Corn in Portobello: Pop goes your money! Pop on Blenheim Crescent.

I've written about 'Pop' the popcorn shop on Blenheim Crescent previously; slightly puzzled at how such a niche venture could survive in an area of escalating rents. I now know how!

I arranged for a 5 year old and his mother try the place out (I am obviously too old for things such as popcorn) today. The following is entirely their opinion.

They liked the packaging - this is important because it was half the weight.

The sweet stuff was too sweet and tasted a little burnt.

The savoury stuff was ok, nothing special and perhaps a little soggy. Nothing to write home about.

They bought a box of cheese popcorn and brought it home. The box and it's contents weighed 80 Grams, the popcorn weighed 40 Grams. the cost was £3.45. I'll do the maths for you; this works out at £86.25 per Kilo... More expensive than foie gras; the most expensive foodstuff I could source (outside Beluga caviare and silly Japanese things). This is why the shop works: yummy mummy is spending a fortune on a handful of highly inflated starch.

The girl in the shop was nice and let them taste different flavours and she said she popped it herself but at these prices it should have been popped by Johnny Depp dressed as Willy Wonka with a kiss thrown in for mummy!

Also there was no information regarding additives, flavourings, MSG or nuts on the pack.

As a comparison a 70 gram pack of popcorn from Tesco cost £1.00. the same thing is on sale in The Grocer on Elgin Crescent (the most expensive food shop in the area) for £1.20!

UPDATE:
I have received the following from Matt at Pop:

Hi

If I do have right of reply, I’d appreciate you representing all my views?



Thanks for coming in. all views welcome, and we’ll look at the shortcomings you pointed out; though I have to say the vast majority of people, whom I’m sure you wouldn’t think are any less smart than you, taste the product, make a choice, and buy some. And many, in particular locals, come back again and again. We’re very happy about this, and because we want to encourage their business, we offer regular customers a discount and are in the process of having loyalty cards printed; it is a sneaky marketing ploy, yes, but it is also meant to make people understand that if they come back they’ll get treated well and regular customers appreciate it. 

So on to price. A full box of flavoured corn is £3.45. If you’re a local and you have a card, it’s £2.75. If you buy two it’s £2.50 each. If you buy a large bag of olive oil and seasalt corn, or sugar-coated corn, it’s £2.20. If you have a party and want single-size servings for kids, it’s a quid. We’re also trying to find some inexpensive snack box type things and get them branded up; buy one and when you bring it in, we’ll fill it for 50p. And I have to hand the government 20% in VAT. 

But let’s start with the headline-grabber – a box of popcorn for £3.45. First, we want to get bigger boxes for the ‘flavoured’ corn – for the coated ones, like English toffee and sea salt, the portion is big enough. So fair point. But let’s look at the costs. The corn itself is not, no surprise, the biggest cost. The price of raw corn has risen 45% in the past few months with US crop failures, but it’s only when you add the flavourings – natural English cheddar cheese made into powder, with no additives, or the butter, three types of sugar, and vanilla that goes into the caramel, or the organic apple juice, natural cinnamon, etc that we put in the Apple Cinnamon – that you get the full picture.

The nice packaging is expensive, about 24p each. Even the labels cost about 9p. Add in labour costs, depreciation, rates, utilities, rent, waste disposal (businesses pay for every bag they throw away or recycle), and all the other costs then you’re left with a relatively slim margin. 

So there you have it, pretty much line by line. I hope it explains our business. It’s not as sexy a story as £100 a kilo popcorn. But then the reality never is as interesting as the speculative guess, is it?


A slightly patronising but sturdy response.

And my point does not come from a speculative guess... It is still ridiculously expensive!

By the way, Matt is a marketing guy and marketing guys do stuff like this... In order to disguise the fact that they just want our money!

The real London tube map.

Police tazer blind man for possession of white stick!

True story. The police tazered a blind man having mistaken his white stick for a samurai sword...

