Pig Sty Avenue

In standard English bastard is of course a noun: "You rotten bastard". I don't recall hearing it used as an adverbial or adjective in other Englishes, but it is in my own English, the Jarrow version of the Geordie dialect of North East England. I remember my father saying, probably in the late 60s on hearing of alleged drug offenses, (maybe it was at the time of the infamous Mars bar bust ): "The Rolling Stones? I wish they'd roll right over the edge of a bastard cliff." Here he was using bastard as an adjectival intensifier, giving the cliff concept a little more colour. Another time I remember him being asked about the whereabouts of some ne'er do well acquaintance, and his reply: "Behind bars. Where he bastard well belongs." Adverbial bastard always conjoined with well . And like its adjectival kin its purpose was to intensify. "I bastard well won't go!" would normally want stress on the won't. The best equivalent to t...

Tell me if I'm wrong, but I think this is specific to Jarrow.  It means and officious, bad-mannered person, little Hitler , is equivalent in Standard British English.  The story from my dad is that Jarrow was the place where all probation coppers were sent to finish their training - I don't know if that was before or after the Northumbria police were established.  So the town was infested with nervous, aggressive young people in uniform who didn't belong-Jarra. There was also the phrase, half-a-polis, an insulting term for a park keeper or any official in uniform.   The first syllable in polis has a short vowel, like Polly , and the second is schwa + /s/ . [I'm buggered if I can remember the keyboard shortcuts I set ages ago for the IPA.  Which is interesting in itself.]

A bit of a surprise to see Johnny Ingles' (called "The Golden Lion" if you're not from Jarrow) was in the national press . Pity it was for a bairn's wake. God rest him.

trees cleared for the new tyne tunnel , originally uploaded by Pig Sty Avenue . This is going to be the site of the new Tyne Tunnel. They cleared all the trees back in February, which is when this was taken. It was my Dad's theory, and it seemed cogent, that they did it then before birds could nest in them. But the birdlife of Jarrow was not to be so easily prevented from causing trouble. That white building in the middle distance, near the bottom left hand corner, is the pub where the herring gull is having a laugh. It's been closed for years now. Pity it's being demolished because it's a lovely old building, and must have been there since before Jarrow Palmers was called Jarrow Palmers. The Gas Light is its most recent name. When I was crawling the pubs of Jarrow it was The Tunnel Tavern. But it's original name, I'm told, was The Commercial. There is a story that when Jobling 's body was surreptitiously cut down from where is was hangin...

Most working class people in Jarrow would like to live in Primrose. It's almost as pleasant as its name suggests. Biggish semis, built before the war, when it still seemed like a good idea to provide ordinary people with decent housing. My mam and dad lived there from the late 70s until they got their pensioners' bungalow a couple of years ago. We often talked about moving there, in terms of an aspiration. Until a month ago. It was interesting to read this article in the Guardian about the rise of the Right in Stoke on Trent. It's a story my townspeople will be familiar with: a Labour party that's been in power for generations and has evolved into an arrogant nepotistic clique. Natural Labour voters eventually need to rebel. If the Liberals don't stand, what are they to do? Memories of the 80s will mean that most Jarrow people are reluctant to vote for the party they still associate with Pinochet's Pal . But the BNP stood in Primrose. And a really fright...

jarrow hebburn , originally uploaded by /pɪgstaɪævnjuː/ . We've lived in Hebburn for a year now and we don't really feel at home here. Herself says that nobody has spoken to her at the St Aloysius playgroup where she takes The Bairn every week over the course of the last year. And in the Iona club, where I go quite a lot, nobody has wished me all-the-best, or even acknowledged that I exist. Whereas, if I go into the Alberta, or the Buffs, in Jarrow I'm immediately at home. Ditto Herself and The Bairn in Jarrow playgroups. There's loads of dog shit on the pavements, too.

...is how I'd describe South Tyneside council. The trees in Jarrow precinct have been there since the early 60s. They had plaques by them to tell you when they were planted by the children of various schools. Those kids could be grandparents now. It's an unlovely spot. The trees were all that prettified it. And now, after forty-something years, they've been chopped down and then uprooted. The plaques torn off clumsily by a mechanical digger, getting bent in the process. I don't know if there's a rationale, or plans to plant new trees. The old ones had been there most of my life, and their removal is unsettling.

Every once in a way you get a reminder that canny auld Jarra hasn't really changed. Here's a family who had their monkey puzzle tree nicked out of their front "garden". Maybe it was a militant group of garden designers, taking direct action against dubious horticultural aesthetics. They are surprisingly expensive . Maybe there's a dearth of the buggers. And we should cash in by sowing some Araucaria araucana seeds at the allotment, and flogging them on a couple of years down the road, at a considerable profit, to numpties who watch those poxy "garden makeover" programmes on telly. Or something.

I could begin to blether-on about the misuse of the word "binge" by the media here, but I won't. Today. Maybe we're going to have an election next month. I hope so, elections are great fun, giving an appearance of meaningfulness to our participatory democracy. Or something. Headline grabbing about "binge" drinking is a fair indicator that Papa Gordon is tempted to give it a go. And this is a Middle England issue. I was visiting Newbury a few months ago and commented on how pretty the town looked, and was told that the flipside was a no-go area at night for anyone over 30, because of all the drunken carrying-on. It made me smile. At least we don't have that problem round here. To be sure, there's a river of drink consumed most weekends, but Jarrow and Hebburn town centres are such bleak spots after dark that no one, young or old, pissed or sober, would want to spend any time there, annoying passers by. So, badly thought out 1960s "redevel...