We are horrified to provide a bed for several nights to the Honorary President of the Australian Model-Makers’ Organisation (AMMO), who is here for W.O.R.D.S.C.A.M.P.
He is not here in official AMMO capacity, rather he has just got electricity supplied to his workshop and is wondering whether to buy a computer.
He’s got himself a wireless which he’s already plugged into his studio to listen to hateful music, so I’ve been trying to tell him how that can help speed up his Internet connection to the w.w.w. (but I’m not sure he gets it).
My wife (Mrs Belm) has already been playing hostess with the moistness, providing a regular supply of her voluptuous finger foods.
Norm Da Pluhm is a thick-necked Aussie with exceptionally large spectacles and a very short temper. He’s brought an old woman with who he originally claimed was his wife, but when she protested her innocence he admitted he had picked up at Darwin airport because he liked her cardigan and he thought she was dressed appropriately for an English summer:
Norm’s sense of humour is hard to locate. He laughs like a donkey at the most curious things, then when I told him the old joke about quimquacks and Goose Jam he looked at me like I was speaking in foreign tongues and said: “You’re a bit of a tw*t, Belm?”
I’ve put a question mark because although it clearly wasn’t an actual factual question, more like an actual factual statement of actual factualness, the way he talks everything sounds like a question. With his silly voice, every sentence he utters rises towards the end to sound like a question.
It can cause a bit of confusion and consternation.
When he said “Nice nibbles?” to my wife (Mrs Belm) as he tucked into her generously curvy finger food, he was actually stating an actual factual fact – he liked what he was fingering into his mouth.
But it sounded like he was questioning the quality of her nibbles and needled to say Mrs Belm (my wife) took slight umbrage and punched Norm on the nose.
When the confusion was resolved and my wife (Mrs Belm) had kissed it better and stuff, Norm turned to me and said “She’s a feisty one” – which I took to be an actual factual statement, but was an actual factual question.
‘Tis all enough to make my head swim with dolphins and porpoises.
I’ll be glad when he leaves and takes the mysterious old woman with him.
Apart from the speaking confusion, he’s managing to upset all my neighbours – even Hugh G Leigh-Pithie, who is one of the most offensive people I know (and I know loads).
Norm has also managed to upset my staffage at Derek Belm & Sons, calling Maurice “uglier than a Dingo’s a-hole?”.
That was an actual factual statement of fact too, as Maurice is uglier than the ugliest thing you can think of – but we try hard not to draw attention to his facially challenged state of being. Maurice was so upsetted that his girlfriend, Gravel, is driving over from her home in Ysbyty Ystwyth tonight to give Norm a piece of her fist.
Alas, Norm will be with us until Thursday morning when I’ll take him over to Sheepy Magna for W.O.R.D.S.C.A.M.P. Thankfully, the seminar is a slumber party, so he’ll stay over there for the duration then he heads straight over to Ireland to annoy some distant relatively types.
I’ve decided to ask my head of security – ex-SAS eunuch Ianto ap Phhhhew – to chaperon Norm de Pluhn for the remainder of his stay to protect him from violent retribution.
I sometimes think I’m far too hospitable for my own liking.
Derek Belm - actually factually 
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