The Pidge Piper of Blackburn
Posted by Roving Mick on December 1, 2020
Like most British towns and cities, Blackburn has a pigeon problem. They foul buildings and monuments, along with unsuspecting members of the public. This is even more difficult to put a stop to when these pests can just up and fly away.
After trying all sorts of ideas and failing with them all, a new approach was needed. There was also a problem of people feeding pigeons and not wanting to see them shot or poisoned. This has led to an increase in their population, resulting in even more destruction to buildings due to their fouling.
In Germany’s medieval town of Hamelin, there is a legend of this town being overrun by rats several centuries ago. Its Burgomaster was approached by a mysterious stranger called the Pied Piper, who claimed he could rid this town of rats by playing a pipe and getting them to follow him to their deaths by drowning in a nearby river. Its city fathers were sceptical, but agreed to pay the piper if he could rid Hamelin of its rat infestation.
The Pied Piper was true to his word. Sadly, Hamelin’s city fathers were not true to theirs and refused to pay him his agreed fee. So he played his pipe again. This time children of the town followed in his wake, never to be seen again. Therefore, if it can be done with rats and children – why not pigeons?
Feral pigeons, found in our towns and cities, are descended from the Wild Rock Dove, which still exists today and has a homing instinct. Scientists believe pigeons use their sense of smell, Earth’s magnetic field and infrasound to navigate whilst in flight. If a way can be found to disrupt a pigeon’s navigation system, we may be able to rid them from our town centre.
One suggestion is to ask Blackburn’s ice cream vans to converge on our town centre and all play their musical sounds simultaneously. Tom Lehrer’s song ‘Poisoning Pigeons in the Park’ has been suggested. When these terrified birds fly away, a robot version would be released to fly with them. This avian decoy would get the real pigeons to follow it by releasing an odour which smells of pizza and kebabs, reminding them of where they like to roost. Once away from their hometown, this robot pigeon would then become a modern version of the Pied Piper by emitting an infrasound which would disorientate these pigeons in flight.
At the other end of our county is located a men-only club which still doesn’t allow females of the human species. But it takes a very keen interest in those of a pigeon variety. Perhaps they can offer their hospitality to our town’s unwanted feathered friends.
Blackburn Travel Agent Offering Trips To Chernobyl
Posted by Roving Mick on November 1, 2020
Sick of stopping in during the Lockdown? Fancy visiting a place which used to attract interest from all over the world? One of Blackburn’s travel agents could have just the kind of trip you really need to give you a glow and radiate happiness.
At first I thought it was a joke when I looked in their window and saw an advert for four days in Chernobyl next August. Some of us of a certain age remember the name of this place with horror. It made Fukushima look like a drop in the ocean. The Americans we’re lucky to get away with their own near miss at Three Mile Island. But there was no escape for the Soviets when Reactor 4 overheated at Chernobyl.
Since that year of 1986, those Cold War days have been and gone. The hatchet has been buried and new intercontinental destinations for tourism are always being explored. Many people from those days will still have trepidations about going to this place. No doubt travel agents will say people shouldn’t overreact. Unfortunately this kind of description will probably still bring tinges of horror to many of us who remember it happening.
If you decide to go to Chernobyl, in present day Ukraine, there may be a few surprises in store for you. Sunglasses used to be in great demand over there for many years and those on sale have extra thick lenses. You may also hear the clicking of Geiger counters everywhere. There is even talk of a Disneyland being built there. Unfortunately their six foot Mouse is a real one. They also have a duck. It’s nowhere to be seen but signs in Ukrainian say Duck and Cover.
Chernobyl’s residents are known for their friendliness. But western tourists are warned not to say certain things otherwise there may be a fallout. This latter word must never be used. Also when paying compliments to people, never mention their radiant smiles, otherwise they may have a meltdown.
With lockdown restrictions including certain travel abroad, perhaps we could see holidays of a similar nature in Britain. After all, we have plenty of nuclear installations in this country. Punk Rock fans could have weekenders at Sellafield. There could even be a bit of Heavy Metal thrown in too.
Perhaps holidays in Chernobyl are becoming a new trend – known as Dark Tourism. After all, there seems to be a fascination with the Titanic. Hiroshima receives two million visitors a year and a similar number visit Auschwitz. Maybe we could find something in Blackburn from our dark past to bring in the punters.
