Village Squire, 1977-08, Page 33McGillicuddy' s Diary
The Village Squire presents the
exclusive feature: the diary of Ezekiak
McGillicuddy, police chief of the village of
Hamhocks, Ontario. Well known for his
courageous battle against the forces of evil,
Chief McGillicuddy has agreed to give
exclusive rights to his diary to the Village
Squire...for a princely sum of course. Each
month we publish a selection of entries
from the previous month.
JULY 1:, Well it's Canada Day, or
Dominion Day or whatever you want to call
it but mostly it's a big yawn around here. I
don't think anybody cares what you call it
as long as you call it a holiday. This town's
about as patriotic as Rene Levesque on the
Queen's birthday.
JULY 6: Well I see the C.B.C. has raised a
big fuss with its program talking about the
amount of organized crime in Canada. The
local newspaper is always sharp to follow
up on these things and came around to ask
if there was any evidence of organized
crime in Hamhocks.
Well. 1 said. not lately, but I had had
some problems a year or so back. There
was a real extortion ring going. These guys
were going around to a few of the senior
citizens on McDonald street and threaten-
ing them unless they got payoffs. Well one
of the ladies refused to pay up and the
hoodlums pulled out all her cabbage
plants. I told her 1 thought it would have
been easier to give them the milk and
cookies they'd wanted but she insisted I
should put the mob in Millhaven, even if
they were only seven years old.
JULY 16: Well it's the big Orange Day
celebrations. Thank goodness they're over
in Maitland this year. 1 remember three
years ago they came over here. They
blocked off the whole main street. They
were having a real problem finding a
building big enough to hold the event in in
case of rain. They finally had to settle for
the Catholic church, the biggest one in
town. Luckily it didn't rain or the old
building might have collapsed brick by
brick just at the thought.
The religious side of the big day seems
to have gone out of the celebration over the
years. There's still a lot of spirit in the
people though. 1 should know because I
had to help clear up some of those spirit
bcttles after the time they were here.
That's what happens when the town has
such a small budget. You have to do things
that aren't rightfully your job. The bottles I
didn't mind though, compared to having to
clean up the street after King Billie's horse
passed.
JULY 15: Mayor Lumpsy is really soaking
up this heat wave. He just got his new
backyard pool installed and he's lording it
over everybody. As usual, though, every
time he gets something new it means
trouble for me. I'm working on a very
important case right now and he's
threatened if I don't solve it quickly he'll
have my head.
Seems somebody, probably one of his
neighbours, didn't take so well to his
bragging about his new pool. Somebody,
I'd never tell even if I knew, dropped a
giant sized bottle of red ink in the pool. The
mayor came out for a midnight dip before
bed and of course couldn't see the colour of
the water in the dark. When he got back
inside and looked in the mirror he couldn't
figure out how he'd gotten a sunburn at
midnight.
JULY 21: Some guy from one of the city
newspapers was here the other day. He
was doing a story on all the crime and
corruption in small towns. I showed him
around to the scene of my latest crimes like
the mystery of the blue footprints that we
found all up the side of the white wall on
the side of the hardware store and the case
of the missing doorknob from Hilda
Shingle's house but he wasn't very
impressed. He accused me of holding out
on him. Said I must be getting paid off by
somebody to keep all the bad things about
the town under cover. I told him I'd been
looking for somebody to try to bribe me for
years because the job sure doesn't pay
enough but nobody seems to have enough
skeletons in the closet to be worth a cent to
me. I asked him to let me know if he found
any juicy scandals. I don't think he did,
but he went back to the city and wrote a
scathing expose on the crime in Hamhocks
anyway.
JULY 27: Somehow I think somebody's
turned the world upside down and we're
where the Sahara Desert is usually. It's
been so long since it's rained that a rain
drop might start a panic in the streets from
those who might think it's an omen of the
end of the world.
My back is killing me from carrying
water to my garden. I know, you say, I
should get a hose. I've had several but
Cindy Lou Quagmire's dog must be
teething or something. He ruined three
hoses in one week. Cindy Lou says he just
thinks they're snakes and wants to kill
them for her.
Lifestyle is knowing how to
avoid accidents at work, at
home, at school or in sports.
It's obeying safety rules.
FOR ALL YOUR
INDOOR AND OUTDOOR
GARDENING SUPPLIES
AND LANDSCAPING NEEDS
ARTS
LANDSCAPING
Nursery and Garden Centre
Open 7 Days a Week
Monday thru Saturday
till dark,
Sunday 12 to 6.
Seeding
Sodding
and Shrubs
Everything for your lawn
or garden
Bennett St., Goderich,
524-9126
igggunes
Autiqufti
34 KINGSTON ST.
GODERICH, ONTARIO
Bill & Lorraine Jones
Home 524-7732
Bus. 524-2238
VILLAGE SQUIRE/AUGUST 1977. PG. 31.