The Hurst Locker

Words and Pictures.

Hurstories: Communal Roof Brush

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Over the years, many kinds of brushes have gone out of fashion, i'm thinking particularly of that scourge of schoolboys everywhere, the dreaded wire Knee Brush. Time was, when a gentle tap on the door of a morning, often signalled the arrival of the Traveling Brush Salesman peddling his many wares. A long handled 'nossy hair' brush for grandad, maybe a Cod Scrubber, to help mam on 'Fish Friday'. And then there was this, from a time when every house had, not only a clean doorstep, but a lovely shiny roof.

London EC2 : Sex and The City

The other day I took a short walk from Liverpool St Station, along Bishopsgate and around the back to Finsbury Square.

The sky havered between blue and grey and the buildings struck me as imposingly austere but quirkily handsome. Sexy, even.

At one point, a cloud joined the party and a few trees turned up to put their spokes in, for good measure. 

The light began to fail and I Central Lined it home with a good, hot strong coffee.

And that was my late afternoon in EC2.
 
 


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

Man's Head Found On Ealing Common

A fairground, two circuses (one Russian, one Chinese)  Diwali celebrations, (a little) sun, giant rain puddles, lots of snow, and a Head. These  are a few of the things that have appeared on Ealing Common over the last year (and a bit). You have to flip the picture on it's side to see the head, but it's definitely there..

And then there were the skies. Striking skies that have looked like smudged ink one night and the next morning, all slashed and bruisied. A self-harming sky..
 
The fairground's arrival always provokes mixed emotions in me. At once both vulgar and quaint. Fairground art is a dying one but I find it gaudily fascinating. And is there anywhere else in the world where you can still win fags as a prize? We all know we're being ripped off when we try to chuck hoops over a wooden block but you always think there's a chance. And hey, my boy actually did it this year! The box of chocs would have been cheaper to buy at the shop by the time he'd had three lots of hoops, but they tasted a little sweeter, as we wandered around, for having been won. The stall holder looked unpleasantly surprised as she handed them over. How did that happen? I'm glad he didn't win fags..
 
When the circus rolled into town, I felt an intitial resentment at having part of the common land fenced off and an admittance fee charged to gain entry to where yesterday I roamed free. But I eventually embraced the new colours and shapes it threw out. Whilst I didn't visit the circus this year, (I have been to one here in the past and it was a bit baragain basement to be honest) the muffled joy of kid's cheers emanating from the tent was quite heart-warming.
 
One abiding image was on the way back from the fair, when we passed two young chavvy girls. One was holding an unfeasibly large, synthetically fibrous, potential fire hazard, of a thing. A cuddly toy animal. It was huge, and we gave them a smile, looking from the toy to the girls and back. What was it, Quint, in Jaws said?  ...lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll's eyes..
 
And I don't mean the toy.
 
Happ New Year from The Common People..

All I want For Christmas is a 6 Foot Seahorse..

I've managed to avoid the crimbo cooks up to now, all promising to deliver to us the moistest birds. But tonight it's Nigella's turn (insert your own joke here). I don't know if I can watch though..

You see, I've caught a couple of her shows lately and thought, i'm sure she's deliberately taken to talking more slowly. But like, sometimes, really drawling. Maybe this is the producer's idea, to make her sound even more sensuous and sexy. Then I saw her in an a advert recently where the draggy speech became so pronounced, it sounded like she was slurring. I even began to wonder if they'd added the effect, afterwards, in the edit. Or maybe it was actually Ronnie Ancona, doing Nigella who'd slipped into a bit of Kerry Katona, mid-impression. At one point I thought, Jesus, she sounds like she's coming round from Rohypnol - ''Weeell, nooo..I don't remembeerr a thing..I just woke up feeeling reeeaaly groggy and there were theeese perrrfectly crisp roooast potatoes done in goooose fat, a turkey and black bean saaalsa and some craaanberry fudge. Did I make them aaaall myself? Oh, I suppooooose, I must haave..'

