Category Archives: Benburb
G8 Police Deny Claims They’re So Bored They’re Playing An Enormous Game Of Hide And Seek
Cop in Galbally this morning, wrecking about.
BY SHENGAS MCGLUMPHIE
The PSNI were forced to respond yesterday to allegations that the extra police drafted in to the county for the G8 summit in Enniskillen have been so bored that they have resorted to playing children’s games and making preposterous allegations against residents.
The claims come following the arrest of Joe McElduff of Cappagh, who was lifted on Sunday evening on a charge of attempted arson whilst trying to light a barbeque in his garden in the rain. A number of what the police called ‘strange-smelling items’ were also removed from his property that subsequently turned out to be some burgers he had bought from Aldi in Dungannon. He was later released without charge.
On Monday, twenty-nine cattle were detained in a field near Benburb for four hours by over 200 officers in a controversial practice known as ‘kettling’, on the grounds that they were ‘acting suspiciously’ and ‘loitering with intent’, whilst a woman having lunch in Askin’s in Ballygawley was cautioned for ‘eating without due care and attention’ after she dribbled some mayonnaise down her chin.
Other people have claimed that a county-wide game of policeman hide and seek is underway, which is why officers are spending so much time parked on top of bridges and key access points across the county, as they try to spot colleagues who are in hiding in ditches, barns and fields.
DI Sean Robertson of the PSNI refuted the claims, saying,
“The PSNI and our mutual colleagues from across the water offer the highest standards of professionalism, a level that is demanded to protect some of the world’s leaders”.
The G8 is being policed by 4,400 PSNI officers together with some 3,600 who have been drafted in from England.
“These ridiculous claims that there’s some sort of childish game going on is a complete fabrication”,
whispered Robertson, from half-way up a tree in a field near Clogher.
Meanwhile 76-year old farmer Finbar Kerr from Plumbridge was stopped for allegedly speeding at over 80 miles per hour in a 1976 Massy Ferguson tractor and link box, whilst going from one field to another.
“80 miles an hour?” said a peeved Kerr. “That thing wouldn’t do 80 miles an hour if you pushed it off a cliff. Them police have nothing to do all day but sit. I have 3,000 litres of dirty diesel sitting out the back in a tank and they never so much much as looked at it. Call themselves policemen?”
“We’re here to do an important job”, said DI Joseph Bruce of the Yorkshire Constabulary. “There are dangerous criminals about and it’s our job to catch them. Which, if they’re as good as hiding as the PSNI, may take some time”.
Moy Internet Cafe Closes Down. Owner Tired Of Explaining Stuff.
Moy man on Google
One of The Moy’s most adventurous business ventures closed today after the owner, Colm Mackle, admitted he was ‘sick and tired’ of explaining what surfing the net meant to confused locals. Tyrone’s first Internet Cafe was launched last month with a fanfare of sandwiches and cold drinks whilst an Apple Store employee from Benburb cut the rope around the shop. Early euphoria soon turned to resentment after Mackle became scundered with requests from patrons like ‘how does this mice yoke work’ and ‘how do you get on to the next line’.
“Ah I enjoyed the first day, seeing the faces of Moy people who thought computers could only be found in America or London. But then it began. One of the first complaints was from a young girl from the Armagh Road who said she was afraid of mice and if I could get her another animal. Men and women were talking to the screen thinking there was someone inside it. And they all seem to forget what I told them as the next day was exactly the same.”
Mackle called it a day soon after he called his first tutorial class on “How to surf the web”.
“I thought I’d educate the locals on surfing and advertised a Beginners Guide to Surfing. 30 turned up. 28 of them were wearing wetsuits, breathing apparatus and carrying a stack of towels. The other two brought dusters ‘for the webs’. What a waste of money this venture was. A centre for left-footed Aborigine Ballet would’ve had as much success as I had with this idea. The Moy ain’t ready for the Internet.”
Local actor, Tony Gribbon, reckons they’re better off without it:
“Ah sure any time I was in it I couldn’t get near it for the amount of surfers looking at videos on YouTube of people falling over or tractor diffing. I mean, it was the only site used. Then there were oul lads typing in ‘bare women’ and getting Mackle into bother.”
