The Edge Magazine October 2021

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EDGE

the ISSUE NO: 295

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The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:14:59

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ARMY & NAVY The proposals are in for our new look Army & Navy roundabout solution, but both I (see page 12) and Billy-Boy (see page 21) have our fears and concerns.

It would be genuinely good to hear from you too, readers, as Chelmsford stumbles and bumbles its way towards perpetual gridlock.

Therefore, your most sensible suggestions would be welcome.

EMMA RANUCANU

The Edge Editor’s Column TECHNOLOGY I hate (and I do mean HATE with a passion) technology of any sort whatsoever.

For instance, I bought a new laser printer recently with ‘wireless capability’, yet could I connect the (ba)custard?

Could I arse.

Mrs Edge managed to connect to it ‘of sorts’ from her iPad down in our kitchen/diner, only I failed miserably to connect it to the PC I produce The Edge on each and every month from my orifice upstairs, yet they sit (my PC and my all new laser printer) less than 1m away from each other.

What’s all that about FFS???

CAT & MOUSE

STRIKE I’ve been absolutely loving reading ‘The Cuckoo’s Calling’ by Robert Galbraith (even though we all know that’s merely a pseudonym for J.K. Rowling) which I bought for just 50p in a charity shop recently. So now I’ve gone and ordered (well, I got my wife to) another 3 books online, which means I’ve just one more to get to complete the set, as I want to read them in order of publication.

Not sure if any of you watched the TV series of Strike, but I loved it.

Just one thing though. Does J.K. Rowling have any teeth, because her peggies are never visible in any of the photographs I’ve seen of her?

CURRY You know if you sniff your armpits the morning after the night before’s curry you can pretty much still smell it as though it were on a plate in front of you?

So why cannot the same be said of a lasagne, or spaghetti bolognese?

BILLERICAY It’s nice, isn’t it?

Particularly the High Street, which is the complete antithesis of Chelmsford’s horrible, plastic, bog-standard, down-market alternative.

Sure, it’s ‘a little bit Puerto Banus’ in the sense that I noticed a couple of ladies driving 4+4s and by their personalied plates their names were obviously Sonia and Melissa, but if that’s one’s only criticism, that’s bearable, right?

What’s more, it seems they actively encourage people to shop there (Chelmsford Council, please take note) as the main car-park, just off the High Street, is FREE all day on Saturdays after 9.30am. How about that?

We had a truly delicious flat white in the one 3 four cafe towards the end of the High Street (near Pasha) and then opted for a bacon sarnie in the popular Queenies (sounds crap, but isn’t) on the opposite side of the road, which was actually bathed in glorious sunshine.

A little lad called Hunter (yes, Hunter) was sat next to us in a high-chair, along with his mum, sister and grannie, most probably. Honestly, there was more food on the floor all around him than in his mouth, or on his plate.

And they have a Waitrose.

And they have a Waitrose.

And they have a Waitrose.

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

The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:14:59

The relationship between Jack Grealish, Mason Mount and Luke Shaw on England duty down the left-flank is the nearest I’ve seen this country come to emulating the Spanish style of tiki-taka.

More end product though, please.

Unbelievable. Magnificent. And, amazingly, she’s British too, apparently. I watched it ‘live’ and couldn’t quite believe what I was seeing.

And what a way to win match point, with an ace.

WALLOP ... have some of that!

SOMEWHERE ELSE Do you know what are useless, noisy bastards?

Leaf blowers, that’s what.

They’re pathetic.

All they do is blow dead leaves to somewhere else, until the wind blows them all back again.

Oh and people who rev leaf blowers are even worse. Stupid twats.

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* NO MATTER your age, it’s likely certain situations in life give you cause to curse out loud, only these days we’re all less bloody minded in our choice of profanity, if you get The Edge’s inference?

Saying merely ‘bloody hell’ just doesn’t cut the mustard anymore and is getting less and less common as the word ‘f* ck’ has risen in ascendancy to become our most popular expletive, a major study has found.

A researcher at Aston University in Birmingham analysed how frequently 16 common swear words were used in 1994, as compared to 2014, by looking at large bodies of transcriptions of casual English conversation.

He found the use of such words had fallen by 27.6% between the 20 year period, while the profanity f* ck had risen to become the most popular curse, pretty much at the expense of bloody’s decline.

The study, which has been published in the journal Text & Talk, also found that although swearing remained more common in men than women, the difference between the genders had decreased notably.

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All hail to that, says The Edge, as it loves nothing more than to hear a well heeled lady slip out the ‘F’ word....and sometimes even worse (just so long as she’s pure class).

www.theedgemag.co.uk

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What a great start to the weekend we had the other Friday night.

The wife’s sister was driving up from Cornwall, so we asked her what she fancied. Now she normally says Chinese, but she surprised us by saying, “Oooooh, shall we have fish & chips?”

To be fair, that’s something me and the missus never have, unless we’re in Southwold and we might have scampi & chips from that Little Fish & Chippy place, I think it’s called.

So anyway, we pushed the boat out and put in an order with the Fish Shack in Havengore (see page 5) and it was ‘proper’ (honesty, I’m pretty sure even Popeye and Olive Oyl would have given it the thumb’s up).

Mine’s the one on the right. I went for the grilled cod (large, £7.25), chips, mushy peas (all Billingsgate fish orders are supplied with a wedge of lemon and tartar sauce), while Mrs Edge’s plate is the one in the middle and she opted for the wing of skate (£7.95), while the sis-in-law chose haddock (large, £7.25) in breadcrumbs.

Oh yesssss, you have probably spotted the whole king prawns (6 for £4.95) which me and the missus simply couldn’t resist, while all three of us also gorged on some calamari (£5.50) while we were plating up. What utter piggies, eh? But we were all starving when we put our order in, so that’s what happens. However, we pretty much polished the whole lot off, as it goes.

The chips were plump and freshly made, which was grand, as I simply cannot abide anything greasy that tastes as though it’s been ‘hanging around’ for far too long.

So do give the Fish Shack a try, readers, as it’s a cut above.

By the way, they’ve got loads of other stuff on their menu too, such as their ‘Breakfast Deal’ consisting of a butcher’s sausage, back bacon or vegan sausage in a roll with a brew (tea) or an Americano (coffee) for £3.95 (add a fried egg for an extra 75p), served 8am - noon.

Or what about a lunchtime ‘Pie Deal’ for £4.95? Choose from Steak in Ale, Steak & Kidney, Chicken/Ham & Leek or Roasted Veg pie, served 11am - 4pm.

And they’ve also got a cold counter selling the likes of ‘the old favourite’ King Prawns in Marie Sauce (4 for £3 / 8 for £5.50 / 12 for £7.50), Cockles in Vinegar, Smoked Salmon & Lemon Creme Fraiche and Green Lip Mussels & Sweet Chilli Sauce, all for £2.95.

Then there’s the ‘Butcher’s Meat’ section selling Jumbo Sausages (£2.10), Breaded Chicken Burgers in a bun with BBQ sauce (£4.70), Homemade 7oz Steak Mince Burgers served in a bun with salad & relish (£4.70) etc.

But back to the ‘Fish Kitchen’ and you can have 12 pieces of Scampi for £5.95 or 2 Salmon Fishcakes for £4.95. Or what about the all time classic of a good old Chip Butty (£2.75).

Not to mention a deep fried Mars or Snickers bar for dessert (£1.95)! www.fishshackessex.co.uk

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Let’s stick with the fishy theme, and I hope you readers are enjoying the return of Gone Fishing (BBC2, Sundays, 8.00pm) every bit as much as The Edge always does.

I often mention this programme to people and they’ll say things like, “I have no interest in fishing.” Well, neither do I. But the fact is, the fishing’s pretty much incidental.

The scenery’s often extraordinarily beautiful, but really it’s the camaraderie between Bob Mortimer (a hopeless fisherman, by the looks of him, who hasn’t improved in the slightest since he was a wee bairn) and Paul Whitehouse (more than competent, I’d say, but then I know absolutely nowt about angling whatsoever).

This pair of comics seemingly go way back, while they’ve both come through fairly dicey heart ops - Mortimer’s was a triple bypass, while Whitehouse’s was only discovered at the very last minute - so there’s that extra bond that makes their friendship particularly endearing.

What’s more, they also always return a fish tut water - “And awayyy” - which is jolly nice of them.

Only the BBC could create this lovely series though, from the quirky theme tune to the adorable locations and also the punctuating silences, as ITV wouldn’t have a bloody clue.

It’s just a shame each episode is only half-an-hour long as I’m always just getting into it, then all of a sudden, it’s over.

One thing that’s hilarious is Bob’s issues with his balance these days.

Now we shouldn’t laugh, but how can you not? He fell into a sea lock during the very first episode of the latest series, and it’s like, one minute he’s there, only the next, he’s not. He’s simply toppled over.

The series was first broadcast back in 2018 and has been recommissioned every year since; and why on earth wouldn’t it be. It simply takes you away from reality completely, and honestly, I could easily watch the entire series in just one sitting, no trouble whatsoever.

The idea for the show apparently came about after Paul was asking Lisa, Bob’s wife, how he was recovering from his surgery, and she informed him he wasn’t even leaving the house.

So he invited Bob along fishing with him and the latter admitted afterwards: “I’d never felt anything like it. There even came a moment when I realised I hadn’t said a single word for an hour and a half, yet I hadn’t thought about anything else other than ‘the moment’.”

Now obviously there wouldn’t be much of a show if they didn’t say anything to each other at all, but there’s a genuine tranquility about the pair of them casting off in their waders, which I guess is how us non-fishermen suspect fishing to be.

It was then Whitehouse who thought there may indeed be a show in the making, describing it as: “Just two old friends who’ve both had a reprieve, being at one with the timeless beauty of the English countryside.”

The Edge honestly cannot recommend this programme highly enough and it’s always touching how Mortimer ‘mothers’ Whitehouse at the end of each day’s fishing with some home-cooked, heart-healthy nosh (well, mainly heart-healthy, as they both do adore a pie).

N.B. Did you see Mortimer getting a huge pickled onion out of a jar in episode two and then doing a Thunderbird impression? Yes, with a pickled onion?

Priceless.

The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:14:59

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The frail elderly people we spotted shuffling around the ship absolutely fascinated us. There were no escalators and the elevators were particularly hard to come by at peak times.

