gabby has been using my surname. She claims it gives her a cloak of anonymity in her business deals but I think she gets tired of trying to spell her surname.

‘She’s in the bath,’ I explained. ‘But she’s not my wife. She’s my Romanian girlfriend.’

‘In which case,’ said the man. ‘I’ll wait.’ And with no more ado, he brushed me aside and entered the flat.

No sooner had the man seated himself on the sofa than Gabby came out of the bathroom, walked straight through the flat, heading to the bedroom. The bird followed her, as did the man’s eyes. He’d clearly never seen a naked Romanian followed by a cockerel before.

‘With you in moment, birdman,’ said Gabby. ‘Chip make you drink. Chip make drink for birdman.’

‘Whisky if you’ve got any,’ said the man, looking a little flushed.

‘Can’t say I don’t blame you,’ I replied, going to fill two glasses.

‘I’m here about the hens,’ explained the man. ‘My name is Green. Graham Green.’

‘Ah, like the writer,’ I said, ready to tell him about my FE classes in English Literature.

‘Without the terminating e,’ he explained and then added. ‘I’m not a writer. I’m in the poultry business. The young lady is interested in buying hens to compliment her cockerel.’

‘A cockerel like that probably needs a lot of complimenting,’ I pointed out.

‘Oh, aren’t all men the same, Mr. Dale?’

I again gestured to my thong. He nodded his head in agreement.

After that, business was concluded quite quickly. Gabby returned and agreed to buy twenty three hens, to be delivered to the allotments that afternoon. I kept pretty quiet until the end when we were showing Mr. Green out.

‘One thing,’ he said, pausing in the doorway. ‘I suggest you don’t leave these hens alone for a night or two.’

‘Surely we shouldn’t bother them on their wedding night,’ I observed. Gabby elbowed my in my ribs but I felt the pain in my thong.

‘You should be around until you’ve tested your defences,’ explained Green. ‘A fox could kill them all in an evening.’

And that’s where Gabby is now: arranging to have a double wire fence put around the allotment and buried to a foot below ground to stop any foxes from tunneling under. The hens are to be delivered this afternoon and I’m to expect a phone call anytime now to tell me to take the cockerel to its new lodgings.

The most significant thing about the whole episode is that it turns out that Gabby has to travel to Glasgow this evening, and since the birds can’t be left alone, I’ll be guarding them for the next couple of days. I’ve got myself a sleeping bag, a camp bed, a torch, and more potato gin than is totally sensible to give a man when he’s feeling a bit down.

So, tonight, as you sit blogging by the fire, spare a thought for me and the chickens.

Sorry

I was a bit curmudgeonly last night, for which I’m sorry. I finished reading The Mysterious Island yesterday afternoon and I didn’t realise how much it had affected me. Not only had one of the reviewers at Amazon ruined a big surprise in the ending, but I’d really begun to rely on the book to cheer me up. It wasn’t a book that changes lives but it was a book that reaffirmed something about life, and for that reason it was so much more welcome.

I have little planned today but I'll try to be more optimistic and try to remember that ever thong has a silken lining. Or something like that...

A Sulk Before Bedtime

I’m sulking and I don’t feel like coming out to play tonight.

Well, okay… If you insist, but I’m telling you that there’s a glint in the The Chipster’s eye tonight. You really don’t want to cross him.

I’m moody. I guess you know that about me by now. Some nights I feel like telling you a story about my day and then other times I get all serious and thoughtful. Nobody reads those pieces, no matter how much I work at them. And I then feel yay high to a daisy. That’s when I begin to brood.

Today has been one of those days when the world seems to have gone out of its way to rile me. So, in the hope that it will lead to some psychological cleansing, I’ve made a list of the things that have led me to this moment, sitting with a bottle of whisky at my elbow and growling menacing threats at the TV.

