Friday 24 July 2015

Fowl play suspected


We sit rather comfortably between a high-class deli and the most exclusive jewellers outside London in the whole of the South of England.

On Thursday morning, a hospice charity had the grand opening of their combined shop and cafe, just one door down from ours, and they made a big event of it, with a celebrity cutting a pink ribbon and everything.

Thursday is our rubbish collection day and, although I normally put out rubbish and recycling in the mornings, for some reason I put it out the night before, just prior to going to bed. I couldn't face doing it first thing.

Two things can happen to it overnight - that it gets kicked around by drunks and that it gets pecked open by gulls, even before dawn. I think that both happened, strewing all sorts of organic and non-organic litter right over the new shop's entrance. The managers had to get in professional cleaners to clear it up. Dry brooms just don't work on wet coffee grounds.

The proliferation of charity shops in British high-streets is taken as a measure of poverty in an area now, and because most of them have no business rates to pay, get all their stock for nothing and pay no wages for their volunteer staff, they are often viewed with resentment by their commercial neighbours for bringing the tone down at the same time as paying their own directors hefty salaries from the profits.

So this charity shop immediately and paranoidally jumped to the conclusion that this was an act of sabotage by the high-class jewellers...

As I explained to the director of the jewellers this morning, the management of the new shop have not got a clue about the problems with drunks and gulls in the city centre.

They will learn - sooner rather than later.


24 comments:

  1. We have to put our household waste out the night before as they collect it at some ridiculous hour { about 6.30 am } … so …. the foxes, dogs, rats, mice and people coming home from the pub have a go at it. I'm pleased to say that, in October, along with our green bin etc we will be getting another wheelie bin to replace the plastic bag so no one will be able to rip the bags open. We are lucky as we have space to put the bins but other houses will have to leave them in their front gardens …… a sign of the times. XXXX

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It sounded like Wind in the Willows for a minute, with badgers, foxes, rats etc coming home from the pub. We cannot even use plastic boxes in our flat, so are forced to use bin liners. They say our stuff should be out by 7.00, but they never pick it up until 9.00 or after.

      Delete
    2. Yes, we live deep into Wild Wood, quite near Badgers house and not far from Toad Hall !! XXXX

      Delete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That sounds a bit censorial for a first comment, Jan. I was talking about drunks pissing through their letterbox and gulls ripping up their rubbish in the daylight.

      Delete
  4. What type of charity is it? 'Save the Seagulls' maybe?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The gulls don't need it, they are already protected.

      Delete
  5. Gulls are too much for peregrine falcons, I suppose. Haws next?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Wait, what do you mean gulls are protected?

      Delete
    2. Yes, they are protected. They have become much scarcer on the coast (because they have moved into towns for food) and so they have been designated as in decline. They don't even bother to look up when the peregrine falcons fly over.

      Delete
    3. You need a Gyrfalcon - a little on the pricey side

      Delete
    4. Is this like a personal drone, but with wings?

      Delete
  6. Gulls are a real problem aren't they Tom? More of a problem than drunks usually up here, although one lad did knock a few bollards over the other night (luckily too late to knock over a few people). When I was a girl (not yesterday or the day before) gulls inland were a sign that there was a storm at sea. Now they are great predators of all things rubbish.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The problem of inner city gulls became much worse when they banned open rubbish-tips. All the gulls would harmlessly spend the whole time beaking through piles of household waste which they now have to rip up bin-liners to get at. Same with Red Kites, who now have to rely on road-kill in the Oxfordshire area. I used to believe my dad about storms at sea too.

      Delete
  7. At my last location, we had wheelie bins for the trash and a plastic bin for recyclables. We were in a more rural place, so not a lot of drunks roaming the streets, and most wildlife couldn't be bothered to crawl up the wheelie bin since cornfields across the street or down the road were providing them food.

    Now i'm in a place where most people take their trash and recyclables to the dump themselves, and more often than not, you chat with a neighbour or acquaintance once you're there because you nearly always see at least one other person there you know.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I really hate wheelie bins just because of how they dominate entire streets. Going to the dump here is a one hour expedition in a car and fraught with legal difficulties. No wonder people fly-tip old sofas.

      Delete
  8. Even in the heartland of rural America, far and away from a sea or any sort, gulls flock around the landfills and sit on the ground in parking lots where there are drive through food establishments. I don't get it.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I live at Norwich-on-Sea. I have never been able to find exactly where the sea is but the gulls have and very are happy and they love the chips and sandwiches the visitors eat sitting outside and they swoop all over them pecking straight from the hand. One even dived for my hat the other day. It must be global warming here already and all that land between us and the North Sea has disappeared.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Cornwall I have to beat them away with my hands. I am adult, but kids don't stand a chance.

      Delete
    2. Just imagine if they'd been born 'cute' looking; every urban do-gooder would be out, trying to protect them.

      Delete
    3. The chicks are quite cute looking, but I suppose all babies inspire those protective feelings. Adult gulls don't seem to find them cute though. They will try and kill any other's chicks that wander into their territory.

      Delete