Shanghai ASBO, City Heritage at knock-down prices, the Dead Dog Blog and Maggie May

By Jove, Missus, what a tattyfilarious time I’ve been having.

I am just back from being shanghaied to China by our City leadership. I thought things would quieten down for me once the 2008 Year of Custard had ended but no missus, not a bit of it. First it was Cannes on our luxury yacht for a week now China again. Aren’t the taxpayers wonderful? I can’t thank them enough for sending me all over the world.

This is the third time in the last two years. Of course I missed out on some other trips.
I didn’t get to go to New York for a week with our city councillors to see how they dealt with all the empty ashtrays when they introduced the smoking ban. As I am sure you will agree, the success of the smoking ban here and the closure of all the pubs was dependent upon the taxpayer footing the bill for a week in New York. A vital fact finding mission. I am just still waiting for the report to come out.

Apparently Missus the Seychelles has introduced increased parking fees at night so we may have to go over there too to see the affect on local business. And Barbados is looking at doing away with bollards. That’s definitely worth investigating. I’ll put my name for that, perhaps me and the Leader, somebody from NWDA and a few highways officers. After all the leader and I are both well known for talking bollards.

But anyway Missus, Shanghai! What an adventure. Yes all leading up to the Shanghai ASBO where Grotty Cash is one of only two British cities daft enough to take part. Of course there are special connections between us. They have the Great Wall of China and we have The Great Wall of Secrecy and of course our next mayor will be The Max Wall of Public Office.

The next Mayor Of Grotty Cash Max Storey

During the trip, I was lucky enough to be able to visit the archaeological site where they uncovered that remarkable life sized army. What an amazing site it was. Did you know missus, that a scouser from Dovecot commanded the original army? Yes missus Terry Cotter he was called. What a leader he must have been for them to create such a monument.


On the poster outside the exhibition is a little man holding a traditional wooden cage containing a songbird. Above him is the battle cry of the Terry Cotter Army – “are you looking at my bird?”





Of course we nicked the idea to create a similar monument to our glorious Lib-dumb army on Crosby beach. The Gormless Men. Have you seen them missus? By Jove!
How much extra would it have been for a pair of cast iron Y-Fronts? They are all astronomically correct madam. I can tell you this, they are not affected by the cold water either, by Jove no. Not even the ones nearer the sea.

You should see the size of the barnacles on some of them. Pop down there with your husband missus and tell him to take all his clothes off and gaze out to sea with them. If he’s lucky, he may get a little tug off shore.

There is a rumour going round that one of the rusty orange coloured gormless statues is actually ex Chief Executive of the Custard Company, Jasper Harbottle. They say he is trying to turn back the tide for a Paul McCartney Concert, either that or he’s pissed as Canute. I heard that Wally Bradlow had in fact given Harbottle a pair of concrete boots and a seaside holiday as a leaving present. Still no apology! He’s waiting Mr Deputy Mayor.

But anyway Missus, I really can’t tell you any more about the Shanghai trip, I am sworn to secrecy. There are amazing plans for the event and it may need several more trips to finalise our freebies before 2010 just in case the ungrateful electorate kick Wally and the Glib Dumbs out of office. Then again, I am sure Moira Anderson and the Labour group will need to go there, now we have committed ourselves.

I am still available and you will need me to translate. I’m fluid in both Mandarin and Mancunian dialects. The Chinese delegation that visited Liverpool said they found it difficult to understand Wally Bradlow and they were appalled by our Liverpool Direct and how terrible it was.

This comment by them caused some confusion amongst those of us raised on The Benny Hill Show. Fortunately I was on hand to say, “Ahh! You mean LDL, oh yes it is terrible, a complete rip-off but they are all too scared of what will come out if they admit it. He understood me perfectly, nodded his head and said “quarter past two.” An international incident narrowly avoided. I helped to avoid another incident when the Chinese were here, they asked if they could talk to somebody about the Beatles and I had to rugby tackle Wally Bradlow before he said “ of course John Lemons wife Yogi Omo was Chinese”

Yoko Bono arrives in Grotty Cash to put some mucky pictures up.

Anyway it turned out they wanted to talk about the beetles in their hotel room. Musically they preferred S-Club Seven. Didn’t they sing Reach for the SARS? Maybe they could make a come back with a song for the Swine Flu. They could get those women dancers from the old Top of the pops – Pam-demics People. Or how about doing Gershwin’s Porky and Bless you. Did you know the council has removed Roger Whitakers Mexican Whistler from all the jukeboxes? Well I suppose you can’t be too careful. That’s probably what caused Peggy Lee’s Fever. Still, it takes your mind off the economic melt down, which will probably kill more in the long run.

