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The PM newsletter - posted here because it may never reach you.

Comments

1. At 11:54 AM on 23 Jan 2007, Aperitif wrote:

   I tell you what Eric, if you do wear the lipstick and manage to entertain the bored, we'll nominate you for The People's Choice Oscar, eh?

   What are you going to sing? If you're looking for ideas, I suggest "Pretty Vacant".

2. At 11:55 AM on 23 Jan 2007, Big Sister wrote:

   Oh dear, Eddie, is Lord Coe anticipating a hard time from you? And who is this Oscar chap? Can I be nominated by him? And what is the connection with wallpaper?

   When you say you talk to the bored every evening, are you referring to your listeners? If they were bored, would they listen? Or are you referring to other Boards?

   And are you coming the the Blog Beach to help us to scavenge for good manners and attention to the laws of the land? Or are you trying to get some free make up for your appearance in Higham Downs?

   Does this council disapprove of your newsletter, it being free? Will they boycott you (and, thereby, us)?

   Oh, and finally, Eddie, if I were to take up you offer of adopting a child, could you provide advice on what is now fashionable in this sphere? I wouldn't want to make the wrong choice, you know.

   And, after all, this is all on a Public Broadcasting Station.

   Thanks, Eddie, I'll listen in.

3. At 12:00 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Belinda wrote:

   Why are Oscar nominations so important? I can't think of anything more boring than hearing about a bunch of largely talentless self-obsessed millionaires, 5500 miles away, being handed a golden naked bloke with alopecia.

   Oh wait, yes I can: listening about the Big Brother 'scandal' where ill-educated yobs prove to be exactly that.

   You're not putting Marc up for adoption already are you?

4. At 12:13 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Eddie Mair wrote:

   THE NEWSLETTER HAS ARRIVED! (How did THAT happen?)

5. At 12:15 PM on 23 Jan 2007, wrote:

   "Oscar nominations, which are seen by industry insiders as a guide to who might win an Oscar"

   Love the oxymoron-ism of it!

   Like saying that marriage is the only cause of divorce, since statistically 100% of all divorces begin with marriage...

   The noble Lord was on 'Today' this morning. Obviously put the hard hat on for that interview and forgot to take it off.

   All sick? Of Celebrity Big Brother stories?

   I can forecast any potential response from the Ch4 board member. 'Nothing to do with us Guv'nor'. They dare not slay the sacred cow, because of the Moo-lah it brings into the channel. Money talks, responsibility walks.

   I'm unhappy with free newspapers. We get two a week rammed half-way through the door. If we're not in to remove them it broadcasts the fact that the house is unoccupied to any potential burglar out there. If it's raining then they channel rainwater through the letterbox. They are full of rubbish, which includes the local news. Might as well get the delivery kid to take them straight around to the local Recycling Centre and cut out the middle-man.

   Si.

6. At 12:31 PM on 23 Jan 2007, wrote:

   OMG the email arrived!!!!
   Congratulations.

   Re free newspapers. I am fed up with having the two London freebies constantly thrust at me as I walk around the City of London. Total waste of paper and print as far as I am concerned.

   And as for those scavengers on the Dorset beach - I think that just shows what a sad materialistic society we have become. They've no use for these things but they'll steal them and try to sell them - and then complain bitterly when they get caught and prosecuted! Ha! How would they like it if we all came around to their garage while they were on holiday, broke in and started leaving with their stuff on the grounds that it was just lying around?

7. At 12:37 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Moz wrote:

   Hooray - have received the newsletter in my inbox... and all before 5pm!

8. At 12:40 PM on 23 Jan 2007, wrote:

   It reached Derbyshire in less than an hour. That's only slightly slower than the delay we get on Satellite compared to Terrestrial. Something is clearly working - just in time for a new system!

9. At 01:03 PM on 23 Jan 2007, The Stainless Steel Cat wrote:

   What's Lord Coe up to then? Digging up people's 100-year-old allotments to make way for a very temporary path leading to an Olympic venue?

   Angry Cat...

10. At 01:05 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Big Sister wrote:

    12.58 in Sussex. Which is nearer to the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Newscentre than Derbyshire. Okay, I know it doesn't work that way ....

11. At 01:29 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Joe Palooka wrote:

    SSC (9)

    Angry tin cat...your'e right...what a silly little sebastian he is.

12. At 02:02 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Frances O wrote:

    Gottit!

    This beach thing seems to be catching on, doesn't it? Except that when I was last on Ther Beach there were no 1200cc bikes lying around - but no police, either. And on that other beach, a distinct lack of camels.

    But, Eric, I must pick a nit with you. We, at any rate, we froggers, we're not bored. Mostly.

