Niggles and Mr. Nobody Blow the Man

In the summer of 1989, I learned a tune that might've been Blow the Man Down. It was my father's fault. The tune came on the radio, on his favourite station, and he said "Ey, that's Blow the Man Down. I blew him off: "BFD. I'm reading."

It would've ended there, but Blow the Man Down is like curry for the ears: it repeats on you big-time. It repeated on me, and on my unfortunate household, for the rest of the summer. It drove everyone nuts, especially my mother. I'm not sure whether it was my persistence that got her goat, or my voice, or my ignorance of the words, but after a few bars, she'd be ready to sew my mouth shut. My version of the song went something like this:

Blow the man down, oh yeah, blow the man down;
Blow the man down, oh yeah, blow the man down;
Blow the man down, oh yeah, blow the man down--
Blow the man, blow the man, blow the man down."

Come to think of it, I still don't know the rest of the song. I don't have the slightest idea what it's about. Back then, I thought--well, I was ten years old. You know what I thought, or wanted to think. Maybe Mother thought it, too. Maybe that's why she hated it so.

Later that summer, after my mother had chased me out of the kitchen, and my father had threatened me with a violin string (what he intended to do with it was unclear, but the menace was not), I came up with some makeshift words. I can't remember them--this is a reconstruction, sort of thing:

Blow the man down from his house in the sky;
Blow down his castle, and see if he'll fly.
Blow the man down--as he hurtles to earth
Blow up his toga*, and see what he's worth!

There was another version, a pirate version, that ended something like this--

Blow him to Davey Jones, under the sea;
Blow him if you want, but don't look at me.

--and a version having to do with long underpants.

I'm surprised Mother never strangled me. Maybe she strangled Niggles and Mr. Nobody**, instead. I haven't seen those guys in a while.

* Or, possibly, Blow down his trousers.

** Niggles and Mr. Nobody were my imaginary friends...sort of. I never played with them, or talked to them, but whenever I did something bad, they got the blame. Who ate the Christmas sweets? Niggles. Who disconnected the radiator? Mr. Nobody. Who vandalised the park bench? Niggles and Mr. Nobody, working in tandem.