I, myself, will be avoiding any rich food late in the evening, this Yule. I'm already feeling bah humbuggy about speding my first Christmas for many years under a Tory PM and would now be worried that some errant piece of stilton too close to bedtime would lead to a dreadful Scrooge like nightmare where I end up being visited by the Ghosts of Tories past (Thatcher) Present (Cameron) and Future (still fucking Cameron). I'd whimper and plead as he forced me to look at the things to come. A Big Society, where the benefitless, sick and lame, roam uncared for and young bright sparks, unable to afford an education are put to work cleaning grafifiti off the walls of skint council buildings. I might recoil in horror as a homeless, unemployed disabled kid shakes his  begging bowl at me..hang on..that's not Tiny Tim. It's Jody Mcintyre! And then, before I get the chance to drop a few coins in, Bob Cratchett, dressed as a riot cop pulls him from his chair and drags him roughly across the ground. Cameron grins and looks over his work, at the chair on it's side, wheels spinning..Gawd help us one and all..

The future being too worrisome to contemplate, we increasingly find ourselves searching for succour in the warm comfort of Christmases past, no?  I was thinking back to my childhood and I realised that I have no recall of being upset about Father Christmas not being real. Most kids become suspicious about him quite early on, don't they? Each year you find another clue, like one year you come downstairs, unable to sleep and the mince pie you left out for him has gone, but the presents haven't yet been delivered. Hmm..contaversial. Anyway, I considered Santa to be rather an aloof figure and he always seemed far too busy to actually play games and have fun. So, no, I wasn't too overcome with grief at that particular reality check. There were other examples of childhood bubble bursts that cut me deep, though..

Unicorns, for one. My sister had a book with a beautiful white unicorn on the front cover, that always fired my imagination, and I was very sad when I realised that they weren't for real. There's a Unicorn hoax on Youtube and when watching it not long ago, it got me right in that little part of the brain that retains childhood memory and I remembered feeling sad about it all over again. But what if? that little part of me stirred...That book cover was from The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe. And that was another let down.I became a little bit obsessed with Narnia being real. I really did stand inside the wardrobe at home and wished and willed there to be a magical land at the back of it. Very disappointing. Then there were The Borrowers. I absolutely loved them and when my mum sometimes searched for a box of matches or something, saying  'I literally just put it down right there. How can it have gone missing'? My mind woiuld tick over and then how crestfallen i'd be at the object's re-discovery, shaking my little head and thinking. but why can't they be real? It's just not fair..

But one of the most disappointing things I found out as a kid was about Seahorses. I had a turqoise bath towel when I was little, with seahorses all over it. (I spelled it 'turkoys', back then). I still have this, albeit a bit ragged and folded away in the airing cupboard. I don't use it now, it's so thin and started to develop holes when washed, I hang onto it for sentimental reasons. Succour. But the thing is, I thought that seahorses were actually proper actual horse sized. I don't know how I got this into my head but I was convinced they were about six foot long and so, at last there was a magical looking creature that really lived in the world. Then I found out the truth. They're diddy. Cute, but you can't ride on their backs and stuff can you? Bah humbug!

Anyhoo, here are a few pics of various London lights, a dinky snowman and one of my old turkoys towel. These civic illuminations might not be the brightest and best out there but we should make the most of em cos I wouldn't be surprised if they're scrapped next year as councils strive to cope with the hefty budget cuts imposed by this ruthless cuntage we  call a government. Have a safe and peaceful Christmas. And thanks for reading my blogs.

Right,  I'm off for a ride around on a six foot sea-horse.. sorry, what am I saying?..i'm delirious..must've been that Nigella inspired Christmas Trifle, the one where she replaces the sherry with Rohypnol..

P.S.
Seahorses have a single mate for life. Every morning, they come together, dance, change their color, twirl around with linked tails and then separate for the rest of the day. They usually mate under a full moon. Now that's fucking magic..

