Ah Cannae Tell a Lie

by Harry Morris

  The date was set for the latest engagement party and no amount of talking by Jimmy could persuade David to do the honourable thing and chuck her!

  As it was, we arrived and took our places at the party, next to the bar, or as near as we could get to it, and sat on the floor.

  Through all of his engagement parties, I’d never seen David look so happy and content as he was this time. It was sickening and was going to take an awful lot of Jimmy’s velvet-tongued persuasive powers to talk him out of it.

  After about a bottle and a half of whisky were consumed by us, Jimmy called out, ‘Eureka! I’ve got it! I know exactly what to say to him.’

  ‘You’ve came up with a good reason why he should call it off?’ I said.

  ‘Well, not really, Harry,’ he blurted out in a drunken slur. ‘But fuck it, this could ruin us as the Three Amigos! I’m going to have to tell him straight!’

  A short time later, David sat down beside us and consumed several large whiskies to catch up, in order to try and comprehend the utter tosh we were spouting from our mouths.

  Moments later, the timing was right for Jimmy to give it to him with both barrels blazing.

  He wasn’t going to spare his feelings, there was too much at stake for us, his best pals, and drinking buddies.

  As Jimmy prepared to begin his speech, with both of them sitting on the floor with their backs to the door, I saw Callie approaching.

  ‘Maybe this isn’t a good time to talk about it!’ I blurted out.

  ‘Don’t be daft. There’s no time like the present,’ Jimmy said.

  ‘Hear! Hear!’ echoed David, appearing pished already.

  I suppose I could have said something like, ‘Hi, Callie,’ and raised their awareness to her presence, but … Hey, it was a party and I didn’t want to spoil the fun and be a party-pooper!

  At that, Jimmy began spouting out his fatherly advice to David, unaware that Callie was standing directly behind them, listening to their every word.

  ‘David! You know that we are your best mates? In fact, we’re your only mates, right? But I’m trying to spare your feelings when I say this. So don’t take it the wrong way, okay?

  ‘It’s Callie. She’s not for you! I mean, just her name is a dead giveaway – Callie! I think it was Collie! And they’ve spelt it wrong. She’s an absolute dug! In fact, if they ever film a remake of Lassie, she could play the lead!’

  ‘And the collar!’ David added, jokingly.

  ‘She must be the ugliest burd you’ve got engaged to yet! And there has been some humdingers over the past few years!’

  The words were barely out of Jimmy’s mouth, with David sitting there beside him, nodding his head in agreement, when the entire contents of a can of beer were poured over both their heads by – guess who? Collie!

  Sorry, Callie! David’s ex-fiancé. With her impromptu action she called off the engagement, there and then!

  Suffice to say, that was the last engagement party involving David that we were ever invited to.

  Last we heard, he was happily married with five children!

  Harry’s Police Contacts Page

  …

  1. Grossly overweight Central Scotland beat man, 42 years old with 23 years’ police service and only 3 years away from an ill-health pension, seeks nimble sex-pot, preferably the female variety, for salsa dancing, glasses of tequila, hot chilli nights in with humid screaming passion. Must have own car and willing to travel. Accommodation provided.

  Police Box 07/55

  2. Verybitter and disillusioned Aberdonian Desk Sergeant, recently dumped by long-term cheating fiancée, seeks a decent, honest, hard-working policewoman, with big tits and long hair, if such a thing still exists in this cruel world of hatchet-faced bitches that look like men, and armed with battery-operated PR24 side-handled batons for company.

  Police Box 41/41

  3. Artistic Edinburgh woman, 55 years young, ex-Force Support Officer, delightfully plump, anorexic reject, loves eating in/out/here/there and interesting pilau rice dishes and getting caught in the rain, seeks mystic dreamer for romantic nights in and a right good shag … pile carpet for my lounge to lie on, in front of a two-bar electric fire with real flame effect while enjoying back rubs. Looks unimportant, visually impaired a bonus. Gagging for it!!!

