The Edge Magazine February 2022

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EDGE

the ISSUE NO: 299

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A MESSAGE FROM THE EDITOR

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COLD IN THE SHADE

FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS

As I was walking from Chelmo Village along the foot/cycle path, through town and as far as the wooden bridge after the Old Chelmsfordians and back, I noticed an elderly gentleman slowly approaching from the opposite direction. When he was but a couple of paces away, he said: “It’s cold in the shade, isn’t it?”

Well, it was the second week of January after all, I thought, so what did he expect?

However, I smiled and acknowledged his statement of fact, as we two strangers shared our common pursuit of walking for walking’s sake.

Further to what’s written on page 2, aye, it all feels a bit like doom’n’gloom at the moment.

After all, 25 years of one’s life really is a significant chunk to have devoted to solely one thing (that which you’re reading), yet it all feels as though it’s about to disappear in a puff of bloody smoke.

Only it’s not just the advertisers The Edge appears to be struggling to attract, when in times gone by I used to genuinely be beating them off with a shitty stick. The printing costs went up last month too, like never before.

“That’s Brexit for you,” I’m told, as the paper The Edge is printed on is always imported from Europe (say n’more).

So everything’s up in the air at the moment.

On the one hand it’ll be a wrench to consign The Edge to Room 101, if that has to be the case after the March’22 issues. Yet on the other, how do you go about finding ‘suitable’ (important word, that) work for 3 days a week, as I still need to earn some wedge in order to get by for another couple of years?

And at my age, these are circumstances I was hoping I wouldn’t have to confront.

KINGPIN

The Edge Editor’s Column BRASSIERE

CHUNKY LASS You know the chunky lass (fair assessment?) who played the traffic cop in The Tourist (more of which on page 11)?

Danielle Macdonald she’s called and she’s apparently more talented and seemingly far better known than I’ve been giving her credit for.

For starters she played alongside Jennifer Aniston in a movie called Dumplin’ (no prizes for guessing which one of them played the lead character), although it’s a movie Mrs Edge watched recently called Falling For Figaro that made me sit up and take note, because the Aussie lass genuinely learnt how to sing for the part (a bit) like Montserrat Caballe.

Way to go, girl.

CORMORAN & ROBIN Never mind Batman & Robin, I have been absolutely loving reading the Cormoran (Strike) & Robin (his partner) novels by Robert Galbraith of late, which as most of us are aware is but a pseudonym for the incredibly talented J.K. Rowling. Currently I’m half-way through the fourth one, Lethal White, with then just Troubled Blood to go, all purchased second-hand on eBay. But if anyone wants to buy the set from me, they can be yours for twenty quid!

THE EDGE Chelmsford CM2 6XD 077 646 7 97 44 shaun@theedgemag.co.uk

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Staying overnight at the Dockyard Premier Inn in Portsmouth on New Year’s Day, I made four notable observations.

Firstly, the lamp on my side of the bed wasn’t working and despite informing reception, it still wasn’t working when we checked-out.

Secondly, the red wine served with their £24.99pp evening ‘Meal Deal’ was pretty much unquaffable (should’ve known better).

Thirdly, why do parents think it’s OK to allow their kids to run around feral during breakfasttime (and also take more from the buffet than they can ever possibly consume)?

Finally, a lone lady wandered in at 09:00am wearing a tracksuit with nothing underneath (well, she definitely wasn’t wearing a bra, that’s for sure) and just a pair of socks (yes, socks).

‘You’re not at home, love’ I thought to myself.

I mean, she could have at least slipped a pair of slippers or trainers on, although I didn’t waste much time looking at her feet.

Kingpin (see page 27) really will be a loss to the fair peeps of Chelmsford if no-one can find a home for his articles. His words of wisdom always deserve to be shared and it has been both an honour and a pleasure to publish them for him for god only knows how many years?

Since he very first mailed me about Robot Wars, totally out of the blue, when The Edge was in its infancy and still very much finding its feet.

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“...do you want to come do it with me?”

Quick as a flash, I replied, “Do bears shit in the woods?”

Perhaps he wasn’t to know, but the East Yorkshire seaside resort of Scarborough holds particularly fond memories for your editor, as in my youth it was one of the holiday resorts my Grandma ’Belle and Grandad Sam, along with my Auntie Phyllis, used to take me for a weeks summer holiday (both their and my only holiday of the year). Blackpool was the other resort we tended to visit, while once we went to Bridlington (also on the East Yorkshire coast) and down south (perish the thought) as far as Cliftonville (yes, Cliftonville), which is not far from Ramsgate and Margate in Kent. What’s more, it was always on a coach from the village they were both born and died in, called Skelmanthorpe (where current Dr. Who Jodie Whittaker was born), so you can imagine how long a journey to Kent in particular it was from there back then. So read on, readers, read on...

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This photograph was taken unbeknownst to me by Lurch afore we left our Crescent city centre hotel room in Scarborough (probably so named as it is situated just off a rather impressive ‘crescent of buildings’ very much like the far more famous Crescent in Bath) on Tuesday 21st December 2021. And just look at it, FFS. We even had a bloody dado rail on the wall (when did you last see one of those?). However, it was clean and functional, so I don’t want to be overly picky where my northern monkey cousins are concerned.

We’d just had our breakfast at 08:30am and had nipped back upstairs to collect our few belongings, only Lurch got involved in a (work) telephone call, so I immediately took the opportunity to pull my snood down over my eyes and allow my bacon & eggs to settle, while he rattled on and on about some strange surveying jargon down the blower.

The funny thing was, just before we’d checked-in late in the afternoon the previous day, Lurch had rocked up onto the gravel forecourt of the far grander (on the outside at least) Central Hotel, which is situated at the very end of The Crescent, in which he told me he had previously stayed, spread his arms wide - as you do - and went “Du Durrr”, because it did look rather impressive. Only when we walked into their reception with our rucksacks and Lurch had given his surname to check-in, the rather puzzled lady in front of us told him, “I’m terribly sorry, sir, but I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

The silly sod had only gone and got his hotels mixed up and booked us into The Crescent by mistake, which was a shame. titter-titter.com Only now check out ‘When Two Carpets Collide’ on page 9, readers, which was frightening!

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On New Year’s Day, I took Mrs Edge to Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth, as I was that impressed with it when Lurch took me there after we’d been surveying in the area, towards the tail end of last year, that I figured it was a decent enough way to kick-off 2022.

I featured it in The Edge’s December’21 editions, if you recall.

It’s like a Freeport, but with taste.

And sure, I did want Mrs Edge to experience it, but I also wanted to save ‘up to 60%‘ (that’s their motto) on a new pair of Timberland boots, though sadly they didn’t have the pair I fancied in stock (which is the chance you take with these so called ‘designer emporiums’).

But anyway, it was still worth the trip, particularly as the HSB bitter in The Old Customs House was every bit as good as I’d remembered it.

We also benefitted from a decent enough deal of just £40 to stay overnight in the recently newly built Dockyard Premier Inn, which is but a mere stone’s throw from Gunwharf Quays.

However, Gunwharf Quays is NOT what this story is about.

I’m looking forward to Lurch seeing/reading this, because now that he’s a father of two nippers himself (one of each), I think he’ll appreciate just how much young Alfie Sadler-Frost in particular would love watching the battleships in Peasholm Park, Scarborough, every bit as much as I almost used to wet myself watching them during summer weeks on holiday in the East Yorkshire resort many moons ago (and tragically, we are talking over 50 of ’em).

The ‘battleships’, as I used to refer to them, come out onto the lake mid-afternoon three times a week to this very day - isn’t that quite something? - for a tremendous half-hour show and honestly, if there are any families with young boys reading this, I do sincerely urge you to treat them to ‘Naval Warfare’ in Peasholm Park if you’re ever, you know, ‘in the area’, as it were, as I have such fond memories of it.

Despite my car’s SatNav instructing us to drive anti-clockwise around the M25 to get to Portsmouth (er, I don’t think so), we used the Dartford Bridge/Tunnel both ways. Only when we got back, I thought I’d better just ‘check my DartCharge balance’ as it’s scary if you go into debit with them, isn’t it (as Katie Price knows only too well).

So I rang ’em.

Yes, yes, yes, I know that most of you would have probably called up your account online, but The Edge is ‘old school’. And anyhow, I’d always previously been able to ‘top up’ my account by speaking to a real, living person.

But the fella I spoke to said he couldn’t do it as the last 4 digets of the card I’d previously paid with didn’t match the last 4 digets of the card I now wanted to pay with.

Drat! So I was ‘forced’ to go online (yuk)!

Turns out I hadn’t used the Dartford Crossing at all during the previous 12 months and my balance was now down to £5.67.

That noted, I figured what’s the point of giving the bleeders anything more than a fiver to cover our return trip to Portsmouth, as the bloody bridge is now supposedly paid for, so since then they’ve simply been striping us all off.

So that’s what I did. I added a fiver to my account, with my debit card that apparently didn’t match my old credit card (why would it?).

Only once I’d done that, I thought it prudent to check to see if my account now read £10.67 instead of £5.67 as I probably wouldn’t be using the bridge/tunnel again in a while.

And guess what?

Damn right.

It still read £5.67.

Bastards.

And do you know it took me three, yes, THREE further telephone calls, adding up to fully 30 minutes in total, speaking to three different numpties at DartCharge to get the pesky matter sorted..

