JANET McCrickard is among the Gadfly Irregulars, a bright firmament of kindred spirits to whom we are perpetually indebted - not least in Janet's case because Wednesday is the only day she buys the paper.

For years we had egotistically assumed it was because she valued the well-turned wit and mordant maunderings of the Gadfly column.

It wasn't, she revealed in her penultimate letter, it was because Wednesday is where the jobs are.

Perhaps it is with a guilty conscience, therefore, that Janet now offers more grist to the ever-turning mill: what, she asks, of the Pudding Song?

Almost everyone will know the words, perhaps with slight variations; the tune may need no rehearsing, either, though Janet - and her mum - have been wholly unable to trace the composer:

All of a sudden

A dirty great puddin',

Came floating through the air.

It missed me mother

And hit me father

And knocked him off his chair.....

The tune's easy. It's Blaze Away by the American "March King" John Philip Sousa, after whom the sousaphone - the instrument worn around the neck, like an arthritic anaconda - is named.

Sousa also wrote marches like Stars and Stripes Forever - known over here as the Earwig Song, because football's words are "Earwig-o, earwig-o, earwig-o" - and Liberty Bell, more familiar as the Monty Python theme.

What, though, of the pudding song and what - asks Janet, from Darlington - happens next? "One assumes that the pudding continues on its career of destruction but why, and what set it off in the first place?"

Are there any more verses to this North-East classic? If not, would anyone care, printably to provide them?

SPEAKING of classics, a 20-minute wait for a delayed train at Northallerton offered chance to peruse Arriva's official explanation for adding to the chaos on the railways:

"Arriva Trains Northern is taking action to improve reliability with a programme to cut down the number of ad hoc cancellations and tackle driver shortages...."

Translated, it means that there will, indeed, be fewer ad hoc cancellations. More than 1,000 trains a week have been dropped in advance from the timetable.

LAST week's column reported the claim that Tintin was the most recognisable character in fiction - made in a new book called Tintin: the Complete Companion - and invited challengers to the title.

We should have been more specific. Fiction for this purpose must embrace only those born onto the printed page and not - like Mickey Mouse, say - those whose star rose from the silver screen.

Tom Purvis's admirable offering apart, the field has been limited. Tom Cockeram in Barwick-in-Elmet suggests Alice in Wonderland - local lass made good - both David Gamble in Cockfield and Harry Brook in Crook present an open and shut case for Sherlock Holmes, the great detective.

Ian Andrew, another of the Irregulars, nominates the Mekon, Billy Bunter (the dear old Fat Owl of the Remove) and Asterix, another cartoon strip hero.

Space may allow reproduction of Tom Purvis's A-Z of Instant Fame, made yet more recognisable by his nifty little illustrations. Father Christmas wins by a sackful, he says, but there are those who say he may not be fictional at all.

In any case, how long before even Santa is overtaken by the hyperbolic Harry Potter? Thanks to all; the real recognition - and the book - to Tom Purvis.

Here's his A to Z of Instant Fame:

Alice in Wonderland, Andy Pandy

Betty Boo, Bambi, Batman, Bilbo Baggins, Basil Brush, Brer Rabbit, Bugs Bunny, Bond... James Bond

Captain Pugwash

Davy Crockett, Dracula, Dougal

Eek & Meek, Eyeore

Father Christmas, Flashman

Garfield, Goofy

Harry Potter, Hong Kong Phooey, Huckleberry Hound

Indiana Jones

Jiminy Cricket, Jemima Puddleduck

Kermit the Frog

Long John Silver, Lone Ranger

Mickey Mouse, Mighty Mouse, Miss Piggy, Mutley

Noddy, Noggin the Nog

Olive Oyl

Popeye, Pink Panther (Durham, Durham...)

Pongo and Perdita, Porky Pig

Quick Draw McGraw

Robin, Robinson Crusoe, Roger Rabbit, Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, Rupert the Bear

Superman, Spiderman, Scooby-Doo, Sherlock Holmes, Snoopy, Santa, Supermouse,

Tonto, Top Cat, Tom and Jerry Tin Man

Uncle Remus

Woody Woodpecker, Winnie the Pooh, Worzel Gummidge

Yogi Bear

Zorro

APOSTROPHE Avenue has had the Road Closed signs up for some time, but Harry Brook - Austen Way, Crook - squeezes past the barriers with what he terms a "stumer".

(A stumer, a word beloved of the column's Old Mum, was originally a dud cheque. In the North-East it has become a more general term of derision.)

Harry, at any rate, spotted a poster for a concert for "two piano's". It's by the Durham University Music Society.

STILL Austentatiously, we reported on September 12 that a new Barratt housing estate at Colburn, near Catterick Garrison, has roads named after literary figures - Cookson Way, Herriot Drive, Kipling Drive, Bronte Drive and Austin Drive.

Austin Drive, it's possible to suppose, was intended to commemorate Jane Austen and not George Austin, the high profile former Archdeacon of York who once wrote something called When Will Ye Be Wise.

A walk that way this week revealed that the elementary error remains uncorrected.

Barratt, also in York, doubtless build very good houses. They'd fail GCSE English literature, though.

TINTIN was Belgian, or at least his creator was. Last week's column again mused upon famous Belgians, recalled Newcastle United's ode to Philippe Albert - to the tune of Rupert the Bear. It has now been appropriated, plagiarised perhaps, for Laurent Robert whose surname is similarly pronounced.

Last week also, the Belgian ambassador was lunching in Newcastle with a bunch of journalists - a select group, it's said, which may explain the column's absence - to discuss the regionalisation of Europe.

Such gripping matters notwithstanding, the conversation turned to football. The previous week, it transpired, Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt had been up here too, presented at St James's Park with a black and white shirt bearing, tightly printed, his name.

The following day, Verhofstadt was at 10 Downing Street and took the shirt with which to "impress" Tony Blair - purportedly the Magpies number one fan. Tony took it with his usual phlegm.

....and finally, a PS from Janet McCrickard. She has given up trying to find a job but will continue to buy the Echo on Wednesdays. "Now," she insists, "it will be for the Gadfly column alone."

Published: 14/11/01