There It Is, you fat banjo-twanging CUNT

May Contain Notts' previously dormant interest has been piqued by goings-on in the charming village of Cotgrave, where a local mouth-breather has been given three years for racially harassing a local takeaway, making them deliver pizzas to his house, and generally gooin' abaaht reckoning he's summat. (There was a picture of him on the Post website, but it's gone. But then again, all these twats look the same - imagine a gibbon that's been licking lead paint off a stick all day, and then had a full-body shave). Christ on a crisp packet, it's one thing to run a shop and get robbed by the local Deliverance extra. It's another thing entirely to actually have to take the shit to the fucker's house. Deepest sympathies to the Shalimar takeaway (you can't miss it - it's in between Five Star Key-Cutters and Kid Creole Krazy Kuts).

The problems started after Mahboob Ulhaq, owner of Shalimar, Cotgrave, gave a police statement about one of Raynor's friends.

Raynor stormed into the takeaway and said: "You are in my village, do as I say."

Yeah, I've seen that sign; "WELCOME TO COTGRAVE. A BIG FAT CUNT WITH BITS OF PEPPERONI IN HIS TEETH OWNS IT. DO WHAT HE SAYS AT ALL TIMES". I bet he even waved a fist dead close to his face like Bully Beef while he was saying it, an'all.

Thankfully, there's a silver lining amongst all this racist mouth-breathery. We've all had our doubts about the standards of hygiene in certain pizza places. After reading this story, I have the comforting image in my head of a kitchen in Cotgrave, with Jeffrey Daniel and Howard Hewett lowering their leather disco trousers and masturbating furiously onto a deep-crust, while Jody Watley empties her nostrils Rugby League-style onto a garlic bread, and all of them growling "Gonna make THIS a night to remember, BITCH".

MAY CONTAIN NOTTS EARTH TREMOR EMERGENCY SPECIAL

Ah, fuck it. I thought it was our earth tremor. Didn't realise that we were sharing it with half the country. Sulk.

Please wash out all crims before recycling

Lots of talk about vermin with shotguns in town at the moment, so here's a light-hearted story about petty crime. It appears that Bulwell is piloting a new eco-friendly scheme; recycling bell-ends. Obviously, there'll be the usual moaning (another bin to look after, getting the collection dates mixed up, the stench of two-week-old crackhead attracting flies in summer, etc), but it's worth a try. And well done to the Post for exposing a new and sinister development in criminal methodology;

In mitigation, William Bennett said Baguley had been affected by his past.

He said his mother was an alcoholic and he had become involved in a gang who used him to smash windows during burglaries.

I dunno about you, but this is a bit scary. I don't know how I would react if I heard a noise at 3am, pulled back the curtains, and discovered a gang of youths using one of their own as a battering ram, or loading him into a massive catapult made of discarded shopping trolleys.

One goes into town for the fanny

It only seemed like yesterday when Parliament and the military were arguing the toss over whether Harry Bastard should go to Iraq or not, so congratulations to the Royal Family for learning their lesson and keeping Prince William's even more dangerous plans to go out on the mash in VIOLENT, NO-GO DEATH CITY NOTTINGHAM a state secret. According to the Post (who are absolutely pissing their knickers with glee over the story), he spent an evening at the Pitcher and Piano before going on to Oceana (and then presumably going across the road to Food Factreh for battered swan, chips and caviar). Gawd Bless 'im, he's just like one of us, etc (Apart from having six security guards around him. And his Dad owning Cornwall. And being able to masturbate into a handful of £50 notes if he hasn't pulled that night. Even though his Nana's face is on them, so he probably wouldn't. Make that €500 notes, then. Etc).

Despite all the cooing and arse-licking, however, I remain unimpressed. When the Post's website said 'Which Nottingham bar was Prince William drinking in?' I guarantee that everyone in Notts with a brain automatically said 'The Pitcher and Piano. Because it's big, and predictable, and up its own arse, and full of twats, and shit. And I bet they went to Oceana afterwards, because that's where all the divvy out-of-towners with no imagination go" .

And anyway, if I was him, and I had six hand-picked security guards with guns and everything who've probably been instructed to take a bullet for me, I'm not gonna fuck about in Twat Church - I'm going in Yates, or Libertehs, and I'm kicking the fuck off. "OI! Your missus looks a decent bit o' fanneh - what's she knockin' abahht wi' a CUNT LIKE YO' FOR? YEAH! I SAID IT, YOUTH! And yeah, I AM wearing a Derbeh shot under these robes, ACTULEH - yo' wanna MEK SUMMAT ON IT?"

Royalty, alas, is wasted on the Royals. Still, here's hoping it starts a trend, and we see Harry Bastard going in the Thurland soon, in his Nazi uniform.

He's not too old to get some smack off his Dad

Man, isn't it horrible when you get shamed up by your Dad? Like when he insists on wearing that manky jumper he got at Christmas 1997 and those trackie bottoms whenever you bring your girlfriend over. Or when you see him Elvis-dancing to Abba Gold at a cousin's wedding. Or when he's on the front of the News Of The World selling crack and heroin to prostitutes in 'No-Go Nottingham crime zone' (fucking hell, is there anywhere in Nottingham that's actually 'Go' anymore?) Radford, after being stung by the Fake Sheik himself (who presumably wasn't posing as a petrodollar millionaire for this particular job).

