WHICH SIDE ARE YOU ON? (GUEST BLOG POST)

Looking back to the playground of St. Osmund’s RC Primary School in the district of Breightmet in the Lancashire mill town of Bolton I remember being questioned at the time as to whether my training shoe allegiances lied with Puma or Adidas. I owned neither, due to my parents not being too well off as well as the alarming rate my feet were going through far cheaper trainers. But it was quite clear I had to make a choice. I said Puma because I liked the fact the trainers I

never really longed for had a cat on the side. Only many years later did I realise that this cat shared the same name as the brand. So, I was in the Puma gang. I assumed we would be involved in some long-standing war against the Adidas kids culminating in us forging together to form the shape of a big nimble cat as we tried desperately to smash down Adidas’ three lines of staunch, unwavering seven-year-olds. It turned out nothing more was said on the matter and I think I had some Adidas trainers before Puma ones after my dad got a better job and we left Breightmet for Heaton.

http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Manchester_Roadhouse

This binary choice has followed me throughout my life. Soon after choosing Puma all us boys were forced to choose Sega or Nintendo. As the girls had to agonise over Sindy or Barbie. As Bolton only had one football team the choice was football or not. Then the hormones kicked in and girls chose themselves. Closely followed by Blur or Oasis. At college reading the NME whilst sneering at the popular boys trying to have sex with the popular girls it became clear I would have to nail my political allegiances to the mast. Red or Blue? The advice I remember getting from a drunk at a gig at the sadly missed Roadhouse in Manchester around the 1997 election (I was five months too young to vote in) was this:

 ‘There are only two rules in life – 1. Don’t hit women. 2. Vote Labour.’

The two seemed obviously linked to me, confirming my socialist tendencies which had been creeping up on me since being introduced to the word by Billy Bragg soon before. Still, later on that night the now far, far drunker man did refer to the two main parties as ‘Two cheeks of the same arse.’ A reflection I may have been wiser to cling on to.

The bipartite quandary is all over the place.
 PC or Mac? 
Android or iPhone?
 Coke or Pepsi?
 Tea or Coffee?
 Rice or chips? 
I know there are often minor alternatives but I’ve tried getting by with a pen and paper, an old Nokia, living off cherryade, fennel tea and kale and the results were disappointing at best.

This Saturday the dubious character of Tommy Robinson showed up to spew his bile all over Media City, very close to where I work. I say character because Tommy Robinson isn’t his real name. It’s actually Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon. Almost certainly chosen because it scans into various football chants which can apparently get you a long way in 21st Century politics – just ask (oh) Jeremy Corbyn. Whose real name is probably something ending with Hitler or Starting with Adolf, or both. Anyway, I was working on Saturday so me and a couple of colleagues went along to have a look at the protest and the protest against the protest. And it struck me that the protest was not something I agreed with simply because it was being led by a known racist and I am not one. Surely that’s simple. But the protest against the protest seemed to be aggravating the protesters even further, giving them strength and attention. Which, from their lazy, drunken yells was lost on them. I did suggest starting a protest against the protest against the protest as a joke. Then encourage someone to protest against me. But that would’ve probably taken things full circle and caused a rip in the space time continuum.

As I ambled back to work it struck me that my ‘Down With Protests’ protests whilst oxymoronic, wasn’t a bad idea. The current political terrain of Brexit/Remain forces us to pit ourselves against each other with no mid-ground or alternative. Throughout our lives we have constantly been forced to pick a team. Red or Blue, In or Out, Giving A Shit or Not Giving a Shit. Just because I believe in equality, the spreading of wealth, higher taxation and justice for all (which means me a comrade or communist in most people’s eyes), does that mean I have to believe every traditional left wing policy? I totally believe in freedom of the individual and the benefits of the free market, in progress and growth. Which makes me sound like Margaret Thatcher’s love child. This confusion is CREATED by binary thought. We are always the goodies and they are always the baddies but the second we start to the see the baddies as having some good ideas we get scared., confused and put on an old Billy Bragg/Gary Numan record. But I like them both!

The thing I believe in most is freedom and the thing I abhor most is control. Forcing people to believe anything, whether they want to believe it or not is not a force for good – it is Fascism whichever way you look at it. Just because I believe in most of the standard left wing values doesn’t mean I have to believe them all. Forcing people to choose a side is a very right-wing thing to do and they are free to try and make us. But we’re are free to say no, whether we know it or not.

So answer me this -
 should we take to protesting against our binary culture -

yes or no?

Matt Lidis is a Writer and this is his Third Guest Blog Post for the Shark Fisherman of Wales. 

https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2016/11/600th-post-by-special-guest-matthew.html

https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-aloneness-of-long-distance-runner.html

He is such a good writer, as I'm sure you'll agree by following him @matthewlidis on Twitter and mattlidis on Instagram that I will be offering him a regular slot on here to showcase his talents. So no longer a guest but a contributing writer. Look out for future blogs with the title 'Matt Lidis Writes' Thank you Matt. 