Benburb Man Develops ‘Craic Index’ iPhone App
Reported Benburb inventor
By Staff Reporter Shengas McGlumphie
Local man Francis Hagan from Benburb held a press conference yesterday to launch a new iPhone application that will put an end to tales of wildly exaggerated nights out.
“People were doing my head in saying that the craic was 90 when I knew damn well it was nothing of the sort. That’s when I had my Eureka moment. Why not develop an app that proves what the craic was really like? See, there’s only ever been one level and that’s 90. That’s where my app comes in – if it says that the craic in the pub last night was 30, let’s not beat around the bush. It means it was shite. Nice and simple”.
Once activated the app detects the level of laughter, hysteria, sobbing, fighting and so on in the immediate vicinity, which it then converts into an index, based approximately on the following:
|
Quality of Craic |
App ‘Craic Index’ |
|
Tara |
“The craic’s 10” |
|
Cat |
“The craic’s 20” |
|
Hames |
“The craic’s 30” |
|
Handy |
“The craic’s 40” |
|
Quare |
“The craic’s 50” |
|
Grand |
“The craic’s 60” |
|
Mighty |
“The craic’s 70” |
|
Class |
“The craic’s 80” |
|
Deadly |
“The craic’s 90” |
Hagan expects to refine the index further still.
“If some boyo were to say to you that the craic was 70.32 last night, you’ll know exactly what it was like, dead vivid and everything. Almost like you were there”. He admits the app needs more testing. “I tried to produce a result where the craic was 100. Jaysus. The house nearly disappeared into a parallel universe. It’s an impossibility due to a scientific paradox or something. These are unchartered waters I’m sailing in. You can’t mess with the natural order of things. Craic can’t be higher than 90. It just can’t. I won’t try that again. I might get sucked into a buckin black hole”.
Hagan says that other apps are in development, including a ‘Foundered Index’ for how cold someone is, and a ‘Bottle Index’ for how slippery roads are.
The current app will cost £1.99. Journalists who were given it to test reported that the craic at the press conference was 20.
Moy Unveil New VIP Section In Stand For New Season. Donaghmore Furious.
The failed Dromore VIP section
Moy GFC this morning unveiled their Premier Viewing Section at their ground on the Benburb Road, becoming the second Tyrone club to do so after the failed Dromore attempt in 1988. Dignitaries such as Plunkett Donaghy and Dr Kennedy from Neighbours attended the opening although photographers from Donaghmore boycotted the event. Moy treasurer Ronnie McGeown cut the ribbon which was actually a bit of police tape the PSNI left behind during a raid last year. The section consists of a perfect square at the top right hand corner of the stand allowing 8 or 10 people to squeeze into. McGeown believes this will become the norm around the county before long:
“Myself and a couple of lads were finding it increasingly irritating to stand with the ordinary man watching a match, what with their foul language and snorting and stuff. We came up with an idea of a VIP section season ticket that will allow six home fans and four away who possess a certain level of respectability to sit together in the top corner with four-foot perspex glass around them. We will provide fine English cheeses and a glass or two of Chilean Merlot. Free wifi will also allow the VIPs to do business transections or arrange social gatherings for the Tatler. We will maybe throw the leftovers to the non-VIP shower at half time like bits of cabbage etc.”
Donaghmore GFC are said to be furious that they have been surpassed as the poshest club in Tyrone. Chairperson Henrietta Winklebottom did not hold back:
“Who do they think they are? Have you ever been to the Moy or Benburb? Shit-kickers we call them. Always covered in crap. We’ve been picking bits of Venezuelan Pork from between out teeth at matches long before the Moy had running water. I had a look at the so-called VIP section. It’s like an exclusion zone for foot and mouth sows. This is just like the time Dromore tried it. They made the VIPs stand on bicycles.”
All six tickets home tickets have been sold for this weekend’s visit of Derrylaughan. The Kevin Barrys were not offered their allocation of four on the grounds that it would be pointless. A VIP season ticket costs £600 or £100 per game.
Greencastle, Kildress, Gortin & Donemana Call For Relocation Of Sperrins
Should I stay or should I go?