And that’s what I mean where the title of this piece is concerned, because no-one is remotely interested in talking to you anymore.

“Do it online! Do it online!”

But if you don’t want to, you’re screwed.

So it’s deffo fair to ask: “What’s happened to customer service?”

Answer: It’s gone for a bloody BURTON, and that’s a fact.

N.B. Presumably never to return.

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The smoke and the smell of the, I dunno, gunpowder? Whatever it was, it used to hang in the summer afternoon air and it was amazing.

Magical even, as this was way before Harry Potter, don’t forget.

I remember there used to be a chap in some sort of a glass dome in the middle of the lake who had a microphone and used to give a running commentary of the battle that was taking place all around him.

I thought he was Scarborough’s version of Liberace, but perhaps my memory was playing tricks with me.

Warships used to sink when hit and fighter ’planes used to also fly across (quite fast too) on wires. It really was quite brilliant. It’s just a question of Lurch being able to wangle us a summer visit to Scarborough in order to ‘do a bit of surveying’ and then catch one of the shows.

Performances are on Mondays, Thursdays & Saturdays Adults £4.50 Juniors £2.50 Family Tickets £12 (2 adults/2 children)

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wandered into a cookery shop, purchased a set of Japanese knives and asked my friend if she wanted to go for a walk in the park. Whilst I’m a huge supporter of women not living in fear, I’m also a big advocate of trusting your instincts, and some situations (rightly) tend to invoke a degree of apprehension. As it happened, ‘Knife Man’ turned out to be a pretty decent guy, although after a few casual dates when he introduced her to his mum and (intentionally) covered a bag of her belongings with his aftershave spray, alarm bells inevitably rang loud and clear.

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The next guy she actually met in a bar on a night out and after a few hours of drunken snogging and dance floor grinding, she was horrified to discover that he was only 21 and that he actually had a girlfriend (although I’m not entirely sure which of those two facts was more of a turn off). ‘The Child’ (hence named) has actively pursued her ever since, sadly (for him) to no avail because she is convinced his behaviour is demonstrative of either infantile petulance or seeking to cross ‘cougar’ off his bucket list.

Neither of which is a particularly attractive proposition.

It has long been said that one has to kiss a lot of ‘frogs’ (or swerve a lot of psychos) before you find a prince (or indeed a princess) and nothing appears to evidence this more animatedly than my friends’ tales (and often traumas) of internet dating. One could argue that the ability to instantly access and peruse a register of eligible people within a specified area allows you to cover a lot of ground quickly; as simple as a ‘swipe right’ on those you feel could be potential contenders. Sometimes an exchange of a few messages is all it takes for you to get a distinct feel for your (in)compatibility, or indeed even their ability to string a sentence together.

However, it must also be considered that any such form of mass exposure and selection is statistically bound to throw up a veritable cross-section of society, including a few obligatory psychos and/or at the very least a collection of morbidly fascinating characters.

There are, in fact, entire social media accounts dedicated to sharing and shaming the online dating profiles of people who would arguably fall into the above categories. Profiles that openly request discreet extra marital relations, shamelessly and crudely objectify women, or those from people who are still evidently consumed with bitterness and resentment from past breakups. Profiles that quite frankly scream at deafening volume: ABSOLUTELY NO GOOD CAN COME OF THIS.

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Based on the experiences my friends have shared with me, I would say that a sense of humour is an absolute prerequisite for surviving the modern-day online dating rollercoaster, as whilst they may not yet have found true love, what they have banked is some truly hilarious dating experiences that they can most certainly dine out on for at least the next decade.

A good friend of mine recounted her recent dating catalogue which included a man who turned up in a pink lycra vest and would not pay by card anywhere because he harboured a strong belief that he was being ‘tracked’ (by whom and why is anyone’s guess, but the former alone was enough to raise sufficient concern regarding his suitability as a potential partner). Next up was a friendly outgoing guy who seemed very promising for the first part of the date, until he Page 8

Undeterred, she persevered, and her next dating delight was a man determined to analyse the break-up of her marriage (never advisable under any circumstances, least of all on a first date), but I think the point of no return came when he shared his ‘rotisserie chicken’ analogy which centred around his belief that all men regularly pass a tasty looking chicken rotating in a shop window, but if they are ‘well fed’ at home, there’s no need to go inside to try it. Needless to say, he was promptly relegated to the bottom of the pile.

With the guy who followed, it felt very much like the universe may have been saving ‘the best’ (strangest) for last. She was somewhat bemused when his friend dropped him off on the first date and it soon became clear why when he admitted he had recently been convicted of drink driving, but to be honest I think the real nail in his proverbial coffin was when he added that he was saving his lines of coke for the weekend.

Despite the comedy gold material that these dating disasters generate, I honestly don’t think I would have the energy for it. A bold statement, I know, and perhaps if I hadn’t experienced the fulfillment of finding my soulmate in the form of the ‘Legendary Dave’, I might feel more inclined.

But I do also wonder whether part of it is growing older and having far less tolerance for drama. However, I am not without my own (numerous) faults and cannot help but muse on what dine-out material a date with me could potentially provide for someone. The other night, I asked Dave if I wasn’t around whether he thinks he would date again. At first he asked me if I was intending to run off with the postman, but followed it up with, “If you had died, I would leave it a little while.”

Since he had Covid, Dave has unfortunately not recovered his sense of smell, so I also wonder how he would fare out in the dating wilds, with no awareness of either his own bodily smell or others. He could potentially date someone several times and get quite serious, before introducing them to a friend, and finding out that they actually smell like cabbage. To be honest, I don’t think either of us are equipped to go back on the dating market, so I’m just hoping the universe lets us grow old and grey (and smelly) together.

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When I went to see the chaps playing walking footie (see advert, right) over at Melbourne Park at their very first session back after the Christmas break, I’m on about, on Tuesday morning 4th January.

I was absolutely bloody freezing stood on the sidelines, yet there they were, all 38 of ’em (all over the age of 50), some even with bare legs!

You can only take your hat off to them, can’t you?

Or possibly join them?

Daft thing is, it made me feel old and sad, all at the same time.

I had to give up playing football in my early thirties with a lower back problem after playing all my life. I’d been in teams from pretty much the age of eight, while in my late teens I was playing for a local amateur club in Lincolnshire who were coached by an ex-Burnley reserve team player two nights a week and he used to proper put us through our paces.

I retired while I was playing in a local Essex league - Sunday morning football - for a team called Warbouys, which was basically the old Chelmsford Squash Club team. They were good times, but I was having to visit a chiropractor after every game on hard pitches towards the end of the season, so clearly the writing was on the wall.

But watching the enthusiasm of the guys at Melbourne Park was a bit like watching one of my favourite movies, ‘Field of Dreams’.

So I urge some of you 50+ ex-footballers reading this to get in touch with them and go along for an initial free session, as you’ll probably love it.

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Edge of the World travel correspondent. Embarks on assignments in a futile effort to preserve his sense of youth, always acknowledging that he ‘Won’t pass this way again’.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Reading that absolutely killed me, Phil, as I could handle a week in the Maldives like nobody’s business right about now.

“You b@st@rd” is pretty much all I can say!

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Apparently is (still) does, which is a good thing, yes?

The guy footing the bill on a first date.

Unless it’s two guys, so then The Edge guesses it’s fine to split it.

Surely it’s not deemed as being old fashioned these days, is it?

Or is it?

Because The Edge honestly hasn’t a clue how the mind of anyone under the age of 45 works nowadays.

However, it’s refreshing to read that 85% of young men (“Oooooh, young mannnn”) still insist on picking up the tab on an initial romantic rendezvous with a fair lassie, so well done to all their dad’s for bringing ’em up proper, as many unfortunately haven’t been.

Thing is though, the study also found that the vast majority of their dates expected them to do so, which is a bit rude and presumptuous of the girls, don’t you think?

These findings come after 552 male and female college students aged in their late teens and early twenties were quizzed thoroughly.

The results, published in a journal called ‘Psychological Reports’, found a ‘strictly gender pattern’ with ‘very little shift from conventionality’.

‘On a typically traditional date, the guy is expected to ask a girl out, make the arrangements and pay for the expenses,’ the study found.

But what The Edge is wondering is, did the guy text or email the girl, or did he actually call her, or better still, ask her to her face, like blokes of your editor’s age always had to do?

Oh and get this: ‘Meanwhile, the girl is only expected to focus on her appearance and make convivial conversation.’

When did they say this study was carried out?

2022...or 1952?

Women have long been assumed to be far more emotional than men, which has perhaps caused them to act ‘harder’ and more ‘ballsy’ in certain situations, with a need to battle against perceptions about their so called mood swings and rollercoaster emotional state.

But apparently, yet another study has discovered that it’s all bollocks and that blokes enjoy a damn good cry at a movie every bit as much (and that’s definitely a hands up from your editor, as I honestly cannot watch ‘Love Actually’ without having a reet good bawl and getting snot all over my sleeves).

What’s more, the study suggests it’s got nothing to do with women’s hormones, P.M.T. or being on the pill.

However, ladies, The Edge needs to ask you this: Could you poke up with seeing your boyfriend, partner or husband in a state of complete and utter emotional disfunction towards the end of, say, ‘Brokeback Mountain’ (I actually blubbed at that too), or is it just not manly?