How did I get on to that? Never mind but I shall keep you updated with the plans for the Shanghai ASBO. But don't think all the money this will cost is going on my hotel bills, no we are spending much more than that. As it says on the partnership website "Liverpool's presence at the World Expo is estimated to cost about £3m, of which half is expected to come from the public sector. (it better had or they'll be after me for the mini bar bills) Liverpool council has committed £300,000 to the project, while the North West Development Agency is expected to reach a decision on a bid for £1.25m shortly." See, peanuts. Or maybe Cashew Nuts.


Speaking of nuts, for some reason people have started asking about my meeting with Lord Rainhood in April last year, which may lead to the revival of my jam production line with the right PR. Well there was Jam in it for somebody but unfortunately as I overdid the free Cherry B that night I have declined to answer any questions for the moment. It cost me a few quid, but it was well worth it. Ahh the trials and tribulations!


Now Missus, I don’t know if you are aware of this but there are a lot of people out there writing these so called Blogs. Mainly busybodies with nothing better to do other than mock or write scurrilous accounts of all sorts of alleged goings on. I can’t understand why they bother, I blame the telly myself, there’s nothing worth watching these days.

Just look at the schedules a few years back compared to now, you had Saturday Seaside Specials, Bobby Davros in a Box, Noah’s House Party – that had a Mr Bloggie.

And don't forget, Leslie Crowther’s How Much is this? Googie Withers in Porridge.

And one of my favourites - Kenco (an early version of Victoria Wood's Dinner ladies)

Now what have we got on telly? Wall to wall reality rubbish, Ramsey f-ing and blinding, that fat little pudding Jamie Olives banging the self promotion drum lecturing us about eating less, while he spits all over the camera man and Ann Robinson squinting at you and calling you thick. Call that entertainment?

It’s no wonder these silly bloggers keep churning out their rubbish. Some of course have followed my example and kept it snappy and to the point, writing about things that capture the “mineshaft” of the people, as the trendy folk say. My old Capital of Custard Blog has been copied around the world. I have just heard there is one in Cyprus called Professor Yassos Choukraboukos’s Official Guide to Cyprus Capital Of Couscous. The fool, what’s Couscous got to do with Custard?
But the point is – and there is one – some of these blogs are very informative. There is the prolific chap who writes about scribbles on a jotter while he has his muesli, and I must say it is a great read, far better than anything you get in the Oldham Echo or even in a newspaper for that matter. I would thoroughly recommend a viewing. I think the blog is called condensed milk or something, and funnily enough he recently did a piece about Connie-onnie, anyway here’s the link: http://condensedthoughts.blogspot.com/

Now the other good thing is that many of these bloggers provide links to other sites This chap had one that looked right up my street. The Liverpool Preservation Trust.

As you know, I started out in jam mining and I still like to see what’s going on in the world of preserves. You have to keep up with the trends although I did come a cropper trying to launch my Raspberry, Kidney Bean and Lentil Jam to tap into the chanting, sandal wearing, crystals and kaftans market. I won’t say much more, the lawyers may be reading this and the court case is sub-jucie-fruit, but it turned out that this particular blog had nothing to do with fruit preservatives at all. No Missus it is about preserving our heritage, architecture and our culture.

Well the blog may be about that but from what I’ve read so-far the people who are paid to do this including the trustees and the city planners seem intent on destroying it, flogging it off for a quick buck or letting it rot. Now I don’t really mind them knocking down Ringo’s house but only on condition he’s in it at the time.

But what I do object to is great city landmarks and some of our finest buildings being wrecked to build unwanted, unnecessary concrete and glass slabs and empty, unsold one bedroom apartments or them being professionally vandalised while the city seems to turn a blind eye. They had better turn a deaf ear as well since the proprietor of one of the favoured development companies is allegedly prone to foul mouthed outburst in his replies about having had to meet and listen to complete W*nkers. Fortunately, he didn't name names.

It's always sad when a loved buiding is sold off or goes under the hammer at the auctions,but at the moment this seem to be a sledge-hammer.

Yes prominent landmarks of great architectural or historical significance can have the front hacked off them or be gutted in broad daylight with no planning permission, but if you drop a fag end in castle street, thirty uniformed men will jump on you and steal your wallet.

I’d like to hack the front off the building they put up to replace the fabulous Casartelli that was left to rot for decades, with no attempt to save the original frontage even if the floors were rotten as they claimed.