That, my friends, is the quandary being forced upon 'Millionaire soccer ace' Jermaine Pennant this morning, as he riffles through the country's leading Sunday shit-rag and reads about his old man being an EVIL MUSCLE-BOUND BOSS OF A SEEDY CRACK DEN (as opposed to a nice, well-kept crack den, presumably), as well as getting information on what prostitutes in Radford are charging at the moment. And I bet his first reaction, like all of us, would be to scream; "Ah DAAAAAAAAAAAAAD! PUT SOME FUCKING TROUSERS ON, FOR FUCK'S SAKE! YER ALLUS SHOWING US UP!" before stomping back to the bedroom to listen to Bullet For My Valentine at top volume.

"AY! Are yo' havin' a goz at me FOO-KIN' TITS, youth?"

Now I've got me Sexperty head on again, I'm absolutely delighted to find a news item that can fit into both blogs, as it features big tits and Mansfield. Next time I hear a mate in the pub trotting out the standard rammell opinion that if he had a massive set of jubblies, he'd wouldn't stop playing with them, I'll stop him mid-sentence, direct him to this news story, and say; "No, mate, you wouldn't. You'd be sat at home getting your tits out on East Midlands Today."

Yes, despite the small matter of three Notts schools being announced as some of the worst in the entire country, the BBC decided that the top news story of the day was a pair of massive Mansfeldian mams. Which must have been great news for anyone having their tea. Personally, that pic above is giving me some serious Clockwork Orange flashbacks. To use the vernacular, that lad had got some right fucking tit on him.

If you ask me, I think the bloke has every right to be fucked off about not getting a breast reduction off the NHS, his life must be hellish. There was one lad at our school who had the same ailment, and every time we were getting changed for Games, he'd be surrounded by sex-crazed youths trying to cop a feel. "Ah man...let me suck them tits, Guy...give us a soapeh tit-wank..."

Of course, my fear is that it might be some kind of virus, and by the summer Nottingham will be plagued by gangs of brick shithouses from Mansfield in bra tops and rabbit ears pushing men into corners at Jumpin' Jaks and bellowing "YOH WANNA SHOT ON ME FOO-KIN' TITTEHS, YOUTH? GET YOH FOO-KIN MAATH RAAND THESE COONTS, OR AH'LL FOO-KIN' PAN YOH!"

(and yes; I'm wondering what those market boxer shorts are saying too. 'Calvin Clark'? 'Calvin Clap'? 'Calvin Claat?')

Bulwell wobbles, but it don't fall down

I've had so many people flagging the following news story up to me and wanting me to comment on it, that I've been feeling like Dennis bleddy McCarthy. I suppose you'll be hassling me into doing Wanted Column On The Air next, or that quiz with the fucking typewriter music in the background. Actually, I've been clamming to write about it ever since I saw it, so here goes; Bulwell has taken the accolade of having the highest percentage of people in Notts who buy sportswear, and the highest percentage of people who do fuck all sporting-related activity, what with them being too busy cramming half of Iceland into their cakey maws.

Personally, I'm a bit shocked by this. How could an area that closes down its swimming pool and opens up a drive-through KFC across the road possibly fall into such a state? How could this happen in a place where the Greggs has the kind of queues that you used to see on the news whenever there was a bread shortage in Communist Poland? How could a part of town where the only sporting facility the locals ever use is the short-cut across the 'Golfeh' to get to Tesco and the nearest bingo hall (pausing to flick V-signs and scream abuse at anybody about to take a shot, naturally) sink so low? (he wrote, as he bit into the crisp sandwich on the side of his laptop and eyed the remains of the Quality Street tin)

Personally, however, I'm not here to talk about the collective lardiness of the people of that gentle town with its babbling brook (who will be hereafter referred as Bulweebles) - do I look like fucking Trisha or summat? The thing that interests me here is the sportswear aspect. I've been to Bulwell far too many times in my precious, precious life, and it's true; they're all absolutely batcheh for manky sportswear in that place. I'm surprised that NCT didn't add a third rail to the bit of tram network that runs through Bulwell, so it would look like there was a huge adidas stripe across the place on Google Earth.

This might be a little hard for our younger readers to take in, but once upon a time, sportswear was an absolute status symbol. I remember growing up in Top Valley in the 1970s, and being in awe of the Abbs brothers, for the simple fact that two of them wore white Admiral Man United away trackie tops. OK, so maybe they wore them all the time, and by 1978 they absolutely funked, but the fact remained; you could not buy this shit in a shop. God knows how they got hold of them. While our Mams were fobbing us off with Littlewoods long-sleeved t-shirts and claiming they were Forest tops, those two lads were undisputed kings of the street, because they were wearing the exact same thing as Joe Jordan and Gordon McQueen.

(and bear in mind that there was precisely one sports shop in town, the almighty Redmayne & Todd, which was the best shop in Nottingham ever ever EVER and had an absolutely gargantuan Subbuteo section).

I even supported Man United in the 1976 FA Cup final and cried when they lost, just because I wanted a trackie top just like that. Me mam should have disowned me.

By late 1977, I finally got hold of a Forest trackie top, with the logo and everything, and it was my turn to dominate. Nobody - and I mean, nobody - had one, and kids at junior school would beg me to let them wear it for a bit. In fact, my first contact with puberty happened because of that top; I lent it to one lad who was in goal, and when he gave it me back, it absolutely reeked of sweat (I got him back later, when he split his trousers reaching down for a ball and I silently pointed out the massive skid mark in his kecks to everyone else).

