50 or so things we love about Birmingham

To set some balance, another Twitter thing, where people are challenged to post a thing one ‘loves’ for each like a post can get. We could have gone on, but no-one liked it.

50+ things we love about Birmingham

  1. 1. The fact that the stone with the architects name on the Town Hall has it wrong.
  2. 2. The flow of people through Digbeth, stopping traffic, after Blues home win.
  3. 3. The way people love the eleven routes unironically and that no-one has yet found a way to commercialise this.
  4. 5. The patterns that spaghetti junction makes, from above or below.
  5. 6. How no-one in town agrees which area things are really in.
  6. 8. That Brum’s Victoria Sq Xmas tree is always sponsored by a Scandinavian company who can’t get any value from it.
  7. 9. That heavy metal refuses to die, existing in the cracks in our concrete.
  8. 10. That you can count the number of people who give a fuck about Michelin stars on the number that the city has.
  9. 11. That people proudly refuse to drop
    the definite article in “the bull ring”. Hang the branders.
  10. 12. That still no-one knows which one the Pavillons was.
  11. 14. That it’s always Rackhams, never House of Fraser
  12. 15. At all times there is always one Brummie searching for King Kong. Sometimes they’re even in Penrith, where his is.
  13. 17. “Magic hour” light in Perry Barr. Honestly, the BCU campus from Perry Hall Park just glows.
  14. 18. The cross city line driver who says “Doodles Town” when he announces Duddeston
  15. 21. The gas towers of Saltley, seen when you’re driving in from the north.
  16. 22. That they spent years returning Digbeth coach station to leave it pretty much the same (don’t mess with perfection).
  17. 24. That Gurchran Mall will turn up with his dhol at the opening of a letter.
  18. 25. The small band of Mail Facebook commenters that cry “what’s this got to do with Birmingham?” on the ‘viral’ stories from TM network.
  19. 28. Summer 98 (pt 2) – Boris Yeltsin went for a vodka at the Trocadero, but forgot to invite the press.
  20. 29. We will cling on to the metrics that show we are the second city not Manchester.

    Even if no-one else will.

  21. 30. Stirchley: not a lot of what you do makes any real sense, but somehow it works, so keep doing it
  22. 31. That this image happened here. That it’s now a Billy Bragg single. https://t.co/mZimKjOSmC

    31. That this image happened here. That it’s now a Billy Bragg single. pic.twitter.com/mZimKjOSmC
  23. 32. That everyone says how much they hate the German Market. But somehow it’s always full of people.
  24. 34. This novel all about bringing the SuperPrix back – Monaco of The Midlands: by Alex Dennistoun  http://amzn.to/2gjNKcc 
  25. 35. That you faved the ‘unpopular opinions’ one much more heavily than this one. You lovely cynical bastards.
  26. 37. That Laurence Inman protects the authorship of his ‘born within the sound of someone moaning’ gag in the manner of Sisyphus.
  27. 38. We love signing petitions about “threats” to Moseley’s Prince of Wales.
  28. 39. Getting pissed cheaply and convivially in the club at Moor Green Allotments.
  29. 40. That photo of Public Enemy on the bridge by the red cage. https://t.co/1zf4crl3BM

    40. That photo of Public Enemy on the bridge by the red cage. pic.twitter.com/1zf4crl3BM
  30. 41. The Streets, even though he denies us as surely as Peter denied Christ.
  31. 42. That ‘where’s the Capita contract?’ is always the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything in gag terms.

    Btw check out @btlpodcast

  32. 43. That you've now passed favs of the 'unpopular' thread, and that it's mostly out of spite for no. 35.

& Cliff's Eternal Flame. https://t.co/6sDHjAITuD

    43. That you’ve now passed favs of the ‘unpopular’ thread, and that it’s mostly out of spite for no. 35.

    & Cliff’s Eternal Flame. pic.twitter.com/6sDHjAITuD

  33. 44. We love the story of how David Unsworth’s wife made him cancel his Villa contract because she didn’t want to come to Birmingham.
  34. 47. The ‘video’ for Tizwas’s Bucket of Water Song… filmed around the war memorial in centenary square.
  35. 48. That the people of Stirchley fought so hard to keep a bowling alley. Maybe they’d left their shoes in there.
  36. 50. David Harewood’s thespian accent when doing promos about how much he loves Brum.
  37. 51. The JRR Tolkien Calendar 1974 (but not any of the turgid novels he wrote) https://t.co/llw27rWPmf

    51. The JRR Tolkien Calendar 1974 (but not any of the turgid novels he wrote) pic.twitter.com/llw27rWPmf

Author: Jon Bounds

Jon was voted the ‘14th Most Influential Person in the West Midlands’ in 2008. Subsequently he has not been placed. He’s been a football referee, venetian blind maker, cellar man, and a losing Labour council candidate: “No, no chance. A complete no-hoper” said a spoilt ballot. Jon wrote and directed the first ever piece of drama performed on Twitter when he persuaded a cast including MPs and journalists to give over their timelines to perform Twitpanto. But all that is behind him.