Because I’ll be honest and say that I actually enjoy a D.G.C. (damn good cry) whilst watching a flick, as I find it kind of cathartic and I tend to feel ‘spent’ afterwards. Plus it’s far better than holding it back and having what feels like a golf ball stuck in the back of your throat.

Mind you, Mrs Edge does refer to me as a big girl’s blouse.

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Crap title.

Should have been called something else.

‘Mucky T-shirt’ perhaps, as he wore it throughout.

Surely they nicked a lot of their ideas from Fargo tho’?

However, a decent conclusion for a TV drama, for a right riveting change, as they very often completely balls up the ending.

So yes, The Edge gives it the thumbs-up.

For those of you who haven’t seen it yet, The Tourist stars Jamie Dornan (above) as a car-crash victim in the Australian Outback who wakes up in hospital with amnesia and a note in his pocket.

An attractive lass called Luci soon befriends him, not to mention Helen, a local traffic cop, whose beauty is all on the inside.

Together the three become embroiled in twist after twist until it is eventually revealed that Dornan’s character’s name is Elliot Stanley and, truth be told, he’s been a bit of a **** in his time.

Which is probably why so many people are after him.

Watch out for the fat guy wearing a black cowboy hat.

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LOOK...I apologise for ‘going on’ about Scarborough, OK? But I’m writing this at the very beginning of January and, if truth be told, it’s actually perking me up - and gawd knows I need ‘perking up’ at this godforsaken miserable time of the year.

Just look at the beautiful blue sky and the frivolous maiden in her straw boater, full of the joys of spring, bless her.

Doesn’t the image remind you of much better, sweeter, happier times?

When me and Lurch arrived in Scarborough it was grey, grey, grey, and, oh yeah, grey. But nonetheless, we walked right down onto the beach, pretty much where this girl is probably headed, and then over the compacted sand until we got to the harbour at the other end. Of course, the setting was nothing remotely like this photograph, but SOD IT, I am so enjoying reminiscing with my rose tinted glasses on, so please, readers, indulge me.

Because here’s the thing, and it’s a weird one. I’ve been on a few surveying trips with Lurch this past couple of years, including the likes of Margate, Isle of Wight, Blackpool, Portsmouth, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Glasgee, and even the South of France on a couple of occasions. But honestly, genuinely, there really was ‘something’ about Scarborough for me, and I’m sure that’s because of the history I have of going there for my summer holidays with me Whizzer & Chips Summer Special comic (the Summer Specials were always bigger and glossy) tucked under my arm way back when I was a wee nipper.

My Grandma & Grandad (not forgetting my Auntie Phyllis, who was more mobile, so would take me here, there and everywhere) even had to lug their reet heavy suitcases up the hill where they lived and then along ‘Shat’ village (that’s what the locals call Skelmanthorpe) a fair old way to the coach pick-up point at some ungodly hour like 07:00am.

But even that was magical to me, as I never usually had to get up at 6.00am in the morning, so I was always brimming full of pre-holiday anticipation.

Lurch and I were talking/pondering, while we were in Yorkshire, that the only way our flagging English resorts can prosper and sufficiently redevelop in the future, to make them worthy attractions once again, is if Covid really does put the mockers on us all flying off abroad and money is invested in Blighty’s coastal towns so that people genuinely want to visit them.

Appreciate that’s a BIG ASK, but could their charm and magic not be rekindled if such places were restored to their former glory?

It’s certainly a wonderful thought.

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Another thing that impressed me to a great extent, it has to be said, about Scarborough’s town centre was the vision of their council to install a whole load of giant plant pots and fill them with trees and flowers (granted, this photograph above was clearly taken before they’d had an injection of flora) the entire length of their High Street, which I must say proved to have a dramatic effect, particularly as there was one positioned every 15m/20m.

Quite simply, the reason for this, their council says, and The Edge quotes: “Was to create a more attractive and enjoyable space to encourage people back into the town centre after Covid.”

Their ‘greening scheme’ was an initiative which was paid for by the government’s Town Deal Track Fast funding scheme....so by chance could Chelmsford get it’s hands on a portion of said lolly, as such ‘classy’ looking plant pots would very dramatically change our local environment oh so much for the better.

I’ll be honest with you; The Edge hates Chelmsford town centre.

The flagstones we walk upon are truly cheap, grotty and sooooo Basildonesque, something that ought to have been stringently avoided. Instead, The Edge would like to truly enjoy sauntering through the centre of our city. So bring on the GIANT PLANT POTS, is what we say, so that us locals might forget about the Mickey Mouse tiles we’re forced to traipse across underfoot.

Oh, and while we’re at it, let’s also consider livening up some of our ‘uglier sites’, such as, dare The Edge suggest it, the Army & Navy roundabout, by perhaps adding a dash of colour to liven them up, like Selby have done (see left) with their giant plant pots.

Can you just imagine a few of those dotted about the A&N? P.S. Oh, The Edge almost forgot.

We’re supposed to be getting an entirely NEW road system, aren’t we? Either a T-junction (to replace the dratted A&N) or a ‘Hamburger.

But even so, I’m sure they’d both benefit from an injection of BRILLIANT ORANGE!

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how he came up with the idea for the programme in the first place, he’s definitely got me thinking about it.

Gervais explained that he was trying to come up with a character that, due to some kind of event or circumstance, felt they had nothing to live for and would question the meaning of life and go around saying and doing whatever they wanted, not giving two hoots about the consequences.

POLIT INCO ICALLY RREC T

He said it took him a while to figure out what would make someone be like that, only then it hit him. Losing his soulmate/partner would be the worst thing that could ever happen to him.

Have you watched it yet?

I think I might just be one of the few that still hasn't. Actually, that's a lie, as I did see the very first episode of season one.

By the way, when and why did we start calling TV shows seasons, like the Americans do, rather than series?

So where was I? Ah yes. I watched one single episode and for some reason I never bothered to carry on with it.

I know I found it sad and thought provoking, although still very funny at times...mainly when Ricky Gervais's character (Tony Johnson) calls a cheeky young lad a "f* cking little ginger c ** t" in response to him calling Tony a pedophile.

(Good to see a comedian/actor who’s not afraid of being non-PC for his art.)

Looking back, I think I simply wasn't in the right mindset to sit through it all when it first aired, so I put it on our ‘Watch List’ to revisit at a later date instead.

And, well, time flies and there's now a third season - ahem, sorry, a third series out now, which Ricky Gervais normally never does, yet I still haven't managed to get back to season/series 1.

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However, after recently watching an interview with RG on the BBC’s ‘One Show’ where he explained

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The bit in the interview that really struck me was when he said he would want to be selfish and pass away before his wife, as he wouldn't be able to get through a day without her, as he’d be far too devastated.

But is that really a selfish thought?

I don't think it is. I believe it's only human and natural to feel that way.

Talking about feelings, from what I've seen review wise about the latest series, it seems to have put the focus of our mental health and wellbeing right out there all over again, especially the importance of being able to talk about how we’re feeling, whether it be sad, lonely, confused or anxious. Hell, even angry.

I really like the fact that Ricky has linked up with the charity MIND and together they will randomly install benches up and down the country, similar to the ones used in the show, to encourage random people to start up a conversation with each other that might ultimately save a person’s life, simply because a stranger is being friendly and making someone feel not so alone. And as we know, hope can lead to happiness.

Keep smiling. Be happy.

Until next time.

The Polak. x

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S N V

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CHINESE CUISINE

All You Can Eat! FEBRUARY 2022 served personally to your table!

Sunday £21.00*

Monday - Thursday Adults £20.00* Original ‘Public Enemy Number One’ Al Capone (pictured above) was at the heart of it. He was in a gang war against a geezer called Bugs Moran and had 4 of his henchmen dress up as police officers to enter Moran’s headquarters on North Clark Street, Chicago, where they lined seven of Bugs’ lieutenants up against a wall and shot the whole damn lot of ’em.

Jeez, that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think, readers?

Only that’s where The St.Valentine’s Day Massacre comes from.

George ‘Bugs’ Moran was a career criminal who ran the North Side gang during the bootlegging era of the 1920s, a bit like how Spin used to ‘lord it’ at The Lion Inn. He fought bitterly with ‘Scarface’ Al Capone for control of smuggling and trafficking operations in the Windy City, instead of simply sitting down for a brew with Al, like a couple of genial chaps, and splitting the city up ‘half and half’.

Throughout the 1920’s, both men survived several attempts upon their lives and on one notorious occasion, Moran and his associates drove 6 cars past a hotel in Cicero, Illinois, where Capone and his pals were having lunch, and showered the building with more than a thousand bullets (bloody hell, readers, I don’t think our Spin would have welcomed their trade after a shit-show like that).

When Capone then discovered there was subsequently a $50,000 bounty on his head, it was the final straw for the gangster and he proper threw his toys out the pram. He ordered his men to totally annihilate the Bugs Moran’s crew. So, on 14th February 1929, a delivery of bootleg whiskey was expected at the Moran headquarters.

But Bugs was running a little late that day and happened to see the police entering his establishment, so he decided to hang around outside for a bit to see how things played out, imagining that his gunmen were probably being arrested in a raid. However, as explained earlier, it was a ruse, as Capone’s disguised men were busy shooting seven of Moran’s best soldiers, and the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre went down into folklore.

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It proved to be the final confrontation between Capone and Moran, as the former was jailed in 1931, while the latter lost so many important men in the shooting that he could no longer control his territory.