By the 80s, Casual Culture (or 'Shadies', as they were known in Notts) kicked the door right in. A gang at our school started calling themselves the Hi-Tec Crew (tsk...rubbish trainers), and people were going to obscene lengths to get hold of a £75 Tacchini trackie top or Pringle jumper (with the resultant effect being that half the kids at school either looked like Games teachers or middle-managers on a golfing weekend). From there, it was a very short jump to Bulwell creating enough static electricity to power five hospitals whenever some indoor whale in a chatty Reebok tracksuit brushes against another gutbucket in a Lonsdale top in another sport shop that doesn't sell anything you could actually play a sport with. Sigh.

The Clough Statues

...are now whittled down to a shortlist of three, and can be seen at the Council House this week. It has to be said that none of the proposed statues look much like Cloughie at the present time, and are a bit underwhelming. When you're up against something as skill as this, you have to come stronger, I'm afraid. Anyway...

Les Johnson: I like the pose, but it's totally unsuitable for a statue that will be on the streets of Nottingham. As anyone who has ever walked past the statue of Robin Hood by the Castle will know, it is almost obligatory for anyone having their photo taken with it to cup Robbo's bollocks and laugh, as if they're the first person to ever think of doing such a thing. That pose there is leaving the great man's cobbers completely unprotected. And if I ever saw some sucky bint on a hen do handling my idol's junk on King Street, I would not be responsible for my actions.

Keith Maddison: This is the most Clough-like pose, even though it's inevitable that some pisshead in the Square will assume that some metal bloke is 'fronting up' to him and will charge over to have a go. However, I'm not enamoured of the face, the Umbro logo on the sweatshirt, or the rolled-up trackie-bottoms making it look as if Cloughie is wearing the kind of boots sported by Monkey whenever he was giving some demons a kicking or trying to convince Pigsy that the woman he was trying to get his trotter over was actually a Slug-Monster.

John McKenna: Despite the more obvious Forestisms in this one, it's my least favourite. Some Notts meathead is bound to piss up against the logo and start a civil war, and it looks like Cloughie has commemorated his retirement by wrenching the Forest badge off the side of the Trent End and is pegging it for a bus.

In their defence, however, the accompanying busts look a lot more lifelike facially than the statues. Both the statue fund and the Council are soliciting opinions, so get involved.

Village Idiots

There's been some unbelievable acts of poncery committed in Nottingham over the past decade, but this takes the biscuit, if not the whole packet: Sneinton - the part of town accurately described by someone in the MCN forum as 'sounding like it's come out of someone's nose, and looks like it too' - now wants to be known as 'Sneinton Village'. Yes, there are some nice bits in Sneinton, but let's consider the facts;

This is a village.
This is Sneinton.
This is a village.
This is Sneinton.
This is a village.
This is Sneinton.
Are we all clear on that? Good.

Apparently, this incredible act of ignorance in the face of truth has come from the local cricket club, for reasons that I can't understand, even after reading the Post article 27 times. "As far as we know there is no legal criteria [for becoming a village] - if we can do some of the things we have got planned, we could re-brand ourselves Sneinton Village." Said the chairperson of said cricket club, as she applied another layer of Brasso to a massive, stinking turd in the road. However, it looks like the idea of a 'village green' is a long way off;

A game was due to be held in October. Teams from a pub, local restaurant and the police were set to take part - but it was called off after health and safety problems with the proposed site, an area of land owned by Castle College.

Trans: 'Someone left a knackered fridge at silly mid-off, and a dead prostitute's needle-pocked arm was found sticking out of the crease'

Of course, there's a precedent to this; the lamentable attempt to rebrand Hockley as 'Hockley Village' (a term which is only used by juff-headed bell-ends who work for estate agents and drive around town in those stupidly-painted Mini Coopers). So why stop there? Let's have Viccy Flats Village an'all. Let's see some signposts for The Magical Fairy Kingdom of Radford, while we're at it. Fuck it, let's start to call Nottingham 'Monaco', or 'St Tropez', and have done with it.

And off we go again

I had the full intention of starting the New Year in an optimistic kind of mood. And then I read this story in the Post. And it reminded me of how I spent New Year's Eve bouncing on the door of the Orange Tree for the LeftLion do. And then I remembered that instead of shutting the doors at 1oish and going off and enjoying myself, I had to stay on the doors, because their beer garden has to shut down early so as not to offend the residents (evidently, 50 people on the pavement outside fagging away and gassing on doesn't make any noise at all), which rather fucked up my New Years.

So I will say this once again: If you have decided to live in a Ponce-Box in the Lace Market and are complaining about the noise at night, you are a twat. You're no less of a twat than someone who moves to Rockall and then moans about there not being a Spar nearby, or someone in the BNP who relocates to Soweto and then complains about 'Blackies' bringing down the house prices - and that, as I'm sure is even aware to someone as fuckwitted as you, is extremely twatty indeed.

Listen up, bell-ends; why the fuck should I and the thousands of other sane people in Notts forego our birthright of getting kaylide, shouting at people of the opposite sex in the street, and generally attempting to forget that we've got shit jobs to go to in the morning just because YOU were fuckwitted enough to buy a shoebox in OUR city centre because you saw Sex In The City and all those shitty property programmes on Channel 4?

