Abnormal service resumes

by Derek Belm

Now that I have been released by my Russian kidnappers, I shall be cracking of the old whippet hereabouts.

A newspaper and newspaper blog without stories is like the Tory shadow cabinet – completely useless.

So I’ll be getting the staffage producing the printed version forthwith, of not sooner.

I’ll also be proverbially kicking the guest bloggers upside their bottoms to produce some written things for here.

The Shouty Villager will return bigger, smellier, stronger, more irrelevant, thicker, 100-times more absorbent and as ignorant as ever as soon as I’ve found whereabouts the guest bloggers are lurking.

Its gonna be immense.

The Shouty Villager Business Awards – July ‘08

by Hugh Janus

I’m stepping up to the plate this month as our editor-in-chief and all-round tosser Derek Belm is still on his holidays.

The July monthly winner of The Shouty Villager Business Awards ‘08 is a bit of a throw-back to a bygone age where things were simpler and sharper.

Orla Quivers are manufacturers of arrows for the archery industry.

Previous suppliers to the likes of invading armies in olden times, Orla Quivers remains a family-owned business which can trace its roots back to Robin Hood and his Merry Men.

The firm’s big break came when it supplied the robbers in green with their arrows and it hasn’t looked back since, even opening a small showroom in Birmingham before it was demolished to make way for a canal.

Run today by Eugene Orla, some production methods have moved with the times but the company still hand-crafts each and every arrow that leaves its village workshop. Here are some arrows being made, yesterday:

When asked for his response to winning the monthly business award, Eugene Orla said: “The Shouty what? I’ve no idea what you are talking about young man.”

Once I had cleared up the confusion he added: “So what’s in it for me?”

I’ve sent a memo to Belm suggesting we only pick winners who have actually heard of our newspaper next time and who aren’t so rude and stupid.

But well done to Orla Quivers anyway as its too late to pick another business.

The Villager Debates – BikerFest, good or bad?

This is the inagau…inaugr…inaggr…the first of The Villager Debates which we hope will become a regular fixture.

We’ll be asking two of our guest bloggers to discuss the pro’s and con’s of a particular issue or subject.

First up we’ve got a clash of female proportions as Henrietta Scuttlers and Laura Norder go head to chest (Henrietta is considerably taller than Laura).

The issue at the heart of this first debate is BikerFest ‘08, the annual celebration of motorcycling culture that is inflicted upon the village. BikerFest has plenty of supporters, but most villagists believe it is an excuse for lawlessness.

Let the debate begin.

Question: Is BikerFest good for village life?

• YES:

by Henrietta Scuttlers

Of course BikerFest is good for village life.

All those big, rough, hairy men in tight leather is the highlight of my year.

• NO:

by Laura Norder

I’m not surprised my flighty opponent is in favour of an event like BikerFest.

But look beyond the muscle-bound young gentlemen with big powerful machines between their legs and this festival is nothing more than an excuse for excessive lawlessness and rampant hedonism.

I’m not against such activities, but I believe they should be confined to the privacy of one’s own country estate and not shoved into the faces of the unsuspecting and bewildered villagers.

Last year’s BikerFest was the straw that got on the camel’s hump as far as I’m concerned.

We had to endure four days of misery as motorcyclists and their cronies rode rough-shod through the peace and tranquility of our sleepy village.

I’m indebted to The Shouty Villager’s photographer, Bob Bastud, who braved speeding motorcyclists, brawling women and nakedness (his own) in order to capture some images of the criminality and debauchery that BikerFest inflicts upon us every year.

Here’s some die-hard bikers speeding through the centre of the village:

Meanwhile this painted lady flaunted her sexuality and loose morals whilst draped over the back of her husband’s motorcycle (Bob spent an hour photographing her):

There is an on-going criminal undertone to proceedings at BikerFest.

This is due to the presence of notorious motorcycle gangs such as Chain Males, the Grippers and the Tin Lid Tyros.

