Enda engages in some phoney tactics to leave Eamon hanging

POOR old Eamon all dressed up and nowhere to go, waiting anxiously by the phone all weekend for Enda to invite him to the Prom — the promotion to Cabinet, that is.

With a “Gilmore (Will Settle) For Tánaiste” badge pinned to his best party outfit, eager Eamon sat staring at his mobile willing it to ring.

But Enda was a past master of the West of Ireland dance hall circuit of the early ’70s and knew the best way to keep a suitor keen is to treat them very mean.

Enda even got his mate Leo Varadkar to start a whispering campaign that Mr Kenny was chatting up independent backbenchers behind Eamon’s back.

Oh, how Shane Ross’s head turned at the thought of such attention, Mick Wallace flicked his amazing blond trusses at the prospect of high office, and — speaking of high office — decriminalise cannabis campaigner Luke “Ming” Flanagan dusted off what wags have dubbed his Five Joint Plan for rescuing the country just in case.

Ming sees a great future for Ireland enjoying days of hope, or did he mean enjoying a haze of dope?

Anyway, Enda was just using the Dáil dandys to make Eamon fret, and the poor fella must have had a sleepless night wondering why no invitation to the great tango of state that is coalition negotiations had arrived.

Then, just to rattle Eamon even more, Enda’s buddies rang up early-morning radio to say that he had indeed left a message for Mr Gilmore but had not received the courtesy of a reply.

Eamon was shocked at the news and rushed to check all his Justin Bieber ring tones were working properly on his mobile — but still no message, what was going on?

Well, it seems, Enda had left the fabled invitation at 7.19pm Sunday night — but he’d left it on Eamon’s landline in Leinster House where no politician has set foot for the past four weeks, and where no one would ever be at a weekend anyway.

So, what was Enda playing at? Trying to destabilise little Eamon before the cut and thrust of the programme for Government battle by deliberately leaving him out in the cold?

It does seem strange the Fine Gael political machine that so meticulously bulldozed its way to touching distance of a Dáil majority could so casually have proved unable to find the right phone number for the Labour leader.

Labourites suspected foul play, or should that be fowl play — as in Enda’s petty revenge for Mr Gilmore sending that socialist in a chicken suit at the beginning of the campaign?

Luckily, Eamon and Enda made up in the end, but let’s hope the new Taoiseach masters the art of political telephone diplomacy before he has to make his next major call to German Chancellor, and European money mistress, Angela Merkel, otherwise it could go something like this:

Kenny: “Hey, Angie, it’s me, Enda!”

Merkel: “Who?”

Kenny: “Enda, you know, the blond guy you met in Berlin on Valentine’s Day when I turned up at your house like that?”

Merkle: “Erm, yes, but we’ve tightened security since then...”

Kenny: “Well, guess what? I’m running a country now. Yeah, a whole country — for real!”

Merkle: “Which country?”

Kenny: “It’s the little broke, dysfunctional one on the top left of the map?”

Merkle: “Mein Gott, not Irlande?”

Kenny: “Yeah, Ireland, that’s the one! Paddy likes what he sees in old Enda, baby!”

Merkle: “Oh, sorry, there’s someone at the door, I think you may have the wrong number, please don’t call again, bye...”

Kenny: “Angie? Angie? Hello...?”