Judge Jock: Simon gets Pokered, Boat Trip Capers and we have a Winner …

This week On the Hot Poker:
Queen’s counsel Simon Moore, dashing Crown solicitor at Auckland, talks frankly about his passions, challenges, achievements and his favourite TV show.

(This is serious stuff, so sit up and take notice…)

“Hi, Si…”

“Hi Jock J..”

“Gosh Si, you are looking spiffing today…”

“Why, thank you, Your Graciousness…”

“Golly, I’m fair gobsmacked by how the carefully placed studio lighting highlights our matching tonsorial splendour…”

“You are too kind as always, Eminence…”

“And, if I may say Si, the cut of your jib has always weakened knees about the Robing Room…”

“Your hand-chiselled tartan pinstripe is truly breathtaking, O Learned One…”

“Just an appropriately dashing number they ran up for me at Strangely Normal, Si…”

(A few moments are taken to adjust the full-width mirrors)

“Do tell us about your fave telly show, Si…Let me guess – Mr Ed in Maori???”

“Shucks, Bro-chap, the whanau’s been leaking again…”

“Well, Si, as always, it has been a jolly pleasure having you chat candidly to us this evening about your passions, challenges and achievements…”

“And finally, Si, any plans for the weekend???”

“As always, Jock J, your rapier-like probing almost caught me off guard (laughs out loud in a lusty, thigh-slapping blokey fashion)…But not this time, chap, I’m on to you…Yes, sirree, it’s another weekend of horsing around for me…”

“Not pondering your defence to a massive wrongful dismissal claim brought by legions of sacked Meredith Connell workers, then, Si???”

“Dammit, Judge Jock – you’ll pay for that insolence…Groom, get me the bl**dy horse whip!!!”

“B*llocks,” said The Scunner.

(Our guest On the Hot Poker next week is…)

And we have a Cute QC winner!!!
Following overwhelming public curiosity, back-alley lobbying and lashings of Bombay deliberations down The Lane, the judging panel declares as follows:

QC Personality of 2013, as selected by the also rans, is QC Anne Hinton…

QC Most Likely to Succeed in 2013 is QC Stephen Mills – a late contender still subject to a Steward’s Inquiry…

People’s QC Choice of 2013 is QC Hugh Rennie…

And the Supreme Winner of the Title of Cute QC for 2013 – after a close fought arm-wrestle in The Corner Bar – is the lovely Mrs QC Deborah Hollings-Chambers!!!

Mrs QC Hollings-Chambers just nudged out veteran contender QC Julian Miles by a stocking top…

Please note: The Cute QC judging panel advises that expected challenges to this result must be accompanied by the usual wad of fivers, delivered in person to Judge Jock at The Corner Bar between 1pm and 4pm this Friday, April 12.

Annual Jurists and Silks boat trip to Riverhead:
Auckland’s upper harbour echoed the other day to the gay carousing of jurists and silks on their annual Easter holiday boat trip to Riverhead.

Once everyone was safely rollocked-up below decks, the gaily-decorated little red boat headed off into a stiff nor-easterly head wind.

Before too long, Cap’n QC Gentleman Jim grabbed the wheel, spun the vessel around and got it back on the right course.

Lashings of alcoholic ginger beer and buckets of sausage rolls later, the Riverhead Pub loomed into view.

(“Who wrote this rubbish???” said The Scunner.)

“Ahoy, Riverhead,” cried Chief Justice Rusty Outboard. “Permission to berth???”

“There will be none of that sort of nonsense in these premises,” bellowed Mine Host.

“We run an orderly house here and you lot better mind your Ps and QCs!!! Get it??? QCs??? Oh, I give up…”

“Look lively, brethren,” said Justice Bushy Tailed. “We don’t have much time, race you to the beer hose…”

“Hang on a minute,” wheezed Justice Clapped Out Knee. “I’ve got me braces tangled in QC Well Turned Ankle’s high heels.

“Whoopee!!!” said Justice Ample Bosom. “Big jugs of Pims No 1 down this end, follow me…”

“Fancy a wee stroll through the mangroves, lassie???” said a shadowy figure emerging from the shadows.

