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Candia Comes Clean

~ Candid cultural comments from the Isles of Wonder

Tag Archives: Gove

Blue Murder

22 Monday Feb 2016

Posted by Candia in Arts, Celebrities, Humour, Literature, News, Poetry, Politics, Relationships, Satire, Social Comment, Suttonford, Theatre, Writing

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Boris Johnson, Brussels, Bullingdon club, David Cameron, George Osborne, Gove

Brassica laughed, It’s the English teacher in you.  You

can’t stop relating everything to literature.

I know, but hark at this.  Et tu, Brute and all that!

I pushed my scribblings over the table, for her to read.

ACT 3:3

Boris:  If there be any in this assembly,

any dear friend of Cameron’s, to him say

that Boris’ love to Cameron was no less than his.

If then that friend demand why Boris rose against

Cameron, this is my answer:

Not that I loved Cameron less,

but that I loved Britain more….as he was

valiant, I honour him: but as

he was ambitious, I slew him.

Here comes his corpse,

mourned by those who shall receive

the benefits of his dying:

a place in Parliament.  With this I depart,

pleading that I slew my Bullingdon pal,

for Britain’s good.

Citizen;:  This Cameron was a traitor.

Osborne:  Friends, MPs, Countrymen, lend me your wallets.

The noble Boris hath told you Cameron was ambitious.

If it were so, it was a grievous fault

and grievously hath Cameron answered it.

He was my friend, faithful and just to me,

but Boris says he was ambitious- and Boris is an honourable man.

Cameron brought favours back from Brussels,

whose ransoms the general coffers might have filled.

When the poor have cried, Cameron hath wept.

You all did love him once, not without cause.

What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?

O judgement!  thou art fled to brutish beasts

and men have lost their reason.

Citizen:  I fear there will a worse come in his place.

Osborne:  Yesterday the word of Cameron might

have influenced the world; now lies he there.

You all know Gove and Boris are honourable men.

And here’s a parchment with the seal of Cameron.

Let but The Commons hear this testament.

Some may go and kiss dead Cameron’s wounds-

yea, beg a law of him for memory

and, dying, mention it within their wills,

bequeathing it as a rich legacy unto their issue.

I fear I wrong the honourable men

whose daggers have stabb’d Cameron.

Citizens: They are traitors!

Osborne:  Boris, as you know, was Cameron’s angel,

so this is the most unkindest cut of all.

Citizens:  Let’s hear his bequest!

Osborne:  To every British citizen he gives 75 drachmas.

Citizen:  Most noble Cameron!  We’ll avenge his death.

(Revolution ensues)

Osborne: Now mischief, thou art afoot.

Take what course you will.

 

Act 4   tbc

 

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Permission Granted

28 Thursday May 2015

Posted by Candia in Education, Family, Humour, Literature, mythology, Philosophy, Poetry, Religion, Social Comment

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

BIrnam Wood, Browning, Dickens, Dunsinane, Gove, Hamelin, Human Rights, in absentia, mojo, Moselle, Musicians of Bremen, Narrative Verse, Pied Piper, Poldark, radon, Riesling, Rip Van Winkle, Schlachte Embankment, Scrooge, scything, St Birinus Middle School, Va-va-voom, Weser

Image result for letter

Mr Augustus Snodbury, Senior Master at St Birinus Middle, opened the parental

letter which he had insisted should be sent.

Mum will send you an e-mail, sir, Peregrine Willcox Junior had simpered.

Paper notification is what I require, child, Snod underlined.  I don’t trust

new-fangled technology for record-keeping.

Blimey! thought Peregrine-or something to that effect.

And so it was that a letter, curiously addressed in childish,

round cursive script, landed on the form desk.  There was no

accompanying apple, with, or without a resident worm.

Once the bell had rung and the boys had filed out to Assembly,

Snod took a closer look.  You will have detected a reckless dismissal

of his need to attend such ritualistic gatherings.

At least the missive did not terminate in the infamous:

Signed,

My Mother.

So… Mrs W was in the travel business.  Might be good for an upgrade.

He had heard of teachers who had taught boys who had become pilots.

Such students frequently proved to be good contacts when a favour was

required from the airlines.  He was short on such sources of beneficence.

But, no-this mother was complaining about the Gove effect.  She could not

comprehend why she could not take her offspring on holiday during

term time.

