So it begins...

4/24/2012

It seems that the good, if misguided folk at Now or Never have offered me a blog- so this is the place to come for celebrity bullshit, the odd interview, musings on current affairs, gayness, ritual magick, mind control and whatever else takes my fancy. I won't promise that all of it will be readable, or that you will actually want to read the bits that are. All I can offer are the horrible contents of my skull, laid bare, and perhaps come some way to providing a virtual experience of what it is like to have to live with all this rubbish taking up valuable space in your mind ALL THE TIME. I am not convinced that anything good can be gained from this, but am willing to give it a go, for the sake of professionalism if nothing else. Don't blame me when something terrible happens, that's all.

On with the gibberish.

2 Comments

Mr. E. Tonwell

6/6/2014 06:34:35 am

Dear Mr. Knight. I recently read you’re your article about Jamie Oliver in Issue 18 of Now or Never. While you are quite entitled to your views concerning Jamie Oliver and his attack on Junk Food, I was horrified to read of your distaste for Wimpy burgers. You seem to imply that Wimpy restaurants are a pathetic version of American-chain-burger-establishments. I am so glad that they are! I would much rather eat a burger in a civilised way, off a plate, with the option of using a knife and fork, than out of a paper bag on a tray. I would much prefer to sit and be greeted for my order than queue like an automaton. The staff are not all ‘grizzled veterans of the roadside burger van industry.’ I have been to many Wimpy restaurants in East Anglia, including the one in Lowestoft, and the make-up of their staff differs. Some have staff of Polish or Turkish origin; others have young natives of the region similar to those found in McDonalds. You describe the experience of eating in a Wimpy as one not to be enjoyed but ‘just a place to wait while you read the Racing Post before Ladbrokes opens’: ‘A cross between a school cafeteria in the 1980s and a soup kitchen for the homeless.’ I disagree! Yes, there is one Wimpy restaurant I know of where a homeless person can be found having a coffee, but the betting shops are a long way away, and I don’t think he’d have the money to gamble anyway. He’d much rather have a coffee in a place that is glad of his custom. Regardless of the fact that many Wimpy restaurants have been redecorated since the 1980s in a sleek modern style, I have fond memories of growing up in the ‘80s. In the 1980s, before today’s unhealthy obsession with health and safety, children at birthday parties would happily punch and kick a member of staff dressed up as a giant burger called ‘Mr. Wimpy’. No one at McDonalds dressed up as skinny scary Ronald McDonald: Although children could get locked in the freezer for five minutes for fun! Concerning the food itself, you describe Wimpy burgers as ‘unidentified road-kill in a bap’ with a ‘chemical after-taste’. Yes, Wimpy burgers have a different taste to their American fast-food equivalent - some people have told me Wimpy burgers taste of rusk – but at least they don’t fall apart! And besides I like the taste! Had they been around, Wimpy burgers would have been the centre piece on the round table at Camelot. Arthur’s Knights would have feasted in awe! In fact there was a Wimpy restaurant in the Camelot Theme Park at Chorley - now closed. Wimpy is not ‘a strange twilit netherworld of a burger bar,’ in fact they are having something of a resurgence. Wimpy sold off its ‘counter-service’ restaurants in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s to the likes of Burger King, and thank God!; they were able to concentrate on their ‘table-service’ restaurants. Some Wimpy restaurants have closed, for example at Newmarket, but Wimpy are opening new ones. The last time I checked, Wimpy had 12 restaurants in an eight mile radius of Southend. What a wonderful Wimpy Mecca this place must be! I beseech you Mr. Knight to travel on a pilgrimage there and eat like the Knights of Camelot, with a plate and knife and fork.

P. Knight link

6/6/2014 10:21:32 pm

Do you know, that is the most eloquent reaction to the Jamie Oliver piece I have yet recieved. Good on you Mr Tonwell, I applaud your passion for Wimpy, and am, in a nostalgic way, even quite pleased to hear that the company is enjoying a resurgence of interest. I wonder how far the resurgence of Wimpy correlates against the rise of UKIP? Clearly there is much research to be done.

Paul Knight

Aesthete, gourmet and accredited discordian priest, purveyor of performance art wank. Professional celebrity bullshit analysis. More about Paul

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