  Police Box 69/69

  4. Govan cop, 36 years old, with blue eyes, medium build, brown hair, with a marriage rapidly going down the toilet pan along with my police pension, seeks an alibi for the 26th February, between 6.30–11.45pm.

  Police Box 11/45

  It’s How You Say It!

  …

  During my induction period within the police, I had to attend Tulliallan Police College for my initial training.

  The first morning we had to line up on the parade square, where the fitness and training sergeant performed a roll call of the students present.

  This particular Sergeant Jones was Welsh, with a broad, infuriating Welsh accent, which he tended to over-exaggerate.

  ‘TOMP-SON?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant.’

  ‘WIL-SON?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant.’

  ‘MORRI-SON?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant.’

  ‘POY?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant.’

  ‘Is it just POY on its own, or should there be a SON on the end?’ he asked, with a smirk on his face.

  ‘No! It’s just Poy, Sergeant,’ he replied.

  ‘I hope you don’t turn out to be a nasty little bugger.’

  There was a pause for a moment, before he continued.

  ‘MA-GOORIE?’ … No reply. ‘MA-GOORIE?’ … No reply. ‘I’ll come back to you MA-GOORIE!’ he said.

  ‘PATER-SON?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant.’

  ‘CLARK-SON?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant.’

  ‘MAL-COL-UM-SON?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant, and it’s pronounced Malcolmson.’

  At that, he looked up from his parade list, peered over the top of his half glasses, perched on the end of his nose and said, ‘That’s what I bloody said, MAL-COL-UM-SON, and you answered to it. Now, is that not how you pronounce it, MAL-COL-UM-SON?’ he said, with an intimidating stare at Malcolmson.

  ‘Definitely, Sergeant, whatever you say,’ Malcolmson replied.

  ‘Don’t try and tell me how to pronounce it. It is whatever I say!’ he confirmed.

  He then paused for a moment to compose himself before continuing.

  ‘MA-GOORIE?’ … Again, no reply. ‘If I find out you’re here, MA-GOORIE, and not answering to your name, you’re in deep shit, irrespective of if you’re male or female.’

  At that he gave an icy stare to everyone on parade.

  ‘MAC-EE-WAN?’ … Quick as a flash, McEwan replied, ‘Here. Sergeant!’

  ‘FEN-WICK?’ … ‘Here, Sergeant!’

  ‘BEL- … BEL-KA … How the hell do you pronounce your bloody name, BEL-KEE-VITZER?’

  ‘It’s Belkevitz! It’s Polish, and I’m over here, Sergeant!’

  ‘He looked over at Belkevitz and said, ‘Well I knew it wasn’t English, so why aren’t you over there?’

  ‘My parents emigrated to Scotland, Sergeant!’ he responded.

  ‘Well, from now on, I will refer to you as Belky!’

  Belkevitz didn’t argue with this.

  Then, after completing his roll call, he returned to the only name that had not been acknowledged.

  ‘Right, MA-GOORIE! Where are you? I know you’re bloody here hiding somewhere, because you ticked your name off on the sheet when you arrived this morning.’

  Still there was no reply from the students in the parade.

  ‘Okay then, let’s try it another way. Who hasn’t heard their name being called out this morning?’

  At that, a student in the second row put his hand up.

  ‘You! Step forward. And what’s your name, son?’ he asked.

  ‘MAGUIRE, pronounced MAG-WIRE, Sergeant!’

  ‘Is that right, Mister MAG-WIRE? Well from now on you will answer to MA-GOORIE, because I think it
sounds better, and you look like a MA-GOORIE! Agreed?’

  Maguire looked at him for a moment before agreeing to his request, but unfortunately for Maguire, for the rest of his entire police service, he was always referred to as MA-GOORIE!

  (Sounds better said with a Welsh accent!)

  PART FIVE

  Motorbiking

  …

  Whilst at Tulliallan Police College I met a colleague from Edinburgh, who told me a story about the time he was asked to perform the duty of a police motorcyclist at the Royal Highland Show.

