Up and Running.

Well I lost my fiver, the café passed the inspection with flying colours apart from the odd missing wall tile and the insectocutor that had in all fairness undergone a sustained and vicious attack from flies during the extended summer. Which brings me to yet another old chestnut, do you know where flies go in winter? Answer: Through Denton to Hyde….. Get it? Oh please yourself.

It was worth loosing a fiver to pass inspection, the café staff had worked hard to meet the stringent standards that the lovely lady Health inspector had set for us. What a wonderful human being she is.
What? WHAT ?

Keep your fingers crossed.

The bitch from hell is back in the building and turning the place over with a fine tooth comb; I am talking of course about the local environmental health inspector, who hates us with a vengeance. This is her fourth visit since closing the café down for seriously stupid reasons.

Without doubt she is looking for something, anything she can get us on. Last time it was because the microwave was finished in white enamel and not stainless steel. That was it, she couldn’t find anything else wrong other than that, she eventually got everybody’s back up on purpose so that she could report that our staff were unhelpful and a hindrance to the commission of her inspection. A new microwave was bought the next day and installed, but it was several weeks before we could officially open again such was the rat’s nest of red tape that she had embroiled us in with the powers that be.

You might think I am being cruel to someone who after all is just doing their job, but if you were to meet this harridan, you would see exactly why I used the term bitch. She wears a permanent sneer, is arrogant, patronising and sarcastic in the extreme.

Like most businesses we cut corners on occasion, but never where aspects of safety are concerned, its more than our business is worth and because of that we have educated ourselves in this respect, to the point of law in fact. That’s how we know she picks at things that are unpickable, still she is back for another stab and as I write she is crawling round the kitchen area of the café with a bleeding magnifying glass in one hand and a CSI type kit in the other.

I’m not a betting man but on this occasion I have chanced a fiver with a colleague that she will get us on something.

Up for it.

I have been rather busy of late so no posts for the last week, I am involved with starting a new business with some colleagues. Its an Entertainment’s event company, basically people search the internet for something to do on stag or hen nights and we put them in touch with a company that can supply what they want and charge them for the privilege. Yes I know it’s a bit of a rip of but people have been doing just that to our company for years, so we thought why not cut the middle man out, become the middle man and make the same kind of money that they do.

We will be offering something a little different than our competitors though, events with a twist, high adrenaline type sports, once in a lifetime situation scenarios, scary holidays that sort of thing. Some of the ideas the gang has come up with so far are free fall parachuting without a parachute. Yes I know its an old one but the twist to this is that for a few quid extra your buddy can keep you company on the way down and help you into an extra parachute he will carry with him. I know what your thinking, no one in their right mind would attempt that, but believe me the world is full of idiots and I just know that one is gonna be a big seller.

Then there is Indonesian bungy jumping, much the same as normal bungy jumping but you get to travel to Indonesia to do it, a full week of bouncing up and down in the sun for a very reasonable price. Unfortunately in that country it’s illegal and carries the death sentence if caught. However the upside is that your week can very easily become a year whilst you wait in gaol for your appeals and stays of execution to run their course after which you make the final bungy jump through the trapdoor.

My favourite though and probably the most dangerous adrenaline pumping, blood vessel bursting thing a mans man can do, is a night out in Manchester city centre. Your night begins with a taxi drive (taking the longest rout possible and with the meter on barbiturates) to the bright lights of Manchester. How about a rock concert at one of the many arenas we have here. The top arena of the moment is built over an abandoned mine (so don’t stamp your feet). Or perhaps you prefer dancing the night away in one of our stylish clubs, where a bottle of beer costs as little as £4, maybe you’re a gay village type of chap and fancy a swim in the canal. You could do worse than go for a meal in one of the few restaurants that haven’t been closed down yet.

However you decide to spend your last night on earth you can be sure it won’t cost you an arm and a leg, to be truthful it will probably cost a lot more than that. The chances of you being able to get a taxi home at four in the morning, or even taking a quiet walk home as you watch the sun come up over the Medlock without some pissed up hardman beating the shit out of you are to be honest pretty slim.

