Dancing With Delight

 

March 2026

This week the Mill Theatre here in Canberra chose two of my stories to perform, Dancing with Delight and Being Alive which are below. Both were very well received. 

The actors brought the stories to life marvelously with just a chair, lighting and expression, so simple yet effective. I was fascinated, mesmerised. There is no screen and you are part of the stage and story, particularly there where the seating design is 'L' shaped, for intimacy.  Anyway, we had a wonderful experience.

Dancing With Delight

Old Gus had expired in the pandemic. In accordance with his wishes, a service was held at the Cremo, replete with music by Mozart, Midnight Oil, Bach, Cold Chisel and assorted other esoteric oddities to sound his passage to the heavenly sphere, or whatever path he might find himself upon.

'Once you're gone, you're gone.' he'd informed the missus, 'But y'know Marg, those Buddhists and Hindus could be right, your spirit might find its way into some other form, a boulder maybe or some other human or animal form, who knows? A plant, hey I might come back as a dahlia?'

And Marg replied 'And you know what Gus? I'd pluck you and stick you in a vase.'

'I'll take that as a compliment Marg.'

And so, also in accordance with his wishes, the family took his ashes to Coolo Ridge and scattered them around those blue-green hills. That night a passing fox noticed a different scent, sniffed, nudged some calcified pieces with its snout and gulped them down in what might be described as vulpesine enthusiasm; a rare epicurean foxy treat.

Old Gus awoke, vigorously scratched his belly with his hind leg, then behind his ear, shook his head, languidly got to his feet, stretched, went outside his den, shook his head again, pawed his snout, put his nose up, sniffed, and cocked his leg. A hot stream of steaming urine marked his territory. 'That should stop that bloody wombat,' he thought.

It was still dark but dawn was slowly caressing and awakening the sleepy earth, dismissing the stars, and colouring a new day. Old Gus said to himself, 'Bloody hell, slept in.' He sprang into a sort of canter along a fox trail experiencing a feast of smells in his snout, the dewy grass, humus earth, deep watery pond, animal droppings, reptiles, insects, tree and herb, in the cool sharp night air, so good he wanted more and more cool, sharper and faster and in his foxy brain Gus was propelling himself as though he were flying through it with a strength he'd never known, he ran faster and faster, way beyond the Ridge, following the Cotter river in an ecstatic blur. Some inner something was driving him and eventually he reached the Lyndsay Prior Arboretum car park.

Those so called Freedom Fighters were still there, and Old Gus had been known for his acute distaste of their hippyish anti vax conspiracy drivel. He cocked a leg and urinated on the van which proclaimed that the 'Satanic elite' had concocted the Covid bio weapon, that it was in fact snake venom and that it, together with the vaccination, was committing mass murder. Old Gus leapt and tore the flag and pole from its hanger on the side and dragged it to their previous night's smouldering fire. Yells were coming from the encampment. 'I don't believe it! It's the Devil in the form of a fox!' Old Gus thought 'Believe it Boofheads, Freedumb and dumber. So exciting, fabulous! I could murder a bacon butty.'

Young Ella was up early again, humming while she plaited her doll Angie and waited for breakfast.

' Mum... MUUUM. Angie wants her bacon now!'

'Ella, I'm cooking it, Tell Angie it won't be long!'

'It won't be long Angie. You know what she's like, she gets up tired and grumpy. She's been like this ever since she kicked Daddy out.'

'Ella, your father left of his own accord. I've told you that.'

'You told me once you kicked him out, anyway he's coming to take me out today. We're going to the playground and then he's going to buy me something very special.'

'Ella, your father is working today. And so am I. You're going to school where you can play with Oumoo.'

'Oumoo says that her daddy lives at her house. Why is my daddy not here with me?'

'Ella please don't start... this early. I've told you he wants to live with that bloody woman, damn her.'

'You swore Mum.'

'I'm sorry Ella, I rarely swear, it's just that... sometimes...' And she bowed her head.

'Mum why did Grandad Gus leave me. I miss him.'

