More Local News

Send us a news story of your own! New residents of St Cleve, Linwell and Little Cruddock are invited to place their local news stories with the StCleve.com Webmaster. Write to StCleveNews@gmail.com starting March 5th for inclusion on the StCleve.com website pages. A few will be chosen each week for their originality and relevance. No nasty words or photos showing private parts will be used. Well - we might still look at them and show the bass-player...

Cold hands but warm heart
Spanish journalist Martinez Seville-Cervantes is recovering in hospital after being found last Saturday in the waiting room of Linwell Halt railway station suffering from hypothermia. Saturday was the coldest day of the year so far. Mr Seville-Cervantes, who had arranged to interview local playwrite Rena Sanderone at his remote farmhouse home, had been waiting to be picked up by Reece Davis Taxis.

Mr Davis told StCleve.com that he had been three hours late because he had been delayed while picking up a consignment of magazines from a printing company, and “you wouldn’t believe the traffic on the Little Cruddock by-pass”. When pressed, however, he did admit to not even having set out until two hours after the agreed pick-up time.

Mr Seville-Cervantes was found by station master Seth Beeching when he returned from lunch. “We normally have a paraffin heater in the waiting room,” said Mr Beeching, “But health and safety rules mean that it has to be turned off when I’m not at the station”.

Mr Seville-Cervantes is expected to remain in hospital for the rest of the week. “I am not one to bear grudges”, he told us. “Mr Davis has apologised, and I will shake his hand just as soon as I regain any feeling in my fingers.”

Public toilet brush-up goes down the pan
Local Government budget cuts could spell the end of the proposed refurbishment of the Victorian public toilets in the Market Square, Linwell. St. Cleve online has learnt from the local plumbing contractor who was awarded the contract, ‘Spick and Span Loos’, that the project has been put on hold following a restriction on the flow of cash from Council’s coffers.

Speaking to ‘Spick and Span’s’ owner and managing director, Lou Rowles, he told us that it was likely that the planned improvements to toileting facilities in the town were in jeopardy following pressure on the Council to stop expenditure on fripperies.

He added that local Councillor, Stan Duppandpee had told him that if he has his way, the Council would not spend a penny on these toilets and that he would ensure that the Council’s cash would not be wasted or flushed down the pan.

Poet and Painter to get make over
Local public house The Poet and The Painter is to get a major refit and makeover.

Now part of a micro-brewery chain along with ‘The Do-er and The Thinker’ in St Cleve, and “The Wise Man and and The Fool” in Little Cruddock, the refurbished pub is being planned to compete with the nearby ‘Dirty Duck’ in Linwell.

New owner and micro-brewery owner, Arthur Pint-O’Guinness, said that he would certainly relish the challenge of developing ‘The Poet and The Painter’ as the flagship of his ever growing chain of local themed pubs in the three parishes area.

“We are looking to the past as well as the future, said Mr Pint-O’Guinness, I’m not one for living in the past, but equally I’m not for ditching it like we have seen in certain quarters of the three parishes, I’m not naming names, but you won’t ever see donkey on our menu! Well, not without a decent sized couple of baps to go with it” he joked.

It seems the refit will retain the ever popular ‘Snug bar at the Poet and Painter’, Mr Pint-O’Guinness said that, he would keep the snug for all the old regulars, and that Derek Pith’s Lord Styone of Stoyne, and Preston’s seat at the bar would always be safe, as would manager Paul and popular barman Danno. He also wants to get a bit of a buzz going in the pub and he reveals he has planned regular young people’s evening’s with top MC and DJ ‘Fatman and the Talking Monkey’, who we think are very likely to be a very popular choice amongst the young adults of the area!

Food will be served on the menu and Mr Pint-O’Guinness has already secured the notable and notorious Mr Heston Bloominheck as Executive chef for the new chain of pubs.

In closing he said that he is also looking to invest in a pub in the Slimpton-on-Marsh area to strengthen the local quiz team, “we need a quizz kid in there to take on Linwell and give them a damned good thrashing”. We hope to have more news on that next month.