Ken Frane: Short Stories: Book Launch

Buy me a coffee 

Q: So David Williams, ya sleazeball, you gotta be some kinda sicko to create a loser like Ken Frane? What have you got to say for yourself?

A: I say, punters can read each short story for $3.00 a pop by clicking the link above which is £2.40 in Llantrisant currency. (The hole with the mint in it) This is less of a commitment than buying the collection together. Try before you buy kinda thing! You also read in the knowledge that the author will use your money to buy a coffee from an ethically sourced cow and coffee bean grower. No crummy chains for this bozo!


Q:And what if Joe Public want to read your pulp fiction the old fashioned way, like in a sandwich and between two covers? A book, a paperback book.

A: Well for the quaint old fashioned types I have priced the book at £11.99 in Llantrisant money. That is because it comes in at 114 pages and a guy has gotta eat for christsakes. You book worms can get yourselves a copy by clicking on the link immediately below.

http://www.lulu.com/shop/david-williams/ken-frane-short-stories/paperback/product-23994142.html

Q: And what about the digital freaks, the Kindle kindred, the juke box jivers who want to savour your freakish words on their computer screens or hand held devices? What then ya lowlife?

A: This is the cheapest option. £6.99 of Llantrisant money gets you all 5 short stories. I might as well cut my hand off. How can I afford to sell it so low? Well no trees are being killed to create a paperback book so costs are being cut right there. Do it for the rainforests muchachos! 

You can do that right here and now by clicking on preview and buy.

Farewell and a Jew

Farewell and a Jew

A KEN FRANE MYSTERY

Short Story by David Williams

The drinking dens of Cardiff Docks were infamous. There were smugglers and pirates and watch repairers and jewellers. Ken Frane had been a hard drinker whilst working for the force and especially in the run up to his divorce. 

He would often walk through Cathays Cemetery and Western Cemetery if he was up Ely looking at the gravestones of those he once knew and imagining himself under the tombstone himself. The Long Sleep. He had remembered his own father up the Rhondda calling out “Take me precious Lord” because he had had enough

“It’s how they taught Hebrew when they brought all the Jews over to Palestine after the war. They wanted a quick method to get the basics of the language over quickly, I was hoping that that was the way they were going to teach it”

He began by saying a few words in Hebrew, but he then said a few sentences in Welsh before launching into an impassioned and powerful speech against the Zionist State of Israel to quote his words. Ken was transfixed. This gentleman had a definite aura about him, and he was now looking as intently at him as he had been looked at about two hours previously. 

"We have reason to believe that you were involved in the assassination of David Levinson this afternoon. You do not have to say anything but, it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”

10 pages 3,256 words 

I'd ❤️a ☕️ #Diolch

Rapid Cycling Self Certified Lunacy

I went to the Job Centre last week to see if I could squeeze any more acidic milk out of the dry and shriveled nipple of the Welfare State. Yes Shark Fisher Fans, I made a claim for Universal Credit more out of curiosity than thinking that I would get anything from the Government's Imaginary Money Tree. I am currently on £62.40 a week Carers Allowance which just about pays for the World Wide Syndication of this blog. I decided to use my constitutional right and conduct my affairs through the very ancient and very beautiful Welsh Language. All went swimmingly until I got to the Job Centre. Not only had I explained that I was a Carer but that I had a long term Mental Health Condition namely Bipolar Disorder but this Work Coach knew her onions and knew Bipolar Disorder. "If you are unable to work because of your Bipolar Disorder then you must get a sick/fit note from your GP" Well this instruction raised alarm bells because my Doctor as well as half the UK and most of the DWP and the HMRC believe me to be a 'malingerer' and not a proper Van Gogh model of manic depressive. A strange fact is that Bipolar Disorder is on my medical notes with the Community Mental Health Team but does not appear on the notes with my GP. There does not seem to be a cross over between the two. I then informed the work coach in English because the token Welsh Speaker was not available, "That under no circumstances could I undertake any heavy lifting or spiritually stultifying jobs at the present time because I was spending over 35 hours a week caring" By caring, I mean spending most of my time on social media but I didn't tell them that obviously. I didn't want to talk myself out of free money.   

I am going to be 53 years of age in 3 weeks time. I don't need this grief. Along with many thousands and millions of others across the world I would forego the unseemly and degrading process of begging for benefits in return for promising to work voluntarily in return for a 'Universal Basic Income'. They've trialed it in Finland but in reporting it, the BBC have belittled it by calling it 'Free Money'. You know guvnor money with no strings attached, nudge nudge wink wink. The Protestant work ethic has a lot to answer for. Since our snotty nosed days in school we have been instructed that 'Arbeit Macht Frei' If that is indeed true, then why not pay schoolchildren to go to school. Teachers are getting adequately remunerated for suffering verbal abuse and mountains of paperwork then why shouldn't the pupils be paid to go to school? If they were paid, they might behave better, they might become incentivised to learn instead of being press ganged into exam sitting and passing without adequate explanation. If Secondary Modern Comprehensive Education is free and especially in Wales where the parasitic political parties who sit in the Senedd/Welsh Parliament Madame Chairperson want young people to vote at 16 in order that they vote for their particular parasitic party THEN why can't Parents/Teachers/Government/Schools pay each and every pupil a weekly wage for attending school? The local PRU would become empty overnight. By paying pupils to attend their color coded schools, the Welsh Assembly would then be able to avoid Post 16 litigation because if they are being remunerated then they cannot complain but if they are going to school and being failed by peer pressure, by bullying, by dis-functional school environments and by out of date exam boards and then failing, SURELY, surely ex pupils should be able to take their former schools to court for failing them. Pupils don't fail exams. Schools fail pupils.         

