John Gibson: Peanuts, it’s the job for a skivvy

WHAT she’s looking for is a skivvy, godammit. That’s the only word for it. You might prefer ‘‘slave.’’ It’s the Queen, no less, seeking somebody for her staff (a maid) and she’s paying sweeties.

Begging your pardon, Your Majesty, but permit me to proffer advice into the royal lugholes – get real. Welcome to the real world. The wages are £273 a week.

Here’s what one has to do for that pittance . . . no, let’s skip it. I don’t have the space for the long-as-my-arm list of “duties”. Can I just say there’s a good chance the applicant should clinch the job brandishing a loo brush?

I have to imagine the ramrod Master of the Household at Buck Palace and Balmoral twirling his moustache and fixing the poor woman with an icy stare. Stop whimpering when I’m talking to you!

To be fair, Her Majesty is providing nosh and a bed over and above the 273 quid.

Bums on seats

Exit stage left, right or centre. Shame on the Edinburgh International Festival. Chancers, they’ve “bent” this year’s box office figures by as much as ten per cent. It seems the figures have had a ten per cent massage, an investigation has revealed.

Audiences this year were lower than in 2008, 2009 and 2010. So we shouldn’t believe the propaganda. Excuses whispered by the organisers are pathetic. For organisers, read jobsworths.

Hard core

Unmistakably seasonal, this street call for Halloween, sent to me by Jimmy Frame, one-tine industrial correspondent for this paper, and recognisably Glaswegian by the sound of it:

‘Haw missus, ye cannae by lookin’. Here’s aiples fer cookin’, sookin’ and dookin.’

Jimmy has preferred Musselburgh to Glasgow for his retirement. What becomes of a Partick Thistle fan.