Motorcycles disrupt Easter Morning
" The roar and thump of a fleet of Triumph Bonneville motor-cycles along Vestry Lane early on Easter morning caused much alarm and complaint from residents enjoying a lie-in and worshipers on their way to the celebration service at the Methodist chapel at Cockshot End.

Early rumours that the village had been invaded by young leather clad rockers were soon dispelled when Mrs Logan, who runs The Rookery Guest House at the end of Vestry Lane contacted StCleve.com to report that five very nice and well mannered gentlemen motor cyclists had stayed at her lodgings overnight from Easter Saturday, en route to an unknown seaside rendezvous.

Mrs Logan added that she had thoroughly enjoyed the company of the “gentlemen bikers” , one in particular who went by the nicknamed “The Big Dipper” who Mrs Logan said had left behind a flat cigarette case engraved with the initials “R.L” and containing six small cigars on her bedside table. Mrs Logan told StCleve.com that she would attempt to contact “R L” to return the signature cigarette case and disposable lighter. A forwarding address in Blackpool, Lancashire was left in the visitor’s book".

Bronze Age Barrow Excavation
Local residents were thrilled when Englands favorite archeologists,
Channel 4's Time Team, visited Linwell recently. It seems Tony Robinson
and the team were in Town to investigate a possible Bronze Age Barrow on
Velvet Green, near Broadsword Farm - the home of rock star, Ian Anderson.

Unfortunately the dig was not without its dramas. Tony Robinson was seen
drinking in the Dirty Duck, with an obviously agitated Phil Harding.
Apparently the otherwise pristine barrow had recently been broken into,
but unusually, nothing had been stolen - rather items had been deposited
into the depths of the barrow, in a stone cist (or stone chamber).

Harding continues: "I spent an age diggin up that barrow. I could tell it
had been broken into. Why someone would want to bury a saxophone in a
stone box, six feet under ground, beats me. Im furious! Im gonna find
the culprit and stick that saxophone where the sun don't shine!

And, as usual, retorted Robinson, he has three days to do it .

Ian Anderson's Home Burgled
StCleve.com learns from its freelance contributor, retired journalist Terrence Charles, known as “Tell” to his drinking pals at The Dirty Duck, that reclusive Linwell resident Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull fame suffered a break-in at his home last Thursday.

”I know Ian from my days as a cub reporter at the old music mag Melody Maker,” Tell told us. “Ian is outraged at this intrusion on his privacy, but is offering a reward for the safe return of his pet rabbits, “Thick” and “Brick” and some other personal items that are missing. “Let these buggers know that they got the wrong bunnies,” Ian asked me. Apparently Ian’s wife, Shona, breeds the very rare Italian rabbits, Torino Sidesaddles, better known in bunny circles as Tosis. A well-bred Tosi can fetch a pretty penny! “I’m sure they sure they were after Mixi and Matt, Shona’s valuable prize-winning breeding pair,” Ian revealed to me.”

Tell believes, however, that there is more to this story. “My sources tell me that although Ian loves dogs he is not that keen on rabbits. They think it more likely that he is really concerned about getting back recordings taken from the top secret bunker studio thought to be hidden in the basement of Ian’s home. Rumours of a new Tull platter being recorded in Linwell have been rekindled by sightings of a visiting flute salesman arriving with a takeaway King Prawn Jalfrezi.

Professor of Criminology makes mischief.
Dr. Alfredo Cadoppi (51) had a little fun with his next door neighbour Tim Thorne when he hid two
60 cm Chinese dolls daubed in tomato ketchup in Thorne's garden shed. Ex-Met Inspector Thorne
had “forty fits and another for luck,” when he found them on Sunday morning. “The jolly japes
have got to stop,” said the slightly-miffed Tim to StCleve.com. Alf was having a good old laugh
behind the Leylandii hedge and I knew it was him right away. Last month he was digging at 2 AM
in his garden burying a large bulging sack. Does he think I'm daft? He's a good bloke, basically, but
the Mad Professor thing is getting a bit much.

