MY CELLPHONE ringing non-stop foreday morning Friday snapped me out of a sweet piece of sleep, expecting to hear some piece of bad news at such an early time of the day.
But as my post-nasal drip-affected voice growled: “Hello, Good morning”, to my surprise on the other end was the very excited voice of a prominent white business man screaming, “Al Gilkes, get up and pee. Check THE NATION and see they will have to pay you some real money.”
As an original shareholder in the Nation Publishing Company, which is now a member of the One Caribbean Media, I assumed he was referring to the recent announcement that business had been healthy during the financial year and that shareholders would be receiving healthy dividends as well.
But I realised that was not what he meant when he all but ordered me to get a copy of the WEEKEND NATION and check Richard Hoad’s Lowdown column and also informed, “Al, The NATION libel you big time. And tek it from me: they have to give you nuff money. So you don’t have to worry about whether the Reggae Festival make or lose this year. And listen. If you want a good lawyer to sue them I can lend you one of mine. FREE.”
In a maze and head still in a daze, I stumbled downstairs, unlocked the front door, picked up my home-delivered WEEKEND NATION from the step, rolled off the rubber referring band, went straight to the Lowdown and, to my shock and horror, an amplified quotation that jumped off the page and into my face caused me to sin my soul with a sexually explicit question at that very early time of day. It read: “As Al said, today’s Whites are more into tennis, golf, polo, surfing, rallying and mud-doggery . . . followed by ribald orgies of drinking, smoking pot and having your way with wanton women in cut-off shorts.”
“Me?” I heard myself screaming. “When [expletive] and where [expletive] did I say that?”
I knew I had recently questioned why white Bajans were no longer into playing popular sports like cricket, football and basketball but, rather, were now mostly into things like polo, yachting, surfing and such.
I didn’t even know there was a sport called mud-doggery and certainly was most ignorant about and so could not have written anything accusing white people of being involved in “orgies of drinking, smoking pot and having their way with wanton women in cut-off shorts”, as exciting as that appeared to be.
I, therefore, assumed that the quote had been taken from what Lowdown had written. But after speed-reading the column to find it, I was again forced to let out a few more choice cuss words when I saw that Hoad had actually written the following:
“As Al said, today’s Whites are more into tennis, golf, polo, surfing, rallying, archery and mud-doggery. I thought the last mentioned involved punishing SUVs in impossible conditions followed by ribald orgies of drinking, smoking pot and having your way with wanton women in cut-off shorts. I was wrong. Mud-dog champ Chris O’Neal assures me there is no drinking or pot . . .”.
So, Mr Roy Morris, I will be quite happy to settle out of court. So just shout downstairs and tell accounts to write the cheque and let me know when to pass for it. By the way, Lowdown, don’t worry. I will remember you when I am in FirstCaribbean paradise cashing it.
Al Gilkes heads a public relations firm. Email algilkes@gmail.com.