I don't usually bother to make New Year's resolutions, but here's one I'm going to keep to in 2008: whenever I'm in the Lace Market after hours, I am going to bellow "BIG! 'AIREH! FANNEH!" as loud as I can, no matter what time of the morning. And if these pissy-knickered mitherers get on your wick as much as they do mine, feel free to do the same.

(PS: Here's what my LL oppo Rob Cutforth wrote a while back about the time he lived in the Lace Market. I've since forgiven him. He's Canadian. He didn't know any better)

The May Contain Notts Awards 2007

Welcome, everybody, to the upstairs room at the Thurland for the inaugural May Contain Notts Awards of 2007. All of Nottingham’s movers, shakers, and knifers are in attendance, and we’ve just had a splendid three-course meal in a giant cob. Ooh look, there's the Slanty N just coming out of the bogs, and Sherwood Bear is over in the corner trying to suggest a threesome with Twiggy and Jo.

Well, the bingo's just about finished, so we can finally open those envelopes and cast an eye over another eventful year for the glittering jewel of the East Midlands. And the first category is…

***SPORTS PERSONALITY OF THE YEAR***

Yes, it’s been another great year for sport in Notts, just as long as you’re not arsed about football, and you really, really, really like ice hockey. The nominees are;

Carl Froch, for having another unbeaten year

…including a five-round mashing of former WBC champ Robin Reid in November. Anyone who can make people in Nottingham actually pay to see someone punch someone else in the face must be pretty special.

Forest and Notts twats, for running about on the pitch at Meadow Lane in a preseason friendly, like bell-ends

Local teet’-sucking mouth-breathers from the Forest end forego their usual Happy Meal to partake in the Kids For A Quid scheme and run on the pitch at the end of the game, only to be chased off by Fat Dads in the Notts end, shaking their fists like Mr The Menace after Dennis has put a ball through his greenhouse. Tsk.

Nottingham Forest, for pissing away a two-goal lead to Yeovil in the playoffs

I was there. It was like your missus trying to resurrect your beached whale of a relationship by giving you a lap-dance, only for her to leave a 12-inch skid mark on your best trousers.

Notts County, for officially becoming the worst club in the country to support

...confirming what we all knew anyway.

and the winner is…

Neil Harris, for shitting on the floor of Muse after Forest celebrate getting battered 5-0 by Oldham by acting like nob-ends in town.

Well done, Neil. Don’t move, let me just put this newspaper underneath you. Here’s your award, now fuck off back to Millwall you chatty bastard. And our next award is...

***SMALL BUSINESSPERSON OF THE YEAR***

It goes without saying that Nottingham is teeming with enterprising people with their eye on an opening in the market. Particularly Bulwell Market. So what if most of what they do is a bit, well, illegal? The runners-up are;

The bloke who nicked an entire kitchen out of his next-door neighbours house

With a special mention to his missus, who claimed that she was bathing her kid the entire time that he re-fitted it and was surprised to find it there afterwards.

That smackhead in St Anns, for continuing to claim her next-door neighbours pension 18 months after he’d died and was found by the police in an advanced state of decomposition

Shane Meadows’ next film virtually writes itself.

Another St Anns twat, for taking advantage of his mate getting stabbed to death at a pub in town to rob £324 out of the till

You’ve got to admire anyone who can see the fiscal advantages of a bad situation. I can imagine him trapped in the World Trade Centre on September 11^th, thinking “Skill! While everyone’s chucking themselves out the window, I can absolutely rinse the stationary cupboard!”

That bloke from Notts who grew the strongest weed ever discovered in the UK

Mmm, green heroin. Who needs mild euphoria when you could have brain haemorrhage ?

But the winner is…

Those two bent coppers, for losing their jobs and getting jailed for passing on information to crims about murder investigations

…in return for discounts on clothes from that shop in town where chavs get their suits for their next court appearance. Here’s your award, plus a £5 voucher for TK Maxx.

More awards later. But now, put your hands together for the one and only SU POLLARD!

Thanks Su. And talking of the great artistic bounty that Nottingham has bestowed to the world, our next award is…

***CULTURAL EVENT OF THE YEAR***

Nottingham, as we all know, could not be more vibrant and eclectic if it turned itself into a massive Aboriginal dildo, and 2007 saw many huge developments. Broadway getting some new enormous blue windows. The council erecting George Best’s old house on top of some old buildings. And some other things. And our nominees are;

The stripper from Arnold, for her thought-provoking performance art piece at a local school

When I was at school, there was always one girl who would show you her bits in exchange for a copy of Smash Hits. Obviously, now that said mag is defunct, I applaud Arnold Hill School for taking steps to remedy the situation.

The fountains in the Square, for thought-provokingly not working for a bit

Yoko Ono must have been right pissed off for not coming up with this one; spend a fortune on the piping, construction and planning of a new fountain that youths can’t empty a bottle of Squezy into, which then produces…nothing. Apart from a flood of mithering letters to the Post.

