No Not That Word

No sex please, we're British

Did you know that when you pick up your copy of the Village Pump you are holding a magazine that contains precisely 15762 words? You didn't know that? Well I do, and how do I know? Well I've counted them. It all came to pass one evening recently when I inadvertently found myself watching a TV programme called 'Home and Away'; it's the one that Alf is in. After some five minutes of watching this I became so inspired, so full of myself, that I felt compelled to do something stimulating. So I counted the words in the Village Pump.

Does 'Home and Away' affect you like that? No, well we must have a talk sometime. Anyway I have discovered something, which may well appeal to those readers of a somewhat disconcerting nature. In these 15762 words there are, as you would expect, such words as would readily spring to mind but there is one word missing. A word you will never find in our highly acclaimed Village Pump. Are you ready for this? Sitting down I hope? The word is SEX.

Are you aware that while you are reading this history is being made. Never before since its inception some 20 years ago has that word been uttered in these august pages. What on earth will Founder Members of the Village Pump think, those people who had the Vision, Foresight, and the ingenuity, and of course people like Chris Young! I mentioned all of this to my lovely Wife but her only response was to give me a strange look and then proceeded to turn the sound up on our TV.

To me this raises a very serious question. 'Should we mention sex in the pages of our Village Pump? How often do you hear people say, 'All you get on TV is Sex and Sex', so surely I am not suggesting that we start to read about it in our local magazine? Well I think I may be onto something here. I have always held the view that hardly any young people read our Village Pump. Well sex and the young do go hand in hand, after all sex isn't banned in Stoke Ferry for example; it isn't banned in Methwold either, but I do know parts of the village where it is profoundly discouraged. So if we can do anything to make our young people take an interest in our Village Pump then we should do so.

All this talk of sex reminds me of a dear Lady who shall be nameless who said to me recently, 'Ballroom Dancing is the only thing you think about', which I had to concede had a ring of truth to it. I reminded her that I had a lot on my mind; I was trying to write a Best Seller. She said I hope you won't call it 'Great Expectations' then suggested why not 'Little things that go bump in the Night'. That proved to be too much and with that I headed to the Pub where I put a proposition to the delectable barmaid; one I felt she couldn't refuse, but of course she did.

Les Lawrence