'So do I darling, I wish he were here now, he didn't leave you, I've explained, everything lives and eventually dies, it was time for Grandad Gus to die, he would have stayed if he was able to. He loved you very much, in fact he loved you more than anyone.'

'Even Nanna?'

'Yes even Nanna although he loved her too.., in his own way.'

'Oumoo's Grandad lives at her home...'

'Angie, here's your breakfast, you can share it with Ella while I shower.'

Ella loved bacon despite her mum's efforts to get her to eat a 'healthy breakfast'. Her mum blamed it on her own father, Ella's Grandad Gus whose appetite for bacon was profound and who would always share it with his grand daughter when she visited.

Ella offered a rasher to Angie and glanced at the morning cartoon on TV. There was a movement outside the door glass. A large red fox sat on its haunches, smiling.

'Oh my beautiful boy' exclaimed Ella jumping up, clapping and laughing. She opened the door.

'Here my boy, you love bacon.' And the fox danced backwards shaking its rear from side to side, grinning before taking the bacon. Ella started to dance, laugh and clap. The fox knudged her affectionately with its snout and made that bark that sounds like a human laugh.

'Such a beautiful long tail, such a beautiful doggie. MUUUM, Granddad Gus wants more bacon!'

So as Ella's mum, Pam explained to Marg later.

'I came from the shower toweling my hair because she was yelling and there she was, her arm around this red fox, the fox licking her on her ear and cheek, and she's demanding that I cook more bacon for 'Grandad Gus' and put some Midnight Oil on. Whaatt?? I thought I must be dreaming and pinched myself. I mean, I know she's got a big imagination but Grandad Gus? Midnight Oil? Where did that come from?

'Who knows what the silly old bugger might have told her.' replied Marg. 'It's a wonder she didn't ask you for a glass of cab shiraz and a ciggie. Look normally I'd scoff at this, you know that, but...'

'But what?'

'Well, I know you're going to say I'm stupid but there was a red fox on my front patio this morning.

I shooed it off with a broom. I found later it had nicked one of the fish out of my pond. It was him. Bloody Gus.'

Ella always maintained, even as an adult, that her Grandad Gus had returned to be with her.

When the ashes of Gus had travelled through the internal passageways of the red fox and had been finally extruded in a copse of trees on Cooleman Ridge, Old Gus dissipated. He intermingled with the breath of trees, the veins of leaves, the molecules of earth, of water, the force of wind, the sigh and stillness of night, and lastly became the resolution and silence of death. But his spirit shone through in Ella's son Jordan, and Jordan's daughter Ella, and her daughter Camille,

the quirkiness of personality and depth of character was his legacy, this family was always a bit wonky somewhere, opinionated, whimsical, mischievous, a bit odd, but ultimately compassionate.

Heaven knows this spirit was meant to be, it added to Humanity.

                                                                    

Being Alive

“When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple, with a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me. And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves, and satin sandals, and say we’ve got no money for butter.” Jenny Joseph.

I'm not old yet, 70 is the new 50 in my book. There's life in this chicky babe, she's sparkling so she is. I'm a gal you don't meet everyday. I toddle down beyond the pale causing a stir in the social circles of this town, into the club with a flourish, my gorgeous smile and rapier wit slashing through those starchy, moribund, church ridden, camphor whiffy biddies.

“Good morrow girls, and how are we knitting and pearling today? Got the biscuits in the oven have we? By god the sun's up, you must be feeling frisky eh Edna, got the winter drawers off? Mine's red silk with yellow satin sequins, tell all your husbands. They've seen them before... some more than once. Only for special occasions ha ha.” And I saunter by in my hauteur and indifference to my table and my newspaper, read for an hour, cryptic crossword and then the highlight pen to the racing fixtures, totally ignoring the outrage, stares and whispers.

I don't have my purple ensemble yet but I do have the red hat, ha that and the brandy and butter.

