Jane Wenham-Jones's Blog, page 9

Plain Jane 140815 – Bra-vellous project

If we live in a small world then Thanet is microscopic. Hold forth in the pub about the bloke from the garage and it will turn out you’re chatting to “that idiot’s” brother’s cousin or his wife’s next-door neighbour.

Gossip about his affair and you’ll discover you’re looking at the woman he ran away with. It was no surprise, therefore, to find that the chap my friend Ann was on the line to, when I arrived at her house, used to be my bank manager. (In the days when these creatures existed and a simple transaction did not require you to answer six security questions, punch out four different numbers on your telephone keypad, and then listen to terrible music for twenty minutes before someone in Madras cut you off.)

“What are you talking to him about?” I asked nosily, upon hearing Brian Short was now heading up the local branch of the RSPB. “Tits!” she declared. Ah yes, silly me…

Ann Munro is an artist, and the powerhouse behind an “installation” planned for the Ramsgate Festival, which she refers to as “Tits Up” and which will benefit the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds as well as the excellent breast-screening charity EKUBS, mainly so that school children taking part in the project can approach it from a feathered angle, and not give their parents the vapours.

The first I heard of it was when Ann swept into my own kitchen and demanded to know if I had any old bras. Well of course I did – what woman doesn’t? I also had uncomfortable bras, ill-advised ones, saggy-strapped affairs and a super-reinforced, upholstered, uplifting contraption that renders one like Barbara Windsor (not necessarily in a good way).

I emptied the contents of the drawer into a carrier bag and off she went. They were destined to be bunting down Harbour Street, she told me. But oh my goodness, things have moved on since then. Ann, just turned 70 and looking amazing for it, seems to have involved the entire isle in her mission.

There are beaded bras and knitted bras and a bra cake, and scores of teddy bears, each wearing their own specially-decorated brassieres.

Shops, businesses and cafes have donated, sponsored and will be putting on displays. There will be raffles and auctions and workshops. It is going to be huge. “It’s about art bringing people together,” says Ann, “and raising awareness and charity. About people discovering their creativity and showing how art can promote a whole area. It’s also about my ego,” she adds refreshingly. “I’m loving my ‘old age'” Basically, loves, if I might summarise, we’re still talking tits. The beaked, seed-loving sort, naturally…

The artworks will be on display from August 24 to 31. For more information find Ann Munro on Facebook or visit http://www.ramsgatearts.org.

If art can bring people together then so can comedy. In the 1970s, the catchphrase “I didn’t get where I am today…” united a generation, and is still used as a quip over four decades later. It sprang from the genius of David Nobbs, creator of TV series The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin and 20 equally hilarious books, who died last weekend aged 80. I was privileged to interview him, teach with him, and consider him my friend.

He was a lovely, generous, kind, highly intelligent and extremely funny man. And I didn’t get where I am today by not wanting to say so.

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Read the original article at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Plain-Jane/story-27601909-detail/story.html

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Filed under: articles, events, Isle of Thanet Gazette, non-fiction, Plain Jane, writing Tagged: Ann Munro, Ann Munroe, Barbara Windsor, David Nobbs, EKUBS, Jane Wenham-Jones, Plain Jane, Ramsgate, Ramsgate Arts, Ramsgate Festival, Ramsgate Harbour, Ramsgate Sands, Ramsgate's Got Talent, Reginald Perrin, RSPB, South East England, South Thanet, Thanet, Thanet South

Plain Jane 310715: Time for a brew

Photo by Brian Green

DEPRESSED by pub closures and the rise of alcopops? Good news is at hand. Sales of the cheap-booze-and-coloured-sugar drinks favoured by overgrown children are falling.