Unknown graffiti artist, for the thought-provoking ‘Suck Your Mum’

If you live in the South of England and are travelling to Nottingham by train, what is the first thing you see when you reach our lovely hometown? Nottingham Castle? The Inland Revenue offices that look like a Nazi POW camp? Those horrible signs that say ‘WELCOME TO NOTTINGHAM – HOME OF CAPITAL ONE’? No; you see a huge piece that says, to everyone coming to our city, ‘SUCK YOUR MUM’. Simple. Minimalist. Genius.

The Millz Taliban, for their thought-provoking YouTube video

It’s not there anymore, but you already know what it looked like; shitty Grime music. Misspelled captions. Twats waving guns about. Obligatory shot of someone else’s pit-bull. Etc.

And the winner is…

That bloke who has a massive thought-provoking Gay wizard on his back

Obvious choice. Here’s your prize, Sir – a massive tattoo of the Village People on your face. Next award, please...

***THE LUDICROUSLY VIOLENT INCIDENT OF THE YEAR***

Naturally, this is the most fiercely-contested award tonight – so much so, that all the nominees have been strapped up to those mobile Hannibal Lecter restrainers. And the runners-up are…

The inbred cousins from Eastwood who started hitting each other with pool balls in socks in a pub in town, because they were bored

Back in the day, they would have settled their differences with a banjo duel. Nowadays, it appears that our neighbours in Bandit Country like to play Human Conkers of an evening.

That nob from Broxtowe, for attacking someone on the tram with a meat cleaver

Not just any meat cleaver, though – a meat cleaver secreted inside a baby’s pram, like Shogun fucking Assassin. Still, as anyone with a babby knows, it’s a right mither remembering to take everything you need out with you. Nappies…bottle…sun hat…dummy…favourite teddy…throwing death stars…

The father and son from Broxtowe, for beating the shit out of two blokes who they thought had robbed from their house

Say what you like about Charles Bronson and the Death Wish series, but you must admit that he had a bit more class than walking about a street in Bilborough with a hammer in one hand and a golf club in another. Especially when you’ve got the wrong house.

That dealer in Basford, for stabbing a bloke in the eye because he wouldn’t buy any drugs off him

No, mate. If you want to get on as a dealer, you offer the first one free, or you offer a discount. What you don’t do is say “Ey! Buy mah foo-kin droogs, or I’ll shank yoh!”

But the winner is…

That meathead from Bulwell who has been banned from every pub in Notts bar five

An outstanding achievement, as I’m sure you’ll all agree. We now go over by satellite to one of the five pubs he’s still allowed to drink in…oh…we appear to be having some technical difficulties…he appears to be…beating people to death with the camera. Oh well.

And now, ladies and gentlemen, it’s time for a short break in the proceedings. Here’s….ALVIN STARDUST BEING JABBERED AT BY A DUTCHMAN!

Ta, Alvin. Without further ado, we move on to a very special award indeed…

***THE MAY CONTAIN NOTTS LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD FOR UTTER CUNTISHNESS AND TALKING ABSOLUTE MINGE ABOUT NOTTINGHAM***

So how the FUCK can Nottingham be the fourth worst place in the country to live in when FUCKING MANSFIELD is only ninth, you BELL-ENDS? Have you EVER BEEN TO FUCKING MANSFIELD, you smug, know-nothing, DRIBBLINGS OF WANK DOWN THE FACE OF AN ELDERLY PROSTITUTE? HAVE YOU? HAVE YOU? I’ll tell you the worst place to live in the UK – INSIDE YOUR SHIT-ENCRUSTED, MEDIA-WHORISH, DELICIOUSLY-PUNCHABLE CUNTY HEADS. Take your award, stick it up your fucking arses, and FUCK OFF WHILE YOU’RE DOING IT.

Ahem. And our next award is…

***THE WORST THING TO HAPPEN TO NOTTINGHAM IN 2007***

Always a favourite category, this one. And the nominees are…

The Broadmarsh Centre, for wanting to get bigger

What kind of a lead paint-licking gibbon would want to increase the Broado by three times, when it’s obvious to anyone in Nottingham that the best thing that could happen to the place is to reduce in size, preferably to the size of a matchbox. Ooh yes, let’s have another Top Shop five minutes walk from the other ones, that’s a great idea.

Skegness, for burning down

Weep, Nottingham. Weep.

The Variety, for shutting down

This place was the 70s in aspic. It should have been a National Heritage site for the preservation of dodgy comedians and dodgier strippers. Sigh.

The Evening Post, for allowing local racists and pissy-knickered mitherers to comment on their website

Jesus, have you been on there? It’s like being trapped in a room with your least favourite uncle.

Nottingham City Transport, for axing the weekday Night Bus Service

Eejat bwoy.

And the winner is…

Nottingham Forest, for wanting to leave the City Ground and move to a 50,000-seater Mega-Bog in Clifton

Come on, Mark Arthur, get up here and take this award. Go on, do that bit where you say that Forest are going to be in the Premiership in a few years time…HA HA HA! What’s that? ‘World Cup venue’? HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAHHHHH! Oh Mark, we’re going to have to book you for next year’s awards, you’re fucking killin’ meh.

And now, the final award of the year is…

***THE BEST THING TO HAPPEN TO NOTTINGHAM IN 2007***

When you think about it, 2007 was very good to Notts. Don’t believe me? Have a look at the nominees…

The Not As New As It Was Old Market Square, for finally not being a building site any more

Yeah, you can moan about the fountains not working, or the expense, or getting Toneh ‘Ahleh Aht O’ Spandaah Balleh to open it, but the fact remains; it’s so good to have it back.

