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HEAR'SAY
Well here we are again, with me to tell you, the readers, what's being talked about out
there on the streets. Well this issue is the New Year and |
Xmas one, and yet
again we find ourselves at that magical time of the year. One can almost hear the
jolly festive carols playing as we go about our daily business, (actually playing in
certain stores for the last twelve weeks!) Ah yes, we can imagine the wonderful aromatic
odour of sweet chestnuts roasting away over our open fires, very carefully of course;
don't want to call upon the third world services of the Green Goddess Brigade do we? And
lastly as we relax after a full, satisfyingly thorough stuffing of Christmas pomposity, we
hear the soft chinking sound of Grandma dropping her teeth into the sherry trifle during
the Queen's Speech.
As winter bites outside, we cocoon ourselves away in front of the telly in our cosy and
comfortable, doubled glazed and fully insulated abodes. Or if it's your second, third or
fourth home/ investment, you happen to let out for nine months of the year and visit
occasionally during the rainy season inputting little or nothing to the local fiscal
economy. Then you would be relaxing in your intensively refurbished, fully doubled glazed,
centrally heated, exclusively modernised, idyllic fisherman's cottage, with luxurious
fitted kitchen and en-suite bathroom facilities in the master bedroom.
Whilst we steal away an hour or two in front of the warm glow of the fire, we can
contemplate how much our next years rates are going to be and some (not before time) will
have to pay the going rate for that little investment by the sea. Oh dear, I guess little
Porcha won't be getting her diamond studded riding hat along with that pony after all.
Mind you after the foot and mouth scare they're practically giving them away down in the
New Forest, £12.00 should just about do it. Stop it! I say to myself, it's Christmas and
so it is on to my other topic.
Don't you love it when it snows? It's the only time during the year my garden looks just
as pretty as everyone else's is; and if the snow can cover up a multitude of sins on my
lawn then perhaps it can do the same to Sheringham's pavements! Hopefully hiding in the
process, all those disgusting sticky whitish blobs strewn in their millions all over the
town centre's streets and beyond. To what am I referring? No, not pigeon or seagull doo,
the animal responsible for this is much larger and of the upright two legged variety. It
is an animal far dirtier than any other. Human beings! Of all ages. And the offence?
Chewing gum. En Masse! Horrid, filthy, sticky white dollops of splodgy goo. Gum spat from
the mouths of everyday individuals, these splats now cover the length and breadth of every
inch of every pavement covering the entire town centre and beyond. Oh the joy of noticing
that ones nice new hall carpet is now sharing someone's regurgitated plastic doby as it
hitched a ride on the sole of ones shoe from the town clock.
Well as is customary by now, I have the solution, and it's been staring us in the face all
along. In the words of Black Adder's Baldrick "I have a cunning plan". The
solution being that Chewing Gum should be sold with a non-negotiable refundable deposit
(£30-40) per packet for the return of the offending "used" article. Also,
whilst we are about it, the same adoption of thought should be afforded to Alco-pop
bottles, crisp and cigarette packets and butts, sweet wrappers, drinks cans and take-away
cartons.
Just think, the recycling and reduced landfill savings alone, from the post carnival steam
clean would be enormous. The used gum could be returned to the place of purchase. Then
reprocessed, squished into giant Tupperware cake boxes with |
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lids, repackaged
and sold as a substitute for "blutac" only this would be slightly stickier. Also
it could be sold as a backing material for faulty fridge magnets and not forgetting
carpenters and builders have used it for securing "that pencil behind the ear"
for years.
It could be placed along windowsills to entrap any would-be thief in the act of breaking
and entering. Long strands of it could be hung down from the ceiling as
"fly-traps" in the chippy or baker's shops. Last but by no means least, it could
be stuck to the base of Alco-pop bottles so they could be lined up skittle fashion along
the prom at night to encourage even more people to throw stones at them than already do.
Alco-pops should be sold in larger size bottles thus making it impossible for kids to hide
them in their packed lunch boxes or to smuggle them into pubs in their tiny handbags on a
night out. The bottles should be returned to the manufacturers by crate like the pubs used
to do with the brown ale and corona bottles.
Crisp bags could be tied and stapled together to make scarecrows to keep any pigeons off
the town clock and to keep the gulls out of the bins on the seafront. With every three
million packets, flattened and stuck with copydex, we could commission the building of a
life sized effigy of the Town Crier in his lovely new £500 suit, bacon and cheese and
onion flavour for colour.
He could be holding a village in bloom award ironically stuck to him with recycled gum. In
fact if we could save enough packets we could have models of anything we liked on
Ottendorf Green like the concrete cow models of Milton Keynes.
I can see it now life-sized models of our councillors adorning the green, pointing out the
directions of the toilet amenities of the town, the where-abouts of the lifeboat sheds and
the new fire station etc. etc.
Or perhaps the people of Sheringham would like an effigy of someone more deserving. Mr.
Macdonald's or Ken Tucky perhaps? Or possibly the greatest Britain; was that Becks or
Churchill? Who knows? I suppose that would depend on your generation.
So there we have it. It seems to me refundable deposits are the way to go. They would
reduce waste and land fills, create valuable reclaimed useful products, thus doing us all
an environmental favour. Not to mention giving us all cleaner streets to live in and a
spotless town centre. So get saving now! Or if we can't do that let's bin it! Please.
Christmas tidings and much merriment to you all in the New Year.
Vic
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Merry Christmas & Happy New Year to all our customers and friends
THE TRADING POST |
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