The Rip in the Fabric of the Universe ...

... but since he had failed to pass on this revelation to the wider community, he had condemned any other penguins suffering from a cork-jammed beak to a short and painful future.

The waddling little dinner-suited git suffered immediate and appropriate retribution when he strutted forth from the cupboard and was promptly trodden flat by the Mother Farcquar who was stomping about the 'tween decks in search of further victims of her evil lusts.

Thus it was that the beneficial effects of the frat were snatched from common understanding just as they were on the verge of being revealed.

"Bugger!" said Staines.

"We know you are!" chorused the entire crew and ...

(...despite being noticeably absent from this thread for several months, Heave-ho had no trouble picking up the gist of procedings)and just as it seemed to him that things couldn't get any worse...through the rip in the fabric of the universe, who should appear but roger, just in time to be...

... assailed by a rousing chorus of "Yo! Heave-Ho!' from the American crew members who had spotted the arrival of Heave-Ho and had remembered that, in addition to his inability to spell, he had a marked disinclination to pay up on his gambling losses. The Americans had - some time earlier - conned Brother Ho into an ill-advised game of craps and had ripped him off something fierce.

In the commotion of events surrounding the Worksafe inspectors, union officials and HR managers, young Heave had managed to absent himself. His reappearance now was ill-timed. The seppos had not forgotten him or his debts and with many a merry cry of: "Yo! Heave, ol' buddy! How's it hangin'? Where's our money?" - they pursued him into the fo'csle.

Roger, grateful for the diversion, proceeded to ...

put all his previous correspoondance thru the spell chequer, realising his spelling error, spoondance, inspired him to dance a jig and attempt to make a fortune.
Things were progressing nicely when an extremely irate psuedo Irishman, Michael Flatley, arrived on the scene and, in a psuedo seppo/Irish accent, announced, Begorrah, Bejaze Roger, oi'll have your nuts for this (which he was keeping for the hamsters), Roger was caught offguard and replied.........

why are you pretending to be Michael Flately when everybody knows your real name is Sean O'Bollox?

"Yes, you are correct, 'tis I, Sean O'Bollox, the RiverDunce. Long have I desired to be like Michael Flately, with his bouncy hair and silly pouncey prancing about - but alas it was never to be because I was born with a disability so grave in it's nature, so cruel in its irony, so wicked in its... wickedness... that I could no sooner rise above it than it smite me back down. For you see, I ...

was born without a reproductive appendage, which I never noticed until my O'Bollox was Sean, however, this allows me to perform some truly cunning stunts on stage such as..............

... the famous Twisting Double-Helix Ankle Tap! I actually won a prize for performing this in a competition. With unbelievably cruel irony, the prize was a jumbo-size container of Max Factor Knacker Lacquer (muffled cries from the lower decks of: "It Adds A Lustre To Your Cluster!")."

O'Bollox stifled a sob.

"Yes! Can you believe it? They actually presented me with the one item that above all else could have been designed to drive home to me the terrible gap in my life (and, come to that, my pantaloons). This never would have happened to that bloody Michael Flately!"

"But" cried Roger, "did you not know that your idol, the Lord of the Prance himself, is also devoid of loose dangly objects. How else do you think he can wear those tight pants without shedding a tear? You poor fool, he too would have collapsed on the stage if presented a jar of that wonderful stuff, for it is as much use to him as it is to you. There's nary a lustre to his cluster, unless it is provided by the efforts of the housekeeper in the Galway Inn in which it is proudly displayed."

"But how? How could such a cruel fate have befallen my hero?" wailed Sean of the vacant trousers.

"Well," began Roger, "it was a dark and stormy night ...

and he was muchly under the influence of that Irish brew, Bushmills, suddenly feeling the urge to relieve himself and wandered off down a dark corridor, it was dark befcause no one had paid the power bill or not able to find the switch.
He opened a door and assuming, quite incorrectly, that it was a toilet started to remove his pantaloons, for being Irish there was no zippers.
Being unsteady on his feet and in the dark he decided the performance should be conducted in a sitting position, and the deed duly done he stood up.
What he did not know was that he was in fact in a cleaning cupboard and he had sat on a mop bucket and upon standing up his foot press down on the lever that activated the rollers.
There was a blood piercing scream from within the cupboard and it was realised that...................