Copies available from roystoncartoons.com or the Four Candles

And there are more brewers in the UK now than at any time since before the Second World War. We have Gordon Brown to thank for introducing the progressive beer tax back in 2002 (in a welcome change from plundering pension funds and flogging off the gold) which paved the way for the mushrooming of microbreweries, micropubs, and now the “microbrew pub” – the dinkiest of which is right here in Thanet. “We challenged CAMRA to name one smaller,” says Mike Beaumont, landlord of the Four Candles in Sowell Street, Broadstairs, “but they haven’t come back to us yet…”

I love this place. My great friend Janice works there, my stepson Paul helps with the brewing, and it’s an easy walk home. So although I’m not a natural ale drinker – more likely to be found clutching a glass of rosé than a porter or stout – when I am given the chance to create my own concoction, a treat offered to a privileged selection of lucky regulars, I scurry along.

I arrive at 8 am to find Mike waving a recipe sheet, while I have tea and reveal my ignorance. Had you asked me what beer was made of, I’d have murmured vaguely about hops. Turns out it is all about barley. We have decided I shall preside over a light summery pale ale (so you can drink more without falling over), thus the barley I will be using will be light in colour too. This is malted barley, Mike explains and the more it’s roasted the darker the beer will be. There followed a complicated lesson on the way sugar turns to alcohol to which I nodded a lot.

“The darker it is, the sweeter it is,” Mike concludes. “Guinness isn’t sweet,” I point out. “Oh it is,” replies Mike. I don’t argue that it is the bitterest thing I can think of apart from cooked avocado (I shall save my soup disaster for another week). What do I know?

Photo by Brian Green

We are going to produce 400 litres – or ten casks full. Casks may be referred to as firkins, but not barrels. Because a barrel is made of wood, and anyway it’s bigger, holding 36 gallons as opposed to nine. Exhausted after all this maths, I listen to an outline of the rest of the process and nod a bit more. Then Paul gives me a Health and Safety briefing about not falling down the stairs, and we descend into the cellar and don long rubber gloves (think a veterinary surgeon in Fifty Shades of Grey) to pour the liquor (very hot water to you and me) through the barley into the mash tun.

Photo by Brian Green

At this point, Brian Green, our photographer, arrives and my stepson suggests that, while the grain soaks for an hour-and-a-half, it will make a hilarious picture if I get into the kettle (the next stage of proceedings) and help Mike clean it. “How will I get out again?” I enquire dubiously. Answer: by treading on Mike and being shoved unceremoniously from behind.

This is the “farming side,” I am told. There is a scientific side too – which involves sterilisation galore. To this end, Paul begins to clean the casks with a caustic and bleach solution and I, somewhat damp and studded with barley bits, repair to check my emails. Mike is sticking a saccharometer – an odd-looking instrument designed to test sugar levels – into one-they-made-earlier with customer Ali, and frowning over a lot of complex-sounding calculations involving gravity and the ABV (alcohol by volume), required in order to pay the duty. (Gordon may have given the small brewers a boost, but they still have to cough up).

Photo by Brian Green

This done, I get to choose my hops. I opt for “Target” that smell of Christmas cake, to give a citrusy edge, and Mike advises Admiral to add bitterness. By now it’s time to pump the hot sugary water, known as “wort”, through a Heath Robinson-type array of pipes and tubes into the copper kettle. I add the hops, peer into the steam and get a beery facial. I have “Flocculation” written in my notes at this point. Sounds rude, but I think it is something to do with giving beer its foamy head.

While Paul cleans out the remaining “mash” – donated to hungry local goats – the wort is left to boil and Mike and I go forth to Gadds, well-known local brewery, and meet smiley senior brewer Jon Stringer, who shows me round this high-tech version of what Mike has going on under his floorboards.

Photo by Brian Green

Gadds supply the yeast. Could I make bread with this, I wonder aloud, as we take the foaming mixture back to our production line. (The answer to this turned out to be no. The resulting bricks defeated even the seagulls.)

After a fabulous lunch made by Mike’s Chinese wife Esther, and a guest appearance by his sunny-natured two-year-old, Alex, it is time for the final act of the day – the transfer of the fledgling beer through a heat exchanger into the fermenting vessel where I pour in the yeast, Paul does yet more cleaning and I retire for a glass of wine to celebrate my small sense of pride and achievement.