Cadoppi is renting The Glebe House, Linwell, for a sixth-month period of research into the Linwell
Ripper, a sordid and, as yet, unidentified character of the 1880s who terrorised local women during
the famine years of the Bollock-blight epedemic. Fellow specialist in criminal law, Prof. Alexander
McTavish-Smith and the good Doctor Alf have formed a close bond in recent years, and are
planning a co-written historical novel set in the grimy streets of Auld Reekie (Edinburgh, to the
uninformed). The tentative title, StCleve.com learned, is “The Linwell Ripper Gangs Awa' Tae The
North.” Via the M5, M6, A74(M) and the A702, nae doot.

Spider lurks below....
The Bavarian Wasp Spider has been reported in the past as having survived in UK climes but only this Spring has it been substantiated that it is now a fully resident non-indigenous species with a permanent and growing population in the Southwest of England. Believed to have been inadvertently imported in large numbers on fruit and vegetables from EU countries in the warm Summers of 2006 and 2007, it was first spotted as long ago as 1922. Since then, it has produced colonies of unwelcome 3 cm-long pests which usually survive our winters by laying eggs and lurking in the home – often in a drawer containing underwear.

Pheromones attract the male spider to the ladies' knicker nest and the unwitting human can getseveral nasty, painful bites, although these are not poisonous.

Wasp Spiders can be deterred by placing a hot chile – Bhut Jolokia is best – in the drawers. Yes –right in the drawers, but remember to remove before wearing. A Wasp Spider in the nethers isinfinitely preferable to a Bhut Jolokia up the whoopsie.....

Keen visitor to the Somerset Levels, Mendips and the Quantocks is German expert on spider habits and migration, Dr Ulf Doerner, of Munich, Bavaria. He recounts how he first encountered the fearsome Arachnid. “When I was at University in Munchen, I had a favourite hobby of keeping a modest sample of the underwear of my female student friends. A silly trophy, I know, but I had a collection of over one hundred. I could not understand why I kept getting a nasty rash around the ears.” Ulf then discovered the baby Wasp Spiders were everywhere! This changed his life and so he switched his university degree course from Sexual Psychology and Criminal Law to Arthropod Biology specialising in Arachnids. “My PhD thesis was titled Infestations of the Privates: a Study of the Bottom Drawer.”

Most male wasp spiders have only a single shot at love because their female partners eat them right after copulation. StCleve.com sympathises with this tiresome state of affairs.

St Cleve C of E Primary School gets arty!
On 19th March, families were invited to join their children at St Cleve C of E School to take part in lots of wonderful art and leisure activities which provided a fabulous end to our theme week of team-building activities. There was a huge range of activities to get involved in: printing, lifedrawing,
sewing, marbling, clay work, batik, more life drawing, appliqué, taxidermy, combat darts,stick-fighting, newt arranging, to name but a few.

A huge thanks from the Headmaster to all of our wonderful volunteers from all of the staff and children - we couldn't have planned such an exciting morning without your help and support.
Headmaster Jason Arbutt also gives clay and game-shooting instruction to the under-10s and can assist with acquisition of Shotgun Licenses for anyone without a really serious criminal record. A nice pair of Henry Atkin side-by-side, sidelock ejectors, 28” barrels and ¼ and ¾ choke are available for sale. £16,500 ono. OK – make it £12K. Cash. No receipt.

Volvo barbecue.
Keen Mendip Hills walker, Aldo Taglia-Farro (49) has opened a new Volvo dealership in the
Industrial Estate, Linwell. Bringing the high-powered Volvo Electrocruise™ Hybrid with the addon
turbo pack, previously only supplied for the Italian market, he can arrange test drives as of April
2nd and will be showing two new 4-wheel drive models in the Clutterbury Waitrose car park the
following Saturday.

Taglia-Farro insists that the new performance pack will soon be legal in the UK although it breaches
all current regulations for hybrid emissions. Roberto D. V. Leonardo, PR Manager at Volvo Auto
Italia, personally attended the opening of the new premises and helped with the painting of interior
murals depicting “The Last Picnic” which shows a group of serious-looking gentlemen in flowing
robes, gathered round a barbecue in front of a Volvo family estate. It has proved controversial.

