14 Sep 2023
We ask a different figure from the local community to choose 10 questions to answer from a list of 50. This week: tongue-in-cheek X (formerly Twitter) feed and secret satirist St Albans Voice (Parody).
Where do you walk when you want to think?
Trent Park in Enfield. It’s just up the road from me and a great place for a picnic.
What’s the first thing you do after you’ve woken up in the morning?
I check what I wrote on Facebook the night before. Maybe delete a few comments, move the street furniture posts down the feed and block a few infiltrators in the group just to support free speech of course. I’ll have a browse through the glossy PR on the rival large council-controlled Facebook groups to get me motivated for the day ahead. I update my calendar of all the upcoming school fetes, church-based booze ups and street festivals.
What object would you save first if your house was on fire?
My signed 7-inch copy of Living Next Door to Alice by Smokie and Roy Chubby Brown. It’s a floor filler and sing along classic. Alice gets a wedding disco rocking when the DJ drops it.
Which three people, living or dead, would be your ideal dinner party guests?
Council puppet Gary Broadbent, Mandy McNeill from the Big Bad BID, and that Ask for Clive vicar from St Saviour’s church. We’d have a few laughs. I’d put the world to rights!!
What super power would you like to have?
Time travel. I’d go back to 1986 before internet shopping was invented. There was no 5G, no LTNs, we had leaded petrol and Bill Gates was working on windows instead of vaccines.
Do you have any phobias? I’m terrified of branded gazebos and the EYES on St Albans gazebo factory.
Have you ever been arrested and if so for what?
Not yet, but I’ve had a fair few cease and desist pre-action notices about libellous Facebook posts that keep me on my toes.
What’s your favourite St Albans pub?
The Waterend Barn!! I love a good Wetherspoons with their sticky carpets, friendly atmosphere, and great menu.
Wednesday or Saturday market?
This question makes me really sad. There’s a major conspiracy led by the so-called Business Improvement District, aka the Big Bad BID, and the council to replace the traditional Charter Market with boozy events. It’s called the Masterplan. The market has been decimated from 830 stalls in 1986 down to just 83 traders this week. I occasionally mention all the strands of the Masterplan on the city’s most influential Facebook group.
Who was your favourite cartoon character when you were a kid?
I preferred the soaps over cartoons. Mid-1980s EastEnders was my favourite. The traditional market was the heart of the community. No internet shopping or gazebos. Nobody had heard of a falafel, quesadilla, or mimosa stall!! The troubled entrepreneurial geniuses Ian Beale and Phil Mitchell were the standout characters and still inspire me today.
