4 December 2000.
Index of earlier issues - click here.
(Those who like digging about will find that there are hundreds of articles on many subjects to be found on this site.)
There are some much earlier Other News on this site. Click below.
early Othernews - 1992, 93, 94.
Bonnington Cafe and Bonnington Square.
This Saturday there is not expected to be any live entertainment in the Bonnington.
Bonnington cafe is a communally owned cafe in Vauxhall, Central London. The atmosphere is somewhat Bohemian, international, friendly, educated, and much wine (bought from the corner shop across the road) gets drunk. Good quality vegetarian. Cheap. The only lighting is usually candles stuck in wine bottles, and the furniture is a collection of odds and sods that people have thrown out. The overall result is relaxed and pleasing. People tend to spend the whole evening over their meal, and engage in discussion with those on other tables, the caterer, the band, passers through......
Bonnington Cafe, Vauxhall Grove, London SW8 UK. Near Vauxhall underground and mainline station, buses 185, 36, 2, 88, 322 and others. Booking is difficult.
King Henry the 6th. part 2.
ACT 4 .
Scene 8.
Southwark.
Alarm and retreat. Enter Cade and (Shakespeare's words) all his rabblement.
CADE:
Up Fish Street! Down St. Magnus Corner! Kill and knock them down! Throw them into the Thames.
Sound a parley (I think a bugle call for a meeting between two sides in a battle - ed)
(Cade continues) What's this noise I hear? Dare anyone sound a retreat or stop to talk when I command them to kill?
Enter Buckingham and Old Clifford.
BUCKINGHAM:
Yes, we dare to interrupt your activities. We come from the king as ambassadors to talk to the commoners whom you have so misled.
(to the crowd): There is a free pardon to any and all who will put down their arms and go home in peace.
OLD CLIFFORD:
What do you say? Will you relent and take a pardon whilst it is offered to you, or will you go on being misled by this rebel until you meet your deaths? Whoever loves the king and will accept his pardon should fling up his cap and say "God save his majesty!" On the other hand, whoever does not honour the king or his father (who made all France quake) should shake his weapon and pass us by.
ALL:
God save the king! God save the king!
CADE:
WHAT?! Buckingham and his friend are so bold as to say this, yet do you base peasants actually believe them? Are you aiming to be hanged with your pardons about your necks? Have you made all that effort only to desert me when we reach the White Hart in Southwark? I had thought that you would never give up until you won your ancient freedoms, but instead you give yourselves up to being slaves to the nobility. They will break your backs with burdens, work you to death, steal your houses, rape your wives and daughters in front of you. You may wish to put up with all this, but I certainly will not myself. God's curse upon you all!
ALL:
We'll follow Cade! We'll follow Cade!
OLD CLIFFORD:
Do you believe Cade to be the son of Henry the fifth, and is that why you will go with him? Will he conduct you through France and make the meanest amongst you into earls and dukes? Alas, he hasn't even got a home, and he certainly doesn't know how to make a living except by theft from yourselves and us. Is it not rather silly to be fighting a revolution at home whilst the French are assembling their forces ready to attack us and take over? I rather think I have already seen them lording it in our streets. Would it not be better for Cade to fail than for us all to be at the mercy of the French? To France, to France, to regain what you have lost. Spare England because it is your native land. Henry has money and you are all strong and manly. With god on our side we can be sure of victory.
ALL:
A Clifford! A Clifford! We'll follow the king and Clifford!
CADE (aside):
Was a feather ever so easily blown to and fro as this multitude of fools are? The name of Henry the Fifth hales them to a hundred mischiefs and makes them leave me desolate. I'd better scarper before it is too late - straight through the middle of the crowd if necessary, and using my sword to do it. Let no man think me a coward, for it is only in the face of overwhelming numbers that I am retreating.
BUCKINGHAM:
What? He's gone? Someone follow him, and anyone who brings his head to the king will have a thousand crown reward. (exit some). Come on you lot, let's try to find a way to reconcile you to the king.
(exit all.)
More next week.
YOU GET ALL kinds of berks in politics - particularly when there is an election coming up.
The leader of the Conservative party (the Tories) and an accomplice have been telling the nation of a stunning and alarming discovery they have made that could lead to the reduction of income tax! Wow!
These astoundingly bright individuals (who may even qualify for membership of MENSA!) have come up with the exremely original suggestion that £2 billion can be saved by the simple process of cutting back on (hold your breath) benefit fraud (yes!) and a further £2 billion be saved by further reducing the already inadequate funding for some other government operation (there's nothing left to flog off cheap to the private sector), the total saving as a result being used to reduce income taxes by £4 billion. The Confederation of British Industry has suggested that further reduction of taxes may not be a very good idea, whilst the large army of claimants and those who pay tax at the lower rates may well not be in favour, because they probably believe that the result for them would be further deprivation by the back door - knowing as they do a certain amount about Tories.
