Alan Sillitoe endorses drinking, Drop In The Ocean announce another gig, a new incinerator appears in Eastcroft, Santa comes and more people get shot
December 1
The BBC ask Nottingham’s most renowned living writer Alan Sillitoe about binge-drinking in his home town. His response? “The British, they drink, they've always drunk, they've always got drunk, for better or worse, right from Hogarth's day, and before”. So there. Meanwhile, A Drop In The Ocean announces it will be putting another all-dayer on later in the year.
December 2
People are already fucked off with the manky Christmas lights in town, especially the dome of the Council House, which looks like something you’d buy off QVC for 12 quid. For some strange reason, someone boots a football into the hanging display over Clumber Street. And it stays there throughout the month.
December 3
Plucky minnows Nottingham Forest gallantly lose 3-0 to mighty League Two big boys Chester City in the second round of the Cup. “We’ve had a great run, and it had to end sometime” says manager Gary Megson, as his players went back to their full-time jobs of shopping in Hockley, driving around in Jeeps, and getting pissed in Geisha. Meanwhile, Notts County go out 2-1 to Torquay…
December 5
Three youths are found guilty of the murder of a heroin dealer with a metal bedstead in St Anns, made more poignant by the fact that the mothers of the victim and one attackers knew each other by giving birth to them at the QMC. All three get banged up for 13 years min.
December 6
One of the Marion Bates killers gets his appeal slapped down. Meanwhile, there’s a serial taxi-stabber on the loose in Sherwood, County beat Peterborough 2-0, and Forest beat Port Vale 1-0.
December 10
Forest draw 1-1 with Walsall. Notts get the same result against Wrexham.
December 11
More grief for cabbies, as 75 black cabs get spot-checked at Nottingham Stupid Long Name Airport. Osama bin Laden is not found in the back of any of ‘em with a wrapped up kebab, but ten cabbies are busted for drawing dole or for being unlicensed...
December 15
Nottingham gets its third massive incinerator, in Eastcroft. Despite mass protests from locals, the Council says it’s a necessary step. “God knows we’ve got to get rid of all those unread copies of Exposed and all the other glossy shit left about in pubs somehow,” a spokesman said…
December 16
The students break up for Xmas, and town is utter, utter carnage. On a more seasonal note, a Carlton postmaster called Deva Kumarasiri announces that funds he raised after the Tsunami will be going to the building of a Sri Lankan village called Little Nottingham. Respect. On the downside, a bloke from Aspley gets life for stabbing his best mate 16 times after a birthday piss-up in town, and Forest lose 3-1 to Scunthorpe. Fucking Scunthorpe!
December 17
Notts County beat Stockport 2-0.
December 23
Everyone knocks off work for Xmas. Carnage.
December 24
The South Terrace of Nottingham Castle reopens. A burst water main almost nine years to the day has meant it has been fenced off, and the repair bill came to half a million. Town is absolutely dead for the first Saturday night in ages, with miles and miles of cabbies milling about and doing fuck all.
December 25
Santa comes, obviously.
December 26
Forest batter Doncaster 4-0, but County lose 3-0 to Oxford.
December 28
Loads of kids in skintight all-in-ones are seen in town doing that walk you do when you’re in a mad rush to have a shit and you’re trying not to draw attention to yourself. But don’t worry… it’s only the Junior British Open speed-skating tournament, held at the Ice Centre.
December 30
Boooooo. The police fence off the front of the Market Square. Bad enough that you can’t watch a moron climb up the Xmas tree this year, but no opportunity to snog a Sharon up against a lion? Political Correctness Gone Mad, youth.
December 31
Anyone who was anyone was at the LeftLion do at the Orange Tree, actually. Anyone who was a bit thick was standing outside Nottingham’s biggest alcoholic crèche, The Works, not knowing that it had finally had its licence snatched out of its chatty hands. It will be remembered for being the place where Brian Harvey had a rather extreme flat-top… and fuck-all else.
January 4
The Council announce that, starting at the end of the month, buskers in town may be facing X-Factor style talent tests. Two questions: does this mean that we’ll soon be seeing twats like G4 on street corners, and what the fuck would they have made of Xylophone Man?
January 9
A massive clock is erected on London Road. Don’t panic, kids, it’s not counting down to Armageddon or anything like that, it’s just the developers’ way of telling us that another massive development is taking place on Boots Island with (more) poncey apartments, offices and bars…
January 10
Two drug dealers from Sneinton get done for a shooting in Radford after having their carpets fitted, paying the tradesmen in crack and heroin and then mistakenly thinking a shoebox with 60 grand had been nicked. The judge describes the fitters’ workmanship as ‘a catastrophic piece of idleness’. Well, what the fuck did he expect? The poor sods had just got paid.
January 11
Big news day in Notts. The QMC and City hospitals announce plans to merge into the unwieldly-sounding Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust in April, while Notts Police reveal that shootings in Nottingham fell by 74% in 2005. There were 11 reported shootings, compared to one a week the year before (and one a day, according to shit-stirring bell-ends in the media). Well done, everybody.
January 13
Something called One Nottingham puts out a questionnaire asking ‘Young Adults’ about the future of the city. It contains such challenging yes-no questions such as ‘Do you want Nottingham to be the safest city in the country?’ and ‘Do you want Nottingham to reduce cancer by 20%?’.
January 16
Three men are charged with the murder of three homeless women in Notts, and it is revealed that one of them wanted to become Nottingham’s first serial killer, which would have made for an interesting careers talk at school. Didn’t he know that Harold Shipman went to High Pavement?
January 18
Two local mouth-breathers get suspended sentences for nicking a couple of life-jackets from a plane at NEMA. One question…why?
January 19
The skintest month of the year drags on, as fuel bills hit the mat all over town. But at least you’re not Lisa Crossley from Arnold, who gets a whopping £202,020,052.47p leccy bill from Powergen. No, she didn’t have a ridiculous amount of lights on her house at Xmas. It was a cock-up.
January 20
The Police announce that crime figures in Nottingham fell over Xmas, but violent crime went up. Talking of which, a chav on a bike from Radford is on trial for biting a police officer in a car.
January 21
A non-fatal shooting happens in the car park of the Showcase in Lenton, keeping up the one-a-month average. Cuh.
We have a favour to ask
LeftLion is Nottingham’s meeting point for information about what’s going on in our city, from the established organisations to the grassroots. We want to keep what we do free to all to access, but increasingly we are relying on revenue from our readers to continue. Can you spare a few quid each month to support us?
