Quad Pro Quo?

Just to prove I can speakus Latinus, just like our local biblio-bloke, my headline's a reminder that quad bikes and assorted other crotch rockets will be whizzing all over Margate Sands for the next two days (click on the pic for details).

That's if they can see the beach for the smoke, as I gather another former hotel that was being converted into apartments went up in flames in Cliftonville this morning.

Carousing with the Margate millionaires last night, the consensus was that the Arsonists' Playground would be better served for publicity and visitors if one of its many teenage mothers gave birth to quads. But that's just an opinion. To be honest the Westcoast bar was kicking, and later in the evening punters spilled out from the Mike and Bernie Winter Gardens having spent a splendid two hours in the company of my old showbiz chum Dara O'Briain. Yes, the Turnip does look like a multi storey car park, but I gather our Frank has bought up most of the property opposite and plans to put a classy establishment in, along the lines of his, er, fashionable Digby and Fayreness gastro pubs. Whether the chattering classes who visit the gallery will be satisfied with chicken in a basket remains to be seen.

Meanwhile I see Communities Secretary John Denham has urged poor old Redcar, which has just had the guts ripped out of it by Corus, to model itself on Margate by building an arts centre and painting murals on all the shop fronts. So at least Margate can look forward to Redcar overtaking it as the emptiest high street in Britain!

Click here to read about John Denham in the Northern Echo