HOW THE FALLEN ARE MIGHTY

A group of local meteorology enthusiasts has an explanation for the mystery objects which have been falling onto Froghill.

As reported exclusively in these pages, a sheet of metal, an industrial food mixer and a large tarpaulin have all recently landed in the area.

Weather wizard Zoe ‘Stormy’ Daniels, founder member of the Froghill Amateur Meteorologists Incorporating the Swansdike Heralds of Environmental Disaster (FAMISHED), told the Observer that it’s all down to climate change.

“It’s all down to climate change,” she said.

“The heating of the world’s oceans is creating a phenomenon known as El Embudo, a Spanish term which translates into English as ‘The Funnel’.”

According to Ms. Daniels, global warming leads to the formation of narrow columns of superheated air, high up in the Earth’s atmosphere. Once formed, these columns slowly sink earthwards. Should one make landfall, it will be easily be powerful enough to suck up anything in its path.

Rising thermals then propel the Funnel and its contents upward. As it reaches cooler air, its retentive power weakens. Anything it has collected is then released and falls back to earth.

“A major Funnel Event was observed over the town of Aliağa in Izmir earlier this month,” said the 24-year-old Ms. Daniels.

“We referred this fact to the Froghill Institute for Social History, who informed us that Aliağa is where HMS Ark Royal was taken to be scrapped, back in 2013.”

Working in close cooperation, a joint FAMISHED-FISH team has concluded that our recent ‘droppings’ were in fact component parts of the defunct carrier, picked up by the Funnel in Turkey.

“We have no idea why Froghill should have been the dumping ground,” said Ms. Daniels, “we have yet to understand precisely how Funnels travel or when they release their load.

“However, what happened here is a far from isolated incident.

“For example, a large number of ironing boards dropped out of the clouds and crashed onto a village school in East Timor last March.

“Two weeks later, a herd of Texas Longhorn cattle suddenly landed in a water park in Boksburg, South Africa.

“And just last month, a yurt full of adventure tourists was swept up from Mongolia and deposited in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

“As luck would have it, the tourists were actually from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, so El Embudo saved them the trouble of catching their flight home.”

IMAGINE - THERE’S NO HYGIENE

The Froghill area’s dirtiest restaurant has been named, following the publication of the District Council’s annual survey of local eateries.

Results from the Cleanliness Reinforcement And Protection (CRAP) Report reveal that Imagine, a John Lennon-themed restaurant in Traubert’s Heath, failed on every aspect of a 150-point hygiene scale.

“The place was disgusting, I wouldn’t keep a beetle in there,” said FDC public health inspector Peter Piecrust.

“Conditions inside were absolutely atrocious. As I was inspecting the kitchens, my gorge rose so high that it formed a lump on the top of my head.”

Among the infractions noted were scattered piles of animal dung in the dining area, a pair of dead tapirs in the fridge, several used condoms in a bowl of whipped cream and a family of Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs occupying one of the ovens.

The establishment has been forcibly closed and owners Richard and Maureen Best will appear at Froghill Crown Court next month, charged with multiple hygiene standard offences.

Contacted by the Observer for comment, Mr. Best said something so utterly filthy that we are not at liberty to print it.

ONE GIANT LEAP FOR SOPHIE’S RABBIT

A Cheetingham schoolgirl has won the £1,000 first prize in a nationwide poetry contest.

Sophie Manning, of Blackheart Lane, beat thousands of other children with her entry in the competition, which was sponsored by Bluddengutz Sausages.

Eight–year–old Sophie, a Year 3 pupil at Cheetingham Primary, wowed the panel of judges with her piece entitled I Used To Have A Rabbit.

Said chief judge Phoebe Wallaby-Ridge: “The panel were unanimous in their decision to award the prize to Sophie. Her poem displays remarkably able handling of such poignant and personal subject matter.”

Asked what she would spend her winnings on, a jubilant Sophie replied: “I'm not sure – it hasn’t really sunk in yet.

“But I think I might use the money to take out a contract on my teacher.”

The Observer is proud to reproduce the winning poem in full.