Bearing in mind the port of Tilbury is usually used for SAGA type cruises, we couldn’t help but wonder whether they had somehow booked onto the Disney Magic by accident and were now a tad confused as to why absolutely everything onboard was mouse themed.

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MELLY MOO BAILEY In September we were lucky enough to experience one of the UK staycation cruises on the Disney Magic from Tilbury. As first time cruisers, truthfully we had very few expectations, but it’s fair to say those we did have were completely blown away.

Queuing for Covid testing whilst being able to see the magnificent Disney Magic in port, literally a stones throw away, with the savage knowledge that if you returned a positive result, you could all be sent packing in the wrong direction, was tense to say the very least. I couldn’t begin to imagine even my own level of disappointment if that happened, let alone my 3 children. But fortunately all was okay and before we knew it, we were stepping onboard the legendary ship.

It has always been my dream to experience a Disney sailing, and I’m not ashamed to admit I shed a few emotional tears, especially when Mickey and Minnie came to greet us and I saw the sheer unbridled joy on my children’s faces.

Our stateroom was amazing; certainly far more spacious than our tent (and even the apartment we had in Majorca this summer, come to that).

There was a surprising amount of storage, which was handy as admittedly I had packed for every possible eventuality (standard) and we probably had enough stuff to stay on the ship for a year.

The sheer scale of everything honestly took our breath away. The ship was simply stunning.

During our 3 night sailing we met over 20 Disney characters and certainly made the most of the outdoor pool areas and the glorious weather.

The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:14:59

I will admit that we had expected the other guests to be predominantly families, and we were initially surprised by the number of adults onboard travelling without children. Ironically, what many of them had was a bristling indignation about the number of children onboard.

Another thing they have is a serious appetite for merchandise and we are not just talking about your standard mouse ears and matching t-shirt, but hundreds of pounds worth of collectible, designer loungefly bags and irregular choice shoes (one woman we spoke to admitted to packing 15 pairs for a 3 night cruise, so I can only assume she actually spent more time unpacking and changing her shoes than she did meeting the actual characters).

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One of the highlights for us was the onboard Kid’s Club. You had to pre-book the sessions, but the kids got to do all kinds of cool stuff they certainly wouldn’t get to do at home, including making slime and meeting Stitch. It was also a major highlight for me and Dave because we got to escape to the adults only pool area for a blissful and restful 2 hours each afternoon. We befriended a great group of people and ended up drinking ludicrously overpriced, very strong cocktails in one of the hot tubs. By the end of our trip, we had developed a whole new level of understanding and appreciation as to why adults travelling without children choose a Disney cruise.

There was no obvious security onboard, but there surely must be emergency procedures and arrangements for any rogue guests, which led us to question: is there an onboard Disney jail? It’s certainly not part of the embarkation day ship tour. Furthermore, if you are incarcerated, do they still feed you? And does this include the ship’s infamous Mickey waffles?

One thing you can certainly do ’til your heart’s content is eat and eat and eat, but what you can’t do is drink alcohol - at least not without taking out a second mortgage. You are allowed to take 2 bottles of wine or 6 cans of beer on board per adult, but these can only be consumed in your state room. So if you enjoy ‘a few drinks’, like Dave and I do, on a 3 night voyage that is simply not going to touch the sides. Everything is charged in US dollars and the ship is currently cashless due to Covid. Charges are made to your onboard account which you can track on the app. Gratuities are basically mandatory, whether you enjoy something or not. I can’t deny the staff go above and beyond to deliver truly excellent service, but with the $13.50 per person per night standard charge, plus an additional 18% service charge on any chargeable drinks that are ordered, and the 20% tax on top of any merchandise or products purchased onboard, it’s extremely easy for costs to escalate.

We could never have imagined that a mid September 3 night cruise from Tilbury would involve ‘pool weather’, but due to the bonus of not having a port itinerary, miraculously the Captain found the sun and we spent the duration doing circles somewhere between Norfolk and Amsterdam, where we enjoyed two days of 20 degrees heat and sunshine, which was perfect for the pools/waterslides and only added to the illusion of the perfect Disney bubble.

The only problem with finally realising one of your lifelong dreams is when you discover it’s every bit as amazing as you always thought it would be, to the point where you know with absolute certainty that you have to somehow one day make it all happen again....although probably not without a Lottery win, or selling a kidney or two on eBay.

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Currently located in North London, Signs Base are relocating to Witham as of 1st October 2021. Originally starting up as an online shop just 13 months ago, the business has rapidly expanded and this move will allow them to serve their customers far more effectively.

Signs Base are passionate about helping their customers promote their business, no matter what size. They work with global brands as well as small, essential local businesses, and both are equally as important to them. “It’s all about telling their story,” says Signs Base head-of-design, Lukasz Surma. He continues: “The move to bigger premises has allowed us to invest in new, state-of-the-art printing and finishing equipment. In addition, a custom-built design station, which can provide 3D visuals, allows our clients to see exactly how new signage will look on their building or vehicle before they give us their approval to print. Sometimes, tiny final adjustments can make all the difference; clients often notice things they had not thought about before, once they can see how the signage will look on their shop, warehouse or fleet vehicles. We know it will make our customer’s decisions that much quicker and easier.”

Signs Base’s new premises are located in Wheatear Industrial Estate, Perry Road, Witham, allowing customers who would like to visit easy access, as it’s close to the A12, as well as offering free parking.

“We currently speak to most of our customers on the phone, or via zoom, but the larger premises will mean we have additional space if customers prefer a face-to-face meeting, especially when bigger projects are being planned. Alternatively, we are always happy to hold face-to-face meetings at our clients’ offices.”

SignsBase.com provides a fully personalised bespoke signage service for every type and size of business, including those that are just starting out and not sure exactly what they need, as well as fully established businesses who are perhaps looking to update or totally re-brand. They have manufactured signs for large retail outlets, small shops, beauty salons, barbers, large warehouses, pubs, restaurants, leisure facilities as well as local authorities and the construction industry. Signs Base work with clients to create the best shop fascias, retail signage, illuminated signs and letters, projecting signs, window graphics, exhibition and display panels, as well as vehicle graphics and fleet branding. They can also help with branded give-aways and clothing because they really are a one-stop-shop for all of your branding needs.

Signs Base are also keen to protect the environment and their company policy ensures they have time to research more sustainable and recyclable printing methods in order to change the way that waste is managed.

They regularly receive after-sales comments and some can be found on the Signs Base website: “The very best customer service and help with design ideas. Love my new shop sign! Will definitely use Signs Base again. All the colours are spot on! Thank you so much.”

Only the expansion won’t stop at Witham. SignsBase.com are already planning to open up in another location in the very near future.

The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:14:59

Watch this space!

www.theedgemag.co.uk

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BERLIN (feat. Casablanca and Chicago) I thought I’d been cast in the role of Victor Laszlo as I made plans to resume international travel. The complexities of working out all of the exit and return requirements for red, amber or green list countries, securing all of the paperwork and the making of arrangements for testing evoked Victor and Ilsa’s desperate quest for the elusive transit papers in the 1942 classic, Casablanca. But escape I did.

As I’ve doubtless mentioned previously, I do like to explore cities. It’s only in major cities that I seem to get an adequately intense fix of culture, history and humanity (along with a complex choice of bars, of course).

I’m intrigued by how cities function and how people live their lives; the interplay of population and infrastructure. Maybe I was a flaneur in a prev-ious life?

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’.

I arrived in Berlin in the early afternoon and after much head-scratching trying to fathom out the local transport network (S-Bahn, U-Bahn, buses and trams) I bought a ticket for zones A, B & C for €10.00 and hoped that would do. I eventually found my way to my hotel and checked-in.

Tip - If you’re planning to visit Berlin, choose a hotel away from the elevated U-Bahn tracks to avoid the noise. The sound effects in my hotel room reminded me of Jake and Ellwood's place in Chicago.

It was fine weather so I hired a bike in a bid to cover as much ground as possible. Cycling through the tranquil Tiergarten, it was obvious that Berlin, like so much of Europe, is cycle-friendly with loads of cycle tracks and courteous drivers.

Following a recommendation, I visited the Topography of Terror museum, located on the site of buildings which during the Nazi regime were the SS Central Command. It was fascinating, if a little macabre. Thousands of photographs capture groups of smiling Nazis appearing very much like any other photos of work colleagues. Groups of professional looking people with smiling faces in smart attire. The gentlemen had kindly faces and could have been anyone’s favourite uncle. It's only when you read the accompanying text that the reality of their monstrous crimes is revealed.

The photos and narrative take the visitor on a journey and explain the chronology and mechanism by which the Nazis gained control and were able to inflict their evil.

The museum opened in 2010 and it was my sense that Germany's modern generations have come to terms with the country's past and have sought to exhibit it in stark detail; a past which older generations found easier to ignore.

While having a couple of beers and lunch around Alexanderplatz, I first noticed Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) which are basically concrete cobblestones, capped with a brass plate, laid into the pavement in front of the last residence of victims of the Nazis. The victims’ names and fate are engraved on the plate as a form of tribute. The project - initiated by the artist Gunter Demnig in 1992 - is now the world’s largest decentralised memorial with over 75,000 installations in cities across most of Europe.

Remnants of the Berlin Wall (which stood from 1961-1989) exist in various locations in the city, but I made my way over to view the East Side Gallery - an open-air gallery consisting of a series of murals painted directly onto a 1.3km section of the surviving wall - located near the centre of Berlin.

I briefly visited the site of Checkpoint Charlie, a major tourist attraction, but disappointingly it looks cheesy and theatrical and fails to capture what it must have been like as a fixture during the Cold War. Fortunately, the neo-Classical and neo-Renaissance architecture of the nearby Brandenburg Gate and Reichstag is far more imposing and makes a real statement.

Walking past Friedrichstraße station I came across a bronze sculpture entitled ‘Trains to Life - Trains to Death’ by architect and sculptor Frank Meisler. On a trip to Poland in 2017 I’d been drawn to a similar and familiar looking work at the main railway station in Gdansk and many readers who, like me, worked in The City of London will have also walked past a very similar looking work - entitled ‘The Arrival’ - at Liverpool Street station on their daily walk to the office.

Frank Meisler was born into a Jewish family in Danzig (now Gdansk).

