Mr Brocklebank: Promoting our rivals

Jan 22 2008 by Mr Brocklebank, Liverpool Daily Post

THE spirit of Drake and Raleigh blows through Moorfields underground station (along with other debris) with the uplifting posters urging local volunteers to join the next Round the World Clipper Race which Liverpool is so proud to sponsor.

How strange, then, that the Clipper yacht graphically illustrated has "Glasgow" written in large letters along the hull.

Perhaps the Glasgow posters show the Liverpool clipper, for balance? Curiouser and curiouser, as Alice in Litherland says.

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NORWEGIAN footballer Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, recently retired from Manchester United, will be knighted by King Harald V for being "a role model to children".

Overlooking his charming nickname "the baby-faced assassin", one wonders how many of our own local talent could honestly be described as being "role models to children" worthy of a sword tap on the shoulder from our own dear Queen?

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WITH yesterday officially decreed as the most miserable day of the year, fear not as the next festive feast day is already being celebrated – commercially, at least.

One of Mr Brocklebank’s keen spies reports that Tesco’s Deysbrook Village store had Easter chocolates and mini-eggs on the shelves a fortnight ago.

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WHEN quango king Jim Gill was asked if his new business development super quango Liverpool Vision, amalgamated from a batch of other agencies, would cause confusion with the soon-to-be-defunct urban regeneration organisation of the same name, he said: "I hope not. I don’t see why there should be."

Brocklebank asks: "Are we paying him good money for these pearls of wisdom?" Probably very good money indeed.

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A RADIO broadcaster discussing the Liverpool Culture Company’s problems referred to the chief executive Jason Harborow as Jason "Harrow- Borrow", making him sound like a pantomime dame. A disgusting slur if Mr Brocklebank ever heard one.

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FOR years, many passers-by have wondered why the isolated Victorian Gothic former furniture store on Great George Street survived previous clearances.

Not for much longer, thanks to Liverpool’s construction frenzy. Gerry Sanderson, of Bath, writing in the influential Building Design magazine, comments: "Has there ever been as ugly or as clumsy a set of buildings proposed as those on the front page for Liverpool’s Great George Street: is the bullying and dwarfing of this sweet little Victorian block some sort of reference to context?"

A little too intellectual an explanation, Mr Brocklebank fancies.

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FANCY that: In BBC Radio 4’s profile of Culture Company’s artistic director Phil Redmond, it was noted that he had 15 cars. Is this male cocktail dress syndrome, with Prof Phil never wanting to be seen in the same car twice?