Street lights, CAB and real ale

17 October 2012

Bingo day today - at least for Jan.  I shall be heading off to Asda at Walsgrave to do the shopping.  No market for me today then.  I'll make up for it on Saturday when I get down town with me camera and start shooting some more street scenes. And speaking of cameras ...

There's another one I keep on promising myself I would join but this one is CAMRA, not a camera.  The Campaign For Real Ale is just that, just what it says in the title.  On Sunday I bought their Good Beer Guide while I was in Brum.  As large as it is, it doesn't cover all pubs and I'm not quite so sure it is all that accurate really.  Take the Felix Holt in Dorktown which is supposed to have a heated smoking area but I've never seen it.  The guide doesn't cover all the pubs selling real ale either.  They've missed out The Blue Bear, George Eliot, and William White (Willy White as I normally call it), from the guide.  It will come in useful later though.

So what is happening in Dorktown then?  Well, the CAB is having to let staff go because of government cuts to its funding.  A change in the law on welfare issues is coming into effect which mean a increase in the work load for CAB and yet they have to lose staff.  Sounds typical Tory that!  Make life harder for those less fortunate and then  kick away their life line so they can't fight it or find out how they fare under the new rules. 

Warwickshire County Council was planning to turn off street lighting across the county in April next year.  Now they have decided to make the cuts two months earlier.  That actually means that between midnight and 5.30am 80% of all street lights are to be turned off supposedly saving £500,000 a year.  The plan could of course increase spending in other areas like policing as house break-ins and muggings increase, or perhaps in town and city centres where CCTV won't be as effective. or NHS spending as accidents increase.  Yep - it's a Tory lead council my friends!

The Boundary Commission has been looking at the size of constituencies throughout the UK.  One of their sillier options was to remove the Weddington area of Dorktown from its current placement and stick it somewhere else.  But where on earth would they draw the line on it?  Weddington itself is usually known as the area to the west of Higham Lane up to the railway line.  But what then happens to the other side of Higham Lane and St Nicholas Park?  Well whatever, they've had a change of heart and are going to leave it where it is.  Common sense has prevailed.

So let's have a look for a photo then ... Well, how about this one then ... 

me looking at some photos on my old Nikon Coolpix 4500.  It was a good camera producing some really good shots, like this one ... 

a macro shot of a blue flower at Brandon Marsh.  The problem with the 4500 was that it stop working every seven or eight months and I would lose it for a month for it to go back for repairs.  The other reason I've chosen this shot is that I have a coffee in front of me, not a pint of real ale!

It's funny time ...

A little old man shuffled slowly into an ice cream parlor and pulled himself slowly, painfully, up onto a stool.. After catching his breath, he ordered a banana split.
The waitress asked kindly, 'Crushed nuts?'
'No,' he replied, 'Arthritis.