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Mr Splodge may well have been there, MrsVic, disguised and spying on us!

It's one thing for others to discuss your private dealings in the manner that we're seeing, but to do it yourself? To be absolutely honest, if i'm to believe what I hear then i must be the only person in Bedlington from whom the Market tavern proprietors have NOT borrowed money; franly, I find that difficult to believe.

But its up to you, and others in that position, to sort that out with them. Slagging them off at every opportunity is not going to get your money back. Besides I'm not sure I believe you but hey.

Fair enough, Splodge, and I respect your right to hold an opinion, but who are 'all these people they have let down'? If you are one of them, then perhaps you need to sort it out with them, rather than spout off about it on a website? I don't consider it my place to judge anyone on deals they have made with others.

Most weekends? hey, I can beat that! How about most nights?? Is this a contest to see who drinks in the tavern the most?? (If it is, I win - hands down.) OK, here's how it is: I LIKE the Tavern for several reasons - Ian's curry being one of them, and the fact that he and Sarah, David and Maureen and not to forget Sacha are good friends of mine - real, true friends, that is, rather than just buddies because I drink in there. If you want to discuss this further, without the need for an internet cloak, you'll find me - too - at the bar 'til dopey o'clock, but you'll find me enjoying it. The problem - well, question - i have with your rather odd accusations of 'cooking the books' is that it's not possible - it's a rented premises: don't pay the rent, and you have to go, it's that simple. Clearly, they pay the rent, as they are still there. I'm not sure if you think they are inventing sales, and the money that goes with it, or borrowing endless money from rich regulars (who they??) and not paying it back, or borrowing beer and, likewise, not paying it back, but all of those make no sense. Sarah has a business to run, and a family to keep, and does a very fine job of doing so. Maybe you don't respect the effort put in by her, and her family, to make the place pay - it does, thanks to the bands on Friday and Saturday night, the curry night, and the upcoming menu - or maybe you bear a grudge against them for not letting some scumbucket in who you prefer to drink with, and that's your choice, but somebody who drinks in their every weekend until dopey o'clock yet persists in coming on here and slagging off the establishment, and the people who run it, is operating in a rather curios manner, as Mrs Vic attests to. I hope you have the guts to come forward and talk to me next tim we are stood at the same bar, as I'd love to meet you face to face: you will know who I am - just ask for the 'most regular of regulars' and they'll point me out. meanwhile, why not say something nice about a business, and a family, who actually try to offer us punters what we want?

It's always interesting when people have a dig at the Tavern with reference to 'debt collectors' and 'cooking the books', especially when one considers the plac is still open while others fall by the wayside. being a regular in there (and elsewhere in the town, although with increasingly less choice sadly) some of the stories that come about are brilliant: there's the famous one about the Tavern not being able to get any beer as the other pubs have stopped lending it to them, and then there's further about how all of teh regulars have been asked for loans, and yet more about them having to pay fo their beer upfront as they can't get credit, and so on. yet, day in, day out, it's open. Unlike others. The pub trade is going through hell these days, as the breweries have the landlords by the balls: they dictate the prices for both the rent and the beer, and there's little anyone (other than the management at a free house such as the Northumberland) can do about that. Cooking the books, as such, is not possible - pay the rent or you're out. Clearly, with your constant references to dodgy goings on and such, you don't frequent the Tavern: i do, and i'm a lot better placed to comment on 'cooked books' than someone who relies on what is nothing more than heresay and gossip. I wouldn't trust Ian to count up to ten, as it happens, but he can cook me a curry any time. Try it before you !*!@# it off.

Ho Ho; no, it's Ian actually, and it's bloody good.

