Gremlin in the works

[SRAYN1]

My father, who served in the RAF, swears blind he was a victim of the gremlins. Is he just spinning me a line?

[Golly]

No. A Gremlin is a creature that moves the runway just as a novice pilot comes in to land. When there are no flights, these creatures break into the workshops and move all the tools around.

[James]

These are mischievous spirits of tools and machinery. They are blamed for the minor mishaps when working ' the reason your hammer hits your thumb rather than the nail. They also steal the screwdriver that was on the workbench just a minute ago. Additionally, gremlins will hide the TV remote control when you favourite programme is coming on, cause the shower water to go cold and burn the toast. They are said to be man's former friends, who became an enemy when he started taking the credit for their inventions. The name gremlin was first coined just after the end of the First World War, when they were humorously blamed for all the technical malfunctions in planes. Gremlin jokes were used wildly by the RAF during the Second World War and started to become almost a belief among the superstitious pilots. Many had them painted on the side of their planes as a good luck token.