Rovers Come To Their Sensors
Posted by Roving Mick on October 2, 2020
Always at the cutting edge of technology, Blackburn Rovers are pioneering new uses of sensors to measure their footballers’ performance and wellbeing. It is hoped this will increase the club’s chances of a return to the higher echelons of the football pyramid.
Sensors will be inserted in player’s boot studs, their shirts and a special wristband. These body tracking gadgets will record everything from blood pressure, respiration and perspiration. Up to 4,000 data points could be collected per minute, including measurements of heat flux, skin temperature and electrical conductivity, motion and the burning of calories.
This gives the scientists and data collectors a chance to see how player’s bodies slow down during and after training sessions. Some of the players will be expected to take it in turns to wear the sensors, even when they take their afternoon naps after visiting the Black Bull at dinnertime. Sleep quality and dreaming can also be measured at the same time.
Data collection won’t be restricted to players and statisticians. All staff will be expected to do their bit in this ground-breaking quantifying exercise. Even workers in the club fish and chip shop and burger bar will be asked to keep tabs on the players’ dietary consumption. The escort agency staff will also have their own secret method of keeping certain performance stats.
There is a possibility sensory stimulation could also be delivered, but FIFA clearance would be required here. This would entail giving players mild electric shocks when they underperform. Unfortunately some think this technology may have arrived too late. There is also the player’s human rights and dignity to consider when inflicting punitive action using these devices.
One measure which may be acceptable to the PFA is for players on curfew, or having to wear a 24 hour tag, keeping sensors about their person for monitoring their movements. Other players could also have these attached the night before playing matches. As with every group, there are rebels. Some players see the sensors as a ‘Big Brother’ form of control and feel like human guinea pigs. One complained of modern football being run by statistics, though he kept quiet about the financial recompense. He said it was like being covered in ants when he was at the Brockhall Science Centre. His only pleasure was pulling the sensors off when going home after training. There, he could feel like a de-assimilated Borg Drone.
Blackburn’s New Penny Farthing Village
Posted by Roving Mick on September 1, 2020
Plans are being considered over land adjacent to Blackburn Bus Station for building mixed-use housing.
This development’s name comes from its proximity to the much sought-after Penny Street which owes its own name to the price of property rental on this street back in 19th century Blackburn.
Along with rented accommodation, affordable 25% shared ownership property could be available to buy. There is also an exciting option of hostel dwellings being included in the mix. This could help satisfy our town’s growing demand for homeless accommodation and ease pressure on finding units for housing remand clients, currently on bail.
A novel approach is to be put in place where all residents who move into these dwellings agree to have a small tracking chip injected into their shoulder. This would be painless and would biodegrade into their body after two years, before following nature’s process of removal. There would be no need for tag wearers to feel embarrassed anymore when somebody asking them the time wants to know why they wear their watch on their leg.
Some wags though have likened the name Penny Farthing Village to Portmeirion in Wales, home of 1960’s TV series: ‘The Prisoner’. They say most of its residents will probably be living there at Her Majesty’s pleasure anyway. But people behind these proposals say whoever made these kinds of comments needs locking up. They are proud to announce their intention to take residents under their wing.
Diversity is the key to Penny Farthing Village. Entry to each dwelling will be by use of retinal scanning. It was thought a similar method using fingerprints may put off some potential residents, reminding them of the process they went through to give them board and lodging in their previous accommodation.
But in a similar vein for people with experience of identifying by numbers, properties on this development will follow the same model as Blackburn’s innovative Romney Walk experiment. This is where every house and flat has its own individual number and these follow each other in sequence around the estate, despite the road names changing. They may have been named after the Cinque Ports, but nobody has ever been left out of sync finding their bearings around Romney Walk.
Proposals for Penny Farthing Village are expected to be submitted at the council’s next housing committee cycle. If the committee doesn’t back-pedal with these plans, a chain of events could soon be put in place to set the wheels in motion.
Blackburn’s Spaceman Was Escaped German POW
Posted by Roving Mick on August 1, 2020
Unreleased classified military documents could hold a key to one of Blackburn’s greatest unsolved mysteries. But this may replace one legendary enigma with an even stranger tale from our past.