I spoke to my man at Scotland Yard who stated: " The particular  constables seeing crime dog was on heat at the time and got the hots for a blind man's collie and instructed the officer to 'taze' away in order to free up the collie for a shagging".

He went on to admit that since the dumbing down of the police force and the introduction of canine team leaders there has been a more dogged determination within the 'Tazer a blind man to shag a dog squad'

.





















A police team leader looking for something to shag. Tazer at will!

Assange claims he was only looking for UFO's.

In an extraordinary change of tactics, after taking advice from Gary McKinnon and in order to avoid extradition to Sweden on sexual assault charges Julian Assange is now claiming that he was going into Swedish women's knickers solely in search of evidence of UFO's.

                         Assange indicating the position of UFO's on the female form.

Harps at the Royal Festival Hall.

Portobello postcards. gladioli.

Mary Cigarettes. International house of pancakes

Embarrasing photo #1:Tony Blair & Jimmy Savile.

One wonders if Jimmy fixed it for Tony!

Frieze London 2012 & why the muse will not be going.

A guest blog from JAN NIEUPJUR.  Nieupjur is both an artist and philosopher. founder of Nieupjurism and Abstract depressionism. Described by Nat Tate as the most important 20th century artist and by Duchamp as the most plagiarised.

The entrance to Frieze New York. They all look the same don't they?


In the 'Creative Marriage' the muse is the 'artist'. She is imaginative and forward looking while the artist has become the 'mechanic'. Nothing more than a conduit for her creativity and the tool by which it is rendered tangible. In the case of 'BIG NAME' artists it is sadder than that; the artist has simply become the 'administrator' liaising between the creative and the mechanics producing the work within the factory like studio. The 'Name' artist is no closer to art than the hospital administrator is to surgery.

Art (or what claims to be art (blame Serota)) is now purely interested in chasing the buck and the places to chase the buck are 'Art Fairs' such as frieze!

Frieze is also the place to be seen for suits, trophy wives, trophy wives in suits, middle aged rom com actors with their Asian babes (plenty of soft porn titillation guaranteed) and 'Artists' in suits. It is nothing but a corporate seminar like any NHS seminar and the be all and end all is the embodiment of victory of profit over integrity or creativity.

For the duration of Frieze the muse will be in the studio conjuring up angel tears from her harp whilst in the tent in the Regents Park they will be plucking the feathers, one painfully by one, from the same angel's wings!

Harp in Madrid.

Sandusky 'trained' Jimmy Savile.

Sounds bizarre but it may be true! Jimmy Savile may have been trained by the recently convicted American paedophile whilst on American trips.
More later when I can be bothered to make it up.

Did Cameron spend tens of thousands on phone calls to Grant Shapps snake oil phone lines?

Well did he?

Photographs on Portobello Road. Nadia Hammoud.

A new exhibition of photographs has been installed on the wall on Portobello between Oxford Gardens and Golborne Road. well worth a look!

Grant Shapps, snake oil salesman runs for the hills.

In the light of Grant Shapps taking down his dodgy 'fast buck' websites we can surmise that he is dodgy, a chancer, oleogenous, a bullshitter and squeakily unclean... all in all a Tory! Cameron has lost the plot!

This could easily be a BNP or similar rally. I'd rather trust Jimmy Saville than this guy!

This country is now being run by a bunch of corrupt, elitist kids, coked out of their brains 'allegedly' and without a single thought for anyone other than their nasty little clique. GOD HELP US.

On a serious note, read this in the Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/oct/08/grant-shapps-how-to-corp-michael-green

Jimmy Savile, George Entwistle and the BBC.

Jimmy Savile: Darling of Auntie Beeb!

                               Entwistle: Seedy 'uncle'?

In the guardian this morning I read the following:

"The BBC director general, George Entwistle, has promised to investigate the mounting allegations of sexual abuse by Sir Jimmy Savile, but only when the police investigation has been completed.

Entwistle told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Monday that he deeply regretted what had happened and apologised to the women involved for what they have had to endure, but he said he did not want to compromise the police inquiry."

