It goes up to eleven.

I took the photo above last Friday; I realised that I had not written anything about the hideous fish sculpture (tm)  for a very long time – in fact the first time I featured it was back on the 21st October 2006! There have been a couple of mentions since, but nothing of any great substance. The sculpture still divides local opinion – it seems to be the local art world’s Marmite equivalent; it provokes both strong positive and negative reactions, depending on who you speak to. I have found around two thirds of locals detest it, whilst a third love it. Nobody I have ever talked to about it is ambivalent. This in itself may be what the artist intended – to provoke a reaction in the audience. One positive thing the statue has done is to become a local land mark; You can say to any visitor “you’re in Erith when you can see a giant fish sculpture on the middle of a large roundabout”. They cannot really go wrong. I still stand by my original thoughts on it though; to me is resembles a giant psychedelic steaming “Mister Whippy” style turd, dumped on Erith by some gargantuan alien creature. At least it is something unique to Erith, not that I would wish it on anyone else. It is in marked contrast to the gypsy cob statue at the other end of Bronze Age Way. My astonishment with that is less to do with its’ artistic value, and more to do with it still being in one piece and not yet nicked for scrap. Talking of scrap, I had an account by one of my valuable local contacts that really shows how bad the problem of unlicenced and illegal scrap dealing in the area now is. These are his own words, slightly edited to keep his identity anonymous: "I was walking up my road  this morning with my wife, and a white van stopped a little way up in front and the occupants were looking at a skip.  Two of the usual sort began to take big chunks of concrete out of the skip and fill up an old washing machine.  "That will make it weigh more" they said to each other.   It was obvious what they were up to and I bet they were unregistered - whatever that means. Talk about brazen!" Quite - I think that succinctly somes up the situation. I have been told by a very reliable source with a position to know that around a third of local scrap dealers are unregistered and operating illegally; my source informs me that when the Police investigate, most illegal scrappies are also engaged in a myriad of other law breaking activities. The sooner the sale of scrap for cash is criminalised the better - it will not stop them, but it will make their lives a bit more difficult, which is all to the good in my books.

The photo above shows MP for Erith and Thamesmead, Teresa Pearce standing with a person dressed in a rabbit suit in Erith Riverside Shopping Centre on Saturday afternoon. The centre was holding a series of Easter themed events for small children to participate in. 

Some very good news to report for a change. It is looking increasingly likely that Bexley College will indeed migrate to a new, purpose built, low rise campus on the site of the old Erith tram shed, long since demolished; I have written about this in the past, with the hope that the move might happen, and it is now looking almost certain, subject to final planning approval by Bexley Council. There is an article in the News Shopper where the vice principal of the college explains their reasons behind the move. Apparently the old campus in Tower Road is so energy inefficient that the college currently spends £300k a year trying to keep the place warm – a situation that is financially untenable. The move to the proposed new site, hopefully to be built on the triangular parcel of waste land  sandwiched between Walnut Tree Road, Stonewood Road and Bronze Age Way. The area is crying out for redevelopment and Bexley College would be an excellent choice as the new local resident. It can only benefit Erith as a whole. The students will have much better public transport options than before – the new campus will be bang next to Erith railway station, and only a minutes’ walk from the bus stops in Bexley Road, outside Erith Riverside Shopping Centre. The shops in the centre will benefit from the extra spending power of the nearby students, and the proposed gym, coffee shop and hair and beauty salons on campus will be open to the public – to be honest, I cannot see anybody losing out. To me it seems to be the ideal win / win situation. I notice from the article that the college may be a great influence on Southeastern trains, and their refusal to install a passenger lift at Erith station. Local MP Teresa Pearce has been banging on about this on our behalf for some time, but at present the arguments seem to be falling on deaf ears. If Bexley College get behind the campaign, maybe there is a chance the campaign may take off again.

