Christmas Crackers 2

Last year in one of my very first articles I posted the jokes that were in my family Christmas crackers. Here once again are the delights of the many bad jokes in crackers:

   What do ghosts eat?    Goulash

   What do you call a chicken in a shell suit?    An egg

   Why did the cow wear a bell?    Because her horn did not work

   What do you call two robbers?   A pair of knickers

   What do you call a horse in pyjamas?    A Zebra

   What do you call a train loaded with toffee?   A chew chew train

   Where do snowmen go to dance?    To a snowball

   Why do cows lie down in the rain?    To keep each udder dry

   What do ghosts eat?    Spookgetti

   What lies in a pram and wobbles?    A jelly-baby

   Why did the tomato blush?    Because it saw the salad dressing

Dont blame me, I didn’t write these!

David Taylor MP 1946-2009

I was sorry to learn of the sudden death on Boxing Day of Leicestershire North West MP David Taylor. He suffered a heart attack whilst walking with his family and died shortly afterwards. He was aged just 63. It is a sobering reminder that none of us are immortal and we should take every opportunity to spend time with our family.

In the run up to the 2001 General Election Leicestershire North West was one of the Parliamentary seats that I was short-listed to contest. I therefore undertook some background research on the constituency and David Taylor. I have some family in the area and therefore had spent some time there as a child. I never met David Taylor but I did learn that he was a popular local MP who had made quite an impact since his election in 1997. He had previously stood and lost in 1992. As history shows, I did not get selected and Nick Weston fought the seat for the Conservatives in 2001.

David Taylor was sitting on a rapidly dwindling majority and had already announced his intention to stand down at the next General Election. Andrew Bridgen, a successful local businessman, will be contesting the seat for the Conservatives and in light of recent polls, will have high hopes of regaining the seat for the party. Due to the highly marginal nature of the seat and the strong Conservative second place Gordon Brown is unlikely to call an early by-election. Instead he will probably leave the seat unrepresented for the next few months so that a replacement can be chosen by the electorate at the same time as the General Election. Any other decision would probably see a Conservative gain and a very bad launch for Labour’s General Election campaign.