Jeremy was my first, my only true love, ha ha the kids would laugh now. But you know how it is. You marry and you are in that bliss of early love, children come and the family brings its shield of togetherness, insularity, and somehow you find yourselves years later looking at each other thinking 'where did we grow apart, who is this person I married? '

Because you change over the years imperceptibly, and in minute increments you drift away from each other. A rift can form. And the strength of the marriage is tested. We managed but not without some rocky moments. Yes I'd give him some stick, a gee up, his head was always in the clouds with his stories and music, but hey I love him still, miss the poor bugger. He said to me on his deathbed 'Rene, take what life has to offer, you don't know what tomorrow may bring. I won't be looking, once you're gone that's it.' And he went in the next hour god bless him.

Norm the second, The Human Chimney I called him, wreathed in a cloud of smoke, puffing on his own demise. He lasted 18 months,. God knows what I saw there, but... yes, he wooed me, flowers, perfume, careless and useless chatter. A woman loves to be wooed so she does. Those biddies might attract some old goat one day, butt them up the clacker.

Dano On Parole, or as the kids knew him, Dano The Dipstick was the third partner. I was flattered by his tats, his pecs, his ponytail and his youth, to be honest. On the back of his Harley I was queen, red hair streaming in the wind, skirt up around my bum, howzat for a 60 year old? He said an older woman like me had more experience and that's his desire. He wanted me pressed against his back, loved my voluptuousness, he reckoned I was cosy, his portable heater. Oh but he was a beast, an animal, the kids knew it when they saw the bruises and begged me to leave him. Problem was, it was my house and he wasn't going. “Get yer arse over here Rene, I won't tell ya again.” I can hear him now, through this song of the pokies plinking and buzzing.

Deliverance came late one afternoon. Dano had been on the turps. “Hey Rene, CLUB, let's hit it. NOW, not fuckin' tomorrow. ” And I followed him to the back stairs. It had been raining, the stairs are steep, and slippery in the wet. “Well, he just went down, must have slipped...” I explained to the coppers. “A fall like that... even the thickest of skulls can crack. I mean, he's a big bloke, and crack he did. A fatal fall. A bit of a yell then a loud crack on the concrete. Blood and brains. Oh mercy, what will I do now?” I was pretty distressed I can tell you.

And now I find myself in the twilight of my years, not old though, naaah there's a few more Ks left in this tank. I shall have an occasional dalliance if the mood takes me. All off - bar the red hat ha ha, The Merry Widow they call me. I shall go to the smartest, most expensive restaurant in town in my trackies and order just the soup, in French. I shall lob rocks on Edna's roof at midnight. I shall crash her soirees with my bikie mates carrying their slabs of beer. I shall practise my trombone on the beach until the dawn arises, then swim. I shall steal corflutes at election time and use them for a bonfire. I shall shine and sparkle like Venus.

I shall make my kids and grandkids laugh at my silly ways, my silly stories. I shall feel my blood singing, my heart pumping gloriously. I shall be ALIVE. I have heaps to do.

“Hey Edna, cryptic crossword clue 'Go higher, old maid'. Stumped? Biddies. Think about it... yeah up yours too.”

In the glovebox - Music in the car

 These discs below I've been listening to on my trips to and from my morning walks. They're an eclectic collection to accommodate most moods. 

Sometimes you just want a jolly upbeat start to the day and Ian Dury is your man.

A wordsmith of prodigious Cockney proportion, often tongue in cheek, sometimes outright salacious (Mash It Up Harry) sometimes achingly poignant (My Old Man) sometimes brutally hilarious (Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick, Billericay Dickie) but always with a tale to tell, and backed by The Blockheads, a formidable band to colour his vision, mixing rock, funk, jazz, music hall and reggae. Sadly he passed in 2000 but his works live on.

And some mornings you just want straight up rock 'n roll and who best to deliver?

Beggars Banquet was the 1968 album which recovered the Rolling Stones' career from the flabby excesses of Their Satanic Majesties Request. Opening with the almighty Sympathy for The Devil, possibly Jagger's

best vocal performance and lyrics, then the prophetic No Expectations, ironically with Brian Jones ( a possible subject) on slide, the album dwells on various aspects of humanity's yoke, all sympathetically portrayed with a rejuvenated band on fire, supplemented by Nicky Hopkins on keyboards, and Jimmy Miller's production. The sound on the 50th anniversary edition is superb - the late Nicky is thanked for his contribution and long departed Rev Wilkins is acknowledged as the writer of Prodigal Song - previously Jagger/ Richards, an old Stones joke...

