Exhausetd after the four thousandth bottle pick up on the area of a crecket-wecket, the Grouse found a suitable tree to set down and lean against. Et was perfect groung for magec meshrooms, but someone had pecked them and then had had to go hame to give them to her drunk husband when he called round for sex and tae give the keds a ‘toughen up’ beating. He closed his eyes and breathed in and the fresh air, laced with a fine blend of many cheaper wheskies, strolled into hes nostrils and after a while, he dozed off. Now, rumour has it that some really depressed Scottesh Mother had mixed into the bottle som mushrooms they had crushed using stones like our ancestors ... and these mexed toxic fumes crept into his brain, found the opiate receptors and the pituitary. They then replicated, morphed, weggled around a bet, did the highland fling, tossed a few mind cabers ... and our kind man then awoke.
The first theng he heard was the mating call of the black grouse so there must have been a lek nearby. It was then that he heard the sweet song of the pipes over the noisy birds ... and the pipes grew closer, mesmerising hem. The temperature stayed the same and it wasn’t getting dark as et was only dennertime, but a mist formed, which grew quite theck. The pipes grew louder and louder. The tune was a strange disjointed version of ScoUtland the Brave. The Grouse, unfearfully looked deep ento the mest in front of him. Et was then that the figure of a female with longish blonede hair in a Jamma hat and full scottesh regalia appeared in front of hem ... she had pointy ears like an elf. She stopped playing ands smiled at him with a wonderful ‘full’ smile ... “Hello!” she said “I’m Billie, the Piper, I’ve come to supply you with my mist cloud when you’re on your mission.”
“What mission’s that?” asked the Grouse, in rather muffled tones.
“You’re going to buy some land on Glencoe and plant trees on it, and you’re going to build a special robot that picks up bottles and throws them accurately into any one of several skips nearby which have been dropped by depressed alcoholic Scottish mothers on anti-depression walks on their motorised pushbikes.”
“Humflu mumffle muffle fluffle.” said the Grouse, which meant ... ‘why do your bagpipes sound odd?’
“Oh yeah. Well when I first discovered my mission from DR Whooo whoooo the one eared, long eared wise owl, I had to get them in order to sort of Pied Piper the eerie Scottish mist to hide you in so that you can appear mysteriously on the sides of hills and stuff when you’re on your mission. I had to go and see Golence, the Glencoe Troll no one knows about, he has a bit of a gagging order on him since the council at Loch Ness found out and thought they may lose business if people come here Troll spotting. That Troll film didn’t help either.
Well you see, Golence is a brilliant bagpipe maker, but he has a blind spot in his right eye, which is his drilling eye. He missed the D and the A holes off my fingering pipe theng. I said, Golence! Ye stupid old bastarrrd, look what you’ve done! He could nae drill them then because the Fairy of the Skirling Pipes had gone and never ever returned to do repairs and alterations. Every set of Scottish pipes are blessed by the fairy. Golence apologised but said the fairy never came back, especially after she’d been paid. If she added holes now, the pipes would curse every person who came within earshot of them; that’s good for wars weth the English, bet a wee bet cruel at the Edinburgh Tattoo.”
Now people, as the Grouse is very softly spoken, I should really speak in Grouse-esh, his own language, but that is tae much like hard work, so I’m gaen normal with his voice. I’m calling him the Grouse, but he wasn’t the Grouse yet as Billie the Piper hadn’t yet arranged his Christening. She simply said to him, “Follow me! We have a date at a lek.”
She began to play her pipes and turned, turned ... she had sewn in glittering letters on her back ‘Long Live Rabbie Burns!’ ... a mist bank formed around them, and she marched off ... he followed.