The subject title comes from a local government 'promo' designed to make local people feel REALLY proud of the beautiful environment in which they live (landfill sites/graffiti dens/lager louts/entire Green Belt going under thick layer of concrete etc) Actually, that's more the Deadhill area, where I used to live till I moved a few miles up the road. To an ex-council house on a large estate 2 miles from Gatwick airport, adjoining Green Belt land that is currently being covered in a thick layer of concrete. As you do.

Actually, this is a damn site better (pardon the pun) than the place I used to live. You get REAL wild birds, rather than the ones piling out of the local night club cum grotty boozer-with-lights-attached; and when you catch the odd farmyard smell, you can at least IMAGINE it may be wafting from somewhere connected with the rear end of a cow, rather than from the blocked drain at the rear of a suspect curry house (I kid you not. One day, I'll relate the story of the newly installed giant extractor fan, the loud squawk, and the sudden puff of pigeon feathers - when I'm feeling strong enough. My kids STILL won't touch KFC if it's in bitesize lumps)

But I digress. My new home town is, okay, quite a bit greener and more countrified, with a lovely old church and pub ... but those are the bits I can't afford. The bit I COULD afford is bland, modern and soulless. Or so I thought.
At this point can I just say, as I have before, that I am NOT making any of the following up, okay? I only relate incidents where I don't need to make it up - hence the lengthy wait.

It started with the transport system. There I was, idly perusing the bus time table (100/327/665 school days only) and wondering why none of the old dears waiting at the stop had bothered boarding when they finally turned up. And then a new one arrived (bus, not old dear), into which they DID all pile - even though, according to the listings, it shouldn't even have existed. It displayed no number, no destination, just these two proud words, front and back: LOCAL BUS. Those boarding did not converse with the driver as I would, asking from whence the vehicle came or to whither it was bound. If you did that, then plainly YOU WERE NOT LOCAL. Yep folks, there it was, in all it's Royston Vasey liveried glory: A Local Bus for Local People. And I thought: man, I LOVE this town.

But there's more, a lot closer to home - and to this fforum. My smallest daughter has become friendly with a kiddie the same age, a few doors down. My move finally settled - kind of - I'd tentatively begun typing away at my creative writing course again. Cue, breathless arrival of SD and friend.
'Mum, Amy's mum's a famous person! SHE'S RELATED TO JANE AUSTEN! Honest, she researched it and everything and not only that, she's a REAL writer and she's writing a book and it's going to be published!!!!'
Amy was madly nodding her head and beaming, which meant it MUST have been true, so before feverishly logging on here I asked what sort of book her mum was writing, imagining a kind of modern take on Sense and Sensibility, just as well written but with less horses and more sex.
'Um. Well, it's about Thunderbirds really, but after they've all died.'

Look, I realise my daughter could have fallen in with a family of complete fruitcakes with no more connection to the creator of Northanger Abbey than Adolf Hitler. I also realise how unlikely it is that a descendant of Jane Austen would be typing up a novel from the leafy climes of a Gatwick council estate, let alone a novel relating the adventures of a group of Gerry Anderson puppet zombies ...

.. but I do believe in clumping and it would be exactly right if - despite severe reservations - I moved to a spot with close connections to my favourite author, without my realising it. In other words, it is just as likely the whole Austen/Thunderbirds thing is for real, in which case you heard it first, okay?

Whatever. Man, I still love this town.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/09/2008 12:37AM by Jazz_Sue.

Jazz-Sue,


Congratulations!


You would be one of the few people in the world who are happy with where they live, despite all the negatives around you.


My memory of the area near Gatwick, from 1977-81, is basically green, except for the M23 (I think) so it is sad to think of it all being concreted over. I assume that between you and Central London there is not a lot of green space left. What of all the little village pubs? I used to meander down to Brighton from London with friends who thought the 50 miles was too far to travel, so we broke it down by pub crawling to the coast.

I would be sad if this were no longer possible.


Anyway, enough of this, may you have much happiness and find more inspiration for your writings at your new abode>

Jazz, that is an incredible and wonderful story. I hope my next move comes somewhere close to inspiring the same emotions in me (but I know it will not). At least I was one of the ones who heard it first!

I do love where I live. I realize it is a complete genetic accident that I so do, but what can I say? California...no doubt about it....California...no doubt about it...

OC Not Wrote: > I do love where I live. I realize it is a
> complete genetic accident that I so do, but what
> can I say? California...no doubt about
> it....California...no doubt about it...

-------------------------------------------------------
> Oh great, thanks for reminding me the nearest I'll get to going THERE is the Gatwick to Heathrow shuttle service so I can look at the posters. Damn you! Damn your ...

Actually, I've just remembered. We've got the M23 log jams, the Bovis Homes 'Concrete the World' United Front, the farmyard smells from the local landfill sites and the Gatwick to Luton fly past every 40 minutes.
You, on the other hand, got Schwartzanegger.
Fair swap.

About these "local buses": maybe it is the same idea as what is known in the Netherlands as "Buurtbussen" (neighborhood buses) and in Germany/Switzerland as "Bürgerbus" (citizen's bus). I found the term Demand responsive transport for the UK, although I am not sure if this is an appropriate translation. Basicly, they are private initiatives to fill gaps where "official" public transport companies won't run due to economic inefficiency. A private association buys a small bus and runs it along a (more or less) fixed line, but not on a timetable. Instead everyone wanting to use it has to make a phone call, and the driver will tell him when he will be coming round, thus collecting the maximum number of passengers in one go.

