Teh Polticks
As you all know I have returned to the golden sunsets and endless sun-kissed beaches of the North-West's favourite resort town of Crewe. I've been back since Good Friday and I can only say that it's been all go ever since.
My return has heralded the triumphant escape from relegation to the Fourth Division for the local footballing team by virtue of the other clubs in the grey area above the relegation zone canceling out a 1-4 defeat by playing even shittier than Crewe did. But that's not all; I now have my own little house, courtesy of the good offices of the Manchester and District Housing Association. I have a bed, a two piece suite, a kettle, mug and a packet of cup-a-soup. I am independent again although I have to nick Sharon's interwebs to do this. And her phone, cooker and fridge. And food.
Even more momentous is the fact that due to the death of much admired local Labour MP, Gwyneth Dunwoody, Crewe and Nantwich has been forced lock stock and barrel into the public eye - there will be a by-election here on May 22nd and, since the Labour Party managed to cock up royally last week in the locals and Gwyneth was not known to be particularly sympathetic to New Labour, the world's media has descended to watch more kicks aimed squarely into the groin of a flailing government, especially as Gwyneth's 7000 majority is being touted equally as safe and vulnerable - because it was personality not party based. It's the first by-election anyone in Crewe can remember as Gwyneth was MP for 34 years and her predecessor for well over 20. The place is crawling with the world's media. Apparently.
I went into Do It All ysterday lunchtime and saw an ITN transmission van in the car park. That was it. Watching the news later I was a bit surprised to see that I'd missed it. Everything. A few days ago I'd made a vow on Jules' blog that I was definitely going to get on the telly sometime during this campaign, not because I have a particular political axe to grind but because I really want to shout something rude at any visiting Tories. Damn. I cocked up big time there.
So, who came to town? Well, for the Lib Dems it was Vince Cable. He's er...in the Lib Dems and they call him the shadow chancellor. There's rumour that the local party had their candidate thrown at them by central office. It wasn't a woman to start with, now it is. Nobody knows, it's all denied, she's the officially selected candidate, no, not a woman because Gwyneth was. No, definitely not. Supporting official Labour candidate Tamsin Dunwoody, Gwyneth's daughter and former Welsh Assembly member, Labour wheeled in big gun justice minister and Lord Chancellor, Jack Straw. He looks disturbingly more like my Dad every time I see him. I don't mind Mrs Dunwoody Jr, she's very nice and I spoke to her on the phone on Monday. She wants to do the job and she knows the area well. I wouldn't have shouted at her.
We have a Monster Raving Loony but I'm not sure anyone cares anymore since David Sutch rather unwittingly lost his final deposit some years ago. We do have another comedy candidate though, one Gemma Garrett from Norniron who is Miss Britain and is representing the Beauties for Britain party. She knows pig all about politics, even less about the trains and posh cars for which the town is justly famous and probably doesn't even know where Crewe is. But she has big tits and that's fine. There was TV footage on BBC North West of a local teen sniggering like Tim Nice-but-Dim because the interviewer had suggested Miss Garrett was attractive. This is great stuff - another two weeks of it please.
What really pissed me off is that while I was in Aldi, I missed my chance to throw something perishable or shout searching questions (probably involving a lot of swearing I'm afraid) at public school manofthepeople and top Tory, Dave "Boy" Cameron. I really don't think I could have resisted it as I find that as I get older, I care less and less about making an arse of myself in public (unless it involves singing, which I just won't do, OK?).