Roger would now also have a future career as a river duncer and soprano (or should I say mop straino?) maybe that is that he was now a spoonerism :confused: :confused: :confused:
Anyway, Heave Ho who had been hiding from the seppos in the cupboard, said "Bloody hell, roger you poor boy a man can't live with injuries like that!" And picking roger up he did what any true Aussie who was being pursued by rich predators and seeing no option would do, jumped into a billabong, singing "You'll never catch us alive...

Well ... he thought it was a billabong. It wasn't, of course. The incidence of billabongs on ocean-going craft is so low as to be undetectable. What Brother Ho and the emasculated Roger had so rashly plunged into was, in fact, merely the hatches leading to the orlop deck wherein lurked the Mother Farquar, who ...

who offered Heave ho the chance of double or nothing on his outstanding gaming debts. He accepted but on the condition that the game would be...

Strip leap frog!!!!!:eek:

... in rushed Staines, eager to join in the new game. As he ran, he attempted to unbuckle his pantaloons. This was a mistake. He tripped and executed an immaculate double-gainer with tuck and pike as he plunged headlong into the Mother Farquar's cleavage. Only his feet remained in view, kicking and struggling.

Much muffled ...

he muffled, " now I see why I keep coming back "

"to Brylcream".

"No no, it's the 100% cotton spencer tht I really admire" he said with a muffled cheesy grin. Just then, an enourmous elephant walked by the townhouse..

as they have a habit of doing. The really disconcerting thing about this elephant (apart from being on this street) was that he was wearing tap shoes because...

he was a fan of Michael Flately and enjoyed the sadistic, albeit artistic, pastime of tapping out ants on the footpath while singing I'm Dancing in the Rain.................

... which confused his admiring fans, who expected him to tap out the ants to the Pink Panther theme:-

"Dead Ant, Dead Ant
Dead Ant, Dead Ant, Dead Ant,
Dead Ant Dead Aaaaant,
De-e-e-e-ad Ant"

A voice wafted in on the breeze: "I am luking fur eh man with eh minkey".

It sounded distant and crackly, like an old 78 record. "Ave you seen eh man with eh minkey?"

"Do you hev eh reum? I need eh reum, do you hev eh reum?"

The voice was becoming more insistent, and sounded closer. Could the rendering of the theme from The Pink Panther by the martyred ants have brought someone back from the dead? No! It could not be!

"Kato?" ...

... a figure in a trench coat with a pork-pie hat - the figure wore the hat, the trench coat wouldn't have ... worn ... a hat, ...of course ... well, anyway, to resume:

The figure was accosted by a small dog yapping furiously. He looked warily at the dog and asked a nearby observer:-

"Diz your dog bite?"

"No, m'sieur!" was the reply. "My dog does not bite!"

The trench-coated figure bent down to pat the dog. The dog promptly bit him.

"I thote you said that your dog diz not bite!" exclaimed the trench-coated one.

"Zat is not ma dog, m'sieur!" was the nonchalant reply.

This conversational exchange confirmed it. Asking for a man with a minkey, asking for a reum, looking around warily for Kato, being bitten by an apparently ownerless dog....

Yes! It could only be ...

... the one and only....

Hercule Poirot. Yes, the silly little French detective with the egg-shaped head and silly upturned moustaches (why do French men have 'moustaches' and everyone else in the world with an hirsuite lip has a 'moustache'. Only the French know...). Yes, Hercule Poirot, champion of upper class twits, solver of murders, foiler of blackmailers, confounder of...

(pssssst)

Sorry? As I was...

(pssst, psssssst psssssssst)

What? I have the wrong stereotypical French man? Oh, so it's that silly one in that sitcom about the French Resistance? No. Well who the **** is it then?

The trench-coated figure took a step backwards and, in a single, dramatic movement, whipped off his pork-pie hat and trench coat to reveal a strapping, athletic physique, clad in a colourful but stylish jumpsuit of clearly interplanetary design.

