Event # 1: Croydon Councillor Quits After IRA Past Revealed
One of Croydon’s Tory Councillors quit in spectacular fashion last week after a punter at one of Council’s public hearings outed her as being an ex-IRA provisional. Apparently the smug gentleman in question referred to Councillor Maria Gatland by her maiden name mid-rant, then corrected himself by saying he was confused after reading a book she’d written under that name when she was a young’un (cue smirk from punter). Turns out Councillor Gatland was up to her neck in it with an IRA gun-smuggling crew in the ‘70’s and wrote a tell-all book after she broke up with one of the men in the crew and left the whole nail-bombs-‘n’-Guiness thing behind. She go bye-bye very quickly once that little doozy came out. Good to see the Tory Party maintains a strict policy of checking the CVs of all those applying for Party membership, ey?
Event #2: TeenyBoppers Riot At Croydon's Fairfield Hall
Any of you heard of “The X Factor”? If not, it’s basically yet another tv programme from the same cookie cutter as the rest of the “Australia ’s Got Emotionally-Challenged Teenaged Singers Who Can’t Write Their Own Material”-style "talent" shows. Anyhoo, The X Factor producers put on a live show at Croydon’s Fairfield Hall (across the road from my work building) Monday night, and we could hear the screaming of the crazy-eyed fans from the 18th floor at work (through double-glazing) when their favourite plucked'n'primped demi-gods turned up.
The X-Factor producers were out front whipping the crowd into a frenzy (they're not top of the pops in The Bill's books right now as a result), but Fairfield had sent out flyers suggesting the show was free when in reality tickets were needed. Management had also underestimated the power thousands of temporarily-insane young moppets could generate when stimulated by too much advertising, bland pop music, hormones and Red Bull, and kept the doors shut as the keening masses watched They Who Cannot Think For Themselves enter the building. Cue ugliness.
The underage mob got their first unwanted taste of what a Sepultura moshpit is like as large sections of their ranks turned into those zombies from 28 Days Later and tried to storm the barricades in a desperate attempt to keep their Objets du Lust in sight. The paltry handful of security guards on duty immediately got on the blower and ordered up some bacon ala kevlar, who, upon seeing the rabid Children of the Corn they were facing, immediately called in THEIR crowd control specialists. Much of the video footage shot by cameramen silly enough to get near the front of this puzzling mass of insanity looks strangely similar to scenes of starving Bangladeshis or Somalians at the UN food trucks – just with shinier hair, better clothes and more tears.
The damage: Epileptic fits, broken arms and ankles, stomach injuries, asthma attacks, panic attacks, lost berets, hurt feelings, smeared eyeshadow etc etc. A heavily pregnant woman had to be extricated from the tidal wave (one might ask what the hell she was doing there at all) suffering bruising and severe loss of dignity. A handful of screechers had to be taken to hospital suffering sundry broken nails and ruffled bouffants or thereabouts. Apparently some sections even Threw Down and got stuck right into a good old-fashioned, Barbies-and-lip-gloss-at-ten-paces brouhaha, as “feral girl-gangs” got Naomi Campbell on each other with their diamante-studded nails and Hello Kitty phones. Outstanding. If only I’d had the binoculars, I could’ve provided the BBC with a slap-by-slap commentary from my desk.
One thing of note I did see from my lofty perch was the giant, menacing secondary wave of uniform-clad local schoolgirls sweeping across the plaza at 4pm like a phalanx of blazer-wearing Berserkers to fling themselves bodily into the heaving pile of flesh and North Face overcoats that was the "line". They've been described by many in the crowd as being foaming-at-the-mouth wild animals and the cause of much of the trouble. Where's Jamie Oliver when you need him?
Rumours also abound that perhaps the X-Factor judges engineered the madness to dilute the bad press from a contestant's kinky s*x tape that's just been released (much to the delight of Clearasil-dodgers nationwide). A course of action which would be like trying to make up for a 20-vodka-shots-and-arrested Friday night by having a Saturday night doing lines of coke off a public toilet seat in Kings Cross. Probably not going to improve your situation.
News from me - not much. Certainly no inflammatory crowd-baiting or Mick-outing, that's for sure. Went out to yet another centuries-old pub and then a swanky new nightclub last Friday night for a friend's birthday, but sadly there were no papparazzi-worthy moments of hedonism or controversy to be had. I did, however, meet Shane Warne's Biggest Fan In The World - he was my taxi driver on the way home. I didn't get a word in edgewise. Not one.
Cold here, -2 degrees last night, and everyone's dog-miserable or sick or both, dagnabit - so give me the lowdown on some funny stuff that's been happening in your vicinity. Or I'll tell people you all belong to a cult that sacrifices cuddly kittens to Steve Urkel.
Hope you're well!