I USED TO HAVE A RABBIT by Sophie Manning

I used to have a rabbit

His name was Mr. Buggs

I’d greet him every morning

With cuddles and with hugs

I used to have a rabbit

I loved him very much

We kept him in the garden

In a little wooden hutch

I used to have a rabbit

He was the special one

He was my very best friend

We used to have such fun

I used to have a rabbit

But one sunny day

Death came to call at our house

And took Mr. Buggs away

I used to have a rabbit

He was playing on the lawn

When a car veered off the road outside

Because its tyres were worn

I used to have a rabbit

So sad to tell you that

The car came crashing through the hedge

And squashed my bunny flat

I used to have a rabbit

But before his body could harden

Daddy dug a great, big hole

And buried him in the garden

I used to have a rabbit

Mummy says I mustn’t cry

Says he’s happy and he’s hopping

With Jesus in the sky

IT DROPPETH AS THE GENTLE RAIN FROM HEAVEN

For the congregation of St Alfege’s, the Lord really does move in mysterious ways. Last Sunday morning, their prayers were answered in a way they could hardly have hoped for.

The Reverend Lionel Hassock closed his sermon with an appeal in support of the church roof fund. By way of emphasis, he indicated the stream of water that was cascading from above into a bucket by the side of his pulpit.

After the appeal, I led the congregation in the hymn The Lord Will Provide,” said Rev. Hassock, “and we had just reached the line ‘The scripture assures us, the Lord will provide’ when there was a sound that I can only describe as ‘flump’ and which came from directly above our heads.

“Then the stream of water suddenly stopped.”

So astonished was he, that the perplexed pastor abandoned the service and led his flock outside into the rain to discover what had caused the noise.

“Imagine our surprise,” continued the Reverend, “when we looked up to find that a huge tarpaulin had landed on the roof, perfectly covering the area where the water had been getting in.

“Such was our joy that we fell to our knees, there in the churchyard, to thank the Lord for His great bounty.”

This is the most recent in a spate of events which has seen large objects falling on the local area. A little over a week ago, a chunk of HMS Ark Royal landed in a Wythering garden, followed a few days later by an industrial food mixer, which flattened a car on Froghill Common.

Have you had an amusing or unusual experience with falling objects? Then why not share your story with our readers? Email your pitiful efforts to www.froghillobserver.co.uk/duckorgrouse or call our Isaac Newtonline on 0372 55055. Calls cost £372 per minute, standard rate.

OBITUARY

BIGGOT, Adolphus, of Catchpenny Road, Froghill. Passed away, aged 85, after a protracted battle with pernicious hypocrisy. Husband to Ada and father to Vladimir, Hermes, Brooklyn, Dweezil, Moriarty, Xenophon, Hancock, Ladybird, Griselda, Agrippa, Sun-Ra, Tesco, Bang-Bang, Drusilla, Herod, Khyber, Grytpype, Moon Unit, Cruella, Banquo, Heat Exchange, Socrates, Aldi, Everlast, Seasick, Bigfoot, Airduct, Pol-Pot, Satchmo, Gaga, Warhead, Groundhog, Chewbacca, Permafrost, Pullstrip and Brian. 

All funeral enquiries to: Buried Treasures Funeral Directors, Froghill. Tel: 0372 52481.

FOOD MIXER FLATTENS CAR, OCCUPANTS UNHURT

A car parked on Froghill Common was flattened yesterday afternoon after being hit by a falling food mixer.

No-one was injured in the incident though the car, a silver Volvo belonging to George Chitling, CEO of Chitling’s Balls and Brackets, was a write-off.

Bob Buttress, a dog-walker who witnessed the event, said: “I was waiting while Paddy did his business and I noticed this couple getting out of a car about a hundred yards away.

“The woman was obviously very angry and was shouting at the man. He seemed to be pleading with her, trying to calm her down.

“I heard him say something about promising to tell his wife, just not at the moment.

“Then suddenly there was this loud whooshing sound and a big object fell out of the sky. It landed right on top of the car. Hell of a bang it made, knocked the couple clean off their feet.

