WStanley

IT’S NOT OFTEN that our memory of places isn’t let down by the new reality. Things, people and places all change whilst our recall of how they used to be remains the same. I was pleasantly surprised to discover, only yesterday, that my recollections of one of my very favourite pubs still hold good today after decades. It seems that very little has changed and what was the near-perfect watering hole is still exactly that. The one I describe is The Falkland Arms and it is set in the picture... Read Full Story

REALLY EXCITING news for you all today. The Red Bladder is soon to have its very own satellite television channel which will be soon be bringing you the very best in entertainment, information and education. Following on from the huge success of the Red Bladder range of books (see Books I know you will love - 20/11/11) Red Bladder (Holdings) Inc is set to launch Bladder Vision and you are amongst the very first to hear about it. We won’t be just trotting out the same old parade of dull, and... Read Full Story

NEVER LET IT be said that I am not a romantic man. Mrs Bladder still talks in hushed tone of some of my more exotic and tenderly thought-out gifts to her over the years. There’s the pink socket spanner set, the tartan ear-muffs and the album of cigarette cards depicting the England cricket XI of 1955 all of which have won a place in her heart. Despite all that though I still know where the line is and that has just been drawn anew by New York’s Bronx zoo. For the sum of just $10 they will... Read Full Story

MANY OF US will be taken with the idea from that little chap Gove, you know, the one who always looks like a rabbit caught in a car’s headlights, 　 As a former leading light in the Fabian Society Mr Gove, of course, always wears a red tie. to buy the Queen a new boat on the occasion of the Diamond Jubilee of her accession to the throne. It might be better though if all of us were to chip in for the bumper present. £60 million, that’s just about a quid each, no trouble. It might also help to... Read Full Story

I MUST ADMIT to being among that rather odd segment of society that has never really given a great deal of thought to Saddam Hussein’s buttocks. As for them being "an item of archaeological, historical, cultural, or religious importance”, well to be perfectly honest that news came as something of a thunderbolt to me. Of course it is isn’t the former tyrant’s actual flesh I am talking about here. No this concerns a single bronze buttock that formed part of a statue in Baghdad which was knocked... Read Full Story

THERE WAS A time, centuries ago, when our forefathers had the good sense to throw up walls around our towns to keep the barbarians out. Different times bring different ways and now they are welcomed in with open arms and encouraged to bring their loathsome ways and practices with them. I suppose that we have become used to having our Town Halls occupied by a bunch of semi-savages who would close every library, flog the contents of the art galleries and museums at the drop of a chain of office... Read Full Story

WELL, TO SAY that I am staggered is putting it a bit mildly but it begins to appear that our Police Stations are rapidly turning into hot-beds of crime. Seemingly anything that isn’t actually Superglued to the floor is walking out of the door and swanning off along the high street, never to be seen again. A Freedom of Information request about the thefts from the Press Association revealed some fairly frightening facts. The Northumberland, Lancashire, Warwickshire, Strathclyde and Essex... Read Full Story

GAS MANTLE makers, cattle drovers, petrol pump attendants and aircraft canvas dopers are all having a hard time of it finding work these days. But there are jobs that need doing and plenty of people available and willing to jump in and fill the gap, so why isn’t it happening? I’m not talking about Belgium cricket bat makers, Croatian wrappers of Edinburgh rock or Kenyan kipper smokers here but ordinary, everyday jobs. I reckon that anyone would be hard-pushed to name a company that couldn’t... Read Full Story

AT THIS time of year many of you will be turning your thoughts to deeper and more meaningful topics. The idle notions of July and August, flippant months if ever there were ones, have gone to be replaced with the stark realities that face us all as we prepare to stick up yet another calendar. That one act brings it home to us all - we’re not getting any younger. Now though, hope is at hand. You may not be able to actually get younger but by using and following The Red Bladder’s new and... Read Full Story

IT WOULD SEEM that down here in Dorset we are finally catching up with the rest of the country. Sadly armed robbery has reached the area. Not that our blaggers are going for the obvious targets like banks, post offices and building societies. No these lads have shown a bit of imagination and struck where they might well have been least expected. They’ve stuck-up a chiropodist’s shop. It was in Parkstone, near Poole. Two masked men entered and threatened the receptionist with a gun, they then... Read Full Story