If it’s all gone well PJ’s – Plain Jane’s Ale – will be on sale this weekend. If I buggered it up, there’s always rosé…

Artwork by Ray Cannon

Photo by Brian Green

 

PJ’s can be sampled at the Four Candles,

1 Sowell Street, Broadstairs. Open Tuesday to Sunday evenings from 5pm (6pm Sundays), Saturday and Sunday lunchtimes noon-3pm.

For more information visit www.thefourcandles.co.uk.

***

Read the original article at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Plain-Jane-Time-brew/story-27514849-detail/story.html

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Filed under: articles, Isle of Thanet Gazette, Plain Jane Tagged: Broadstairs, David O'Donnell, Dennis Franklin, East Kent College, Jane Wenham-Jones, judgemental, Manston, Margate, Michael Pearce, Mike Pearce, Mr Pearce, Plain Jane, Radio Kent, Ramsgate, South East England, South Thanet, Ted Bennett, Thanet, thanet district council, Thanet South

Plain Jane 170715: I can be as judgemental as the next person

My esteemed colleague, Mike don’t-get-me-started Pearce, has been on one of his jaunts.

I don’t ask for details – they invariably involve pinball machines, model railways and making small children cry – but I am informed so I may take on the sole and solemn responsibility of scrutinising the Gazette’s letters page “in case anyone’s been rude about us”. He is always disappointed when they haven’t. He may feel let down once more, but there was plenty else to entertain and annoy him.

Two letters supporting the re-opening of Manston as an airport – that’s the spirit Ted Bennett and the nameless correspondent who was giving Dennis Franklin a run for his money – which would have Mike huffing, but Jingoism and Flog-em-and-hang-em sentiments respectively from a Mr Hearnshaw and Ms Russell of which he would approve. (I don’t call our Mr Pearce ‘Genghis’ for nothing).

What drew my attention was the sad plight of David O’Donnell from Margate who’d spent five hours driving to Oxford, and was complaining it was “stop, go, stop, go” until they’d only travelled four miles in 20 minutes. Count yourself lucky, Dave. On the day your letter appeared, I spent more than three hours driving to east London.

It was simply ‘stop’ on the M2 – a road we could once rely on – when the entire carriageway was blocked for over an hour due to an accident. “Do you feel an irrational rage against the person who caused this?” I asked a fellow driver, as many of us switched our engines off and wandered the tarmac in the sunshine. “I try not to be judgemental,” he replied loftily. I wish he’d been beside me when I drove back in the rain on Monday morning. Ahead of me on the Thanet Way, a white van (wouldn’t it be?) swerved and skidded before I gave it a wide berth, assuming it had aqua-planed on the wet road.

The driver only had one hand on the wheel as I passed; the other was extended before him, the better to read texts on the phone he was watching instead of the traffic. Judgemental? Yes, I can be…

Talking of which, I should perhaps apologise to the security chap who eventually let me out of East Kent College in Broadstairs last Tuesday evening after I was locked in the building following a Radio Kent broadcast from the studio there.

Despite, I might add, very specifically requesting of the staff member who should have known I was coming, but didn’t, that the door be left open. Luckily for all who work there, I am not a thief or a vandal and the computer equipment, books, paperwork and drawer contents to which I had full, unsupervised access until I was able to raise someone to release me, was safe at my hands.

I will still take the opportunity to temper the speech I delivered upon exit. Our local educational establishment is probably not the dimmest, most inefficient, hopelessly incompetent, shambolic organisation with the worst communication skills, I have ever had the misfortune to deal with. It just felt like it at the time.

Finally, I am grateful to the “other” Michael Pearce who wrote to this newspaper last week to inform us that there will be two full moons in July, a phenomenon that occurs occasionally due to there being 30 and 31 days in some months and a full moon occurring every 29. The second appearance, Mr Pearce reminds us, is known as a Blue Moon. He suggests we might use the opportunity to make a wish.