Still excitement is the name of the game and for those individuals or groups (remember there is strength in numbers) who are willing to pay for an alternative type of event and go that extra mile for an experience they will never forget (or remember) the rewards are great. All bookings must be paid for in advance.

Big Ed

A lady friend of mine who has read this blog from start to finish has suggested to me that certain posts make me sound a little big headed if not arrogant, something of a jack the lad as it were. I think it depends on how it is read, one of the problems with the written word is that the reader has to put their own emphasis on words, and of course any vocal intention by the writer is lost, and has to be replaced by the reader.

I’m sure people will see it slightly differently but hopefully the content should give direction. I write with tongue in cheek and my main aim is to make you laugh or at least chuckle, I certainly don’t mean to offend. My friends concern is probably due to the fact that she knows me to be a nice, harmless, good egg, salt of the earth, generous, good intentioned, charming, intelligent, sexy, good looking, every woman’s dream type of chap. Me big headed……..Never.

Of mice and kids.

It looked like we were in for a thunderstorm last night which quite excited me, I love thunderstorms, have done since I was a kid. When my Brother and I were very young and a storm was brewing, my Father would get a couple of chairs and place them just inside the front door so that we could watch these magnificent events in comfort.

We didn’t have a telly in those days so it was the only entertainment option we had and it was free. When we did eventually get a TV I wasn’t that impressed with it, the thunderstorms lasted longer than the TV programs which were only broadcast for a couple of hours a day. I remember one stormy Sunday afternoon very well. My pal Turnip and I had gone to Gorton park to do some serious playing, we called him Turnip because of the shape and colour of his head, think Andrew Lloyd Webber and you will get the idea.

The park sported a well-stocked play area in those days; it also had toilets and a large open fronted building with benches around its walls, the ideal place to go when it rained, or to get some shade during the summer months. Sadly that’s all gone now and instead it’s a place to dump cars or get rid of your unwanted used condoms.

Turnip and I decided to try and swing so hard that we would do a three hundred and sixty-degree turn over the bar that held the swings in place. Obviously that was impossible to achieve, but in those days it was the Holy Grail for young boys and there was always someone who knew someone who had done it. Turnip tried so hard that he fell backward of the swing and added the colour of blood to his already reddish vegetable face.

He began sobbing in that way children do when they can’t catch their breath, I helped him up and we made our way to the open fronted building to sit down and tend to his wounds.
It was a stroke of luck him falling off the swing, one because the rain started just then, but more important than that was that we found a dead mouse under one of the benches. Had turnip not reached for the stars on the swing some other kid might have found this treasure.

We sat there trying to work out how we were going to share this mouse between us when the first crack of thunder erupted and echoed around the empty stone building. Suddenly the sky turned black and as it did the rain hit the ground and bounced three feet into the air, the darkness was illuminated by a huge bolt of lightening. This storm was turning out to be a belter. As the second crack of thunder erupted in our ears we were distracted from the mouse by the sight of a woman screaming hysterically and running towards us, with her hands over her ears. She completely ignored us and began running round in circles screaming at the top of her voice.

The park keeper who had a little office at the far end of the building heard the commotion and left his tea and newspaper to see what all the fuss was about. He tried valiantly to calm the screaming woman, who very obviously was frightened of thunder and lightening, but she wouldn’t be calmed so he tried the only thing he could, he slapped her face. He struck the woman just as her husband who had been chasing after her came onto the scene. So there she is hands up to her face in a protective pose, there the parky is hand raised and poised to strike again and there the husband is pissed wet through and pissed at the nerve of a complete stranger hitting his wife.

The husband launched himself at the parky and began swinging wildly, the parky tried in vain whilst avoiding blows to explain things to the husband, and the woman still screaming hysterically was now rolling around on the floor trying to escape both the storm and the fighting men. I noticed that the woman wore bloomers. An item of apparel I thought only schoolgirls wore at that time, at least I knew Lillian Chippendale wore them, pink ones down to her knees, but they didn’t impress me, although she was quite a pretty girl, I often wonder what happened to her.