You may recall that back in January I warned against opting for a “contactless” debit card? I wrote that the security on them was very poor, and that the encryption system the cards use has been compromised. Well, what do you know? Watchdog featured some IT security testers using a smart phone app to automatically siphon off card details whenever the phone came into proximity of a contactless debit card. Don’t tell me I did not tell you it was only a matter of time before this happened. I rejected the contactless card I was sent, and requested a good, old fashioned dumb card for this very reason. I did discover that some banks are automatically sending contactless cards out to customers when their old cards are due to expire, the caveat being that at present this policy only holds true for people within the M25. The banks believe that Londoners are more sophisticated and open to using new technology (read gullible) – utter tosh of course, but bearing in mind the big banks are all based in London, the London centric approach does not really surprise me.

There has been much coverage in the press in the last week of the murder of mathematician and intelligence operative Gareth Williams. Suffice to say I think it very unlikely the full story surrounding his mysterious death will be released for many years to come. This lack of information has led some people to speculation – and in one very clever case, create a website which presents an investigation into the case that is presented as a work of fiction, but actually contains a lot of factual detail. Who would be better to investigate the murder of a spy, whose body was padlocked inside a large sports bag, then placed in the bath, inside a spotless flat, with no sign of a struggle, and the door locked from the inside? Only the World’s greatest detective would be up to the task. Cue “Sherlock Holmes and the Alderney Street Mystery”. A fascinating read, and a very thought provoking approach to a serious and dense mystery.

On a further literary note, Google are running a series of television commercials to promote their Google+ social networking service. The  adverts feature people carrying out various activities with a narrator reciting quotations from Shakespeare’s poem “The Seven Ages of Man”. One of the finest pieces of writing in the English (or for that matter any other) language. The problem is, that the advertising agency who created the commercial have decided to cut the final verse covering the last age of man from the commercial. To my mind this is cultural barbarism. The poem loses all its’ meaning, following as it does human life from birth to death with all of the stages in between. Cutting death from the piece renders the rest incomprehensible. I think Google have dropped a clanger with this. Google did however pick up some geek credibility last Sunday – which unfortunately reached the Maggot Sandwich after it had already gone to press. Google launched a version of its’ popular Google Maps service for 8 – bit computers and games consoles – you can see a video about their development here:

Some viewers did not notice that the release date was April 1st.

A criminal gang (possibly this is grandstanding them a tad – it may be one or two dodgy people) are currently on the radar of the local police. They have found a way to remotely unlock cars that have wireless key locking systems, by using some modified radio equipment – quite possibly a walkie talkie. The gang seem to be operating in the Erith and Northumberland Heath areas. They send random radio signals to parked cars, and any that flash their indicators to show that they are unlocked get raided by the gang members. One of my local news sources got targeted in this way earlier in the week. A full report on the situation can be read on the Erith Watch website here.

Tickets have now gone on sale for the 2012 Chap Olympics. Unlike previous years, the event will be held over two, rather than the usual one day. As their website puts it “This is a significant year for the Chap Olympiad: after years of covertly observing our sporting spectacle, The British Olympic Committee has picked 2012 as the year to stage its copycat event, called simply “The Olympic Games”. Our response is simply to put on a bigger, better Chap Olympiad than ever before. This year’s event, on Saturday 7th and Sunday 8th July, will take place over two days in Bedford Square Gardens; Day One will be our usual Chap Olympic Games, including Umbrella Jousting, Swooning, Ironing Board Surfing and Not Playing Tennis, while day two will host the Paralyticolympics, when those barely able to stand will still have their trouser creases and their pipe-smoking technique put to the test. Gold, silver and bronze cravats will be awarded separately on both days, so competitors on either day do not have to attend on both days in order to win prizes. The events on Day Two will differ from those on Day One – though, as usual, performance will be judged principally on maintenance of panache, perfectly knotted ties, stiff upper lips and acceptable (i.e. caddish) levels of skulduggery. On Day Two there will be a special Gin Tent, staffed by nurses trained at the Atters Attree Gout Sanatorium, to assist any contestants who have tested negative for alcohol levels, or those who are feeling a little under the weather and require a top-up”.  Sounds like my idea of civilisation! You can read more about the event, and the Chap Magazine by clicking here.