Further on into the article I read:

"Entwistle, who rose through the ranks of the BBC as a journalist (and described elsewhere as: a "loyal BBC soldier"), said he had not about heard the rumours of sex abuse until late last year but conceded: "Jimmy Savile was regarded as by a great many people as odd, a bit peculiar and that was something I was aware some people believed."

Then I read the following in another article: "The former head of Radio 1 was aware in the early 1970s of allegations of sexual abuse involving Sir Jimmy Savile, an ex-press officer for the station has claimed.

Rodney Collins said on Wednesday that an ex-Radio 1 controller, the late Douglas Muggeridge, asked him to find out whether newspapers were looking into sex abuse claims about Savile in 1973.

Collins, who was head of press for Radio 1 when Savile was a DJ at the station, urged the BBC to launch a full internal inquiry and to examine who knew what and when.

"The BBC should now – having first of all said they knew nothing about this – hold a full inquiry, they should co-operate with the police. If anyone working there at the time had some knowledge of this they should put their hands up," Collins told MediaGuardian!.

So Entwistle rose through the ranks of the BBC as a journalist! A pretty good indication then that the quality of journalism there is pretty poor or that the BBC has a long tradition of brushing its own shit under the carpet or both.

Of course Savile was odd! Alarm bells should have been screaming years ago, especially after savile's defence of Gary Glitter. And of course BBC management would have known about Savile's 'parties'.

Rather than wait (no doubt hoping that all this will go away) the director General should instigate an internal inquiry immediately.

The BBC is often referred to as 'auntie', it transpires that 'Seedy uncle' might be a better epithet!

Oh! And how many seedy men at the Beeb had Jimmy fix it for them to live out their own seedy fantasies I wonder? 

The Collective at the West Bank Gallery.

bloody hell! Something worth going to see in a Notting hill gallery.

A group show running for a very short time (until the 7th) featuring some surprisingly good stuff. go and catch it.

I loved the organic forms of Kate Linforth:

Serene, understated ceramics by Maria Dehaan are both Beautiful and functional.

kim Francis makes almost indescribable fragile objects of great beauty. Faberge made accessible.

WEST BANK GALLERY is at133 Westbourne Grove W11.  look it is pissing with rain, there could be no better way of escaping it! Prices are realistic too and for once it is not 'faddish' ephemeral tosh.

Arty Self portrait.

Cardiff harp

Pop corn shop on Blenheim Crescent W11. The dumbing down of Portobello continues!

Yes! it is a popcorn shop, they sell popcorn, nothing else but popcorn. How on earth can a popcorn shop survive in an area of escalating rents?

Review: http://jannieupjur.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/corn-in-portobello-pop-goes-your-money.html

The Pelican, Tavistock Road W11 is reopening on saturday 6th of October.

After some considerable time closed following a rather checkered history the Pelican is finally reopening its doors! It will be interesting to see how it goes; the new owners appear to have spent a considerable amount of money on the buildings interior which indicates that they may want to keep the usual suspects out.

In the light of what is happening generally to our local pubs lets hope the Pelican maintains some standards!

The new owner showed me around the other day and was keen to assure me that it was not attempting to be some kind of gastro pub but something that might resemble a PUB!

Opening on the 6th at 6,00 pm... worth a look anyway.

Tate Modern Christmas gift ideas 2012.

I have had a sneaky peep at the following... Nothing new then!


Tate Modern Christmas gifts 2012


Banksy grafitti kit complete with stencls, spraycans, balaclava and false balls.

Gilbert and George Rococo shit embellisher. Containing resin and gold leaf for the perfect ormolu stool. (Shit not provided but may be bought separately from the Tate gift shop in handy 30g tins. Price: £97,250.00 courtesey of  Piero Manzoni)

Tracy Emin camping condoms. Signed by the artist for authentic artistic fucking intent.

The 'LOOK AT ME' Nicholas Serota mirror... Just repeat after me; If I say it is art it is ART! (This gift works well with Last years 'Emperors new clothing' Curators costume.)

