Wells:Watchet Twinning Initiative

Wells - enter at your peril...

The City of Wells has launched a crusade in which it will try to have itself twinned with Watchet. In pursuance of this aim certain practices are being undertaken in the borough, designed to repel and alienate visitors. As a result of these I have been obliged to write a letter of complaint to the Lord Bishop concerning the shoddy treatment meted out to me by his underlings on Wednesday. I reprint part of my letter here and need comment no further upon the ugly incident which goaded me to write it.



"Yesterday I visited Wells Cathedral with my husband and we found it very unkind. The Women's Institute Carol Service was in progress and we were directed to sit in one of the rows of seats. Doing so would have involved inconveniencing a number of people already seated, and as we were only able to stay for a short while we said we would rather sit at the back on a bit of stonework which had been put there for the purpose by the builders of the Cathedral 800 years before. This we were told was forbidden. The officials were resolute, so we left, saddened. One of them said it was because of Health and Safety, but there are ways of saying these sorts of thing pleasantly and with a hint of apology that softens them and turns away wrath. Such ways were not in operation at Wells yesterday.

I would point out that I play the hymns every Sunday at Oare in the county of Somerset, and the Revd Colin Burke shall hear of this. You might advise your ladies that it is not expedient to antagonise village organists because they are in short supply."


 

 

 




Visiting violinist forced to play in
inferior busking zone in Wells

Furthermore,


i) a twopenny piece which 'Trenchcoat Man' keeps in a crevice in the stonework at Wells, has been stolen; 

ii) one of their indigenous buskers occupied for hours the prime spot beside the marketplace, depriving Our Boy of considerable income that he would have generated by playing his violin there;

iii) the WI ladies used up all the parking spaces;  

iv) the prices in the charity shops have been embellished so that overcoats are now retailing at £30 to £60 - even moth-eaten ones;

and

v) the seriousness with which they take the campaign of insolence can not be doubted when one sees that they have despoiled the Cathedral Green with this Yuletide Eyesore:
 

 

 

 

 

 

I think the people of Wells have made their intentions clear. They have allied themselves handsomely with Watchet, and their ambitions of a union with those barbarians seem likely to be satisfied very shortly.

 

However... I have some experience of the inhabitants of Watchet and I can warn Wells that it will RUE THE DAY.