Eventually the storm subsided, the woman and her husband left to go home, the parky had long since dissapered back to his newspaper and tea. Turnip and I were alone again musing on what had been a great day all round, a thunderstorm, an hysterical woman, a fight between grown ups and of course the mouse we had found. We couldn’t decide who was to have the head and who was to have the tale, in the end I let Turnip have the whole mouse, well he had banged his head and cried.

Ahh Well

I once wrote a birthday story for a girl I cared a great deal about, she had sun blonde hair and a smile that made your knee’s go weak. The story was about a small pile of golden flakes and the magic that they held. Just sprinkling the flakes in your hair would enable you to skip through clouds and travel to far off lands. Almost everyone I have met would love to be able to fly, and you can if you meet the right person. The problem is when you meet the right person but at the wrong time. It happened to me and though the outcome was sad, for a time we flew and played in the sky.

Gimme a break.

Hope is a wonderful thing; it’s the catalyst that turns dreams and positive thinking into reality, whilst you have hope your direction will always be upward and forward. Even if the eventual result of what you had hoped for differs by a greater or lesser degree than your original plan, you will have realised at least part of that plan. Remember plans can always be changed and rearranged to suit the moment. Lose hope and you come to a standstill and will have achieved nothing.

I know, I’ve been dogged by bad luck all my bleeding life.

It's going to come, so face it.

Young men do not fear death; they think themselves invincible, you cannot fear that which you know will not be met.
Old men do not fear death, they know it to be inevitable, but care not and weary at the thought.

He who walks with danger.

I have a secret identity that no one knows about, not my friends, not my family, no one, well it wouldn’t be secret if they did would it? I can reveal to the world that my alter ego is that of X-man. Yes I was the first X-man or woman for that matter. It all started with a school Christmas party. I was in the second year at Spurley Hey High school and eager to try out my chat up lines at the Christmas bash. They didn’t seem very effective during the day, but I thought that perhaps with the music and flashing lights of the first Christmas party where I didn’t have to have my name cellertaped to a spoon and plate they might work.

The night of the party (make that late afternoon) my plans were to be scuppered by the arrival of a vision in red and black velvet. There before me stood Eugene Smith a girl I had always thought gorgeous. She took my breath away, the result of which I could hardly speak let alone chat anyone up, however the night was not wasted; we started a friendship that lasted long enough for me to realise that some women were princesses. During the time that we were close she invited me for a bike ride, that’s going to be difficult I told her, as I didn’t have a bike, she offered me the use of her Mothers bike a very bohemian woman who I believe used to be a ballet dancer.

The bike ride was an enjoyable event spent in the company of an enjoyable girl, unfortunately the proceedings were marred by the taunting's of a couple of my mates who had seen me sat astride a ladies machine. I protested of course that I was only using it because mine had a puncture, but I wasn’t believed, and I made things worse by telling the taunter's that the bike I didn’t really have was the mother of all bikes and could easily beat anything they had.

One particular chap who was fond of putting bangers in dog turds challenged me to a race to decide who had the best bike. I agreed and the race was scheduled for Saturday morning, this meant as it was Tuesday that I had four days to produce a bike that would save my dwindling reputation.

I set about begging, borrowing and stealing all the bits I needed to build my super bike, given the time and resources that I had it would have put the A-team to shame. By Friday night I had everything but brakes. Ken from next door came to the rescue with a back peddling brake, that’s a back wheel that you pedal backward to brake, odd I know but it did work.

Saturday morning came and I was ready, the machine glinted bright yellow in the sun, and though I say so myself it looked the part. The saddle was a little uncomfortable but I didn’t plan on spending too much time on it, I was going to win this race……or die!!!!!

Those that knew about this great event had already gathered along East road and Mamby road where the race was to be run, a distance of some two hundred yards. There were two bends along the rout, a gentle curving bend where East road met and continued as Mamby road, and another almost ninety degree bend where the finish line was.

We lined up level and at the command we were off, my adversary got away quicker than I did as my bike was geared down. As we neared the first bend he slowed down to get round it, but I who had thrown all caution to the wind kept peddling through the bend and managed to pull alongside him.
We were on the strait now and my legs were killing me, but I just peddled harder, he pulled in front, I pulled in front, it was neck and neck. Then from somewhere I found my second wind and just powered past him like a speeding bullet, he had started to slow down, I thought because he knew he was beaten, but it was for an altogether different reason. We were fast coming up to the second bend, which very definitely could not be taken at speed.

