Going Out In Style

Father Ted famously uses the occasion of his Golden Cleric award to make an acceptance speech that settles a few old scores.  “And now, we move on to liars …”   Yesterday I attended the retirement celebrations of an outstanding and highly-esteemed lawyer who practised in my neck of the woods for 30 years.  Though extremely effective, yer man is the eiptome of ‘mild mannered’ and we looked forward to his address in the justified anticipation of some wise and witty words.  We got all that – and more.

A bit of background.  In the bad old days before competition in the energy industries (and by Heaven, they were bad) one of the great nationalised industries used a particular law firm for all its major commercial dealings.  The senior partner in said firm therefore effectively wielded the power of his client’s monopoly – and many there were who felt he did so to baleful effect.  Across the industry, all of us on ‘the other side of the table’ had cause to mutter under our breaths.  But hey, monopoly is monopoly, you just have to grin and get on with it.

Anyhow, our golden guy was once a junior lawyer in this very firm.  As people do, he was paying tribute to various folks he’d learned from over the years, and when his account reached that period of his career we were wondering what characteristically diplomatic turn of phrase he might deploy to describe the great ogre under whose lash we had all suffered.  He certainly picked his words carefully – “treacherous old bastard!“, to be exact.

It was a great party.

Any other good retirement speech stories out there?

ND