Sad little Kippax, before he ate FineDope (c) |
This is the story
of a little donkey. The donkey’s name was Kippax and it lived on a farm with a
herd of other donkeys. Kippax would spend its days wandering around behind the
other donkeys, minding its own business, eating grass and producing medium-to-large
amounts of methane, like little donkeys are wont to do. Kippax’s flatulence was
never a real issue, but, you know, there was always plenty of hot air. As Kippax
grew up, it became a fully fledged member of the herd, neighing and cavorting,
even occasionally gamboling, with the
others. The donkeys would race to the far gate to see who would be first to get
his head in the trough when cruel Farmer Hardaker put the hay and fodder out
for them. Sometimes Kippax would win the race and get to the hay first, but
often it was beaten to it by bigger stronger donkeys. Kippax did not mind this
because it felt natural and normal. In fact it became known as the natural order of things amongst the
donkeys.
One day the farm
was sold to a new farmer, called Farmer Murdoch. He quickly began sprucing the
place up, painting the stables and straightening the pigs’ tails. Farmer
Murdoch didn’t much care for ambling donkeys. He was keen to see something a
little more dynamic, something that might attract visitors to his farm or
investment in his outbuildings, so he encouraged the bigger donkeys to be
greedy and to take all the hay for themselves. He put obstacles in the way of
the other donkeys, so that they wouldn’t win any of the races. As the bigger donkeys
began to win the daily races to the hay troughs, they got even bigger and
stronger, some of them expanding to the girth of a medium sized Conservative
politician. The same magnificent donkeys would be taken to the annual
agricultural fair, where they would win sundry prizes and gain great fame and
fortune. Some would then go on take part in the Grand Donkey Derby an event that
took place abroad, where they would often make fools of themselves, but
occasionally come back with a rosette and a big bag of feed as a special prize.
Even when they lost the Donkey Derby, they would always be well fed, making
them stonger than ever for the race across the field when they got back home.
The other donkeys
stayed at the farm. Some, like Pompey and Shaggy Bates, became lame and were put
down, whilst others hobbled on in their own haphazard way. Kippax grew thin and
pale, wandered the field’s very perimetre and produced stools of an unusual
colour and terrifically vile odour. He never won the race across the field,
finding the ground cut up by the magnificent hooves of the quicker donkeys. At
one point his groom, Master Pollock, very nearly killed him altogether when he
left a rake on the floor and it twatted him full on the hooter.
Highland Fergus, Âne + José Burro enjoying the high life |
Children who
visited never chose to ride on Kippax, as he smelled off and looked awful. On
more than one occasion the Farmer thought about calling in the vet to
administrate, but something always stopped him. Meantime, the other donkeys that
had grown fat and strong from winning all the races, amongst them Fergus the irritable
highland donkey, Âne the French ass and José Burro, a noisy braying Portuguese Wild
Ass, wore fine coats of thick lustrous fur and had pretty ribbons and garlands
festooned around them. Visitors came from far and wide to watch these magnificent
creatures whilst nobody took any notice of Kippax and the other bedraggled
specimens at the back of the herd.
Then one day,
somebody did take a look at the other members of the group. A man in a strange
outfit arrived with a big bucket of ultra quick donkey feed, called FineDope
(c), apparently manufactured in a laboratory in Abu Dhabi, as he saw this was the only way to build up the poor wretched Kippax
quickly enough to be able to enter the Donkey Derby always won by the big
powerful animals. Fergus and Âne and José Burro got very angry at this and
pushed and nuzzled their way to see what was happening. When they saw one of
the bedraggled specimens was growing strong like them, they began to bleat and neigh
to such an extent that nobody got any sleep for weeks. José Burro made a whining sound like an animal being lowered into a mincer, despite the fact that he had often eaten FineDope (c) himself in the past. The noise became so
great that police arrived from foreign fields, amongst them a Very Special Constable
called Michel.
Michel had strict ideas about how laws work and thought it unfair that the big fat dominant
donkeys, who he thought had grown strong by their own careful ways, should now be
challenged by one of the dirty ones with matted fur. He told the farmer that he
would not allow any donkey that had been given FineDope (c) to show at the
fair. “Eet ees unfair for zees lurvly durnkyes to ‘ave thees durty wurns stand
in zer way. Zees wurns must nurt enter to ze Donkey Derby. Eet ees only for
nice donkeys wiz good fur.” he said and spoke to all the donkeys warning them
not to eat odd food given to them by strange foreigners wearing frocks, even if
they were starving hungry. “But we are dying of hunger,” said one of the other
donkeys, Old Villa, and was soon joined by Fat Ash (who was in fact as thin
as a hose pipe by now) and Toffee. “If we don’t eat, we will surely die. It was
the same for Kippax and now he’s a big strong boy.” they neighed.
Fat Ash wearing thin |
Bu the special
constable had other ideas and aimed his gun at Kippax. “If zees one comes to
zee Donkey derby after eating FineDope (c) ze end will be sweeft” he shouted.
But Kippax had already buried the sacks with FineDope written on them and was
now strong enough to run with the others to get to the hay. He could run as
fast, if not faster, than the three big donkeys and did not need anymore
FineDope (c). But when he ran for food the next day and, getting to the hay
first, began to tuck in, Special Constable Michel rose from behind the wall.
“Zees,” he said, holding up a sack of FineDope, “just zees!”. But when he
opened it, he found only normal hay, the same hay that all the other strong
donkeys had been devouring over the years. The big donkeys were dismayed and
even some of the starving donkeys, being animals with limited intelligence,
felt sad too. When they saw Highland Fergus and José Burro unhappy, they
automatically felt unhappy too, although they weren’t entirely sure why. That’s
donkeys for you.
By this time Kippax
was a strong and succesful donkey, easily winning the races across the field
and beating Fergus and José Burro to the continental shows, where he preened
and posed alongside donkeys from neighbouring fields, like Klippety Klopp and
Frank Ribery. One day Special Constable Michel looked down at his feet and found
that Kippax had delivered a rather large steamy dollop to his shiny policeman’s
boots. It was a kind of metaphor, but none of the donkeys understood because
they were all as thick as pig shit.
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