The Hard Rock Café, for shutting down

No offence to it – apart from the fact that it was some rubbish touristy dive of the type beloved by Italian exchange students in pastels – but it used to grieve me sore to see that lovely building that divided King Street and Queen Street defiled with a big and horrible sign. And it’s going to be the location of the new Cloughie statue.

Steve Green, for announcing his retirement in 2008

Sorry Steve, you seem like a pretty nice bloke, but you really shouldn’t have nobbed off the Drug Squad to concentrate on burglary.

Central News East, for shutting down in 2008

Goodbye, skateboarding rabbits. Goodbye, deliberately interviewing the most toothless window-lickers you can find in the Square for vox-pops. Goodbye, pretending to be in a floating News-Pod in the middle of the Trent when you’re actually in a studio in Birmingham. Goodbye, that rubbish news-reader with the funny-shaped head.

And the winner is…

Colin Gunn, for being sent to the Naughty House

Say no more.

And that concludes the May Contain Notts Awards of 2007. Thanks for watching, and may your New Years Eve be as much of a gargantuan piss-up as ours is. See you all next year, and to see us out…BRING ON THE DANCING GIRLS!

Happy New Year, and – as always – STAY NOTTS.

This is what Nottingham's like

Someone offers train travel to London for £1.50. And some twat on the Post forum moans about not getting a free cup of tea.

There's a twat in me kitchen, what am I gonna do

I suppose I'd better review the latest episode of Kitchen Nightmares, seeing as it featured the Curry Lounge on Upper Parliament Street, even though I would rather watch my own Dad shit into a glass bucket. The things I do for you.

In case you're unaware, Kitchen Nightmares follows the usual Channel 4 framework of getting some toff to tell the plebs how to sort their lives out, along the lines of shows like Your Dog Needs To Be Neutered Almost As Much As You Do, Your House Stinks Of Unwashed Arse, and Look At Your Shit, You Feckless Indoor Whale, Go On, Look At It. It stars, as you're already aware, the hateful Gordon Ramsey, an Aryan who believes that, if you swear every other word, people won't notice that you're a toff doing a girl's job (ooh, hang on, my ears have started burning...).

Gordon points out that although Nottingham has shitloads of curry houses, people aren't going to the Curry Lounge - and he speculates that it might be because you can order whatever dish you like and they have tellies that play Bollywood films and they hang the nans up like aunties' knickers. No, mate - it's because it's situated on the most horrible street in Nottingham, better known as Shit Pub Alley. You don't go to Upper Parliament St for a curry. You go there to get shitfaced, put a glass into someone's face, and try to knock some slags off in Libertys. The only nan anyone's interested in that part of town is from Strelleh, and is wearing a leather mini-skirt.

After some low-level slagging off, more swearing and loads of shots of Gordon poncing about in the Square (presumably to show how ABSOLUTELY FUCKING ROCK he is to strut about right in the middle of ASSASSINATION CITY), Gordon turns it round, and when he returns the restaurant is full, which is nothing to do with the fact that the restaurant has been in the papers all summer, and he's come back with a camera crew. If Hairdressers' Monthly has taught us nothing else (and it hasn't), it's that you could fill Bulwell Lido with dog shit, and enough people would dive in and squdge about in it if there was a camera there.

Still, it was nice to see Channel 4 doing something about Nottingham without getting its knickers all sodden with bullshit about rat-faced youths shooting each other. I'll still be going to the top end of Friar Lane for a curry and Gordon Ramsey is still a cock, though.

It's Shit-Thick Petty Criminal Week in May Contain Notts!

I don't know about anyone else, but when I've got a girlfriend on and I go to her parents' house, I always make sure I'm looking presentable and minding my P's and Q's. And maybe even bring over some Ferraro Rocher from the garage, if I really fancy her. What I don't do is turn up off my mash on Magic Monkey Juice and Space Drugs, threaten to kill everyone inside if they call the 'Feds', and then fall down the stairs and out the door after a failed attempt to grab her Mam's handbag. Particularly when it turns out that I've got the wrong house entirely.

Thanks to that particular incident and other assorted episodes of random cuntishness, that lad up there now has four years in the Naughty House, by which time he might be able to grow a proper moustache. And if the aforementioned 'Kelly' is reading this, and that contemptible bit of scrag really was the only bloke on offer, I advise her to run to the Foresters as quickly as she could say 'Fair go, Bea, you're Top Dog in Wentworth now'.

When Re-enacting Scenes From 'Scum' For A Bit Of A Laugh Goes Wrong

Obviously, when you're trying to write a blog about Nottingham, it would be very easy to just sit down and record every violent incident that was reported in the Evening Post. I don't like doing that - for one, it gives off a totally false impression of a city that has taken an absolute pasting from the media. But mainly because I'd have been chained to this laptop 24 hours a day, sitting on an Kilimanjaro of my own excrement, with my fingers worn to bloody stubs. So I try to stay away from it whenever possible.

And then a story like this comes along, and you don't know what to think. So let's begin at the beginning...

A Man was left bleeding and unconscious after a "play fight" with pool balls in socks.

(random bell-end) had taken the makeshift weapons into the city centre "for protection" on a night out with his cousin, Nottingham Crown Court heard.

