FLOGGING A DEAD HORSE

After the gluttony and over-indulgence of the holiday season, a restaurant review would be rather over-egging the pudding, so we’re refraining from eating out until our tummies have all returned to normal size (with a little help from Playtex in some cases). On Christmas Day we had a sumptuous eight-course feast featuring delicacies from as far away as Auchan and Billa, accompanied by a bottle or three of very palatable chateau-bottled ruby nectar; after some perfectly immoral cheeses had been redeemed by a large glass of Harold’s favourite vintage port, we finally prepared to push our gluttony to the limit with one of Imelda’s incendiary Christmas puddings, which had to be ignited first to burn off the fumes. Harold took out his authentic army-surplus Zippo lighter which Bodger had sent him for Christmas, with “Kabul Harriers” engraved on the facing. Unfortunately, the fuel must have been syphoned off from Sellafield, and the pudding did a fair impression of Joan of Arc. We gave our After-Eights to the nice firemen - shame about the curtains - and settled down in front of the telly with a large box of Rennies, where we promptly fell asleep. Christmas viewing is not what it once was. I woke up in the middle of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and tottered off to bed around midnight, leaving Harold snoring away in his chair, still wearing his singed paper hat and dinner jacket (his trousers were still wrapped around the charred remains of the Christmas pud).

On New Year’s Eve we were invited to join a family party at the stud farm of Fergal and Deirdre O’Blarney, the well-known horse trainers. They live for horse racing, as you can tell when Deirdre fires a starting pistol in the kitchen, and Fergus shouts “They’re off!” as the whole family races for the table. Fergal’s Uncle Dermot, a retired jockey, was sitting next to me on two cushions and a copy of the Warsaw Yellow Pages. He cleared his throat noisily and often into a large Irish linen handkerchief with “Hotel Bristol” embroidered in the corner. He suffers from Tourette’s syndrome, that disorder where people keep shouting out odd words at inappropriate moments. It made it quite difficult to keep one’s mind on the oysters, which require great concentration to eat, especially after several pre-prandial Jameson’s. I had just loosened one from its shell and was about to daintily slide it onto my tongue, when Uncle Dermot bellowed “Fork!” and caused me to start violently. The oyster flew off the shell and into Uncle Dermot’s pint of Black Velvet*. I had to distract the old fellow for long enough to switch glasses with him, so turned to the assembled company and announced: “Uncle Dermot wants a fork!” which made them all laugh like drains. While they were all mopping their eyes and picking themselves up off the carpet I managed to snatch Uncle Dermot’s glass and replace it with my own, which left me with the dilemma of how to retrieve the offending mollusc. There was no elegant way of doing it without drawing attention to myself, so, noblesse oblige, I took a deep breath and a big swig of Black Velvet, swallowing the oyster whole. It was not a wholly unpleasant sensation, and I made a mental note to invent a new cocktail for my next drinks evening.

Still wondering how asking for a fork could cause such hilarity, I asked Uncle Dermot if he would like a knife as well, to which he replied that he didn’t need a fork and knife or a fork and fork. (Uncle Dermot also seemed to repeat himself unnecessarily, no doubt one of many after-effects of falling off horses at high speed). We got through the rest of the meal without further incident (if you discount Harold’s table manners), and as Deirdre invited us to trot round the paddock for Irish coffee, I drained my glass of Black Velvet … and found a very forlorn oyster lying sadly at the bottom. Uncle Dermot shouted “Horse!” and reached for his handkerchief once more. I’m afraid I passed on the Irish coffee, being first past the post to the bathroom.

After the hangovers had worn off, we set off for a few days in the mountains, where Harold was determined to conjure up the spirit of Sven, his alter ego from a parallel universe. Sadly, the the snowbound Swede refused to be summoned. Invoke as he might, (Harold standing on the mountain top with arms stretched to the sky chanting in Old Norse brought the black slopes to a standstill) there was no response from his nebulous Nordic nemesis. The vicarious Viking had vanished. Harold was nonplussed. Then, in the middle of the night he sat bolt upright in bed, took off his goggles and announced that Sven had been called up for Salt Lake City but said goodbye and thank you for the music. In that case, I said, you won’t be needing to wear your ski boots in bed any more.

It’s rather sad to see the end of Sven, especially as I hadn’t got round to penning part II of The Sven Files. He’d sort of grown on me. I will never be able to listen to Abba again without thinking of him. This is where the story ends, this is goodbye. However, I’m sure some other exotic spirit seeking a temporary home will be squatting in Harold’s subconscious before very long. Perhaps a Sioux Chief, or a Hell’s Angel … it’s quite exciting, a bit like living with The Village People. In the meantime, readers, if an elderly chap wearing a beige cardigan and a Washington Redskins baseball cap comes up to you and demands imperiously: “Do you know who I am?”, please tell him and point him in the direction of home before his batteries run out. Thank you so much