An original 18th century off licence for the wino dandy’s of the day. Picture their wives each evening, nipping out in their pyjamas for twenty Super kings a bottle of Smirnoff , six cans of Special Brew and a packet of Red Rizzla. Then back to their town dwelling house on Hardman Street to neck the lot before retiring to bed with a cup of hot Rococo. Now it's advertised as "Posh Pads" How very respectful of the destruction of our most historic building - that was.

I can’t even look at the replica they put up of the Casartelli . It’s like if you sat on Yehudi Minestrone’s Stradivarius violin and offered to replace it with a Ukulele from Hesseys, pretty much the same shape, same number of strings but he just wouldn’t want to shove it under his chin.

They could have saved the front of the building if they had wanted to, like they promised to do with the old dole office in Leece Street. How’s that coming along by the way? There’s been a big hole there for about 10 years. Where are they keeping it, has the short sighted Mr Magoo Group sent it away for specialist restoration?

Now in the early days I had read quite positive accounts of Magoo developments and i was a great supporter when I heard that they had ripped the front off Billy Butler’s house, I don’t care if he was a pioneer of radio, we’ve been holding his plums for far too long, but it seems I was mistaken. It was the lovely Josephine Butler House that they have destroyed – well I say destroyed, they claimed it was restoration. I am no expert but I don’t think you can restore a sandstone entrance canopy and surround by smashing it into dust first. It didn’t seem to work for Sir Thomas Street. But anyway, we are told that the cladding is getting specialist restoration although why you will need it for a car park, I don’t know, since that’s the latest plan for the site.

Here is Josephine Butler House as it was and then after the sledgehammer attack. Then an artists impression of the Magoo groups proposed restoration.

Pictured before restoration began . After Magoo had carefully Hacked off the front



Josephine Butler House as it will look on completion

Now thanks to the idiots at Liverpool Roger Moore University or Littlewoods Polytechnic as I remember it, the Magoo Group has now got half of Hope Street, for a knock down price, literally.
The proposals are to develop Hotel and apartments! Just what the city is crying out for. I am surprised they haven’t got hold of the old Irish Centre yet, or the Duke Ellington rooms to give it the proper name, although that may be because Councillor Flu Clogdance used to do the Jitterbug there and wants to revive it.

We are always shouting about wanting to be a world-class city, but I suppose it depends which part of the world we mean. Possibly they mean parts of Arizona or the Klondike as it seems to me that we are building a series of posh ghost towns. Enormous monuments to celebrate an era of uncontrolled property speculation, all standing empty and yet we keep inviting in more and more. Now what did it say again on the Liverpool - Shanghai Partnership website about our remit for the Shanghai ASBO?

"The exhibition space will promote how Liverpool as a modern, leading city can develop and prosper while conserving its rich history as a World Heritage site."

Ahem!!!

Now Missus, what about all these other apartments they keep on building in the city centre? Take that Liverpool One Park Westphalia apartments at the new Debenhams shopping centre. (still plenty of retail units left if anybody is interested) Did anybody look at the plans or a model before they put up that monstrosity? No wonder they’ve only sold four of them. Who wants to live in a 1960s technical college? It’s the same colour and design as our toilet freshener, I am sure of it.

Look at the original concept model for it and see what you think.

Design Concept for Liverpool One Park West Apartments

If you did live in it, first off you can’t get in without wading through 300 Emo's camped out on chavasse car park drinking Red Bull and secondly what happened to the top floors on the pointy bit? Is this why they are banging on about obesity, is this why the teachers are nicking the cheesy wotsits and curly wurlies out of the kids lunch boxes? Are they desperate to find people skinny enough to fit in the top floors?



It’s a good job you can get flat screen Televisions now, but you won’t turn into a couch potato in there - you couldn’t get a couch in them – you’d have to hang from the wall by a coat hook holding your breath. And all that for a starting price of £199,000!

Seriously missus, what is the point of these luxury apartment towers, each one taller than the last? If you haven’t got one of the top floors, what’s the point? All your friends will just laugh at you boasting about having a flat in Beetham Tower if all the people are gawping in at you from the bus! Completely pointless, unless you are on the top floors otherwise think how many bottoms on toilets are overhead while you’re having your tea. All that sewage flowing down behind your bedroom wall.

I don’t care if there are football stars living in the block, I don’t want anything Tommy Lawrence or Jackie Milburn has passed dribbling down my offside. Here, anyway is the link to the site, just in case I have got any facts wrong.

http://liverpoolpreservationtrust.blogspot.com/

Well worth a look if you want to know what’s happening with the heritage and fabric of the city as well as our Merseyside and Liverpool Museums and Art Sculleries.