They inevitably clash during the festival, challenging rival gang members to yard of ale drinking contests, dominoes, badminton and a break-dancing competition.

Last year one of the chief Chain Males himself, Archibald Lickings, made an appearance and proceeded to ride around the village at break-neck speed startling my horse:

For these reasons and many more I’ve yet to make up, I believe BikerFest should be banned.

My anti-BikerFest stance has nothing to do with the fact that the Norder family estate used to play host to BikerFest, but the organisers moved it to the Bedknobs & Broomsticks when my Pa-Pa demanded £50,000 a year for use of our grounds.

BikerFest is wrong and has no place in the village.

Tell us what you think. Who wins the debate?

Summer health tips #4 – keeping kids happy

by Oona Flucker

One of the greatest health problems of summer is children.

Having them around the house instead of safely enclosed in school for most of the daylight hours can provoke feelings of high anxiety and mounting stress even the most placid and well-meaning of folk.

If the weather is foul then such problems can be multiplied. Even in fine weather, keeping children occupied (and so your own health and well-being in check) can still be a trial few really have the stomach to endure.

I have yet to be cursed with children – although my husband, Rev Timothy, being a man of God, wants a mighty brood – so I am largely free of such summertime stress.

But that doesn’t stop me from dispensing sage words of advice alongside ointment, dressings and personal hygiene products at my village pharmacy.

My best advice is to give children work to do, but to make them think it is actually a game they are playing.

I have prompted two fine examples this very week.

The first involves Veronica Harmon-Icker’s little lad Irwin, a hyperactive little s**t with no f***ing manners and a tendency to stick his fingers up his own a***e at the drop of a hat.

I knew Irwin had a penchant for mechanical things, so my solution gratefully taken up by his high-maintenance and overly-sexed mother was to send him off to the local garage to “play” at being a hydraulic ramp.

Here was Irwin, yesterday, helping the mechanics to fix a small truck:

Everyone’s happy. The mechanics save wear and tear on their usual hydraulic equipment, the little gob-sh**e Irwin gets to play all summer and not f***ing terrorise everyone with a mile-and-a-half radius and his mother gets to lounge about all day like lady f***ing muck.

I’ve also dispensed some fantastic advice to Eleanor Handwasher, who has no fewer than six of the f***ing little s***s to look after in the summer.

There not all her’s, obviously, some of the b******s are actually b******s belonging to single mothers and she’s their child-minder.

Anyway, I knew the Army was doing some work at the firing range on t’other side of the hills at Hints and they were struggling with some mine clearance.

So my solution was to get the six puking little w*****s to practice stilt walking on the mine fields. Here they were, yesterday, before they landed on the wrong spot and made everything go f***ing boom-boom!

It did make me laugh when Mrs Handwasher asked if this was a “fairly dangerous game for young boys to be playing?”

She seemed suitably reassured when I answered: “Does the f***ing Pope s**t in the bl***y woods?”

So, remember, keeping children occupied this summer is my number one health tip.

Give them something to do that will tie them up (literally, if you want) until it is time for bed. Better still, pack them off with grandparents somewhere far away and enjoy the f***ing hot weather and some peace of mind.

Happy holidays everyone!

Pitfalls of penning Bonekickers with a villagist twist

by Mostyn (off of Dinsmore & Mostyn)

Father has been bitten by the writer’s bug.

After watching my dilatory twonk of a PA (that illiterate oaf Scotty) typing away at his little PineappleMac (or somesuch contraption), Father decided that there must be money to be made in writing words.

His aim, therefore, is to write the Christmas special of quality BBC adventure drama “Bonekickers”, before next year submitting a screenplay for a big Hollywood film featuring Harrison Ford, Russell Brand and Anne Diamond… so he got his faithful old quill out of the drawer and began scribbling.

But first he knew he must start at the bottom (ever a man of humility) so he decided to write some scripts for Dinsmore and I to use in our everyday lives.