I bought their live set El Mocambo from 1977, the basis of their earlier Love You Live, but this is the total show released in 2022 and it's wonderful. A small club, audience of 300, old rockers mixed with songs from their recent Black and Blue with Billy Preston on organ, original member Ian Stewart on piano and additional percussion from Ollie Brown, it's a steamer!

And sometimes you just need something different - Mulatos has been in the car for a few years now, as have the two beneath it. Omar Sosa is a jazz pianist from Cuba, and this album is from 2004 and was remixed for the dance floor, it's tunes and rhythms being cool and compelling. 

I do love soul and Sam and Dave were two of the best exponents, their music being well favoured by the black audience. Love those gritty harmonies, those Mar-Key horns, that production, the drum sound at Stax in Memphis, backed by Booker T & the MGs, engineered by Jim Miller and recorded live in one take, it was visceral, real. Hold On, I'm Comin'... Other artists -  Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Aretha, Carla Thomas - wonderful, oh yeah not forgetting Ray Charles, Sam Cooke and James Brown, the innovators. 

This double album has the best sound, I have another album, a re-recording, nowhere near as good.

Dave Brubeck was a great jazz composer and pianist. The album Time Out has been in my collection since 1965. The Ken Burns Jazz compilation box set accompanies the excellent TV documentary series issued in 2000. Aside from the compilation, single disc CDs were also released for major artists and this is one.  The 2 CD Essential covers similar ground adding more. The early tunes are just as spectacular as the later material, showing his rhymical complexity - check out the 1953 Le Souk recorded live, Brubeck's piano is stunning. 

 

This double CD below was gifted to me by Steve Fox from Raw Art & Blues in the town of Mogo

in 2007, after he learned that my music collection had been incinerated along with our house in the 2003 bushfire here in Canberra. It was such a generous gift and one which I tried to repay by advertising his wonderful musical and artistic wares on my Mystery Train radio program. Sadly the village of Mogo was decimated by bushfire in 2019. Steve Fox had departed for another business enterprise well prior. The CDs are packed with rare tracks, some being from the sole recording, some on acetate, unissued; the sound generally is very good. You can read Steve's dedication to me below; such a kind man.

Some mornings you just need a brain scraper, which Jimi will provide. This generous box set was first issued in 2000, then again with 4 extra tracks and better sound to my ears, in 2013. 

Jimi recorded prolifically, he loved to create and his recordings both studio and live, always explore. No two are the same and that's fortunate for the Hendrix family who have released many albums since his death, and mostly all are really good IMHO, great notes, photos, production and of course fab tracks.

This one was the first box set, the 2013 second version, and it's a cracker with alternative versions, fabulous live tracks and rarities.  This is the indulgence after the main course.

JS Bach's Brandenburg Concertos are wonderous, pure music, harmonies, colour and rhythm in six different settings, here with an added two orchestral suites. I have a number of performances but I love the sound of this one by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Herbert Von Karajan. Karl Grebe in his notes states that the Brandenburg Concertos, among all Bach's works, 'have attained the greatest popularity and universal recognition. Nevertheless they remain what they always have been: a precious possession and a musical treasury in which there are always fresh delights to be discovered.'

 

 

Books read and enjoyed 2024/5

 

These are books I've read over the past year or so, each one an experience. More below.

Long Island by Colm Toibin is a much lauded 2024 novel,  and the follow up to his award winning Brooklyn from 2009 - he's written others in the interim eg. The Testament of Mary which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, his third shortlist.  

Sebastian Barry, like Colm Toibin, is now an elder statesman for Irish literature, both poets and playwrights as well as novelists, both appointed as Laureates for Irish Fiction by the Irish Arts Council.  Old God's Time, like Long Island, is beautifully written and also an emotional journey.

Normal People is the second novel by Irish author Sally Rooney, published in 2018 when she was 27.  It has garnered a swag of awards and plaudits. Like her debut, Conversations With Friends, it explores modern relationships, self awareness, being articulate yet completely dumb, with a backdrop of feminism and social divide. I read it in a couple of days, was smitten. 

