I walked into town today. Well, it was a nice day, and it’s good to get out of the house. I walked through the Market Square, where there’s been consternation over the last few days, as the Nottingham Eye has been told not to call itself that, but instead is to be known as the Nottingham Wheel. This is because the London Eye people “did not want any link with the smaller wheel”. As you can imagine, the people of Nottingham are dismissing this metropolitan snub, and are continuing to use the original title in their daily conversations. Well, they might be. I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve heard anyone refer to it at all, which is odd considering how big it is (yes, big, London Eye people. Our Eye, is big and your Eye, while bigger, would be too big for the Market Square. It wouldn’t be appropriate. It would feel like an invasion by Martians with odd ideas about what constitutes an efficient war machine. Bigger isn’t always better, as I’ve just proved). So, now it’s officially a Wheel, in order that London can still feel special. I hope Londoners are looking at their Eye with a new sense of wonder this week.
No threat to London.
I then went into the Post Office to drop off a parcel. I was sending it to a Freepost address, which meant that I didn’t have to queue, but could instead walk round to the parcel hatch and leave it there. This meant that my visit to the Post Office was quite brisk – in, up to the parcel hatch, and out. I felt a vague sense of disquiet that a member of staff hadn’t yet taken it from the hatch, and hoped no one would just walk up and take it out of there (though as it was a load of unwanted CDs, I wasn’t too concerned. If someone else wants NOW 51 or Athlete’s second album that badly, they’re welcome to it). Once I was back on the street though I felt more concerned at how speedily I had been able to walk into a public building, drop off an unattended parcel, and leave. I suddenly felt how easy it would be to abandon a more harmful parcel. One that contained a Martine McCutcheon CD, maybe. That’s a joke, of course, but it demonstrates just how much tabloid sensationalism has affected daily life, if I’m mentally reprimanding Post Office staff for not taking more notice of what I’m bringing into their branch. It also made me think of a letter I read on page 145 of Ceefax this morning from a pensioner complaining that his neighbour allowed her young daughter to run around in the garden naked, which meant that he couldn’t go into his garden because it’s likely that he’d be accused of being a paedophile. Not that this had happened, just that he thought it was likely in his head. Obviously, raising these concerns with the neighbour was out of the question. No, Ceefax was undoubtedly the best medium to air his grievance.
I love page 145. It’s full of this kind of thing.
On the way back, I thought up a new game of Town Centre Bingo, which is to count off how many young women you see with badly pronated or supinated Ugg boots. Have a look next time you’re out. You’ll surprise yourself.
Also, I realised that one day I will crack and be arrested for pulling down boys’ trousers. I should qualify that statement with some haste, and say that I mean those boys who wear their trousers down below their arse. This is a trend that started quite coyly, showing only the top of the wearer’s cheeks, which were usually clothed in very baggy boxer shorts, but now it seems that it is de rigueur for the whole arse to be visible, and pants have replaced baggy boxers, meaning that trips into town often make me feel like the Ceefax pensioner. As the trousers are so low to start with, I do feel an overwhelming urge to run round like a maniac, pulling them down to their ankles, but I understand that this is an urge which I must suppress for the good of society. This I will strive to do. In my research for this paragraph (oh yes – this isn’t just thrown together you know!), I discovered from a sage the reason for this sartorial madness. This wise person is called Answerer 1, and she has knowledge to share.
IN SUMMARY: Young people, eh?
