Soap Opera Scotland's Game of Gnomes - Series One
by Rab Christie
Genre: Drama
Swearwords: Some mild ones.
Description: EPISODE TWO - The early Gnome gets the good seat.
_____________________________________________________________________
We meet up with Scott and Angus again at the door of the Mother of All Parliaments, trying to find the way in. There’s a lot of helpful men and women dressed in interestingly historic type costumes trying to play sheepdog to #TeamMacGnome and the leader of the Independent Gnome Party had come down on a special day trip for the historic photo call. The sun even shone.
But soon enough the party atmosphere disappeared with the cameras and Scott and Angus had to try and find their way round the bowels of the building. The word monolith sprang easily to their lips – and it wasn’t just the fabric of the building they were referring to.
Scott took a load of photos and put them out on GnomeSM (which is their version of Facebook, NOT anything to do with sado-masochism – SM stands for Social Media). Angus said maybe he shouldn’t do that as the Mother of All Parliaments was a private sort of place – some might say secret – and there were signs saying ‘No photographs’ all over the place. But Scott didn’t care. He was the elected representative of the Rural Mountain Constituency and he wanted the people he represented to know exactly where he was and what he was doing.
‘That’s not the way we do it here,’ a veteran One Nation member pointed out to him early on. ‘You need to settle in and learn the ropes, old boy.’ Or he might have said ‘young man’. Whichever you find more patronising. Scott didn’t care either way. Gnomes with plums in their mouths deserve to have a sour sook, he thought.
‘It may not be the way you’ve done it,’ Scott said, ‘but we’re here to shake things up, not settle down. I’m not here to learn ropes or get my feet under the table or any of your ridiculous clichés. I’m here to make this place responsible to the people – to all Gnomes, in all the nations.’
The One Nation gnome shook his head and wandered off to the subsidised bar muttering something about ‘the vandals at the gates’.
Scott and Angus watched him go.
‘He needs a rocket up his arse,’ Angus said.
‘The whole place needs a rocket up its arse,’ Scott agreed. After a minute he said, ‘And maybe that’s exactly what we’re here to do. Remember Gnome Fawkes.’
Angus laughed, because he thought Scott was joking. But in the wee small hours of his first days at the Mother of All Parliaments on the Dirty Old River in Das Capital, Scott did a lot of thinking. And the thought he kept coming back to was that this place was wrong in a really fundamental way. And that just perhaps, he was the Gnome to do something about it.
Over the next week, Scott and Angus started to find their way around the building, but the more they discovered, the less you could suggest that they were settling in. In fact, the more they discovered the less settled they became. And then it came time for the first visit to the Mother of All Parliaments Debating Chamber.
‘Protocol, protocol, everything is protocol,’ Angus told Scott as he woke him up far too early one morning. ‘We have to book our seats in the chamber. And that means being up bright and early.’
It was early but Scott didn’t feel bright. He didn’t like the bright lights big city life and whatever people might say on GnomeSM he was not in danger of becoming a Metrognome any time soon. He was just a country gnome at heart.
‘It’s not like we’re vying for the best seats in the house,’ he said. ‘The cheap seats are good enough for me.’
‘If we don’t get there early enough we’ll not have any seats at all,’ Angus said.
‘What do you mean?’ Scott asked.
‘There aren’t enough seats for everyone,’ Angus said.
‘You what?’
‘No, not by a long chalk. There’s more than 650 of us and the seating capacity is somewhere around 360.’
‘You’re joking,’ Scott said. His credulity was being stretched on a daily basis but this seemed just one stretch too far.
‘Aye, they say that’s enough and to spare, normally,’ Angus said.
‘But things sure aren’t normal now,’ Scott said. ‘Not when we’re on a three line whip to make sure we all turn up for everything. No skipping debates for us. We’re here to work, not arse around, after all. Not just to suck up the cheap food and drink and sit in the library enjoying the ambience.’
‘And that’s why we’ve got to get ourselves down there before Prayers,’ Angus said.
‘Haud the bus,’ Scott replied. ‘No one said anything about Prayers.’
At the swearing in ceremony a couple of days before (when they’d been fed through like so many battery chickens) Scott hadn’t thought to count the chairs, assuming, as you would, that it would be one per person – imagine classrooms with only half the number of seats to pupils – no, perhaps don’t imagine that, it might come true in One Nation Gnome World. Sometimes you just have to think things for them to come true, after all.
Scott had thought that he might have to kick up a fuss, not being a ‘believer’ in any supreme power but he was allowed to swear on his honour as a Northern Gnome so that was one difficulty avoided. And now they’d sneaked up on him. You couldn’t get a seat in the Chamber of Horrors unless you went to Prayers. What? I mean Whaaat?
