Banks take
note: I’ve
lost my faith
rdinarily, my interest in
personal finance extends to
opening the odd statement
from my Little Piggy Saver
Account which I opened in 1985. I stuck five
quid in there back when Nigel Lawson or
Geoffrey Howe or someone was chancellor
and have since seen the interest make
steady progress. But Sir Nathaniel
Westminster – the patriarchal-looking
piggy bank that you qualified for once
your balance reached £100 – has always
remained tantalisingly out of my grasp.
I’d always dreamt of that fat, porcine
ornament with his pinstripe suit and red
bow tie peering down at me from my
bedroom shelf, stuffed full of pound notes
and 10-bob pieces. As it turns out, I was
wrong to put so much faith in those
dastardly banks and their cruelly enticing
piggy-related marketing schemes.
Now we sit on the precipice of a global
economic meltdown in which even your
average Johnny Paycheque like me is
O
threatened with financial oblivion. What
help would Sir Nathaniel do me now?
Very little, I’d imagine, the obese,
inanimate idiot.
SEND SAM YOUR THOUGHTS, THEORIES, ICED BUNS, ETC, TO: SAM.DELANEY@SHORTLIST.COM
18 / www.ShortList.com
I’d always assumed that my lack of
financial acumen would ultimately protect
me from the effects of recession. Usually
it’s only rich people like Randolph and
Mortimer Duke out of Trading Places who
seem to fall foul of these crashes. After all,
you have to have assets in the first place in
order to lose them. But the prime minister
woke me from my protracted, work-shy
kip the other morning, barking from the
STUFF I RECKON IS QUITE GOOD THIS WEEK
THE RADIO
STATION
Nuwave
radio.com
Still listening to
your music on the
radio like you were a character h t iin Last L tOf Of
The Summer Wine? Log on to Nu Wave
Radio instead and see how nice the
hip-hop and soul music feels in your
shrivelled ears.
SAM DELANEY
WANTS ANSWERS
The writer and broadcaster takes on the world every week… and occasionally wins
If we do sink into the worst depression
since the 1930s then I am ready. I’ve
seen The Waltons, I know what to expect
“This, of course,
demonstrates the capitalistic
nature of the garden mole”
THE BLOG
Stuffwhite
peoplelike.
wordpress.com
Farmers markets,
expensive
sandwiches, making
people feel bad about
not going outside… this is the stuff white
people like, as meticulously explained in
a blog so funny you’ll puke.
clock radio about the impact this whole
fiasco might have on “ordinary people”.
What does he actually mean? Is
someone from the bank going to come
round and repossess the Lady Hilary pig
I received once my savings reached the
50-quid mark in 1996? Well, they can
bloody well try it. But I tell you now –
they’ll have to prize that beautiful, busty,
hand-painted pig from my cold, dead
hands before I’ll give it up to those
penny-pinching suits. Why should I have
to pay for their mistakes? If we really do
sink into the worst depression since the
Thirties then I, for one, am ready. I’ve
seen The Waltons – I know what to
expect. I reckon I’d look dead nice in
a pair of ragged dungarees.
“Seriously, you owe
me 1p change”
DAILY DAILY DELANEY
DE DELANEY
AT AT SHORTLIST.COM
SHORTLIST.COM
CURRENTLY LIVE ON
The only way to
deal with a grizzly
A recent spate of grizzly-bear
attacks in Macedonia have
sparked a nationwide controversy.
The bears have been raiding
villages for honey, destroying
bee hives, scaring villagers and
ruining businesses.
But these days, bears are
a government-protected species
so all the aggrieved villagers can
do is take the bears to court. Once
there, prosecution lawyers would
doubtless eat them for breakfast:
“Is it not true, Mr Bear, that on 28
March you arrived in the village of
Bears are protected,
so villagers have to
take them to court
Apidija and proceeded to run
amok, growling menacingly,
swiping your giant paws at
passers-by and demanding access
to their honey supplies? And, when
they refused to comply with your
unreasonable and aggressive
demands, took it upon yourself to
steal said honey, licking out a hive
with such relentless greed that
your entire head eventually became
stuck inside, causing you to charge
blindly into the woods howling
with rage and confusion?”
The best any bear could do
would be to plead insanity and hope
for a cushy stint in the Macedonian
Institute For Demented Wildlife.
“Nice costume
Dave. Dave?”
PHOTOGRAPHS: ALAMY, GETTY IMAGES
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