Evacuated by the Kindertransport in August 1939, he travelled with 14 other Jewish children, via Berlin, to the Netherlands and then to Liverpool Street in London. His parents were arrested three days after his departure, held in the Warsaw Ghetto and later murdered at Auschwitz. He was raised by a grandmother in London, attended school in Harrow, did national service in the RAF, and then studied architecture at the University of Manchester.

Kindertransport is the name given to the rescue mission that began nine months prior to the outbreak of World War II. The UK took in nearly 10,000 Jewish children from Nazi Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia and the Free City of Danzig. The children were placed in British foster homes, hostels, and farms.

In gratitude to the people of Great Britain and in commemoration of the 1.6 million children murdered in the Holocaust, five memorial sculptures (sited in Berlin, Hamburg, Gdansk, Hoek van Holland and Liverpool Street station, London) were erected between 2006-2011 along the children’s route to safety.

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On my final evening I took a walk out to the Rathaus Schöneberg (City Hall for the borough of Tempelhof-Schöneberg). It was on the steps of this building that U.S. President John F. Kennedy spoke on 26 June 1963, proclaiming "Ich bin ein Berliner".

I was honestly in my element and wide-eyed exploring Germany’s capital.

It wasn’t all consumed by glimpses of dark periods of Nazi and Cold War history though. This is Germany; there are loads of open spaces, public transport is efficient, the quality of beer is guaranteed and food portions are generous.

wontpassthiswayagain@gmail.com

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Voodoo kings and queens were spiritual and political figures of power in 1800s New Orleans. Their core belief was that ‘one god does not interfere in daily lives, but that spirits do’. Connection with these spirits can be obtained through various rituals, such as dance, music, chanting and snakes, and the newly formed Chelmsford Voodoo Association can give you all that, and more.

Meanwhile, in Haiti, voodoo began as an underground activity.

During the 1700s thousands of West African slaves were shipped to Haiti to work on French plantations. The slaves were baptised as Roman Catholics upon their arrival in the West Indies.

Voodoo is a supernatural ancestral connection, passed from generation to generation by word of mouth (oral tradition), rituals and spiritual practices, displaying subtle variations from tribe to tribe. It’s birthplace was Benin in West Africa.

Voodoo has been popularised and commercialised throughout the last century, but still its roots in New Orleans run deep. Priests and priestesses still practice the religion as it came to the city from Africa and the islands.

Before you are thinking of joining the Chelmsford Voodoo Association, one thing to take into immediate consideration is that it isn’t accurately portrayed in most movies, TV shows and books.

Voodoo isn’t a cult, black magic (they’re chocolates), or devil worship. People who practice voodoo aren’t witchdoctors, masons, sorcerers or occultists. Nor has voodoo ever been anything intended to hurt or control others, while most voodooists have never seen a ‘voodoo doll’, unless, like you, it was in a movie. It isn’t morbid or violent, nor is it practiced in the same way throughout the world.

Voodoo is merely a religion, and if you haven’t yet found the right religion for you, then hey brothers, and sisters, the CVA might well be just the type of thing you’ve been looking for.

Those who practice voodoo believe that there is a visible and an invisible world, and that these two worlds are intertwined. Death is a transition to the invisible world, so our predecessors are still with us in spirit. They watch over and inspire us.

Racism clouds our view of voodoo. Hollywood created a mythology that we have adopted as the truth. Voodoo has become part of modern folklore as something evil that can hurt us.

But nothing could be further from the truth.

Perhaps something is missing from your own life?

To find out more, simply Google Chelmsford Voodoo Association.

EDGE

the CVA Chelmsford VOODOO Association

www.theedgemag.co.uk

shaun@theedgemag.co.uk Page 11

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WE ALSO REPAIR CARAVANS!

theEDGE

Okay, okay, well seeing as it’s a pretty important roundabout and the cause of much of Chelmsford’s congestion frustration, it’s pretty essential we get this right.

On that point, The Edge has lived in Chelmsford since 1983, after a one year stint renting in London (Eccleston Square, SW1, don’t y’know) and the first thing one of my work colleagues said to me when I told them I was moving out to the ‘sticks’ of Chelmsford was, “Oh, that’s where the Army & Navy roundabout is.”

Talk about notorious, only I’d never even heard of the damned thing.

Anyway, to get to the meat and two veg of the matter, there are but two proposals in the offing. One is what you see above, which is being touted as the T-junction alternative, and it’s important to The Edge as this is the route (or ‘rowt’ as the Yanks say) it generally travels in to Chelmsford, as denoted by the exemplary yellow arrow.

But so far as The Edge can make out, this option is flawed by the positioning of the traffic-lights at A and B. Oh sure, it all looks very nice and neat in the model (above), but think about a tailback from traffic-lights B curling all the way to the approach road beyond traffic-lights A, thus completely blocking traffic heading towards Danbury/Wickford/Southend from Parkway.

When you have two major junctions so very close to each other, tailbacks are what often tends to happen, and if the timings of the traffic-light colour changes aren’t 100% spot-on (and let’s face it, they very often haven’t been at the current Army & Navy roundabout since the flyover was removed a couple of years back) then it’s asking for trouble, and trouble equals tailbacks.

As Essex County Council readily admit: “There are no perfect solutions and no scheme would remove all queuing and delays at the junction, but we now have two options which offer the best balance for all transport users.”

So let’s move swiftly on to option 2, ‘The Hamburger’, and it’s a ‘winner, winner, chicken dinner’ (due to its name alone) in this publication’s eyes.

However, upon closer inspection, The Edge can foresee less cause for both chaos and cock-ups, while the route out of town (we’ll never be a ‘real’ city) in the direction of Chelmer Village/Springfield/Colchester looks as though it might hopefully be relatively free-flowing, on paper at least.

Rather worrying though, as getting to the centre of Chelmsford is a complete and utter no-no at certain times on certain days, while Saturday daytimes are pretty much a write-off, so let’s just hope this turns out alright.

An underpass, like on the A127 at Rayleigh, has always been The Edge’s preferred option, and surely we could have siphoned off some of the money collected from the Dartford Crossing to help pay for it?

But that solution - and it would have been a real solution - clearly isn’t even an option, so let’s just hope we get the second best alternative.

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Following it’s continued success, Meadow Croft Garden Centre has already officially opened it’s well-known German Market & Christmas Fair.

Inspired by traditional German Markets, you will be captivated by the sights, sounds and smells of the market, with irresistible seasonal treats and unique yuletide gifts and decorations.

The German Market is open daily until Thursday 23rd December during the garden centre’s normal opening hours. Festive visitors can wander amongst the many Christmassy chalet style stalls, soak up the festive atmosphere and get in the mood for the holiday season.

Discover over 30 stalls each adorned with handpicked, high-quality artisan products, including carved wooden decorations, delicate glassware and baubles, traditional cuckoo clocks and Scandinavian gonks, whilst the smells of Bratwurst, Gingerbread and Glühwein waft intriguingly.

At the heart of the Christmas Market, from 10am daily, Meadow Croft will also be serving lots of mouth-watering, specialist German festive foods, such as Frankfurter, Sauerkraut, Waffles, Apple Strudel & Schokokusse, which the whole family can enjoy.

The garden centre will hold two evening events at the German Market information for these will be released on the website and social media, so do keep checking!

So join Meadow Croft this year to soak up the festive atmosphere and enjoy the whole unique and traditional German Market experience. (both the garden centre & restaurant remain open as usual) Meadow Croft provides free parking and can also be accessed via the local bus service running between Wickford and South Woodham Ferrers.

The nearest train station is Battlesbridge, whilst South Woodham Ferrers and Wickford stations are also nearby and have taxi ranks.

For more information, visit www.meadow-croft.co.uk/events/german-market or follow the event on social media @meadowcroftgc.

Meadow Croft German Market, Woodham Road, Battlesbridge, Wickford, SS11 7QU.

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26 www.theedgemag.co.uk

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given opportunity, they really do seem to be a dying breed.

So thank god that ‘NO TIME TO DIE’ will finally be out by the time you read this month's issue (yes, me and the missus pre-booked our tickets for the opening showing).

It's been a very long wait and expectations are getting higher every time a new clip or trailer is released, so I pray we aren't disappointed.

POLIT INCO ICALLY RREC T

“YOU ARE ONE UGLY MOTHERF@CKER!” The first time I heard that line was in 1987 from the classic movie Predator, starring the man mountain that was Arnie Schwarzenegger.

As a mere 12 year old lad, I never got a chance to watch it on the big screen at the time and had to settle in front of the TV at home and watch it on a grainy VHS recording. However, fast forward to 13th August 2021 and much to my delight, the local Odeon was showing a ‘remastered anniversary re-release’ of said nostalgic movie.

Now anyone that knows me, or has read my columns previously, doesn't need telling twice how much I love all things retro and ‘of a certain time’.

And after sitting there, in my ‘premier seat’, with a smile on my face for near enough a couple of hours, it got me to thinking all over again about just how great (and often cheesy) the 80s and very early 90s were for not only action movies, but also action movie superstars.

Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Bruce Willis, Mel Gibson, Steven Seagal, Jean Claude Van Damme; hell, even Chuck Norris and Jackie Chan, all in their prime.

It was a real golden age for high octane action stars and movies. You paid your ticket and you knew exactly what you were going to get every single time....ENTERTAINMENT. Oh yes, and with real stunts and not a sniff of CGI.

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I've always loved Daniel Craig and his interpretation of Bond, but for any of you that still aren't sure whether you like him or not, I’d thoroughly recommend you watch ‘Being James Bond’ on Apple TV (it's free to watch at the moment too). Because even I'd forgotten just how much stick he took when it was first announced he had landed the 007 role.

The press jumped on anything negative, from the colour of his hair (‘Blonde Bond’ - shock/horror) to him wearing a life jacket as he made the trip across the Thames on a lifeboat to his inaugural press conference (‘Wimpy Bond’). S’truth, they even tried to turn fans against him when he said, during an interview he had undertaken but two days after finishing the making of ‘Spectre’, when asked the question would he be making another Bond movie, he replied, "At this moment I'd rather slit my wrists than even think about making another Bond movie."

Yet both the press and those who were so very against him at the beginning are now so very sad that he will be asking for a vodka martini for the very last time.

It’s clear to hear, during the documentary, just how much he has loved playing Bond and is proud/honoured to have been a part of such a great British institution, and if the behind the scenes footage is anything to go by, it's also easy to see why he got so many injuries and felt so mentally drained at the end of making each movie, as Craig really does give it his all, plus a little bit more.