‘It’s really just an administrative mechanism,’ Angus pointed out. ‘Just go in and sign up for a prayer card and put it on the seat and that holds the seat for you.’
‘Not going to happen,’ Scott replied. ‘I’ll take my chances and stand if I have to. Can’t be worse than the Metro system.’
And that is why if you’d tuned in to Gnome TV to witness the historic first day of the New Mother of All Parliaments, you wouldn’t have seen Scott but you would have seen Angus sitting proudly on the front bench in a seat that was reserved for the old trouble maker Gnome who hitherto had bagged that seat – it has to be said with no real opposition since there had generally been plenty of seats left over in the Old Mother of All Parliaments – but Angus knew where the cameras would be pointed and with a cunning sleight of hand and a bit of judicious shoving, he managed to get himself into the Old Trouble Maker’s seat. The media spotted it and immediately named Angus the New Young Trouble Maker, which made him happy as it meant he’d made a name for himself straight away from the off, which is a good thing for a potential career politician.
Scott was happy (well of course he wasn’t happy to be standing in a crowd, but you know what I mean) to be standing out of the firing line, but he was uncomfortable in the task of soaking up the atmosphere. He found the atmosphere to be one of privilege and it didn’t sit any more comfortably with him than sweat. But he thought that perhaps not making an instant name for himself might be more useful in the long run. He wanted to keep his thoughts private and under the radar. Apart from those he felt he could share with his constituents through GnomeSM and most of these thoughts were to do with disgust and disapproval.
These thoughts seemed to be in accordance with most of the responses he got from said constituents from Rural Mountain Constituency. Generally the local folk were very proud of their champion. They mostly appreciated that he was making a sacrifice by going into the jaws of the beast and not being able to see the sunset over the mountains or feel the cool, fresh mountain air in his lungs. They could see, as he could feel, the stifling aura of the Mother of All Parliaments and only hoped that their man would be able to stand firm against all that it had to throw at him. And on that cliffhanger we’ll leave Scott and Angus till next week.
Swearwords: Some mild ones.
Description: EPISODE TWO - The early Gnome gets the good seat.
_____________________________________________________________________
We meet up with Scott and Angus again at the door of the Mother of All Parliaments, trying to find the way in. There’s a lot of helpful men and women dressed in interestingly historic type costumes trying to play sheepdog to #TeamMacGnome and the leader of the Independent Gnome Party had come down on a special day trip for the historic photo call. The sun even shone.
But soon enough the party atmosphere disappeared with the cameras and Scott and Angus had to try and find their way round the bowels of the building. The word monolith sprang easily to their lips – and it wasn’t just the fabric of the building they were referring to.
Scott took a load of photos and put them out on GnomeSM (which is their version of Facebook, NOT anything to do with sado-masochism – SM stands for Social Media). Angus said maybe he shouldn’t do that as the Mother of All Parliaments was a private sort of place – some might say secret – and there were signs saying ‘No photographs’ all over the place. But Scott didn’t care. He was the elected representative of the Rural Mountain Constituency and he wanted the people he represented to know exactly where he was and what he was doing.
‘That’s not the way we do it here,’ a veteran One Nation member pointed out to him early on. ‘You need to settle in and learn the ropes, old boy.’ Or he might have said ‘young man’. Whichever you find more patronising. Scott didn’t care either way. Gnomes with plums in their mouths deserve to have a sour sook, he thought.
‘It may not be the way you’ve done it,’ Scott said, ‘but we’re here to shake things up, not settle down. I’m not here to learn ropes or get my feet under the table or any of your ridiculous clichés. I’m here to make this place responsible to the people – to all Gnomes, in all the nations.’
The One Nation gnome shook his head and wandered off to the subsidised bar muttering something about ‘the vandals at the gates’.
Scott and Angus watched him go.
‘He needs a rocket up his arse,’ Angus said.
‘The whole place needs a rocket up its arse,’ Scott agreed. After a minute he said, ‘And maybe that’s exactly what we’re here to do. Remember Gnome Fawkes.’
Angus laughed, because he thought Scott was joking. But in the wee small hours of his first days at the Mother of All Parliaments on the Dirty Old River in Das Capital, Scott did a lot of thinking. And the thought he kept coming back to was that this place was wrong in a really fundamental way. And that just perhaps, he was the Gnome to do something about it.
Over the next week, Scott and Angus started to find their way around the building, but the more they discovered, the less you could suggest that they were settling in. In fact, the more they discovered the less settled they became. And then it came time for the first visit to the Mother of All Parliaments Debating Chamber.
‘Protocol, protocol, everything is protocol,’ Angus told Scott as he woke him up far too early one morning. ‘We have to book our seats in the chamber. And that means being up bright and early.’
