NLJune2007

Hi Everyone

And welcome to the June Newsletter. Things are starting to get busy here in sunny Mevagissey now that the summer season is getting underway. Shame about all the rain, though we shouldn't complain as we seem to be getting less than some other places in the country... which makes a change.

As always we have heaps of new goodies for you to peruse..... but this month we have an unprecedented 5 pages full of new stuff. So, just follow the link below if you have a spare hour or two.

What's New

We would like to thank all those who have sent Bazz messages of support, for his efforts to give up smoking. The good news is that he has now gone 7 weeks without a cigarette..... And still no one has been murdered....... or even badly beaten so far.... Although Rose had to dissuade him at one point, from taking a group of badly behaved children for a swim in the harbour. Then there was the incident where Bazz came very close to assaulting a police officer who was yet again giving him a hard time about unloading outside the shop.................. but that is a long story......... What? You mean you want to hear it?..... OK, It's about time for the monthly rant section anyway.

Now don't get me wrong here, I don't have a problem with the police usually. I know for the most part they are decent people doing a dangerous job often under very difficult circumstances. But every now and then someone lets the whole side down.

Those of you who have visited us will know that there is a small forecourt at the front of the shop which we use to put out various items of stock and our advertising board etc.
For those who haven't visited please see picture below.

Now this forecourt is jointly owned by the shop, the restaurant next door and the flat above the shop, we all have a door opening onto it and we all have a shared right of way across it. It is therefore private property and not a public right of way. Nor is it part of the public highway. We quite often park our van on the forecourt when we arrive in the morning to unload new stock and we often park there in the evenings to load up rubbish sacks etc. One morning we found a plastic envelope stuck to the windscreen with an official police warning inside which said that we were illegally parked and if we did it again we would get a parking ticket. We just thought someone was having a joke and threw it away. A couple of days later I caught a policeman standing on the forecourt writing out a parking ticket for our van. I was very polite and asked him what he was doing. He said "You have been warned about parking here before so now I am going to issue you with a parking ticket for obstructing the public highway" I explained to him that it was private property and not part of the highway and that the only thing I was obstructing was my own shop doorway. He said "My sargent has told me to clamp down on parking outside this shop. And the council are not happy about you putting all your stock out here and blocking the public footpath" At which point I kind of lost it...... You know those moments when your mouth starts running and a bit of your brain is thinking "You shouldn't be saying this... you are going to get into so much trouble unless you stop right now" but your mouth just keeps on going........... My response to him ran something like this (I have omitted some of the choice expletives so as not to offend our younger readers. "You can tell your bloody sargent that this is private property and he can shove his poxy parking tickets where the sun don't shine. And you can tell the bloody council that this is not a public right of way and if I chose to, I could build a bloody wall all the way round it to keep the bloody police, the bloody council and any stray pedestrians out. In fact you are standing on private property right now without the owners permission and without a warrant and if you don't leave immediately I will call the police and have you arrested for trespassing." The poor bloke just stood there looking gobsmacked. I was sure by this time that he knew I was in the right because I had just sworn and shouted at a policeman and I wasn't spreadeagled across the bonnet of my van wearing handcuffs.... So I pressed on "Well don't just stand there looking at me, go and arrest some real criminals and stop harassing law abiding citizens going about there lawful business."

Since that time there has been no mention of parking tickets however if I have as much as a millimeter of tyre overhanging the edge of the forecourt the police give me a hard time.

Now you may feel that I went off the deep end here but this event was hot on the heels of another incident which made my blood boil....... A few months back we had a quite a bit of trouble where we live in St. Austell. Cars were being vandalised on the road, graffiti was being sprayed everywhere, eggs were being thrown at windows regularly and no end of things being stolen from gardens. and funnily enough there were three teenage lads who always seemed to be in the vicinity when anything happened. No one had actually seen them do anything but it was becoming obvious that there was more than coincidence involved here. One of our neighbours called the police to complain about the problems we were experiencing and to their credit, the police sent someone down to talk to residents in the area about the problem. They called at our house (but we were at the shop) and they spoke to our friend Ian who was doing some building work at the house for us at the time. He told them that we had experienced similar problems and that we were so frustrated with the situation, and it had been going on for so long, that if we actually caught the culprits in the act we were likely to deal with the matter ourselves. We then received a call at the shop from a police woman...... Now did she call to say that they knew who these lads were and that they were going to keep an eye on them..... No..... Did she say they would put on extra patrols in the area....... NO (not enough resources... too busy harassing people for parking on their own property).... What she had called for was to give me a good telling off for making threats towards these lads and to tell me what a dim view they took of people taking the law into their own hands. And if I caught them dismantling my car, I should leave them to it and call the police and let them deal with it. She also tried to tell me that because we had bats and pentagrams painted on our van, that we were asking for trouble and implied that we deserved everything we got. So when did they pass a law that said "those who paint bats and pentagrams on their van are fair game for vandals." Suffice it to say that one or two hard words were spoken to these lads including "baseball bat", "Axe", "Death", "Blood" etc.. (mostly by our mate Ian who caught them up to no good in our back garden) and the problems seem to have gone away since then. No thanks to the local police.

And here it is... The van the police think is so inflamatory, it deserves to be attacked by vandals and should be given bogus parking tickets at every oportunity.

And then there is oranges....... What has happened to oranges..... ASDA seem be stocking things that look like oranges which come in packs ambiguously marked as "Citrus"... Some of them peel like satsumas but taste like lemons. Others have half inch thick peel and taste like grapefruits.... What is going on here...... This has to be some sort of GM thing going on. It's getting harder and harder to buy good old fashioned oranges anymore. Then there are the strawberries. They all seem to be massive things which don't taste of strawberries anymore... now tell me they are not GM.

You just have to be soooo careful what you eat these days.

Then there is Tesco who keep telling me that they have taken all my favorite foods and reduced the salt and the fat in them..... Well sorry but they probably won't be my favorite foods anymore. It is just becoming impossible to buy real food anymore. Even crisps haven't escaped. you just can't buy a descent packet of crisps without reduced fat and reduced salt. Even walkers crisps are pale imitations of their former selves. Surely salt and vinegar flavor crisps with reduced salt are just vinegar flavor crisps...... It's just not the same. The reason I am so wound up about this is that I am reasonably fit and healthy, I have perfect blood pressure, I have very low cholesterol, my heart is in great shape. I eat a good balanced diet but once in a blue moon I fancy some good old fashioned high fat, high salt, full strength, full flavor, bad for you junk food..... but you just can't buy it anymore. Everything is Good for you, low fat low salt, low sugar, low calorie even bloody McDonald's is going healthy on us.... Although it's worth going there just to see all the staff wearing sweatshirts that say "I'm Loving It" when you can see from their sullen miserable dejected expressions that they are obviously loathing every minute of it. Thank the Goddess we still have a kebab shop in town. The last bastion of full fat, full salt, full flavor food in St. Austell.

Anyway I've ranted myself to a standstill now so I'd better bring this newsletter to a close.

I'm sure that by now you are all well aware that Bazz has three new CD's available.... so I won't bother to mention it this month...... And there is no need to tell you that you can hear samples from all three CD's Here

Planet La La Music

So we won't mention any of that.

Or that they are selling like hot cakes....

Or that they are only £9.99 each....

or that they they are really very good.
So we won't mention any of that either

So until next month.

Bright Blessings From Bazz & Rose
At The Lavender Pillow