Those close to me might like to hastily book a jaunt of their own, instead. I have long noted that I become slightly deranged when there is a full moon. So friends and family – you lucky people – now you can look forward to my doing it TWICE…

***

Read the original at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Plain-Jane-judgemental-person/story-26914798-detail/story.html

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Filed under: articles, Isle of Thanet Gazette, non-fiction, Plain Jane, writing Tagged: Broadstairs, David O'Donnell, Dennis Franklin, East Kent College, Jane Wenham-Jones, judgemental, Manston, Margate, Michael Pearce, Mike Pearce, Mr Pearce, Plain Jane, Radio Kent, Ramsgate, South East England, South Thanet, Ted Bennett, Thanet, thanet district council, Thanet South

Plain Jane 030715: Mike and Jane – Thrills at Dreamland

I didn’t see the rides at the opening of Dreamland. The wait was too long, the speeches too protracted and when the ribbon had finally been cut by the motley crew of “VIPs”, an “entertainer” in rainbow-coloured dress tried to take my arm and skip me through the crowds.

I withdrew to Forts where my friend and Guardian columnist, Marina 0’Louglin, had already taken herself, head shaking, for a bacon roll. Leaving the be-rouged artiste to bound, far more appropriately, after an unsuspecting child. “I’d have told her to–” growls Mike Pearce, as we enter the sun-filled fairground on Saturday, me with fresh hope in my heart and him with a face on.

Frankly, I was stunned he’d agreed to come at all, and so, I think, was he. “Ah – it’s sweet,” I breathed as I got my first proper look at all the twirling twinkliness, while he perused the pinball machines and muttered darkly about entrance fees. “£17 worth of sweetness?” he grouched.

True, there are teething problems and it’s not finished yet. The Big Wheel did open but had to stop for a while, the Crazy Mouse – the ride I’d particularly earmarked as I walked in – was having some adjustments made. But the Twister was zipping back and forth, the Zodiac Jets whirring and the green caterpillar trundling happily along its rails.

Mike, citing fear of heights, wouldn’t go on any of ’em.

But by now he’d cracked a smile and was tapping his feet to Poetry in Motion, so we left him holding the bags while my son Tom – pressed into service as our photographer – and I went forth on the Wave Swinger, gaining a high five from cheery Farrah Griffin on the gate, for it being our first ride. I hope I’m not going to be sick, the boy confided cheerily as we whirled.

Knowing he’d had two burgers to counteract his hangover, so did I.

Back on the ground, we’d lost Mike, who reappeared sometime later from the Wall of Death, proclaiming it “seriously scary” and announcing with glee that he’d found the dodgems. Here, his joy knew no bounds as he rammed his way into the bumpers of small children and I tried to drive him into a corner.

The photos are blurred because Tom was laughing too much to hold the camera.

Such innocent pleasures are what it’s all about. The whole place is delightful and lovingly done. I cannot wait for the Scenic Railway (last ridden when I was fourteen) to re-open for my nostalgia to be complete.

In short, Reader, I loved it. And I think, maybe, so did HE…

Mike says, “MY DAY at Dreamland never stood a chance. Excitement is seeing Palace score a last-minute goal. It is not having my innards rearranged on a frenetic fairground ride.

And I hate anything described as hip. The last hip person was Edd “Kookie” Byrnes in “77 Sunset Strip”, mouthing “You’re the ginchiest” to Connie Stevens, she of the tight sweaters and baby doll voice.

I was always going to miss the delights of my teenage years – the Guess Your Weight Man, the call-and-response bingo callers, the river caves, where I once nearly brought down the scenery when I grabbed a pillar to try to stop our galleon of love while I was courting a girl with glasses.

(The result was not a passionate clinch. It was a fearful creaking noise, the tub wilfully refusing to stop and me nearly tumbling into water in my best – and only – suit.)

So I’m bound to be rude about the new Dreamland Lite – yet how can I be when the sun shone, the dodgems were a hoot, the Wall of Death riders thrilling, there were pretty girls everywhere, and all to the soundtrack of original fifties American rock’n’roll?

With a reputation to live down to, I must carp about the staff trying to be so desperately jolly.

I do not do jolly, as will be confirmed by people who enjoy yelping, cackling, making silly puppet-on-a-string gestures and using meaningless words like “woot”.

That does not mean I do not do fun, as Jane will be the first (and possibly only) person to acknowledge, .