Things That Have Really Got On The Chipster’s Nerves Today

1. Getting very few emails from real people. I like emails from real people. I hate newsletters. I hate sale information. And I hate SPAM. Today I received an unbelievable amount of SPAM. Hence…

2. Spammers. How many deposed Presidents of the Congo are there and why do their widows always write to me to ask to use my bank account? It’s this kind of irritating behaviour which probably got them deposed in the first place. I’m beginning to think exile was too good for them.

3. The news that Vic Reeves has landed a book deal for his short stories. Do you know how much of a market there is for short stories? None. That’s why people don’t tend to write them. They don’t sell as books. Unless, I suppose, they’re written by a celebrity. Which makes it all right. Pass me the whisky…

4. Professionalism. I’m surrounded by it and it’s ruining blogging. I hate these people who run blogs full of ‘professional advice’. These are the same vacuous fools who go on ‘The Apprentice’ but have no idea about how to do a job. They are the people who take their CVs more seriously than their qualifications or their ability to do a job. I am so much more than my CV.

5. Spamming professionals. People who leave comments on blogs that are tangentially related to the subject of the blog they’ve created full of tedious ‘life advice’. You mention something about CVs and along they come, with their holier than thou attitudes.
6. I hated staring at Steve McLaren look out at me from the TV screen all day. It was like looking at a death spasm. I really needed the whisky.

7. The most beautiful weather of the day but stuck listening to next door’s gardener playing his music too loud and occasionally shouting the length of the garden to announce that he’s dug up the skeleton of yet another of their daughter’s previous pets.

8. The woman in Tesco asking me if I wanted help packing my bags. I’m beginning to think I should just say ‘yes’.

9. Will Farrell has made another lousy movie. Anchorman was terribly unfunny. Yet I forgive him so much because of the ‘More Cowbells’ sketch he did on Saturday Night Live. The whisky makes me do crazy things…

10. My back has been aching again but if I don’t perform on Saturday night, I'll have no money for next week.

11. The prospect of having to get a job. The prospect of giving up my blog. The prospect of working in Tesco, asking people if they want me to pack their Will Ferrell DVDs in their shopping bags, before spending an afternoon discussing my professional career profile with somebody in management who longs for nothing more than to get on The Apprentice or marrying a rich SPAM King from the Congo.

I’m now going to bed sober but I’m sure to have a hangover in the morning.

Night night.

This is what I do and I'm doing it

I thought this morning’s lesson went rather well. I submitted my homework (which I’ll post here as soon as I’m done with this) and we read some more poems, some of which even rhymed. I was really delighted by the whole episode.

During a chance conversation during our break, Mrs. Rust mentioned that any of us with a ‘yen to write for a living’ must buy either The Writer’s Handbook or The Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook. And like the conscientious student I’m so desperately trying to be, I immediately nipped out to my local Waterstones and bought myself a copy of each. I’ve been locked up in my den since then, giving them a full and proper examination.

And my conclusion?

What a crock it all is!

Let’s be clear on this. There’s nothing I enjoy doing more in this world than writing. There’s nothing I’ve love more than to earn a living by making people laugh with my vaguely incompetent mutterings. But let’s also be clear: I’m not a man to be treated like a petulant child. I don’t want to be mocked, mimicked, patronised, or consoled. I don’t want somebody to take my dreams and package them between two bright yellow covers and tell me that all my ambitions can be realised if I unlock this prize with a £15 donation to the cause.

In other words: I’m pretty sure if there’s a certain way to become a writer, this isn’t it.

And, besides, what does it mean to be a writer? I've been thinking about this quite a bit recently. Reading other blogs have helped me come to the conclusion that I am already a writer. I write every day, sometimes for hours on end. I would like money for my pains, but the whole reason I do this is because I love putting words on the page. I like the way they sound, the ways they sometimes jar. I love the patterns I can make. I like how they sound on the ear, sometimes sad and sometimes funny. I don't know what it is to be a writer beyond doing this. This is what I do and I’m doing it.