(OGL image)

Nothing much gets done in the last couple of weeks, she observed.

In your opinion, thought Snod, but in the case of your bratlet, nothing

much gets done all term.

Mrs W went on to recognise that she could face a fine of £60 per day.

She made the point that she would be saving that amount (and more)

by travelling off-peak.  She did not fear the Birnam Wood of prosecution,

nor the Dunsinane of incarceration.  She seemed to fear no man of woman

born.

Aha! reflected Snod.  Never underestimate the power of metaphor.  A wood

did come towards Dunsinane!

He anticipated the appeal to Human Rights and was not disappointed.

She quoted the CEO of a Cornish tourist board who advocated family

enrichment weeks.  Cornwall- that was where that wretched Milford-Haven

hailed from.  The Junior Master didn’t seem to have been enriched by his

upbringing down that neck of the woods. Perhaps it was the radon that

had affected him.

This woman seemed to think that Snod should turn up to teach whether

her child was in absentia or not.  She suggested that staggering the school

holidays might be a good idea.

I would be the one who would be staggering, fumed Snod.  I’m practically

a stretcher case by the end of June as it is.  When am I expected to re-

charge my batteries?  I will not utilise the ghastly phrases about losing my

mojo, or va-va-voom.  I just need to vamoose.  Preferably for eight weeks.

This out-dated long summer break is tied to our agrarian past, continued Mrs

W.  It might have made sense when children were needed to bring in the

harvest.  Things have moved on.

I wouldn’t agree with you there, Snod scowled, though mollified that she

had used a Latin based adjective.  The only interest the children of today

have in land management is an unhealthy curiosity in scything, as

demonstrated in Poldark.  It would do them a lot of good to bring in the

hay, whether the sun shone, or not.

He suddenly remembered how he had assisted the groundsman in his

school  holidays, when no one had collected him and he had not been

invited home with any chums.  He had felt abandoned like the youthful

Scrooge in Dickens’ heart-rending tale.

The summer holidays had stretched out forever.  How bitter some of his

experiences had been back then.

Suddenly he felt quite benign.  A snatch of that awful song from a

Disney film came to his mind.  Let it go!  It will be one fewer ink

exercise to mark.  He, or she, who pays the piper calls the tune.  And,

yes, Mrs W pays the school fees, whether her son attends or not.  It is

just a pity that a greater proportion of that payment doesn’t filter down

to the rats who, as in my case, are contemplating leaving the sinking

ship of Education anyway.

And was he a piper then?  He had no intention of leading his students

into a Rip van Winkle cavern.  Maybe he did induce sleep in some, especially

on a Monday morning.  That would be his drone.  Piper…drone!  Puns had

always amused him.

No, the boy could go.  What did he care?

Felicitously, Snod didn’t have to worry about what to teach in Period

One.

The woman had jolted his memory of how successful a source

Browning’s poem could be.  Now where was that copy of Narrative Verse

through the Ages?

Maybe his tolerance and compliance might be good for an upgrade after

all.  Hamelin– he didn’t think he had been there.  Maybe he and Virginia

could take a river cruise down the Weser?  He wondered if that might tie in

with the consumption of some fine German wines.  He would ask Mrs W for

advice.

No problem, Mr Snodbury.  We can arrange a Hanseatic cruise for you with

a two day Schlachte Embankment break.  Tell you what- we will throw in a

complimentary Musicians of Bremen beer garden experience at no extra

charge, in view of all that you have done for Peregrine since last year.

It wasn’t exactly Moselle and Riesling, but at least that was some of

the school hols sorted.

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Drink Driving

02 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by Candia in Arts, Celebrities, Education, Film, Humour, Suttonford, television

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Cadillac, De La Warr Pavilion, Gourmet Jelly Beans, Gove, heads-up goggles, Italian Job, Michael Caine, MIranda, New Year Resolutions, Quartet, Richard Wilson, The Hard Rock Cafe, Vauxhall

SECRET DIARY: KEEP OUT!

This is the intellectual property of:

Tiger-Lily Brewer-Mead

Nutwood Cottage

Glebe Lane

Suttonford

The Shires

Europe

The Northern Hemisphere

The World

The Solar System

The Universe

Whatever

Anyone who opens this diary will be poisoned by polonium-especially

little brothers.  You have been warned!