Just not the sort of fun that involves an army of “greeters” telling me they hope I’m having a wonderful day. Firstly, because I know they really couldn’t care a toss and secondly because the chances are that I’m not.

I am allowed to raise an eyebrow at the rides which were not working and, slightly more concerning, the rides that were trying to work but didn’t.

The still unused roller-coaster has a straight-out-of-the-box weirdness, but probably nothing that a couple of coats of Sadolin wouldn’t put right.

There are some great pinball machines, although a few hundred more are needed to fulfil the earlier suggestion that it would be the biggest collection in Europe, or was it the world?

But while I’m still warmed by the sun, humming a 50s rock’n’roll song, marvelling at the motorbike dare-devils and chuckling at the dodgem smashes, here’s a message for the greeters.

Yes, thank you, I did have a wonderful time.”

***

Read the original at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Thrills-spills-Dreamland-jolly-time-Mike/story-26820653-detail/story.html

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Filed under: articles, Isle of Thanet Gazette, non-fiction, writing Tagged: Broadstairs, Dreamland, Jane Wenham-Jones, Margate, Marina 0'Louglin, Mike Pearce, pinball machines, Plain Jane, Ramsgate, Ramsgate Harbour, Ruth Bailey, South East England, South Thanet, Southwark, Thanet, thanet district council, Thanet South

Plain Jane 190615: Eating your way through hotel breakfasts

SO FAR this year, what with speaking and interviewing and literary festivals and running off to bang my head against a different wall, I have spent 32 nights away from home.

In 2014 it was 67. Even allowing for lie-ins and hangovers, over-sleeps or the odd mix up re. serving times, that is quite a lot of hotel breakfasts. I am now something of an expert.

In Broadstairs, the first meal of the day is a hit and miss affair. Sometimes I set forth to the Dalby Café in Cliftonville to partake of their excellent toast and perfectly-judged fried eggs while my son eats his body weight in sausages and bacon.

On other days I come over all health-conscious and whiz up bananas and strawberries and frozen spinach (quite frankly when you spend that much on the whizzy thing you feel ill if you don’t).

But most of the time, I get on with other stuff until I’m distracted by the sound of my stomach rumbling and realise it’s 11.30 am and I’d better have some chocolate.

Put me in a hotel and it’s all change. Whether it is an innate urge to get my money’s worth or some Pavlovian response to waking up in a different bed, who knows, but I open one eye and I’m starving. “The calories!” cries a colleague, looking aghast when I head for the fried end of the buffet selection. “Won’t you put on weight?”

Not if I can help it. For those of you planning hotel stays this summer may I offer my three-point breakfast strategy plan. (Giving me an opportunity to remind you that I am a long-term authority on the perils of “Writer’s Bottom” and the author of a ground-breaking weight-loss book, on which, frankly my dears, I could do with some sales.) For yes, the catered morning repast offers a very real chance of consuming 2,000 calories before 10am and there are three ways in which you can approach this opportunity:

1) With abandon! Eat everything in sight. Have strawberries and cereal, porridge and honey, the full cooked ensemble of eggs, bacon, sausage, black pudding, baked beans (if you can stomach the latter two – I’d prefer to munch on my leg), hash browns, toast, and croissants.

Then use the stairs not the lift, walk everywhere briskly and don’t eat again till you have a tiny dinner (you will get away with it).

And while you’re enjoying every glorious mouthful, watch the thin girl – yes, that one with the sanctimonious expression who’s clearly as miserable as sin, spooning fat free yoghurt over her kiwi fruit.

Ask yourself: do you want to be like that?

2) With discipline. Eat almost nothing and dine out on your sense of virtue.

Sit piously sipping your green tea and nibbling on a blueberry (while adopting a similar facial arrangement to the one you witnessed above) or your black coffee with a morsel of cheese.

Feel yourself bathed in self-righteousness and peruse the other guests.

See that fat family in the corner? The bloke with the stomach, who can barely squeeze behind the table, the annoying kids going back for more pastries? See how enormous his wife is? Then look at her plate. Allow yourself a small sniff. That’s why.

