May Contain Notts: April-May 2006

Words: Al Needham
Thursday 01 June 2006
reading time: min, words

First slab laid in the new Market Square, German riot policeman nips over, mass hugging in the Arboretum, fried chicken place employs a bouncer

fc09b6ee-ca0c-48c7-994b-5d1111c2447b.jpg

April 1
The first slab in the all-new Market Square is laid by a singer from New Zealand. Of course, if they had just laid one massive slab, it’d be finished by now.

April 8
A German riot policeman visits Notts to learn how to deal with football hooligans. If you think that’s bad, wait until next month when the LAPD, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Robocop come here on a fact-finding mission.

April 12
Certain pubs in town are forced to crack down on underaged drinkers by refusing to allow people who look under 25 in without ID. That’s Cliff Richard fucked if he wants to come in the Social, then.

April 17
In your face, Hull! Nottingham is announced by an insurance company as the city with the worst burglary rates in the UK, beating our bitter statistical rivals into second place. Hang on a minute? didn’t our police force disband their drug squad a few years ago so they could devote more resources to burglary? It’s all the students’ fault, apparently, because they can’t be arsed to shut a window every now and then.

April 20
New stats reveal that there were 5,000 fewer crime victims in Notts than the year before, with 19% fewer break-ins. But drug offences went up by a whopping 23%, and there were 8% more chinnings

April 21
LeftLion interviewee Whycliffe is on the cover of the Post for being in court on three begging charges.

April 23
Dr Raj Chandran, the former mayor of Gedling, successfully sues the arse off the BNP for mistakenly fingering him as being stuck off for sexually abusing a patient. They’d got the wrong man entirely and got absolutely rinsed.

April 27
Evening Post quote of the year; "The odds of getting a hole-in-one are pretty high. But the odds having one witnessed by a member of Westlife must be phenomenal."

April 30
The first ever mass hugging event happens in the Arboretum, when 150 randoms cop a feel of each other. Have these people not been to Jumpin’ Jacks on a Saturday night?

May 4
The Times’ resident art-ponce Waldemar Janusczak comes to town to look down his nose at underclass vermin like you and I in a piece masquerading as a review of the British Art Show. “Is Nottingham the ugliest city in Britain? Phoney ye olde taverns, its supremely high gun rate and the gangs of exiled smokers puffing up and down Maid Marian Way…Even John Betjeman would be revolving in his potting shed in the sky at the spectacle of Nottingham Castle’s contemporary suburbanness” Oh, go and and have a another inhale of Tracey Emin’s pissy knickers, you dezzie twat.

May 5
Absolutely nothing changes in the local elections (mainly because they’re not being held in town), apart from a slight shift to the Tories in the shires. Unlike other, more backward places I could mention, the BNP does absolutely arse all in Notts. Ha!

May 6
An emotional rollercoaster of a day for Nottingham clubs. Forest lose 1-1 to Bradford, meaning no play-offs, while Notts County hammer Bury 2-2 to ensure they stay in the Football League.

May 8
Jermaine Jenas, who used to ponce about in the Lizard Lounge with in a T-shirt with his own name on the back according to my mate, is named in the England World Cup squad. No-one really knows why.

May 9
Europe’s orangest MEP, Robert Kilroy-Silk, calls on the German government to bar Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from the World Cup for threatening to destroy the world, or summat. Ahmadinejad, who always preferred Trisha in any case, can’t be arsed to reply.

May 10
A woman from the Meadows is charged with getting the arse after her separated husband forgot their wedding anniversary and persuading two other blokes to jump out behind a bush at him waving guns about, like you do.

May 11
USA Express Chicken in, erm, Ilkeston becomes the first takeaway in the country to be ordered to employ a bouncer on the door. They should do that at my local chippy, I heard three sausages got battered there the other night.

May 12
A gang of Bestwood window-lickers get sentences of up to twelve months for causing £10,000 worth of damage to a bus.

May 13
Two stabbings occur in town on the same day. Two of the bastards! If any national newspapers are reading this, I have already taken out the trademark on ‘Knifingham’.

May 17
Gedling MP and new Home Office minister Vernon Coaker admits to having a go on a spliff or two when he was at Uni 32 years ago. The world does not end and civilisation does not crumble.

May 19
A new star enters the local firmament, as Lea, a model and pigmentation artist with 30M (yes, M) breast implants enters the Big Brother house. Approximately two seconds later, some internet spod allegedly finds pics of a Percy Filth nature of someone who allegedly looks a bit like her allegedly doing rude things. Allegedly. Why is she going in there? “For the money and fame, just like the others”, she said. Goo’ on, me duck!

We have a favour to ask

LeftLion is Nottingham’s meeting point for information about what’s going on in our city, from the established organisations to the grassroots. We want to keep what we do free to all to access, but increasingly we are relying on revenue from our readers to continue. Can you spare a few quid each month to support us?

Support LeftLion

Please note, we migrated all recently used accounts to the new site, but you will need to request a password reset

Sign in using

Or using your

Forgot password?

Register an account

Password must be at least 8 characters long, have 1 uppercase, 1 lowercase, 1 number and 1 special character.

Forgotten your password?

Reset your password?

Password must be at least 8 characters long, have 1 uppercase, 1 lowercase, 1 number and 1 special character.