 “As I was looking for my mobile to call the police, the pair of them picked themselves up off the ground.

“She shouted something about never wanting to see him again as long as she lived and limped off down Swansdike Road.

“He just sat there on the pavement, suit all covered in dust and saying ‘My car, my car’, over and over again.”

The object was later identified as an EasiChef 500, a floor-standing industrial food mixer made of cast iron and weighing around 200 kg.

A police spokesperson, speaking on condition of cash-in-hand payment, said that the mixer showed signs of scorching, similar to that seen on spacecraft after re-entering the earth’s atmosphere.

This is the not the first time that Mr. Chitling’s vehicle has been destroyed in a freak accident. In the early hours of New Year’s Day, a brand new Audi A8 was consumed by fire after sparks from his trousers ignited the fuel tank.

MISSING MAN FOUND SAFE AND WELL

A man who went missing last week has turned up safe and well.

Willy Standing, who left his home last Friday to buy a newspaper, was taken into Froghill Police Station at just after 8 this morning. He was covered in bird droppings, feathers and small animal bones but otherwise appeared to be in good shape.

“He was in a right old mess and he was a bit confused,” said Sergeant Harry Parsnip.

“So we cleaned him up as best we could and gave him a cup of tea, but he seemed to be having trouble getting it down.

"Then he sicked up a vole.”

Standing, 54, of Bessels Close, Cheetingham, later told police that he had been abducted by birds of prey while on his way to the newsagent.

He recounted how a pair of white-tailed eagles had swooped down and grasped him by the shoulders, lifting him off his feet and carrying him away.

They took him to their nest in an oak tree on Traubert’s Heath.

Once there, he was kept captive by the birds, who fed him beak to mouth and seemed intent on raising him as if he were their own chick.

Mr Standing was discovered early this morning by an ornithologist, who alerted the police after spotting a limp hand hanging out of the nest.

Rita Standing, told by the Observer of her husband’s ordeal, said: “Eagles? What again? 

"That's the third time in the last two years.”

ROYAL PAYS LOCAL MAN A FLYING VISIT

An unexpected sight awaited Wythering resident Roy Barrowman as he opened the curtains yesterday morning. For there, smack in the middle of his front lawn, was a large chunk of metal with his name written across it.

“I’m pretty certain it wasn’t there when I went to bed on Friday night,” the retired sausage handler told the Observer, “because I’m sure I would have noticed it.

“So you can imagine my surprise when I looked out of the window to see this great grey thing with the letters ROY on it, sticking out of the front garden.

“Now I did think I heard a thud during the night,” he said, “but I put it down to a dream I was having about anvils.”

Unsure what to do about the situation, Roy phoned the police who, in turn, appealed to the Froghill Institute for Social History for assistance.

“It’s not really my area of expertise,” said FISH head Dr. Crispin Mortlake after an examination of the 10-by-16-foot metal sheet, “but judging by its thickness, colour and the presence of rivets, I would suggest that it’s a piece of a ship.

“Moreover, given that the three stenciled letters almost certainly form part of a longer word, I conclude that this is a fragment from the bow section of HMS Ark Royal.

“The depth to which it penetrated the soil suggests that it must have fallen from a considerable height,” Dr. Mortlake added.

“Mr. Barrowman is exceedingly lucky it didn’t land on his house.”

Asked what he intended to do with the huge and unexpected addition to his garden, the 79-year-old said he wasn’t yet sure.

“I’m not yet sure,” he said, “though I might turn it into a water feature. After all, it’s got my name on it and no-one else in the street has one.

“But that’s not my main worry at the moment,” said Roy, “because the cat didn’t come home yesterday and I can’t think where he might have got to.

“The last time I remember seeing him was the night before last, when he was out on the front lawn, playing with one of my old surgical supports.”

USAIN BOLT SAVES WOMAN IN PANCAKE ORDEAL

A Swansdike woman is recovering in hospital today after a traumatic near-death experience with a pancake.

