Dear Sir...

Britain is, by and large, a charitable nation.  Certainly charity is the only possible explanation for the continued enthusiastic support of some of the nation’s national football teams, who can be relied upon to put in a truly tragic performance in any tournament more challenging than the one down the rec using anoraks for goalposts.

Charity takes many forms.  For instance, many older men, even married ones, help to support young women by putting them up in a small flat in Mayfair and ensuring they have enough money for their education, gym memberships, discreet visits to Harley Street and, if necessary, impromptu foreign travel one step ahead of the press.

There are national charity days for broadcasters, when the BBC tests to destruction the patience of an audience who have only tuned in to see the special seven minute long ‘Doctor Who’ episode and who have to sit through musical number after musical number for fear of missing it and not Tweeting something snarky in the moment.

There are charity days that take the form of brave volunteers who, armed only with regulation anorak and a thermos containing a cocktail of gin and paraffin, stand on the high street for hours rattling a tin, in aid of funds for Lifeboats, or the fight against some vile disease, or the welfare of any animal from the donkey to the, well, it’s usually donkeys.

The English in particular love their animal charities.  Ironically this is a result of knowing fuck all about animal welfare and thinking meat comes from the supermarket rather than a Disney character voiced by a beloved recovering alcoholic.  This affection and affectation has given rise to the myth that the English give more to animal charities than they do charities that look after humans.

Why does this myth persist?

The thing is, charities have started sending gifts to those who contribute, like calendars and stickers and, frankly, people are much more likely to use, and display, their bookmark of a grinning donkey in a hat than they are the sort of image usually sent out by a charity that looks after children in some war torn hell hole, which is usually, how shall we put this, authentic, and not the sort of thing you want fellow commuters thinking you consider appropriate to mark your place in ‘What Ho Jeeves’.

Whilst charities may send you gifts to prompt you to donate (‘please find enclosed a free biro, now use it to fill out the enclosed standing order form you middle class biro stealing bastard’), that’s a lot better than the menace that risks turning us from a nation with our hand in our pocket to a nation with our hands round the throat of the gurning tosser obstructing our path on the pavement.

I speak of the ‘chugger’.  And if you thought the BBC News team doing a ‘Kids from Fame’ medley in aid of ‘Children in Need’ was irritating, that’s nothing compared to some twat in a cagoule with a smile and a clipboard trying to get your bank details off of you without even the common courtesy of pretending to be a Nigerian prince.  Or giving you a coaster.  These are young people who are employed to cheerfully try and slow your progress to the cake shop or pub by asking you if you have ever thought about the problems of the lack of availability of drinking water in the world.

BTW the correct answer is not, as I found out, ‘absolutely, Waitrose is out of Highland Spring again, it’s a fucking disgrace’.

I think people find chuggers irritating because British people are genuinely generous to charities but like it that by giving they can be both anonymous and altruistic.  That’s why those (now considered to be a little bit offensive and, actually, when you think of it, somewhat creepy) collection boxes in the shape of life-sized replicas of children that used to stand outside shops could do so safely and unchained, no one would dream of nicking one.

Actually, it was because they were full of coppers so they weren’t worth nicking, and, because they were full of coppers, nobody could lift the fucking things anyway!

Village Life - the Charter Fair

Wooly decorations adorning the village on Charter Market day.

Many years ago, so long ago in fact that it was before the world was in black and white, possibly as far back as when the world was woodcut-coloured (predominantly black and white, but with the occasional full page of dazzling colour, with a giant letter somewhere in the landscape), some bloke with probably a beard and almost certainly a crown granted the village it's charter.
A charter for a village back in Ye Olde Days was a very big thing, as it was all about status.  The village went from being a collection of shacks at a muddy crossroads with a tavern where weary travellers could be waylaid and their bodies conveniently disposed of in the parsnip fields, to being a collection of shacks at a muddy crossroads with a tavern and a town hall, where decisions like taxing travellers could be taken, meaning you got to take money off them on a regular basis.  It didn't matter that the tavern had a hygiene rating of no stars, this was an age when everything had a hygiene rating of no stars.
Having a charter meant status, the ability to legally burn witches and, depending which way the ecclesiastical breeze was blowing, Catholics or Protestants and, most important of all, having something over on those bastards from the next 'village' along, which was just a collection of shacks at a muddy cross roads with a tavern.  Ha, losers.
Village rivalry a few hundred years ago was settled with the occasional pitched battle (well, 'battle' may be exaggerating things slightly, as it probably consisted of a couple of dozen peasants with assorted clubs).  Then it became all about who had the most peasants left standing after the plague hit town, then who had the biggest church, and so on.  There was a brief return to basics when, in the heyday of football hooliganism, things were settled once again by a battle, this time on the pitch.  In these much more civilised times, rivalries are settled by where beats where in the regional heat of 'Britain in Bloom', which is not to say that local pride does not occasionally result in action being taken in the dead of night with step-ladders and weed-killer resulting in mysterious blight in the neighbouring village's hanging baskets.
Local pride is very much alive and well in the village.  This was clearly exhibited a few years ago when the Post Office, in a misguided move, decided to give the village the same postal address as the nearest town.  The villagers sprang into action; sod 'Save our hospital', this was 'Save our house values'.  The villagers fought long and hard and eventually decided simply to ignore the Post Office, who subsequently also decided to ignore their own advice.  Honour was satisfied.
The crowning glory though was a couple of years ago when a Little Waitrose opened in the village.  Forget having the biggest church, and forget that the village already had an independent butcher, green grocers and bakery, this meant free coffee.  Yes, you heard, free coffee.
So villagers are proud of their village, and fiercely protective of it, including being protective of the charter that gives it it's status.
One of the requirements of the charter is that the village should have an annual charter market.  Back in the middle ages this would no doubt have been quite special, featuring tradesmen selling ribbons, hog roasts and possibly even a witch burning.  Today, it's still a big deal, and rather special in that as well as tradesmen, local people can have their own stalls, in their own front gardens.  It's like a cross between the biggest yard sale ever and the reaction to the council advising that for one day only they will come and pick up all the old crap you've been meaning to take to the dump for years.  Attics and garages are plundered and hugely optimistic price tags are attached to one-step-from-landfill items.
If nothing else, it provides a valuable insight into the mentality of your neighbours, especially the ones that think there's a market for VHS tapes, even one marked 'Derek & Anthea's Sex Tape', and included by mistake.

Sweet Charity

With red nose day once more done and dusted, it’s good to see that various ingenious ways were being used to raise money for a good cause. There’s charity dancing, charity music and charity books.

There are very few words, I suppose, that cannot be enhanced by adding the term ‘for charity’ after them.

‘Dogging’, though, is one of them.