Chapman brother faced false penis noses (set of two). Now you and your brother can look like a pair of dickheads.

The 'Munch Scream' cot and buggy mobile. Ideal for disturbing the very young artist.

Andy Warhol bald patch. Impress your friends with your impersonation of Andy without a wig!

Warhol without wig: http://jannieupjur.blogspot.co.uk/2010/10/club-21-remaking-scene.html

The 'Jackson Pollock' Muse beater. An authentic paint spattered singlet ideal for the 'Abstract Depressionist*' during alcoholic rages. Works equally well on long suffering wives/boyfriends.

The Damian Hirst animal mutilation starter set has been withdrawn due to legal issues... It was rubbish and overpriced anyway! 



*Abstract Depressionism: Copyright. Jan Nieupjur 2009. http://jannieupjur.blogspot.co.uk/2008/11/barking-on-thin-ice-in-search-of.html

Midge Ure gets a custard pie.

Or was it a Viennese whirl?

Jeremy Forrest and Megan. Why the French are not treating it seriously.

French correspondent Gaspard Disdain writes:

The raison zat ze French is not taking zis serious is zat it is a matter of love and we French know all about love. Not like you English Island stealers.

They are a young couple in love and deserve to be together, how does it matter zat he is a married teacher with moral responsibilities and she is a child (I know that makes him a paedophile but so what) it is obvious zat she is in love with ze ansome brute. You only ave to look at the way e dresses to see he is a babe magnet. And on top of zat, being a maths teacher, he can help her count ze ways she loves him.

Come on England, do the mathematique, put deux at deux togezeur and come up wiz two happy lovers.

We French may run from a fight but we run to ze hanky panky faster than your Widow Twanky.

Give zem a break.... Call it half term!   Zut alors!


Editors note: Gaspards views are his own and being a Frenchie are invariably wrong.

On a slightly disgusted note I gather the tabloids are offering loads of cash for topless photos of Megan! I'd like to see some saggy dugged photos of  themselves for a change. Tell you what, send me your photo's and I'll publish them!

UPDATE. 27th September.

As a direct result of this blog French police have pulled out their collective finger and found the couple in Bordeaux. He is is in police custody while she is probably in 'le Price Unique'.

Sussex police issued a statement saying the pair were "safe and well".

"The information which led to them being located came as a direct result of media coverage in France," the statement said. "At this stage we are not confirming the specific location where they were found. Their families have been informed and arrangements will now be made for Megan and Jeremy's safe return."

Ryan O'Reilly has the last word on Portobello Road and RBKC.

Portobello drinkers 'harassed' by children

From our sports correspondent Dave 'the Mexican' Wave. As usual his view are his own and of a 'tabloid' nature.

Things are coming to a head in Portobello Green, Notting Hill. Members of the Portobello serious drinking team are claiming that they are being harassed by a pingpongist terrorist group who's members include children as young as five years old. According to a spokesperson from the drinking team; " We are fucking being fucking chased off our fucking drinking table in the fucking park by a bunch of fucking antisocial table fucking tennis fanatics".

Portobello 'drinking' team on the disputed table.






From the other side of the fence a local pingponger stated: "It is ridiculous! this is a table tennis table not a drinks table. There are drinking places all over the place but only this one table tennis table".

'Terrorists' at play! 











The drinkers went on to complain that sport is an elitist activity which should be discouraged now the olympics are over. One stated: "Sporting activities in this neighbourhood give a false picture of what is essentially a shithole  left to accommodate us drinkers, crack heads, junkies and such by RBKC while they gentrify the rest of the borough for coke snorting tax avoiders and the like.

Rumours however of royal personages getting their kit off in the park are unfounded.

The artificial hip. For all you Hoxton Hipsters out there!

I was really pleased that I managed to get 8 Z's into one line. Cool or what!