By Gombeen
Following on from yesterday’s news that Greencastle had tabled a motion at the Tyrone Congress that the Sperrins be moved from their present location, it has emerged that they have received vociferous backing from Kildress, Gortin and Donemana. In an added twist to the sensational developments, Glenelly, Strabane and Plumbridge have promised to fight tooth and nail to keep the mountain range exactly where it is for varying reasons. Donemana’s Richard O’Neill explains the stance of the four pro-removal townlands:
“Yousins in the rest of the county don’t know what it’s like to wake up til this giant thing towering over you everyday like big mad parent. Every buckin day. And what it is? A big hape of moss and bogland – useless to man and beast. They talk about the beauty of Mullaghcarn Mountain. It’d be damn well beautiful to me if it was sitting in Benburb or Trillick. And it’s freezing here. The sun can’t get at us. Sure you only have to look at the complexion of us indigenous peoples stretching the whole way across to Lissan. You’d think we’d been in solitary confinement all our lives with the gaunt skin and bags under the eyes. There’s so much we can’t see here – Portrush, the Aurora Borealis and the North Pole. It’s just not fair and another thing – there’s no drying at all here if the wind is coming from the north. That gigantic useless lump of turf blocks the whole thing. We’re calling on the Tyrone Sperrin Society to consider moving the range to the south west of the county of maybe abroad to Portygal or Egypt.”
Glenelly’s tourism spokesman, Eddie Parton, refutes the claims of the foursome:
“Listen, if them mountain glipes from Kildress hadn’t cut down all the trees 6000 years ago then it’d be a thing of beauty. They’ve greedily bogged the land out with their incessant burning of things. They’re always burning things down there. The Sperrins are crucial to tourism around these parts. Hikers usually try to go up them only to find it’s too wet and soggy and just freewheel down to here or to The Plum to buy coats and flasks and things. The Sperrins are here to stay I say. What about that lovely song concerning Slieve Gallion Brae:
My name is Joe McGarvey as you might understand
I come from Derryginnet and I own a farm of landAre there better lyrics on the planet than that opener?”
The four protagonists have been slow to distance themselves from a telephoned threat from a group calling themselves the Strabane Slashers to the tourism board warning that if the vote doesn’t go in favour of the removalists, they’ll blow the mountain range up anyway. Richard O’Neill added:
“We do not condone the use of explosives to rid ourselves of this monstrosity but let’s not get carried away. There’s worse things in the world than a couple of lads from Strabane blowing up the Sperrins.”
The Tyrone tourism board are to make a decision next week. They will also try to ask the Sperrins themselves by listening to the ground with a cocked ear.
Benburb Man Doesn’t Like Champ. Mixed Reception.
No more for Rafferty’s mouth
By Staff Reporter Shengas McGlumphie
A 28-year old Benburb joiner finally admitted to his family yesterday lunchtime that he doesn’t like champ, and never has. Aiden Rafferty’s dramatic ‘coming out’ occurred during a chicken roast dinner at his ma’s house in the Tullydowey Road before Eastenders on RTE, when he finally plucked up the courage to tell his father Tom, mother Mary, and two sisters Roisin and Rachel.
“Growing up I knew I was different to the other kids,” said Rafferty. “They were all just horsing the champ into them like mad and I just wasn’t like that. I was always confused about my feelings towards the potato. Some of the kids used to call me hurtful names, ‘potater hater’ and all that. I tried to ignore the cruel jibes but it was never easy, especially the Dungannon ones at the Academy.”
It has emerged that his family are still adjusting to the news. Late last night a fight was reportedly broken up outside the Benburb Arms involving Tom Rafferty who reacted violently to a bit of gentle slagging about his ‘champion son’ and other potato-related puns.
“When I told my da he just stood up and walked out the room. He only came back when mum brought out the Blue Ribands. He hasn’t talked to me since. I think it’s hard for him to accept me as I am, him being originally from Eglish and all. My mum has been more supportive, and my sister Roisin said that she always suspected I didn’t like champ. I’ve been keeping this inside me for so long, I can now be true to myself and get tore into the basmati rice whenever I like”.
Some locals have reacted badly to the news, calling for Rafferty to be chased out of the townland to somewhere like Donaghmore or Castlecaulfield where other fussy food people live in relevant harmony. Others have welcomed the news, intimating that it will help Benburb stumble into the 21st century.
Rafferty is currently receiving support and counselling from the Champ & Colcannon Aversion Trust in Craigavon, which helps those with potato disinclination. Anyone affected by this article can contact them on 02980 665887.