“Golly, look who it is,” said twin blonde QCs We Look Dangerous And We Mean It.

Our Man At The Bar strode forward, hairy-thighed and taught of buttock.

“I’m today’s floor show, don’t ye know,” he said, before pub security dragged him out the back for a quick seeing-to.

“Gather round,” said The Scunner, “and I’ll tell you a tale…”

“One day Judge Jock, long-bottomed and resplendently gowned, was propping up his leaner in the Ladies and Escorts Lounge when in bounced a pair of Swedish tourist ladies.

“Oh, Judge Jock, is it true what they say about what Kiwi jurists wear under your judicial regalia?” queried the lady Swedes.

“Aye, it is that, lassies,” said Jock J. “Come closer and I’ll give you a wee peek…”

“Oh, Judge Jock, it’s…”

“That’s quite enough of that carry-on,” intervened Mine Host. “This is an orderly house and we are not putting up with a repeat performance of last year…Get out, the lot of you…”

“Knuckle him,” yelled QC Punchy With It.

“Put the boot in,” screamed Justice Butter Wouldn’t Melt In Her Mouth.

And so it was that Their Honours, Learned Silks and Local Gentry brawled noisily around the place before the triumphant daytrippers set sail for home.

“Ah,” said OMATB, making sure a nauseous Justice Be Gentle With Me was strategically positioned over the blunt end. “These team-building jaunts are wonderful for morale…”

“B*llocks,” said The Scunner.

A Judge’s girlfriend goes online:
“There I was, Judge Jock, all dolled up in my best boob tube and slingbacks, waiting under the lamp-post on the corner just the way His Rogue-ish Honour likes and what do I get???

“A bl**dy text message, that’s what…”

“What do you make of this, Jock J??? ‘Sorree, Svetlana, kant makeit tonite…kept in arffter wirk bye UnoWho…’

“Excuses, excuses, Judge Jock…That’s all he gives me these days…He’s up to summat, I just know it…He can’t spell and who is Svetlana??? He does call me other names but who’s she???…What can a poor girl do???”

“What’s that you say???”

“Our Man At The Bar is at a loose end and fancy free??? Parked on the next corner??? Yoo Hoo, OMATB…”

“I’m up for it – off to the Ladies and Escorts Lounge we go, sweetie…”

“Harrumph,” said His Honour.

“B*gger,” said The Scunner.

Lost from the Ladies and Escorts Lounge:
There are mounting calls for an independent inquiry into the recent disappearance of highly sensitive material from the Ladies and Escorts Lounge.

Full details have yet to be leaked but insiders say the Lounge’s hand-crafted, leather-bound files containing the names of patrons and their guests are nowhere to be found.

Also missing is a series of remarkably clear photographic images of young relatives from Hawke's Bay, captured by in-house CCTV.

In a brief statement on behalf of the L & E Lounge, Judge Jock told a slavering media pack the missing files were unlikely to pose much of a security risk because most patrons would be unidentifiable in their flamboyant costumary.

“Career-killing embarassment, Yes…National security, No,” said Judge Jock, quietly pocketing “reward money” from those anxious to have the material returned.

“These lapses happen from time to time…Sure to be down to systemic failure…Bound to turn up down the back of someone’s trousers, I expect…I don’t recall…No more questions…Now, s*d off…”

“Yes, S*d off,” said The Scunner.

Next time: Advanced Twattering from the Behind the Bench
Background: In court, folk are forbidden by judges from twattering directly to the outside world.

This is to prevent embarrassing c*ckups such as those which occur when twattlers fail to hear the word “not” in front of the word “guilty.”

As Judge Jock’s step-by-step manual will show – with examples – the ban does not apply to Puisne Judges or Queen’s counsel, who maintain a steady flow of twit-twats throughout trials…

Coming soon:
A handy judicial guide on how best to direct a jury in order to save time and avoid long delays in getting down The Lane, or the Dungeon, whatever takes An Honour's fancy on the day...

janderson@nbr.co.nz