As World War II came to an end, German Prisoner of War – Otto Schwarzenbeck – was being transported by train through Blackburn, ironically our English equivalent of his surname. As this train branched off down the old railway line at Cherry Tree, our German POW saw an opportunity and jumped from his train, landing in thick foliage beside the track. His escape wasn’t noticed until this train stopped at Chorley. By then he had rushed across nearby fields and headed for the hills. In this case, those hills were Witton Park and Billinge Woods.
With World War II nearly over, this left a tricky problem for Britain’s War Office. Only two prisoners of war, one from each of these global conflicts, had ever managed to escape from Britain and return home to Germany. Having to admit another had also managed to escape during the latter conflict was not a high priority when there were soon to be victory celebrations.
So a Government ‘D’ Notice was put in place to cover up this incident. Our POW would be quietly welcomed back into society when it was all over and the coast was clear. He could then be repatriated to Germany and his escape would be airbrushed from official internment records.
Meanwhile Schwarzenbeck himself, a survival expert, was quite at home living in Blackburn’s woodlands; they reminded him of his beloved Black Forest retreat. Unfortunately as a fugitive and with little knowledge of English, he didn’t realise World War II ended during his time in hiding, leaving both military and civilian authorities with a problem over how to catch Otto and persuade him to return home.
Their answer was to create a misinformation campaign against him, hoping he would leave under his own auspices. They would publish false rumours of Otto being a crazed flasher thereby dissuading people from approaching him. They even created outrageous rumours of alien abductions across the north side of Blackburn. After all, he was an enemy alien.
It meant we had an opposite situation to what was going on across the pond in Roswell USA. American authorities were blaming their alien problem on everything under the sun, apart from little green men, whereas the Brits were saying their escaped POW could well be a spaceman after all.
Their problem wouldn’t go away and bizarre rumours of strange extra-terrestrial incidents taking place gripped Blackburn’s population during post-war years. Fortunately for everybody, relations between Britain and Germany became very cordial and reports of strange goings on in the woodlands of Blackburn eventually faded away
The remaining mystery is what really happened to Otto Schwarzenbeck? Did he find his way back to Germany? Or did the unthinkable happen and he was abducted by real aliens? Perhaps our answer lies within those Ministry of Defence secret classified files. We could be in for a long wait.
Blackburn Pile Sufferers Demand Understanding – And Ointment
Posted by Roving Mick on July 3, 2020
Do you suffer from Piles? Well, you are not alone. There is a growing movement developing in the bowels of British society for understanding and recognition of this little understood and painful malady.
Piles, or to call it by its correct name, Haemorrhoids, causes suffering to many people in our society. Identifying the number of sufferers has proved to be very difficult though. This is due to it being one of those ailments nobody really likes to admit to having.
Can you remember the day you went into a chemist and started to go red? You wanted to buy Pile ointment but lost your bottle and to hide your blushes, you ended up having to buy contraceptives instead. Very embarrassing indeed!
Many Piles sufferers tend to bump into each other in pub toilets by accident. They are often mistakenly accused of gross indecency by undercover police officers. It must be pointed out how these meetings are random and purely coincidental, being based on individual need rather than arrangement.
To solve this thorny issue, suggestions have been put forward by sufferers to make Pile ointment available in pub toilet vending machines. These are out of sight and this can help relieve pain and embarrassment for sufferers and anybody else who just happens to walk in on them.
The ointment is in sachets and will be inside boxes of a similar size to ones used for other popular products, such as condoms and erectile dysfunction tablets. This should prove cost-effective and very handy to vending machine manufacturers as there is no need to replace any of the existing dispensers. They will be re-labelled instead. Also the ointment is now available in a wide variety of colours and aromas, i.e. strawberry, banana, cherry etc.
Dr Emma Royds has had a lifetime of experience suffering from Piles and is an expert on this subject. She says: “If you have Piles, don’t just sit on it. You are not alone”.
Along with requesting Pile ointment being made available in Blackburn’s pub toilet vending machines, extra soft cushions will also be requested. There are also discussions about setting up a support group for sufferers. Regular meetings would be held in town centre pub venues. It has been suggested perhaps the most appropriate location for these would be the aptly named Grapes Hotel.
Old Danny’s Snake Oil Coming To Blackburn
Posted by Roving Mick on June 1, 2020
During a time of hibernation, dreams sometimes had their price. And so came the Snake Oil Salesman.