13. At 02:17 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Gillian wrote:

    Chrissie the Trekkie (6) I totally agree with you. They're not only lifting items off the beach, they're battering the containers open to get more loot. I heard a woman on Today who has lost her entire house contents, which were in one of the containers. The police were far too slow in securing the area.

14. At 03:22 PM on 23 Jan 2007, The Stainless Steel Cat wrote:

    Gillian (13):

    I don't think we should criticise the police in this case. I think all the criticism should be directed at the greedy and unscrupulous thieves who are not only breaking the law - and it's been explained on most of the media that this *is* against the law - but are creating an environmental problem to rival the oil leakage from the ship.

    And yes, I said thieves. Not "beachcombers", not "salvagers", not "scavengers", but thieves. I think that has to be made very clear.

    ...I'm very angry today, aren't I?

15. At 03:33 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Gillian wrote:

    SSC (14) Yes you are....what did I say?! You've got me quaking in my boots! I know they're thieves....I didn't say they weren't! Oh dear, I need to lie down on the beach....oh, no.....bad word!

16. At 03:59 PM on 23 Jan 2007, The Stainless Steel Cat wrote:

    Ooh, Gillian, I didn't mean to sound like I was getting at you!

    It's the media who seem to love playing up this "Whiskey Galore" image of cheeky locals confounding the big, bad authority figures, rather than simply saying, "Today several several hundred people were observed committing acts of theft on a Devon beach."

    I'm not for a moment angry at you, nor do I think I could be at any Frogger.

    I *am* angry at those people who think it's their right to get something for nothing.

    I *am* angry at the media for not doing enough to condemn this lawbreaking and portraying it as a bit of naughty fun.

    I *am* angry at the Olympic people for - as I say in another thread - bulldozing a set of allotments that have given boundless pleasure to Londoners for over a hundred years, just to build a path and some transient buildings for one month in 2012.

    I *am* angry at the Olympics (again) for sucking up so much lottery money that grants for projects around the country are being curtailed just so that London can have a month of sport in five years or so.

    Sorry for ranting everyone, but sometimes the self-interest of certain parts of the human race just makes me really depressed.

17. At 04:14 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Aperitif wrote:

    A little creamy milk for you, SSCat, and a gentle stroke. There, there, remember, there may be badness out there but there is goodness too. Hug, x.

18. At 04:19 PM on 23 Jan 2007, wrote:

    I'm with the Cat! Puss for PM!

    
    xx
    ed

19. At 04:28 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Mark Intime wrote:

    Steady on Stainless; you'll burst something venting all that anger. I've heard that stroking pets is a very good way of relieving stress, but you may not wish to go down that route as the report said that dogs were better than cats.
    I must admit to feeling rather sorry for the innocent residents of Branscombe who have had their village invaded by the marauding hoards - that is hoards of thieves, police and press; a most unwelcome mix!
    If you would like to take a trip to the frog beach later (I hear it is blissfully unadorned with ransacked contaianers) I'll make sure there's something alcoholic put aside for you.

    Mark

20. At 04:33 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Big Sister wrote:

    Couldn't agree more with Stainless - the Devon beach scenes are quite appalling and an indictment of a sector of today's society. And I don't, in this instance, care at all if I sound like Disgusted from Tunbridge Wells.

    I'm quite sure this behaviour would have occurred ten, twenty, thirty, or however many years ago - it is the baser side of human nature, after all, which will always be there - but the difference is, as others have suggested, that the media in times gone by would have called a spade a spade - it is theft, barefaced theft.

21. At 05:37 PM on 23 Jan 2007, The Stainless Steel Cat wrote:

    Aperitif:

    Purrrrrr!

    I've calmed down a bit now, hearing just now about the "damp squid" cheered me up!

22. At 05:55 PM on 23 Jan 2007, wrote:

    ?
    

    You batter your head against the door until you begin to wonder whether it is a door at all. Suddenly it opens, and you find yourself flying through space. The superstores’ green conversion is astonishing, wonderful, disorienting. If Tesco and Walmart have become friends of the earth, are any enemies left?
    ...
    These were the most arrogant of the behemoths. They have trampled their suppliers, their competitors and even their regulators. They have smashed local economies, broken the backs of the farmers, forced their contractors to drive down wages, shrugged off complaints with a superciliousness born of the knowledge that they were unchallengeable. For them, it seemed, there was no law beyond the market, no place too precious to be destroyed, no cost they could not pass to someone else.

    
    --George Monbiot
23. At 06:25 PM on 23 Jan 2007, wrote:

    Apparently lots of goodies have been snaffled by organised sales folk, otherwise known as thieves? If the insurers don't pay out, the rightful owners will recover the money by raising their margins on their other stock, and the large scale looters will affect us all including themselves.

24. At 07:19 PM on 23 Jan 2007, Frances O wrote:

    Ed (18) - it took me a few seconds to realise that that wasn't about the HOUSE of Commons...