Booker Prize winner Prophet Song by Paul Lynch is yet another dystopian novel this month, the other being Juice by Tim Winton. Juice was about the results of climate change not being addressed. Prophet Song has been compared to George Orwell's 1984 and like that book it is about life within a fascist state - secret police, imprisonment, torture and control, in Ireland of all places, and the effects on a normal suburban family.  Eilish Stack is the wife of a teacher Larry, who is also the trade union representative. Following a visit from the GNSB, Larry disappears. The book is about Eilish's fight to keep her family together. It's not an easy read, being stark with long paragraphs and no quotation marks, but it is your nightmare, gripping and harrowing, there's no denying it, and you are compelled to find out what happens. 

All or Nothing is the title of a Small Faces hit from 1966. The lead singer and songwriter, with Ronnie Lane, was Steve Marriott. Led Zep frontman Robert Plant 'wanted to be Steve Marriott'. David Bowie rated him as 'the best vocalist this country has produced'. He auditioned for The Stones tp replace Mick Taylor, but Mick and possibly Keith too felt threatened (also Marriott who was known for his motor mouth just wouldn't shut up - the band realised he couldn't possibly be contained). Dylan described him as 'an amazing talent'. The book is authorised by his family, yet it comes warts and all. A fascinating read if you are a Small Faces and Humble Pie fan. It takes the form of quotes from associates and family, with editorial inserts. In the end, an irrepressible personality and exceptional talent burned through rock 'n roll excesses. 

Tim Winton's Juice is a far more sobering read. It describes a world of the future which has resulted from little action on climate change, in order to keep the fossil barons happy. It's a compulsive read, a love story with tragedy and drama, a Nemesis group hunting the descendants of those responsible, hunters becoming hunted, it's a story of hope shining through desolation, and it may be our story. 

Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami was released in 2018, in the English translation. He's since released another. Murakami employs magical realism, nothing is as it seems, the scenery changes, metaphors and symbolisms arise, there may be a well, a cat, a bird, a jazz cafe, 60's music, adolescence, all are props in Murakami's world. His style is relaxed and beguiles the reader. This book seems to have varied reviews. I enjoyed it very much but his best for me so far are IQ84, The Wind Up Bird Chronicle, and Kafka On The Shore. That said, you will be absorbed by any Murakami book - except for me, Norwegian Wood. Why? I was underwhelmed. I don't know, maybe I was expecting more, many liked it and it made his popularity in the West. 

Nora by Brenda Maddox is the biography of Nora Barnacle, who became the wife of James Joyce, 'just another Dublin jackeen chatting up a country girl', as she said. Nora Barnacle? Love that name. She had been dismissed by the literati, the academics as a Galway hick, unworthy of Joyce's genius. Maddox, through much investigation portrays Nora as a strong, articulate wife/partner, Joyce's 'piece of Ireland', his muse and source for dialogue/language in Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake. 'She was amusing, passionate, courageous, spontaneous and articulate: she talked and talked. Joyce listened and listened, and put her voice into all his major female characters'. Maddox states that she began the book liking Nora, and finished it in awe of her.     

I posted a poem about the tragedy of 'Jim' and Nora's daughter Lucia Joyce in November 2023. Explanatory notes follow the poem.

https://barrymcgloin.blogspot.com/2023/11/lucia-joyce-was-daughter-of-nora.html

The Love Object - Selected Stories by Edna O'Brien

This lady could really write - sadly she passed last year at 93 -, and despite much resistance in her early career from the Irish church establishment who banned and burned her books, and her husband who claimed that he had written them, she persisted and won through, became famous and renowned as a great writer, beloved in many countries but especially honoured in Ireland, a land of great writers. A poke in the eye to those hidebound puritan detractors, hah, imagine how they might feel with Sally Rooney's books?  Yes, Edna was a trailblazer.

She was brave, steadfast, a line through from James Joyce whose biography she wrote.  A line that was needed to cut through the false piety of religious dogma, the patriarchal 'thou shalt not' of those black and white sinful identifiers, and the seemingly inevitable eternal damnation of a woman's being. It was a ruthless, gruesome and cruel myth. 

