Yosser: I'm desperate Father.
Priest: Please, call me Daniel - Dan if you like.
Yosser: I'm Desperate Dan!
What a great line from The Boys From The Blackstuff, it must have come to Bleasdale in a flash of inspiration and when I heard it I couldn't stop laughing. The smile stayed on my face for days.
What a great line from The Boys From The Blackstuff, it must have come to Bleasdale in a flash of inspiration and when I heard it I couldn't stop laughing. The smile stayed on my face for days.
My first regular hero was probably Desperate Dan of Dandy fame. Who could not but admire a cowboy who ate a whole cow in his cow pie horns and all, shaved with a blowtorch, had a bed pillow that was reinforced by rubble and was so strong that nothing could beat him. True, he might have been a bit thick but when I grew up I wanted to be just like DD.
Of course, Dan was much older than me. He was born on 4th December 1937, the date that the great D.C. Thompson first published the Dandy. At first, Dan was a bit of a desperado on the wrong side of the law, hence the Desperate bit to his name, but as time passed he became a goodie helping damsels in distress, old ladies and little kids fueled by the strengthening powers of his massive cow pies. I loved how he looked after his Aunt Aggie, his little nephew Dannie, Katie his niece and Dan's girlfriend Little Bear, an Indian squaw, and I loved how he tucked into his pies.
I so looked forward to Tuesday, market day, when we'd go to buy some fresh fish and then into Holland's the newsagents to get my copy of The Dandy. Korky the Cat, Keyhole Kate, Freddy the Fearless Fly, Barney's Bear, Roger and his Lodgers, and the infamously named Dirty Dick kept me amused for hours as I read my comic over and over but Desperate Dan was my hero. I liked the Beano - Dennis the Menace, Biffo the Bear, Minnie the Minx, Roger the Dodger, Lord Snooty and the Bash Street Kids and back in the 1950s sales of the Beano topped over 2 million a week. I read the Hotspur, the Wizard even the Eagle (and sometimes June and School Fried or Bunty in her underwear - yes we were all gender fluid back then), but it was the Dandy every time for me. I loved the Dandy a little more than the others because of Desperate Dan.
Cow pie anyone?
Of course, Dan was much older than me. He was born on 4th December 1937, the date that the great D.C. Thompson first published the Dandy. At first, Dan was a bit of a desperado on the wrong side of the law, hence the Desperate bit to his name, but as time passed he became a goodie helping damsels in distress, old ladies and little kids fueled by the strengthening powers of his massive cow pies. I loved how he looked after his Aunt Aggie, his little nephew Dannie, Katie his niece and Dan's girlfriend Little Bear, an Indian squaw, and I loved how he tucked into his pies.
I so looked forward to Tuesday, market day, when we'd go to buy some fresh fish and then into Holland's the newsagents to get my copy of The Dandy. Korky the Cat, Keyhole Kate, Freddy the Fearless Fly, Barney's Bear, Roger and his Lodgers, and the infamously named Dirty Dick kept me amused for hours as I read my comic over and over but Desperate Dan was my hero. I liked the Beano - Dennis the Menace, Biffo the Bear, Minnie the Minx, Roger the Dodger, Lord Snooty and the Bash Street Kids and back in the 1950s sales of the Beano topped over 2 million a week. I read the Hotspur, the Wizard even the Eagle (and sometimes June and School Fried or Bunty in her underwear - yes we were all gender fluid back then), but it was the Dandy every time for me. I loved the Dandy a little more than the others because of Desperate Dan.
Cow pie anyone?
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