So perhaps there are some hero's left, after all.

All the best, G.P. x

Where have all the action hero's gone? You know the ones I mean, the ones that when shit comes to shove, you just know they are going to save the day, no matter what.

Apart from Tom Cruise still managing to do all his own stunts for the Mission Impossible franchise and The Rock flexing his muscles at any

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S N V

CHINESE CUISINE

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served personally to your table!

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The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:15:00

A woman was so desperate to give her kitchen an update that after baulking at prices of more than £600 online decided to dust off her drill and make an island from scratch for just £100 using IKEA bookcases.

What’s more, she was adamant that she’d "never been prouder" of herself after replacing her dated old dinning table with the cobbled together bookshelves.

With her heart set on an island, the 33-year-old looked around for freestanding options online, but was flabbergasted by the prices, which started at around £600.

"I’d always wanted an island,” she said, “but I didn't think I could ever afford one. I also had such a small space to work with. It was madness, really.”

Correct.

But after learning how to use a drill during lockdown, she was determined to find a way to make it work, so she searched online for a hack.

After finding what she was looking for, she gallantly headed off to IKEA with her mum and picked up one large Billy bookcase (£25) and a small one (£15) to act as the base.

On top of that she used a tabletop from the desk section (£25) and bought a couple of brackets to secure them all together with (£3 each).

Finally, she picked up three high stools which had been reduced from £19 to just £5 each at Sweden’s favourite furniture store.

At a separate hardware outlet she then forked out a further £28 on a cover for the back of the bookcases and some screws. All told, the materials for the ‘island’ cost her just £114.

Although she already had a drill, a screwdriver set and a sander, she also invested in a small jigsaw from a B&M store for £21.99 as she figured she “deserved it”, and The Edge will grant her that..

Her mum helped her with the initial building of the flatpack, but after that she got to work by herself piecing it all together.

And as you can see, readers, it’ll never been an ‘island’ in a million years, though fair play to her for producing something out of nothing and giving it a damn good go. Gawd bless ’er.

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EDGE readers of a certain age will no doubt have fond memories of watching the cartoon capers of the Wacky

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Races show of the late sixties during their childhood, which was inspired by the 1965 comedy movie The Great Race, starring Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis and Natalie Wood.

Strange as it may seem, there were only ever 17 twenty-minute episodes of the Hanna-Barbera show, although there were numerous spin-offs, mainly featuring the main character Dick Dastardly, who if they ever brought the cartoon series to life would surely have to be played by bronze antiques spiv David Dickinson.

There were 23 cars in total and The Edge is going to pay homage to some of them as they were quite brilliant.

MEAN MACHINE - Driven by Dick Dastardly and the fantastically sniggering Muttley (great name for a dog).

Dastardly was the archetypal moustache-twirling villain who never won a single race, due to his constant hijacking of events. So let that be a lesson to you, kids.

BOULDER MOBILE - Hacked out of pure stone and navigated by the excellent Slag Brothers, Rock & Gravel, on circularish wheels chipped out of rock. The Edge used to love those wooden clubs the bro’s held in their hands while they used to enthusiastically whack each other over the head with them. Great days.

CREEPY COUPE - Horror themed car driven by monsters The Gruesome Twosome, including a bell tower inhabited by a fire-breathing dragon. Not the most aerodynamic of shapes, but a pure pleasure to behold.

CONVERT-A-CAR - With the one and only inventor, Professor Pat Pending in the cockpit, who can pretty much transform his vehicle into anything. (The Edge always thought he was called Professor Patpending!)

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CRIMSON HAYBALER - Not an Edge favourite. Controlled, of sorts, by ‘The Red Max’ (speaks with a German accent). A sort of a car/plane hybrid, although it could only ‘fly’ for very short spurts.

COMPACT PUSSYCAT - Snigger, snigger (Muttley-style). Yes folks, it’s Penelope Pitstop, the lone female driver who was seemingly more concerned with her looks and applying lippy than ever she was winning races.

ARMY SURPLUS SPECIAL - Epic armoured vehicle with a roller on the front, ably marshalled by Sergeant Blast and Private Meekly (such great names). Fired cannonballs to make itself go faster!

BULLETPROOF BOMB - The famous Ant Hill Mob. A group of dwarflike gangsters (how did they think this stuff up?) who often used ‘getaway power’, which was ‘feet through the floorboards’ (i.e. running Flintstone-style).

ARKANSAS CHUGGABUG - Hillbilly ‘Lazy Luke’ & Blubber Bear, a timid, cry-baby of a grizzly. Luke manoeuvred the steering wheel with his bare feet while the Chuggabug is steam powered from a rickety old boiler.

TURBO TERRIFIC - Driven by long-chinned prick Peter (not so) Perfect, who is forever cosying up to Penelope Pitstop and ‘helping her out of trouble’. A so-called ‘gentleman racer’, almost Nivenesque. Strong, but vain.

Often boasts about his high-tech racecar, which then, on cue, promptly falls apart.

BUZZ WAGON - Rufus Ruffcut, a lumberjack, and able companion Sawtooth, a beaver (hey, let’s hear it for the beaver)! Their car is entirely made out of wood, featuring 4 circular saw blades for wheels, while Sawtooth is able to nibble through fallen trees (if such are ever blocking their path) at exceptionally high speed.

So there we have it, readers. The Edge does so hope you enjoyed this amiable amble down Memory Lane.

www.theedgemag.co.uk

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DEAKS

EDGE

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Ale

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ARMY & NAVY So it looks like they are finally making some plans for the future of the Army & Navy roundabout in Chelmsford. Why they couldn’t have done something during lockdown in order to reduce the impact on everyday road users I don’t know, but Essex Highways finally have a consultation open which focuses on two main options; a hamburger roundabout (which is a roundabout with a road through the middle of it) or a separate T-junction. They are calling the proposals a ‘Sustainable Transport Package’, which I read as meaning: Let us do everything we can to stop people driving into Chelmsford.

Surely most people are the same as me; would they really consider making that journey on a wet, cold November morning in a suit, or skirt, on a bicycle? And I certainly don’t think they’d be choosing to walk that distance either.

I live in Danbury and commute to Chelmsford around 3 times per week, as well as visiting our city centre around once a week. If we had the weather of Barcelona, then I would probably cycle the 5 miles a fair few times, but that still wouldn’t justify a new cycle lane.

For me, this will be the final nail in the coffin for the already struggling high street. I actually quite like going into our city centre every so often, to do a bit of shopping or for a spot of lunch. But sadly I won’t be doing that anymore if they make it impossible to drive there.

I wish Essex Highways would be straight with us and call these proposals what they really are, which is an attack on car users. If this was truly a consultation, then they would give us the option of either having cycle lanes and footpaths or not. Both proposals include them and neither proposal really sets out how they will deal with and support - vehicle traffic through the junction. If they are genuinely concerned about traffic at the junction, then why on earth did they allow a supermarket to be built there? Why do they keep allowing property with allocated parking to be developed in the city centre if traffic is a problem?

I have been trying to engage with those behind the proposals (mainly to see how many of them use the junction themselves) yet I get very little in return. I have also reviewed the consultation and can’t see anything that addresses my concerns. The main question I have is what is wrong with a flyover? The old flyover used to just about cope with peak traffic

demand and in a post-Covid world I anticipate that demand will be reduced as a result of agile working and working from home.

The bottom line is that this ‘Sustainable Transport Package’ will be a disaster and not used by any of the nameless people who are behind it. It will lead to increased delays in traffic for the benefit of but a few cyclists and will simply move the problem to somewhere else. I already have an alternative route that takes an extra 10 minutes each way, but it is a thousand times better than catching a bus.

And if it’s in an electric vehicle to boot, then that’s even better for the environment.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this, so do get in touch via the Edge’s Facebook page.

The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:15:00

As part of the proposals put forward, they are intending to extend the Sandon Park & Ride site as well as introduce a new Park & Ride site to the west of Chelms-ford. They are also intending to introduce new cycle lanes and footpaths as far as I can tell, but there is actually very little information on how the proposals will help drivers.

Which leaves the Park & Ride and I am not convinced that it has the capacity for everyone to ditch their cars and opt for the bus instead. I have used it a few times and I don’t think I would be prepared to commute via that method on a regular basis. I don’t find the experience particularly pleasant and it adds around 15 minutes to the journey each way, and that is if the buses are running on time. If the new proposals try to restrict car traffic going into Chelmsford, it will simply increase journey times, but I am sure most people will happily sit in their cars for an extra 20-30 minutes to get through the junction rather than get on a bus. That idle traffic will probably do more damage to the environment than any potential benefit of a cycle lane and footpath would deliver (especially as no one would use it).

I can order pretty much whatever I need online these days and there are plenty of other restaurants out there that I can drive to. Nor do I think I’m alone in thinking like this.

For me, the thought of going for a nice relaxing meal with the family doesn’t include having to get on a bus there and back.

www.theedgemag.co.uk

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ONLY JOKING! BANG

Young Sam, a strapping 17 year old, decides to join the army. So he travels to Aldershot to commence training.

When they are handing out the rifles, he is at the back of the line and they run out just before they get to him.

The Sergeant gives him a stick and tells him, “Just pretend it’s a rifle, son.”

So our hero goes running through the mock battle, pointing his stick and yelling, “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang. Bangidy, bang, bang, bang.”

The next week, they start bayonet training.

Once more, Sam is at the end of the line and again they run out just before they get to him.

The Sergeant tells him, “Just pretend that your stick has a bayonet at the end of your pretend rifle, son.” So Sam goes running through the mock battle with his stick yelling, “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang. Stabidy, stab, stab, stab.”

Well, the unit finished basic training and gets called up to go into real battle and our hapless hero finds himself eventually on a landing craft, hitting the beach.

Unfortunately, they have never given him a real rifle and he still has his stick and is wondering what in the heck he is going to do.

As the unit fights its way inland, Sam mindlessly points his stick at an enemy soldier standing on a hill and yells, “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang.”

To his amazement, the enemy soldier drops down dead. So he aims his stick at another and yells, “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang.” And that enemy drops down dead too.

So now our hero is running madly along, pointing his stick at any enemy soldier he sees, yelling “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang,” and enemy soldiers are dropping like flies.

Then an enemy soldier jumps out from a bush right beside him and, quick as a flash, Sam prods his stick a few times and yells, “Stabidy, stab, stab, stab” and his foe drops to his knees and then writhes into the bus hand dies.