I also read her 2015 book The Little Red Chairs which was a stunner, described by Philip Roth as 'her masterpiece', this when she was 84! 

 https://barrymcgloin.blogspot.com/2024/07/

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell

This is the most enjoyable novel I have read recently.

A fictional story based upon the actual son of William Shakespeare, who was named Hamnet, who died in his youth, and the relationship between him and his parents, and the grief that came from his death. Wonderful historical fiction in beautiful poetic prose, better than any of her previous writings. 

I loved it so much that I bought her follow up, also an historical novel called The Marriage Portrait, and enjoyed it almost as much. She's a lovely writer. 

Author David Mitchell called it "A thing of shimmering wonder."

Klara and The Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

I'm interested in AI, particularly in its future use as robot humans in fact I've written a couple of short stories on the subject.  Time: The Act explores exploitation of robot humans, it also explores the question of reciprocal feelings, emotions and the responsibilities of humane management. 

https://barrymcgloin.blogspot.com/2024/11/time-act.html

The Japanese/English Nobel and Booker prize winning author Kazuo Ishiguro is noted for his quiet understated style, each word in its place, but there's always more beneath.  A beautifully written book, a quick read with depth and emotion, and thought for the future. 

The Map and The Clock by Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke

I do love poetry anthologies. I have some of the best - the two collections from Ted Hughes and Seamus Heaney, The Rattle Bag and The School Bag, Sean O'Brien's The Firebox (Poetry in Britain and Ireland since 1945), Staying Alive and Being Human edited by Neil Astley.  Paul Kelly's selection Love Is Strong is also a fine collection, The Making of a Poem by Mark Strand and Eavan Boland, and lately Poetry Unbound by Padraig 'O Tuama, which is 50 modern poems all unpacked with commentary by Padraig.

Carol Ann Duffy is my current favourite poet. Previously the Poet Laureate, and Gillian Clarke is the National Poet of Wales. Together they have edited this fine and lively collection of British and Irish poems which starts with the earliest known written poem Caedmon's Hymn from around 600AD, translated by Paul Durcan, through numerous Anons to 'the emerging Zaffar Kunial', with living poets having one poem apiece. It is a major piece of work, up there with Ted Hughes and Seamus Heaney who are both well represented here.  You will be pleasantly surprised by many selections. Praise is superfluous.  

Lastly, one of my favourite authors passed on in 2024, C.J. Sansome who wrote the Shardlake series about a hunch backed lawyer who solves mysterious crimes in medieval days. Sansome himself was a lawyer prior to becoming a writer and his insight adds to his writing skills. The research is meticulous and medieval days are smelt and felt in etched realism, mud and dung, smoke and clamour, incense and hymns, with a background of violence and brutality, pious priests and lopped heads and swords scraping on bone. The almighty power of Church and State. Oh, there's a few balancing romances in there too.

I read the final Shardlake book recently called Tombland. It's a door stopper. I'd read some Amazon reviews which suggested that it wasn't up with his best - total codswallop, some like to critisise because it strokes their perceived superiority. It must be sad. Fear not, Tombland will have you enthralled through its 860 or so pages of novel, followed by a 50 page essay and bibliography of his sources. 

  

 

Blackbirds

 

Black Birds

There is a lull this evening when the world

holds its breath, the rain has ceased and the sun's

warm rays embrace all then slowly slip away

and colours in the garden become richer, deeper

and that's when our blackbird sings, five notes

five notes again, then seven, then five,

piercing and startling the air

in clear brightening joy.

I recall a village in the Cotswolds

where we slept in a sandstone cottage,

golden in the late afternoon sun,

and the rear garden with its rock wall faced

a field where rabbits hopped and a blackbird's

song shimmered the air into the evening. We ate

at a table flush with luscious cold cuts

and toasted our travels with fine Merlot.

Now, I just read about those Russian missile

and drone attacks on a children's hospital in Kyiv.

One young lass with her hand blown off, another a leg.

Deformed for life. How brave you warriors

must feel... A crow caws to the falling night.