On the seventh anniversary of the massacre, one of Capone’s former hitmen from that fateful February day was killed in a crowded bowling alley by a burst of machine-gun fire. To this day his killer remains unidentified, but the likely culprit was thought to be Moran himself, who had since been relegated to small-time robberies until he was eventually sent to jail in 1946. Eleven years later he finally croaked in Leavenworth Federal Prison of lung cancer in 1957. www.theedgemag.co.uk

136 MOULSHAM STREET, CHELMSFORD. TEL: 01245 290099 Page 15

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That’s not The Edge being harsh, is it?

Because they do, don’t they? They look like a right pair of idiots.

And what’s with Freddie’s hair sometimes?

I mean, why PROMOTE the fact that you’re NORTHERN? Are they doing it for a laugh, or what? Is it some ‘in’ joke?

The Edge likes Flintoff, but thinks he’s a ‘M2F’ (Manc too far), as these days Top Gear is both ‘cock’ and ‘north west heavy’. To be fair, the pair of ’em, both Flintoff and McGuinness, need culling.

Chris Harris is excellent, alongside two naughty grown up schoolchildren, but there’s only so many shows you can host, Paddy.

The Edge has said it before and it’ll say it again: get Julia Bradbury on the show. She loves cars, she’s a great presenter with a lovely screen presence, and she’s admitted Top Gear would be her dream job.

And simply get someone else to work alongside her and Harris, only best make it a bloke, as it’s a show about cars after all.

What? What’ve I said?

Oh come on, ladies. You know you can’t drive for toffee!!!

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The first thing Mrs Edge replied after I’d WhatsApp’d her a photo of our room in Scarborough wasn‘t how ‘cock awful’ it looked, but: “Your beds are a bit close, aren’t they?”

Isn’t it odd, in so far as if the roles had been reversed and she’d gone away for a night with her girlie friends, I doubt I’d have commented about the closeness of the beds.

What on earth goes through women’s minds?

Did she think I was in danger of Lurch ‘bumming’ me at 03:00am in the morning, or summut?

No chance. We both value our sleep far too much for that sort of malarkey.

It’s just pure sexist on Mrs Edge’s part.

We were there to do a job of work, woman.

Keep your sordid comments to thyself!

I have to say, this sign made me titter when I saw it, because it’s a typically ‘Northern Ting’, innit?

I mean, can you imagine there being much call for the likes of this sort of entertainment in Chelmsford?

And Tony Skingle’s probably a shit Elvis impersonator at the best of times.

But it’s ‘the north’ all over, or ‘the north as we see it’ from our pedestals down south.

But I loved our trip to Scarborough.

Absolutely loved it.

Memories mixed with the reality that I didn’t really know the place at all.

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Now this is what I call a proper pint of ale.

Looks like Guinness.

But isn’t.

Tastes far better (I like Guinness, and honestly, it does).

Best of all, it was served to perfection in the pub (Scholar’s Bar) just around the corner from our hotel in Scarborough.

‘Silent Mike’ (remember him?) first introduced me to Old Peculier many moons ago in the Queen’s Head on Lower Anchor Street (now those truly were great days, every single Friday night without fail).

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DEAKS

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CORONAVIRUS POSTPONEMENTS The Premier League is currently quickly becoming a farce with clubs able to ask the Premier League to postpone games if Coronavirus affects their squads.

Last month, Arsenal asked to postpone their North London derby against Spurs as they had but one player missing with the virus.

Of course the idea of the Premier League being able to rearrange fixtures at the request of clubs is a sensible move because we could have seen entire teams depleted given the transmissibility of the virus and the proximity at which the players work with one another.

LET’S PLAY DARTS At the time of writing I have just watched the thrilling conclusion of yet another brilliant PDC World Darts Championship. If someone had told me when I was younger that I would sit and watch a darts match and enjoy it, I would have told them they were stark raving

mad. Yet here I am, having just sat through an entire tournament.

The whole thing is just done so well. It’s really cheesy showbiz stuff, mixed in with a boozy crowd and the games themselves are pretty thrilling. Irrespective of where you are in the standings, there is always the chance of an upset pretty much all of the time.

Whilst the players are no longer able to drink beer at the oche, they are still some distance short of looking like prime athletes.

Billy Hinken watch’ as it is incredibly addictive and I guarantee you will finish any tournament being fully enthralled and cheering someone to victory.

TIKTOK However, the amount of skill and mental resilience required really must be quite something. Most of the top players these days average well over 100 with 3 darts and that means they are hitting a treble at almost every visit to the oche.

While I appreciate this is something they probably do for 8 hours each and every day during practice, the mental arithmetic required alone is really quite special too. They can actually do the maths and readjust to the numbers quicker than the television cameras can follow them.

If you haven’t watched any darts yet, then I strongly recommend that you quickly add it to your ‘stuff to

If you ask me what the craziest thing to come out of this pandemic has been, then it would have to be the fact that, as a fully grown man, I have a slight addiction to TikTok. The platform that started out as social media for kids to share dance routines has been hijacked by parents and I swear in two years I have learnt more from that app than I ever did at school. Everything’s about 1 minute in length and with every swipe of the page there is a totally different topic, from cookery to woodwork, to science and music.

Its highly addictive and a great way to waste 30 minutes of your day.

Just watch out for pins and needles if you are a ‘toilet scroller’.

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However, Arsenal and other clubs, including Spurs and Liverpool, have used the rules to their advantage.

The Arsenal v Spurs fixture was called off because Arsenal “have players missing through injury, suspension and international duty”.

Whereas the reality of the matter is that they had but one player out with Covid, yet in that same week they let 2 players go out on loan, which makes me question the integrity of the entire season.

A few weeks back Newcastle suffered injuries to their two best players and, as a result, they used the Covid situation to get fixtures postponed. Not only did that offer them time for their players to return, but in Newcastle’s case they have been able to go out in the transfer window and sign lots of new players.

I just cannot see how that is fair on the teams around them. I think that it is more than a coincidence that Tottenham appoint a new manager and then use the new rules to get games postponed in order to give the manager time to work with his new squad. Liverpool recently got a game postponed, but then somehow still managed to play just a few days later against Shrewsbury, presumably because they thought even their reserves could beat Shrewsbury.

It’s an absolute joke and has resulted in teams not postponing games because of Covid reasons, but because teams haven’t been able to field their strongest side. Arsenal were by far the worst and it shows you just how far they have fallen when they ‘bottle’ a game against their biggest rivals.

www.theedgemag.co.uk

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ONLY JOKING! FLOB-A-LOB

Bill and Ben were having a bath.

"Flob-a-lob,” says Bill.

"Did you just fart?” replies Ben.

BRAZIL NUTS My girlfriend is pretty sure that Brazil Nuts is a certain style of manscaping for the far more discerning gentleman.

6 MONTH SOBRIETY I’ll be celebrating 6 months of being sober in about, oooh, another 178 days.

KID’S GRANDAD My kids call their Grandpa Spiderman. Not because he’s got any super powers or anything like that. But he does struggle to get out of the bath.

RESISTANCE TRAINING True resistance training is putting your foot down damn hard by refusing to go to the gym.

LOOSE FITTING What’s with people who wear loosely fitted watches around their wrists?

Noisy w@nkers.

KITKAT A father gets up really, really early.

Creeps out of house.

Lets car roll down hill before starting it up.

Drives 100 miles to the Cheddar Gorge.

Locates remotest cave.

Makes himself comfortable on a camping chair.

Gets out a KitKat. His kids immediately poke their heads around the corner of the cave and ask, "Can we have some, Daddy?”

TOTALLY FREE I have this absolutely gorgeous neighbour living in the flat next door. She’s mid-twenties. Talk about two puppies in a bag. Oh and legs that appear to go on forever. Attractive face, beautiful dress sense.

Anyway, I was at home the other evening when my doorbell rang and it was her.

"Oh,” I said, immediately tongue-tied. “Well hi.

Can I help you?”

I was doing my best to sound casual, but my

heart was literally hammering in my chest as she was dressed to kill. A total bloody vision.

She said, "Oh, I’ve had such a tough day at work and now I have a strong urge to go out and have a really good time. Maybe dance a little, get a bit tipsy, perhaps a little love making.

So, are you doing anything tonight?”

Maybe a little too quickly I stammered, "N-n-nno, I’m not. I’m totally free.”

"Great!” she said. "I’m expecting a delivery at 8.00pm. Will you sign for it?”

START RUNNING My doc advised me to start running.

It’s not that I’m out of shape or anything. It’s just that he’s very recently found out that I’ve been shagging his wife.

TAKE THREE MUMS A brunette, a redhead and a blonde were talking over coffee one day.

The brunette broke the ice with, "Oh my gosh. I opened up my Charlie’s purse the other day and I found a twist of weed in it. I just cannot believe my 14-year-old smokes weed. I mean, I can’t even broach the subject cos she’ll just scream and shout about what was I doing in her purse in the first place.”

The other two comfort her as best they can.

Then the redhead says, "I found a fake I.D. card in my Jackie’s purse. She’s 14 too and obviously underage drinking in pubs. I can’t believe it."

The other two lament and comfort her accordingly. Then the blonde pipes up, "I feel your anguish, girls, I really, really do. Because the other day, I found a condom in my Sarah’s purse. Jesus Christ, I just cannot get my head around the fact that my daughter’s got a penis.”

HUGE SEX DRIVE I don’t want to brag, but I have a huge sex drive. Yeah, it’s like 5TB and almost full now.