Only then, an enemy soldier comes walking

slowly towards him along a path.

Sam carefully aims his stick at the soldier and yells, “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang.”

But the enemy soldier just keeps on coming and Sam begins to panic, but tries once again: “Bangidy, bang, bang, bang!”

Still nothing.

As the enemy soldier gets closer, Sam cries out, “Stabidy, stab, stab, stab.”

But the enemy soldier runs right over him, crushing him.

As Sam lies there, dying, he hears the enemy soldier muttering, “Tankidy, tank, tank, tank.”

HELL A guy dies and finds himself knocking on the doors of Hell.

Lucifer himself answers the door personally.

"Dave!” he says. "Welcome. We’ve been waiting for you. Now listen carefully, I’m letting you chose your own torture, but be warned, this will be at my pleasure, maybe even for ever. So do chose wisely.”

So Dave goes through hundreds of scenarios, but can’t decide which one, until he comes across a room where an old guy is sitting on a sofa, beer in hand, watching football on TV, whilst getting a BJ from a cheerleader.

Dave’s eyes immediately light up. "This is it!” he says excitedly. “This is what I want for eternity.”

"You’re sure?” says Old Nick.

"Hell, yeah?” shouts Dave with glee.

So the Devil strolls into the room, taps the cheerleader on the shoulder and say, "Okay, Mandy. Shift’s over. Looks like we’ve found someone keen to replace you.”

RECEPTION The hotel receptionist picks up the phone.

"Reception,” she says. “How can I help you?”

"This is Mr. Brown in room 112. You need to send someone up straight away.”

"Of course, sir. May I ask the nature of this request?”

"Yes. My wife and I have just had a blazing row and she’s threatening to jump out of the window.”

"Oh, I’m sorry, sir. But that is a personal issue and it’s company policy that we do not interfere.”

"But your window is stuck,” cries Mr Brown.

“Can you send someone up from maintenance?”

UP-MARKET I took a young lady I’d only recently met to an up-market restaurant.

She went through the menu like a laser beam and ordered only the most expensive dishes.

"Does your mum feed you like this at home?”

I asked her.

She said, "No. But then my mum wouldn’t be wanting a BJ later on either, would she?”

"Fair point,” said I. “Fill your boots.”

SPY An American CIA operative is in Moscow, trying to get some dirt on a Russian politician.

He finds him in a bar and walks in, dressed in Russian attire, pretending to be a Russian.

Everybody in the bar looks at him, but he keeps his cool. He orders a drink and walks up to the politician and says, “Greetings, comrade.”

But before he could even finish his sentence, the Russian politician says, “I think you are an American spy.”

The spy is alarmed, but being a highly skilled, trained, operator, he says, “That is not true. I am the proudest Soviet there is. I can sing the anthem more beautifully than any other man in

this joint.”

He then proceeds to sing the Soviet national anthem so melodically and beautifully that everyone in the bar stands up and cheers.

“Very good, very good,” says the politician.“ But I still think you’re a spy.”

The spy continues to keep his cool. “I am a historian,” he says. “I can tell you everything about this glorious country of ours”.

He then spends half-an-hour recounting the Revolution, the Great Patriotic War, about how superior Russia is in terms of technology compared to America, and makes a great argument about how communism is beneficial to society as a whole.

“Amazing. You are indeed highly skilled,” says the politician. “But I still think you’re an American spy.”

The spy is getting slightly frustrated now, but is still relatively unfazed.

He replies, “I am a good drinker, a true Russian.

So let us drink and see who comes out on top.”

The entire bar turns its attention to the politician and the spy, who are now in a drinking contest.

The bartender serves shot after shot of vodka and after about an hour of continuous drinking, the politician almost passes out, unable to hold as much liquor as the spy, to a resounding cheer from around the bar.

In the midst of all the whooping, the Russian politician climbs to his feet, smiles, and in a very slurred drawl, repeats, “You are good, you are so, so good. But I still think you’re a spy.”

The American, piss drunk, loses his cool and gives up. “Okay, okay. You got me. I am an American spy. But why have you been so sure from the moment I walked in here?”

The Russian politician replied, “You forgot to remove your MAGA hat.”

Q&A Q. What’s green and yellow and smells of bananas?

A. Monkey spew.

SEX MACHINE My ex-girlfriend told all of her mates that I was a sex machine. Yeah, how about that?

She actually said I was a “f cking prick,” but I * know what she really meant.

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So, from 1/9/21 the Department of Transport (DoT) has decreed that our unleaded petrol will become known as E10 - hands up how many of you knew that?

So what does this mean?

In simple terms, the amount of bioethanol in our petrol increases from the current percentage of 5% to 10%. The DoT maintains that the simple outcome is that this fuel produces far less Greenhouse Gases (GhG) upon combustion, but - and it’s an interesting ‘but’ - the DoT does accept that the new fuel may be less efficient and provide less mpg when we use the all new E10 fuel, so we’ll have to fill up our tanks more frequently, which will obviously cost us more (doesn’t it always?), producing less GhG (I don’t think so) - at best it’s a zero-sum gain (using more E10 is equivalent to using less E5).

I know, I know, it’s cockeyed, but if you use more of a less efficient fuel, it’s equivalent to using less of a more efficient fuel, so there’s honestly unlikely to be a significant reduction of GhG produced by motor vehicles.

So, who wins? Certainly not Joe Public. But guess what? The Treasury gets more money in fuel tax, as do the petrol companies, but certainly not the environment. The DoT maintains that: “E10 is a safe and reliable fuel, compatible with the majority of petrol-powered cars on the road today.” But the one overriding problem with E10 fuel is that it’s not suitable for older cars. “Almost all (95%) of petrol-powered vehicles on the road today can use E10 petrol and all cars built since 2011 are compatible.”

These are the types of fogies

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But if you own a pre-2011 car, or a beloved vintage car, where oh where does that leave you? Probably you’ll have to leave that car at home, in your garage, or parked on the side of the road - or sell it, if you can get anything for it? Fine if you’re getting rid of an old Porsche, Mercedes, Aston Martin or Ferrari, but not all old cars become classic icons that you can flog for thousands of pounds at a car auction. You’ll be surprised how much these cars can go for.

Sure, models like the McLaren F1, Ford GT40, Porsche 959 go for many millions at auction, but you’d be surprised at some of the values achieved by many ‘ordinary’ cars. At a recent car auction of vintage cars, I saw an original Audi Quattro go for £145,000, a Lotus Cortina for £65,000, a Smart Crossblade (a tiny car with no roof, no windscreen and two seats) sell for £16,000 and a Sunbeam Tiger go for over £75,000.

And guess what?

If you buy one, you’ll have trouble buying the fuel to run it with.

Probably the wildest car at the auction was a 6.2 Litre Dodge Challenger SRT Demon in an appropriate ‘satanic black’ producing over 800bhp. Crazy, or what?

But how are you going to enjoy your vintage/performance car? Sadly, it’s going to become increasingly difficult, as these older ‘polluting’ cars will likely be barred or restricted from road usage, so bang goes the pleasure and enjoyment of owning one.

Because not every vintage car owner wants to attend car rallies, or car shows, but merely wants to enjoy driving a car that harks back to simpler ‘motoring times’, if there ever really were any?

The side story at many of these car auctions is the sale of high end expensive vintage models bought by mystery bidders who bid by telephone and in many cases buy cars as an addition to their collections. It’s an interesting spectacle, with a bank of manned phones with the accredited officials talking to their clients, standing up as they bid against each other, sitting down when not bidding.

They’re up, they’re down, and the sums bid can be dizzyingly high.

Many of these expensive, rare, and amazing cars are locked away in private collections; but at least they’ll be wonderfully looked after, carefully driven and hopefully, in time, many of these collections will eventually be opened up to the car loving community.

But with the advent of E10 fuel, together with motoring hybridisation and electrification, many of these older, beautiful, and anachronistic models will continue to disappear from our roads, while road traffic will sadly become universally blander, quieter, and much more regulated.

We’re honestly going to miss the growl of those V8 and V12 engines and driving will become all the poorer for it.

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As a correlation to the declining white population, the number of people calling themselves ‘mixed race’ has grown in the last ten years by a staggering 276%. Yup, it’s true, love is blind. To skin colour at least.

Salutations once more from the west coast.

This month we’re going to take a look at the national census that takes place every ten years in both the UK and the US. It’s on the turn of the decade over here and a year later in the UK. So the British one has only just been completed in March 2021 and no results are available for at least another six months. But as the US version was completed in 2020, we now have some findings to talk about.

So how does all that relate to the UK? Well, let’s pose some uncomfortable questions.

That Emma Raducanu. The girl done good for Britain, didn’t she? Oh how we cheered her on.

Union Flags waving.

And those findings leave a pertinent point to be made about the UK’s future. More in a bit.

But she was born in Canada to a Romanian father and a Chinese mother. The family arrived in the UK when she was two years old. She’s the very epitome of mixed race, one world rootless humanity that the likes of Farage and Johnson (and specifically Theresa May) despise so much. Yet the day after her US Open victory there’s our Nige tweeting his congratulations because she’s British. But a few years ago he was complaining about Romanian immigrants and saying he didn’t want them as neighbours.

First though, a little learnin’ for yer. Unlike the UK census, the US version is decreed by the constitution and it has serious implications. For example, the number of seats your state gets in the House of Representatives is determined by population. So California, which has recently seen an exodus of people for various reasons (sky high house prices mainly) may actually lose a seat and be reduced to 52, not the current 53.

State funding is also affected. Everyone involved takes the census very seriously.

Similarly, Johnson was praising his fellow Brit for her tennis tournament winning skills, yet when he was Mayor of London, he said the only thing Romanian immigrants do is swell the number of people sleeping in the streets.

Over there, if memory serves correctly, the census is akin to your laundry. That is, something you have to do, but don’t give much thought to.

Having got all that background stuff out of the way let’s get to the interesting matters. The 2020 US census has thrown up some very intriguing facts. It points to how the future will look over here, and as we all know, for better or worse, what America does today, the UK will inevitably mimic a few years later.

By far the most significant thing the census has thrown up is that the ethnicity mix of the US is changing rapidly. In the ten years since the last census the portion of the population that identifies as white has declined by 9% and now sits at less than 60% for the first time. That one fact alone explains a huge amount of the appeal of Trump (and Farage, come to that).