Quite how these stunningly creative and original ideas could be executed or how they know that there is £2 billion of benefit fraud they do not seem to want to tell us, but being so very bright they will have worked that out and so we should all vote for them.
As to those of you who wish to claim on your national insurance you can whistle. The welfare state is already too expensive without people expecting to receive that for which they have paid.
THAT WASN'T THE only bit of campaigning I came across this week. A certain person I know came up with the suggestion that television licenses for single people should be less than those for families, because in a family a whole collection of people are able to view for the price that a single person has to pay! This ingenious idea, which would no doubt appeal to politicians everywhere, could be most evenly and justly executed by having a fixed charge on each person in the country, rather like the pole tax which was so popular that it led to riots.
Fools like me who don't watch television might not like the idea, but we are only a minority.
Meanwhile, the same person suggested that builders should charge single persons less than they charge families for the same reasons.......
You do indeed get some berks in politics.
Computer building and modifying freaks will be pleased to know that London Recycling have started marketing used computer bits in their shop in Peckham. Their website is below ('this is a recycling site....').
Alternet News might appeal to some readers as a regular list of goings-on in the human rights/green areas of life. You can receive it by email. I have put one copy on this site so that you get an idea of what it is about and how to subscribe.
For sample Alternet email click here.
This website is about accounting investigations and fiddles. If you like to look at financial scandals (both hidden and public) this might be worth a look. I have not been there myself, but the books produced by these people, although difficult to follow, cover a lot of mysterious ground.
This website is about the destruction of countryside and agriculture. Worth a visit if you want to find out about how it is thought the British countryside will fair under the ongoing creep of the multinationals.
This website is one to do with monetary reform.The British Association for Monetary Reform. If you are interested in economics it is worth a look. http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~bamr1
This is a website about alternative currencies.Might be worth a look to those who have realised that you don't necessarily have to have money as such to be prosperous.
This is a website for something called The Green Guide. I know nothing about it, but am hoping it is something worthy. Please let me know if it is questionable.
This is a site concerned with one of the most unpopular planning decisions ever made in Greater London, the Crystal Palace Complex. It is so stunningly awful that only a handful of people who do not live near it appear to approve, whilst the rest are not entirely uninclined to mention such things as payola, freemasons....you name it! The site belongs to the London Borough of Bromley, but the aggro generated by it and the destruction of amenity caused by it will be almost entirely suffered by residents of adjoining boroughs and not the people of Bromley themselves.
This is a recycling site based in London, and offering materials to anybody. The organisation is a charity seeking to link suppliers of surplus materials with users. Especially good for the more ingenious designers amongst us.
The email of the people who run the above site is cs@london-recycling.demon.co.uk. They are called Creative Supplies. Look them up for more info.
Here's an interesting education site - particularly for those who have young children and are not quite sure what to do to avoid the worst of what`s on offer in the mainstream of education.They are called www.edrev.org.
early Othernews - 1992, 93, 94.
There were a few essays that went out with the early Other News as a freestanding item. You can read these by clicking below.
London Journey - a trip from Docklands through Beckenham and back to Docklands.
(Friday Woodworkers are suffering a temporary break due to some of the episodes not having been fully edited at the time of writing. It may take some timne to fix this problem.
Episode 17.
(These articles were written in 1988, and were my first attempt at writing. Some people when shown these fell about laughing, some smiled faintly - and some yawned. I thought I was going to write a technical book, but it soon became apparent that I was much more interested in the people than the technology - and that is the main reason there are no drawings - although it might be rather good to do a couple of caricatures sometime.)
Index of Friday Woodorker articles (and a means of access).
A READER COMPLAINED that it was not possible to go back more than 6 articles in Gabriele`s area. Regrettably this is because there is no index, and I have not the time to organise one yet. However, for those determined enough to find the early ones, they should be accessible by going to an early Other News and clicking through from it. This will not be fast, but I think will do the job. They started about November 1997 I think.
In an earlier issue I told you about my feelings regarding Tempo retailers and the Lexmark 3200 printer I bought from them.
The Lexmark 3200 printer I got from Tempo must surely be the most uneconomical printer I could possibly have bought. The black cartridge only does about 250 pages of ordinary type - for £28! That makes each sheet cost 11.2 pence plus the cost of the paper and probably another 11.2 pence more if any colour is used! - ABOUT 22.4 PENCE A SHEET! Nearly a pound for every four sheets!
I wouldn`t recommend you to buy it - but also look at my earlier article for an idea of Tempo`s service.
A person to help make up a subject index for the growing numbers of articles on The Other News From England. Email editor@othernews.co.uk
8- or more-track tape recorder. email pcj@gn.apc.org
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From The Other News From England. http://www.othernews.co.uk
Even better if you print the date of the article.
editor@othernews.co.uk