With thanks to Co-op Historian for the fantastic pic!I'm heartily sick, I have to tell you, of these mass market explainers, like the dreadful City Boy of the incredibly irritating Martin Lewis, who patronisingly explain to us dumb fucks on our morning commute why we are all deeply embedded in a puddle of excrement on Shit Street.
On the shite theme, does anyone really buy this bullshit about the whole credit crunch (I have been trying to avoid using this trite cliche, but had to admit defeat in the end) thing being caused by bad mortgage loans in the USA? It all seems a bit too convenient for my liking. In the febrile run-up to the festive season, the Madoff story broke - relatively quietly it has to be said - and I couldn't help but smell a rat. I mean, I know the USA is helluva big, with a motherfucker of a population, but surely there can't have been that many bad loans made - to lead to the virtual collapse (watch this space) of the entire world economy? Where were all these so-called experts and economists when one august institution after another crumbled into so much dust?
Where are they now that Adams (crap shops anyway, if you ask me. It's also intriguing that their website has no reference whatsoever to the stores going into administration) joins Woolies, Zavvi (the major disappointment for me on this one is that that twat Branson seems to have managed to worm his way out of trouble. Nothing would give me greater pleasure than the vultures of Fleet Street being able to let loose a Branson Pickle headline) Whittard and the others on the scrap-heap of the global economic slump?
Aside from the huge holes in the country's high streets (thank god for that, some might say - especially the good people of Exeter) there is of course the impact on the jobs market and the slow death of so many smaller communities to think about. I know, from experience of Oswestry, that life is hard out there, and it ain't getting any easier. For a lot of people, those few hours' work in the shops would have made the crucial difference to their lives.
So far, incredibly, the coffee chains seem to have been relatively unscathed by the whole process. I am of course aware that Starbucks has been struggling, but this is in relative terms to the retailers mentioned above, and there still seem to be new coffee shops opening up all over the place. I am as guilty as anyone else of (over)indulging in the overpriced stuff they peddle, but there surely must come a time when it all falls down?
Meanwhile, in an alternative universe, the football continues. And may god help us all.