Tyrone Weekend Gossip Snippets – March 9/10
ELECTION NEWS
Francie Molloy’s victory in Mid-Ulster have seen a rise in extreme beard-sporting men across the county. Molloy’s fashion statement has been embraced warmly by the locals who wanted a new fad as the Dennis Taylor upsidedown glasses were starting to look dated.
BENBURB SUNDAY
Benburb Sunday organisers have warned Justin Bieber that if he’s late or takes ill during his performance in the townland this summer that they’ll kick ‘seven shades of shite’ out of him. The threat was sent by fax.
MOTHERS’ DAY IN ARDBOE CANCELLED
Mothers’ Day in Ardboe has been postponed for a year after a shop in the village mistakenly advertised it as Mother’s Day, with the apostrophe in the wrong place signalling it was just one mother. Children took this as gospel and neglected to buy anything for their own mothers. Mrs McGuigan is the lucky mother.
STREET LIGHTING IN GREENCASTLE REJECTED BY LOCALS
Greencastle residents have cut down the recently erected street-lighting on the main street. They said it was shining a light on the ‘things’ they do at night.
PLUMBRIDGE ROMANCE
A 21-year old carpenter from The Plum ‘got a woman’ at the Greenvale last weekend. The priest is to mention the success at Mass tonight and the choir have promised to sing the song from Titanic.
GORTIN MONITOR KOREAN CRISIS
The Gortin International War Monitoring Committee have issued a statement saying they’re keeping an eye on ‘them there Koreans’ and that they’re not afraid to ‘start swinging’ if they don’t calm down a bit.
TONY DONNELLY PISSED OFF
Tyrone assistant manager is reportedly ‘pissed off’ at having to stand behind the wire during games with the ‘ordinary plebs from the East’, complaining of wire marks on his hands. Negotiations to do a swop deal every now and again with Mickey are on-going but Harte is refusing to budge, stating an allergy to wire mesh and people close to the lough.
Benburb Man Caught Drink Driving On Tractor Lawnmower
Jordan in happier times
Benburb erotic fiction writer, Jack Jordan, was fined £20 and warned about his future conduct after he was caught ‘zig-zagging all over the place’ and ‘singing his head off’ on his Mountfield 1430M Lawn Tractor yesterday evening on the Clonfeacle Road.
Jordan, 44, has also been enrolled on a 6-week drink-awareness programme in the Moy in order to curb the desire to commit the same offence again. Strawberry pickers in an adjacent field alerted the police after they witnessed an inebriated man revving his lawnmower ‘a wee bit more than normal’. Sarah Mullan told us:
“I was picking away when I heard a loud engine sound flashing up the Clonfeacle Road. He must’ve been doing, say, 7mph like. Then the terrible truth was laid bare when I saw Jack, full out of his head on brandy probably, slurring his way through ‘The Black Velvet Band’ at the wheel of his Mountfield 1430M. I was at my wits end thinking of the damage he could do on that. Mrs Glackin up the road has a lovely bed of daisies outside her front hedge. Jack was capable of obliterating the whole lot in this form so I phoned the cops who arrived before any carnage was committed.”
Initially, Jordan defended the accusations vehemently, insisting that Mrs Hughes had just given him ‘a nip of the craytur’ for mowing her bushes in her back field. The breathalyser indicated he was 20 times over the tractor lawnmower limit after which he admitted he’d downed a bottle of Bush as well as a few ‘glasses of stout’ whilst making a hames of Hughes’ field.
“I was only making the short half a mile journey home sure on the Mountfield. All these bloody do-gooders in Benburb would sicken your happiness. That Mullan girl never liked my singing.”
Jordan will attend the lawn-mower drink-awareness programme after Easter and is at present the only person enrolled.
New Reality TV Show For Benburb. ‘Wreckin About’ To Air In July.