OK, three things are automatically springing to mind here;

1. I dunno about you, but when the words 'play fight' spring to mind, I think of me picking up my nephew and chucking him on the sofa like the Undertaker, or me and a mate punching each other on the shoulder when we've got leather jackets on, like John Travolta and Kenickie in Grease. There doesn't seem to be anything fun about swinging about a pool ball in a sock and whacking your mate on the head with it, like you were Ray Winstone and he were Phil Daniels.

2. If you need to take a weapon into town 'for protection', maybe God is telling you that you shouldn't really be going into town that night.

3. This might be just me, but who the fuck apart from cast members of The Beverley Hillbillies goes out on the batter with their cousin? I've got loads of cousins, and I only ever see them at funerals. It's not that I dislike 'em or owt; I just have mates.

But after drinking a large amount of alcohol on August 17, the pair began hitting each other with them in Long Row, in the city centre.

OK, bear with me a minute, because I'm having trouble with this one; how badly kaylide do you have to get before you start thinking that stoving your cousin's head in with a mace constructed by something whipped off a pool table and half of summat you bought from Primark is a really good way to inject a bit of fun into your night out?

"Ah man, this is shit and there's no fanneh abaht - shall weh goo to Social?"

"No mate - full o' foo-kin' students"

"Shall weh gerra kebab?"

"Norrungreh"

"Shall weh goo on the bandits?"

"Foo-kin skint, youth"

"Shall weh, I dunno...clonk each other in the foo-kin 'ead with them pool balls in socks we brung aht?"

"Foo-kinYEAH! I forrgorrabaht them. MINT! You go fost! Tee hee!"

Gareth Gimson, prosecuting, said: "Officers on patrol were told by a member of the public about some sort of disturbance.

"Police saw two men and were concerned that one of them had some sort of head injury.

"One pool ball was handed to an officer at the scene. A sock was on the floor next to a pool of blood. Another sock containing a pool ball was also found near to the pool of blood."

Next time you're in the pub and you're having a moan about 'Babylon', recall this story and remember; this is what the police have to do every fucking day. If your Mam's been burgled again, and it's taken the coppers ages to come round, don't blame New Labour or the council or the New World Order; it's because they've had to wipe the arses of a couple of mongs from the more mediaeval parts of Nottinghamshire who were working out which one of them was the Daddy-Uncle-Brother.

In mitigation, the court was told the cousins were having a "play fight" which went wrong.

No shit.

The defendant had an alcohol problem

Even less shit than the no shit that went before.

...but was working to cut down his drinking, the court was told. He told police he was carrying the ball and sock because he was having trouble with some drug dealers.

Now then, I don't know that much about drug dealers in Nottingham, but I'm guessing that they may just have access to weapons that could easily counteract someone who had to fumble about in his jacket pocket for five minutes, and then check that he was holding the right end of a sock so the pool ball wouldn't fall out, and then whirl it about for a bit. It seems to be about as useful a pissed-off dealer-deterrent as a bit of fire on a stick, or a Spongebob balloon on some string.

Mr Gimson said: "He told police he would have used them if trouble had come his way. He said it had been an accident that (his cousin) had suffered the injury." He said the prosecution accepted it was nothing more sinister.

So there you have it: going into town and pitching yoursen in the lottery of being in the same pub on a Saturday night as a couple of cast members from Deliverance who've decided to take out pool balls in a sock - Officially Not Sinister.

October and November: The Main Points again

1 October

Secret files released by the National Archives on Rudolf Hess include a letter from a Nottingham bloke offering good wishes to Hitler’s right-hand man, along with a photo of his kids holding up a model Zeppelin. ‘It's like getting the autograph of an Australian cricketer - you may not like things to do with his personal life and you have to strike a balance in getting their signature’ he said to the Post, whilst popping a photo of his granddaughters throwing an Airfix plane at a Jenga stack in the post for Osama bin Laden.

2 October

Broadway holds a gala night for Control, to celebrate local actors copping a break and the fact that someone from a production company drove into Lenton, looked through a square made from their thumbs and index fingers, and said ‘Hmmm…yes…this looks exactly like the sort of depressing shithole where a miserable Indie twat with a Nazi fixation would want to top himself’.

3 October

The long-predicted global recession begins to bite. House repossessions in America reach an all-time high. The Dollar hit record lows against the Euro. UK house prices slow down. A pot of mushy peas at Goose Fair’s dedicated pea stall is jacked up to one pound twenty.

4 October

The residents of Wollaton pull back their lace curtains at 2am to be greeted with the sight of something out of The Sweeney, discovering a bleddy big burning Mercedes containing a stabbing victim. Turns out that said victim had previous for using a golf course in Leicester as a front for a massive drugs operation and had buried vast quantities of pills and powders under the fairways and greens. Warning to anyone pulling on diamond jumpers and dragging their irons out the loft; he also guarded said stashes with explosive trip wires.

5 October

Nottingham City Transport announces the axing of their regular Night Bus service, weeing in the face of everyone who works in this so-called 24-hour city who quite liked getting home from their shift without having their wallets raped by a cabbie. Sigh.

12 October

The head chocolate-maker at Thorntons resigns after getting caught squishing the truffles at Hotel Chocolat. Amazingly, it’s the top story on Central News East, outranking the small matter of a shooting in St Anns. Imagine you’re that poor sod who got shot; laid up in the QMC, with your only consolation being the fact you’re going to be the most important person in Notts at 6pm, only to see them banging on about some gimp mashing up some expensive tuffehs. And they wonder why no-one gives a toss about the forthcoming axing of Central News East.

