Continue reading »]]> The travellers guide to Plymouth.

Don’t!

That is the simple message at the moment. However if you would like to see an accurate replica of the chaos the city faced shortly after the blitz, enter at your own leisure. If you have an hour to spend, come and park in Vauxhall Street, put your feet up in Gydnia Way or try and working out the road works Rubik cube that is The Barbican! Notte Street is well named and it is not a street any more, more a cone strewn trench.

If you would like to get to the historic Barbican to sample its fantastic night life and famous restaurants or to simply watch the mouth breathers of society showering each other in lager, try Brittany Ferries. If you ask the Captain nicely he may drop you off near The Admiral McBride which is by far the quickest way to get to The Dolphin at the moment.

As for the city itself, here’s a quick recap. If you are coming from Exeter, peel off at Ivybridge, up past Ben Mee’s Dartmoor Zoo, down through Plympton, left into St Budeaux, over the Tamar Bridge, then double back, reverse down Royal Parade and set out on foot having abandoned the car anywhere at the end of the town which looks like someone has tried to recreate Stalingrad
just after the Germans left. Remember to pack a coat, compass and food for three days and if you are going to Sutton Harbour, a gas mask may also come in handy.

If you are coming from Cornwall, you have my deepest sympathy….on several levels.

Fitz

Continue reading »]]> THE FITZ FILES BLOG

After many years writing in The Herald newspaper Fitz has decided to blog instead.

May 7th 2011

What a magnificent device…the iphone! In the 36 hours I have had it I have discovered that when I sit on the loo I am facing 61 degrees north east. I have also discovered that it is 2.15pm in Olso, obviously it might not be as you read this, but when I flushed, it was! I have also discovered that if you have chubby fingers you can really cock up the texting facility, etre Blampert keeps getting messages such as.. SeE u in about kiasdhiasda minutes Fitb.

Also, each time I answer the phone, I photograph my ear…can anyone explain why?

Of course gaining access to world wide information and running your life via apps, ipods and Bluetooth connectivity is fine assuming that the bloody phone turns up on time and to the right address. All of this fingertip touch technology does fall down when some unwashed ‘Nigel’ in a transit van, who is supposed to be delivering it, can’t find your address. Then, with landline technology, you try and dial the ‘help line’ at the parcel delivery company. Nine times I was cut off from ‘information’ where a recorded voice told me on each occasion that…..We are currently experiencing a high level of calls at the moment…. really…..outrageous…you’re a call centre and some unthinking bastard has called you!

At 6.30pm the doorbell went as I was trying to get through to the ‘help line’ for the tenth time and sod’s law kicked in, they actually answered. I was about to go off on one when I saw ‘Nigel’ on the doorstep holding a small package and with great pleasure hung up on them. I opened the door.

His opening words were…. ‘Express delivery!’

‘Not in my world, mush.’ And followed up with. ‘Get lost did you?’

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I even tried using my 3G iphone map system. I’ve got the same one you have just ordered but the coverage around here is crap. They don’t work. So I had to stop and ask at the garage.’

Arr! Still, I have seven nice pictures of my ear, know the time in Oslo and the GPS position of my bog…Oh and am developing a text relationship with etre Blampert.

Continue reading »]]> May 5th 2011 Knock knock. Who’s there?

Knock knock. Who’s there? American special forces. American special forces who? American special forces who…who have managed to carry out an operation without cocking it up for once!

Another leap into the 21^st century has occurred in The FitzGerald family household, I have ordered an iphone! Sounds marvellous, what is an iphone? Apparently the technology has been around for some time with such things as ipads, ipods and even ipatches. I think Nelson had an ipatch, but how the hell did he charge it on Victory? I have been round the ship and there
is not a single three pin plug anywhere. I saw a cat-o-nine tails….which I guess must be an ilash! Hey hey…boom tish…still available for pantomime.

Worked with the charming Peter Alliss this week at an after dinner speech at Churston Golf Club and he was truly a gentleman and very entertaining. The enemy, the good lady wife, couldn’t attend the event which was probably just as well. When she heard that I was meeting him she said…

‘Oh I have always liked him. He is the last of the original cast, isn’t he?’

‘Cast of what?,’ I replied.

‘Last of the Summer Wine!’

Not a great follower of golf or Wallace and Gromit!

April 29^th has passed with due pomp and circumstance. A date which will always stick with me, Gus Honeybun was 50! I
spent seven years with the world’s most famous rabbit. He now lives in semi retirement at Flambards in Cornwall, never writes or phones. I will always remember an incident at Navy Days when a charming young lady of about six entered the Gus Honeybun Magic Grotto. I told her that if she could tell Gus a joke and make him laugh, I would give her a Gus Honeybun badge. Outside watching on the television screens was her proud father, a member of the Naval Provost. Six foot four and built like brick wotnot, the sort of chap who could lift a tank but couldn’t spell it.

‘Why did the pervert cross the road?’ was her sudden outburst!

Oh! One of daddy’s jokes, who was now running through the crowd, slinging people out of the way. Earlier that afternoon I had met the Pusser’s Rum rep, so I was feeling no pain and without thinking or remembering I was on television replied…

‘Why did the pervert cross the road?’

‘He had his dick stuck up the chicken,’ was her answer.