Colonic Irrigation Centre.
The proposed application for conversion of the Old Dairy, Bruttock Manor, will have planning refused, StCleve.com learned last week. The drainage facilities on the site and the amended sceptic tank details were considered to be insufficient for the load imposed, said a member of the planning committee during an off-the-record conversation at the Dirty Duck. London-based operators Open Hole Ltd had planned three upscale countryside irrigation centres but have already had two turned down in the Home Counties. CEO Bunty Threadneedle has insisted that “the economic benefits to the area would trump any downside from the odd escaped doody.”



Third salon for Davide.
Hairdresser Davide Harley has opened a third salon in Clutterbury to supplement his original
Linwell-based venture and the in-store Quiff and Quaff ™ franchise at the Clutterbury branch of
Waitrose. Davide, who changed his name from Dave Spurling to Davide Harley after his obsession
with the USA Motorcycle manufacturer, rides out with the Maltington Dark Angels, a disreputable
Somerset motorcycle club. Club Secretary and organiser Justin Matlock, recently placed runner-up
in the Hell for Leathers Fetish Contest in Clutterbury Fairgrounds and is assisting Davide in press
and promotion for the new salon. A waffle party is planned. Customers are invited to bring their
own toppings.

Kiddies plough new furrows.
The Clutterbury Gnomes and Garden Machinery Fair will opened by a “minor Royal” next month we are promised. Sandy Norden will bring a steam calliope and several vintage traction engines to the fair. Andrew J Lancome will provide several renovated agricultural tractors for children's rides and a 3-furrow plough will be hitched to “Matilda” the 1954 little grey TEF-20 Ferguson for demonstration ploughing on the neighbouring Old Copse Meadow. With reconditioned 34 HP 2000 rpm Perkins P3 diesel and 12 volts electrics it will pull up to twenty small children riding atop the 3-furrow plough. “Would take thirty, easy-peasy, but Health and Safety bods draw the line at twenty,” says AJ.

The exhibition of hand-made garden gnomes will open at 9.30 am and may be purchased on a firstcome, first-served basis from Mr Norden. G-nomes™ are cast in plaster, finished in GRP, and painted to order in national colours of various Euro nations. They can be fishing gnomes, golfing gnomes, executive gnomes or casual, lounging gnomes engaged in no particular activity.

New life for the Old Library?
Antique Book-seller Matthew Bunter, purchased the Old Library in Linwell village last month in
the hope of reopening in due course as an online book download centre and erotic literature
emporium. “It will perfectly supplement my more traditional range of literary wares,” said Mr
Bunter, former church warden at St Olive's. “Got to move with the times before the times move
with you,” pondered Matthew, with wry humour. StCleve.com feels the same, obviously. Planning
is to be sought in the latter months of the year after basic repairs to the roof. The old Library is
thought to have some roof timbers originally salvaged from renovation works at Canterbury
Cathedral during the last century.

Madame Seductress.
Hermione Parritt-Jones is set to appear for the international publication Madame-X MagazineSummer Swimwear edition in June. Already shot in Antigua, Barbados and Weston-super-Mare, the photos show the 19 year-old ex-Eastonbirt College schoolgirl in a variety of fashion-wear. Recently grounded by parents Roger and Huffy for spending several nights up in London without permission, she has been given the green light to postpone, for now, her university studies in order to pursue a modelling career. Headmistress Diane Polyp-Duckworth of Eastonbirt reluctantly agreed that “irons don't stay hot forever, so best strike while there is still fire in the old oven.”

Hermione completed work experience at Credit Uzbek Investment Bank, Canary Wharf, last Summer and chose modelling over her original plan to seek an MBA at a prestigious Massachusetts Business College. Her mentor at Credit Uzbek, Mark Caddish received a £12,000,000 bonus last year although much of this was in deferred stock ownership and off-shore bullion. Inland Revenue are “interested” in his earnings and tax declarations over the last few years.

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