That was yesterday. This morning I was quietly minding my own business around the Market Square, clutching a bag of pigs' ears for the dog and a second hand coat rack for my hallway when I became aware of some media presence, not least from the young man with a microphone from BBC 5 Live imploring a young and appreciably fleshy market trader to yell out one of his cries. He declined saying he would be losing business while doing so. Had the interviewer chosen to point his mic at me I would have made some comment about the value of recycling to the local economy. The recycling in this case being the very same wrecked video game rifle I saw in a skip at the local tip the previous evening and onto which I'd just tipped a pile of dog-soiled carpet tiles. There was further presence: bulkier men with curly wires coming out of their ears and the kind of mobile you don't get in Phones 4 U plus several policemen and a few curious PCSOs. Then I saw Mrs Dunwoody Jr and shook her hand, saying that we'd spoken a couple of days previously to which she replied that we indeed had and that it was nice to meet me at last. She is now in full election mode and obviously fully stripped of her primary faculties, especially the ones that suggest she knew me from a two-minute phone conversation two days previously and without the benefit of any formal introduction.
The security wasn't for her, however as the Foreign Secretary, David Mini-Egg was performing the function of party big-gun in the provinces. That's him on the left of the picture, Mrs Dunwoody Jr is in the red coat on the right. Mr Milli Vanilli is of Polish descent so he certainly wouldn't have felt out of place in the market, where the prevailing chatter is almost exclusively in his mother's native tongue. I resisted the urge to run forward and present the Minister for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs my bag of pigs' ears with the instruction to hand them to his boss in recognition of his handling of just about everything during the last year, although on closer examination of that picture, the presence of the microphone in his face has made me regret my hesitancy. I need glasses.
I wonder who's coming tomorrow? Please tell me it's Boris.
My return has heralded the triumphant escape from relegation to the Fourth Division for the local footballing team by virtue of the other clubs in the grey area above the relegation zone canceling out a 1-4 defeat by playing even shittier than Crewe did. But that's not all; I now have my own little house, courtesy of the good offices of the Manchester and District Housing Association. I have a bed, a two piece suite, a kettle, mug and a packet of cup-a-soup. I am independent again although I have to nick Sharon's interwebs to do this. And her phone, cooker and fridge. And food.
Even more momentous is the fact that due to the death of much admired local Labour MP, Gwyneth Dunwoody, Crewe and Nantwich has been forced lock stock and barrel into the public eye - there will be a by-election here on May 22nd and, since the Labour Party managed to cock up royally last week in the locals and Gwyneth was not known to be particularly sympathetic to New Labour, the world's media has descended to watch more kicks aimed squarely into the groin of a flailing government, especially as Gwyneth's 7000 majority is being touted equally as safe and vulnerable - because it was personality not party based. It's the first by-election anyone in Crewe can remember as Gwyneth was MP for 34 years and her predecessor for well over 20. The place is crawling with the world's media. Apparently.
I went into Do It All ysterday lunchtime and saw an ITN transmission van in the car park. That was it. Watching the news later I was a bit surprised to see that I'd missed it. Everything. A few days ago I'd made a vow on Jules' blog that I was definitely going to get on the telly sometime during this campaign, not because I have a particular political axe to grind but because I really want to shout something rude at any visiting Tories. Damn. I cocked up big time there.
So, who came to town? Well, for the Lib Dems it was Vince Cable. He's er...in the Lib Dems and they call him the shadow chancellor. There's rumour that the local party had their candidate thrown at them by central office. It wasn't a woman to start with, now it is. Nobody knows, it's all denied, she's the officially selected candidate, no, not a woman because Gwyneth was. No, definitely not. Supporting official Labour candidate Tamsin Dunwoody, Gwyneth's daughter and former Welsh Assembly member, Labour wheeled in big gun justice minister and Lord Chancellor, Jack Straw. He looks disturbingly more like my Dad every time I see him. I don't mind Mrs Dunwoody Jr, she's very nice and I spoke to her on the phone on Monday. She wants to do the job and she knows the area well. I wouldn't have shouted at her.
We have a Monster Raving Loony but I'm not sure anyone cares anymore since David Sutch rather unwittingly lost his final deposit some years ago. We do have another comedy candidate though, one Gemma Garrett from Norniron who is Miss Britain and is representing the Beauties for Britain party. She knows pig all about politics, even less about the trains and posh cars for which the town is justly famous and probably doesn't even know where Crewe is. But she has big tits and that's fine. There was TV footage on BBC North West of a local teen sniggering like Tim Nice-but-Dim because the interviewer had suggested Miss Garrett was attractive. This is great stuff - another two weeks of it please.