He's the prosthetic aesthetic
the artificial hip
the coolest thing to hit the town
since granny took a trip.
He is the London Fields creative
the Hoxton neo-native
the ultimate self-oblative
hip hip hip hip hip.

He is ironically moustachio'd
wearing comical pistachio
drainpipe trousers  and a pork pie hat
He knows full well
 that he's not where it is 
if he's not where it's at
He is the pastiche fantastiche
is cooldom uber alles
likes erzatz Piazzolla pizza jazz
and avant garde French ballets.

He is he is he is he is
he is he is
he is

Hip hip hip hip hip hooray.

He is he is he is.

Portobello postcards # 176. Tony the key man.

Drug dealer starter kit and the jeweller to the stars

I found this on the interweb, the perfect Christmas gift for the children of our times.

The jeweller to the stars.

They are waiting in the cafes
the restaurants and bars
or parked on unlit corners
in expensive cars
they are waiting for the snowman, the blow man, the let's go man
they are waiting, waiting, waiting
for the jeweller to the stars.

He is the closest thing to royalty
their business is all his
with his bags of herbert sherbert
(the silly rich mans whizz)
he makes them feel quite special
and just a
little
bit
show biz
they are guaranteed to talk the talk
walk the walk as well
he is the pied piper
the piper at the gates of hell.

White christmas is his ringtone
on his prepay mobile phone
his sole visible means of support
the long suffering wife at home
he is the king of the powder rooms
his shit it smells of roses
to the vacuous trustafarians
born
with
silver spoons up their noses.

He is known to each and every one
the jeweller to the stars
he hasn't got a friend on earth
and there ain't no life on mars.

That clown Shapps, Cameron and drugs.

There is Grant Shapps: Tory party chairman, snake oil salesman, conman, manipulator of the truth. And then there is Andre Shapps: Guitarist with the Rotten Hill Gang, frequently seen in the neighbourhood sporting an extravagant moustache, striped blazer and bowler hat riding a unicycle.

Andre Shapps, musician and unicyclist.


The clown is of course the former and perfectly fitting to the circus that the government has become.

Grant Shapps, clown!


Is Cameron on drugs or just mad?

RBKC's half million pound piss hole on Portobello Road

A guest blog from Jan Nieupjur. As usual his views are his own


I've talked about what RBKC call portobello square before; http://jannieupjur.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/half-million-pound-loo-seat-on.html  they have built a half million pound lavatory (in Tavistock Road) from wildly expensive Chinese granite and stupid granite balls and put a seat round the tree by the lavatory. It has all become clear... The aim of RBKC is to contain the borough's drunks and junkies in the square in order to keep them from the posh bits rich gits live in; rich gits like RBKC councillors who have lined their pockets creaming off tax payers money.

The great little corner shop at the end of Tavistock Road is now a down market alcohol shop intending to capitalise on the drinking scum on the bench. The great little corner shop is run by Muslims (I thought they didn't do alcopops or diamond white ( I'm not being racist...Just curious)); nice people but driven by greed, who will no longer get my business because I can no longer buy stationery or a ball of string there and I am abused by the pissed up customers! They also advertise whores in the window (curious (http://jannieupjur.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/love-blossoms-on-portobello-road.html))

Come on RBKC, you are turning the place into a shit hole!

Drunks drinking drinks in order to get drunk. When drunk or drinking they drunkenly bully the community. Camorons 'big society' in action!  Photo: Jan Nieupjur.

A much better idea is to walk up Portobello 100 yards to the Continental Stores just re-opened on the corner.... A proper corner shop!

FEAR AND LOATHING IN PORTOBELLO GREEN and the 2012 Team GB drinking squad.

PORTOBELLO GREEN. Sounds idyllic doesn't it. sadly it is far from that at present!

Portobello Green is a small park area adjacent to Portobello road where it passes under the Westway, it is managed by Westway  Development trust. So far so good. WDT have very thoughtfully put a table tennis table in the park to be used by anyone with a mind to, it is also an ideal place to take children to play. The park is designated as alcohol and dog free with the threat of fines for transgressors. Great!

