SIKH DAGGERS AND SAMURAI SCHOOLKIDS DO THE BASH STREET KIDS BECOME THE SLASH STREET KIDS?

School and all aspects of improving our fertile young brains has always been a breathtakingly dangerous experiance. Beginning from the ungodly hour we started the long trekto school and our first bad tempered scowling teacher of the day ,until the trek home at the end of the dayafter our last bad tempered scowling teacher of the day .In those days we did a full day educating , none of this finishing about two o'clock in the afternoon. In the morning we had to get a double decker bus laid on esspecially for us. The bus was absolutly 'chokka-Block 'full.....Then at hometime the same scally hoardes were supplied with a single decker bus ,which if you missed ,well!...Tough shit ,basically!...The bell went at 4 o'clock and the bus was full by 30 seconds past. There was no waiting for sir or miss to give you permission this wasn't school discipline this was a fight for survival. I saw lads break bones on that crush in the home bus, absolutly insane it was....None of your health n' safety for the fruit and hopes of the future in them far flung days.

 I went to a really good grammar school and ,basically being a lazy bastard 'Blew it!'....Thats how i became a cartoonist!....It was run by the De La Salle catholic brothers and when we saw them in their full length black smocks with a little card  white brotherly looking collar....Us little snotty kids totally 'bottled it!'
The headmaster was about 6foot 6" tall ,but they called him 'THE SKULL'... And you only had to look at his thin boney face to know why !....There were civilian teachers, some absolute bastards ,but all quite happy to inflict pain in a variety of cunning sneaky , ingenious ways , which even as you were being battered you had to admire the skill and technique only attained through years of practise that was going into the infliction of pain into you !

Fear was the tool by which the knowledge and education was crammed into our totally uninterested boyish brains. Homework was only done if you were afraid of the teacher of that subject, but even then it wasn't done at home. The work was copied off someone on the bus in the morning and finished in the classroom before lessons began. The work was in two , blindingly obvious stages ...Firstly the totally indecipherable writing done while crammed on the moving bouncing  bus. Secondly , the slightly less awful ,but twice as rushed from the fairly stable classroom before the lesson began.

When we had playtime we had 47 -a-side games of 'footy' with a TENNIS BALL'???....Which for obvious reasons resulted in busted toes ;twisted ankles ,but most annoyingly ,for parents causing a pair of shoes to last about a week!

. I've never smoked in my life, but a lot of my mates would go around the back of some sheds and trying to look cool puffing ,gasping n' coughing on some ciggies. The teachers all knew when and where they wer so just took turns to leave the ciggie smoke filled staff room to grab the kiddie smokers and haul them out. Not having had a fag, when i tried to plead my innocence i was told "SHUT UP, LEATHERBARROW!"...But not me ,in my never ending quest for right and justice i would go on and on and in  the end would find myself in front of the BRUCE LEE of the cane....BROTHER DAMIAN....'THE SKULL'....He whizzed that cane like BRUCE LEE'S nunchuka's. If you see any of my old teachers and mention me they will probably be suprised i'm still alive as they thought i was smoking about 70 ciggies a day when i was 12.

Many of you ol' farts out there will remember reading the BEANO, DANDY,SPARKEY, BEEZER, etc,etc full of good ol' tales of kids getting' whacked' by 'teecher'!.....In fact, like me many will remember the various forms of torture and tools of torture that were used in real life. The canes old, new, battered ,thick, thin ,long, short; As were the belts; Pumps ,galloshes and even rugby boots. But the simplest were the unerring accuracy of the piece of chalk or board duster which flew across a class of snotty little schoolboys as if controlled by a form of laser guidance system avoiding the 'innocent'and homing in on the guilty target, normally just above the nose. And of course there was the unarmed torture; Pinching earlobes; Pulling the hair that would one day become your manly sideburns; Various,pinching, prodding, poking, pulling, slapping, etc, etc, all good fun, but i have to admit it did keep us in a form of control and discipline which the snotty little bastards of these more enlightened days have no concept of. Now teachers have no defence against the snotty little monsters they have to face. As we live in more enlightened times and every classroom is filled to the gunnels with all race and creeds; Languages ceremonial dress, etc, etc. But it has turned dangerously insane....