C.S.I. Ealing

So about half past 3 this afternoon, I was wandering up to Caffe Nero in Ealing Broadway. The promised double-dip big freeze seemed to be kicking in and drizzly needling rain was making for a gloomy day, all round. And the icing on the cake was that later, I  was supposed to be catching a 207 bus to Hayes. I'm not a big fan of Hayes. I am of icing and cake, though..

A coffee and snack first then. Decided.That's when, lost in thought, I was halted abruptly by police tape stretching across the road and both pavements. Police too, stood, preventing people from going any further. I realised how quiet it was. No traffic. This roadblock went on for some distance. There were quite a few parked cop cars around and an officer was telling people to move along if they hadn't seen anything. I thought that there must have been a road accident, though I couldn't see any vehicles. I contemplated doubling back on myself to Starbucks but then thought, no, I prefer the Italian blend these days and and anyway, I only needed a couple more stamps on my card for a free cup.

So I went around the back streets and managed to circumnavigate my way into the cafe. It was virtually empty. No passers-by, see. I savoured my brew. Oh, and a lemon muffin. No icing but darn good. Right, Hayes it is then, I thought, resignedly, half-expecting the police tape to have  now been removed meaning that i'd be allowed back up the Broadway, unhindered.. And that's when I saw that it had turned into C.S.I. Ealing..

 It was all go. There were more police cars parked dramatically, zig zag fashion. There were plain clothes cops with clipboards in the middle of the road. A tent had been set up and there were the forensics in their spacesuits carrying stuff into vans. At one point, two regular police carried a long plastic bag and I thought for a horrible moment that it was a body bag. Then I noticed some wood sticking out of the end. 

The word was spreading that two policeman had been stabbed. One was critical and the other, a special, they say, was less seriously injured. There were plenty of gawpers around, myself included, though I did try and catch my bus to Hayes. But after moving about 3 feet in 10 minutes, I got off again. No Hayes today. Oh well, every cloud and all that...
 
Now there were several TV and radio reporters setting up equipment on the sidewalk.('pavement' doesn't cut it when it's all gone C.S.I.) and yet more cars were arriving. Things were looking serious. And then it dawned on me that this was because, if rumours were to be believed, there was a possibilty that this could soon very well become a murder scene..

I stood close to several eye witnesses and earwigged as they spoke to press and reporters about the various parts of the incident they'd seen. From what I gathered, this is a close apporoximation of what occurred.
 
Police were doing bus ticket checks on a 207 bus. At a stop near the Town Hall, a man, acting suspiciously, got off the bus. (I've heard since that he was already known to and wanted by police). I heard that he wasapproached and that an argument quickly escalated and the man stabbed two officers. A witness said that at one point, the perpetrator held an officer in a headlock on the ground and that there was blood everywhere. I heard that about 5 other police then piled onto the guy to try and get him off the policeman. A woman said that they were stamping on his hand to try and get the knife away from him. Apparently the guy had been arrested.

I took a few photos. I have to say that the police were being very calm with bystanders by now and were not ordering them way from the scene, just keeping them firmly on the right side of the police tape. I asked a uniform if he knew how the victims were. He didn't know. My phone was on low battery and once it conked out I didn't really feel the need to stand rubbernecking any longer. As I walked home, I heard more cars en route to the scene. The sound of sirens. A radio report emanating from an open shop doorway was confirming the critical stabbing of one officer and the less serious injury of another, in broad daylight in Ealing Broadway this afternoon. 
 
I, like many others, have been pretty critical of the police this week, over some of their treatment of protesters during the student demos, in particular the wheelchair bound Jody Mcintyre, dragged from his wheels by bully boys in uniform. However, in this context, critical is not something I enjoyed hearing.

And that bag that I thought had a body in it, well, later, watching the rolling  TV news, I noticed they kept showing that bit, obviously hoping to get the same reaction from viewers. And that struck me as a little cheap and nasty..