I made an instinctive grope for my brake levers, which of course didn’t exist on this particular model, I looked down in horror at the bare handlebars bereft of even a bell, and started to furiously back pedal for all I was worth, but to no avail. I hit the very high pavement edge and was launched into space at god knows what speed into the direction of two very nasty looking gate posts. It was almost aesthetic, the bike and I were one, and not as we sailed through the air but after we hit the posts and lay in a tangled mass on the floor.

There was blood and snot everywhere, anything that could have broken did, and it took not a little help from my very impressed friends to untangle me from what now looked like something Salvador Dali could have painted.

Man (or boy) had merged with machine and become X-man. Wherever there was tyranny, wherever there was unjustness, and wherever there was a citizen in need of help I would be. My career as a superhero didn’t actually start for quite a few years. But for a long time after that fateful day I did speak with rather a high pitched voice, and as I wheeled my broken machine home with the handlebars bobbing up and down because of the miss shaped front wheel, I knew my destiny was set.

Burn't offerings.

Its been an uneventful weekend apart from Friday night when just as I was taking my evening meal out of the oven my phone rang and frightened the life out of me. I’m not easily frightened but the phone was on the work surface next to the oven and as I bent down my ear was only inches away. The result was that my carefully prepared Flan au Chou-Fleur, (well my version of it) finished up on the floor.

I had been meaning to turn the ringer volume down for some time but couldn’t work out how to do it, the loss of my dinner cured that and I managed it. However I turned it down to almost off and as a result didn’t hear it ring later on when Mike tried to get in touch. Mike always calls round on a Friday for a couple of hours, but for some reason I thought it was Thursday. That and the phone call, which was an invitation to go for a drink, meant the poor bugger was sat in his car outside my drive waiting for me to come home.

I spent the evening in pleasant company watching (for the second time) the video of the Take that concert at the Manchester Stadium filmed earlier in the year. My friend had been there and she was anxcious to show me the one hundredth of a second clip of her clapping her hands excitedly somewhere in the crowd. She run the DVD back and forth saying things like “there, there” and “that was me, did you see me” I didn’t but said yes to spare myself any more.

Before I left she started to make me something to eat in a Brevel toaster, but I wasn’t really in the mood for a ham, cheese and jam toastie, so I turned it of and made ready to leave. I could see she was tired and a little drunk so not wanting to outstay my welcome I left. Apparently some time later she had woke up and resumed cooking the toastie along with a pan of noodles, which of course she forgot about and went back to sleep on the couch.

By morning the toastie looked like a long dead tortoise and the noodles had been burnt to a cinder and had fallen through the new hole in the pan. Luckily she woke up to the smoke detector waving a white flag and no real harm was done. I hate to think what might have happened if the smoke detector hadn’t done its job.

The whole thing was of course my fault, but I know I had turned the toaster off, and as for the noodles they weren’t even a glint in the pans eye when I left. Shades of Don and the recalcitrant sausage, now that was a fire!!

Now you see em now you don't.

I have a friend Don (See on beating bullies) who can do magical things with his teeth, Paul Danials has got nothing on this lad when it comes to slight of hand. Don was separated from his teeth some years ago when I worked at the Bell Vue Beer Keller as a bouncer.

He had been in the Keller when some colleagues and I ejected a group of rowdies from the bar. They left and went over to the ballroom I suspect to cause trouble there. Don was having no luck with the ladies in the Keller and decided to try his luck in the ballroom, unfortunately he was recognised as a friend of mine by the rowdies who kept announcing loudly that I was nothing without my back up.

They conveniently forgot that there were seven of them and only three of us at the time of the bar ejection. Don being the type of chap that he is defended me and as a result was set upon as he left the ballroom. He didn’t stand a chance of course, but I’m told he gave as good an account of himself as was humanly possible given that there were seven of them and one of him. At some point during the scuffle his face was introduced to an iron bar by one of the group (a chap named cook) who I can assure you got his some time later.

