Maybe it's my warped mind, or too much reading Pilgrim's Progress, but I knew Shambles' scenario was allegorical as soon as I'd read it. I was surprised at how many missed it, even after two or three nudges from wide-awake cats.

But please don't ban all imagery, Callie and others. If you were fooled, take it on the chin, like Jed did (some good sentiments, Jed). Where would folk songs and poetry be without imagery?

For my part, as one who must surely be in Shambles' sights, while at the same time having upset his enemies, I am resolved to move at least at little in his direction.

In future I may well be sucked into non-musical threads, but I'll not start any. I started a thread about prisoner releases in Ulster recently. I had intended it to be thought-provoking, but it turned out that some people - not unreasonably - read it as just provocative. The thread turned up some useful banter in the end, but more by luck than judgment, on my part.

So when it comes to starting threads, I'll stick to music-related. My small contribution to making sure, as Joe Offer put it in another thread, that any newcomer, referred here for music reasons, is going to see at least a few music threads among the dozens listed.

But I can only go with you so far, Shambles. In fairness to Catspaw, I'm sure I've seen him reconsider posts several times, and he's entitled to have that said by a non-clique third-party, even if he's capable of saying it himself.