From a polar bear bench pressing a giant key in Norilsk, the magnificent minimalism of Magnitogorsk’s black triangle, and the bag of wriggling puppies being drowned in a sack on Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky’s standard, Russia has an instinctive understanding of how to best represent yourself on a flag.
As previously mentioned, I’m really not one for flying. The first time I got on a plane, I spent the first half an hour whimpering and shaking into my mum’s bosom while she had me in a protective headlock.
I was 31 at the time.
We’re here because we’re heading to Amsterdam to smoke loads of drugs and have it off with all the prostitutes (Eleanor), as well as maybe having an aimless wander around the canals and checking out the city’s Botanical Gardens (me).
This is home turf for me; I grew up on Abbey Hey Lane, went to Abbey Hey School, and to complete the set, I even contrived to make sure that my first girlfriend was called Abigail Haye.
Understandably, he said that he “felt physically sick” when he saw the crossbow bolt sticking out of the astroturf, although he’d have doubtless felt worse if fate had sent it a few inches the other way.
A saintly Marcel Marceau, the conductor holds a bus pass to the side of his face and mouths to the more senior contingent that they’ll need one of them to get on for free. The eldest lady pulls out a casino membership card, which doesn’t quite work.
The scenery lightens with a lily pond just as we reach Cragg Vale. It’s so perfect that it was surely the inspiration for Paul McCartney’s seminal Frog Chorus, a song I got in trouble for humming while being read a story in the first year of primary school…
There don’t appear to be any more interchanges in the UK which are named after infectious viral diseases, so we’re cruelly denied a Runcorn Rubella or Malmesbury Manflu. More’s the pity…
As giving Fido a shampoo and trim isn’t too different from Sharon’s monthly cut and blow, I suspect that most dog groomers are former hairdresser who prefer asking dogs about their holidays instead…
Of all the days we could’ve stumbled across The Golden Lion, we’ve somehow found it on the day that Jarvis Cocker is playing a DJ set upstairs, and Andy Votel is doing a pub quiz…