The Government’s proposal to monitor all online activity in real time that was reported this week is both worrying and laughable. Worrying, because it shows that the government wants to emulate China and Iran in policing online use to a micro managed degree. They aspire to total control and monitoring of all UK web and Email users. Laughable as it would be utterly impossible to operate or monitor due to the colossal volumes of data that would pass through every day - thousands of Petabytes of Emails, MP3 files, web logs - you name it. It is just not practicable to capture and record this amount of information - the Internet Service Providers will not want to do it, as the associated costs would seriously impact their business models, and would potentially make them liable for any errors or omissions. GCHQ will not want to do it, as the amount of effort and money it would entail would swamp their day to day activities (and I do not see the government putting their hands in their pockets to foot the bill). I think this one will quietly go away in time.

April 6th marked the 20th anniversary of the first version of the Windows operating system that really made its' mark on the world. On 6th April 1992, Microsoft launched Windows 3.1. This was a long chalk from being the first version of Windows, but it was the first one that became very popular with both the general public, and with businesses who previously had either been using DOS based PC's or very expensive Unix workstations. Until the launch of Windows 95, three years later, Windows 3.1 was the big player - OK it did crash a lot, but when it worked it was good. One of the best applications for Windows 3.1 was the excellent Word 2 - a really feature complete, mature word processor and desktop publishing tool (see the screenshot above) that could teach a lot of modern applications a thing or two about efficient coding. I used to run it on a 486 SX 25 laptop with a mono display - it was an excellent piece of software, which I ran for ages, and only finally upgraded when Word 6 came out - a good application, but bloated in comparison. You can read more about the anniversary of Windows 3.1 by clicking here.

One of my discreet local informants has dug up a real gem of a story. Bexley Council are running a scheme to encourage parents of small children to use real nappies, rather than using disposable ones. On the surface of things this appears to be a laudable idea - disposable nappies take years to break down in land fill sites. The timing of the scheme could hardly be worse, however; as the Government have just enacted hosepipe bans in many parts of the country, including the London Borough of Bexley. I appreciate that modern washing machines are relatively economical and efficient in the use of water, but it seems to me that the council is sending out the wrong message at this time. I don't think anybody has thought it through properly. Non disposable nappies still need a lot of water and a lot of energy to keep clean - I have checked  my facts with a licenced child minder and mother, who confirms my suspicions.

To finish for this week; Jim Marshall, creator of the legendary Marshall range of amplifiers died on Thursday. In way of tribute, here is probably the most famous Marshall stack of them all - the one owned, and demonstrated in the clip below, by Spinal Tap songwriter and guitarist Nigel Tufnel. His Marshall amplifier famously goes up to eleven.

The Inebriati.

The photo above shows the view along West Street towards Erith Town Centre; on the right you can see part of what used to be the Trafalgar pub, which was converted into flats about ten years ago. I recall visiting it on a couple of occasions before it closed down - it was rough. I hate seeing pubs turned into accommodation  but there are some times when there is no logical argument to keep going - and I think the Trafalgar was a case in point.

I have encountered the shell suited individual that I wrote about last week, a further two times this week.  Both times he was toting an outsized can of electric soup, and curiously was mounted on an ancient bicycle of indeterminate parentage, and accompanied by a vicious looking Staffie / Pit Bull type fighting monstrosity, which appeared to be little more than a collection of huge pointy teeth supported by four over muscled legs on a lead. The dog acted as the motive power, to pull both the bike and heavily sozzled chav wobbily along. Every time I see him, he's consuming gargantuan quantities of canned beverage that would be more appropriately classified as industrial cleaner, rather than anything one would wish to consume. I reckon when he turns up his toes (which I don't think will be too long in the future, if he keeps up his current lifestyle), if cremated he would go up like a Roman Candle, and probably take a week to put out. Conspiracy theorists have thought for decades that the world's political and economic directions are controlled my a shady cabal of financiers, religious leaders and politicians in a secret society called the Illuminati. If this is true, then the Happy Shopper version of that dreaded secret society must also exist in Erith. I have now formed the opinion that he's a senior mover and shaker in the shady secret cabal that actually run Erith - the Inebriati.

