2012 KLWIN Calendar

We said NO...and we're going to keep saying it, all through 2012 with the official KLWIN Calendar, 13 pages of glossy, fun poking cartoons aimed at the Democratically challenged leaders of Norfolk County Council, in who's name the proposed idiocy of a mass burn incinerator are being fostered on the peoples of West Norfolk.

KLWIN are fighting the good fight but they need our help in raising much needed fighting funds especially with the case for a Judicial Review looming in December, and at £5 the calendar represents excellent value because not only do you get a functional time table for the whole of 2012, and a good laugh every month but also you will have done your bit to stand up for YOUR democratic rights.

And what a great Christmas pressy for friends and family.....I'll be in the town centre on occasion to personally sign your copy...keep your eye on the local press for details.....it'll be the best £5 you'll spend this Christmas.

The calendar is also available on E-BAY http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/KLWIN-2012-Cartoon-Calendar-Alan-Castleton-/290625256857?_trksid=p5197.m7&_trkparms=algo%3DLVI%26itu%3DUCI%26otn%3D1%26po%3DLVI%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D3814470387836785263

Tug-o-War

In older times Tug-o-war contests were popular events in the town and the Northend fishermen were unbeatable, even against strapping young policemen and after all, they were horny handed, hardened professional rope pullers back in the days of sail.

Young fishermen were not allowed to take part in the contests which meant that the Northend teams were made up of the elder members of that community and they would have spent many hours drinking before taking the field and even then the anchor man would have found all the time in the world to neatly coil the rope as his 'crew' reeled in the opposition.

Eventually they were beaten by a professional team (who illegally wore studs in their shoes) but only after the fishermen had been drinking for many hours and even then it took the professionals three tries to achieve a victory.

The race home

At the end of a tide it was all about getting back to the King's Lynn fleet before anyone else could hog an inner berth....Sometimes the tide would not be quite high enough to get more than one vessel into the mouth of the fleet and a 'log jam' would ensue with much subsequent pushing, shoving and various bits of skulduggery.

Off below

Another Northender illustration featuring the ritual of provisioning for the coming tide. This was as simple as it could be...Tea, Sugar, evaporated milk and fuel, in that order.

Dangerous sands

These two illustrations demonstrate what a dangerous place the Wash could be. What with unexploded WWII bombs and the combined efforts of both the RAF and USAF, who use the Wash as a bombing and target range. The clink of rake on bomb casing was not unfamiliar to the Northend fishermen scratching for cockles and the odd strafing kept them on their toes.         

Shopping in the Northend

Shopping in the Northend of King's Lynn for much of the 20th century meant one name, 'Harry Southgates'. I would be dispatched to Harry's on a Friday night complete with shopping list and trade bike. Here I would stand in a queue of mostly women and be prepared for a long, boring wait until it was my turn to be served. Nothing was hurried and because everyone knew everyone, each customer would digest their lives in a blow by blow monologue whilst their shopping list was compiled into goods....do I miss it? Heck no, life's too short as it is.



String theory

In the Northend fishing community of King's Lynn 'string' was a universal panacea....a veritable 'solution looking for a problem'.

Who's Norfolk?

This magazine always manages to rattle my cage.....if it's our Norfolk why aren't our opinions taken into consideration?

Northenders, gossip by the gallon

This illustration from my Northenders series harks back to my 50's/60's recollections of the ladies who would beaver away at a large marble slab peeling shrimps into pint pots made of wood bound with brass hoops. The speed of their nimble fingers would be a blur and would only be matched in speed by their tongues...Apologies to my Aunt Elaine in who's possession this illustration now resides, and who is still peeling shrimps in her late 60's.

Northender's, Hard sand - soft sand

Another of my 'Northender' series of humorous drawings. The Wash is home to several sand banks which generally 'shift around a bit' and they vary a great deal from being very hard to work on to being very soft to work in.. As cockling in my day was a manual task which required raking the wee beasts out of the sand with a short handled rake, the type of sand was going to determine whether it was your arms or your legs that were going to ache by the end of the tide.

This image is available in card form at True's Yard Fisherfolk Museum, King's Lynn. It also features in their 2012 calendar.

The original framed illustration is also available for sale. Please contact me for details.

Democracy vs County Council

The following is but a sample of my personal take on the truth's behind the great Incinerator debate....or at least it would be a debate if Norfolk County Council understood the meaning of democracy.

