By Pat Fielding
The day for entries has come at last,
Entries pour in thick and fast,
The telephone rings – it never stops,
No time to visit the local shops.
The birds are entered in a book
No one but me gets to look
Oh no the label printers jammed,
I’ll have to write them all by hand.
Wednesday night arrives at last,
The telephone deadline has just past,
Labels are done and posted out,
I don’t know what I worried about.
On Saturday night some birds come in,
Staging going up – what a din,
The absentees are all deleted,
Soon the booking in will be completed.
Everyone walked across mats at the door,
For Biosecurity we can’t do more,
The staging has been given a really good scrub,
A virus won’t dare invade this club
The judges arrive at half past nine
Of the show manager there is no sign,
The show secretary has just gone nutty,
Found the show manager with a bacon butty.
The results of the judging are coming through,
For the show office there’s lots to do,
Lots of forms for the secretary to complete,
For each of the societies there is a sheet.
Rings are checked for the BS,
With cleaned hands? Of course - yes!
Rosettes are placed upon the cages,
This job alone seems to take for ages.
We are ready now to open the doors,
First a quick sweep of the floor,
The exhibitors rush to see the best,
Pushing and shoving in their quest.
Cups presented and the trophy book signed,
Everyone’s milling around but they don’t mind,
Catching up on news like fanciers do
The winner of the raffle is twenty two
Its now late afternoon on the day of the show,
Everyone’s patiently waiting to go,
The birds they need to be booked out,
“lift your birds” the show manager’s just shout.
The hall is empty and quiet at last,
Our open show is now in the past
We’ve done really well to get through the day
Our only hope we’ve made the show pay!