3) With balance. Remember that just because it’s there you don’t have to eat it ALL.

The bits you don’t eat, you’ll have forgotten by this evening.

If you do eat lots, don’t have lunch.

Or you can do what I did on this particular occasion and carry out such dramatic adjustments to the annoying toast machine, that far from turning out pale flaccid slices it actually catches fire.

An event that will amuse the Brits, throw the Germans and Americans into a state of panic and leave you feeling morally unable to breach the bread area for a second time.

If you ditch the carbs (not hard when they’re blackened and smoking) you’ll burn fat all day. It’s my pleasure. Please don’t mention it.

***

Read the original at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Plain-Jane-Eating-way-hotel-breakfasts/story-26722548-detail/story.html#ixzz3dmyH53H0

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Filed under: articles, Isle of Thanet Gazette, non-fiction, Plain Jane, writing Tagged: Broadstairs, Jane Wenham-Jones, Margate, Plain Jane, Ramsgate, Ramsgate Harbour, Ruth Bailey, South East England, South Thanet, Southwark, Thanet, thanet district council, Thanet South

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Plain Jane 050615: It’s tough to get a job if you don’t speak nonsense lingo

I HAVE been self-employed now for nigh-on 30 years and have long suspected this has rendered me utterly un-hireable to anyone in the usual (some might say “real”) world of nine-to-five.

My particular skill set: being able to spend long hours welded to a computer while wearing pyjamas, knowing how to touch-text with my left hand at the same time as unwrapping a bar of chocolate with my right, and operate a mouse with my elbow; pidgin French, a mostly clean driving licence, and an inability to know when to stop talking, does not immediately lend itself to many occupations.

But I used to fondly think I might probably, if push came to financial shove, at least get a job in sales. Now I know I couldn’t do that either. In my day, when you wanted to make someone else buy something, you simply told them what a brilliant product it was and how cheap you’d make it. Not any more.

Sitting behind two suits in a café near Sloane Square this week, I was reminded of my introduction to the game Bullsh*t Bingo whereby you mark a cross every time someone uses a flowery but largely meaningless phrase like “blue sky thinking”, “window of opportunity” or “touch base with”. I could have filled an entire card in seconds.

Some sort of investment portfolio was on offer which would “trade up” and “net down”. Our rather manic-sounding salesman was going to “model out the process”, “generate receivables”, and fulfil “order-winning critera”. He assured his companion he was “on message,” “thinking in the same space” and “very FCA compliant” especially after “translating strategy into achievable objectives” and speaking to the “visual risk assessment guys”.

Then he withdrew to have a conference video call on his iPad and was rather reassuringly heard to say “bugger it” as he tripped going round the corner. My mouth hung open, but my son, who did a management module at university, merely shrugged. “That’s the sort of stuff I had to write in that essay you couldn’t understand,” he told me. I preened, thinking that at least my son was employable and equipped for the world of big commerce even if it had decisively passed over his mother. So, did you get what they were on about? I asked him, jerking my head at the next table. “No,” he said.

B INGO also makes me think nostalgically of the callers on Margate seafront in the days when a glamorous teenage night out involved hanging around Dreamland and stumping up whatever it cost to scream fetchingly all the way down the scenic railway. (Blissfully ignorant of a future where plain English is dying and one can’t get a job.)

I am as enthusiastic as the next woman about the reopening of the park with its vintage rides and “host of indoor and outdoor events” (I quote) “celebrating the best of British culture.” I applaud the job creation, the effect on visitor numbers and the potential boost to the local economy. I am looking forward to going.

However, without wishing to put a dampener on proceedings, I am feeling increasingly nervous about the much-heralded June 19 for the official launch. A recent peer over the wall from the car park nearby, suggested, if I might use modern parlance, that operations’ communicative sub-units have not translated strategy to measurable objectives with sufficient clarity.

One fears, therefore, that decentralised control activities may have compounded a lack of strategic alignment and goal congruence. Far be it from me to offer the conjecture that a process classed as internally neutral, has formulated an approach to set backs and operative deviations that has been merely reactive not proactive but I do worry that it still looks like a building site and won’t be open on time!