Awhile ago a Sikh judge  decreed that a Sikh boy shouldnt've had his ceremonial dagger taken from him in school one day. So whereas everybody ,in schools, colleges, airports, etc aren't allowed to carry sharp implements of any kind, schoolkids can carry ceremonial daggers into the class. Soon Japanese Samurai schoolkids will go for lessons with their Katana sword; Scottish kids'll have a Dirk down their sock like the children of Gurkhas with their Kukri's. English kids can have a sabre, the welsh can have an axe, the irish have their swords and shelaleoughs(sorry about the spelling). Various other peoples around the world in lots of nice places dont seem to carry swords, but carry AK47 machine pistols or rocket launchers, but i'm not totally sure there for ceremonial reasons......Must be wonderful being a teecher, once all they had to worry about was catapults(yes, i actually made one that worked, it wasn't just Dennis the Menace) and the variety of inky,snotty,flemmy things that could be flicked from a ruler, a ceremonial wooden 12 inch school ruler, before they became ceremonial 30 cm plastic school rulers.

I WENT TO THE TOILET WITH BATMAN !!!

Last week i went to my very first comic festival, and a very strange affair t'was as well. The fine Hunt Emerson and his lovely lady Jane let me stay in their humble home and fed n' watered me , so thanks for every thing.(the cheques in the post!). There was an opening night party at a pub in 'Brum' city centre and Hunt and his band 'Let rip' ,he's a fine 'Little plucker' is our Mr Emerson. Then they were followed by two editors from DC, a brit n' a yank who hadn't rehearsed, but they were quite good. They were followed by a bit of a heavy rock band who weren't bad, they played some unusual songs, given a rock twist and came out quite well. (e.g. 'The avenues and alleyways and Delilah',as heavy metal songs.) I got upset as they did a version of The Osmonds 'Crazy Horses', turned into the Who's 'Wont get fooled again', then from The Who back to the Osmonds' Crazy Horses'....hmmmmm?????!!!!!!






The following morning i was booted off the very comfy settee i snored the night away on. A gallon of tea and a loaf of toast and off we jolly well went to the Millenium point ,i think it was called, a very impressive building with one floor full of comics. We set up Hunts stuff and i got coffee for Hunts friends and guests, (arent i wonderful?..Didn't i mention i was wonderful?); Tony, the publisher and salesman, Paul, a canadian artist and Steve ,who Hunt does work for. All nice guys, not as wonderful as me, but who is, eh? I went out to get the drinks and passed a very long queue of very strange looking people, for it was they, the comic fans. A lot in fancy dress and some real weird dressed ones who became weirder when i found out they weren't in fancy dress. Finally the doors burst open and the hoards powered in ,i dont know about bulls in china shops, but herds of buffalo's in comic shops. Lots of comics ,maybe not too suprisingly. But i was made up to find an IPC stand with sheets of original artwork from all the British comics ;Lion,Valiant,even the Eagle ;Robot Archie; The Steel claw,etc, etc, No Dan Dare, but the Eagle stuff was great. It was all very enjoyable .There was artists drawing away, a couple really good guys i managed to view past the crowds queuing around them. I was sent for coffee just as a slightly recovered Jane made a showing. It had taken a couple of gallons of strong tea at her friends breakfast table to attempt to drown the 'Hangover'(never?). But she was her usual cheery self soon enough. Poor ol' Hunt's suffered tho' ,he's done his back in and lost a filling the day before on a plate of muesli(there ,i told you these health foods'll do you no good. But does anyone listen?)....So, that was giving the 'lad' a bit o' gyp. But our hero ,beared up manfully, he wasn't going to let a busted tooth get in the way of making money.

I decided it was time to retire to 'The Bog', so without a second thought i found a cubicle to accomodate my very specific requirements, and set too fulfilling those requirements. As i sat there, listening to a sexually orientated convoluted conversation, which i felt i should let them finish before i showed my face. So after a good flush i walked over to the sink( you've got to be seen to make the effort, haven't you.) I just happened to glance up and the speaker was Batman! Not a crappy Adam West schoolboy vest version, but the whole moulded suit, i'm sure Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman dressed him that morning.Thoroughly 'gobsmacked', i walked out desperatly needing a strong drink.







When i said i was going to the comic 'do', Elara ,the daughter ,when she found i was seeing Hunt, "Hunt Emerson,COOL!"....Hunt through the years gawd bless'im has done bits of work for her, and shes a big fan and never misses the Beano, for Hunt Emerson. But i bought a couple of Hunts more 'Artistic' Stuff ,shall we say? Firkin the cat ,etc I don't think i'll show this stuff to 'My little angel', cos at the end of the day "your a very sick/strange/weird man, Mr Emerson, but we love ya!"