When the lockdown finally ends, many pubs could have gone bust. But one of the breweries may have its own answer.
Once upon a time in the north-west there came a traveller from even further northwest. He arrived in Blackburn by Shire horse and cart. He had a top hat on his head, a twinkle in his eye and he was a man with a plan. His name was Old Snake Oil Danny.
Old Danny looked at Blackburn and thought: ‘This is my kind of town’. Its populace gathered round his cart and he gave them his sales pitch. He said he patented a remarkable cure for every human ailment known to science. This was down to venom extracted from snakes living on a farm in Ireland. Now the people of Blackburn could reap these benefits of this wonder tonic. Maybe they could be cured of consumption, colic, common colds and Corona Virus.
This is what Danny was trying to do. He span them yarns of how his snake oil tonic could make men feel strong and tough and look more attractive to women. He told the girls his tonic would keep them slim and help them become a hit on the dance floor. It sounded too good to be true, but those good people of Blackburn swallowed it all and Danny became a rich man.
He had wealth, power and property. Even having such influence behind him where he could dictate to his customers what to do with property they bought from him. No doubt in another era he would have been able to claim a bride’s first night of wedlock, but there was no money there and Danny was too old anyway.
Eventually Old Danny tired of Blackburn, deciding he hated the place and was a country boy at heart. By now its townsfolk realised Danny was a charlatan and his snake oil was just quack medicine after all. Once he’d made his money, he realised he’d overstayed his welcome and it was time to get out of town. Soon Danny was gone. Blackburn didn’t matter to him anymore.
But like his grandfather clock pendulum, things were starting to swing and Old Danny was frightened he would swing with them. Moving to the countryside became one big self-isolation. He was less welcome there than he was in town. Things were compounded by Covid-19 arriving and everywhere going into lockdown. With pubs being shut until further notice, breweries were looking at other methods of shifting their produce. History could be repeating itself and Old Danny might have to dig out his horse and cart once again.
Blackburn Lockdown Takeaway Misery
Posted by Roving Mick on May 1, 2020
Since the Corona Virus lockdown we have seen examples of nature reclaiming our environment.
Numerous animal species have been moving into locked-down areas. These have included sheep and goats wandering into British town centres and sharks basking in harbours around the world.
We are also seeing something similar in Blackburn town centre. But it’s not just four-legged creatures moving into our town centre, two-legged ones have also been observed.
Young people, who depend on other humans for food, appear to be losing weight due to fast food outlets being closed down. This has led to them encroaching into the town centre by themselves or in groups of their peers. They appear to be suffering from hunger and clearly missing companionship of other human beings.
Across the country there have been reports of young people scavenging in bins and fights breaking out amongst them. This has been blamed on the lockdown. It has also been held responsible for stopping benefactors from giving young people sustenance in their favourite feeding grounds.
Every cloud has a silver lining. One of these has been the amount of recipes we have been bombarded with on social media. With the lack of takeaways being available, this has made people realise if they want to survive, they must try cooking their own meals.
It has been a gradual process, brought about by this return to nature. Following initial horror stories of people eating Marmite peanut butter soldiers and burnt sausages, things have started to improve. By trial-and-error, many people are learning how to cook proper meals. After all, necessity is the mother of invention.
Now we may have a situation where Blackburn town centre fast-food outlets could see a sharp decline in their footfall and sales. Social distancing will be a factor in who can eat in their premises. Even more worrying for them is a possibility of having to provide cutlery with their meals.
But the biggest issue to affect some fast-food outlets will be their requirement to provide disinfectant filled finger bowls on dining tables and only allowing customers to eat certain meals with knives, forks and spoons. Antiseptic coated latex gloves may be allowed for eating some meals, but the use of hand sanitising vinegar may inhibit the taste of fried chicken and beef burgers.
We are now starting to see glimmers of hope that a Covid-19 vaccine may be in sight. This will eventually lead to the lockdown being lifted. Hopefully scientists can then produce a vaccine to combat the consumption of fast-food products.
Blackburn’s Vulcan Pub Still Packing Them In
Posted by Roving Mick on April 1, 2020
It’s nearly thirty years since Blackburn’s legendary Vulcan Hotel shut down.
Situated across from Blackburn College, this pub gave our town’s students a different kind of education. It was called sex and drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. Unfortunately this didn’t go down well with College Management. After years of trying to get the pub closed down, they eventually had their wish granted in the early 1990’s.