Read the original article at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/s-tough-job-don-t-speak-nonsense-lingo/story-26635907-detail/story.html

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Filed under: articles, Isle of Thanet Gazette, non-fiction, Plain Jane, writing Tagged: Broadstairs, Jane Wenham-Jones, Margate, Plain Jane, Ramsgate, Ramsgate Harbour, Ruth Bailey, South East England, South Thanet, Southwark, Thanet, thanet district council, Thanet South

Breaking News… 100 Ways is on YouTube!

janewj:

I have been updated! The flab book has a new cover and youtube trailer and I have been given an author page on facebook. Not entirely sure what to do with it, as yet :-) but if you are on facebook yourselves and feel inclined to click the “like” button, that would be marvellous…. If you feel like trying the flab tips or encouraging your friends to*, that would be even more wonderful… (before and after pics always welcome! :-))

* NB As I instructed my father, after he thrust one of my postcards at what he described as “a large lady” in the queue in Tesco, this has to be done with caution. I have advised: “Of course YOU don’t need this, but it’s vaguely amusing…” as a potential opener next time. He has promised to bear it in mind when he’s out of the plaster…

Originally posted on 100 Ways To Fight The Flab:

100 Ways is now on YouTube!

Click on the ‘play button’ below to view this video…

If you liked it and / or have some feedback, we’d love to hear from you. Do leave a comment below. Thank you. :)

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Plain Jane 220515 – A chilly reception

OH DEAR! It seems I haven’t got off to the best possible start with our new Kipper council. Let’s hope I don’t require a new wheelie bin in the next five years.

The Winter Gardens was rammed on the night of the general election with 150 members of national and regional media poised to see Nigel Farage’s moment of – what turned out to be non-glory.

I joined the throng the following morning in time to witness Mr Farage’s exit stage left without waiting for the others to finish their speeches (considered very bad form in political circles) and the ridiculous “prophet” utter an obscenity (considered very bad form by me).

Two days later, the much smaller band of – mostly local – hacks were still looking tired, but I arrived to see an apparently restored, grinning and hand-clapping Mr Farage – or “Daddy” as one successful candidate rather nauseatingly dubbed him – leading his merry band in the cheers and flag-waving as we watched TDC turn purple.

It is not what one would have chosen, not least because most of the new intake have never done it before, but since I would usually go for people not parties in local elections, I decided to approach proceedings with an open mind.

When I found myself in the coffee queue with two purple rosettes, and a hand was extended my way, I shook it. John Buckley HAS done it before, he told me.

Newly elected to the Beacon Road Ward, he explained he had previously represented Broadstairs & St Peters town council for Labour. When I expressed surprise at this profound leap of allegiance, he countered it with his support of Manston.

Far be it from me, an ardent airport fan, to disagree, but my eyebrows remained raised. But wasn’t he, I asked nicely, a little concerned about a certain element that UKIP tended to attract? Mr Buckley opened his mouth to begin what sounded like a reasoned reply, and was drowned out by what I can only describe as a squawking from the second rosette. I will not bore you with the entire exchange, suffice to say that it included much huffing, puffing and eventual storming (hers) from the queue, some ineffectual attempts at pacification (Councillor Buckley’s) and the rather curious accusation being hurled my way that I made racist comments myself in what had suddenly become MY paper.

UKIP, it seems, also tend to attract people who don’t listen, don’t understand, don’t want to engage in rational debate and who think that the best way to win round a sceptic is by shrieking about the shortcomings of the Socialist Workers Revolutionary Party (I don’t like them much either) and complaining that a councillor from the Labour party had called one of their number a fascist. Entertaining as all this was, I think we can be thankful that the lady in question is only married to a Kipper (not Mr Buckley, I should perhaps make clear) and not standing for office herself. Council meetings, I fear, will be chaotic enough already.