The last thing I saw was an enormous arm with an HMS Eagle tattoo on it, grabbing her and whisking her off into the crowd. She never a got badge!

Continue reading »]]> FitzGerald has entered the 20th century

Well, FitzGerald has entered the 20th century, only to discover that the 21st century has been knocking around for a bit already. Yes, in a moment of weakness, I have applied for my tax disc ‘on line’. It has only taken me three hours and cost £1725.00!

During that period I managed to log on, log off, cop on and irritate a member of the French coastguard who I thought was the DVLA helpline. I have been directed, misdirected, re booted and left a threatening message for Bill Gates at his office in the US. I have ordered a Xerox ink toner cartridge, a manicure in Spain and apparently attracted the attention of Eva from www.russianhousewives.com.Oh and at some point I hacked the CIA most wanted list. I am guessing that some of the women from the first website would never be included on the second……errch!

Anyway, after three hours I have finally been promised a tax disc from the DVLA and will display it proudly in hopes the police don’t notice that it is for a 1927 Fordson model F tractor with rotary plough.

I tried, I really tried to follow the guidelines on screen, but I am nearly 50! However, since exiting the wonderful world of website financial transactions, I have noticed that I now hold a fishing licence for Southern Ireland, may use a firearm in Denmark and am allowed to transport low grade beaver tranquiliser over state borders as I seem to have registered myself as a vet in Saskatchewan. The last time I ventured onto any form of e-commerce website, I ordered a 52 kilo pallet of finch food by mistake. I wasn’t going to waste it and started to load the bird table and every sort of container I could find. After two weeks, we had the fattest tits in the village but at least we thinned out the squirrel population with diabetes and strokes. Result!

I am going to log off now as there is a smell of burning rubber coming from the back of the computer and a large truck has arrived in the street outside. Oh god….more bloody finch food.

Fitz

Continue reading »]]> Andrew Marr had an affair…with what?

And speaking of the news this week, how big are Talibans and would I notice 500 of them burrowing under my skirting board.

Anyway, ratboy, the son and heir, is off to America to play football for the Plymouth Argyle academic side……surely that’s an oxymoron.  Being apart for ten days from a 16 year old will be a wrench for his mother and me, but the enemy, the good lady wife, is coping well. She has placed the champagne on ice, burnt a lot of his bedding and keeps bursting out laughing for
no apparent reason several times an hour. There were a few worries on the social deportment side of things so it was decided that a ‘pep talk’ on behaviour would be given at the farewell dinner. It started with the usual do’s and don’ts….no wild sex, no drugs, no breaking wind at the dinner table, don’t drink directly from the toilet bowl and please…..please pull the curtains when not wearing pants. I agreed to most of his requests and told him to behave as well.

So, off to the good old US of A. Philadelphia and New York here he comes. How far did he get? Wiltshire, in fact Chippenham General Hospital casualty! Slipped while getting on the mini bus and put his arm through the bloody glass panel side window. The enemy now in floods of tears, champagne bottle in bird bath and entire week of middle aged partying put on hold.

However I did witness a particularly touching mother/son phone call.

‘What do you mean cut? Well how much blood? Main artery, don’t be a whimp! Just get on the aircraft, Virgin interiors are mostly red anyway, nobody will notice.’

The Daily Mail’s Mother of the Year award on hold again.

Continue reading »]]> Well what a week.

I had a stoob moment in the bathroom on Monday. What is a stoob moment? Well eagle eyed readers will have sussed that the word is boots backward and it involves carpet tiles, the bathroom scales and me! I stepped gently onto the device to see if my Greek god like torso had changed in anyway over the last couple of weeks and  STOOB. That’s the imprint left on the carpet from the manufacturers name on the back of the scales. I am not sure what I weigh as I wasn’t wearing my glasses but I know I lost a couple of nails plucking the bloody scales out of the shag pile afterwards. I have moved the scales around the room on a regular basis trying to get a more accurate reading, by the radiator seems to be best.

The enemy, the good lady wife, did point out that by having them there, it does allow me to rest my paunch on the towel rail and thus suddenly lose a stone and a half! I think that has appeared in the Simpson’s but let me assure you that I have been doing it for years and it works. I admit it, I am 49 and my age and my waist seem to be in tandem. Roll on 50!

We have had five cloudless days in Devon and most of the population seem to have gone ‘baboon’s bottom red. But the sudden sun has guaranteed the reappearance of  ‘DFS woman’ as I called her. I noticed one on Plymouth Hoe this afternoon, about five foot tall and my weight giving the world a wonderful fashion parade and a glimpse of what every teen bullock is wearing this summer. Just for the record, she had a crop top restraining a couple of overly ripe Stilton’s, a skirt the size of a hankie for a gerbil and a mid rift like a DFS sofa.

This charming young debutant wandered by, then stopped to rummage in her hand bag for a wet wipe. On bending over she gave me and most of Saltash a scene reminiscent of a meat delivery to the rear of Dewhurst’s but on a positive note it did remind me that I must worm the cat. Apparently she had stopped to get said ‘wet wipe’ for her young beau who had just dropped his breakfast, a rather slippery can of Special Brew. However, it must have been love as she spent a good five minutes wiping lager froth off his ankle tag.

All the best

Fitz