THE OTHER NIGHT My missus got so mad at me the other night that she packed my bags whilst I was down the pub.

I eventually staggered back home and she started ranting and raving at me, telling me to get the f@ck out of her life.

As I walked down the path to the gate, dragging a suitcase behind me, she shrilled, "And I hope you die a long, slow, painful death."

So I turned and said, "You want me to stay then, do you?"

NEW ZEALAND The only country where you can get a delicious hotpot, a jumper and a fantastic shag, all from the same animal.

COLD & WET “Oh, no!” Tom gasped, as he eased his way through the disastrous scene before him. Never in his 40 years had he encountered anything quite like it. How could anyone survive in a place such as this?

He could only hope that somewhere amidst the overwhelming destruction he would find his 14-year-old son.

Only the slim hope of finding Alex kept him from turning and fleeing the scene. He took a deep breath and carefully proceeded.

Walking was virtually impossible with so much waste matter strewn across his path. So he moved cautiously ahead at a snail’s pace.

“Alex? Alex?” he whispered.

He tripped and almost fell several times.

He heard someone, or something, move. At least he thought he had. Though perhaps he was just hoping he had.

He shook his head and felt his gut tighten. He couldn’t understand how this could be happening.

There was meagre light, but not enough to see anything clearly.

Something cold and wet brushed against the back of his hand. He jerked it away fast.

In desperation, he took another step forward into the darkness and cried out, “ALEX?” From a nearby pile of unidentified material, he heard his son stir.

“Yes, Dad,” Alex replied, in a voice so weak it could hardly be heard.

“It’s time to get up and get ready for school,” his father sighed sullenly.

RESPECT The wife huffed, "I’m not talking to you.”

I grunted.

She said, "Don’t you want to know the reason why then?”

"No, babes,” I said. “I respect your decision.”

ALCOHOL If you think alcohol might be bad for your short term memory, just imagine the damage that alcohol could do?

SAVE THAT When I was younger, so much younger than today, me mam caught me pleasuring myself into a sock. Her only comment (apart from I should be grateful I didn’t do the laundry) was, "You should save that for when you get married.” Fast forward 10 years and I have to say, my new wife wasn’t overly impressed when I presented her with six full milk bottles worth.

THE WOLF OF WALL STREET Apparently, in the film ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’, they say the F-word 506 times.

However, that record was broken this afternoon by my husband as he tried to assemble an IKEA footstool.

MARRIAGE “Until I got married, I had no idea it was possible to buy decorative pillows in matching sets”, said the average bloke.

SOAP-ON-A-ROPE A boy asked his mum why there was a soap-ona-rope in the bathroom.

She said, "Oh it’s probably gone and hung itself after seeing your father naked.”

EVERY WOMAN Apparently every woman is ‘bi’. However, just tread carefully until you find out whether that’s ‘sexual’ or ‘polar’.

G-SPOT “I finally found where my G-spot is,” said Brian.

“Well, saying that, it was actually the Customs Officer at the ‘BIC’ (Border Inspection Crossing)“.

All jokes published are supplied by Edge readers. Please send your ‘egg yokes’ to shaun@theedgemag.co.uk

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Unleash the Power of Print

The real definition of a war involves a declared state of conflict between two or more parties, whether they be countries, political groups, or other hostile organisations, and you can include THE COVID VIRUS as an active participant.

A war usually involves the mobilisation of those parts of society which may include the armed forces, together with the medical services and various segments of industry (which also includes Big Pharma).

The enemy in any conflict must be recognised, identified, and defined as an active participant - not some nebulous political or terrorist group.

During the active phase of the war there are usually restrictions on personal liberties, such as freedom of travel, the ability to congregate in large numbers, and the legal need to follow Government Guidelines.

Does this all sound familiar?

During the last 2 years of the pandemic, the United Kingdom has already lost half the number of unarmed civilians that we lost in the full 6 years of WW2 (1939-1945) and who knows where that figure will eventually end. Of course we’re at war, but this time the enemy is the Virus, and our armaments are the Vaccine, and the Antiviral Therapies.

We wear a uniform of sorts, which includes the Mask and a variety of PPE outfits. We are regularly controlled about where we can go, how we can travel, and in some cases what we can do. Additionally, in our recent past (since 2000) we’ve had curfews imposed, plus impositions on the numbers of relatives/colleagues we can meet up with (go on, check this out at researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk).

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Even as we venture into 2022 the Medical Director of NHS England has stated that the NHS is now on a “War Footing” which by definition is “the condition of being prepared to undertake or maintain war”.

As the NHS and its staff are our principal combatants, whether they be in the Hospitals/Care Homes/GP Surgeries, Vaccinators etc. in this conflict we most certainly are at war.

A further similarity to previous conflicts is that our normal supply chains are disrupted; not that long ago we experienced petrol supply disruption, various food supplies have disappeared from supermarket shelves, and we hear on a daily basis that there are staffing shortages affecting transport, healthcare and numerous service industries. Unlike WW2 we cannot mobilise an army of women to replace the men who have gone to war, as it is now 2022 and women

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have long held important roles within our society and they, like men, are affected by the virus. So in many ways this war has had a more profound effect on our society than numerous previous conflicts.

And it’s not over by a long chalk. In previous wars and conflicts, unused and abandoned weapons, whether they be planes, tanks artillery pieces or rifles etc. were simply sold off to other emerging nations for their use, or simply left behind - remember all those US and UK armaments abandoned in Afghanistan. Today’s weapons - the Lateral Flow Tests, masks and hand gel containers - are simply being discarded in the bin, or out on the street. We’re told they are all biodegradable, REALLY? Take the Lateral Flow Test (LFT) - one test is roughly 10 grams of plastic (about 1/3 of an ounce). Not much, you say.

It is, however, estimated that in 2021 in the UK, somewhere between 7-9 million LFTs were used per month, which is roughly 100 million per year or 1 million kilograms, which equates to almost 1000 tons of PLASTIC WASTE. Or, to give you a better idea, this is the equivalent of 123,000,000 - yes, MILLION plastic water bottles (according to sciencedaily.com) which is a lot of plastic waste, don’t you think?

And we’ve not even considered the issue of disposable masks, as in 2021 it was estimated that 55 million were DISCARDED EACH DAY in the UK, all of which contain microparticles of plastic.

The amount of plastic discarded as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic have become unimaginably huge when you add up all of the medical waste being abandoned throughout the world on a daily basis, and its mainly plastic, little of which is biodegradable, and there is absolutely nowhere to either sell it or store it, so it simply accumulates in landfills, the sea, or by the roadside.

Welcome indeed to the Post Covid World.

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G

reetings once again from the Californian coast.

put the interest of the country ahead of their own ego. Yet do you think either is inspirational?

How are you feeling back there? A bit down?

Had enough of viruses? The whole world appears to be sinking into a climate abyss?

The nation’s population is way too divided?

The future is looking bleak? Spurs are still not good enough?

No, me neither.

Inspirational heroes don’t come along very often. And it doesn’t matter which side of the political divide you inhabit, you have to recognize that certain people, whether you agree with their politics or not, just have that certain ‘it’ that connects with the brighter side of people’s character.

Yup. Here too.

OK, you probably don’t care about the last one, but it would be surprising if you weren’t feeling the weight of most of the others on that list. Surprising, that is, unless you are one of those happy (or should that be selfish?) souls that can wade through the puddles of life thinking only of yourself, oblivious to, and caring little for, the wider world around you.

Anyway, while contemplating all of this doom and gloom recently, an epiphany occurred. A true Road to Damascus moment. Or, to put it in simpler terms, a light bulb suddenly burst into luminescent glory.

But before we get to the big reveal of what that moment was, we’re going to have to travel back in time to the land of big hair, big shoulder pads, big braces and greed is good. Yup. The 80s.

Something else was also big back then. As well as the simplistic yet catchy synth music of the Pet Shop Boys, Duran Duran and the like, there were far too many power ballads with monstrous and overly dramatic arrangements.

or brown. None of the actual details matter.

Just that said hero is inspirational. Someone that can stand head and shoulders above us and provide a reason for hope that the future will not be filled with Trump’s proud ignorance, lawlessness, violence and general assholery, or Johnson’s ineptitude, lying and corruption.

Actually, right now, most of us would probably settle for something a lot less than glorious.

Just some respite from the ugliness that seems to have been creeping up on us for the past five years would do as a start.

We need a hero. We’re holding out for a hero.

Now, Bonnie’s emotional vocal performance entailed her crying out for a larger than life man who would come charging in on his big white horse and drag her off to be, er, treated well.

And let’s be clear, despite the very obvious needs of Bonnie, the hero we’re in need of right now can be male or female, black, white

shaun@theedgemag.co.uk

Yes, that’s what we need - a hero to rescue us from the gloom-pit and give us some optimism. Any one of those named above could do it, but for various reasons, not least of which is that most of them are dead, they’re not coming to the rescue.

So you take a look around, desperately searching for that larger than life hero we’re still holding out for, and what do you see? Not much, sadly. In fact, it’s worse than not much there’s no single person on either side of the Atlantic that even looks as if they might be able to sit astride a white stallion, much less ride one into a glorious future.

One in particular came to mind whose title very aptly coincided with the thoughts of that moment. Cue Bonnie Tyler with aforesaid big hair, big shoulder pads and even bigger arrangement.