15 October

Those two pissy-knickered house-shitbags on Channel 4 find a new way to raise Nottingham to fourth in the latest edition of The Worst Places To Live If You’re The Kind Of Middle-Class House Price-Obsessed Wankstain Who Watches Shitty Programmes Like This On Channel Four Because You’re Scared To Go Out, by annexing Rushcliffe. Next year they’ll grant independence to The Park and Hockley in an attempt to get us to the top. That bald cock and his hateful pinch-faced bint of an assistant claim that Mansfield is a better place to live by seven whole places, which is all you need to know, really.

16 October

Notts County finally sack the former (and soon to be) building site worker Steve Thompson after sinking to the bottom of Division Four. They install Ian McParland as the new boss and go on a decent run.

19 October

The Variety, the club in Radford, which for over 40 years was the only place in Nottingham where you could play bingo with strippers from Matlock, finally closes down for good. Another part of Nottingham’s soul disappears forever, and if you didn’t go, you’ll never know.

24 October

A Cinderhill factory worker gets shamed, due to spending £500 on having a two-foot tattoo of Dumbledore on his back, only for said imaginary wizard who doesn’t exist to be outed by JK Rowling. ‘It’s been terrible’, he says to The Sun. ‘I’ve always liked Dumbledore, but not in that way’. Jesus in a jumpsuit, it's come to summat when a man can use a national newspaper to point out that he doesn't want to have bum-sex with a wizard in a kid's book.

29 October

Wet Wet Wet (ask yer mam) play a one-off gig at the Hard Rock Café. Two weeks later, the Hard Rock Café goes out of business.

4 November

Forest’s projected move to a big new toilet in Clifton is nixed by the City Council, who want a location nearer the city centre. I know just the place; right next to Trent Bridge. Just behind the Southbank Bar.

5 November

Truants at Arnold Hill School bash their faces against the nearest available wall when it turns out that a stripper puts in a guest appearance at a drama class for some lad’s birthday. The school thought about calling in the police, but were worried that they’d only pull the dinner ladies over the counter, grind their crotches into their faces to Hot Stuff by Donna Summer, and make the headmistress suck whipped cream off their truncheons.

7 November

Twiggy and Jo win an award for Best European Breakfast Show. Christ on a crisp packet, who were they up against? A monkey banging on a saucepan in Oslo, and someone drilling holes into farm animals in Bucharest?

9 November

A local youth is up in court for reacting to his mate getting stabbed to death in a city centre venue by robbing the till of £324 (and yes, you’ll note he even took some pound coins). Obviously, he needed all those notes to staunch the wounds, a clearly-marked first aid kit evidently not being available.

13 November

Whoever is employed by the Post to sit on YouTube all day typing ‘Nottingham’, ‘Guns’ and ‘Oh My God, They’re All Going To Murder Us In Our Beds’ finally hits paydirt when they uncover a video of some lads called the Millz Taliban waving guns about and smoking weed. Note to local gang members: don’t name yourself after a religious group that outlaws everything you like doing.

17 November

The latest local crackdown on beggars in town turns up a man whose was identified as dead and cremated by his own mam in Manchester a month previously. Hopefully, the coppers have also got that bastard who pretends to be a Big Issue seller and tries to flog LeftLion for a quid, claiming that we’ve been bought out by them.

19 November

A 26 year-old scamp from Bulwell is hit with an ASBO that bans him from every pub in Greater Nottingham bar five, for such japes as waving an air pistol in one pub and puncturing someone’s lung with a fork in another. Every pub in Notts minus five equals a shitload of pubs, making it the biggest bar-out in history and worthy of a place in the Guinness Book of Records.

Crime-related Stories of the Day

Copper puts thief in hospital
Gun-related palaver in Arnold
Bilborough family re-enact six months' worth of EastEnders storylines

The Eleventh Crack Commandment

Thanks to the only decent song on Biggie Smalls' last album, we're all au fait with the ground-rules of drug-dealing, but now, thanks to a couple of eejat bwoy from Basford, we can now add a new dictum to go with 'never getting high on your own supply' and 'don't let crackheads have tick' comes a new rule; Don't end up with your name in the Post because you stabbed someone in the eye who didn't want to buy any drugs off you, like a twat.

Somebody dig up the McWhirter Brothers immediately

The govermental arse-wiping process better known as ASBOs are usually not worth commenting on, but this takes the biscuit - if not the whole packet. This youth here has been barred from every pub in Notts bar five for the next five years, due to 16 incidents of unadulterated meatheadery in assorted hostelries. Every single pub in Notts minus five, as you may have already divulged, is a fucking enormous bar-out and worthy of a place in the Guinness Book of Records (the other thing that probably crossed your mind, of course, is that you must really have to hate someone if you feel the need to puncture their lung with a fork).

Obviously, in a more enlightened society, they'd display him at Goose Fair in a glass tank and charge people to watch him punch the fuck out of a crocodile or summat, but at least - according to the Post - we can all feel safer in our beds now. Which is nice. The five pubs that he is allowed to drink in must be very pleased with the publicity they're now getting. I know where my next pub crawl and informal business meeting is going to be, don't you?