Selly Park Deli fight back against the loosers

Hey. How's it going. Had a good nine months?

Never let it be said that I don't take criticism on board. To this end, here's a nice email I received this morning, presumably from Selly Park Deli, star of previous posts here and here.

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN -

I am quite disgusted that you should open a forum, and encourage people to scandalise companies who are working to make a living . Therefore allowing loosers that have nothing better to do than criticise.
Selly park deli is a family run business. During the times of recession you have encouraged people to slander small independent british run stores.

WELL DONE!

In my defence, I encouraged people to slander small independent British-run stores a few months before the recession. Consequently I'd like at least part of the credit for kicking the whole thing off. Anyway, although "slander" generally has to be untrue, and it's not like any of their customers would see my blog in a million years, I do genuinely feel slightly bad for picking on a small, honest, family-owned cafe.

Sorry, did I say honest?

In a stupendous coincidence (particularly on a morning I was only viewed by one reader), within minutes my original post got its first comment in over a year:

Selly park deli:

Went in a few weeks ago> I must say it was nothing what I was expecting, the food is proper fresh. I was quite impressed with the price actually if i were to do a comparison against Subway, I would say the deli would win definately against quality and price. (John)

I guess we'd all like to have real satisfied customers, just like real photos of our own sandwiches. But in times of recession you have to make do, right?

Birmingham thanks you for committing less crime

Hey, no problem. I just cut back on the armed robbery and let a couple of drug mules go. It was more the credit crunch than a sense of social responsibility, but it's always nice to get some recognition.

Birmingham: proud of our hideous freaks

Children's drawings unnerve me, and it's only partly the monstrous heads and outlandishly sized limbs. It's also the suspicion that these things are drawn by specialist illustrators, possibly the same ones responsible for that cutesy kids' font with all the backwards Rs.

Anyway, whether you're proudest of Miss Windtunnel 2008, Sinister Blonde Dwarf or Pinhead McGraw, I don't think there was a clue in any of its 360 degrees what the point was. Is the council making sickly posters just to reassure us that they're proud of children? How much money did they spend on giving passers-by a warm, fuzzy feeling? Or, y'know, a cold, deep nausea.

This one goes out to Gary Glitter

What if I don't want to?

Technorati tags: Baby of the Year

Don't get too involved, now

The makers were probably going for "help with homework". But everyone walking past remembers the feeling when they saw their first horse porn.

Birmingham City Council gets down with the kids

Some middle aged council staff presumably sat in a boardroom and brainstormed the essential features this advert would need to alert today's yoof to the council's leisure services.

• Jagged, uneven font on a graffitied-wall kinda background
• Teenagers striking annoying poses
• Funky web address with a "2" in place of "to"

But most importantly,

• A string of snappy phrases belittling the reader in the slang of 1993

Just looking at it, I feel like I'm being bullied. Actually, after seeing it for a month, I've decided the quiet, pimply-looking guy on the left is being bullied. The gurning idiots next to him are shouting those catchphrases, the guy in the middle is laughing his head off, and dorky guy is just crying inside. It really is a nice impression of being 15.

Anyway, it's some comfort that in the unlikely event this advert peer-pressures any teenagers into checkin' it out, the web address leads here. If having to click "Child / Young Person" doesn't do it, the totally sad-case list of options (Family/Social support, Education/Learning, Disability Info?!) and the absence of anything so much as a jagged font will have them loggin' off before you can say Birmingham City Council is gay.