SANTA'S GARAGE MECHANIC

We've all heard that Rudolf had a red nose, but do we know why?

There's one thing that any Father Christmas must do and that is make sure his transport is in A1 condition for the Big Day, and to that extent he needs extensive garage facilities.

Under his Ice Castle, Santa had constructed a confusing labyrinth of garages. There was a huge space with an inspection pit illuminated by a thousand candles and an alarm clock " the clock was needed to warn mechanics when they'd been down below the vehicle for more than ten minutes when the oxygen supply in the air will have been consumed by the candles. There were other huge spaces, too. The vehicle (a sleigh of unbelievably massive proportions) needed repainting every year ready for Christmas Eve, when the vehicle would be needed as a matter of urgency.

And one particular year, not so long before “D” (for delivery) Day, a fault was discovered.

The Sat Nav was on the blink.

It wasn't just on the blink it had blinked out altogether. It's little screen was as dead as the fabled dodo.

Santa stood in the garage and watched Grubble as he went through his tooth-sucking and head-shaking routine.

“You'll need to take a map this year,” he muttered ruefully. “In fact, you'll have to take a whole atlas of maps, cause this daft machine of yours won't work, bloody thing.”

“What's wrong with it?” demanded Santa.

More tooth-sucking and head shaking, and: “Who can tell?” asked the dwarf, miserably. “It ain't my field, boss, an' that's a fact. But if you was to ask me...”

“I did ask you!” snapped Santa. “It's what I pay you for. It's what you're here for. It's why you get your wages!”

“Then I'd have to say...” mumbled Grubble, sucking violently. “I'd have to suggest … the fault is most likely in Rudolf, bloody creature.”

“In Rudolf?” repeated Santa, his eyes and mouth wider than usual. “How come it's to do with Rudolf?”

“It's his antlers,” grumbled Grubble, “they're wired up as an aerial to pick up the satellite signal, and one of 'em must have been fractured. That's most likely what it is. Rudolf's got a fractured antler, bloody thing.”

“And you can't fix it, dwarf?” demanded Santa. “You can't get some duck tape or solder or superglue and fix it?”

A great deal more tooth-sucking and head-shaking and tooth-sucking again. “The trouble is, antlers ain't mechanical things,” he grumbled. “They're made of living stuff like ceratin, and that don't respond kindly to repairs of that ilk. You need a vet doctor, that's what you need, a bloke as can put the offending antler in plaster until it mends!”

“Can't you make an artificial one?” demanded Santa. “I can't go out of here and all over the world in a fortnight without my Sat Nav!”

“You managed once,” groaned Grubble. “I recall the time you went out with just a twig to guide you.”

“I'm not going back to those days, Grubble! Now, you get that satellite navigation system fixed, or you'll get your cards and I'll be looking for another chief mechanic come the New Year!”

“That's harsh, sir: that's bloody harsh!” grumbled Grubble.

“Maybe, but that's how things are!” snapped Santa. “You've got two days, so get to it and fix my machine!”

And he stomped out without giving the dwarf a moment to argue back at him. He had a job to do, and he was determined to do it, and that being the case he needed his Sat Nav.

Meanwhile, Grubble put his mind to the problem.

What this needs, he thought to himself, what this needs is a fancy amplifier, bloody thing!

And he poked around in boxes containing forgotten this and that and the other, black bits with wires hanging from them and white bits with loose screws and bits of once-sticky tape hanging loose. And there were coils of this and that, LED lights of forgotten use, a horseshoe or two, leaky old batteries that reeked of acid, broken parts of old valve radios, torch bulbs that may or may not work " in fact, boxes of pure delight.

And he fished out a length of fine copper wire, a once-silvered reflector, a red rear bicycle lamp as well as several items of totally unknown purpose.

And he set to work with a will and a great deal of tooth-sucking and head shaking.

He twisted the fine copper wire round Rudolf's offending antler (“sorry about this, old fellow, but the boss is in one of his moods”), attached bits of this and that on a big bit of the other and bolted them to Rudolf's saddle and connected the whole lot to a creation of his own, made of the old bicycle light and a collection of LEDs, and he mounted this last thing on Rudolf's nose because there was nowhere else to put it. (“Sorry again, old fellow, but you know what he can be like...”)

And two days later, when Santa returned to check on progress Grubble sucked again and even blew a couple of puffs and shook and nodded his head and muttered “it's a bit Heath Robinson, but it should work for a bit.”

And he showed Santa how his Sat Nav screen lit up brighter than bright, and showed a detailed map of the vicinity of the Ice Castle.

Santa was truly happy, almost deliriously so, then he noticed something.

“What's that?” he pointed.

“Oh? The nasal capacitor, bloody thing?” asked Grubble. “Rudolf don't mind, sir, but without it I can't get anything to work...”

“You bloody moron!” grated out Santa. But he had to accept the modification, either that or risk getting very lost indeed on Christmas Eve.

And subsequently he had to accept that, from that time onwards, his leading reindeer would display a brightly red flashing nose, one that could be seen for miles in every imaginable direction across the world on Christmas Eve.

His own red-nose sat-nav.