Peace loving Lums of Planet Blog,
I am whispering these thoughts from the cupboard under the stairs. As London descends into anarchy and the loot thirsty hordes scavenge the land for shiny things, the only guidance I could call on was that old Protect and Survive cartoon http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/films/1964to1979/filmpage_warnings.htm
we used to get as kids to deal with nuclear war with the Russians. So, I've whitewashed the windows, stockpiled beans under the floorboards, taken all the doors off and stacked them in the cupboard and hid under them covered in factor 50 ICBM grade sunscreen.
Actually tonight, I feel a bit foolish crouching in here, in the dark. It all seems quiet outside, no screaming sirens, no frantic searching helicopter overflights and no gangsta talk outside my window.
Apparently there are four times the number of coppers on London streets tonight than normal, keeping the cheeky little urchins at home with their mums. A good deal of those extra policeman have been drafted in from office jobs and old DIs from the Sweeney that have had to dust down their old miners strike riot gear and hope it fastens in the middle, still, good luck to them.
What we have seen in the last few nights in London is a brief glimpse of the future. The social breakdown that will occur virtually minutes after, or before if our rulers give us warning, a meteor strike, super volcano or zombie invasion. Old scores settled, materials gathered for the upcoming struggle, the weak being preyed on by the strong and bold, cupboards under the stairs will be in demand then, I tells ye.
Mind you, don't believe any of them when they say its some kind of social reaction to hardships and disenchantment. This isn't a revolution, this is a smash and grab, a blatant rush for something for nothing and the childish thrill of breaking things, add the swarm mentality and frenzy feeding instinct to get as much down your throat before the opportunity goes and well, there you go.
I remember the riots of the 80s and 90s, in similar locations, Brixton and Toxteth for instance. Those instances seemed to come from a different place with real and justified things to say, if not do. There was looting of course, but it was secondary and a by product. Looting seems to be the primary objective of this series of eruptions with do-gooders and two-bob over analysts trying to tag some social ill onto it.
Tell you what though, there has been some entertaining news stories coming from the foreign press, the Russians claimed all the animals had been let out the zoo and never mind what you think of the Iranians, they have a sense of humour. They have called for the police to show restraint in dealing with our protesters and an independent international body to look into police brutality. Its hard to imagine an Ayatollah chuckling, but I managed it when I thought of them coming up with that. I expect old Qadaffi would like to request UN resolutions to send an aircraft carrier to sit in the Thames estuary, dropping baseball bats and scaffolding poles for the London rebels to legitimately get rid of mad dog Cameron.
Other news in my time away from the lum. A number of London tourist attractions have been visited in the last few weeks, here's my very brief and too quickly formed opinion of them.
- Buckingham Palace, very worthwhile, and a real treat to see how well my and all my ancestors taxes, blood and toil have been so well spent and invested in worthwhile treasures like Fabergé cigarette cases, that incidentally I don't think will fit filter tipped fags, just those woodbines King Edward smoked so I expect the value has dropped a little. It really is like a, well, a palace I suppose, fit for a queen, er, yes well, you get it, marks out of 10, 9.
- Madame Tussauds, if I had qued for two and a half hours to get in and also paid 30 quid each, well, I may well have wanted to decapitate every wax dummy in the place and carry the heads home to use as interesting centre pieces for the dining room table, just to feel like I hadn't been robbed and processed like a veal calf in a French sausage factory. There is an in door marked entrance, from this point there is a solid worm of humanity, snaking through the humid interior for about a mile until you're ejaculated into the gift shop. Perhaps on the way you may have seen some dummies that looked vaguely familiar, in a shiny sort of way, but so would the one thousand Japanese tourists who are sharing your section of worm, so the camera flashes and squealed Japonic Shinto art direction means you wont have seen them for long. They were shit anyway. 2/10, only cos I got in for free and didn't queue.
- Imperial War Museum, this was very good, at times I felt like I was in a big airfix diarama, big tanks, planes and guns all with history and stories behind them. If we keep having wars though they will need to build an extension. 8/10
- London Zoo, thankfully before the rioters had released all the man eating lions and tigers and bears. I love a zoo, so I'm easy to please, a little delighted that the zoo of the empire that once covered the world hasn't any caged chimpanzees to see going slowly mad, or elephants, Christ, if Billy Smart can have one I'm sure the Zoo could be allowed one, but otherwise, very good. 7/10
That's all from this edition of Visit London.
Lang May Yer Lum Reek
