'Summer is-a-coming-in, loudly sing........um...er....'

'Guv are you busy?’

The ‘guv’ in question…(me)….Is lying back in the comfy recliner, feet up and a copy of the Radio Times resting gently against the bridge of my nose.

I open one eye and focus on the questioner.

‘Ah there you are guv, I thought for a moment the latest gripping episode of Murder She Wrote had caused you to lapse into napping mode.’

I clear my throat and through relaxed vocal chords attempt a reply.

‘As it um’….(clears throat)…. ‘happens young Bing I’……(second clearing is required, and then a third.) ……. ‘I was considering the efficacy of purchasing a case of wine.’

‘Blimey ol’ poop, decisions, decisions. And there was I thinking you’d nodded orft!’

I attempt to look hurt by this scurrilous accusation, but for some reason the lad is not impressed.

‘Well tubby chops, if you have a minute I would appreciate your aid.’

‘Certainly Bing, certainly. In what way can my, not inconsiderable experiences of life and problems in general, be channelled to bring a satisfactory fruition to your latest dilemma?’

(Dear reader, I don’t often speak in this manner, but I enjoy the way Bing cocks his head first one way and then the other, as I rattle out such a sentence.)

‘Well old big bonce, perhaps you could focus your blooming big brain on the matter of shifting the lid off the snack tin, thus enabling yours truly to partake of a snack or three?’

(I’m aware that I have been possibly cocking my head first one way and then the other as the lad replies!)

‘Crumbs, is it that time already Bing?’

‘It most certainly is old huff and puff.’

Reliability is the watchword for hounds like the boy Bing. Much of their routine is founded around their desire to eat a little, but fairly frequently. Unless otherwise distracted, the desire for dainty morsels is the ‘timepiece’ by which they govern their days.

I manage to extricate myself from the comfy recliner, and find Bing seated by the tin, eager for my arrival.

‘Hello guv.’

‘Yes Bing, I know where the tin is kept.’

‘Just checking old poop, you do have a mind that is apt to wander and so forth.’

‘M’mmmm.’

‘And such like.’

‘M’mmmm.’

Bing gently accepts the proffered nosh and beats a hasty retreat to the sunlit garden. Here, he sets about his mid-morning chomp.

Ah, there's something rather comforting in the daily round. A certain amount of order is rather important to one who, rather like a bee, is apt to trundle from one ‘flower’ to another. If you catch my drift…..or buzz?

Meanwhile……

Tea has been brewing, and a steaming mug of the ‘cup that cheers’ rests before me on the kitchen table.

Mid-sip a hound goes hurtling by on his way to the lounge. A long low growl is left in his wake.

Has he heard old happy the postman and his squeaky cart on his way to ‘Lyons’ ? (We live in a corner house.)

Or.....

is there an unexpected guest about to arrive? Not being particularly busy, I stroll back to the lounge to gather up the Radio Times and its leaflet about bargain cases of wine, and await events…..

‘Stone me guv they're back…big time!’



‘Who, what…um crumbs…er…what are Bing?’

‘Blooming Whizzers!!’

The old folk song ‘Summer is a coming in, loudly sing cuckoo’ springs to mind, and being the…um…er….well, chump I am, I sit at the piano and start to busk the backing to this delightful ditty as I sing along.

A certain hound stops mid room, and peers at me.

‘Here I am guv, tracking this here critter, and all you can do is tara-diddle away on that there box of tricks!’

‘Each to his own Bing, each to his own. Besides you’re the master of fly catching, I merely wish to add musically to the hunt, rather in the style of the old silent movies, don’t you know!’

The lad seems sort of placated, and stalks his way to the lounge windows in the hope of ‘paffing’ the ‘blighter’ with his hooter.



The verses and choruses are mounting up…(I’ve been improvising as the hunt continues before me.)



‘Excuse me oh tickler of the ivories, how many more flipping verses are there to this dirge?’

‘D-d-d-d-dirge Bing?’



‘You heard.’

‘Well I think about um er………20?’



I was ‘hootered’ away from the keyboard in quick time and joined the rogue fly outside in the garden….he having been paffed and chased off, and me with a bruised ego.

　

There’s no pleasing some folk.