Rigorous Mortis

Ken Frane

Last of the Cardiff Docks’ Detectives

Rigorous Mortis

The latest short story in the Ken Frane collection

When an assassination attempt is made on a politician in the Welsh Assembly, Ken Frane is the first person to attend the front doors of the Senedd.

"You are a pain in the arse Frane; you are always the first at the scene of the crime"

“Not bad for a fifty-eight-year-old eh, not bad for an old codger that the force had written off years ago, not bad ....

"All right, all right…. so?

“So instead of slagging me off as per usual, why for you not get me some assistance on this case?

“Christ Frane, you always come over ‘Italianate’ when you get the whiff of a lead. Why you didn't go down with the ship of Butetown Police Station I don't know!”

“This is Cardiff Docks Terry, you know as well as me that strange things happen down here'. Slights of hand, Optical Illusions. Don't forget the Magic Circle had their convention in the Coal Exchange last month"

Terry responded dryly

“We’ll you would have to be Derren Brown on speed to organise this little lot"

"He had been one of Wales’s most identifiable politicians, appearing on UK's Question Time but it was his habits as a human being rather than as a Politician that would now come under scrutiny."

“This has sent shock waves around the world"

“Don’t be silly Ken, this is Wales, the world has never heard of us"

“Terry has got a point Ken." Standish adds

“This will all blow over soon and we'll all go back to being the UK backwater that we all know and love”

“Look I agree with you, Wales is a shit hole but it's our shit hole, so we need to solve this and solve it pronto before Peter Price and the Cardiff Bay posse get their fingerprints on it"

"Up on the twyn overlooking the brwyn was the twmp! Nobody messed with the men who lived on the twmp. It was a lawless place where children rode horses without hats and the law of vigilantism was alive. It wasn’t far from Gilfach Goch. Imagine if you will a cross between Berchtesgaden and the Celtic Manor Resort." 

Frane didn't like prison. He thought the whole concept was alien to a civilised society. He got through the privatised security measures for prisoners without too much trouble, but he had been recognised by one of Peter Price's Associates from the Bay Police who was undertaking his own investigations with other prisoners. The word would surely get back to Big P.

Buy me a coffee please?

It's ridiculous rhyming

It's ridiculous rhyming

Let's take the Schitz out of ophrenia

the hero out of heroin

There's no Craic to be had in Cocaine.

Let's take all these words and put them in the bin.

I'm not sinning, I haven't done anything wrong.

Those aren't the chimes of a clock you're hearing

 but the smoke rings from my bong.

It's ridiculous rhyming

I should stop it

"Oy rhyme, go on hop it."

What's in a poem? Lots of words

What's in a word?

I'm glad you've asked that question.

No I'm not, who am I kidding?

Why ask one, if you don't want an answer!

You're nowt but a rhetorical bum

Let's take the friend out of chum

Let's take the cream off the top

put it at the bottom, and call it scum.

Why would you want to tear down my tent?

Because you are a Conservative, you must be bent.

bent as in crooked or bent as in queer?

We should all drown our sorrows, go and have a beer

But what use is alcohol? 

As useful as junk food and gambling?

Hang on sunshine are you walking or rambling?

Never start any writing if you don't know where it will end.

It's as compulsive as that there rhyming

It'll send you round the bend.

Conduit of Kindness

Hey Son!

Are you a conduit of kindness?

Are you comfortable in your shyness?

Or did you listen to your Dad

telling you to

'MAN UP'

Does your competitive streak need a tweak?

Are you out there

standing tall

or 

would you rather curl up into a ball?

To be a man is to be hated

for your wolf whistle and your scaffolding.

Sometimes we wake up

and wonder what's happening.

We have no role any more

apart from therapist and penetrator.

It's kind of confusing

when we always feel like we are losing.

So we gotta fight and deal in spare parts

get drunk and light up our farts.

What is it to be a man?

Is it to be told continuously

You Can! You Can! You Can!

What if you can't?

What if you can't pretend any more?

to be a man?

What if you have to hit the floor

and hide from every motherfucker

who expects things from you?

Hunter, Gather, Provider

By the time you're 50

your heart has turned to concrete

you must have walked down

every sleazy street

looking for that woolly mammoth

to kill and eat.

https://www.express.co.uk/life-style/life/749328/woolly-mammoth-penis

Further Reading
https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2017/03/willies.html