So, perhaps what people mean when they say they dream of being a writer is that they dream of the writer’s life. Which, I might add, is probably all that it is: a dream. The considerable number of people I know who claim they want to write, find an amazing number of reasons why they don’t. They realise, I suppose, that the reality of writing involves hard work at some point in their day. And who wants to be stuck alone for hours on end, many of which are spent reflecting on your own inabilities to do your job well?

The solution to hard work is to buy a book that solves your problems. These books placate us all by making the path to publication sound so reasonable. The delusions begin with their descriptions of agents. Yet reading between the lines, it’s a matter of ‘don’t call us, we’ll call you’. Agents attract bad writers like gadflies are attracted to... Well, perhaps the simile doesn’t quite work. My point is this: is there any way to get an agent to notice you other than stripping off and parading up and down outside their offices? No, I mean it. Is there any other way? When I tried the stripping off route (on seven different occasions with five different agents) I was arrested three times, groped twice, and in every other instance told that ‘we only deal with established writers’. This is the only reason I can see that 'Chip Dale's Guide To Thongdom' has still not made it to the shelves of hardbacks.

Yet I hardly blame them. I don't blame agents and I don't blame publishers. I blame The Writer’s Handbook. I blame The Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook. I blame every creative writing workshop. I blame the industry that has formed around the many millions of people who found that their PCs came with a keyboard. I blame the people who confuse typing with writing.

And I suppose in the end I also blame myself for thinking that I’m any different.

As Mrs Rust said to me at the end of this morning’s coffee break: ‘You know, Chip. It would probably be better for you if you stayed as a stripper.’

I nearly told her that this is what I love to do and I really don't want to stop doing it

A Brief Late Update

I’m sure it comes as something of a surprise to all of you who think my every day is a packed thong of worldly delight, but I had a very quiet Monday. The only thing to happen of any great note was Gabby announcing that she has been thinking of getting a tattoo of Lembit Opik riding a snake. I naturally talked her out of the whole silly business and I also sorted out yesterday’s disagreement.

One incidental note: I had a phone call today from Mike who runs the Green Dragon Tavern. He asked about my back and I’ve agreed to dance this weekend. He was also wondering why I’d ignored him today in the town centre. I explained I hadn’t been in the town centre, to which he sounded quite surprised as he swore that he’d spotted a pair of maroon hot pants. He laughed it off and said he was probably mistaken as it was hard to see them beneath the black raincoat the man was wearing.

I didn’t say a word but I clearly now have to ask the obvious question: has Reverend Hope taken to wearing my discarded hot pants?

Tomorrow I have my weekly FE lesson. I'll post details as soon as I get home.

Christian Charity

On most days, if you managed to grab me when I’m out about town, you’d find that when it comes to making charitable donations, I’m as generous as my thongs are unfeasibly large in the crotch. I might run a mile when it comes to Comic Relief (and, I should add, that's an unsponsored mile) but I’m always happy to do my bit for the lesser known charities.

You might remember that I was one of the founding members of the Erotic Dancers For Donkeys appeal. I’m proud to say that we saved one of Rhyl’s oldest creatures from the knacker’s yard and he can still be found painfully carrying sticky children for mile after mile up the sands here in North Wales. I also once did a sponsored nineteen hour thong marathon to buy the minibus which the local scout master subsequently used to ram raid the local off-licence during a drunken night out on the town. You might say that I helped him get his ‘criminal damage’ badge.

So, Charity is The Chipster's lifeblood, which is why, during an idle few minutes last week, I sorted through some of my old costumes. Even when I retire an outfit, they tend to be still as good as new. There may be a little bit of spoilage from all the body oil but not so much that they’re not wearable for everyday use. And since they’re all ex-stripper stock, every idem of clothing has the added advantage of having elasticated seams, easy to put on and even easier to take off.