Heehee, Roysten Vasey you say?
Let me know when the place next door is up for rent!

Are You Local?
This is a local Fforum for local people.

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Blood! Death! War! Rumpy pumpy! Triumph!

Actually, I've discovered the Local Bus is actually a shoppers' bus which runs 3X a week, linking the town centre to Tesco and Other Places of Local Interest. It's got a number, as well, though not many bus stops bother to advertise the fact. It's 1*2*3, written like that. There's no 1*2*2 or 1*2*4 or, indeed, any other 1 star anything. Imaginative, eh? There's the 100, but that's starless. Much like the sky round here, thanks to Gatwick and the motorways.

Those not familiar with the wonderfully surreal UK series, League of Gentlemen will wonder what I'm on about. Those who are in the know are, no doubt, the same sort who will walk into their 'Sainsbury's Local' filling station cum supermarket just so they can exclaim, 'This is a local shop for local people' in very loud voices until they get thrown out.

Funny, cos there's one of those in Horley, too, on the Chequers roundabout.

"There's nothing for you here..."

What was that about nude Wednesdays?

Sounds like a good way to celebrate humpday...

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Start worrying if the circus comes to town, and I wouldn't be asking for any of the "special" meat either!

There are lots of animals round here - small dogs, especially.
Lots of veterinarians, as well. Funny how nervous our local one gets, when he's asked to do something. Almost like he's expecting something dreadful to ...
I think I'll trim the rabbit's nails myself. Probably safer.

Right by the River Mole, we are. Lots of ponds and lakes, and it's the tadpole season. Which means ...
... toads. Lots and lots of toads!!!


Moley, Ratty, Toady... books that come alive ... a newspaper called the ...

Suddenly, this thread is back where it should be. Creepy.

I'll carry on then, shall I?
Latest on the local fforum (names changed yet again to protect identities):

I answered the door to a well-spoken middle aged lady wielding a clipboard yesterday, who thrust an important-looking piece of paper into my hand whilst simultaneously ticking me off her list. First thought might have been, 'Uh-oh,' but she didn't give me time to finish it.
'I take it you are taking part again this year? The 'Village in Bloom'competition, I mean.'
'Um. I didn't know ... I mean -'
But by then she had clocked the front garden. The broken flower pots filled with weeds, the unkempt lawn, the old divan bed still waiting to be disposed of. The cute plastic bunny rabbit holding a 'Hey man, keep off the grass' sign ...
And her eyes at last swivelled round to me.
'Oh. You're not Mrs Fuse-Strimmer, are you?'
'No. I'm Ms Hertzendanger. The lady you want moved out in February. Not long been here, ha-ha. Lawn mower's been a bit underused ... did back in moving, um, potted acers across. Yes, got the bed idea from a back issue of 'Amateur Landscaper', using it to mark out borders ...'
She cut me off midstream.
'Oh dear, that is shame. She didn't tell me she'd moved.' (Hastily crossing off the tick she'd made) 'I only popped by because I thought she'd be interested in taking part again. She came third last year...' Then, hopefully: 'I don't suppose you know her new address? She can't have gone far; I see her at the bus stop regularly, and it's only just down the road.'
Ah. Now here, I could help her. 'Yes, it's a bungalow in Chequer's Close, I believe. You know, near the pub? It's only a five minute ...'
'Oh no.' The clipboard was placed firmly under her arm. 'We don't deal with people from there. We only take entries from LOCAL people.' I recalled, now - that bus stop is one of the few bearing a 'Local Bus' timetable. Somehow, I felt I had been here before. But there was a pause before my address was permanently obliterated from the parish records. 'Did you say you had moved in permanently, Ms Hertzenburger?' I swear, she squeezed her eyes shut before she said the next bit. 'Perhaps I could leave you one of our forms, then? there's plenty of time - you've got until July for you to, er, get your back better ...'
And she scuttled off. No doubt, to tell her friends in the charity shop all about it.
It's quite amusing, really. We're all fairly newcomers in this little row of houses and, as I write, all around are the frantic sounds of beds being weeded, lawn mowers mowing, fence posts being straightened ... Me? I'm off to do some landscaping. First job, a bed-shaped pond. To put my tadpoles in. Toads, of course.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/14/2008 12:46PM by Jazz_Sue.

Might I suggest poison ivy, cactus, lantana, prickly pear, three corner jacks, thistles, and a few cow skulls, all carefully located as in a Japanese garden?


(Land mines optional)

And perhaps a tasteful water feature of razor-wire and an arrangement of rusted out cars positioned for maximum harmony. Reckon that will get you in with the flower crowd!

I like the idea of cow skulls. Very artistic, that. I know a few cows I could take an axe to.
Hmm. Countrified, so must have an agricultural theme.
Sheep. Rabbits. Lambsies. Cute liddle ducklings...

Balls to that.
Rottweillers, that's it. Lots and lots of Rottweillers. And American pit-ball crosses (cunningly disguised as the relatively harmless 'Staffies') to keep them company.

I'll dig a patio, of course. Nice and deep, so the neighbours can wonder where my ex has gone. Into the Staffies, probably.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/15/2008 11:43PM by Jazz_Sue.

Don't forget the Lilandii (sp?) trees planted in the border, they should grow and grow.

Triffids. You need to grow triffids.

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