Like most Blackburn teenage students, going in here was a must. Plus in the mid-70’s they put on a really good spud pie with peas or gravy at dinnertime. This was enough to convert me to the Vulcan, along with their jukebox and the great atmosphere which pervaded throughout the pub, both upstairs and downstairs.
When you think of this pub, you think of long hair, leather jackets, motorbikes, weed and glass fights in the back room. But it was also full of characters who went on to enrich Blackburn’s folklore. Remember when Viking Billy’s mum won Spot the Ball, or the pools, and him throwing cigars all over the pub? Or thinking you were in the fairground hall of mirrors when you saw the Gardiner brothers. No they were big lads, as a bunch of Burnley fans were to find out. They decided to take a detour to Ewood Park when they saw them stood outside the Vulcan.
After the pub shut down it became a subject of great nostalgia to many of its former patrons. This has spawned reunions and a very funny Facebook page called ‘I Drank In The Vulcan In Blackburn’. Created in 2008, this brings together some of the old Vulcan stalwarts and shares news and views, along with featuring records which used to be played on the pub’s memorable jukebox. One of the highlights of this Facebook page has been its use as a vehicle for helping organise these Vulcan reunions. They have previously taken place at the Havelock and Mill Hill pubs.
On March 14th there was a Vulcan reunion with a difference. It was held in Blackburn town centre in two pubs next door to each other, a joint venture between the Drummer’s Arms and Rock Box. This turned out be a really good event and brought about a big turnout. I popped in the Drummers on the afternoon of this event. After meeting up with Brian Rossall, an old Vulcaneer, we went back and forth a few times between the Drummers and the Rock Box that day.
Despite the sands of time having given most of us a good scouring, there were still a lot of familiar faces from those good old days of Blackburn’s legendary Vulcan. Many old friends met up and a good time was had by all. The great news is this event went down so well, we can expect another reunion to take place next year in the Drummer’s Arms and Rock Box.
Rovers’ Own West Lothian Question
Posted by Roving Mick on March 1, 2020
Blackburn Rovers could be close to breaching Financial Fair Play (FFP) rules again. But club owners, the Venky’s, may have found a novel way of getting round these regulations.
As well as owning Blackburn Rovers, it seems Venky’s are also big fans of Scottish singer, Susan Boyle. Although many Rovers fans would argue the song which brought her fame was from Les Miserables and quite a good description of our club owners.
Venky’s thought things were getting even better for them when they heard she came from Blackburn. Unfortunately what they didn’t realise was the town she lived in wasn’t Blackburn, Lancashire. It was the one near Edinburgh, in West Lothian, Scotland.
When they had this explained to them about our town’s namesake, north of the border, it made Venky’s think how they could gain from this unusual situation. As they say in Scotland: ‘Mony a mickle maks a muckle’. They came up with an idea of moving our Rovers lock, stock and barrel to that other Blackburn.
Moving to Scotland could help deliver their early promise of European football every season. They also noticed Scottish football is a bit too top-heavy, being dominated by the Old Firm. Maybe opportunities could arise allowing another team to come along and take up the slack.
There have been cases of English teams playing in the Scottish League before. Up until recently, Berwick Rangers comes to mind. Along with Scottish border side, Gretna, travelling in the other direction. It is also worth noting Rovers’ first two FA Cup triumphs, in 1884 and 1885, were against Scottish football pioneers and Hampden Park custodians, Queens Park of Glasgow.
Actually demolishing Ewood Park and rebuilding it in West Lothian could become a way to gain entry to European football by joining the Scottish League. It could also be a clever way of getting round possible breach of FFP sanctions in England which could be coming Rovers’ way. Instead of selling our ground on paper, like Derby County and Sheffield Wednesday, why not move it somewhere else instead? Where else could be better than a place called Blackburn? This would be way beyond the Football League’s thinking capacity.
The possibilities are endless. Blackburn Rovers could even become champions of Scotland and gain entry into European football every season. They would make Venky’s much derided promise of this a genuine reality.
As Susan Boyle famously sang: ‘I dreamed a dream’. Maybe Rovers fans can also dream a dream one day and sing another of her songs – ‘Auld Lang Syne’ – to Venky’s.
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