Father’s rationale is that the great existential thinkers such as Alfred Camus and Jean-Paul Gaultier believed in predestination, i.e. the idea of “life’s script being pre-written for us by God”, so therefore Father has decided to get up early every morning and write all of our dialogue for the day.

Dinsmore and myself both greeted this idea with much scepticism, as we feel that being two rather verbose dandies, our naturally sharp and saucy banter – all conceived spontaneously, I rushen to add – is the talk of the town. Observe if you will a conversation Dinsmore and I had only last Monday morning:

• MOSTYN – Good morning, Dinsmore.
• DINSMORE - Good morning, Mostyn.
• MOSTYN – Isn’t it a lovely day today?
• DINSMORE – Yes – it is.
• MOSTYN - Yes.
• MOSTYN – That’s a nice cravat, Dinsmore.
• DINSMORE – Thank you, Mostyn.
• DINSMORE - Have you been drinking, Mostyn?
• MOSTYN - Yes, Dinsmore. Heavily.

You see? Pure quality banter; witty and yet philosophical. You could not ever script better.

But anyway, Father forced Dinsmore and myself to go into Fennybough village with our scripts and get on with our lives as normal, only with better dialogue (his words).

Unfortunately, Father’s currently literary style owes much to the only three written documents he has ever read: the screenplays of Goodfellas, Pulp Fiction, as well as a script from series three of ‘Til Death Do Us Part, so Dinsmore and I did not go down so well in the parts of the village with better-priced properties.

For example, by the church, Reverend Rubbs was so taken aback by our fruity expletives that he had to have a little sit down, while Mrs Berlingo of the WI had a heart attack – as did Deputy Mayor Cecil Pimmingot (he of the delicate sensibilities), who died.

Then things took a turn for the even worse when Dinsmore and I suddenly remembered that we had agreed to address the annual meeting of the Fennybough Liberal-Ethical Equal-Rights-For-The-Incestuous Association in the market square on that very afternoon.

Association members arriving for the meeting:

Not wishing to deviate from my script (due to Father’s threats to cut my allowance if I did so) we continuized as scripted, with it all going down well until I declared (as written) my fervent dislike of “those darn motherf***ers”  – in line with a similar quotation made by Samuel L Jackson from one of the aforementioned films.

Suffice it to say, there was a riot. And I was arrested, a victim of trendy-wet political correctness once more.

Dinsmore managed to avoid being detained by the relevant authorities, due in no small part to his (admittedly exceptional) Tony Benn disguise, and he was last seen taking a not-unattractive mother-and-daughter pairing from the Association out to elevenses.

Sometimes a script editor can be a valuable asset.

So until my liberation, I urge you: be careful out there…

Abandon children, not examinations

by Sandra Stallyon

I am refreshed, revitalised and invigorated from a short holiday with an old staff member and friend.

I visited eastern England’s premier coastal village, Tepid-next-the-Sea, to spend some quality time with Elspeth Grinder who is now head mistress of the local school there.

Ms Grinder came to me as a recently qualified Mathematics teacher in her early 20s and over the course of her first year under my head mistressship, all the liberal ideas, enthusiasm for teaching and empathy with pupils had been well and truly beaten out of her.

By the time her second year at my girls’ school came around she had been moulded into the perfect teacher – one part tyrant, one part prison guard, several parts bigot and the rest of the parts deeply anti-social.

She rose to the lofty heights of deputy head mistress under me. 

Many thought her a shoe-in for my position when I retired. But Ms Grinder decided she could no longer stay at the school without my formidable and inspiring presence and took up the opportunity to move to Tepid-next-the-Sea and become head mistress at the Robert Maxwell Memorial School.

It is quite timely that I should return from Ms Grinder’s warming hospitality and villagist teaching methods to news that some schools in the brightly-lit city of Birmingham are preparing to abandon A-Level examinations.

