Life In A Quiet Town

Armed Police. Riot Police. Police Dog. Police Tape. Police Vehicles. My neighbourhood at four this afternoon.

The Hub happened to look out of our bedroom window and suspected something was going on when he saw half the street was cordoned off, ten Police vehicles taking up the parking spaces and all the neighbours out. I have always wondered what made numpties stand around looking at nothing for hours at a time and now I know: nosiness. I was out there like a shot, numptying away like the rest of them.

I spotted one of the few neighbours I actually know:

Me: What’s going on?

Neighbour I Know: Jed’s barricaded himself into the house.

Me: Who’s Jed?

Neighbour I Know: Dunno.

The Riot Police had on helmets and shields and were preparing to break in when they were told to stand down because Jed (presumably) was coming out.

This one's blurred to protect identities (not that I'd recognise him if I fell over him; maybe he really looks that way)

So it was exciting but not particularly dangerous (less bullets than I’ve experienced on a normal Saturday afternoon’s shopping in post-Apartheid South Africa). Everyone went back to preparing dinner and swearing at their kids (not me; Spud doesn’t get in until five). Some of the local boys chatted to the officers once the tape was down and the suspect on his way to the slammer; one lad asked to try on handcuffs, preparing for his future career, no doubt (not as a Policeman, sadly).

Another quiet day in Stockport; but what is it about Wednesdays that brings out the Police? Last Wednesday our local high school was evacuated because someone planted home-made bombs. That was the rumour, anyway: the evacuation was real; not sure if the bombs existed.

What have I learned today? I have learned that a strip of plastic emblazoned with the words ‘Police Line. Do Not Cross’ has magical properties, because even our local don’t-give-a-stuff-for-authority youths dared not disobey it. Oh, wait a minute: that might have had something to do with the firearms and number of officers.

I have learned that I am human and I can now stop sneering superiorly at news reports on tv in which hundreds of people hang around looking at nothing for hours in the hope of seeing something for a few minutes. I am a numpty.

And I have learned that the Hub keeps a camera secreted about his person at all times, enabling me to share today’s non-event with you mere minutes after my dinner. Or it would have been, if I hadn’t been distracted by a passing Malteser and only just remembered that I had something to tell you. Chocolate: numbs the brain, expands the bum.