But we’re going to appropriate that song for an entirely different reason. Many of us would like for humanity to be a bit less ugly right now and there’s a vacancy for the hero role on our team. Someone we can look up to as a righteous and true leader for large swathes of the population. Someone with a sword and a shield shouting, “Follow me into the future”.

There was Churchill during WW2 who, whether drunk or sober, undoubtedly had what was required. JFK did too, as did Martin Luther King Jr. Ronald Reagan was similarly inspirational in the way he portrayed a sunlit American future for its citizens. In more recent times, Tony Blair had it for a while, before he ruined his reputation with Iraq.

Barrack Obama won the presidency in a landslide with his message of hope, but he was never quite able to live up to it.

With the world aflame both literally and metaphorically, the need for such a hero is arguably as great as at any time since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. But where is (s)he coming from? Well, you’ll get no answers here, because as already noted, from a Californian vantage point at least, there’s nothing to see.

Meanwhile, the hopes for a brighter and less divided future for the world, at least in the UK and US, are currently residing in the hands of Joe Biden and Kier Starmer. Both are transparently decent men. Each appears to be competent. Unlike Trump and Johnson, neither seeks to stir up hatred and anger via stupid culture wars. And they both seem to

And on that somewhat depressing note…

Anon Chelmsford.

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ANDREW ELEY

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Narrowly missing last months editions, Spider-man has dominated the box office this winter, so it’s time for my slightly belated opinion on what’s been a behemoth, along with a host of other releases that, at the time of writing, you can still catch at your local cinema (or no doubt soon on streaming).

Spider-man: No Way Home Imagine a James Bond film in which some of the series most iconic villains somehow all come together, such as Jaws, Odd-Job, Goldfinger etc. and the only way to defeat them is for the previous Bonds; Connery, Dalton, Moore, Craig etc. all getting together.

Well, that’s the basic premise of the latest Spider-man film that pulls both heroes and villains from 20 years worth of movies to deliver a high-concept, but equally totally daft superhero romp. The movie has literally smashed box office records with its combination of fan nostalgia and sheer audaciousness, bringing audiences in by the truckload. But is the film actually any good? Well, it has some decent action scenes and great performances from its high calibre actors, such as William Defoe, back as the Green Goblin, and Alfred Molina as Doctor Octopus.

But the story is abandoned for spectacle, fan service and general absurdity.

The Kingsman Kingsmen: The Secret Service (2014) was an entertaining action spoof of the Bond franchise and other spy films that spawned a truly awful sequel featuring an embarrassing performance by Sir Elton John that looked to have killed the franchise off early.

But realising their mistake, The Kingsman pivots hard away from pop star silliness by giving us a much grittier prequel, set during the events of World War 1 and how the Kingsmen agency came to be.

If you can get over that this is a revisionist telling of the events of the Great War (and some critics couldn’t), then you can enjoy a exciting, visceral, weird and often surprisingly emotional action film that I found myself completely pulled into.

A huge improvement on the previous sequel then, although fans of the original may find it’s switch to a more serious tone hard to swallow (even if it does feature some silly Page 26

CGI mountain goats that completely steal the movie!).

The Matrix: Resurrections Oh boy, this is a real stinker of a movie, it pains me to say.

The Matrix (1999) is a classic, a true sci-fi masterpiece that influenced cinema for a decade and remains firmly in my top 10 films of all time. It had two sequels, but it was always clear the movie was a stand-alone event, while continuing to add further installments just reeks of a cheap cash-grab.

Which, in fact, not only is this film exactly that, but it even alludes to the fact that it knows it is by selfreferencing the previous films, as characters discuss that Warner Bros wanted a fourth one made to make some money. This film either thinks it’s very clever, or it is just a middle finger to Warner Bros by the director who said they felt forced into making it. Whatever the intention, it’s a dull, confusing and a total pointless mess of a movie that soils the status of the original which should have been left alone.

You can’t really make out the Army & Navy roundabout when you look at Planet Earth as a whole, can you? So people who live beyond, say, 30 miles outside of Chelmsford probably don’t know what a bugbear it is to all those of us who have to contend with the damn thing 24/7. But it’s there alright. You can see the Army & Navy roundabout when you look at Planet Earth from outer space, so they say. But The Edge clearly wouldn’t know that to be fact as it’s never been in outer space to take a look for itself, so we end up trusting the likes of peeps we’ve never even met before, don’t we? Such as Captain Kirk, David Attenborough and Buzz Lightyear.

Scream This is one of those new ‘Legacy Sequels’ or ‘Re-quals’; a combination of being both a reboot of a long running franchise and a direct sequel. Although it is entitled simply Scream, there is no doubt that it is Scream 5 in all but name.

Wes Craven (A Nightmare on Elm Street) delivered a truly original slasher flick back in 1996 with the original, which pulled off the difficult task of being scary, funny and smart all at the same time. It’s huge success inevitably meant we got increasingly worse sequels and this latest attempt to resurrect the franchise 25 year later fails to add anything fresh or original.

Ultimately, for a horror film, it commits the biggest sin by not being scary. In fact, the scariest thing is Courtney Cox’s plastic face, ruined after years of cosmetic surgery.

Titane This is one of those films that if someone asks you what it’s about, you say it’s about 2 hours. From the warped mind of Julia Ducournau (Raw) comes this French art-house horror in which a woman who was involved in a horrific car crash as a child now works at motor fetish shows, grinding seductively over car bonnets in front of obsessive fans. She then f cks a car, becomes pregnant * (lactating car oil from her nipples), goes on a killing spree, pretends to be a missing boy from years ago (binding her body up to try and disguise her ever increasing bump) and finally dies whilst giving birth to a half-machine, half-human baby.

Being a bit of a cinephille, I really wanted to like this one, off the back of it's positive buzz during the film festival circuit, but it was a bit too weird and bit too slow in the middle to really engage me into it’s totally bizarre premise

But what is, apparently, a fact is that Planet Earth’s rotation is gradually slowing down. Hmmmm, how about that? To put that into some sort of perspective, if something similar happened to your washing machine, you’d contact a plumber pretty damn quickly, wouldn’t you, and bugger the extortionate call-out-charge.

Fear not though, fair readers, for Planet Earth is also decelerating almost imperceptibly at approximately 17 milliseconds per hundred years, so it’s not as if it’s likely to affect the likes of you or me. However, at some point, perhaps in another 140 million years (not that Planet Earth will exist by then), there could well be 25 hours in a single day.

We are called the Blue Planet because when astronauts first went up into space and looked back at Planet Earth with human eyes for the very first time, due to 70% of our planet being covered by water (think that exceedingly wet Kevin Costner movie), they said it “looked blue”. Yet only 3% of our water is fresh. #absolutetotalbummerthat.

Do you know why we have a Leap Year every 4 years? It’s because a year on Earth is actually ‘a little bit longer’ (The Edge won’t bore you with the fractions) than 365 days and those extra little bits all add up. Although why the extra day always gets tagged onto February The Edge isn’t sure, as it’s always quite fancied a date such as 32nd January.

Oh, and get this: the Earth isn’t actually round. Yes, we accept that the David Icke’s of this world say that the Royal Family are all reptiles and that the world is as flat as a pancake. But in fact it’s geold. Which means that its rounded shape has a bit of a bulge (think Dirk Diggler in Boogie Nights) towards the equator region, which is all due to the rotation process and the pectoral thrust.

Planet Earth tilts at roughly 66 degrees. But anyhow, back to the water thing. Of that 3% water on earth that is fresh, 2% of it is frozen, in the form of ice sheets and glaciers. Which means that should we, you know, ever get into a bit of a Bear Grylls survival type of a situation, only 1% of the water available to us is drinkable, from sources such as lakes, rivers and that which is underground. (Not very handy, that latter one, is it?)

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I

f you haven’t watched ‘Don’t Look Up’ on Netflix yet, you really ought to. In fact, I’d also recommend you watch the other superb film by Adam McKay ‘The Big Short’ as well. I can’t think of another 2 films that so perfectly bookend the last decade and a half, and so aptly demonstrate the utterly embarrassing state of our society.

‘Don’t Look Up’ is an excellent allegory of the climate crisis, or more specifically, our pathetic and ultimately deadly inattention and lack of action towards trying to solve the biggest crisis we’ll ever face. So in this article I want to try and spell out just how utterly screwed we are and why it’s completely our own fault. You’re welcome.

KiNGPiN The Kingmeister reports

It’s All About The Arctic Forget about the floods in British Columbia, or vast swathes of America, Europe and Australia being on fire. As impressively dreadful as they are, they’re just a sideshow. The Arctic is ground zero for climate change and home to some nasty negative feedback loops that, when they kick in, are going to accelerate the whole damn thing.

“WE’RE ALL GONNA F@CKING DIE!”

Let’s start with the IPCC reports and the COP26 meeting. The intergovernmental panel on climate change (IPCC) are the reports used to provide policy makers regular assessments on climate change. The climate scientists can only put in 100% verifiable facts, so while the evidence might clearly point towards something catastrophic, they’re not allowed to say that. Therefore, these reports are conservative, while the reality is almost certainly much worse. That’s their words, not mine.

This was demonstrated by Rupert Read, an academic and climate activist who has spent months talking to the scientists who write these reports, when he said in a recent interview: “Look at what’s happened in North America this year with the heat dome. I’m going to be blunt now - this has scared scientists shitless. None of this was supposed to happen for another 4060 years, but it happened.”