There are certain white people that hate this shift and blame their declining dominance and influence on immigration. That may be part of the story, but there’s a separate stat that identifies another reason. White people ain’t having babies. The average couple now has 1.93 children. You don’t need a degree in computational

Hypocrites both. There’s a temptation to use a much stronger word, but we’ll leave it unsaid.

Insert your own favourite.

maths to work out that is going to diminish the herd. Or to be an economics nerd to know that someone has to pay the taxes in future that will provide pensions for us aged buggers.

Incidentally, for those of a certain age (that is, old) you may remember a routine that the great Richard Prior used to do in which he noted the declining white population and succinctly asked: “Aren’t you people making love any more?” Or words to that effect.

The central message of the US census, which, by extension will apply to the UK sooner or later, is that the world is increasingly multi-ethnic and multi-cultural and younger people are just fine with that. Us old farts each have a choice. We can either accept that fact, go with the flow and get ourselves accustomed to the changing dynamics and points of view. Or alternatively we can rage, King Canute like, at the incoming tide and vote for a past that was never as golden as it is portrayed and is a guaranteed path to irrelevance in the 21st century world.

Emma Raducanu represents the future, Johnson and Farage the past.

Which is it to be?

Our choice, Boomers.

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What's the ONE place we always think of, where we ALL want to go, but think its SUPER expensive?

Of course, it’s the Maldive islands, right?

You’ve no doubt seen overwater villas with pools and slides splashed all over your timeline on social media and you might well think ‘it’s not for me’ - but with over 300 island resorts I can honestly GUARANTEE there’s something to suit everyone in the Maldives.

Why? Because it’s oh so aesthetically pleasing on the eye for starters.

And it’s been purpose-built to meet the demands of people (like you) who go there to visit, meeting there needs and there wants, which is why the Maldives will forever be trending where travel is concerned.

And hey, what’s not to like?

Once you arrive you will be whisked away to your island in either a speed boat or via a seaplane, James Bond style, where you will be instantly drawn to the surroundings of the Maldivian islands. With so many styles to choose from, you can opt for a rustic, innovative, sophisticated, or laidback simplistic overwater villa. All of your favourite hotel brands most likely already have a spot there waiting just for you.

Oh and it doesn’t stop there. If you’re on an all-inclusive option, you can get so much more for your money. You can satisfy your heart’s every desire and have some amazing experiences, such as snorkeling safaris, jet skis, castaway island picnics, night time movies on the beach, dining on the sand etc. And for honeymooners, the Maldives is bang on the money with some added extra benefits, such as a romantic dinner on the beach, complimentary excursions and room upgrades.

As for me, I would love to get the chance to dine in one of the underwater restaurants, surrounded by sealife. How epic would that be? I also fancy staying in one of those bubble tents, tucked away in the corner of the beach, with a BBQ at night underneath the stars. Another treasurable moment would be a deep soaking tub, in an overwater villa, with floor to ceiling open doors, watching the sun sink into the Indian Ocean.

Without ignoring the fact that it can be expensive to stay in an overwater villa, there are many factors to the price, such as taking a seaplane or speedboat to your final destination etc. So, if you were to ask me what the true ‘Star of the Show’ is, I’d say it’s the beach villas and/or beach villas with pools. They are but a few footsteps from the sea itself, yet are conveniently nestled on the beach, offering the very best of both worlds.

As your travel agent, I would recommend a split stay, doing a few nights in a beach villa, before upgrading to an overwater villa, which is the ‘cherry on the top’. But as an even better travel agent to the norm, I would highly suggest a twin-centre stay, as opposed to simply a full stay in the Maldives. If lockdown has taught us anything, it has surely taught us to maximise what we have. So when planning a trip to the Maldives, why not add on a second destination as well?

It can truly be cost effective. Take Sri Lanka, for example. Start off in Sigiriya Rock, where you can climb and have breakfast whilst watching the sunrise. Then you could head down to Kandy, a city elevated above sea level with misty covered mountain tops. Then head over to Ella and stay in the enchanted treetops. You could even hop over to Yala National Park for a jeep safari. And once you have had your adventure, it’s then just a quick flight to the Maldives to....relax.

Where you can enjoy either a full stay in an overwater villa or get even better resort options by doing a split-stay in both categories. That’s because 3 nights in Sri Lanka would be equivalent to just one night in an overwater villa in the Maldives. And there are so many other twin-centre combinations that would give you something as spectacular as this.

How mad is that?

So why don’t we discuss your next getaway together soon!

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ANDREW ELEY

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Spooky season is already upon us, so it’s the perfect time of year to settle in and watch a scary flick or two. But which new horror releases are trick and which ones are treat?

MALIGNANT (currently showing in cinemas) Director and writer James Wan has built up an impressive horror resume over the past few years, bringing us Saw, Insidious and The Conjuring franchises, scaring up huge box office numbers and gaining a legion of horror fans in the process. So it was unusual that Malignant had no reviews prior to its release, which usually means a film is a dud and the distributors don’t want us to know it.

But apparently the real reason for it not receiving any reviews was to save the viewing public from critics spoiling its major plot twist. And boy, does it have a plot twist, which makes sticking around for it’s bloody and gruesome third act well worth the wait. Because honestly, throughout most of watching Malignant, I wasn't sure if it was a bad movie, a good movie, or a movie so bad it was good. The opening scene is so amateurishly done and the acting often so very awful that it came across like a cheap B-movie from the 80’s. But that, it seems, is the whole point.

The film pays homage to cheesy 70’s and 80’s horror flicks, rather than another serious supernatural thriller like the aforementioned titles. And once you get that, that it’s execution is purposeful, you can really sit back and enjoy the ride.

But the less you know about the plot going in, the better, so no spoilers here. Perhaps less classic horror and more haunted house attraction, it will make for some utterly entertaining scares this Halloween.

Verdict: Treat CENSOR (available to rent/buy) The 70’ and 80’s horror vibe continues with Censor, a wonderful British horror flick in which a film censor, Enid, haunted by memories of her missing sister, finds that her life starts to unravel as the line between what is real and what is fiction begins to blur.

This is a film that will definitely appeal more to those of us who grew up in the time period where concerns over ‘video nasties’ where a thing, and as a kid you used to ask your unwitting parents to rent

out a VHS film from the local shop because it had a cool picture of a man’s face melting on the front.

It’s hard to conceive it now, but there where plenty of banned films back then that we knew existed and wanted to see, but were unable to do so, legally, of course.

Even in the mid 90’s I was sweating at customs on my return trip from Amsterdam, not because I was smuggling weed or magic mushrooms in my holdall, but because I was in fact smuggling DVD’s of then banned movies The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Exorcist and A Clockwork Orange.

Films that didn't get re-released in the UK until 1999.

In Censor, Enid’s (Niamh Algar) job is to sit and watch video nasties all day, deciding what should stay in and what should be cut. She soon finds herself under the spotlight when an act of violence is blamed on a film she has passed and the pressure begins to take it's toll when she begins to believe that her missing sibling, presumed dead, may have turned up in one of the films she is viewing. It’s an intriguing set up and it uses its view into her world of film censorship to create a forbidding and creepy atmosphere. The ending won’t be for everyone, but if you take in the small details throughout, it’s beautifully poetic in the most terrifying manner.

Verdict: Treat CANDYMAN (currently showing in cinemas) The original Candyman was the first 18 rated movie I ever saw at the cinema, under age, back in 1992 at the old Odeon in Romford’s Liberty Shopping Centre (during the dark days when Chelmsford had no cinema of it’s own). Perhaps, for that reason, it holds a special place in my heart, but it is also a decent horror movie, based on a short story by Clive Barker. It is a re-imagining of the classic Dracula story; a man wronged whom in his grieve and anger becomes a demonic entity in death, looking to be reunited with his great love.

There are several (awful) sequels, but this new movie jettisons them to be the definite follow-up. Though unfortunately it also jettisons the mythology and gothic romance of the original, to be replaced with socio-political commentaries regarding police brutality and gentrification that is so heavy handed you just feel constantly bashed over the head with it. Even without that, the story is nonsensical and doesn’t explain why many things that happen happen. Which is a shame, because it’s beautifully directed and Yahya Abdul-Mateen (Aqua Man, The Trail of the Chicago 7) is a formidable screen presence, cementing himself as one of the most exciting acting talents in Hollywood.

Re-watch the original instead.

Verdict: Trick

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A very dodgy deal You may recall a little while ago I was selling my Hilux pick-up due to the fact that it didn’t particularly work as a family car and, apparently, selling the dog or the kids would have been frowned upon.

KiNGPiN

So, the Hilux went to a nice couple who live on a farm in Kent and I’m sure it’s running free and very happy there. Me? Not so much.

After a lot of research, I decided on a Kia Sorento and found one at a car dealership in Essex. Being the shrewd and streetwise fellow that I am, I did my research on the dealership as well and was pleased to see a veritable barrage of 5-star reviews on Autotrader from verified purchasers. So off I went and shortly afterwards returned with my shiny new (well, shiny second-hand) Sorento.

Despite my reservations about finally getting a proper car-type car, I actually really liked it. It was comfortable and handled well (though to be honest, after all the 4x4’s I’ve driven, anything feels like driving a sports car) and I was enjoying my time driving a ‘proper’ car for a change. Right up until the point the steering cut out while I was doing around 40mph on a slip-road, approaching a busy roundabout. Luckily, I was supposed to steer left around a grass verge, so I was able to drive off the road, rather than ploughing straight across the roundabout and directly into A&E. Understandably, this soured my appreciation of the Kia somewhat and I phoned up the dealership to experience some of this 5-star customer service, only to find that either the owner had gone off his meds, or those other reviewers had been smoking their own. I can honestly say that in my 40+ years I’ve never experienced anything quite like it. As customer service goes, it was so bizarrely dreadful it was actually funny.

As soon as I’d finished my first sentence, the guy launched into what I can only describe as an enraged rant. It was impossible! It couldn’t happen! It was my fault! I’d obviously been driving like a madman (to Tesco and back, I might add). He finished his diatribe by starting to tell me how “you people are all the same” and that all his customers tried to cheat him, at which point I’d had enough.

The older I get, the less tolerance I have, and where a few years back I might have tried to calm him down a bit, I just told him to stop talking shit, which admittedly didn’t go down too well, and he hung up on me. So I called him back, but he didn’t answer, so I left a message reminding him the car was still under warranty and five minutes later his mechanic called me to say he was going to come and take a look at it the following weekend.

