The Banksy Balls effect

Despite my, quite frankly, show stopping appearance in – arguably the best book ever – that critically acclaimed seminal work Home Sweet Home by Steve Wright, published by Tangent Books and available here and in all good book shops, I can report that the Banksy vs Bristol Museum exhibition has had absolutely no effect whatsoever on visitor numbers to this site.

The Bristol Blogger’s team of financial CONsultants Tellem Watt-Hay Warner Hare say, “In technical economic terms, the ‘Banksy effect’ for this blog can be best described as fuck all. Can we have our cheque now?”

BANKSY BALLS: what they said:

Jan Ormondroyd, bureaucrat and coffee aficionado: “My brilliant plan to end the recession by selling cappuccinos to art lovers has been a total success. I now propose the city starts spending on cream teas and sticky buns. If we all remember to have two scones instead of one and order extra jam the recession will be over by Christmas. Have the organic, Fair Trade option and it’ll be over by November.”

Stephen Wray, economic guru: “This just goes to prove that if people take their laptops down the Watershed to Twitter on Facebook about the World Cup in 2018 it could be worth £10 billion to the city’s economy by the end of next week, isn’t that right Mr Lansdown, sir?”

Paul Barnett, Acting Head of Museums: “I saw the back of that Bristol Blogger’s head once.”

Sid and Doris Bonkers from Sea Mills: “We queued for 87 hours in the pouring rain to see the Banksy exhibition. We got beaten up twice by drunks, shot at by Yardies, the baby got struck by lightning and poor old Grandma Bonkers dropped dead from exhaustion after 14 hours, but we had to laugh – after just two days there – when that Dr Jan Rogers, Jon Ormondroyd and load of people with laptops, strange haircuts and copies of Wired magazine wafted straight past us in the queue to get in to a special Champagne reception.”

********** STOP PRESS **********

Council to build lift to heaven

In a radical proposal, the Blogger learns the council is proposing to build a lift from the Trenchard Street car park directly to heaven.

Cabinet Member Dr Jon Rogers said: “Art’s the name of the game these days so I’ve instructed my officers to get on their bikes, out of the box and start asking themselves what would Andy Warhol do?

“So yes it’s true, my officer team are indeed currently working on a feasibility study to build a lift from the Trenchard Street Car Park all the way up to heaven so visitors to the city can meet God.

“With the experience we’ve gained from the Bansky vs Bristol Museum exhibition we believe we can keep the queues at this innovative new visitor attraction down to a waiting time of around 30 days and 30 nights.

“To maximise income generation opportunities, at the bottom of the lift we’ll be installing the first in a new franchise – the ‘Jan Ormondroyd’s Coffee Heaven’ concept – and we’re proposing that the ground floor of the car park become a pervasive socially digital interactive wi-fi laptop media zone with secure bike parking and a strict anti-homophobic bullying policy where visitors will be able to Twitter their experiences of meeting God here in Bristol directly to the wider world.”

Council economics guru, Stephen Wray said: “the economic effect of an organised mass holy experience in the Trenchard Street Car Park could be of biblical proportions and are incalculable even for a financial genius such as myself. But we’ll make about £100m.”

Jan Ormondroyd told us, “This is an opportunity to grab a big slice of the “Papal pound” cake (served with a large coffee hopefully!) and create a visitor attraction that has potential gains in terms of the city’s reputational place marketing self image uplift strategy. There’s no reason why the Trenchard Street Car Park can’t be right up there with other global religious attractions like Lourdes, Mecca, the Vatican and Disneyland.”

Council Cabinet Member with responsibility for climate change Gary Hopkins said: “The climate change impact of this proposal is neglible because we’ll publish a glossy recyclable leaflet that says so.”