If you live in West Norfolk and someone mentions 'democracy' I think you'd be entitled to raise a cynical eyebrow at least. The battle for that most cherished of values (won through centuries of trial and sacrifice) between the 65,000 or so people of West Norfolk who demand it, and the Leadership of Norfolk County Council who dishonorably withholds it, continues apace.
It seems NCC will stoop as low as it takes to hang on to their blinkered insistence that Norfolk should adopt a waste strategy that is so contentiously outdated, anti-environmental and hideously expensive that it begs the question WHY?
Surely they must have realised that at some point people were also going to question their choice of incinerator operator. Cory Environmental and Wheelabrator Technologies, who operate under the umbrella of Waste Management Inc, haven't exactly got a history as a 'safe pair of hands', an attribute you would expect as the bare minimum for a company in an industry with such potential for environmental catastrophe.
This might be especially puzzling when you realise that checking the operational pedigree of Cory Wheelabrator is no more difficult than a fairly simple Google search.
It's there for all to see...the multitude of lawsuits, fines, out of court settlements, allegations, writs, convictions and even proven links to organised crime stretching all the way back to the 1980's with a clear message that this was/is an organisation whose only consistency is the  failure to conduct its operations safely, cleanly and efficiently.
It is very good at one thing though....making money, and lots of it. It seems that fines and settlements totalling hundreds of $m are inconsequential compared to earnings.
The fact that they are 'over here' scouting for new 'money harvesting' pastures should come as no surprise either. It would seem the good ole US of A has learnt the hard way since an incinerator hasn't been built there since 1995 and many towns and cities are now examining the fallout around their incinerator plants (For a touch of irony check out cancer rates in Lynn & Boston Mass.) which doesn't bode well for Waste Management Inc and their litigious horizons....I reckon they're going to needs lots more money and it has to come from somewhere.
And it is on the question of cost that NCC 's stance becomes all the more incredulous....Burning waste is hugely expensive, appox £120 a tonne MORE expensive than landfill. Why then, when there are so many better, greener, and cheaper alternatives out there, are we in West Norfolk staring hell in the face.
Could it be.....MONEY. It is no coincidence that the only potential winners in this environmental debacle will be Cory Wheelabrator and good old, undemocratic, Norfolk County Council who will stand to 'clean up' to the tune of £125m in grants and subsidies over the next 2 decades.
None of this is new of course. It's all out there in the public domain, but going back to the question of democracy, or lack of it in this context, just how far will NCC stoop to bludgeon this monstrous strategy upon us? I suspect as low as it takes or until someone...the people, throws these little dictator wannabes out of office but the question is, will it be before the damage is done?
If the 65,000 people that voted against an incinerator in West Norfolk were to get off their bums and march on County Hall it would all be over in a trice, of that I'm certain.

Xmas dinner

A really good Norfolk turkey will sell itself.

Plucked

Plucking turkey's is a fine art and if you've ever wondered what they did with old cow's udders.....

Bath time

A certain amount of subterfuge is needed to entice turkey's into a hot bath on a warm summers day. 

Boxing day

Only in the turkey industry would 'boxing' day precede Christmas day.

Catch me if you can



Catching turkey's calls for a well planned, co-ordinated strategy.

Travelling turkey's

Transporting turkey's from farm to farm in the Norfolk countryside has its hazards. 

Cornered



Turkey's aren't renown for their smart thinking.....has this one cornered himself?

Cunning fox

A day's golfing for the turkey's and a day's cunning for sly fox's.

Feeding time

Only the best dining for Norfolk turkey's.

Vets

No one likes a jab...even the farmer's squeamish.

Sexing chicks

The simple science of sexing chicks.

A day in the life of a Norfolk turkey

In 1999 I was commissioned by the British Turkey Federation to produce a calendar for the Millennium in support of The Peter Aliss, Powered Wheelchairs for Severely Disabled Children's Charity.

I elected to depict the life cycle of a commercial turkey, the prospect of which terrified the life out of them. Trust me, I said. People will love it....and they did, raising 10's of thousands with the sale of the originals raising £26k alone.  One of the better thing's I've done with my life.

This image was titled 'Hatching' and as you can see, the principle is quite simple...and entirely feasible...bootiful bor.