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8 May 2024

This England: Shell-ebrating crustaceans

This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain – has run in the NS since 1934.

By New Statesman

The Crab Museum in Margate celebrated International Crab Day with some clawsome gags, in the inaugural World’s Funniest Crab Joke competition. The event was  judged by an expert panel of judges including the comedians Harry Hill and Rose Matafeo, as well as children from Ramsgate Arts primary school. The winning gag, submitted by Leon Price, was: a man walks into a restaurant with a crab under his arm and says, “Do you make crab cakes?” The manager answers, “Yes, we do.” “Good,” says the man, “because it’s his birthday.”
The Guardian (Kate McIntosh)

Parked and deprived

A new £51m park-and-ride in Eynsham, Oxfordshire is all but finished – but can’t be used, as funding for an access road is not yet in place. Hanborough and Minster Lovell county councillor Liam Walker said the P&R will be shut “for a number of years” while the council works to build a road to access the site. However, a spokesperson for the council said the length of the delay was “not confirmed. Options are being considered.”
Witney Gazette (Dan Tarzey)

Way out west

Steve Smart, 65, from the Isle of Sheppey in Kent, is such a fan of Westerns that he has turned the garden of his semi-detached house into a Wild West town complete with general store, saloon, jail and even an undertaker’s. The project has taken 25 years and has cost the grandfather thousands of pounds.
Kent Online (Amanda Welles)

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This article appears in the 08 May 2024 issue of the New Statesman, Doom Scroll