Sadly the park is the chosen meeting point for the areas collection of street drinkers (and worse) making it a no go zone for children or families, basically WDT is obliged to maintain this lovely little spot as an enclave for piss heads, pot heads and crack heads along with their dogs and threatening attitude to anyone who has the temerity to move them on!

Team GB drinking squad.


This is not Westways fault. Westways role is not that of a branch of Social Services nor the Police, nor are they supposed to be managing a pisshead creche for RBKC who seem to be happy to pass on the resposibility for their lack of responsibility regarding their socially marginalised residents! How the Council can believe that it is socially acceptable to have this situation continue is beyond me!

Perhaps RBKC could build a 'Cannery Row' themed area somewhere else, infusing it with Steinbeck's characters in order to create a comfortable environment for the drink/drug/dog on string element who currently cause the park to be a no go area for ordinary folk and their children. I'm sure that tourists would happily pay to gawk at a real piece of London 2012 and the GB serious drinking team now that the Olympics have gone. It would also be an opportunity for RBKC to generate income from the sale of Special Brew, crack and ganja within the area.

Come on 'Royal Borough' sort your shit out!

Gill bradley. Portraits of Portobello.

Coming to the Tabernacle in October.

Muse with harp.

Postcards from Portobello Road #1918: Gassed on All Saints Road.

My grandfathers generation were obliged to join the army and travel to the Somme in order to 'do a little gas', these days one can get that 'in the trenches' vibe on All Saints Road!

Evolution by Edgar Muller in Tavistock Road. NOT Portobello Square!

We are being bullied, by RBKC, into calling the Portobello end of Tavistock Road Portobello Square! What touristic bollocks... It is Tavistock Road.

Below is the rendering of what Edgar Mullers thing is going to look like... They don't tell you that you will have to look through a lens to get it but that would spoil the notion that it is an interactive street art thingy in which visitors may place themselves strategically within.

It is part of the 'INTRANSIT'  Festival running in the borough from the 13th to 27th of July. More HERE

I am photographing the creation of this thing over the next few days.

 Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4. hope it ain't water based paint!

Eventually it looks like this.



















But if you look through the little lens it looks like this!

Hmmmm. Waste of time and money really.

The Guardian, racism and negative stereotyping. Flooding in Wales!

I'm not posting a photo for this item for obvious reasons. But then I found this from SKY news:

There has been some flooding in Wales recently. A very good friend of mine has family in the worst hit area. I checked out the guardian online site for news and I was offered a collection of pictures to view.

I was offered 10 recent photographs of the flooding... I was show 8 photographs of flooded caravan sites and two of flooded roads. No devastated villages, no houses, no bruised communities, just caravan sites!

What does that tell us? It tells us that the gooood people at the guardian consider wales to be a land of caravan parks and nothing else. Obviously in Guardian land Wales is infra dig and without any true culture other than caravans.

The Guardian even made up captions for anonymous caravan parks, placing them in villages that do not have such things.

Perhaps the guardian editors and hacks are celebrating the rains as a means of dousing the fires in their holiday homes.

While we are on the subject it might be a good idea to return the Hay festival to the Welsh people and send the brit/pseudobrit literary wankers back to their tin foil barbecues at their poncy self indulgent literary onanist do's at bankrupt (financial and moral) country estates.

The Guardian used to be better than this.

Historical note: the guardian used to be the Manchester guardian. The majority of middle class Mancunians (and Liverpudlians) spend their holidays blighting Wales with their caravans (a caravan is the height of chic up there I'm told) and it is a known fact that most posh Mancunians are conceived in a caravan in Rhyll... Conception of course follows seven pints of llagwr and a cwrry! Really really posh Mancunians buy a holiday cottage near their caravan which they then burn down themselves for the insurance

Grace Jones, Jubilee and hula hoop!

Whatever you think of the royal familee, monarchy, the jubilee or Fergie's versus Pippa's bum the whole thing was worth it for this:


God bless you maam!