Oh God, He's Back

Remember our old friend Alwyn Cox from Oswestry? He's back, kids, and he's even grumpier than usual. Whilst this latest letter into the Sloppy Star isn't particularly interesting, it's made me laugh enough to blog about it. Cynical Ben - fear not! I have not forgotten the straw hats blog. Oh no! But let's have a look at this letter first:

Dear council employees, if any of you find it necessary to contact me by telephone again do not have the temerity to hide behind a withheld number.

Useful letter this. Thanks for writing this in to the local newspaper, and not the council themselves.

If you need to withhold your number for whatever self important reason you have given yourself to justify doing so, then you must tell me who I am speaking to before I tell you if you have contacted the person you wish to speak to.

I have a slight problem here. This Morning has just started, featuring the lovely Holly Willoughby. I currently have man flu, meaning I have a box of tissues next to me. We also have workmen in, and one of them has just walked in to ask me something whilst I'm sitting here in my pyjamas, watching Holly Willoughby with a box of tissues next to me. You do the math.

Don't you dare ever again phone me on my personal phone and expect me to identify myself to an anonymous voice.

Are you still banging on? Jesus, we get the point.

If you phone me, you tell me who you are before I speak to you.

Is it just me, or is this breathtaking arrogance?

The woman that phoned me on Thursday found that she had to identify herself pretty quickly before I cut her off.

That's one way to interact with a woman. Another good one is to kick her in the fanny. Trust me on that one, Alwyn.

Only when I knew who I was speaking to did I tell her that she was speaking to the intended person. It would have been much better if she had identified herself the moment that I answered the call. Better manners also.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Try something like the following - "Good after-noon. I am Mrs So-and-so speaking from Shirehall. Can I please speak to Mr Cox?"

Breath taking. I literally do not know what to say about this anymore.

Good manners do not take a lot of brain power.

End of letter. Wow. The funny thing is Alwyn, I'm half-tempted to agree with you, if you weren't being such a pompous buffoon about it.

Next week in Alwyn's letter - how a waitress should serve him correctly!

Adventures in Greendale

I've teased you with this, and despite wanting to give it a few days, I can't resist it any longer. My fingers are literally itching, although that may just be a fungal infection. So, without any more babble, let us look at a letter into Monday's Shropshire Star, penned by the splendid Alwyn Cox from Oswestry. For any new readers (Hannah) - Alwyn's letter will be in a bold font, my responses in this normal font. Let's do this thing.

So now the shopkeepers in Ellesmere are complaining that the arrival of Tesco has damaged their businesses and caused job losses.

This is unfortunate, and is a sign of the times. Whether you like it or not though, it is true.

This is not true.

Oh, okay.

The workers at Tesco do not stand in the high street and kidnap customers and force them to buy Tesco products.

Not true Alwyn! I was once walking past Tesco when an employee rugby tackled me to the ground and demanded that I went in and bought some bananas, a Tweenies DVD and a pack of large condoms. I did what I was told.

The free choice of the public allows them to shop where they want to shop.

I didn't have the heart to tell him I only need small ones.

They obviously choose to shop in Tesco. So it is the public that are damaging the small businesses because they do not want or need them. We live in a world of free markets. The consumer is king, and if they choose to shop in the likes of Tesco and Sainsbury then so be it.

This is not news, Alwyn. Nor is it particularly interesting. I'm going to need you to spice up this letter with something stupid - about anything. Cheese. Paul O'Grady. Post Offices. Whatever!

They have decided that they no longer want to tramp from the greengrocer to the butcher, then onto the grocer and newsagent hauling more and more packages with them as they go from warm to cold to warm moving from one shop to the next.

Get on with it.

They want the convenience of everything in one place, so they go to a supermarket.

I've just suddenly twigged what Alwyn is doing here. Yes, kids, he's read my blog about how to write/bullshit your way through an essay, and now he's practising with this letter! This is precisely what is happening here - there can be no other reason to just type a load of stuff that we all know and is completely unnecessary.

Alwyn, get crazy, and get crazy quick.

Same with the post office.

At last!

Who cares if they are closing? I don't.

Might just be the most egotistical sentence I have ever read, ever. And considering I sometimes read back my old blog entries, that takes some doing Alwyn.

I buy my car tax online. I do not need postal orders - you know, those funny things the post office sells that cost more than the object that they are used to pay for.

It gets worse kids.

If I need other currency I get it from a hole in the wall in the country that I am visiting, it is cheaper and I get it as I need it.

Enjoy being mugged.