The people whose life’s work is to study the climate are now “scared shitless” by what they’re seeing, yet we’re still sitting on our fat arses doing very little. So, the climate scientists can only publish conservatively in the IPCC reports, but they’re telling it like it really is at the COP conferences, right? Wrong. Guess who’s not allowed in the room with the world leaders when the climate crisis is being discussed?

That’s right, the climate scientists. I suppose Michael Gove was right after all when he said we’ve had enough of experts.

with electric cars tomorrow, it would take two years of the world’s entire cobalt supply just to build the batteries. Extrapolate that to the entire world and you’ll start to see the problem.

EV cars, wind turbines, solar arrays and batteries, all of it requires even more destruction of the environment and an even bigger expenditure of fossil fuels to accomplish it. So let me put this as clearly and as succinctly as I can: There is no easy and painless way out of this.

There are too many of us consuming too much and using too much power. The problem is now so large that even trying to fix it is going to make it worse, or at least it will if we keep insisting the fix has to keep the status quo in place.

Net zero and carbon neutral are just nonsense phrases to convince us that (A) we’re actually doing something, and (B) we can carry on as we are. Whereas the uncomfortable truth is that if we want a chance, and it really is still just a chance at this point, to stave off the worst, then all of us would have to commit to a radical simplification of our lives. Cars, air travel, heating and hot water on demand, eating meat every day and buying more plastic and electronic rubbish. It would all have to stop, or at the very least be curtailed in a massive way.

I’d say that holds true for Joe Biden who, after dozing off at COP26, went home and presided over the largest ever sale of oil and gas leases in the Gulf of Mexico. That’s not too surprising when you learn that the largest delegation at COP26 was, you guessed it, the fossil fuel industry.

Yet all of that is simply unthinkable to the average Joe, and that’s before we even get to the necessity of dismantling our current socioeconomic system, because none of the above would work while capitalism still rules the roost, which is exactly why we are where we are. You can’t have a system reliant on constant growth on a planet with finite resources, it really is that simple, and unfortunately our childish refusal to admit that is going to spell disaster for us as a species.

The COP meetings are a carnival, a distraction to make us think our glorious leaders are actually doing something about it, when all they’re really doing is deciding the best way to keep everything ‘business as usual’ and most importantly, keep all that sweet, sweet money flowing to the right people.

But that’s OK because disaster is entirely what we’re hoping for! A 3C increase in the global average is classed as ‘catastrophic’, meaning the literal end of life as we know it and the deaths of billions as food shortages and entire regions becoming inhospitable, causing starvation, disease and war.

The Comforting Lie Of Net Zero

Although a commitment to 1.5C was made at COP26, it’s already becoming apparent that’s impossible. Instead it’s likely we’ll hit at least a 2C rise, something only classed as ’disastrous’.

And that’s it. That’s the best humanity can manage. Literally aiming for disaster and keeping our fingers crossed we don’t get a catastrophe instead.

But we’re all going carbon neutral, aren’t we?

Soon we’ll all be driving Teslas, we’ll have solar power coming out of our backsides and there will be no emissions to worry about. That would be great, but it’s just not feasible.

If we replaced every car in the UK, just the UK,

This will be an accurate rendition of the Arctic soon The thing to remember about climate change is the worse it gets, the worse it gets. Millions of tons of methane is buried in the permafrost which is more than 80 times more potent than carbon for warming the climate, so as the temperatures rise, the permafrost melts and the methane is released, which makes the temperature rise even further and melts more permafrost to release yet more methane, and on and on it goes.

The less ice coverage there is the less heat is reflected, so the temperature of the sea rises even more, which could lead to blooms of toxic algae on an unprecedented scale, poisoning the oceans for thousands of miles, and if the ocean ecosystem goes, we all go with it.

Forget rising sea levels. Google ‘Blue Ocean Event’ which scientists are now theorising could happen as soon as 2030 and feast your eyes on terms like ‘Arctic Death Spiral’ and ‘Extinction Event’ for some light reading.

So What Can We Do? Nothing. The time to take decisive, meaningful action was 30 or 40 years ago. Now, we’re just rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic. Barring a literal miracle turning things around, we’re on the downward slope to catastrophe and picking up speed fast. Only we’re still talking about a timescale of decades, of course, so we’ll be OK, which is all we really care about, isn’t it?

I want to really spell this out: This is all our fault.

We’re lazy, greedy, selfish and cowardly people who have put our lifestyles over the future of our children. Shame, shame on all of us.

We’ll get to enjoy some of the fruits of our labours over the next couple of decades and we’ll get a taste of just how bad we’ve made things for our descendants. So get used to hearing ‘unprecedented’ and ‘faster than expected’ over the next few years as we see yet more floods, fires and heatwaves, although we can all take some solace from the fact that we’ll never have to pay the price for our greed and cowardice.

Our children will pay that bill for us.

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Max Headroom’s

BIZARRE NEWS

’SPOONS ‘CHIPGATE’ NEWS

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A man with sufficient time on his hands claims to be on a mission to collect a fried potato chip from every single one of the 925 Wetherspoons pubs throughout the UK. Boris Bennett, 45, says he always carries a folder of chips around with him - each one in a clear pouch and perfectly labeled with the outlet they were purchased from.

His ‘hilarious’ hobby came to light when he posted a picture of his ‘trading cards collection book’ on Facecock. It then appeared on Wetherspoons’ Paltry Chip Count, which is a group on the site where Wetherspoons fanatics discuss how many chips they got with their meal.

But is this challenge a wind-up? Social media users were quick to point out it would take a fair old while to visit every ’Spoons across the country - meaning the chips could get rather mouldy in the meantime. But our ‘time on his hands’ man claims he is deadly serious.

Boris says he has spent yet more wasted time coating his chips in Vaseline and wax to make them last longer.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Wetherspoons has commended the challenge, naming Boris ‘one of a kind’ (i.e. a regular cheapskate ’Spoons drinker).

His post on Facebook reads: “Evening all. You may remember me from Stonehenge/Chiphenge post, only now I bring you this; a healthy 38 chips in my meal at the Spinning Mule in Bolton this afternoon.

You see, I am currently on a mission to collect and record one chip from every Wetherspoons in Britain...”

If you readers are wondering: ‘Does this numpty really walk around with a trading cards collection book full of chips?’ Well then, amazingly enough, the answer to that is yes; yes, he bloody well does.

What’s more, his post has gone viral, gathering tens of thousands of likes and comments across social media from others who have nothing better whatsoever to do with their time.

Boris, from Bury, says he’s thrilled with the response and would “love to shake the hand” of Wetherspoons founder Tim Martin one day.

He said: “I decided to do it because I thought it would be funny for all of the other members of the group, and also because it gives me an excuse to travel the UK to visit all of the Wetherspoon pubs.

“I’m trying to get to as many as possible, but if I get too tired, I might pass the baton on to other fellow chip enthusiasts.”

BB added: “It feels rather exciting to get 18k+ reactions on Facebook, 110k+ on Instagram and 100k+ on TikTok. It’s something I’m very proud of, especially as it’s such a daft idea.”

A spokesperson for Wetherspoons said: “Wetherspoons has numerous fans who love to visit all of our pubs and record their visits, while others take photos of our carpets. Boris is one of a kind. We wish him well in his venture and hope he manages to achieve his aim.”

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MOTCO

Man on the Clapham Omnibus THE WEATHER

What to write about, as I sit here in the depths of January, enduring that post you know what holiday period. I say ‘you know what’ as a notice went up on the board in the fabled Edge writers lounge dictating that, like Macbeth and Voldemort, the name was not to be mentioned in any way, shape or form for at least another 10 months.

But I digress. As I look out of my office window, the answer emerges from the beautiful winter mist, rather like the ray of gently warming sun hitting the window. The thought did not hit me like a bolt of lightning and neither did it leave me thunderstruck. It merely gently swirled around my head until the fog lifted. The more alert readers amongst you may well have detected the emerging chosen theme aided by the very title of this particular piece. Yes, it’s the weather, and the particular obsession the fair citizens of the UK have with it.

I guess the early seed was also planted as I read a headline in the Fail on Sunday. It screamed in true Fail on Sunday style: ‘Red faces at BBC as it admits big freeze forecast was wrong’. Now, before I go on, when it comes to the BBC and the weather, can there be any shock that they got it wrong? More on that later.

Apparently, the BBC’s weather forecast supplier has had to apologise to another ‘respected’ meteorology firm. Why? Well, because one said we were going to be chin deep in snow and freezing cold, while the other said: ‘In your dreams, sunshine. Its going to be shorts and t-shirt weather.’ Okay, so I may have exaggerated the second part, but I think you can work out which one was the BBC forecast. Given that New Year’s eve was the warmest on record, warmer than some Mediterranean countries, and ice rinks were melting, it was a fair victory.

weather for ducks, Milky!”

Yup, and one would feign a smile as cold water dripped off your hat onto the tally book and your hand dug into a bag full of wet gritty coins for their change. Mildly funny, but after three or four hundred doors knocked on, it somewhat lost its comedic power.

Although it proves yet again that the weather is the standard ‘ice breaker’ to start up any conversation.

As I have illustrated, we use the weather like a greeting and have elevated our weather language to mention it even if we are not really talking about it. Think about everyday expressions, like ‘saving up for a rainy day’. Or ‘a storm in a tea cup’. And ‘you’ve got your head in the clouds’. (FFS, this is all getting somewhat ‘long-winded’, Motty.