What really pissed me off is that while I was in Aldi, I missed my chance to throw something perishable or shout searching questions (probably involving a lot of swearing I'm afraid) at public school manofthepeople and top Tory, Dave "Boy" Cameron. I really don't think I could have resisted it as I find that as I get older, I care less and less about making an arse of myself in public (unless it involves singing, which I just won't do, OK?).
That was yesterday. This morning I was quietly minding my own business around the Market Square, clutching a bag of pigs' ears for the dog and a second hand coat rack for my hallway when I became aware of some media presence, not least from the young man with a microphone from BBC 5 Live imploring a young and appreciably fleshy market trader to yell out one of his cries. He declined saying he would be losing business while doing so. Had the interviewer chosen to point his mic at me I would have made some comment about the value of recycling to the local economy. The recycling in this case being the very same wrecked video game rifle I saw in a skip at the local tip the previous evening and onto which I'd just tipped a pile of dog-soiled carpet tiles. There was further presence: bulkier men with curly wires coming out of their ears and the kind of mobile you don't get in Phones 4 U plus several policemen and a few curious PCSOs. Then I saw Mrs Dunwoody Jr and shook her hand, saying that we'd spoken a couple of days previously to which she replied that we indeed had and that it was nice to meet me at last. She is now in full election mode and obviously fully stripped of her primary faculties, especially the ones that suggest she knew me from a two-minute phone conversation two days previously and without the benefit of any formal introduction.
The security wasn't for her, however as the Foreign Secretary, David Mini-Egg was performing the function of party big-gun in the provinces. That's him on the left of the picture, Mrs Dunwoody Jr is in the red coat on the right. Mr Milli Vanilli is of Polish descent so he certainly wouldn't have felt out of place in the market, where the prevailing chatter is almost exclusively in his mother's native tongue. I resisted the urge to run forward and present the Minister for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs my bag of pigs' ears with the instruction to hand them to his boss in recognition of his handling of just about everything during the last year, although on closer examination of that picture, the presence of the microphone in his face has made me regret my hesitancy. I need glasses.
I wonder who's coming tomorrow? Please tell me it's Boris.
posted by Richard at 7:16 pm
5 Vegetable peelings:
Of course, in North East Hampshire, things operate on a much more controlled and relaxed manner.
Several years ago I had a caller who purported to be canvassing on behalf of the Conservative party. I enquired, in a concerned and compassionate way, whether someone kidnapping his children was the cause of this sorry situation.
Allow me to disperse an old myth. Americans cope fine with irony, it's the bloody Tories who don't.
That was it. We sometimes get bothered for local elections, but media? What's that?
Apparently Nick Clegg is coming "this week". As nobody actually knows what he looks like he will be a hard one to spot. Should I see him I will shout "Bring back Charlie Kennedy, he owes me a pint" from a discreet distance. For those with a longer memory "Norman Scott was innocent" should suffice
It's Boris.
I have this wonderful image of the city falling apart like a clown's car, culminating in the London Eye dropping off its stand and rolling away down the river. Politics is truly part of the entertainment industry...
I'm dead envious. It's been so long since I had the opportunity to shout at a politician. I like the pigs' ears gag particularly. Did you see the bloke wipe snot on Cameron the other week - the revolution is under way.
As ever, Malc I was wise after the event. I really was holding a bag of pigs' ears, bought from the market directly behind Ms Dunwoody. The gag arrived after I'd got home.
I did shout at someone today because they'd spread over the zebra crossing at Tescos and I was trying tpo drive over it. I don't know who they were but there were some cameras and clipboards. Nick Clegg was here earlier but I missed him. Next week sometime it's Jackie Smith.
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