Thus my friend had his jaw fractured in several places and most of his teeth went walkabout. The teeth that were left served as anchors for the wire that kept his mouth tight shut for several weeks whilst it healed. When the wire was eventually removed it was obvious that the remaining pegs had to go.

That was twenty-eight years ago so Don has had plenty of time to perfect his act, to the point where he can remove his teeth with one hand in the blink of an eye. This comes in very handy at meal times when in the company of others (he cant eat with his teeth in you see). However this skill is wasted really because after removal he wraps them in a serviette and places them on the table in front of his plate for everyone to see. He can pop them back in with the same slight of hand that he uses to take them out. But what’s the point of this elaborate technique to hide the fact that they are false when he will insist on rattling them round in his mouth and making that annoying double click before speaking. I suppose its more interesting than the penny behind the ear trick.

A close shave.

There used to be a metal bridge that spanned the railway lines a few hundred yards from what once was Bell Vue station in Gorton, its long gone and so has the station. On one side of the bridge there was a dirt track that ran from Hyde road to a stone bridge near sacred heart church. On the other side of the bridge was a large croft where people used to dump rubbish, it was just across the road from Sunny brow park, where we used to play as kids.

One day a friend and I had crossed the bridge on our way to the park, we must have been about fourteen at the time, I cant remember exactly when it was but certainly early sixties. For some reason we decided to explore the railway embankment, there was a gap between the bridge and the fence which made it easy to get to the lines, dangerous I know but young men are stupid and we were no exception. We spent about an hour watching nails and pennies we had carefully placed on the lines being flattened by the wheels of trains, but eventually got bored with this and made our way back through the gap in the fence intending to meet our pals in the park.

As we came through the fence a man came out from under the bridge steps and grabbed us both by the shoulder, he was dressed strangely in that he wore a suit but had a black peaked cap with a British railway badge. He informed us that he was a railway policeman and that we were in serious trouble for trespassing on railway property. We said we were sorry of course (didn’t mean a word of it) and that we wouldn’t do it again. What he said next made my blood run cold, “I’m going to arrest you and put you in gaol, unless you come into the bushes with me and do exactly as I tell you” at these words my friend shouted “run” and bolted in the direction of the park.

I stood there for what seemed like ages with my mouth open, I was paralysed by what this man had said. Then my friend who had stopped running turned back to me and screamed at the top of his voice “RUN” this galvanised me into action and I did run, like the bleeding wind. Of course we made it safely to the park, but swore each other to an oath that we would never tell anybody about this, well we couldn’t really we would have incriminated ourselves. It occurred to me that I had seen this man before, in fact I had seen him several times, usually sat astride a motionless motorbike outside the chemical works which was behind my parents house and where it turned out he worked.

Some time after this event I saw the man again, this time in Sivoris café on Hyde road. Café’s were a big thing in those days; young people spent a lot of time in them. He didn’t recognise me and if he did he hid the fact well. He was sat in a corner with a cup of coffee and a sullen look on his face just staring at people, he didn’t blink, he just stared. I could never forgot this face, the next time I saw it, it was staring out at me from the front page of a newspaper, the hair was different, but the look was just the same, It was Ian Brady.

Oblivious.

The best time of the day is the first few moments after you wake and are aware, but not fully conscious. For the shortest time you forget, sadly it never lasts and remembering weighs you down.

Shhhhhh

I think the dead soldiers of both world wars would be turning in their graves if they could see what is going on nowadays, they knew that walls had ears, and loose tongues cost lives. Politicians and the purveyors of news were in those days careful about what they said and whom they said it to. Things were on a need to know basis in those days but above all the moral of our troops was important. They had to know we were doing our bit at home, after all they were fighting for and in lots of cases dying for the freedom of the western world. Most of these lads were conscripts, although a good deal of them volunteered in either case they knew they stood a good chance of not coming back, but still they went.
Its different now though, all you have to do to get any information about troop moral or the condition of the equipment they have (or don’t have) is watch the news. If that isn’t bad enough you are bound to get journalists standing in key areas of major cities giving tips on the best place and time to commit a terrorist attack. Britain’s soldiers are woefully under equipped and it’s a disgrace that we ask these men and women to risk their lives for what many believe is an unnecessary war, without spending the money that will at least give them a fighting chance. Still I dare say its needed for art grants or another millennium dome or something.