The Cowboys Ride Into Town OK, so things were looking slightly more 2-star by now, although I still wasn’t happy. And I was even less happy when Bodgit & Leggit eventually turned up, although at least the absolute cobblers they told me was 5-star, I suppose. I mentioned the coolant reservoir was constantly empty, despite me filling it up several times, and that the car was obviously burning coolant and overheating. Their response was that it didn’t shaun@theedgemag.co.uk

The Kingmeister reports

matter if the coolant was empty, which anyone with a basic knowledge of engines or a working brain in their head knows is utter nonsense.

When I pointed out the potentially fatal nature of the issue and that I could have lost control of the car with the kids in it, their response was a wave of the hand and “Yeah, everybody has kids.” No mate, not everybody has kids at all, you muppet. More like: “We could all die in a collision when the steering cuts out”.

But he topped that off by downplaying it further and telling me the problem was: “When things like this happen, people panic. But all you needed to do was press the ignition again to restart the car.” Really? People panic when they completely lose control of their car? Tut. Pussies, the lot of ’em.

I should have gone to Swiss Toni’s At this point I began to doubt both their competence and their honesty and said I was going to take it to another mechanic. To which they replied that I shouldn’t do that as mechanics would often invent a problem as they were usually short of work. And on that bombshell I politely thanked them for providing no assistance or comfort whatsoever and sent them on their way. After which I immediately called my mechanic and booked the car in so that an actual professional could take a look at it.

It took my mechanic roughly an hour to find combustion gases present in the engine, which points to something like a cracked cylinder or dodgy head gasket, causing the car to burn coolant and overheat. More importantly, it pointed to a car I couldn’t drive until at least £1500 worth of work has been done to it, and like most of us, I didn’t have a spare £1500 easily to hand.

The warranty from the dealership had finished by this point and judging by my last little chat with them, I didn’t think they’d bend over backwards to help me out. And obviously I couldn't sell it on either, as I’m not that unscrupulous. So I was at a bit of a loss. At least I was until a bit of Googling turned up some interesting information.

Three Cheers For Consumer Rights Now, I didn’t know this until I did some research, so this might be handy for some of you if you’re unlucky enough to end up buying a car from Dick Turpin, but the consumer rights act of 2015

means that if you buy a car from a dealership and it develops a significant fault within 6 months, that isn’t wear and tear (such as brake pads etc). The dealer is legally obliged to repair, or replace, the vehicle. They get one chance to repair or replace it and if it isn’t satisfactory, then they have to refund you, minus a certain amount based on the mileage since purchased.

Apparently the act has gone through a number of updates as, surprise surprise, the dealers were quick to find any loophole they could to get out of admitting they’d sold a lemon, and more importantly, having to pay for it. So the law now defaults to assuming the vehicle was sold in that condition with the onus on the dealer to have to categorically prove that it wasn’t, which is extremely difficult, if not impossible, in the majority of cases.

I did ask my mechanic if I could have caused it, but based on the mileage done since purchase (I basically drive to Tesco and back once every 2 weeks these days), his response was a definite: “Not a chance.” So, I got all my facts together, found a nice template letter provided by WhichCar? magazine, which nicely sets out the salient points of the consumer rights act pertaining to second-hand motor vehicles and the dealers legal obligations, filled that in and emailed it to the dealer I bought my Sorento from, along with a very polite covering letter that clearly conveyed the sentiment of: ‘Dear Dickhead, you sold me a lemon that almost caused an accident. Get it sorted or I’ll see you in court.’

It honestly took roughly five minutes before I received a response saying they wanted to confirm receipt of my letter and that they both took it very seriously and would look into it immediately.

Legal Proceedings Now, the dealer can still come back to me and tell me to sod off, and while I obviously don’t want to go down the route of legal proceedings, I will if I have to. And if the dealer does decide he doesn’t want to do what he’s legally obligated to do, I’d be very surprised indeed if any such proceedings don’t go my favour.

But while I’m confident that I’d ‘win’, it’s still another headache I don’t need, so I’m hoping that this all gets sorted out without having to involve the courts, as I have neither the time nor the inclination, and unless the dealer really is a bell-end of biblical proportions, I’m sure he’ll feel the same way.

So while I did briefly enjoy having a ‘nice’ car for once, I think I’ll stick to 10-year+ old Toyota 4x4’s from now on, as you basically have to drive those off a cliff for them to stop working.

I know one thing for sure though; if they do agree to repair it, I’ll be getting my mechanic to do the work, so that I don’t find a new head gasket held together with Sellotape or bloody Play-Doh.

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Max Headroom’s

BIZARRE NEWS BABY & THE BULLDOG

Did you read the one about the baby and the bulldog?

Just look at this photo. This English bulldog has seemingly taken to being more than just man’s best friend. He’s also taken on the role of being big bro’ to the smallest member of the family.

So it makes you think, doesn’t it, that maybe dogs aren’t as dumb as they look? Nor perhaps kids, for that matter, either?

After less than a year spent in tandem, these two are apparently almost inseparable. They love taking naps together, playing together, and sharing licks, kisses and cuddles together.

And get this. Apparently when the baba is taking a nap in its cot, the bulldog will go over and lie down next to him and have a nap too. Isn’t that just adorable?

English Bulldogs seem to be very chilled dogs and don’t even mind when kids are rolling all over them and jumping up and down on their testicles and stuff.

Meanwhile, the dog is treated like a true family member, due to his big brother status and protector of his ickle bro’.

Baba likes to check the dog’s paws, fiddles with its ears, and sometimes even puts his hand in the bulldogs mouth without ever getting bitten.

“He’s such a happy and chilled out dog who hasn’t got an aggressive bone in its body,” says its thankful owner. “He truly seems to have such never ending patience and the two of them genuinely seem to have such an incredibly strong bond. It will be lovely to see my son growing up with his fluffy bestie right by his side.”

DENTIST EXPLAINS WHY YOU SHOULD NEVER EAT BREAKFAST BEFORE BRUSHING YOUR TEETH

In what will probably be the last year of The Edge, let’s truly celebrate fogeyism by all you 65+ readers sending in your snaps, as this could be your last chance to appear anywhere that’s ‘full-colour & glossy’.

The more interesting the photograph, the better, so try to use a little imagination. And hey, if you’re chairbound, well then, you’ll have to use even more imagination still, won’t you? But that doesn’t exclude you. No way.

So get your asses in gear and get those photo’s sent in. The Edge is looking forward to seeing ’em!

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A dental therapist has uploaded a video onto TikTok explaining to her 39,500 followers that it's crucial to always brush your teeth before eating breakfast. This is because doing it the other way around can damage your pearly whites.

She explained: "You shouldn't brush your teeth after breakfast, always before. There are two reasons for this. When you eat breakfast your mouth becomes acidic, so what you are doing, when you brush your teeth after breakfast, is brushing the acid into your teeth, which wears away the enamel. Whereas brushing your teeth before breakfast helps protects your teeth from anything you are about to eat."

Her video has been viewed over 819,000 times and garnered over 36,000 likes.

However, some folk were frustrated by the idea as they didn't want their breakfast to taste ‘minty’.

What’s more, not all dentists agree on this point. Some dentists say it's fine to brush your teeth after breakfast, as long as you leave it for a period of 30 minutes after eating/drinking.

But who’s got 30 minutes to spare first thing of a morning?

Headroom Advice: Brush your pegs both before and after your breakfast!

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MOTCO

Man on the Clapham Omnibus

PINTS NOT NEEDED If we were playing one of those parlour guessing games, this topic would make for a very interesting scenario. It would go something like this…“You think I am Greek, but I am not. Well, perhaps just a little. I might have been Turkish, but then again, only possibly, in parts. In my modern form that we all know and (secretly) love, I am, in fact, 100% German.” In Germany, ‘this thing’ is part of everyday life and is simply treated as such. It is a product that is available absolutely everywhere, especially in cafes and bars and (where I sometimes visit) at my bank’s head office in Munich, just as it is all over Germany.

There is no secret shame or embarrassment to this product that must be hidden behind a smokescreen of bravado and lager to enjoy it. Instead, you simply walk up to the seller and ask for it, even at lunchtime, even when sober. Readers of a certain vintage may remember the barber asking if sir would “like something for the weekend?” Which, of course, is not an opportunity to respond, “Yup, 50 quid would help, as I’m out on the lash with the boys tomorrow.” (N.B. Younger readers, that sentence about ‘something for the weekend’ is your look up task for this month.

It’s a hangover from less enlightened times.) But back to our mystery product and some of you may have already guessed, especially if the next question in the parlour game was “Can I eat it?” that the answer would be, “Absolutely....with garlic, or chilli, or just a little lemon juice, if you prefer.”

I am, of course, referring to the famous Döner Kebab. Our late night friend and guilty pleasure that apparently can only be eaten after several pints of lager with Dazzer and the lads, or after a flagon of chardonnay with Shazzer and the lasses. So firstly, yes, it is of German descent.

That is shocker number one. While shocker number two is the fact I have eaten one in the last few days, during the hours of daylight, without an accompanying bucket of lager. So there we have it, my confession laid bare to one and all.

I am currently in Norfolk, as a stranger, thus removed of all inhibition. As broached earlier on this year, in my article entitled ‘Rinsed’, I am, in fact, not writing this as the once regular October ‘Poolside Observations’ from a sunlounger afar. No, we decided, for several reasons, not to go abroad this autumn, so are getting a second wealth enema here in sunny North Norfolk (and it has been very sunny). So it’s more a sort of rural rinsing. Think of Midsummer Murders involving your bank account; it’s countryside carnage on your pocket. (“Enough, Motty! Get back to the döner. Signed, EE.”) Before anybody questions the location against the food choice, in a large village called Heacham, there sits the splendid Flame Grill establishment, purveyors of fried fish products and assorted charcoal grilled fancies. And it was there, when presented with a choice of cod and chips or a large doner by the counter staff, that I threw caution to the wind. I looked around, there was nobody in sight, so no-one to judge or condemn me. And the words simply spilled out of my lips and said, “Yes, please. I’ll have a doner kebab with chilli sauce.”

Thereafter followed by absolutely no regrets whatsoever.