I have had a couple of items of feedback regarding the Maggot Sandwich - the most common of these being that people are occasionally  seeing two identical copies of some embedded videos. I have got to the bottom of this now; the entries display correctly in all "full fat" web browsers (Opera / Chrome / Konqueror / Firefox / Safari / IE) but there are occasional display errors on phone based browsers. Blogger does not formally support specific smart phone browsers such as Palm WebOS, or the Android platform. This seems to be where the problem lies. You may find errors when viewing on mobile devices. Unfortunately there is not a bundle I can do about this, other than log a support call with Blogger - which I have already done.

Further to my recent comments about the perilous state of the surface of Manor Road in Erith, I have now made formal representations to Bexley Council about the rapidly disintegrating road surface. Surprisingly, the day after I sent my Email, I received a personal message from a member of the highways team, assuring me that a Council Surveyor would be investigating the matter within a week of my original enquiry. I await to see the outcome with interest, and will report back accordingly.

The 2011 Chap Olympiad is almost upon us. Do consult the video below, which will give you a flavour of the event in previous years. It takes place on Saturday July 16th in Bloomsbury Square, London. You can read further details about the event by clicking here.



Erith Yacht Club have been carrying out a recruiting drive in Morrison's this week; I don't know how many new members they expect to sign up, as Erith is not exactly the kind of place where the locals take to the water. In years gone past you would only have found a local with a boat if they had won it as a prize on 3-2-1. I tried to join the club some years ago, when I took my Marine VHF radio licence examination there. They had (and for all I know still do) a rule that to be a member you have to own a yacht - no associate members are permitted, which I felt and still feel is rather short sighted, when you could recruit some willing volunteers to help out at events and to provide a general spare set of hands around the place. They do seem to be doing more to interact with the local community than before - it was always quite an insular group. I suppose that in order to justify the huge amount of money that has been donated to the club by various organisations, they have to offer something in return to the community.

Below are a couple of photos I have resurrected from the Pewty Acres archives; they were taken by Nick Jackson, and show me running my afternoon show on Radio Caroline back in May 1990. I only had this broadcasting slot for around a month. Thankfully I was soon moved to the midnight to 6am slot - which was far more to my taste, as it was far less formatted and controlled. Overnight I could pretty much play what I liked, and I concentrated on longer album tracks. I would feature a bands' more challenging and involved pieces that otherwise would be overlooked on mainstream stations. From the extensive and appreciative feedback I got from listeners, they certainly seemed to value the show - I got tons of positive feedback, letters and postcards from all all around the UK and mainland Europe. It was a long slot, and I also had to wake up the breakfast show DJ in plenty of time for him to take over. For much of the time this was an individual called Rico - a very popular on air personality with the listeners, but a total self obsessed pillock in person. He had an ego bigger than the ship, and was deeply in love with himself. One morning he could not get out of bed, so I covered for the first half hour of his show, explaining to the listeners that Rico was having trouble getting his ego through the studio door, and in the meantime I regaled the audience with tracks like "There's no-one quite like Grandma" by the St Winnifred's School Choir, "Deck of Cards by Wink Martindale, and The Wombling Song. Strangely enough I did not get told off by the office, and the self important tosser Rico was never late on air again.

I have been listening to 24/7 free radio station Laser Hot Hits quite a bit recently. You can visit their website here to listen online, or to find details of their frequencies and broadcast schedule. They play a wide variety of styles of music, with something pretty much assured to appeal to everyone. Do give them a try.

Don't forget that you can view my photo albums online via my Flickr account by clicking here. I would be interested in your opinions and feedback.

I commented last week on the sartorial faux pas made by some banker types near my office in Canary Wharf. The wearing of shorts in public, whilst not participating in sport is really just not on  it is the first slippery step in the downward spiral to chavness. You will find an instructive video clip below, featuring top Savile Row bespoke tailors Henry Poole & Co. They illustrate the correct art of dress for the contemporary person about town.

Now that the weather is finally improving, I have been noticing how many people are lathering themselves in fake tan. It is utterly stomach turning. I came out of Morrison's yesterday afternoon to see a young woman in her early 20's looking more akin to the colour of a piece of furniture - she was an orangey brown colour more often seen when coming from an open tin of Ronseal. Her entire skin seemed to be an utterly unreal, almost cartoonish hue - with the addition of around half a kilo of foundation slapped on her face, she looked like she had been bobbing for chips in a deep fat fryer. Horrid.

