Vegan, it's their choice

his is my second blog. My first was a tad unfair due to the fact that I am angry at something completely different and it came out as an attack on something I don't really care that much about.

Sorry Vegans but I don't really care. It's your life choice and all credit to you for making it, and sticking to it. But I really don't care about the possible health benefits. I have some rather odd views on health and life that I keep to myself and discuss when the wine flows and the conversation is amongst those who relish debate as means to express views rather than change minds.

I also don't think that, should everybody suddenly become Vegan the world would be a better place, and the only animals that will be saved would be future animals a long way off in the distance. Should all animal produce sudden not be consumed for diet or any other purpose I really don't think we'd just let them go and be wild. We certainly won't spend money on feeding them. The current crop of animals would probably just be slaughtered.

I'd like to point out here that I am not arguing against Vegans. Everybody has the right to choose how they live. I know there will be many arguing that, as a meat eater I am complicate in animal cruelty. But as I said, everyone suddenly not eating meat would save a single animal, it would just lay waste to the carcass. Though this argument does real have a lot of meat in it (yes I did)

I have friends who are Vegan (and that still sounds like a racist statement to me). I do not wish to offend the pale brigade, and I wish them all the B12 supplements in the world. I just wish that such life choices didn't come with the inevitable guilt trip of people like me. For I am a meat eater, and I will not make any excuses for it. Yes I am overweight, yes I am out of shape, both fitness and actual bodylines, but I am actually happy. Not because I'm fat, but because I realised who I am, and I'm good with that.

What about the animals? I'm not a bastard, I'm not into animal cruelty. When I find out about certain companies and their practises I do try my best to vote with my wallet.

So here is a Poem that was so hard to write.

No meat

Not even bacon will have me beat

I'll take from the land to make my diet complete

No skin

Not even wool will I be seen in

I'll have on bed the finest polyester linen

No Dairy

Not even if it makes me sound quite contrary

I'll sup from the Soya cup and be merry

And in a cafe in Wales

At the end of the menu

Vegetarian meal: egg; chips and beans

Vegan Meal: chips and bean

But at least they tried.

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My magic

My magic (a moment in my life) Colin Daives

I love magic, have done since my very earliest memory. I actually wanted to be a magician, even tried practising for our in front of a mirror. Desperately trying to palm a card, holding the nine of diamonds in my fingers while concealing it from the audience and keeping my hand looking natural.

I would watch Paul Daniels with wonder. He maybe a bit of a Barclay, but his close order magic is something to behold. The same can be said of Jerry Sadowitz. Not only did he have to ‘offend everyone’ Scotsman years before Frankie Boyle said “Oscar Pistorius sounds like a Harry Potter sell to grow someone’s legs back,” but he was, and still is, one of the finest close quarter slight of hand trickers I have ever seen.

I never got close to these giant of the UK magic industry. I thought my love for the craft and my desire to conjure would never join. That my shot of creating wonder in the hearts and minds of an audience would never happen. And I was only twelve years old.

Then something happened, I wrote a story. This was not that unusual for me at the time, amongst my peers I was know doing such thing on a regular basis however, this story was different in three ways.

Firstly it was part of a challenge. This was the early 1983, we had all watched the Horizon programme about effects of nuclear strike; we had all read Raymond Briggs ‘When the Wind blows’; we all heard the speeches from Thatcher and Regan; we were all scared.

My friend, Anthony Hamlin, suggested we write stories about nuclear war. This seemed like a great idea, and during the next free writing session we both put pen to paper and scribbled out a tale of destruction. So this was the first time I wrote based on a theme someone other than the school had suggested.

Secondly was the teacher reactions. Pete Cartlidge was our form teacher and for some reason he loved my story, so much so that he put it forward to be read out at assembly. This was high accolade indeed. Then something strange happened, the headmaster My Nunn called for the story so he could have a read. This was unusual, but off it went. The following day the news came back that he thought it was ‘too strong’ for assembly and it was withdraw, banned.

I found this utterly strange, Anthony on the other hand found it utterly hilarious. Weeks past and the story drifted from our thoughts until Mr Nunn had to go away on school business and Mr Cartlidge, being the deputy head, put the my story back on the table. I questioned this decision which got the response “when the cat’s away...” So his was the first thing I wrote that caused controversy.

Thirdly was the performance. I stood on the stage in front of the entire junior school, some three hundred and sixty children aged eight to twelve and twelve teachers. I read the piece which included the lines “I remember the cloud, looking like a mushroom. So beautiful yet so destructive.” and as the protagonist contemplated taking his own life (which was one of the rules of the story challenge) “no one to live for, but so many people to die for”

As I finished reading I was met but a stunned silence, you feel the emotions in the room. I could see one of the teachers crying. Another teacher began to clap which started a chain reaction across the room with some of the children cheering. Mr Cartlidge smiled at me as I left the stage. It was the first time I had written something that had proved an emotion response. It was the day I realised I could effect people with my writing, the day I learned to true meaning of magic, the magic of words.

This was quite a profound thing. It would be years before I realised the true deeper meaning of this event. But now I’m here, writing children’s books, poems and blogs. Conjuring up entire worlds of fanciful images. All to try and create a wonder in the eyes, hearts and minds of an audience.

I still love magic, and even though I can figure out how a lot of tricks are done, I don’t care. The skill is in the mechanics, the entertainment is in the performance, the presentation. The rules of a good magic trick are the same as a good story. To quote the film ‘The Prestige’

“Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called ‘The Pledge’. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course... it probably isn't. The second act is called ‘The Turn’. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you're looking for the secret... but you won't find it, because of course you're not really looking. You don't really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn't clap yet. Because making something disappear isn't enough; you have to bring it back. That's why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call ‘The Prestige’.”

Not all stories need a twist, they just need to leave the audience with an open mouth full of wonder and overflowing ideas on how you just got there. That could just be a description. I may not work for everybody, but for those you managed to connect with, well that’s magic.

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Not in my backyard

Not in my backyard

Rip up the landscape,

Lay down the tracks,

Let them who claim to lead us,

Get quickly there and back.

Through this green and pleasant land,

From the smoke around the Shard,

All in the name of progress,

Just not in my backyard.

Dig holes in the hillside,

Force water to fetch the gas,

Pay the village folk a percentage,

For the disruption of shaking mass.

Give jobs to those around the holes,

Get them to punch the card,

All in the name of prosperity,

Just not in my backyard.

Stare in the face of hunger,

Watch children die for clothes,

See farmers forced to sell their souls,

As the world economy slows.

See the families suffer,

Behind the multinational façade,

All in the name of value,

Just not in my backyard.

Stand up against the tyranny,

Say no to politics of hate,

Refuse to allow the status quo,

Deny the sniper at the gate.

Kick out the would be hustlers,

Show them how life is hard,

Because this world which they are fucking up,

Just happens to be my backyard.

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