Fr Megson was sat on the top deck of the 142 bus this morning grooving away to the late Joe Dolan's timeless classic Make me an island and leafing through his Compendium of Sexually Transmitted Diseases.  Not a great book, if truth be told.  Far too many drawings and not enough pictures.  And the pictures that you do find are perhaps a little too graphic to get your juices flowing freely. But it's a book that Fr Megson wouldn't be without in the rush hour - even when the students pile on in Fallowfield  ("I've only got a 500 Thai baht note, driver, can you change it?") he is still guaranteed to have at least two seats to himself.

But not this morning. 

"Bless me Father, how's yer belly off for spots?"

solicits Dusty as she plonks herself and her 17 Discount Booze bags down beside him.

"Sorry about the bags Father, I was just pickin' up a few odds and ends for the team's breakfast.  You're lookin' awful lonely Father.  Aren't ye lucky I got on to keep ye company.  That's a very interestin' looking book you're clutchin' there under yer cassock.  Are ye still troubled by that aul discharge down below or are you just doin' a bit of research for a theme round.  Do ye fancy a wee quiz now, Father?  Ah go on Father, ask me a disease.  I'll crack open a few lagers  and it'll just be like the real McCoy.

"Listen Father, will ye be seein' Roisin soon?  Will ye do me a favour?  Can ye tell her I was askin' for her and will she be in tomorrow night?  I need to call round and apologise for not gettin' her a Xmas card and a wee present.  I also need to poke her eyes out and scald her tongue.  Fancy the aul strumpet  standin' up in a crowded pub and shoutin' out that I was a lesbian.  The cheek of her Father!  The aul dirtbag.  Sittin' there slaggin' decent Godfearin' women off and her sluggin' away on lager from the neck of a bottle like tumblers had never been invented.  Is it any wonder that there isn't a back street flax mill in Belfast that would employ her?   She must be awful jealous of me, the aul minx.

"Father, you just tell Miss Roisin that I've had more men than she's had liquid breakfasts and what's more, I was never desperate enough to have to marry a  Mayo man just because any man from the  more respectable Counties would refuse to touch me with a barge pole.  Tell her to put that in her pipe and smoke it and I hope it chokes her..... are ye nearly finished with that can, Father, I'm in sore need of an ashtray?

"Tell her as well, Father, that me and the team have never even been to Lesbos. There's no way I would spend good money to sit on the beach for two weeks watchin' women with morals no better than a common Protestant lyin' around sunbathin' in dungarees and screamin' in agony when their nose studs get too hot.  If ye want to see that sort of thing, Father, it would be far cheaper to lie on the grass outside Manchester Town Hall of a sunny Friday afternoon.

"Well  Father, we're near the Town Hall now so ye'll be wantin' to get off.  It was grand to see ye again before ye die. I've not seen ye on top of yer column recently.  Don't worry about it, Father.  Ye wouldn't be the first Imperialist lackey to get knocked off his column. Look what happened to that Nelson hoor in Dublin a few years ago."

Dusty was talkin' to Fr Megson