Word clearly got round for there was a definite chill coming from factions of the purple camp for the rest of the afternoon. Ironically, the only one who looked pleased to see me and offered a smile, was Nige himself! But: “we have cleaner streets already”, tweeted a local in protest at my cynicism, “or is it my imagination?” I think it might be, love. It took the new lot a week to get email addresses, let alone the dog mess cleared up, but let us wait and see. My mind stays just about propped open. And if it turns out I’m wrong to feel quiet dread, I shall say. In the meantime I shall watch and I shall listen. Lady of UKIP who never got her coffee – you should try it some time…

You can read the original article at: http://www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Plain-Jane/story-26546957-detail/story.html

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The one that enraged a Kipper….

This was my Isle of Thanet Gazette column, published 8/05/2015 that gave rise to the following on this week’s letter page. As I said on twitter – thanks for all the amusing response! – I love the idea that I should pay for my sins by attending a council meeting…. Punishment indeed!!! :-)

The offending piece:

“They are homophobes; they are sexist.”

 “They are self-opinionated and won’t take criticism.”

 “They’ve shown  how incompetent and secretive they are.”

 “They play games.”

By the time you are reading this, we will know which party’s representatives have landed in Thanet, and whichever one it is, the chances are it will have been described as one of  the above.  The most enjoyable part of interviewing the various candidates for the seats of South and North Thanet in the lead-up to the general elections, was hearing the rants that I wasn’t allowed to print. Above is the short version. I have acres of tape on what is fundamentally wrong with Labour, the Conservatives, the dreaded UKIP, the Lib Dems (actually nobody took them seriously enough to be rude) and the Greens (ditto).

When we got down to analysing individuals, most of my interviewees were keen to protest that they weren’t in the business of knocking their rivals, but did manage to shyly reveal:

“He’s not going to do anything for the area.”

“He’s not going to trot around dealing with people’s problems.”

“He’s a bit like the temple in Cambodia with four faces”

“I’m a different breed of politician from him. I’m not here to tell lies.”

“He’s just using it as a stepping stone up his own vanity ladder.”

“You can’t trust him.”

So welcome whoever made it through. You sound thoroughly delightful and I’m sure we’ll get on like a house on fire. One thing is for sure – it will indeed be  a HE in South Thanet. Our current incumbent at the time of writing, Laura Sandys, is sadly not standing for re-election. I can honestly say I have never heard her say a bad word about anyone.

I have had various conversations with Laura over the last five years: as a journalist seeking her views, at local gatherings various, and as a constituent to her MP. Ms Sandys was unfailingly smiley, concerned, committed and above all, moderate. Even my most left-wing friends had little negative to say apart from the obvious – that she was a Tory. In traditionally right-wing circles, hallowed was her name. When she first came on the scene, the criticism levelled at her most frequently was a puzzled: “She seems a bit too nice.”  Eventually we realised she actually was nice. Very! She also worked like a Trojan, was passionate about her causes, would turn out to the opening of an envelope even when it was cold, dreary and pouring with rain – make-up-less, hair wet and still managing to look as if she were privileged to attend  – and always seemed to be one of those rare creatures:  the politician who is in it to try to make the world a better place, not for their own self-glory. I know I am not the only one who would have voted her back in, in a heartbeat, whichever party she was standing for. (Except UKIP, obviously. But the good lady is  far too intelligent for that!). Good luck with whatever you do next, Laura! I doubt Thanet will see your like again.

ALSO BY THE TIME you are reading this, I will be propping my eyes open with matchsticks, having flown back from  a week working in France (see www.chez-castillon.com) in time to cast my vote and pitch up at the Winter Gardens for the count. It’s a long sleepless night, filled with politicians and council officials, news bulletins and anxiety, and not even an open bar. I wouldn’t miss it for the world. I’ll have seen who we’ve got and be suitably relieved or disappointed or in deep despair .

Whichever of the three, my message for the new chap is this: I hope you’ll do a bit more for Thanet than they said you would…

Filed under: articles, Isle of Thanet Gazette, Plain Jane, writing Tagged: article, Chez Castillon, Conservative, Councillor, Election, Isle of Thanet Gazette, Laura Sandys, Margate, Plain Jane, UKIP, Winter Gardens