The other day on opening the downstairs front curtains we
were greeted with the sight of a pile of dog pooh slap bang in the middle of
our lawn. This is now the third time this has happened. We contemplated putting
up a note thanking the considerate owner for their unsolicited and greatly
unwanted surprise package.How can a dog owner just allow their animal to
defecate on a neighbour’s lawn and just walk off benignly whistling a merry
tune? However, then you consider the Village and the blobs of dog mess
scattered indiscriminately around the pavements, not just on the verges but
smack bang in the middle of the walkways! Every trip to Mrs Minshaw’s shop, our
corner shop, involves a ritual of 'eyes down for full house of dog pooh'.
I’m sure local kids must play ‘Dodge the Dog Muck’! What motivates someone to allow their dog to
just pooh and then for the owner to just walk off? Surely at minimum you as the
owner just ‘kerb’ the dog so that the poo goes somewhere no one else is going
to walk in or on it? The gutter is not ideal but far better than slap bang in
the middle of the pavement! Or and this a tricky one locally: You clear the
mess up and put it into a public bin or take the bag home and dispose of it
there. The bags are FREE from the local council. Free. No charge whatsoever. I
was shocked walking down the Seaton Road and Church Road to see so much dog
mess scattered on the pavement. It all seemed so random. However what shocked
me the most was that it was, on the Seaton Road especially, just dumped outside
of a neighbour’s house and sometimes right where that neighbour would
come out of their house onto the pavement. Do people in the Village really have
that level of disrespect for the people that they share the village with?
Surely not: I cannot believe that in such a small village that there can be so
much disrespect for each other. However by the display of dog faeces presented
on a daily basis it seems that there is an underlying current of that. As for the state of the Church Fields a local
walk, to go for a walk there you have to dodge the piles of pooh on the made up
footpaths. There is an acre of open field that the sensible dog walker could
allow the animal to use. Just common sense really. It’s yours and mine place to
live, it’s our Village come on Villagers let’s treat other with respect and
have a nice place for the kids to grow up in and for us all to walk around and
enjoy. Then we have to deal with the phantom Werthers Wrapper dropper. He
or she is a dog walker, you can tell by the pile of pooh close to where the
wrappers are dropped. But that is another story.
I wrote this Obituary piece for The Guardian about Stanley Green while I was an undergraduate at Goldsmiths' College. I contacted The Guardian and asked them if I could submit it for publication. It was sent off to them and I waited in eager anticipation for their reply. It was published on Wednesday January 26th 1994, the Editor made no changes or additions except by adding some photographs (the photographs used here are later additions by me): "A Consuming Passion.... Stanley Owen Green who has died aged aged 78, was that tall thin man with steel-rimmed glasses who marched it seemed for an eternity up and down London's Oxford Street. It was his banner that made him famous, held high above his head and proclaiming "LESS LUST FROM PROTEIN" in large white letters. Underneath the banner he endured the taunts of sticky schoolchildren and the spittle of office workers alike, to bring his unique, indeed puzzling message to the people of London. He later wate...
Hi David,
ReplyDeleteUnrelated to your post, but I'm researching a piece on old gadgets and technology for the Independent on Sunday newspaper in the UK.I came across your website twitter post about Squarial, and was wondering if you were still using a squarial? If so would you be willing to comment on why you still use the dish and what appeals to you about retro technology
Regards