Coastalblog

For weeks all the town has been quivering with anticipation. The talk has been of little else. The world at large may debate ejections from conferences, lottery winning rapists and the successful apllication of a consitution in Iraq. In Ormskirk the talk has been only of the opening of our shiny new Somerfield. Now, regular readers will be aware of my deeply held antipathy towards Morrisons, and the discovery that one in every eight pounds spent on the high street fills their coffers makes me uneasy about feeding the Tesco monolith. And Waitrose is all the way in bloody Southport. So will the shiny new Somerfield be a Blairite Third Way for me. Will I be able to browse it's shiny white aisles soothed and at peace, picking up those various bits and bobs that I just can't get in the butchers and greengrocers? Don't be fucking silly. I'm going there for the freakshow. Somerfield stands on the site of the old Kwik Save. A cheap cheap cheap hellhole where the playing of the...

Been a while, hasn't it? Not to worry, merely one of those hiatuses which occur when there is otherwse a little too much on my plate. Hardly a gap of Stone Rosesesque proportions anyway. Who, me? Getting ready to leave work. This coming Saturday's my last shift (after which Coastalblog's Guide to the Restaurant-Going Public should be up here before too much longer), after which. Well, there are possibly plans afoot, but I am reluctant to blog about it until everything's a little more concrete. Rest assured, you're going to be sick to death of the sight of me before too much longer though.

The Ormskirk short stories are not remotely pornographic. I fear that writing pornography without suffering from an enormous giggling fit would be entirely beyond me. Why then, have two recent visiotrs got there via searches for "fucking in car park" and "taxi fucking" respectively? And who is searching for these (to my ear) exceedingly esoteric pleasures? (Though it's nice to note that people are just plain weird whatever their creed. Clearly these pastimes are what pass for fun in the NW US and Saudi Arabia, respectively. Imagine the potential for international relations as soon as we all come together and declare our love for fucking in improbable locations. Together. As one. Weirdoes)

So I was going to write a lengthy rant expressing my contempt for this years round of fuel protests (though I hesitate to dignify this collective bout of national stroppiness with the nobility of genuine protest) but today's Steve Bell does the job far better than I could ever do. I will say one thing though. This protest is, really, fuck all to do with tax on fuel. Well, maybe in the case of farmers and hauliers. Fair enough. The rest of you, well, it's more all about the right to listen to Top Gear Classic Drivetime Rock on your way to a conference in the Beckham Suite of the Novotel just outside Nuneaton, isn't it, really? I realised this when one of the fuel protestors (no, that word just doesn't sit right) declared that, under his nom de cockfarmer Captain Gatso he also fights against speed cameras, you know, those devices that restrict the motorists right to kill everyone. What was it my mum always used to say about compensating for something?

Why on earth did I give such a long notice period? This is dragging on forever. The only thing keeping me going at work is a grim determination not to conform to the "checked out, not trying any more" stereotype because I'm a PROFESSIONAL goddammit. That being said the end of term feeling is contributing to my being slightly ruder to the customers than usual, including forcing one to apologise to a waitress for yelling "wahey" after she'd dropped some plates. After snapping at him that it was her first shift and she was nervous enough already so why not cut her some slack? Ill mannered sod. And asking one guy who'd spelt his surname (Smith) out to me to repeat himself four times before going "Oh, Smith, right". I shan't really be sorry to see the back of the place. I've got a lot to be grateful to it for, but I've had enough of the general public for the time being. If catering has taught me one thing, it has taught me that, far fro...

It occurs to me that I am not particularly well qualified to comment on Katrina. I am safely ensconced on the other side of the ocean. I am naturally left leaning in my politics, so the urge to indulge in a bit of knee-jerk Bush-bashing without being in full possession of the facts is almost overwhelming (and thus to be resisted). But there are a couple of facets which are worth pointing up, just in case they get lost in the overall noise. First up: the egregious and cadaverous U.S. Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff stated "That 'perfect storm' of a combination of catastrophes exceeded the foresight of the planners, and maybe anybody's foresight" in short, there was nothing that could be done, it was a storm of unimaginable proportions. Leaving aside the argument that no storm is of unimaginable proportions, and that a city lying below sea level should perhaps be prepared for the worst case scenario, it's also worth pointing out that Katrina's w...

Wow, and I thought I had a way with invective

This coastalblog update brought to you thanks to the intrepid reporting of Lesley. It's not often my walk home is interrupted by an urgent cry of "Matt, you've got to come, there's people stood around the clocktower and they're singing". Not often enough amyway. So I tagged along behind an in-full-flight Jim, to see some genuine Ormskirk weirdness. We met Lesley on a bench, at a safe distance. There was a group of people there all right, but they'd stopped singing, and instead circled the clocktower as though it were some chi-chi Victorian maypole, banging staffs on the ground at each point of the compass inset into the paving. With impeccable timing, the alarm went off at work, so I had to go and see to that, but I am informed that Ormskirk is being menaced by a great evil, and this wednesday night ritual is in order to save us from said looming menace, and will continue. Of course, in a couple of weeks time the students get back, and wednesday night is t...