So let’s do the educational bit, shall we? Because we can’t have people thinking this magazine is just frippery and fun, after all. There are some disagreements about this, and as with any cultural based food, a few often tend to claim ownership. It is the transformation from local product

to the global version that I am focusing on. The döner kebab likely arrived in Greece in the 1920s with the population exchange between Greece and Turkey, later transforming into gyros. A century later, after its invention, it was introduced and popularised in Istanbul, most famously by Beyti Güler.

Now there’s a lot of folklore surrounding the origin of the döner kebab, with multiple individuals and cultures disputing responsibility for its invention, as already mentioned. For instance, Germany went through a period, during the 1960’s, of inviting Turkish immigrants to work in their country as ‘guest workers’ to assist with the country’s rebuild. This lead to Turks becoming the largest ethnic group of non-German origin living in Germany. Which has lead many to believe, nay insist, that the döner kebab was actually first created in Berlin by a Turkish guest worker named Kadir Nurman (see below-left), back in 1972.

A moment in history that is not, but ought, be roundly commemorated.

After all, if it were the UK, a blue plaque would surely be in order?

Nurman sold his first döner kebab in West Berlin across from Bahnhof Zoo. At 26, he emigrated from Turkey to Stuttgart in 1960, as part of the aforementioned workforce initiative. He arrived in Berlin initially to work in the printing business, but quickly noticed that there weren’t many substantial options for busy German workers looking to eat ‘lunch on the go’. So a printer he began, a legend he became.

Nurman derived his idea for the döner kebab, as we know it today, from the typical meal of Turkish royalty, which consisted of meat skewers served on a plate with rice and vegetables. But he wanted to make this tasty dish more portable, so he simply wrapped the ingredients in a kind of bread known as durum, and the modern döner was born. Naturally, this neatly packaged story is often disputed, but I for one am buying it.

Others who claim to have first created the döner include Nevzat Salim, a Turkish man who alleges that he sold the first ones in 1969 in the town of Reutlingen, out of a stand operated with his son. Mehmet Aygün, a fellow Berliner, also says he created the first döner in 1971. And, for the record, a guy called Ahmet Loom has also thrown his hat into the ring.

Some say that the döner was incepted in Turkey, but the chairman of the Turkish Döner Production in Europe is vehement that the döner was, indeed, invented in Germany. Variations certainly do exist in Turkey, while many will attest to the fact that the döner has existed in different forms (and under various names) in the Middle East for ages.

When all’s said and done, there is a kind of snobbishness to the whole humble döner situation. While everybody is happy to tell you they once had a shish kebab, which is the prettier skewer version that it’s all based upon, are these people brave enough to tell you that they’ve also had a döner without the obligatory boast of a gallon of alcohol first? No, they probably won’t, is the honest answer. But why? What’s the problem?

Surely they can’t taste that bad? Just think about this set of statistics for Germany alone. Döner kebab sales reach a staggering total of over 3.5 billion euros each year, while 600 tons of döner meat are consumed each day, making it one of the most popular fast food items in the country. Which is also a hell of a lot of garlic and chilli sauce to contend with.

The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:15:01

Many years back, my (young) son and I were enjoying some ‘bloke time’ and I jokingly told Mott Jnr that we were going to have elephant foot for tea. So later on, we’re in the kebab shop and he’s looking up at the meat revolving around the flame on the spit. Clearly his young mind was weighing it all up, because it could, in all probability, really have been the foot of an elephant (if you really think about it). And he decided it to be true and told everyone at school on Monday morning what he’d had for tea over the weekend.

Great thing is, they all believed him too. Playground legend, my lad!

Yours aye,

shaun@theedgemag.co.uk

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TOTALLY TRACIE AMAZON TRENDING So we are now slowly drifting back to working in office and closing the Zoom cameras. But will life ever really return to the pre-pandemic days?

Covid has changed so many things.

One colourful and rather loud lady in the office I work in returned this week and proceeded to do the rounds, telling us all that she had just got back from her ‘Staycation’. I immediately wanted to shout and scream and tell her that it is not even a ruddy word. “You stayed home and went for days out. Big deal.” But no, she was adamant she had been on a relaxing staycation, despite the endless traffic queues everyday and stopping at motorway services stations to chew on stale, curled up baguettes.

Honestly, we are such stiff upper lipped Brits that we have to be seen to have gone on ‘breaks’ and ‘holidays’, only we never go on ‘vacation’ as that is a US term. Yet ‘Stay’ and ‘Vacation’ have such polar opposite meanings, so how can ‘Staycation’ ever be a thing it is not? It’s just made up twaddle.

Then again, a lot of the Covid Rules only exist for the good of who they serve. I recently asked to view a house - and this has already happened to me several times - where the agent asked to see ‘Proof of Funds’ before they would allow it.

Generally their excuse is: “We only want those who are serious about buying to view in order to cut the risk of Covid inside our seller’s house.”

Yeah, yeah. ’Course they do!

Unscrupulous agents merely want to know your purchasing power so they can often push for a higher offer in these crazy house buying times. So I confronted one agent about this, who laughed and said, “Tracie, you are far too streetwise for me. But you can’t blame me for trying, can you?”

Covid has honestly taken on a whole new meaning for the word ‘Spiv’, which was a traditional name for a person who made money out of a crisis during the East End blitz. Only now we have the modern day ‘Covid Spivs’ in so many areas of our lives to worry about.

But if you have no concerns about the roof over your head, you also have the ‘Covid Deliveries’ to deal with. We have all got used to buying things

Page 30

online. I buy the most bizarre things on Amazon at 3am in the morning.

There are several types of modern day delivery. The one that bashes on your door at 7.00am like a bailiff, or the other one who is cheery, happy and tells you their life story and how many deliveries they’ve already done and have left to do and you honestly cannot get rid of them. In order to delay you further, they insist on taking a photograph of you smiling into camera as you hold your package and then they tell you how to pose: “Move your head to the left, show a bit more skin” when all I want to scream is: “Let’s get this over and done with.

Why don’t I strip naked for you - only cut the crap and give me my parcel!”

Finally, you have the worst ones of all. It flashes up on your phone that your parcel is 29 stops away, so you get all excited and start to prepare (i.e. you refuse to move more than 3 feet away from the window). You keep staring at your phone as the number decreases. You are parched.

You want a cup of tea, but know the moment you put the kettle on they will turn up. So you jig about, wanting the loo. You stand there utterly transfixed, waiting patiently like a child for the ice cream man. Only then you blink, because you have been too scared to for the past 30 minutes, and it flashes up on your phone: “Tried to deliver, but no one was home!” So you scream, you wail, you vow never to buy anything online ever again, until you wake up at 3am to a ping from Amazon Trending must haves and away you go all over again.

Will we ever return to normal? Every conversation seems to focus on the ‘jab’ these days. Those that have not had it proceed to tell those of us who have that we are mere ‘sheep’. I simply tell people to mind their own business. I don’t care if people believe I am being controlled by the Illuminati the Illuminati will be more at risk of dying from boredom if they are watching me. But what I will say is that I know of two antivaxers who spouted that Covid was a lie, only they both got Covid a few weeks later and both ended up in hospital.

Even dating sites have got in on the act. Some list those who have been jabbed and those who are prepared to wear a mask on a date. Whereas in my day, that kind of thing was reserved for those ‘kinky fetish sites’, only now it’s apparently all the rage.

P.S. Kim Kardashian showcased her winter wardrobe this week. Say n’more. Coming (allegedly) to a Primark store near you (the ‘pauper version). Still, I guess it will serve as a Halloween Outfit!

tracie123@aol.com

The Edge would have really liked to have seen this one get over the line though, as it ought to have been the final piece in the City jigsaw, before Pep abandons ship in the summer of 2023 and ‘the noisy neighbours’ plunge back down the Premiership like a stone to become mere mid-table mediocrity all over again.

That’s not likely to happen, is it?

Who knows, for who can hold a candle to Guardiola?

Thomas Tuchel, most certainly, for he achieved in but five months at Chelsea what Pep has yet to do in over 5 years at City, which is to lift ‘Old Big Ears’, as apparently the European Cup is often fondly referred to.

But surely Kane deserved his ill-fated move to City, from a purely footballing point-of-view? The chance to play with better players and form a proper, loving ‘bromance’ with Kevin De Bruyne.

166 Premier League goals in 246 games for Spurs in the top flight (at the time of writing). Jeez, that’s almost 1.5 goals per game. Not only that, he provided the most ‘assists’ last season too, which is practically unheard of for a ‘leader of the line’, especially for a team that finished seventh, a massive 24 points behind champions City.

So what now?

Well, apart from his seemingly dodgy ankle, Harry clearly looks after himself. Therefore, The Edge sees him as a sort of English Robert Lewandowski (33) type of chap who ought to still be playing at the highest level certainly for the next 5 years.

Truth be told though, Harry will see this as a missed opportunity.

But then he shouldn’t have signed that lucrative long-term contract that Spurs dangled in front of him, should he.

Either way, no doubt he’ll be chomping at the bit to put one over on Guardiola at the Etihad on Saturday 19th February. Wallop! “There you go, Pep. That’ll teach you not to sign me.”

Sad thing is, and it’s a cliche, but football offers but a very short career, although untold riches to the very best ones these days, without a doubt. But The Edge could actually visualise Harry in Pep’s starting XI on a regular weekly basis, whereas for all he cost them, can the same honestly be said of Jack Grealish?

Early days, but the jury’s still out on that one.

Yet wouldn’t it be poetic justice if Spurs somehow amazingly finish above City this season and Nuno does indeed pull a rabbit out of a hat (The Edge just knew he’d have his beard coiffured the moment he landed the Spurs job).

Because it’s not about the money for Harry; it’s about the glory.

You hear former strikers, like Shearer and Lineker, absolutely purring when they describe balls played into the box from out wide by the likes of Beckham and Trent Alexander-Arnold.

They’d have “liked to have gotten on the end of that”.

And Harry would too, where De Bruyne is concerned.

Hopefully there’s still time...

MATCHES

GOALS

ASSISTS

PENALTIES

2020/21

35

23

14

4

2019/20

29

18

2

2

2018/19

28

17

4

4

2017/18

37

30

2

2

2016/17

30

29

7

5

2015/16

38

25

1

5

2014/15

34

21

4

2

Or, he could simply stay at Spurs forever and be known as the greatest servant the club ever had in their proud history.

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The Edge October(1003) 2021/10/01 20:15:01

Why not refurb your existing conservatory?