God Bless Greggs!

Like Wetherspoons and Robbie Savage, Greggs gives the man and woman on the street what they want!
Bread Pudding, Baguettes and Belgian Buns, the holy trinity!
Also see http://bapstodaps.blogspot.com/2007/08/thesis-greggs-and-demise-of-dough-based_03.html for interesting blog on the demise of regional cake talk!!
But i must say Benjys is sorely missed!!

Managing expectations!

Recession
Cuts
Redundancies
Public revolt

Royal Wedding

hooray!

Austerity London (or any other place)

I quite often walk around London wondering how i would manage with no money, or very little, and i actually try some times not to spend very much just as an experiment, obviously i do this on my own and not with my wife and kid who would accuse me off being a skinflint! Anyway here are my observations;
Food and Drink -
Waitrose and some of the other posher stores regularly have free tastings as do food/farmers markets such as the ones in Borough and Spitalfields.
Private views in the smaller galleries, and even some of the bigger ones, are usually quite easy to gatecrash and usually have free drink and food, I even gatecrashed the Whitecube in trendy Hoxton and helped myself to quantities of free wine, beer and canapes.
Culture -
Obviously private views and galleries again.
Libraries with free books, newspapers, IT and events.
Bookshops with free book readings and events.
Free lectures at the LSE, Gresham College etc
And obviously just walking around London is free and I cant think of a better way to pass a few hours.

Up the Holloway

Two conversations overheard in cafe on Holloway Road -

Two old geezers, the first one scottish the other english - "Spurs are playing at home tonight" "what" "i said Spurs are playing tonight" "what" "are your fucking ears blocked or something" "i can never understand what  the fuck you're saying" "for christ sake we,ve known each other for 30 years" - the conversations over the years must have been riveting!!!

Two young middle-class students, the waitress approaches and asks "would you like to order", one of them picks up the menu and the other comments "why are you looking at the menu, all restaurants sell the same things don't they?" Err Indian, Chinese, French, Italian etc etc!!!!!

The Barbarians are at the gates!

The onslaught has begun! from London to Leeds councils are taking the easy way out and closing libraries and sacking librarians, the savings made are miniscule but the damage to communities and society as a whole is immense.
Yes libraries are intrinsically about books but many offer a lot more, free ICT, information and reference services, children's activities, activities for older people, reading groups, outreach services for refugees/asylum seekers etc etc and of course a safe and warm place for people to meet and greet. They play an important role in the provision of Lifelong Learning and increasingly assist people who are job hunting.

But because of the Governments ideological decision to hit public services instead of the City and the banks we are in grave danger of losing this valuable national resource.
We are beginning to hear prominent voices against the cuts and there are dedicated groups of campaigners opposing them but my own profession has been pathetically ineffectual, unfortunately librarians are not very militant by nature.

how the middle classes have ruined it for the rest of us!

Me and the wife have been visiting local schools in order to choose which one to send our daughter to next year.
The 'tours' are usually conducted by the head teacher and there are usually other parents towing along.
At the question and answer session at the end you can bet your last dollar that some handnitted metrosexual type will say "what proportion of kids in the school have english as a 2nd language?" and when they are told "quite a lot" they say "does this hold the other kids back" Come on be brave just say "there are too many ethnics in this school and my precious fragile little blond haired, blue eyed jemima, oliver etc will be overrun and intimidated by them, i would rather they went to school with kids of their own class and colour"
Of course they all come armed with data from Ofsted, league tables etc and of course they will do the best for their little wonder and for themselves, that is their way!

How the other half live!

Meandering through Mayfair the other day I popped into the 'Punch Bowl' for a quick pint. "A pint of Kronenbourg please" "That will be £4.30 please sir" "Fuck me is it gold-plated?" No response!
Anyway I take my pint outside to enjoy the vista and low and behold there are a couple of archetypal sloan traders standing next to me "fucking labour" "fucking trade unions" "just bought a house in the cotswolds" Drank my pint swiftly and went.