If only.

The Dodecanese group of islands lies in the Aegean Sea. One of the group Kos is a popular place for holidaymakers and having spent two weeks in Kadamena I can see why. I spent my days lazing in the sun or drinking at the poolside bar and my nights in the beach bar watching the sun set. Yes I spent a lot of time in bars Purely for research purposes you understand.

The last week of my trip there I decided to take the boat over to Nisyros which lies between Kos and Tilos and is one of the few still active blue volcanoes in the world. Nisyros was known in antiquity as Porphyris. According to Greek mythology, Nisyiros was formed during the battle between the Giants and the Gods. Neptune persecuted Polivotis the Giant who, terrified, crossed the Aegean Sea, seeking salvation. Neptune captured Polivotis near the islands of Kos. The god impaled part of the island, Krikelos, with his trident and hit the Giant with it. Thus the island of Nisyros was formed, and Polivotis has been sending his sighs, via the volcano to earth ever since.

We set of early in the morning in what seemed to me to be a decidedly rickety vessel that popped and banged as we picked up speed. There seemed to be far more of it above the waterline than below and I hoped we weren’t about to make any sharp turns. It was a pleasant enough trip that lasted just over an hour and I spent it on the top deck with the wind in what’s left of my hair and the smell of diesel in my nostrils. As the islands harbour Mandraki came in to view I was struck by the contrasting colours of the white painted houses and the dark volcanic sand.

My first call was the little café that doubles as a bar and souvenir shop. I spent a pleasant hour or so chatting to Yanis the owner who spoke several languages, then it was of up the volcano trail in a three hundred year old bus that ground its gears and struggled with the steep climb, but eventually made it to the top. The view was fantastic, the decent into the volcano was a little scary as the driver took advantage of the incline and coasted most of the way and at some speed. The hillsides were peppered with olive bushes and here and there black sheep grazed happily.

The inside of the volcano was like a scene out of starwars everywhere you looked there was yellow, orange and red rock. The bus kicked up lots of dust as it sped toward the little resting-place just above the bubbling and spitting centre. It’s a truly wonderful sight, but later as I sat in one of the old taverns that is populated by the locals, I watched the sun go down and what once was a brilliant blue sea, changed slowly to a silver like mercury lake. The combination of moon glow and the phosphor in the sea created this effect. There and then I decided that this was where I wanted to live, the beauty of the island and the friendliness of the people is unique. One day I will go back, but this time to stay.

Greed by the sea.

Have you ever noticed that whatever seaside town you visit in this great country of ours, should you make the mistake of buying chips, and we all do, without fail they are always an orange colour, smell of week old kebabs and taste rancid. This has to be because they rarely if ever change the cooking fat, presumably because that would cut into the nine hundred percent profit they make on this rubbish. It’s the same with ice cream, very small portions at a very big price, and they never look like the picture on the van.

Turn on the news and you are bound to see some resort council member bemoaning the fact that people just don’t visit the seaside anymore, and It doesn’t surprise me at all. They are pricing themselves out of business, greed got the better of them years ago and now they are reaping the rewards. Not too long ago I took a trip to Spain for a couple of weeks, total cost including air fair and hotel £560, The same year I made the mistake of going to Blackpool for three days, total cost £600. So here is a run down of just some of the most popular seaside attractions and what they have to offer.

Blackpool: overpriced and tatty. New Brighton: shut. Rhyl: Boarded up and crime infested. Scarborough: cold grey and hilly, though I have to admit the Grande Hotel is worth a visit even if it’s a little tired. Morecambe: a none event really, best thing about it is the sea. Southport: great if you like sand. Great Yarmouth: probably the answer to our overcrowded jails.

Give me the sun and the blue sea of the Mediterranean every time, where the beer fags, clothes, and virtually everything else is cheap or reasonably priced, the portions are large and where you are served with a smile and genuine interest. Instead of the sullen grumpiness that is the norm in this country.