Day 35

Dear Diary,

This is turning out to be one of strangest days I’ve had since the day I was built, or at least since the time when I was new and shiny and The South Devon Rural Bus Company, which’d bought me new and sparkling from the Daimler Company, saw fit to rent me out to the By-The-Seaside-Holiday-Camp-and-Family-Fun-Park for a week of special summer spectaculars (as they called ‘em). ‘Course, that was a long time ago and things were different then, which in some ways was for the better and some for the worse, and I promise to tell you all about it later, when I have a spare moment or three. Promise, cross my heart and hope to be taken to Misther Florian Da Blossom’s Discount Used Tyre Emporium and sold for scrap if I don’t.

Since I last put away my pencil, Dear Diary, the tractor-jam in the middle of the street still hasn’t budged an inch, and in the back of the black limousine, Old Wanger Nose hasn’t shifted in his seat, either. ‘Course, he might just be having a nap (he looks old enough to do that on the spur of the moment), and, then again, he could be dead. If this is the case, since he’s been sitting still for an hour or so, he could’a died long enough ago for them wot makes the fun decisions to send him either upstairs or down into the basement. Being a bus, I don’t know much about such things, but if he has died, I’d guess they’ll send for Father Brady O’ Flanaghan Murnaghan of the Church of The Immaculate Septum on the bottom side of the island to get it all sorted out. ‘Course, if they move quick enough, they’ll probably find the vicar at Misther Doctor Bernie Da Gnu’s ‘Wash ‘n’ Wake Funeral Parlour for a Beautiful Goodbye’ seeing as how he goes there about ten times a day. Mind you, if they want to bury Old Wanger Nose hisself in that fancy concrete bunker tomb they’ve built for him on top of The Bank of Old Wanger Nose and not just his empty custom-made non-biodegradable plastic pretend marble coffin with the gold-plated plaque saying “Here sleeps Old Wanger Nose”, Father Brady O’ Flanaghan Murnaghan might be advised to put the old man directly in the sarcophagus and avoid any of Misther Doctor Bernie Da Gnu’s funerary ministrations. However, knowing folks around here, even if they does know wots going on (or’ve been reading over my shoulder the last coupl’a days) they’ll probably make a party outta taking bets on wot flavour cat food Misther Patchouli Da Fanny and Misther Doctor Bernie Da Gnu’ll make outta the old man’s innards. This is, quite naturally, neither here nor there, on account of I don’t know whether Old Wanger Nose has actually died, or whether he’s just malingering like old people does when they don’t wanna be interrupted by their wives or squalling grandkids.

Finian Da Fabricator still hasn’t come out of the bank, so we don’t know if he’s had any luck in rescuing Miss Milly Da Fardle’s luggage wot was filled to the brim with bingo winnings, or whether Miss Cabbage’s brother-in-law, Elmer Da Snog, has absconded with it out the back door and immigrated. So, in the mean time, I’ll probably fill up the time by going back to wot happened in the secret stainless steel body-stuffing laboratory in back of Misther Doctor Bernie Da Gnu’s ‘Wash ‘n’ Wake Funeral Parlour for a Beautiful Goodbye’. That is, unless I get interrupted or something more interesting happens.

As you might remember, Dear Diary, if you was paying attention and not watching daytime television at the time, several things was going on. Wot was left of Miss Louella Da Bunkle and Miss Merideller Da Mento had just been hauled away to The Gnu Fanny Deluxe Cat Food Company by Howard Donald Da Fardle, to be made into ‘Little Old Lady and Pickle’ artificially-flavoured cat food. Missus Milly Da Fardle, who’d been watching all this from behind the special eavesdropping screen in the secret stainless steel body-stuffing laboratory at Misther Doctor Bernie Da Gnu’s ‘Wash ‘n’ Wake Funeral Parlour for a Beautiful Goodbye’, was about to leap out and blackmail Mister Doctor Bernie Da Gnu and Misther Patchouli Da Fanny from here to kingdom come on account of their ingenious body-selling cat food business. But before she could do this and get rich, the back sliding door opened and the triple-wide coffin containing the Misses Purdy was wheeled in. Naturally, on account of Missus Milly Da Fardle having being a personal acquaintance of the Misses Purdy from childhood, and on account of she’d even been seen in public with ‘em when she couldn’t help it, she had a scientific interest in studying wot the conjoined triplets looked like after their clothes was stripped off and they lay on the three slabs wot Mister Doctor Bernie Da Gnu’d pushed together.

It was worth the wait, but with all the arms and legs jutting out this way and that, and with the various bodies starting and ending in different and unexpected places, Missus Milly Da Fardle needed about a half hour to figure out what was going on. Right then and there, Missus Milly Da Fardle made up her mind, after the blackmailing was over and she’d made herself richer’n she already was, to ask Ms. Billy Bob Da Rubble, who everybody says is a lesbian and more open about it than a can of Spam wot’s burst in the sun, and who made up the Misses Purdy’s clothes in a special way so’s they was almost not embarrassing to be seen in public with, how she did it.

Wot happened next was, while Mister Doctor Bernie Da Gnu and Misther Patchouli Da Fanny was debating wot flavour the Misses Purdy ought’a be, or if there was enough of ‘em to make ‘em into more’n two or three flavours, and if it’d be easier to cut ‘em into more manageable pieces before trying to fit ‘em into the refrigerated meat van (which I admit was in very bad taste, but it’s wot they said), Missus Milly Da Fardle went and had a sneezing conniption fit, right there in back of the secret eavesdropping screen.

Oh-oh, the front door of The Bank of Old Wanger Nose is opening. I’ve gotta put away my pencil and watch wot’s about to happen. I’ll catch up with you later, Dear Diary. Sorry if I’ve left you with your tongue hanging out like I did earlier. As I always say, so endeth the last few minutes at an inconvenient time.