Now another blog I dip into now and again is Lois Baldock’s regular offerings. You may have read recently that she resigned her position as lead for Ethical Standards due to an entry she made on her blog 2 years ago in which she called a bunch of *opportunistic conniving deceitful bastards, “L*b D*ms” and “L******s” who later complained about such a disgraceful comment.
Lois Baldock

Well it was her choice to resign over this – I hope, and you can respect that decision unlike those who cling on even with criminal conviction. In the supportive comments on her Blog, reference was made to another blog site, one that, as an animal lover, I found very distasteful.

The Blog in question is in support of the "Opportunistic Devious B*stards" and is called Dead Dog Blog.

It features some unfortunate looking stuffed dog, similar to the one that used to have Bob Carolgees arm up it’s khyber - It spits as well.

But do you know Missus; I was quite pleased to see it. I do hope it’s not banned from Council and Library computers. It provides a valuable insight into the Glib Dums who as we know are very fond of dogs. Although Norman Scott wouldn’t agree.


In fact they have a special dog that they look after. They donate millions of pounds in council tax to the dogs’ home in Misadventure Place. They have even built a little doggy shower to help keep Fido's mucky little paws clean. But nevertheless it is good to see that they can enjoy some satire and a little joke. Well they elected Wally Bradlow as leader and are having Muck Starey for Mayor, so obviously they have a strong sense of humour.


Now some people may find the look-alike pictures it features a little offensive. I know there was a recent complaint from a Mr Potato Head.

But we have to be able to give and take Missus. You give them a vote and they take you to the cleaners. I particularly enjoyed the most recent satire about the three Garston Labour Councillors. who had failed to turn up to some meetings to discuss how to spend some funding in a way that would make a difference to the area.“What would you do with £140,000?” It asks, concerned that this money could be wasted because of them. Now some people may think this is having a go at these councillors but you have to understand the Glib Dums.

This is clearly a cry for help by way of confession and a touch of self-effacing humour. What they are really talking about is the waste around Capital of Custard and all the rest of the money they have squandered. The real question they pose is what would you do with £121 million? Where’s the money gone?

I mean for heavens sake £140k wouldn’t cover one of the pay-offs they had to make to the numbskulls they hired that almost cocked-up the whole of 2008. £140k is less than half what they had to pay off Henshaw to get shut of him. Or Archer and Harbottle and it’s nowhere near how much of your council tax money they gave to their head of finance Mr Hasitall in order to see the back of him.

The poor little pooch, it must be getting on a bit as well. Its memory is going. It is typical of memory problems within old age. You can remember things that happened a couple of years ago, like some naughty words in a blog entry by a local opposition councillor, but you cant remember the court case criminal conviction and losing the appeal from one of your own executive members guilty of fouling the pavements in Belle Vale. I don’t like to see glib dumb animals suffer like that but at the same time, I would never have them put down.
So to offer my support, here is a look a like for your Deluded Dude Dead Dog Blog.



Toilet Brush Head___________Dude The Bog

http://dudethedog.blogspot.com/

Now before I go, I must mention a special anniversary this week

30 years since Mrs Twatcher landed on the roof of number 10, like an evil Mary Poppins in a twin set and pearls.

A little boy ran up to give her some flowers and she poked him in the eye.

I recall her entering Downing Street and making a statement to the waiting press.
She said;

“ I am reminded of the words of the Marquis de Sade who said- All, all is theft, all is unceasing and rigorous competition in nature; the desire to make off with the substance of others is the foremost - the most legitimate - passion nature has bred into us and, without doubt, the most agreeable one.- but I probably better say something by St Francis The Sissy instead, where is my harmony hairspray Dennis? ”

Remember the election song. No not "Supercallousfarrightwitchshitextremeantisocialist"

The other one. Wanted a Prime Minister Mummy for two adorable children

[Sung]

If you want this choice position
have an evil disposition
Hollow cheeks, and warts!
Shrill voice, cruel thoughts

You must be mean, you must be vicioious

But be seen to wash the dishes

Take out the unions, make laws
To put them on all fours

Always be cold and raw
Save your face by taking us to war
Lie about Belgrano slaughter
”Rejoice!” dead sailors in the water

You will give us lots of cause to hate you
An eternal flame in hell shall commemorate you
we won’t hide your spectacles So you can’t see
The harm that you do
Or the misery

Hurry Maggie ,Many thanks
Sincerely,

Your ignorant racist daughter and idiot criminal son who should be doing 30 years.

I blame the parents.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNTzp9grp2Q Perfect Nanny

Tatty Bye Everybody Tatty bye

Be nice to each other