Benburb on a Saturday
A new reality TV show is to be launched in Benburb later in the year as part of the Benburb Sunday celebrations. Filmed entirely in the area, the show is set to follow three families around for 24 hours a day for ten weeks, called ‘Wreckin About’. Despite initial apathy towards the idea amongst the locals, the Dutch TV company BSE managed to convince three families in the area to take part in the programme which will record their every second on camera, be it at work, home or just wandering about the fields. The first to sign up were the Glackans, one of the quietest families in the area. Gertie Glackan explained their decision:
“Ah sure isn’t it great. They did a trial run last week and all went well. I was afraid there wouldn’t be much happening in the house or Benburb itself and people would turn off the TV in their droves. But you just don’t realise the dramas that happens week in week out. Didn’t the top shower start leaking. It was some handlin. The cameras were up like a shot and filmed the drip. Then a tiler from the Moy turned up to give a quote to fix it. He said £120 all in – £85 for the labour and £35 for the sealant. Well didn’t my Patsy go clean mad and called him all the fleecing bastards of the day and a typical Moy thieving bollocks. It was very dramatic. I pretended to cry to add to the whole atmosphere. Them Dutch ones were loving it.”
The identity of the two other families remain a mystery at the minute but speculation is rife that the Martins, the blow-ins from Eglish who encounter bad manners from locals on a daily basis, have signed up to the project. Last year there was a bit of a scandal when Leo Martin was called ‘an oul woman’ by the Benburb Church cleaner after he turned up for service wearing a jumper tied around his shoulders.
The show will air in July.
Hallowe’en a “Load of Balls” Claims Benburb Butcher
Jordan, today
One of Benburb’s most colourful characters, Jessie Jordan, has publicly denounced Hallowe’en as a ‘load of balls’ and has refused to partake in any ghoulish festivities around the spookingly week-long festivities in the sleepy hamlet. Driving along Benburb’s ‘Golden Mile’, Jordan’s Butchers is conspicuous with its lack of frightening decorations which adorn businesses such as Mackle’s Craftware and Mullan’s Alternative Medicine Shop on the same road.
“Let me get this out of the road straight away. If any child even thinks about knocking on my premises on Wednesday they’ll be met with a black pudding to the gob. Trick or treat? The trick will be for the accompanying parents dislodging the lamb chops from their backsides. The treat will be all mine watching their tearful retreat. It’s a pile of dung. I’ve already sabotaged five bonfires around the Moy and Eglish. Apple-bobbing? Think I want to dip my bake in a bowl full of the slabbers and snatters of cousins and the like? I’d rather ate a pig’s arse through an electric fence.”
Jordan’s vehement refusal to celebrate the pagan festival seems to date back to an unfortunate incident in 1977 when his mother baked an apple tart for consumption after the bonfire. His sister, Denise, explained:
“Jessie never really forgave my ma for that. He thought he’d play a practical joke whilst everyone was out dancing around the bonfire, half naked. He snuck in and attempted to ate the apple pie and then blame it on the dog. He didn’t know my ma had put the traditional 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p and 50p inside it. She was a generous woman and usually splattered a rake of each coin amongst it so everyone would win a good bit. Poor Jessie threw the whole thing into his mouth. We found him on the floor spitting the last of his teeth onto the floor. It was a bloody sight. He was called Gummy Jordan for years.”
Benburb holds its breath.
Benburb Priest Rares Up Over Parking Spot
Well known Benburb cleric, Fr McNally(originally from Maghery), has stunned the Benburb parishioners by going on a verbal rampage during Stations of the Cross tonight in St Mary’s Church. It has emerged that the reason for his outburst surrounded the decision of sacristan Mrs Gildernew to park in his spot outside the vestry door. Although the car park was three-quarters empty, Fr McNally took issue with the sacristan’s manoeuvrings, three minutes before he arrived on the scene.
“I’d never seen the likes of it,” avid church-goer Kitty Mulgrew told us. “The good Father just went berserk calling the whole parish a ‘bunch of selfish pricks‘. He said that’ll be the last time he’ll set foot in this ‘hellhole of a place‘. Then he lit on the Gildernew family saying they were a shower of Eglish blow-ins anyway. It was savage stuff.”
An artist’s impression of Fr McNally
Things took a turn for the worse when he ordered the altar boys to bounce Mrs Gildernew’s car out of his parking square. The young boys, aged 8-11, only managed to slightly move her Ford Ka before Mr Gildernew arrived with a shotgun. Mulgrew added:
“It was like a real western scene, the likes never seen in Benburb before. Patsy Gildernew told the altar boys to get back into the vestry but the Father was blocking their way. It was only when Gildernew threatened to blow his head back to Maghery that Fr McNally relented. Jaysus we thought it was one of them British soaps.”
Mrs Mulgrew has since resigned from her sacristy post and took a taxi home, leaving the car there for badness.
Tyrone Tribulations 