Sale away with me honey...

We went to town where almost every shop displayed prominent Sale signs. It was, perhaps unsurprisingly, quiet - let's face it, we're all skint, the cards are maxed out and there's a lot of post-flood associated dismay round these parts. If only it were a conscious spurning of the shopping mall of consumerism in favour of a simple life uncluttered by material wealth rather than an inability to lay our hands on a bit more credit, eh? HMV was a tad hectic but otherwise, it was almost a pleasure to wander around with the boy Finn attached to me via his swanky baby carrier. There were other men who, like me, were attempting to display the modern face of masculinity, with their offspring attached to their chests via complex sling arrangements. "Look at me," we scream to the public, who are complicit in this game with their saccharine smiles of acknowledgment, "I've made this tiny living breathing thing and I'm going to carry it around, even if it means being a bit edgy when I'm getting on and off escalators". I made eye contact with another male sling wearer. What went unsaid went along the lines of "ain't we just the best fathers? Can you believe there are people that don't carry their babies around like this? Is your lumber support working, cos my back's f**king killing me?".

I swapped the chore of dibbing in and out of Ronnie Wood's shoddily composed autobiography Ronnie for the wonders of Russell Brand's My Booky Wook, which is like a very rude, saucy version of James Frey's lambasted (but still brilliant, in my opinion) A Million Little Pieces. I do feel as if I know too much about Brand and his trouser parts now, having just turned the final page on the debauched cross-addicted life he led, but I'd certainly recommend My Booky Wook if you're looking for an excuse to wallow in a nice mix of filth, comedy and pathos. I used to note what I was reading and listening to on this very blog at the foot of the posts but I got out of that habit. Perhaps I shall resolve to do it again in 2008. Or maybe I won't. Is anyone interested? Maybe I'll just do it to satisfy my own selfish ends.

Reading: Will Self and Ralf Steadman - Psychogeography Listening: Josh Rouse & Kurt Wagner - Chester.

I wanna know have you ever seen the rain...

Ah, what a wonderful Christmas. Presents and good times galore. Hope yours went well too.


But back to the business of moaning and groaning...

When I first perused Hull's new shopping experience St Stephen's, I thought I'd started to lose the plot. Here was a retail development that reckoned it brought the High Street, well, indoors, under the cover of a zillion sheets of curvy glass. Which lends one to believe that the weather won't be joining you as you nip in and out of H&M, Game and the mighty Tesco. Yet, as well as being underwhelmed by the amount of retail units that had been let back in September, I could have sworn, as I mingled with the madding crowds, that rain was hitting my body. The shopping continued and I marked the odd rain drop down to my ever-muddled brain playing tricks on me.
Just three months on, though, and it would appear that the rain was indeed entering this steel and glass structure. Today, a small army of chaps in flourescent jackets were mopping the slippery shiny floor like crazy demons. They don't build these things like they used to, eh? I do hope it came with a guarantee.

Tangfastic...

Made the brave move of mixing with some crowds Christmas shopping. We didn't mingle for long. My, they're a miserable bunch, these 21st century shoppers, and they don't appear capable of seeing that the baby carrier you're lugging around actually contains a baby. Here's a tip: if you really hate shopping so much that you must push your way past everything even when it's not strictly necessary, and you must do it all with a downturned mouth, why not tell your friends and family that, actually, present buying isn't for you and that they'll have to go without? And what is it with these men that disassociate themselves from their partners during the shopping excursion, walking several feet ahead and then just stopping, sighing and breathing heavily, waiting for 'er that should be kept indoors and cookin' tea to catch up, before doing it all again? We were happy to get back to base, and I'm now unwinding by sitting in front of Sky News and eating Tangfastic, sweets every bit as sour as those shopping in Hull today.

Well done Biggins, the new King of the Jungle, who semed genuinely touched that viewers cared enough about him to pick up their phones and vote. Nice bit on the Reuters wire about Biggins' route to victory:

Biggins was given the "bushtucker bonanza" in which he ate a witchetty grub, crocodile's foot, three cockroaches, a kangaroo penis and a kangaroo testicle.

"I'm really a breast man," he joked while eating the penis.

I never had any Evel Knievel toys. But the spoilt kid that lived next door but one had the entire collection and I was allowed to play with them occasionally. The toys were pretty realistic - the stunts never quite went to plan, the little plastic Evel always fell off mid-air and the whole lot usually came crashing down to the floor with a few bits scattering in different directions. The real thing always struck me as a bit of a bumbling fool, mainly due to one of the most enduring memories of my childhood, which was sitting in front of the old Redifusion telly in 1975 watching EK jump 13 double-decker buses at the old Wembley and landing pretty miserably, breaking his pelvis in the process befored telling the crowd that he would be retiring (he would be, but six years and a few more broken bones later). So he's now riding on the big motorcyle in the sky and I'm expecting him to land awkwardly any second. RIP you crazy loon.

Tags: Biggins, reality tv, Evel Knievel, shopping

Stalk me...

If you'd been following us this morning, you'd have found yourself in Luciano's...


...a rather nice Italian cafe-restaurant which, despite the garish bright orange exterior, has a rather soothing ambience inside and serves up great food and a natty line in desserts (coffee and cake 9-noon and 3-5pm just £3.50). Also, telly trivia fans will be keen to know, the waiter from South Shields who may or may not serve you used to be in Byker Grove. Maybe I should be on commission? Check out those hefty light bulbs, though, they definitely ain't burning energy efficient there.

Later, with the rain belting down, I passed some time here...


...Hepworth's Arcade, where stands the legendary Dinsdale's carnival novelty store, the place to go for your fake doggy doos and itching powder. My mother was telling me the other day that my grandfather used to work upstairs in Hepworth's Arcade, when it used to house Hull's telephone exchange. They used to stand somewhere close to where I took this snap and he'd wave at them from the balcony. Who were the Hepworth's? Well, this old ad that is still on the wall really doesn't explain it all..


Yes, they were the Great XL tailors and clothiers. But does the XL mean they made clothes for the larger gentleman or are they roman numerals? Which would mean there were 40 of them, which would indeed be great. Back then it wasn't the Hepworth's Arcade - it was plain old Silver Street Arcade then. I like to think that Hepworth's 40 tailors and clothiers mobhandedly forced all the other shops in the arcade to agree to the name change. I wonder if they also bullied my grandad?

When I got home I had a nice chat with Aileen Jones, a medal winning lifeboat helmsman from Porthcawl, and some of what she told me will add a bit of flavour to the play, I should think.