  Although he hadn’t attended a motorcycle course, he held a licence to ride one, and as they were very short of motorcyclists for this event, they assigned him for the week.

  His duty was to patrol the Newbridge roundabout at the end of the M8 and M9 motorways and monitor the traffic.

  In order to perform this duty, he was given a brand new Norton Commando, a wonderful machine that could fairly shift.

  After a few hours of patrolling up and down his motorway area, he was instructed to return to the Highland Show for his lunch break, during which, with it being a very hot sunny day, he decided to have a walk round the area.

  On returning to his motorcycle, he received a call to assist another officer at a road accident on the round-about.

  With his confidence high, having spent the last three hours riding up and down the motorway on his Norton Commando, he mounted his bike and roared off across the grassy showground with blue lights flashing and siren blaring, as he headed for the exit gate next to the agricultural testing station.

  However, as he did so, he was unaware of the metal bar strung across between two poles, placed there to prevent vehicular traffic or the public from entering illegally.

  At the last minute, he saw the pole and braked hard, but the bike failed to respond and slid along the grass surface.

  Unfortunately for him, he struck the metal pole and was immediately thrown off his bike, but his speeding motorcycle continued on its merry way and collided through the front of a glass greenhouse full of tomato plants and continued to travel along the entire length of it, coming to rest at the opposite end, when it smashed through the glass at the rear.

  As a result of the accident, he was conveyed to hospital where it was diagnosed that he had sustained three broken ribs.

  However, that was nothing in comparison to the 120 or so trial tomato plants that his runaway bike had destroyed along the way.

  He still looks back on this incident and can’t fathom why all his applications to join the motorcycle section on a permanent basis were returned to him … Application rejected!

  The Hypnotist!

  …

  Paul McKenna was booked to appear at the Lochinch Police Club one night to perform his famous hypnotising routine.

  He managed to attract several of the audience up onto the stage.

  As he whittled them down, he was left with four volunteers, three men and one woman.

  One of the men just happened to be my old mate and permanent tormentor, Donnie Henderson.

  ‘Sleep!’ said Paul, laying his hand on Donnie’s head. ‘You’re in the desert, it’s really hot and you want a drink of water.’

  Donnie started licking his lips furiously.

  ‘Now you are at the North Pole,’ Paul said. ‘And you’re freezing your butt off with the cold!’

  Donnie started to shiver and rub his arms vigorously.

  ‘Now you’re back in Scotland, you have an excellent job in the police, a really nice bungalow in a nice part of Glasgow, a full international Bupa healthcare policy, you drive a top of the range Mercedes, you’ve recently been promoted to the rank of Detective Superintendent and you’re married to an ex-super model!’

  At that point, Donnie opened one eye and whispered out of the side of his mouth to Paul, ‘If you even attempt to wake me up, I’ll fucking jail you!’

  Cathy the Cleaner

  …

  One morning, I was over at the Castlemilk Sports Centre with the missus to put in some on the running machine and, when we came out, having carried out a physical work-out that Jane Fonda would have been proud of, we were feeling totally knackered, but dare I say it, completely fit … So we went into McDonald’s for a Big Mac and chips!

  As we sat there loading up with our daily cholesterol intake, my missus was drawn to the cleaner, who appeared to be very thorough in her duties.

  It so happened we needed a cleaner to call once, perhaps twice a week, to carry out some general cleaning and dusting in our flat.

  This wee woman appeared to tick all the right boxes, according to the missus. Only one more place to check – the toilets!

  Having visited the toilets and returned with a glowing report, she told me to call her over and ask her if she was interested in a little extra cash cleaning for us.

  After a brief meeting with her, we arranged that she would be picked up by me in the car and driven over to the house, where instead of the £4 per hour she was earning with McDonald’s, we would pay her £6 per hour.

  By the way, Ronald McDonald wasn’t picking her up and dropping her back off afterwards.

  As it was, on the Thursday of the same week, I picked her up and brought her to the house.

