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| 1. You're Fired!!!! |
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Halloween at Stepminder Castle...in the Northern Irish town of Rockfergus; venue for the annual...
STEPMINDER SPOOKS AND FIREWORKS PARTY
Talking of spooks, allow me to introduce myself; Lord Sidney
Dunlambert... owner and keeper of the castle, and mayor of the town. Pretty impressive, eh?
Except that I'm dead of course; have been for years!
And while being a ghost in an empty Irish castle - with nothing but cobwebs and the smell of rotten fruit to keep you company - isn't much fun, I've always looked forward to the thirty-first of October; the one night in the year when this place came alive again, thanks to my niece, Edna.
She's popped up here every Halloween from the Molly Malone Hospital where she worked, 97.23 kilometres south. She's a doctor, you know; probably the most gifted doctor in the whole of Ireland!
Unfortunately she's not allowed to carry out real doctor-type stuff on real people anymore because of her epilepsy. But brains to burn, and no mistake.
A whizz with fireworks too; I've been told you can see them from as far away as Scotland on a clear night.
And talking of hospitals, and Scotland, and fireworks...it all kicked off a wee bit early this Halloween at Moss Abbey Hospital near Galashiels, when new boss Sir Alan Sweetstuff visited.
At 4.45pm Sir Alan was presenting a 'Hospitals in Bloom' award to Ben Madigan, the most gifted, hard-working gardener in all of Scotland, despite his diabetes.
But at 4.56 pm a rogue firework hit the hospital's clock tower, and by 4.58 there were fire engines abandoned all over Ben's lovely lawns and flower beds.
Sir Alan didn't get to tell Ben the rest of the news.
*
At 7pm that same night, I was stood at Stepminder Castle's highest point. Down below, Edna was putting the finishing touches to her own firework display, as my super-sensitive left ear picked up a private helicopter, twenty-three miles north-east of the castle.
The closer it got, the better I could hear the on-board telephone conversation.
It went a bit like this:
The Butler:
'So how did you get on earlier Sir Alan?'
Sir Alan:
'Brilliant! I fired three porters, two nurses, a chef, five cleaners and a lab technician. And if a firework hadn't hit the clock tower, I'd have had time to fire that gardener guy too.'
The Butler:
'Ben Madigan?'
Sir Alan:
'Thats the one. But I'll be back over there later so I'll get rid of him then. Right now I've a castle to visit, for some more fireworks. Happy Halloween!'
The phone went dead, just as the helicopter came into view above Stepminder...and that's when I started to really worry.
*
Unbelievable! Talk about a party pooper!
My poor niece, Edna, had long since come to terms with being epileptic and had worked really hard to get it under control.
And yet there he sat... her new boss, Sir Alan Sweetstuff...in MY old chair...in MY study...in MY castle.
And he fired her.... FIRED HER!
Just because he had no use for an epileptic doctor in one of HIS hospitals.
Totally ridiculous! Who does he think he is...this Sir Alan guy? He's just a business man. What does he know about saving lives?
It's not like he's a doctor. And certainly not the most gifted doctor in all of Ireland; not like Professor Edna Dunlambert.
But before Edna could even answer back, a scream roared up from the castle grounds, and the most gifted doctor in all of Ireland was off out of the room faster than a rogue firework.
Within seconds she was on her knees inside Maud Pinkerton's ice cream van in the courtyard.
Maud was my dearest old friend (when I was alive) and she still came here every Halloween with her famous ice cream van for the party.
But tonight she had suddenly found herself struggling to get a breath after some cute kid tried to pay for his ice cream with a handful of sticky coins and a dry roasted peanut...
MAUD PINKERTON HAS ALWAYS BEEN ALLERGIC TO PEANUTS!!!!!!!
Edna pulled open the special drawer where Maud kept her Epipen injection for just such an emergency. She jabbed her quickly in the thigh and watched as Mauds breathing returned to normal.
Emergency over...but it would be a few hours before the patient would be well enough to be scooping up ice creams for the kids again.
There was nothing else for it; a quick ambulance trip to hospital for Maud (just to keep an eye on her), and an evening selling ice cream for Professor Dunlambert.
Sir Alan Sweetstuff was watching it all from the window high above when his mobile phone rang. It was his butler again, and the conversation went a bit like this:
Sir Alan:
'What is it? Don't you know Im firing someone!'
The Butler:
'Sorry Sir Alan, but I'm afraid there's been a break-in at the mansion. They got everything.'
Sir Alan:
'A break-in? Everything? Where was the stupid, one-eared guard dog?'
The Butler:
'Chewing on the bone the burglars gave him!'
Sir Alan:
'Bone? Right, he's fired too!'
The Butler:
'But Sir Alan...'
Sir Alan:
'Watch it, or youll be next!'
And with that, he hopped into the waiting helicopter and left the Stepminder Spooks and Fireworks Party behind.
Home to sort out the mansion mess.
But there was the little matter of Moss Abbey to deal with on the way.
*
Ben Madigan had spent all evening tidying up the grounds. Rushing backwards and forwards between the hospital and the garden centre.
The fire engines were long gone, but so too was the little rubber garden ornament that had sat for ages on the grass outside the ambulance station.
The porters called it a goose; the nurses argued it was a duck. But Ben Madigan had spent enough years cutting the grass around it to know that it was, definitely, a goose. And enough years to know that now it was missing, the Moss Abbey paramedics wouldn't be best pleased.
The helicopter didn't even land. It hovered noisily above the station.
'By the way Mr. Madigan,' shouted Sir Alan from its open side door, 'you're fired!'
'Fired?' shouted Ben, startled. 'Why?'
'I don't need you anymore. I've sold most of the spare land off to a builder. We won't have any gardens soon, so we won't actually need a gardener. See Ya!'
Ben sighed as the helicopter disappeared into the Galashiels night sky. It had been a long, hard day. He needed his insulin. He needed some food. And most of all, he needed a good night's sleep.
Just as well he'd planted that micro chip into the goose's rubber knee earlier in the evening after the fire fighters seemed to be taking a rather keen interest in it.
Tomorrow he'd switch the tracking device on and go find his little friend; hopefully before the paramedics even realised it was gone.
*
Check out the next blog - 'Goose on the Golf Course' - coming soon.
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