I do not write letters on bits of paper, then shove them into other bits of paper, and then stick other bits of paper, that I would have to purchase, on to them only to have to tramp to a red box on the street corner, shove all these bits of paper into this box and hope that a man in uniform will come and collect my bits of paper and deliver them to the address that I have written on the front.

There is so much shit there I wouldn't know where to start. And I'm at university, pretending to be studying John Milton. Currently, I'm not sure who I hate more - Alwyn or Milton. It's a toughie. I particularly enjoy Alwyn taking 5 lines to describe writing a letter and posting it. He really has been reading my essay guide, clearly.

I'm just going to move on, because re-reading that just makes me even more annoyed. Also, I don't want Sue to take too long imagining a man in uniform. Have a sit down Sue!

He will not come, of course, because he has decided not to work as a way of protesting against progress, just like those whingers complaining about Tesco.

I'm tired of this nonsense. I'll leave that sentence for Vole to foam at the mouth about.

I send e-mails like this letter to the Star. I pay all my bills by direct debit or online banking. I buy all my clothes in online shops.

My grandmother is a 70 year old woman who lives on her own, and wouldn't know the internet if www.dutchgirlswithbigboobies.orgy slapped her round the face. For her, her local post office is crucial. And I'm 22, so I'm not one to hark back to "the good old days" but I'd be gutted if all post offices closed down. For many elderly people, they are important, and give them just a little feeling of community, as they go and socialise to the same people every week as they collect their pension. Not everyone has the internet.

If my shopping habits cause the demise of small over-expensive shops, then so be it. Turn them all into bistros, restaurants, pubs and housing.

Alwyn Cox's priorities in life, in order - Food. More food. Drink. Somewhere to live.

Turn the high streets into pedestrian zones with tables and chairs,

Could you not just move to Paris, please?

trees, and roundabouts for the kids to play on. Move with the times and enjoy life, stop harking on about how things used to be and look to how they will be.

I'm starting to get tired of this, and I do really need to do some actual work. I think the main problem here is that I'm not 100% sure who you are attacking, considering you've taken a scatter gun to a few different people and things.

That is what Tesco did. When I did a Saturday job in Tesco as a schoolboy over 40 years ago it was a little corner shop with all its goods still in boxes stacked on the floor. Look at it now. I would say it is doing something right, probably giving the public what it wants.

End of letter. I am dazed and confused.

I know this has been a really long entry, so if you couldn't be bothered to read all of that, I'm now going to provide you with a summary of Alwyn's letter:

I don't

I buy

I do not need

If I need

I get it from

I am visiting

I get it as I need it

I do not write letters

I would have to

I have written

I send e-mails

I pay all my bills

I buy all my clothes

If my shopping habits

I did a Saturday job

I would say

Me me me me me me me me FUCKING ME

Are you ready to be...

...if you've just said the word "heartbroken" out loud after reading that title, congratulations! You win...nothing. Because in this instance, you're wrong. Are you ready to be bored, people? Of course you are, you're reading my blog. We all know this is what you do to pass some time once you've looked at the news, e-mail, all other blogs, pornography, the news from Norwegian elections. I know you, people. I know you.

Anyway, I want you to cast your mind back to a blog entry of mine a few weeks back, the link is handily here. If you can't be bothered to click on the link, a quick summary:

A man called Allan Tucker from Oswestry wrote a letter into The Sloppy Star saying, quite simply, that the Taliban are not "our lot" and that we should just leave them and exit from Afghanistan "pronto". I didn't agree, and I proceeded to make a few lame jokes and gently ridicule him. But I will give him credit though - his letter got across his point of view perfectly. He wants the troops to come home from Afghanistan, and his short, snappy letter left no doubt as to his feelings on this matter.

Congratulations Allan. What this means however is that the last thing you need to do is write another letter into the paper about Afghanistan. Seriously, why bother? There's no point. So you're not going to do that, are you? Are you? Oh, you are? Okay, cool.

What a fiasco the Afghan war is. We have been sucked into an imbroglio. Our part must end.

(end of letter)

You know that phone I have where I can phone anyone in history? I haven't used it for a while - I had to get it repaired after it melted whilst I was having phone sex with Fanny Hill. Anyway, I feel like phoning a Hollywood actor. Let's try.....Bill Murray!

(taps out unnecessarily long phone number)

"Hello?"

"Mr Bill Murray sir! It is I, Ewar!"

"Yes?"

"Are you okay, you sound a bit down?"

"No, I'm not okay. You see, I'm stuck in this weird world where every day seems to be exactly the same as the last. It's just the same old shit and I'm finding it difficult to cope!"

"Goodness Bill! I couldn't imagine anything like tha...(looks at paper) Actually...I hear you brother. Hang in there."