Richard Baum

As if by some magical force, Mother Nature has once again shown that she’s a Lib Dem voter by turning the sky blue as the campaign kicks off properly.

Last year, all of April was bathed in sunshine as we spent countless hours outside leafleting and canvassing. Recently the weather has been a bit touch-and-go, with bucketfuls of rain pelting me at alarmingly frequent intervals. But today the sky has cleared as if Nature herself was beckoning me with a seductive finger and whispering “Go forth and accumulate votes” into my quivering ear.

Global warming may spell trouble for low-lying Pacific islands, but for Prestwich Liberal Democrats, the unseasonal April warmth has its advantages.

Unfortunately for us of course, the sky is equally blue for the other parties. So I console myself with the fact that our arguments are better, our policies are stronger, and our record of hard work more impressive than either of them. Having the winning ideas is always a useful back-up plan to the weather.

Yesterday I went out leafleting in Rainsough. I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to the three houses on Rainsough Avenue who didn’t receive a leaflet, after I fled from the scene pursued by a dog that I thought at first glance was a runaway buffalo. It really was one of the largest and most aggressive dogs I’d ever seen, and I really didn’t appreciate either its growling, or the fact that it could’ve ripped my head from my shoulders with a single bite.

It’s not that I’m scared of dogs. I have grown to quite like the inquisitive ones that come and sniff my shoes as I walk down their driveway. There’s even a sense of satisfaction in hearing the snarly ones rip up my just-delivered Focus just inches away through the front door. At least one member of the family has shown an interest.

It’s the mad ones prowling gardens that I don’t like. Almost always black and brown, normally sized somewhere between “foal” and “yacht,” and easily capable of snapping my spine in half. Yesterday’s was a prime example. I’d not seen it before, which is a novelty because I know pretty much every dog in the ward now. But it was pacing the garden and growling at things, as if bitter that the job it was born for (guard dog on the Berlin Wall) had been cruelly snatched away. When it saw me it barked so loudly that I thought there’d been a gas explosion.

It was so big, and clearly capable of leaping the flimsy fence separating its mighty jaws from my flimsy flesh, that not only didn’t I venture into its garden, but I left out the ones either side too.

So, that’s why three houses didn’t get their leaflets. And I feel vindicated, because, here I am, alive. And ready for more today. Hooray.

Rick