[Merlot – French - the little blackbird]  

Time: the Act

 

This short story was written in late July 2023 following the first birthday of our grandson Lenny, and the death of Sinead O'Connor, Irish singer/songwriter and author of her autobiography Rememberings. The story explores what could well happen with the development of AI. 

                                                            Time: The Act

Our grandson turned one years old on 26 July 2023 and we were to visit Melbourne for his birthday and look after him for 4 days. Prior to going there my son Jamie, his dad, had sent some images using an AI software which projected what he may look like in two or three years. He had input 30 images to generate this. The images were fabulous but we found them somewhat unsettling, ‘creepy’ said my wife, ‘scary’ said I. It was as if time had been manipulated.

On the plane down I was reading a C.J.Sansom novel set in the sixteenth century. I was totally engrossed and yet here I was in a 21st century jet, 35,000 feet above sea level.

In the year of M21, ‘M’ being Murdoch, ‘Anno Domini’ having been superceded by the UN with much opposition from the poorer countries, Lenny Mac was asked by his advertising company to find an ‘office girl’ in Robotics. Inc. These were actual robots as opposed to those purveyed through DNA True Humans. Inc which were far more expensive. There were mid priced hybrids but the DNA ‘human’ parts had objected to the instant robotic solution and the robotic bits had complained that the human bits were too slow, and consequently the hybrids were inclined to occasional internal combustion. To look at, each was identical, human like in every respect. So Lenny purchased a pure robot of Sinead O’Connor for a huge sum paid by his London advertising company.

In the office unveiling ceremony Lenny had unscrewed the top from the metal casket and pressed ‘start’ on the remote button. Sinead sat up. She was fully clothed and seemingly breathing.

Exclamations of “Oh wow” “Holy shit” “I don’t believe it” etc. came from the onlookers, four men and three women.

Sinead looked at each one. “Well Sinead where have you landed yourself this time?” she asked herself in her Dublin accent.

“Sinead,” said a tall smooth looking casually dressed dude. “My name is Robert Brookes and I’m the CEO of Brooke’s Beats which is a well subscribed advertising agency in central London. You’re in good company and I expect you’ll enjoy your time with us, a bit of office work, composing jingles, that sort of thing, nothing too strenuous. Lenny here will be your mentor. If you have any issues, please don’t hesitate… My door is open.”

“Well there’s an issue here for a start, your worship. I am no two bit jingle singer Sonny Jim. I’m a fooking world class Irish artist…”

“Lenny, sort it” replied Brookes exiting.

Later, after Lenny had presented Sinead her employment duties in the best possible terms, some acting, some singing, no stress, she was still thinking of doing the bolt but she had taken a liking to him. Martin, his offsider and a bit of a lad had other ideas.

“So Lenny, do we pop Sinead back in her casket tonight?”

“I’m not going back in there auld son. Do ye think I’m a fookin’ corpse or wha? I’m sure Lenny has a spare couch... or something. I’m aching for a wee bit of comfort if you get my drift.”

“Lenny, what say we grab a couple of six packs and head back to your place with the casket?” said Martin.

“Marty there are times I despair of you. You do realise Sinead is covered by the Act, the Robotic Ethics Act?”

Yes indeed. The Act had come about when the UK government in a misguided attempt to top up Treasury had commissioned DNA True Humans Inc. with producing a live Queen Elizabeth 1. It had cost them over 3 billion Pounds Sterling which they hoped to recoup, double in fact, with tourism and a zoomed Fox News special segment at half time NBL. The DNA had been ‘harvested’ not from the well dead clacking remains thank Murdoch (May He Always be With Us), but from hair in a jeweled box at Hampton Court. The government had opted for DNA rather than an AI robotic approximation in order to hear and see exactly how Her Majesty had spoken, thought and walked. However, the age of the resultant ‘Being’ was determined by the age of the DNA and in this case a 14 year old Princess Elizabeth was delivered. Cost blowout max. They’d come this far and had to give it another shot.