2nd January, 2013

Dark Chocolate Jelly Belly Beans (50g)

I’ve broken my New Year Resolutions already.  I ate a whole packet

of chocolate-smothered Gourmet Jelly Beans from Diva’s Deli in one go

and I didn’t write you up yesterday, my sweet companion, as there was

no time for pubescent soul-searching and navel-gazing, as Sherry and I

had to catch up with quite a few back episodes of Miranda on I-Player.

Miranda Hart Tickets

We were playing around with our new heads-up display ski goggles

which show your friends on the slopes how many vertical metres

you have covered and the hang time of your latest jump. Cool, but

hot.

Sherry’s dad said all the pupils at St Vitus’ would be wearing such

headgear in the corridors of girl power, but that we would be

revealing predicted grades, module marks and form positions instead.

Sherry told her dad that he was so yesterday, as the exams are not

going to be modular in the near future.  I mean, that Cove man-like-

expects us to remember things.  I don’t even register who he is.  Or is it Gove?

Oh, yeah, a cove is Aussie slang for the manager of a sheep station.  Hmm, he

might do better over there. Not.

Profile picture

Mum went to Costamuchamoulah this morning to get back into her

normal social routine after all the festive fuss.  She wanted to meet up with

Candia to discuss when they were going to see a film called Quartet.

It’s about and for wrinklies.  So is Amour and they want to see that

too.  Depressing.

Anyway, when she arrived, she had a shock as she thought her must-

seen wrinklies’ hub had been converted to a vulgar chain.  There was the

auto jumble cliche of half a car jutting out of the brickwork, looking like the

iconic 1959 Cadillac and other such classic motors embelleshing The Hard Rock

Cafés the world over.

Then she thought that she should text me and tell me to come up

pdq and to bring my digital camera as it might be useful to

have some images for my Art project.  She thought that it must be an

installation by that sculptor, Richard Wilson, who stuck a tilting bus

on top of the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill-on-Sea.

Richard Wilson 9 12 July.jpg

But, on closer inspection, she saw that the number plate read:

SON IA1.  It was the rear end of Sonia’s silver Vauxhall, but thankfully the old

bird wasn’t inside.  Mum realised then that it wasn’t version 2 of Hang on a

minute, lads, I’ve got a Great Idea, inspired by Michael Caine in The

Italian Job, but more like Hang onto your hats, ladies. It wasn’t

Such a Good Idea to have One too many Dewlap Gins at Lunchtime.

(Quite a Lot of People Know That.)

Candia was waiting for Mum at their corner table and she had heard all

about it, first-hand, from their mutual friend, Clammie, who had been having a

cappuccino when the front bumper of the Vauxhall had made its sudden

dramatic appearance into her world, like some kind of evil vehicular advent,

or Dark Rider of the 21st century.  So, she was ready to spill the beans, as

well as drinking them.

By the time I arrived with my camera, they were already well into the

epic narrative of The Prang.

Mum wouldn’t let me go and interview Sonia for my English Media

assignment until the ageing girl racer had had a couple of days to calm down

and, dare I say it?-sober up!

Adieu, dear Diary.  You shall know more hereafter. ( Have got to do some

Maths, or Sherry will be in a higher percentile.)  Precious wants her A*.

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My name is Candia. Its initial consonant alliterates with “cow” and there are connotations with the adjective “candid.” I started writing this blog in the summer of 2012 and focused on satire at the start.

Interspersed was ironic news comment, reviews and poetry.

Over the years I have won some international poetry competitions and have published in reputable small presses, as well as reviewing and reading alongside well- established poets. I wrote under my own name then, but Candia has taken me over as an online persona. Having brought out a serious anthology last year called 'Its Own Place' which features poetry of an epiphanal nature, I was able to take part in an Arts and Spirituality series of lectures in Winchester in 2016.

Lately I have been experimenting with boussekusekeika, sestinas, rhyme royale, villanelles and other forms. I am exploring Japanese themes at the moment, my interest having been re-ignited by the recent re-evaluations of Hokusai.

Thank you to all my committed followers whose loyalty has encouraged me to keep writing. It has been exciting to meet some of you in the flesh- in venues as far flung as Melbourne and Sydney!

Copyright Notice

© Candia Dixon Stuart and Candiacomesclean.wordpress.com, 2012-2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Candia Dixon Stuart and candiacomesclean.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

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