Evie Jemlettis, of Squinting Lane, was in the kitchen yesterday making pancakes, when a routine toss went badly wrong.

“I flipped the pancake into the air, just as I always do, but instead of falling back into the pan, it fell on me,” said Evie, from her hospital bed.

The pancake landed on her head, moulding itself instantly to her face and forming a hermetic seal over her nose and mouth. Unconsciousness followed and Evie fell to the ground, just minutes away from death by asphyxiation.

It was then that family pet Usain Bolt, who was in the kitchen with her, took the action that was to save her life.

“We named him Usain Bolt because he was always running everywhere as a puppy,” explained Evie’s husband Ted.

Seeing his mistress lying motionless on the floor, the doughty dachshund realised that something had gone terribly wrong.

“He rushed to the telephone in the hall, knocked the receiver off its cradle with his nose and then hit the speed dial button,” said Ted.

Exotica enthusiast Ted was in the garden shed, looking through some old magazines he’d collected as a teenager. Puzzled at receiving a call from home on his mobile, he answered immediately. 

“I could hear Usain barking on the other end and immediately knew that something was amiss,” the 43-year-old told the Observer.

“Luckily, one of the things they taught him at obedience school was to bark twice in response to the question: ‘Is this by any chance a pancake-related, life-threatening emergency?’

“So when he barked twice in quick succession, I was off down the garden faster than the real Usain Bolt!”

Emergency services were called and arrived within seconds, paramedics performing the Schwarzenegger Manoeuvre on Evie as she lay on the kitchen floor. Only just conscious, she was then rushed to the Anti-Batter Unit at Froghill General.

“It was touch and go there for a while,” said a grateful Ted, as he sat by his wife’s bedside, “Evie wouldn’t be here now had it not been for Usain’s quick-thinking.”

Asked whether she would ever be cooking pancakes for the family again, Evie smiled weakly and shook her head.

“No, I don’t think so,” she said. “I think it’s time to admit that I’m a useless tosser.”

MISPRINT

Due to an editorial oversight, a misprint occurred in yesterday’s edition of the Observer. In a report from the Wythering Annual Flower Show, we stated that “the judges were favourably impressed by George Mackerel’s beautifully furled pink penis”. That should, of course, have read “beautifully furled pink peonies”. We apologise to Mr. Mackerel and his family for any offence caused.

IT’S OFF TO THE MOON FOR THE GUINEA PIG GUINEA PIG

Durwood ‘Doc’ Pigeon, whose HydroVac 2000 vehicle desiccator is being trialled as we go to press, is hardly a man to rest on his laurels.

Work on his next – and easily most ambitious – project is already nearing completion.

“I’m going to send my pet guinea pig to the moon,” the jubilant inventor told the Observer yesterday.

“To the best of my knowledge, nobody’s ever attempted it before, so Lawrence will be a guinea pig in every sense of the word.

“The idea came to me after I successfully fired a Burmese cat across the Channel last year. It made a reasonably soft landing on a greenhouse roof and now lives with a family in Deauville.

“They write to me sometimes, but they tend to sound a bit resentful,” he added.

In preparation for the trip, Lawrence will be placed inside a Ziploc bag stuffed with vitamin-enriched hay. This will serve as both food and bedding during the voyage. Once he’s safely inside, the bag will be pumped full of oxygen and sealed.

With the bag secured, half a dozen cardboard tubes, each packed with a mix of gunpowder and barbecue briquettes, will be fitted into place around Lawrence’s body, using a large industrial elastic band.

“All six fuses will be lit simultaneously then, as they start fizzing, I’ll propel Lawrence into the air with the same catapult I used for the cat.

“As the force from the catapult is boosted by the ignition of the fuel, the whole thing should go critical and achieve escape velocity,” said Doc.

Once out in space, zero gravity conditions will cause the elastic band to slacken, allowing Lawrence to jettison the tubes by wriggling inside the bag. From then on, the 240,000-mile journey should take around two weeks.

“Lawrence has undergone rigorous mental and physical training to prepare for this,” said Doc, glancing affectionately at the impressively muscular rodent.