A somewhat grumpy Princess Elizabeth was given her old room at Hampton Court and visitors lined up for weeks, eventually being ‘enchanted’ by a quick glimpse of the 16th Century Queen to be. Meanwhile a second attempt produced the goods, a 58 year old live Queen Elizabeth 1, replete with red hair, white face and black teeth. She too was not happy to be alive again and rained shrill curses upon ‘whomever has wrenched me from the arms of Morpheus.’ She was eased into her old rooms at Richmond Castle, and a new mattress, top of the range at Sleep City, the Rip Van Winkle (Version 4), was installed. Alas and alack, it was not to her taste “Would you have me drown in down, dolts?”

Her Majesty had to be persuaded by the Prime Minister to participate in the Fox News interview which would ‘be short and assist accounts enormously.’ The interviewer, Dade DeSantis Jnr 111, was renowned for his ‘no bullshit cut the crap’ style and the Brits had some misgivings but the purse strings pulled louder. The remnants of the Windsors - Buckingham Palace was now a museum - tut tutted a bit but Queen Elizabeth 1 was a Tudor and no relation anyway according to Fox News. All went swimmingly for the first minute or so, then:

“Since you died there has been speculation that you were no way the Virgin Queen and in fact had a beau, Sir Robert Diddley, sorry... Dudley, and that you may have been implicated in the death of his wife who was launched down some stairs. Whadya say to that Majesty?”

The old Monarch’s eye twitched, her head shook. She was silent for 30 seconds (‘Dead Air’ in media terms) then replied, “I apologise to Humanity for encouraging Drake and Raleigh to explore the Americas. Had I known this to be the result I would have washed my hands of it.”

“DID YOU Sleep With Him? YES or no?”

“I will say this: a clear and innocent conscience has nothing to fear. Dudley was a dear friend for many years. I was blessed with a handful of friends but he was the sweetest and dearest. I still mourn his passing. I loved him greatly. You would besmirch his memory with filthy accusations. If you are a prime example of humanity in the Americas, then God help it and all who reside in it. You disgust me.” And with that, she walked from the room.

Social media in the UK went ballistic, so much so that the press took the initiative ‘Our Blessed Monarch Insulted by USA’ and ‘Our Betty Lectures USA on Morals’ etc. and the populace became so incensed that, had the USA not been the UK’s biggest and best military ally with a mountain of weaponry, war undoubtedly would have been declared. This led to Parliament passing the Robotics Ethics Act which provided robots, DNA, AI and hybrids with their own disabling mechanism should they feel ethically compromised. It also put the onus on owners to be mindful of the robot’s sensibilities, or the Act would be applied. This, Lenny reminded Marty was law and effectively recognised that robots had feelings like humans. It was landmark legislation.

Lenny did indeed have a couch and took Sinead home rather than ‘pop her back in the casket’. 

“So Lenny why did you choose me? You find me attractive?”

“I’ve enjoyed your recordings from an early age Sinead, my parents and grand parents loved your stuff. My granddad had a DVD of two of your gigs which I watched so many times… Apart from that I thought you courageous, inspiring, your protests were brave.”

“Ruined my career unfortunately, for some time. I got the establishment offside. And all those boos. Frank Sinatra and Danny DeVito threatened to punch my lights out. Word was disseminated that she was loopy, a lunatic.”

“But time proved you right, the Church hid pedophiles.”

“Yes Ratzinger himself, the Pope was involved, moving offenders in Germany to other parishes. But I ask you again, why me?”

“I should mention. You died on my first birthday, 26 July 2023.”

“You are kidding? Wha? We are cosmically connected my Lenny.”

“Sinead the main reason I used to convince boss dude Robert was that you would epitomise our vision. Courageous and brave, with empathy, a moral imperative, putting a human face on our advertising company with all of those qualities plus artistry and defiance if needed.”

“Lenny, I’ve never heard such a load of crap.”

“See! You have that ability to suss the bullshit…”

Now, they both rolled around on the carpet in mirth.

Is this when Lenny tells Sinead about his girlfriend Maddy?

Does Maddy find them in a compromising situation? Would the writer be so gauche?

Will Sinead ever write a jingle? Can’t see it really but who knows?

What happened to the two Elizabeths?

Does the writer have a surprise ending?

I’ll let you know. Perhaps.