You can view the local real time weather situation for Erith by viewing the Erith weather station website here. Thanks to Bob G4MHJ.

The Maggot Sandwich now has had just a little over 35,000 unique and individual page views. These come from all around the world; mainly from Commonwealth countries, but also from pretty much everywhere - I am just waiting for my first hit from North Korea, but I am not holding my breath. Most of these visits are anonymous, but I can happily publicise one regular reader from the other side of the World - felicitations go out to Maggot Sandwich regular Siva, who lives and works in Banglaore, India. He's a guru in IT server virtualisation and all sorts of techie dark arts - he's been reading the blog, and making the occasional comment for some time now.

If you are a Maggot Sandwich reader and would like to be featured, please drop me a line, and I am sure that something suitable can be arranged.

There has been some discussion in the local press of late about the situation regarding Dartford; the general opinion is that the town is in a state of degeneration. The reasoning behind this is that the Bluewater and to a lesser extent the Lakeside shopping centres have sapped the customer traffic from Dartford Town Centre. I think that there is a level of resignedness that needs to be overcome in order to revamp and reinvigorate the powers that be; Dartford is not dead and buried, it currently just smells that way - dedication and effort can bring it back to where it should be, as the first county town in Kent - the initial place of note that one encounters when travelling from London.

The final video below is a graduation piece by a group of budding French CGI artists - it is an outstanding piece of work - they should be justifiably proud of the results of their efforts. Do make sure you expand the video to full screen to get the full cinematic effect. Have a watch, and post a comment below.

The Erith Fish Sculpture - a slight return.

I first Blogged about the hideous Erith Fish Sculpture way back in October 2006. Since then it has been the location of a failed suicide bid, when a bloke deliberately drove his car at it. The guy got off with minor injuries (if you wish to kill yourself in a modern car, it is a good idea to disable the air bag first); He was patched up in hospital, only to jump off the top of a local tower block a week later. There's no pleasing some people. Anyway, after the local council shelled out £60,000 of council tax payers' hard earned cash to commission the garish monstrosity pictured above, only eighteen months later they have had to call the artist back again as the thing is already falling apart. The mosaic tiles appear to have been laid on top of Polyfilla! As you can see from the photos above, the thing is undergoing fairly major restorative surgery. A couple of pounds of Semtex under what has become the wart on the hairy bum that is Erith would surely be preferable.

Please feel free to leave a comment using the link at the bottom of this posting. You don't have to identify yourself if you don't want to.

I think a vast majority of the residents of South East London and North Kent have completely forgotten all forms of manners and decency; nobody (apart from myself and a small number of civilised people) bothers to queue at bus stops - there is generally a rabble and each person for themselves. It is not just children, many of the parents are just as bad. I always have a go at anyone who pushes in front of me - what amazes me is most of them don't even realise they are doing anything wrong! The same thing can be said of holding a door open for someone; most times you are deemed lucky if you get so much as an incoherent grunt of thanks, most of the time there is no response at all.

My photos of both the Erith River Festival and last Saturday's FarnFest have gone down well, with many people viewing them. If you wish to have a look you can find them here.

I am hoping to attend this years Chap Olympics, held in London during July; you can read an account of the goings on at last years' event here.

I have been experimenting with a terrestrial digital TV receiver for my new iMac. The small plug in receiver is almost the same size as a USB memory stick; once the supplied software is installed all looks OK until I try and get a signal. The first desktop digital antenna I purchased did not work at all - in fact it looked like it had been returned as faulty then put back on the shelf at Argos. I got a replacement and all I can pick up is Sky Sports News and Sky Three, and both of these pixillate, pop and fart - it is easier to watch BBC iPlayer. I think I must live in a terrestrial digital signal black hole! Any suggestions are welcomed.

Do watch the clip below - it is only three minutes long and is quite entertaining if you are a Dr. Who fan like me.