Every six months or so, I’ll donate a few costumes to the local church, who are always quick to pop around and take them off my hands. I like to think that it’s the church’s way of saying that it has finally abandoned its outdated opposition to Lyrca, and between you and me, these charity donations have done the mischievous side of my nature no end of good, especially seeing the good Reverend Hope wearing my old black raincoat around town. It once use to feature in my 'Secret Agent' routine – the one involving the camera with the telescopic lens – so whenever I see him on a rainy day, I’m tickled in most unusual and slightly heretical ways. I don’t think it could amuse me any more, even if I thought of him wearing a dog collar and thong.

Today, the vicar’s wife came around before the evening service to pick up the bags of clothes I’d decided to donate. We’d gone to look at them in the spare bedroom where we got to discussing the price the church might ask for a pair of bright magenta hot pants I’ve worn only once. That’s when Gabby burst into the room and accused Mrs Hope of being Amy Winehouse.

Yes, I thought that a little odd, too, but clearly the poor girl had been reading yesterday's entry in this blog and due to her poor grasp of the English language, had assumed I was having an affair with a heavily tattooed singer.

‘You raven haired temptress!’ spat Gabby, impressing me with a couple of new words of English and the poetic use to which she put them. ‘You come steal Chippy. You not get away! You tattooed bãşinar!’

And if you learn nothing else today, you can at least assure yourself that you now know the Romanian word for ‘farthead’.

‘I beg your pardon?’ said Mrs. Hope, full of that crispy Christian confidence you get when you know you’ve got full holiday insurance for the afterlife. ‘Who exactly are you?’

‘Me?’ asked Gabby, stabbing herself with a finger. ‘I am Gabby. Pretty Girl. Singer of hokey cokey!’

Mrs. Hope laughed. ‘And what, pray tell, is hokey cokey?’

Well, Gabby wasn’t taking such as insult sitting down. Nor was she for taking it standing up either. She took it flying through the air, grabbing Mrs. Hope by her throat before swinging her to the bed.

It was a truly terrible scene to watch from the safe distance of my hiding place behind the wardrobe. A fight developed between the vicar’s wife and my Romanian and, in its ferocity, it rivalled those battling gypsies in From Russia With Love. If I’d still had my secret agent costume, I might have taken the James Bond role and leap in to protect Mrs. Hope. But I didn’t, so I couldn’t. Besides, I noticed that Mrs. Hope was holding her own – technically holding a good chunk of Gabby’s hair – so I was tempted to see how it developed. In a way, it was a battle between rival theologies and I was interested to see which one God would favour this time.

Indeed, I wouldn’t have got involved at all if Gabby hadn’t managed to pull off one of those moves she’s learned from all the Jackie Chan films she watches late at night. She ran up the wall and did a back flip over Mrs. Hope who crumpled beneath the weight of our favourite Romanian export. That’s when things got out of control. Now with the upper hand, Grabby attempted to rip the poor woman’s blouse off, demanding see a tattoo of Lembit Opik riding a snake.

My mind went cramp with the fear that Gabby might actually win and that I might also be stuck with a pair of maroon hot pants. I knew I had to act. Even Oxfam won't take maroon hot pants.

I grabbed my Romanian buttercup by her left leg and dragged her from the room and straight into the bathroom where I deposited her in the bath and turned the cold water tap on full. The room immediately began to fill with steam. I quickly nipped out and strapped the door shut with my belt wrapped around the handle and tied to the radiator.

Mrs. Hope was easier to calm down. She was still in the spare room, clutching a sponge-sized piece of Gabby’s hair.

‘So sorry about that. It was a case of mistaken identity,’ I said, holding up my now beltless pants with one hand. ‘I don't suppose you've heard of Amy Winehouse?’

She hadn’t, and if I’m honest about it, didn’t seem to care to learn a thing about her.

In the end, I managed to placate Mrs. Hope with a few extra items of clothing. These Christians are very forgiving, but I warn you to never believe a word that they tell you.

Anybody can be bought off with a couple of fur lined thongs.