It was early but Scott didn’t feel bright. He didn’t like the bright lights big city life and whatever people might say on GnomeSM he was not in danger of becoming a Metrognome any time soon. He was just a country gnome at heart.
‘It’s not like we’re vying for the best seats in the house,’ he said. ‘The cheap seats are good enough for me.’
‘If we don’t get there early enough we’ll not have any seats at all,’ Angus said.
‘What do you mean?’ Scott asked.
‘There aren’t enough seats for everyone,’ Angus said.
‘You what?’
‘No, not by a long chalk. There’s more than 650 of us and the seating capacity is somewhere around 360.’
‘You’re joking,’ Scott said. His credulity was being stretched on a daily basis but this seemed just one stretch too far.
‘Aye, they say that’s enough and to spare, normally,’ Angus said.
‘But things sure aren’t normal now,’ Scott said. ‘Not when we’re on a three line whip to make sure we all turn up for everything. No skipping debates for us. We’re here to work, not arse around, after all. Not just to suck up the cheap food and drink and sit in the library enjoying the ambience.’
‘And that’s why we’ve got to get ourselves down there before Prayers,’ Angus said.
‘Haud the bus,’ Scott replied. ‘No one said anything about Prayers.’
At the swearing in ceremony a couple of days before (when they’d been fed through like so many battery chickens) Scott hadn’t thought to count the chairs, assuming, as you would, that it would be one per person – imagine classrooms with only half the number of seats to pupils – no, perhaps don’t imagine that, it might come true in One Nation Gnome World. Sometimes you just have to think things for them to come true, after all.
Scott had thought that he might have to kick up a fuss, not being a ‘believer’ in any supreme power but he was allowed to swear on his honour as a Northern Gnome so that was one difficulty avoided. And now they’d sneaked up on him. You couldn’t get a seat in the Chamber of Horrors unless you went to Prayers. What? I mean Whaaat?
‘It’s really just an administrative mechanism,’ Angus pointed out. ‘Just go in and sign up for a prayer card and put it on the seat and that holds the seat for you.’
‘Not going to happen,’ Scott replied. ‘I’ll take my chances and stand if I have to. Can’t be worse than the Metro system.’
And that is why if you’d tuned in to Gnome TV to witness the historic first day of the New Mother of All Parliaments, you wouldn’t have seen Scott but you would have seen Angus sitting proudly on the front bench in a seat that was reserved for the old trouble maker Gnome who hitherto had bagged that seat – it has to be said with no real opposition since there had generally been plenty of seats left over in the Old Mother of All Parliaments – but Angus knew where the cameras would be pointed and with a cunning sleight of hand and a bit of judicious shoving, he managed to get himself into the Old Trouble Maker’s seat. The media spotted it and immediately named Angus the New Young Trouble Maker, which made him happy as it meant he’d made a name for himself straight away from the off, which is a good thing for a potential career politician.
Scott was happy (well of course he wasn’t happy to be standing in a crowd, but you know what I mean) to be standing out of the firing line, but he was uncomfortable in the task of soaking up the atmosphere. He found the atmosphere to be one of privilege and it didn’t sit any more comfortably with him than sweat. But he thought that perhaps not making an instant name for himself might be more useful in the long run. He wanted to keep his thoughts private and under the radar. Apart from those he felt he could share with his constituents through GnomeSM and most of these thoughts were to do with disgust and disapproval.
These thoughts seemed to be in accordance with most of the responses he got from said constituents from Rural Mountain Constituency. Generally the local folk were very proud of their champion. They mostly appreciated that he was making a sacrifice by going into the jaws of the beast and not being able to see the sunset over the mountains or feel the cool, fresh mountain air in his lungs. They could see, as he could feel, the stifling aura of the Mother of All Parliaments and only hoped that their man would be able to stand firm against all that it had to throw at him. And on that cliffhanger we’ll leave Scott and Angus till next week.
About the Author
G. R. Christie (Rab) is from a farming background. His political awakening started in 1996 with the BSE crisis and matured in 2001 with Foot and Mouth. He then studied journalism and politics and he now combines the pitchfork with the pen – or the crap with the computer!
Rab is familiar to many from his political/cultural commentary/rants on McRenegades and is editor in waiting at Deveron Press – launching in December 2015. He’s having a go at satire with the latest McStorytellers McSerial, Soap Opera Scotland’s Game of Gnomes – Series One.
Rab is familiar to many from his political/cultural commentary/rants on McRenegades and is editor in waiting at Deveron Press – launching in December 2015. He’s having a go at satire with the latest McStorytellers McSerial, Soap Opera Scotland’s Game of Gnomes – Series One.