WHERE EGOS DARE

ONE OF the most popular reads in London is Ri-Ra, a free monthly magazine renowned throughout the commuting fraternity as the perfect literary antidote for those seemingly interminable Tube journeys to and from work. Travellers without the foresight to bring their own reading material will resort to perusing any printed matter on the Tube, however banal: discarded property or business sections, religious pamphlets, Argos catalogues, the conditions on the back of their tickets or, in cases of extreme tedium, Times Square by Brendan Glacken. No surprise then that the monthly dispatch of thousands of Ri-Ras to the city s Underground stations causes no end of ruaille buaille, with passengers of every stripe and shade licking their chops at the prospect of their monthly fix of what promises to be a well-written, aesthetically pleasing, witty and informative take on Irish life in London.
This month, Ri-Ra promises to be even more well-written, aesthetically pleasing, witty and informative than usual, as I have just submitted my inaugural contribution to same. Editor Micheal O Coughlan got in touch recently and begged me to complete a questionnaire, not dissimilar in its line of interrogation to the Hot Press Mad Hatter s Box. We think you d be ideal, he enthused, buttering me up like a crusty slice of bread. Then, the ultimate in flattery: Our deadline is tomorrow and we re really stuck, he pleaded cravenly. A cry for help, if ever I heard one.
It has been well documented in this column, albeit by me, that everything I do is great. Therefore, I firmly believe that by providing pithy answers to a light-hearted questionnaire in a popular London monthly, I would be touching the lives of thousands of weary Londoners with my greatness, thereby adding some much needed sparkle to their sad, empty existences.
Truth be told, I d prefer to be one of those people who adds to their own mystique by refusing to entertain such frippery. Point blank refusal to do interviews, or indeed light-hearted questionnaires, lends an air of intrigue to certain folk in the business they call Show. Newcastle centre forward Duncan Ferguson is one such enigma.
The ungainly Scot has little truck with the media, and is notorious for his steadfast refusal to co-operate with journalists or other meejia outlets. A recent newspaper article chronicled the futile attempts of the BBC to engage his services for an episode of A Question Of Sport, the televisual equivalent of your average light-hearted questionnaire. Having had their every plea roundly ignored for months, they finally played their ace in the hole by asking John Parrott, a team captain on the show whose sister happens to be Mrs Duncan Ferguson, to put a good word in. The chirpy former world snooker champion agreed to see what he could do, lodged the request over Sunday lunch and was lucky enough to be dignified with a response. That response was No.
Getting Duncan Ferguson to appear on A Question Of Sport has clearly become a personal quest, a kind of holy grail, for some endearingly naive celebrity booker at the BBC. The pursuit of Big Dunc occupies her (these researchers are invariably clipboard-wielding young females) every waking hour, and that s a lot of hours, because she doesn t sleep at night, choosing instead to lie awake, plotting her next move. Deep down she knows that Big Dunc, Richard Kimble to her Lieutenant Gerrard, probably wouldn t even be a particularly entertaining foil for the japes of either his brother-in-law John Parrott, or his cheeky compatriot Ally McCoist, two men all of us would happily welcome into the bosom of our families if they took a shine to our sisters.
However, she doesn t care anymore because Big Dunc s comic potential is no longer an issue. Renowned more for his height, his time in the slammer, his capacity for sustaining injury, his abilitIes as a footballer and his love of pigeons than his ability to crack wise, the man the press dubbed Duncan Disorderly has become the Scarlet Pimpernel of the light-hearted sports quiz world. They seek him here, they seek him there, but deep down, you know that they can seek him til their arses turn blue, but they still won t get a result.
Big Dunc s obstinance is nothing if not admirable. Who else but him would, upon finding himself contractually obliged to give six pages worth of quote to Total Football magazine, call in the solicitors before refusing point blank to discuss anything other than the football boot he was being paid handsomely to endorse. Mitre got good value for their money, as the mere sight of their logo causes both Stuart Clark and I to giggle helplessly and start quoting large chunks of the interview to each other in Scottish accents. Neither of us has the foggiest idea whether or not our mimicry is up to speed or not, because neither of us has ever heard Duncan Ferguson speak.
Sadly for them, the readers of Ri-Ra will soon learn that I am incapable of such
reticence.