Dear God, will the Magic never end?

Elder Gull (who, unique among Brighton gulls, can read newspapers as well as pick those choice little still-warm chips out of them) has come across a warning of yet another Arty Farty Festival planned for this quaint little burg by the sea. Yet another market, with stalls, stallholders, trestle tables bearing squidloads of said Art, but few serious buyers.

It's another demonstration, according to the blurb which EG read with many a sigh, of the Art and Craft, Leisure and Recreation focus of New Brighton. As Sister Tui Gull says (in print, on big Wellington billboards) "Yeah, right". This riff is straight out of the Revitalisation plan, and places the cart squarely in front of the horse. Real artists follow patronage, money, and their own insistent inner impulse to create, sometimes simultaneously. They sure as heck don't follow Central Planning Committees.

And to cap it all off, another day with "country, pirate and gospel" music. From some of the usual suspects, of course.

Dear God, will this natural magic never end?

Yes, young gulls, one day it will. When there are a serious number of residents, in close proximity to a natural gathering-place, with serious discretionary cash jingling in their pockets, and with cosmopolitan artistic tastes. We, the red-footed gullz, will know when that day arrives - we'll hear some seriously varied music from (gasp) Outsiders! We'll feast on some actual Discarded Cuisine, not burgers and chips. We'll peer enviously through the windows of a niche bookshop, rather than peek at those stupid kids snorting laughing gas. That's when we will know Revitalisation has occurred.