“Landing, in particular, will require him to exercise absolute discipline and split-second timing.”

By the time Lawrence begins his lunar descent, both oxygen and hay will be all but depleted, leaving little in reserve to absorb the impact. It is therefore crucial that he quickly creates a cushion of air around himself, to avoid a potentially fatal crash landing.

As the spacecraft enters the moon’s atmosphere, a small onboard cassette machine will click into play. The recorded instruction ‘Breathe! Breathe!’ will repeat at three-second intervals, prompting the cavy cosmonaut to massively increase his respiratory rate. His accelerated exhalations should fully inflate the bag and allow him to make a soft landing.

“I trained him inside a beach ball, connected to the hose of an old cylinder vacuum cleaner I’d found in the loft,” explained Doc. “As I shouted the command to breathe, I’d turn on the cleaner and suck the oxygen out of the ball.

“When I was satisfied that he was exhaling at maximum rate, I would throw the ball down onto a mattress, to simulate the bump of landing in the Sea of Tranquility.

“We’ve done everything we can and he’s 100% flight-ready. The only thing now is to wait until the beginning of the next lunar cycle, so the moon will be full when he arrives.

“That way, he should have the maximum surface area to aim for.”

When asked by the Observer how Lawrence would be getting back to Earth, Doc stopped speaking for a moment and looked pensive.

“Do you know, I hadn’t thought of that,” he admitted.

“But Lawrence is a resourceful little chap – he's bound to come up with something.”

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Sir, 

Two weeks ago, I found a pair of kidneys while visiting the Ladies’ in Everdene Road. They were lying on the floor in one of the cubicles. I imagine their owner must have had an unusually explosive evacuation and then forgotten to reinsert them before leaving.

Having no hormonal teenage sons to worry about, I took the kidneys home and put them in a jam jar. I have set a piece of steak beside them, as I understand the two go quite well together.

Concerned for their owner, I contacted Froghill police. They informed me that although they’d received reports of a pair of mislaid ears in a cornfield and a spleen in a vent at the Buried Treasures Funeral Directors, nobody had reported losing any kidneys.

If you mislaid your kidneys around the middle of last month, please contact me, as I'm sure life without them must be really quite ‘offal’. My email address is katy@frogmail.com.

Yours faithfully,

Kate N. Sydney-Pye,

Swansdike

NO IFS AND A BUTT - CORPORAL IN PEAK CONDITION

A Cheetingham man is to make a solo ascent of Everest for charity later this month.

Corporal Kevin Baldock, 27, of the Royal Tank Regiment, will attempt to scale the 29,000-foot peak on a pair of aluminium stilts. He will be raising money for The Woebegone Aspect Trust (TWAT), an organisation offering cosmetic surgery to bulldogs with self-esteem issues.

As regular readers will know, Cpl. Baldock is no stranger to feats of derring-do. Earlier this year, he successfully crossed the Sahara dressed as Donald Duck, in support of a charity promoting education at gunpoint. In May of last year, he swam the English Channel in a suit of armour, with all proceeds going to The Donkey Sanctuary.

Sponsorship will be provided by Wythering nursery Ladie Garden, which has presented Cpl. Baldock with a 210-litre plastic water butt, bearing the slogan: ‘Ladie Garden – come and see what we’ve got in our furrow’.

Nursery proprietor Sadie Ladie told the Observer: “I read about Kevin’s last exploit in your pages and was very impressed by his sense of originality.

“We're more than proud to sponsor him. He’s promised to plant one of our seedlings when he reaches the summit, to commemorate the event.” 

Asked how he saw himself coping with the sub-zero conditions on Everest’s slopes, the courageous corporal answered: “The stilts I’m using are over four metres long and should elevate me above the surface of the snow so, hopefully, frostbite won’t be a problem.

“Obviously, wearing the water butt is going to hamper my movements a bit. But, on the plus side, I hit upon the idea of packing it with the thermal cladding from my Mum’s immersion heater.

“So that ought to keep me warm when the going gets chilly.”