Once again they have got it all wrong – they should not abandon exams, they should abandon the pupils.

A lesson could be learned from Ms Grinder. She announced that the main summer examinations would be taken on July 15 and arranged for all the pupils to be gathered together in the main gymnasium.

Here they were, back then, having been assembled with Ms Grinder looking suitably self-satisfied:

Having ensured all windows were blocked, the doors were bolted and the walls sound-proofed, Ms Grinder locked the pupils inside the gymnasium.

They are still abandoned inside and will remain so for the duration of the summer and will only be released in September when it is time for them to return to their studies.

Ms Grinder has arranged for the school’s caretaker – Alf Plopp – to provide rations of water and basic foodstuffs twice a day through a security hatch (apart from the fortnight he’s away on holiday himself, kite-surfing in the Ascension Islands).

This seems one of the most imaginative, progressive, intelligent and inspiring pieces of educationalism I’ve seen since I retired.

I believe it would also bring an end to the endless debate about the quality and standards of testing and examinations such as SATs, GCSEs and A-Levels.

Simply abandon the children to fend for themselves.

What greater test could they have?

Only the strong-willed will pass and by the time they emerge blinking into the real world at 18 (or 21 if I had my way), they will be prepared for whatever life might throw at them.

Congratulations Elspeth Grinder. I taught you well.

Food on the move

by Thick John

Exciting news! If you can stomach that kind of thing, obviously.

In my absence from the village, one of our local take-aways has introduced a delivery service.

Whilst we were all getting drunk and disorderly thanks to the flighty sort Henrietta putting Belm’s money to good use, local eatery Pie-hole’s (owned by Stevie Pie-Hole) has added a new string to its culinary bow.

It will now delivery your grub, free of charge (apart from a £10 handling fee) to your front door.

Here’s the delivery chap, yesterday, getting lost whilst trying to deliver some food to someone:

Pie-hole’s specialises in what it calls “urban fusion food with a twist, reflecting the rich diversity of multi-cultural Britain”.

All I know is they don’t even do chips, so I’ve never had any of their grub.

I did try and test out their delivery service, but as Pie-hole’s is next-door to my boozer (the Bedknobs & Broomsticks, the UK’s only Angela Lansbury-themed public house) they refused.

Tossers!

[Please note: There will be no sports coverage this weekend as we're still waiting for Frostbite Phil to be extradited back after an unfortunate incident with some beach volleyballists and an ice-cream seller's entire stock of white chocolate Magnums.]

Return of the bloggists

by Henrietta Scuttlers

The Shouty Villager’s blogs have been unusually quiet this past week or so.

I should explain.

Prior to his departure for a working holiday tour of Europe with his wife (Mrs Belm), our esteemable editor-in-chief Derek left me with a “kitty” valued at several hundreds of pounds.

This was to pay for any unforseen expenses during his absence and to fund any legal fights incurred by the writings on this here blog.

So I decided to treat all my fellow bloggists, plus a few hangers-on and a nice couple I met at the bank to a holiday with the kitty money.

Here we are, yesterday, returning from our little jolly jaunt away.

Normal bloggism will resume tomorrow.

I only hope no-one writes anything illegal before Derek returns as I’ve spent all the money he gave me – and he’ll come back to a few hefty IOUs we incurred along the way too.

But we had a nice hols, so that’s OK.

Until tomorrow…

A lesson in basic economics

by Edward Framley

I have no knowledge whatsoever of financial matters, the stock market and suchlike, because when you’re as independently wealthy as myself there is absolutely no reason to fret.

But I won’t let that stop me from expressing an opinion or three about what is euphemistically described as a crunching credit crisis.

It hasn’t stopped others from spewing forth their ignorance either, so I feel almost honour bound to toss my pre-decimalisation coin into the bowler hat.

Clearly those who aren’t lucky enough to have a family fortune squirrelled away acruing untold riches in interest are having a tough time of it.