Bang on, Mrs Vic - way to go old girl. Unemployment is always going to present a problem of one kind or another, but the 'jobs nicked by immigrants' excuse simply doesn't wash with me. before my present era of self-employment, and since my starting my first job at the age of 18 - my God, that was some time ago - I have worked for eight different companies, many of them with workforce of in excess of 500. The number of 'immigrants' I can count on having worked alongside is absolutely negligible. Of course, in a different part of the country (and bear in mind my working years in the great metropolis of Manchester) things may be somewhet different, but certainly not here. As for the Gurkha's, let em in.

From my office window I can see several nice fences; anybody else have anything to say on boundary enclosures?

Hang fire as the Sun is not yet closed! I believe there are 'interested parties'.

You can do that in the Tavern on a Saturday night - ginger ones included! Good to have you back.

What are you doing out there Mrs Vic?

While agreeing with Malcolms perfectly logical observation that we have, as a race, increased the levels of pollution we are soiling the planet with, the fact remains that our contribution - in terms of CO2 - pales into insignificance when weighed up against the natural emissions. The figures I do not have at hand, but we are talking hundreds of billions against tens of millions. I'm not advocating that we should all waste energy willy-nilly - it costs too much - but neither am I pedalling the myth that we all need to switch to hybrid cars pretty soon or the planet will die (in fact, as of the moment and for the last several years, I don't drive.) As Threegee rightly points out, there is a considerable amount of money spent on research into this area, most of which seems to produce computer models that predict things we can not possibly predict; the weather forecast example is clearly relevant, as it highlights the variability of nature. Furthemore, if you talk to the Inuit, who carry out a regular census of Polar Bears (name, religion, address, telephone number....) they will tell you that while numbers are declining in some areas, they are increasing in others. They will also tell you that this happens over decades, it is not unusual. They do this regular count, incidentally, in order to deduce where they are most likely to get eaten while fishing. The whole climate change industry is allowing governments to impose absurd and poorly thought out quotas and taxes on nations worldwide: the commitment to renewable energy that this country has made is impossible to meet - that's a fact, not a supposition: we could not build the number of wind turbines required in the time given, and then we would have nowhere to put them (apart from off shore, but remember - unlike our local ones - that the sea moves, and with it the cables....I'm sure Gooch would have told them that). To sum up, the advert that runs for ever on TV - the one saying 'we are now producing more CO2 than the planet can cope with' - is not true at all; we are contributing very little indeed. Now, on another note, Malcolm also raised the point about magnetic influences - I agree, there is a very odd planetary arrangement arriving soon, and cosmic storms are expected in the near future. This is all very interesting, and merits greater investigation. Meanwhile, I'm strapping myself to my desk for all of 2012, in case the increased gravitational pull of Jupiter sucks me out of the window.

I doubt you'll miss it!

The majority of them are not allowed in anywhere MrsVic. Mind, I'm not allowed in somewhere.

They don't have any! We've been here before, in another thread I believe, with relation ot the IPCC approved data put put last October for Siberia which was, as it happens, a copy of that put out by the same agency in September. This resulted in alarmist claims that October, 2008, was the warmest, ever, on record! It wasn't, of course, as the figures were for the previous month. When questioned as to how this could happen, the agency (GISS? I have not the name to hand but they are one of four who monitor for NASA and the IPCC) stated that they could not afford a quality control process.

Whoa, it's gone all modern sort of! I like the grey, very neutral.

It's on Wiki, for heavens sake, you expect it to be nonsense!

Poor old Mr Darn. And I thought he was stronger than this. Come back, Darn, all is forgiven.....

Coming from a background in the print and publishing industry, and being a writer myself, I was aware of Lorem Ipsum; I just thought it was funny. I'll get me coat....

No, it's a supercar. Alfa Romeo, with a very tricky race bred engine under the bonnet. Probably not expensive enough for you, though, and built by Italians.

Such as?

Asbestos roof. Steer clear.

Your chicken soup was pretty good, but then it came in a tin. I wouldn't be a customer, Mrs Vic: no beer, no me i'm afraid. I am, though, pretty much middle class despite my lowly address.

Thought Italian food was !*!@# ?