Signed, EE.) Or what about ‘on cloud-nine’ and the classic ‘I’m feeling a bit under the weather’?

Allegedly around one third of the country are talking about the weather at any given time. The Scots dialect has over 100 different words for rain. This is achievable, of course, as there is a weather forecast on the TV or radio constantly. We love our weather presenters and they cater to all tastes and age groups. Think (the lovely) Carol Kirkwood in the morning on BBC1, right through to the eye candy that is Tomasz Schafernaker in the evening. Incidentally, his name is worth around 39 points at Scrabble.

Of course, we have good cause to be obsessed with the weather as we have our fair share of it, let’s face it. And most of it ought to be embraced, I should add. I like the sunshine, especially so as I get older. But equally I love walking along the coast on a bitingly cold day, wrapped up snugly with Mrs M on my arm. Our seasons are fantastic in every way and when we get the true weather for each and every one of them, it can bring such joy, even the spring rain.

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We Brits have the reputation of being reserved by our overseas cousins, assumed as somewhat reluctant to talk. Now I always struggle with this stereotype as I watch my fellow countryman brawling in foreign bars, and think ‘reserved my arse’ (or usually their bare white arses). But, my friends, there is one way to engage a Brit in reluctant conversation and it will begin with the statement …”Nice weather for the time of year” or some such weather-based gambit. In my reckless youth and between city exams, I used to take the summers off. One year I worked as a milkman for the Co-op in Harold Hill. My round was nearly 500 drops. We had beautiful all-weather gear called a ‘superb suit’, which lived up to its name and kept you very dry indeed.

Money collecting days were usually Fridays and Saturdays. If it was raining it was usually weather based chit-chat hell. Not because one was wet. No. The door would open and a voice would say: “Nice

We are addicted to the weather forecast like it were some kind of sport, or perhaps it’s like picking the football results for the old-style pools coupon? I was living in a village on the night Michael Fish told us all that some woman had rung the BBC to ask about a hurricane.

He dismissed her and laughed it off. But in the early hours of the very next morning a heavily pregnant Mrs Mott and I listened as parts of our roof disappeared up the road, the lights went out and the gas went off. I looked out the window and the old windmill that was opposite our house was spinning for the first time in decades as the sails broke free. Yup, many thanks for that, Mike!

Then there was the famous ‘BBQ summer’ the BBC promised us a few years back, yet I seem to recall the most indifferent, wet and cloudy summer in memory. These days I work at home and have the radio on in my office. A voice declares it is sunny and bright blah blah.

“Whaaaaat?” I often sigh. “Oh no it isn’t, you halfwit. Look out the window,” I often shout at the invisible chirpy tones.

We may love it, we may hate it, but we can’t stop talking about it. I don’t know if Mark Twain ever graced our shores, but he certainly produced a great quote that captures the UK situation: “If you don’t like the weather, just wait 5 minutes.”

Yours aye,

shaun@theedgemag.co.uk

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I even made my Asda delivery man put my food deliveries in plastic tubs halfway down my driveway, before I washed everything in sterilizing water.

I remember standing there, screaming at him, pointing to the tubs, directing him with a broom handle, whilst wearing an old welder’s mask I’d found in the barn. I kid you not, I have always been a bit overly dramatic. In my mind I looked like that woman in ‘Flashdance’, whereas the reality was I probably looked like ‘Mad Jason’ from ‘Friday the 13th’. This was at the very outset, mind you, when people were fighting on the floor of the aisles of supermarkets for loo roll and putting plastic buckets on their heads with cut-out slits for their eyes.

Oh what a month January was - I’m so glad it’s behind us. They used to say ‘a week is a long time in politics’, but Partygate seems to have been never ending. They also say you should never talk politics or religion with friends you don’t want to lose, so I have always steered well away from those topics in my columns over the years, because everyone who reads and supports my columns are very dear to me. I am always moved by the sheer amount of people that contact me each month, but I also feel I cannot avoid Partygate.

Part of me wants to say, “It’s the Dunkirk Spirit in the face of death”, we’re not afraid of Covid, so we kept on partying, whilst the rest of the world was bricking it. Mad dogs and Englishmen! But while the rest of the world were locked down terrified, our PM and his entourage were ‘having it large’ in the number 10 garden, making a DJ booth on top of the photocopiers and dragging suitcases full of booze across London to smuggle into Downing Street. They were fearless. But, of course, that’s not true.

I, like you, probably cannot believe what the news is churning out right now. It seems as though we are living in some sort of altered reality.

I was absolutely terrified the day they first announced the need for vulnerable people to shield at home. I completely lost it. I sat down and just started shaking with fear for my loved ones and my friends who work in the NHS. My son has serious underlying health issues and I remember crying on the phone to him at 2.00am begging him not to go to work, or even leave his home. And, to his credit, he didn’t. He never saw anyone, or went out, for months, working from home, completely alone. Looking back on it, how a boy of 26 did that, I honestly do not know. But he really stuck to the rules, like a lot of other vulnerable people did, while I myself barricaded the gates so no one could knock on my door and risk leaving Covid at my doorstep, which I might have feasibly passed on to him.

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I was terrified. I did not go out. I bought everything we might need for Armageddon. I really thought my son was in mortal danger. I remember the race for ventilators and the warning that there would not be enough to go around, waking up at 3.00am and wondering if I could, in an emergency, do anything with the Henry Hoover?

Yet here we have a Prime Minister who caught Covid and ended up in ITU early on, hovering at death’s door for a week, allegedly allowing staff to throw a party. In their defense, I have to say, I used to be a bit of a party animal myself back in the day, yet not one of the parties I attended ever consisted of cheese’n’wine. No-one I ever knew danced like the PM after a single glass of Malbec and a chunk of Stinking Bishop. All of that Lambrini was wasted on us. If only we’d known.

People up and down the country have made huge sacrifices over the past couple of years. Think about our NHS heroes - what a massive slap in the face Partygate must have been for them. There they were, going out every single day, many with young families, putting their lives on the line, saving others in horrendous PPE, yet those who were making the rules to try and keep the hospital admissions as low as possible were partying. You could not make this up if you tried.

Covid may be nearly over (for now), but the key workers who kept the food on our shelves and the doctors and nurses who went out every day to save lives, they’re the ones we should be concentrating on. We, as a country, ‘did it’ and we should be very proud of ourselves. We made the sacrifices and we got through it, which was real British Bulldog Spirit.

STUPID CUPID No February edition of The Edge would be complete without a mention of St.Valentine’s Day and love, so I would like to wish everyone a very happy February 14th. However, for those who don’t have love on their mind, the BIG BANNER on the A12 advertising ‘Sympathetic Lockdown Divorces for a Set Fee’ always makes me chuckle every single day!

tracie123@aol.com

So you immediately know where The Edge is going with this, right?

“That one went straight down the ’keepers throat.”

The goalkeeper merely did what the club pay him to do and saved a shot that was fired straight at him.

“He’s played it round the corner.”

Total gibberish. What ‘corner’ is the commentator on about?

“Leeds United look like a totally different team since the break.”

That’s because Bielsa craftily sent on 11 ringers at half-time and totally fooled the referee by their ‘glasses & moustache’ disguises.

“Chelsea are winning the majority of the second balls.”

Oh, didn’t you know? From the start of this season, the game has been played with two balls on the pitch, instead of just one.

“The Lesser Spotted Van De Beek.”

When an expensive player doesn’t get so much game-time as would have been expected.

“Playing in the hole.”

With football pitches looking impeccable all season long, it’s hard to make any sense whatsoever of a remark such as this.

“He certainly put his laces through that one.”

Kicked the ball exceptionally hard indeed.

“Manchester City are playing with a false number nine.”

Simply because Fernandinho (the number 6) is show-boating by doing a head-stand in the centre-circle prior to kick-off.

“Sold him a dummy.”

Alexis Sanchez’s transfer from Arsenal to Manchester United on 22nd January 2018.

“He’s gone and bent it.”

Uri Geller’s debut for Grimsby Town v Hereford United on 25th August 1973 when he altered the shape of the crossbar.

“He’ll have felt that.”

Classic understatement. When a player is stood in a defensive wall and receives a ball travelling at 70mph into his scrotum sack struck from a trajectory of just 10 yards away.

“Taken one for the team.”

See previous.

“Invited the foul.”

Unbeknown to the player himself, his team-mates have sneakily pinned a ‘Kick Me Quick’ sign onto the back of their star player’s shirt in the hope of winning lots of free-kicks throughout the match.

“The referee’s going to book him...”

To do a turn as a ventriloquist at his daughter’s 4th birthday party.

“You’re not fit to wipe my arse.”

A welcome song fans sing to the opposing team’s players.

“Having an early bath.”

Some players do their best to get sent off midway through the second-half so that they can be the first into a nice warm team bath before the other 10 to 15 lads climb in with their muddy legs.

“Playing in the channel.”

England v France. Venue: English Channel.

“Gave the ’keeper ‘the eyes’.”

When a penalty taker plucks his own eyes out of their sockets and hands them to the opposing goalkeeper before taking a penalty kick with his side already leading 5-0 with but 3 minutes to go.

“Warming the bench.”

Christian Benteke and his blow-torch at Crystal Palace. c The Edge

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