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Cilla in a corset and fishnets?

A weekly column reproduced from the Bristol Evening Post


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To Derbyshire, for a spot of shooting. A damn fine bag too, of 248 pheasant, three magpies and a Taliban guerilla who was hiding in a gorse bush.

They get everywhere these days, don’t they? Special Branch have even come up with a list of 47 Taliban supporters supposed to be living in Stoke-on-Trent. My, they must have been hard to spot.

I don’t know if you’ve ever been to the Potteries, dear reader, but half a dozen bearded men wearing black turbans driving through Burslem while manning a machine gun mounted on the back of a Toyota Land Cruiser would tend to stick out a bit. Even if they were eating cheese and bacon oatcakes.

But back to the shooting party. I took my man Whittaker along as a loader, having told him to dress appropriately. My god, you should have seen his suit. At least an acre-and-a-half of vivid checked tweed. If he’d been born 50 years earlier, we’d still have a thriving textiles industry in Lancashire. His wife must own a ride-on iron.

Over a splendid lunch of badger pie washed down with pints of Two Stroke (half Stella, half Special Brew) one of the chaps confessed to being a member of the Territorial Army, and admitted that he was a little concerned about being sent to Afghanistan. We managed to reassure him, though.

After all, if he doesn’t finish work until 5pm on Friday, he’s going to spend all weekend travelling there and back, so the chances of getting shot up by an angry towelhead wielding an AK47 are slim, to say the least.


Last week I mentioned Friends Reunited, the web site which allows old schoolmates to get in touch with each other. There is also a facility for leaving messages and memories of former teachers.

Predictably, not all of these messages are complimentary. Some of them contain all sorts of tawdry allegations, most of which are probably true. So now the National Union of Teachers wants the site closed down.

Listen, union chappies. This is our chance to get our own back for years of intimidation, bullying and outright violence. We will not be denied our vengeance on those who humiliated us.

There’s more…