Loud groans up at Stormont from Secretary of State Paul Murphy and his team from dear old Blighty as pantomime time looms up in the wake of that ill-timed Ulster election.
They had looked forward to a welcome break from Bleak House but now it was cry havoc again and a ruined Christmas.
Was Murphy responsible for that scare at 10 Downing Street, the report that Tony Blair suffered gripping stomach pains?
Tony was not the only one with belly ache on hearing RTE's election exit poll on Wednesday night.
Was there a late night message to the prime minister with the unwelcome news from Neverneverland?
Tony be warned in advance... but it looks like another deadlock, gridlock or lock-out from Stormont?
Prime Minister: "Gripes, what a pain. Enough to sicken a pig. Sorry, Paul, but you will have to hold the fort. I know it's Christmas but you'll have to get that lot around a table and talk sense to them."
Murphy: "Sense – that's in short supply in some quarters. Ugh! More talks at Hillsborough? We hoped to be back home by now but its beginning to look like a long haul."
Prime Minister: "Look at it this way, talks are better than bombs. I must ring Bertie. I am sure he's fed up too... with other things on his plate including the European Presidency." (Note: I hasten to admit this is pure fiction but it could have happened. It was good to hear that Tony's illness was only a temporary set back and not serious).
Now about that ill-starred election, which reminded me of Craigavon's 'smash and grab' election way back in the thirties.
This time it was the turn of the DUP and Sinn Féin to grab the opportune moment when the rest were dithering.
The ancient DUP leader, Big Ian, rejuvenated by his big majority appeared at the north Antrim count with little Sir Echo Ian Junior.
Grabbing the lapels of the startled UTV man's coat he roared: "I don't need you!"
He told us he had no time for TV panels of journalists and other politicians, preferring to go round meeting the people. Presumably that strata of our society still under the spell of his guldering bigotry.
His spiel regurgitated endlessly, led by his party men, is that the Belfast Agreement (he shuns 'good Friday') has now been rejected by the majority of unionists and therefore is dead and buried and must be replaced by a 'fairer one' to the unionists!
Former Deputy First Minister of the assembly, Seamus Mallon MP, making a welcome appearance on the BBC election panel was at pains to reject this perverse proposition pointing out that it had not a snowball's chance in hell in view of the vast expanse of the international agreement backed by two sovereign governments and endorsed by the referendum of the people of Ireland, north and south.
Where would they begin to unravel this historic document?
Withdraw the 'consent' principle? send the republican and loyalist prisoners back to reopened prison camps?
Replace the police service by an all-Protestant RUC?
Dismantle the north/south bodies and set up a new assembly, a mirror image of Craigavon's Protestant parliament for a Paisleylite people.
To mention just a few of the so-called concessions to republicans which stick in the craw of the assorted no-men, is to conjure up a vision of the miserable Northern Ireland we thought we had left behind five years ago.
The cold November election or 'sham fight' as Seamus Mallon sees it, was held in the midst of political confusion. It has resulted in an even greater mess and muddle.
If the two governments responsible for overseeing our dilemma don't move swiftly to bring us back to the real world, we could be lapsing into a Palestinian like shambles fuelled by the upsurge of the most reactionary fundamentalists in Europe.
Prime Minister Blair and Taoiseach Ahern, who set this scene, meet tomorrow in Wales. We have lurched back to Terence O'Neill's crossroads.
Behind us is the grim rocky road which led to the nightmare of the killing fields. The fickle finger of fate points once more away from all that to the way forward.
It's up to them to speak out loud and clear.