  ‘Okay, Cathy, I’ll leave you to see for yourself what needs to be done, but it’s all the usual things, like mirrors, dusting, emptying the dishwasher, hoovering … You’ll know what to do, I’m sure!’

  As for me, I retired out of the way to my office to do some writing and leave Cathy the cleaner to do the needful.

  After about an hour, I went through to see how things were going and, to my surprise, there was Cathy standing outside on the balcony, puffing on a cigarette, and there was the missus hoovering away in the lounge.

  I shook my head and returned to my office to carry on with my work, only to return to the kitchen some thirty minutes later to make a coffee, and lo and behold, there was Cathy in the kitchen, sitting at the table, supping away on a cup of tea, and the missus was in the bedroom, polishing the mirrored wardrobes.

  I might be slow, but I quickly assessed the situation and came up with the answer: something isn’t right here!

  I walked from the kitchen with my coffee at the same time as Cathy was going back outside to the balcony for another intake of nicotine.

  About an hour later, I again walked through to the kitchen to find Cathy rearranging the glasses in the cabinet, shortest to the left, tallest to the right, and where was the missus? Well, she was only down on her knees cleaning the en-suite toilet.

  After three or so hours of this saga, starring Cathy the cleaner and Marion the house owner/employer, I decided to call a halt to the proceedings, but not before Cathy decided to steal my thunder.

  ‘Harry?’ called out my missus. ‘That’s Cathy finished. She’d like a lift home now!’

  I was actually disappointed, because I was hoping she would say, ‘Harry? That’s Cathy starting, she’d like to know what to clean first!’

  ‘Right, run her back home and give her £25, she did well,’ the missus said, sounding convincing, but unaware that I had witnessed Cathy’s cleaning within the house at first hand.

  I was tempted to say, ‘£25? She did fuck all!’

  However, I decided that this would be Cathy’s severance pay included, and the sooner I dropped her off, the sooner I was rid of her!

  I walked back into the house, prepared to lay down the law regarding Cathy’s noticeable lack of elbow grease, but the missus was crashed out on the bed, totally exhausted and sleeping like a baby … I wonder why she was so tired?

  As for Cathy, no doubt she was sitting in front of her TV thinking to herself, ‘Not a bad day’s work. Three hours away from the house, having been picked up and dropped off, with £25 cash in my pocket for allowing me the privilege to do so.’

  Why can’t I find a job like that?

  I’m a Lesbian

  …

  I walked into a pub, sat down at th
e bar and ordered up a large whisky from the barman.

  As I sat there sipping on it, a lovely young woman came over and sat down on a stool beside me.

  ‘I’m sure I’ve seen you before, you’re a policeman, aren’t you?’ she asked me.

  I replied, ‘Well, I’ve spent twenty-six years up to now serving in the police force, preventing crime, locking up neds, protecting property and serving the members of the public, so the answer to your question is yes, I’m a policeman!’

  She smiled and nodded her head at me in acknowledgement.

  ‘Well I’m a lesbian!’ she said. ‘I seem to spend my entire working day thinking about women.

  ‘When I shower in the morning, I think of women.

  ‘When I watch TV at night, I think of women. In fact, everything I seem to do makes me think of women, women, women!’

  A few minutes later, a woman entered the bar and she excused herself and went over to talk with her.

  Just at that, a man moved from the opposite end of the bar and came over and sat down beside me.

  ‘I overheard part of your conversation there with the young lady. So, you’re a real policeman then?’ he asked.

  To which I replied, ‘Well, up until tonight I thought I was, but I’ve just found out that I’m a lesbian!’

  Purl One

  …

  Safety campaigners are using snapshots of a female motorist pulling a jumper over her head whilst driving along a busy road in excess of 30 mph, to warn other drivers of the dangers.

  The driver has since been given three penalty points and given a £30 fine for failing to be in proper control of her vehicle.

  ‘It defies belief that anyone would think that is a smart thing to do!’ said a spokesman from the road safety charity Safe Speed of Life.

  At one stage, while having no eyes on the road, and no hands on the steering wheel, she was being totally disrespectful to other road users!