Pesky Blenders

'Pooh?'

'Hmm?'

'What else?'

'What else what?'

'On our walk home yesterday you said Tigger was organising this quiz "for a start." What else?'

'Ah, well, he's getting two pitches ready.'

'Oh, he's not going for that after all, is he? Where will we put them all? Brazil's bigger than us.'

'No, Piglet, tv pitches. Ideas for programmes.'

'Oh. Ah. What programmes?'

'Well, a very popular drama has just started a new series with a stellar cast.'

'Pooh, are you reading that from something?'

'No, Eeyore's words. He's watching it avidly.'

'Meaning somewhere between indifference and disdain.'

'Well, yes.'

'What's it about?'

'Apparently, a gang in Birmingham in the 1920s who are in constant battle with a mob of wild, ungovernable accents.'

'Goodness.'

'Oh, yes. In one episode, Eeyore says, the gang leader has an hour-long arm-wrestle with a farm-worker accent from the Wiltshire-Dorset borders--'

'Really?'

'--who then escapes by turning into an unassuming crofter from the Kyle of Lochalsh.'

'Hoots, mon.'

'Piglet. Never in the entire history of Scotland has anyone ever said "Hoots, mon".'

'Not even under their breath?'

'Especially not under their breath. But Eeyore found the latest episode riveting--'

'--so…mildly distracting--'

'Well, yes. Some of the accent mob infiltrate the gang and sound plausibly Brummie. For about three minutes. Then they throw off their--whatever it is accents wear--to reveal themselves as a Geordie, a Salopian and a hapless drugs mule from Bogota.'

'So what are these pitches Tigger's going on about?'

'Ah, well, he intends to produce reality versions.'

'Of this accent show?'

'Yes. One's a sort of Candid Camera thing, but all very good natured, with everyone shaking hands afterwards--well, if they've still got hands after the pranks.'

'Dare I ask what he intends--?'

'Perky Blunders.'

'And the other?'

'Now, this one is more of a public service effort. You know, the dangers of the kitchen.'

'Oh, right…How Limp Is Your Lettuce sort of thing?'

'Well, more to do with rogue appliances.'

'I'm bracing myself for--'

'Pesky Blenders.'

'But what about the original? Are they meant to sort of fall in with all this?'

'How do you mean?'

'Well, is the gang-leader meant to break off from another arm-wrestle with a duplicitous non-Brummie accent and say "Will you look at the cut of that whisk?"'

'Probably. You know Tigger. As he says, he'll run it past the envelope.'

'A Wiltshire-Dorset accent, eh? Does it say "Bah, b'ain't natural"?'

'Don't do that, Piglet.'

'Not even quietly?'

'Especially not quietly.'