things that go NURK!

17/09/07

(We had been talking about making stew out of whatever was left in the house.)

Of course the greater spotted common stew is enjoying something of a revival after its near extinction in the 1930’s due to the great stew hunts of that time, causing it to be renamed the lesser spotted uncommon stew until 1953, when it was taken back off the endangered list. Sadly no one realised the effect that culling a large part of the stew population would have on the whole casserole ecosystem and we saw the disappearance of a number of small Goulashes and hotpots. Of course beef Goulash and the Lancashire hotpot, being hardy breeds, weathered such troubles and became synonymous with their genus, (Goulashes and Hotpots respectively,) as the de facto breeds.

Interestingly the collective nouns for both Goulashes and Hotpots is a ‘Nurk’, due to their distinctive mating calls, which for some reason can only be heard by Greta Humbuckle and her husband Norbin, who are an elderly couple from Gibralta who settled in Wandsworth in 1920.

In contrast the mating call of the Common Stew goes more like, “Tukka! Tukka! Pa-Phwee!” and consequently their collective noun is known as a bowtruckle. The uncommon Stews (like rat meat, ginger and angel delight stew for example,) for some reason have evolved without mating calls, instead preferring to attract mates using a variety of sleazy dance moves whilst wearing speedos, a touch of eyeliner and performing a lewd spectacle with a fig, a feather boa and the contents of Noel Edmond’s glove compartment, which goes some way to explaining why they are not more common.

“instead preferring to attract mates using a variety of sleazy dance moves whilst wearing speedos, a touch of eyeliner and performing a lewd spectacle with a fig, a feather boa and the contents of Noel Edmond’s glove compartment”

Is it wrong that I find this description very alluring?

I have been the owner of many fake chickens in my time (my favourite being Savage the Chicken) and have never seen them running around post decapitation. In fact I have never seen them run around – I have seen them ricochet round the front room when my brother realised that they were very twangy.

Beef goulash is proud to be a pen pal with Hungarian goulash- they have pursued very healthy relationship over the years, involving swapping cards at Christmas, Easter & National Meat Day in both countries as well sending outlandish gifts to each other. The happiest occasion on Hungarian Goulash’s side was when Beef goulash popped over for a surprise mini break & presented him with a gift of paprika & David Hasselhoff LP’s.

The Bowtruckle is also the name of a tree/paper dwelling imp that is found in Harry Potter books, 4 year old Copies of Private Eye and boxes of sherbert.

The impish bowtruckle is characterised by it’s enormous frontal lobes that look like Lloyd Grossman and a high pitched squeal similar to that of a minor Beano character getting a beating “Yaroo, Owch etc”.It feeds on stale Pringles and discarded Fenchurch jumpers and has a distinct mating call of “Skiba – babba – dibit blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah”.

Twangy fake chickens sound like a lot of fun. There may be a niche in the market.

Ah the Goulashes and their Hoff obsessions. Many a Goulash hunter has been saved by looking directly into the eyes of a charging Goulash and screaming “Look! It’s the Hoff and he’s signing 8x10 glossy’s!”

National Meat day in Hungary is taken very seriously. So seriously in fact, that all Hungarian citizens are forbidden from laughing or even smiling for the duration of the day. Last year, Otto von Wangschnitzel was found guilty of snickering before midnight and sentenced to eat his own head without using his hands.