An old lady chum of mine, Cynthia, married one of these City types and informs me the world financial markets have moved from a state of mild unease to total “brown underpants time” hysteria in a very short space of time. She even says her husband is off his golf at the moment, such is the extent of his concern.

So, I think, it must be bad out there in the world of high finance and low moral fibre.

Indeed, my long-term neighbours (the Mucklers - Fred and Olivia) recently called by seeking advice on how they could bolster their pensions.

Once they explained what a pension was, we chatted about their options over a few ports.

The upshot was that both Fred (who is 71) and Olivia (a sprightly 66) should consider some part-time gainful employment to top up their hand-outs.

I’m pleased to say they took my advice.

Fred is currently acting as a satellite installation, positioning himself on hilltops and in wide open spaces to enable campers and caravaners to get a satellite television signal. Here he was, yesterday, braving the elements at Kingsbury Water Park, earning a honest day’s crust:

Olivia, on the other hand, is putting some of the skills she has picked up at our local villagist equivalent of the WI to good use.

She has set herself up as a mobile florist, attempting to sell flowers from the basket of her bicycle as she cycles all over the world. She picks her stock up from verges and at the roadside and I believe she has so far made 93p in new money.

Here she was, yesterday, on the outskirts of Boise, Idaho, in the United States of America, shortly before she was chased out of the state capital as a suspected terrorist when someone noticed she was “dressed funny and spoke with an odd accent”:

So, all things considered, a successful experiment in surviving the global financial catastrophe looming large over most of you.

You have to accumulate in order to be able to speculate on just how bad others must be feeling whilst you sleep soundly safe in the knowledge that your supply of money is never going to run out.

A lesson in basic economics that many would do well to learn.

A fitting tribute to a villagist icon

by Laura Norder

It is not often that the political divide is successfully straddled by a particular issue or individual.

There are usually too many differences of opinion to bring about consensus, such as the thorny subject of nudism on public beaches.

However, one person who continues to be all things to all people and who has a habit of uniting foes and friends in harmony is undoubtedly Lady Thatcher, the blessed Margaret who we all probably agree is far more worthy of sainthood than a short nun from the colonies.

Although she wore different political colouring to myself, I and others of my persuasion recognised a kindred villagist spirit from the very early days of Lady Margaret’s career and felt a certain affinity with what she was trying to achieve for this grand nation we live upon.

So news this week of proposals to grant the Ladyship a state funeral has exercised the finest political minds of a villagist bent too.

We met, yesterday, at the Sketch Club to discuss how we can pay our own suitable tribute to a former great leaderess.

Although the Sketch Club is a gentleman’s only establishment (and hurrah for that) I have been granted honorary male membership in order to attend such meetings as yesterday’s. I’m still not allowed in the main clubhouse, so the meetings invariably take place in the Sketch Club’s sauna.

Here we are, yesterday:

I’m out of shot as I’m demonstrating the pose I believe Lady Thatcher’s statue (if we were to commission one, obviously) should strike, whilst members of the villagist political elite discuss what I am doing.

It was a fruitful meeting. As well as the statue idea (mine, with a thought that I recreate my pose for Henrietta Scuttlers to fashion a noble looking piece whilst being watched by the political elite), we’ve had numerous other suggestions.

These range from commissioning a new Lady Thatcher song, to renaming the village Thatcherville.

The one we probably won’t return to is the annual tribute we paid for almost a decade after Lady Thatcher was dethroned.

Dress Like a Coal Miner Day proved extremely popular, but there are many who now believe that time has moved on and we should not repeat such a celebration and should find something more modernistic.

I will keep you all informed on whatever decision is made.

But be rest assured that it will be a fitting tribute to a woman who single-handedly engineered society to meet her own needs and whose legacy can still be seen in the state this country currently finds itself in.

Lady Thatcher, the thinking villagist’s politician, we will salute you.