"Eet ees I!" he exclaimed. "None ozzer zan zer famous, zer celebrated, zer well-known intergalactic celebrity: Flash Dordogne, Zer Franch Spaceman!!'

"Who?" said the puzzled, indeed mystified throng ...

I am Hercule Poiroit, and I am not a silly little Frenchman, I am a silly little Belgian.
Hercule was really peeved, again, as everyone referred to him as being French.
He exploded in a fit of fury and demanded that Mother Farquar set about bullying the scriptwriters into submission so this would never happen again, but she was nowhere to be seen despite her massive bulk............'Mother Farquar, where are you' he called and in the distance he saw ...............

much to his dismay...

...a wooden...

... whistle that would'n whistle.

Hercule recoiled.

"Sacre Bleu! Ma Foie and Coq au Vin!" he exclaimed.

Flash Dordogne didn't quite recoil. (His tights wouldn't permit of such a drastic manoeuvre - he had tried it once and needed several lavish applications of MFKL to partially restore the damage). Instead he raised a Gallic eyebrow:

"Mon Dieu! Zut Alors and Camembert!" quoth he. "Whut ees zees peeculiar moustachioed Belgian personne doing 'ere?"

"Good moaning!" said a familiar voice, in atrociously mispronounced Franglish. "I thonk he is attoompting to soolve a mastery. I ced be wrang, of coose. It hoppened wince - a ling tome agoo!"

Flash and Hercule looked at each other and said, in unison: "What did he say?"

Crabtree was unfazed by this and he ...

rewired himself so he was in phase......................

...with the three criticisms just levelled against him.
Totally disregarding them, he said...

"It's tome this voosell mede sim proogross! Coost iff - fare and ooft! Brook eet the fare t'gillants and sploce the meen brooce! All hounds on deeck!"

Amazingly enough, the crew seemed to understand what it was that Captain Crabtree required because they successfully engaged the mighty vessel's warp drive and promptly wafted across the galaxy at Ridiculous Speed.

This caused not a little consternation amongst the Francophone newcomers. Poirot's moustaches (you're right about the use of the plural form, Brother Silent - bit of a Gallic affectation, it seems). As I was saying, Poirot's moustaches were badly affected by the enormous shift in the space/time continuum consequent upon deployment of the ship's warp drive and they drooped sadly athwart the Belgian's prissy little chops. Flash Dordogne's skin-tight jump suit wrinkled badly under the stress, leaving him unable to strike the kind of manly and athletic poses that were his wont.

Clouseau, on the other hand (forgotten all that stuff about minkeys, reums and Kato, had you? Big mistake - Clouseau was there all right). Clouseau, on the other hand was not at all put out by the sudden gigantic intergalactic leap.

"I'm going to my reum to diffuse this bermb!" he declared.

"Bermb?!!?' said ...

Mother Farquar, diffuse my berm, thankyou, my emeroids are axtroomli pinfel, ploos purse them soo I mee by abel to sloop toneet................
didn't noo aah cood spake fronch dood yee

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Iain

didn't noo aah cood spake fronch dood yee

---

(massage for Eiaowen from the Captoon: Er you attoompting to teke tha pooss?)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Iain

didn't noo aah cood spake fronch dood yee

---

Schoolyard Willie, welcome to the BB.

Al :D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Driver

(massage for Eiaowen from the Captoon: Er you attoompting to teke tha pooss?)

---

Hey Col.
Dont go taking the p!ss out of our Willie!!:D

Al :o

Ignore him Col
You milk it for all it's worth.

(Listen, fellas, I keep trying to tell you, it's not me who speaks like that - it's bloody Crabtree!)

Meanwhile, back on the ship, the Mother Farcquar was attempting to respond to Clouseau's invitation to help him with his bermb. Little did the poor French fool realise that he would have been better advised just to shoot himself.

The Mother Farcquar, with an evil leer, reached over to adjust Clouseau's trenchcoat when, out of nowhere, a small black-clad Oriental person hurtled across, samurai sword aloft and crashed into the Mother Farcquar, uttering a wild oriental cry of:- ...

Bonsaiiiiiiiii.....................

... and presented the Mother Farcquar with a little tree ...

unfortunately for him, he tripped, sending the tree flying right into the...