Ipswich
I was born and raised in Colchester but after various moves have ended up in Ipswich for the last 8 odd years.

The thing is, I don't seem to be able to get back out! I've tried selling up and moving a couple of times but each time it's fallen through. I think it's a secret plot to keep my genes in their pool. And god knows they need them.

In those 8 years I've had my car broken in to five times, the last time they tried to steal it and wrote it off. I've had a walk-in burglar (who I luckily disturbed thanks to my cats. An answer for another QOTW) and not that long ago caught some guy pissing in my back garden, pissed off his tits, at 6:30am.

After the pissing guy, I decided to replace my back garden fence and gate with a taller, more secure one. I left parts of the old fence on my driveway, waiting for a couple of dry days to take them up the tip. Someone flipping pinched them. I know it saves me a job, but still...

And I, apparently, live in a nice area!

And Ipswich men are so hard to get along with! Every single conversation I have with a newly met bloke goes like this:

Him: So do you support 'The Town' then?
Me: I don't really follow football to be honest. I grew up with Colchester Utd as my home team so I lost interest in football at an early age. (I always tag on this last part to stop them questioning my sexuality with the power of humour!)
Him: Hur, hur, hur. Oh. (They don't know what to do if you can't talk 'The Town'). So did you go to school here?
Me: No. I went to the Gilberd in Colchester. (You would have thought they'd got that from the Colchester UTD comment).
Him: Oh. *Looks around desperately for someone more local.

Every single conversation.

I kind of feel it's my fault really, that maybe I should follow at least one team just so I can make conversation (and maybe a friend) with a man. As it is, I've got several female friends and one lone male friend (who also doesn't like football! No, he's not gay either. Nor from Ipswich).

Please let me get back to Colchester. Please.

On another note, Solihull. Surprisingly nice place despite the name.
(Big Smurf Brush me daddy-O, Mon 2 Nov 2009, 19:57, 9 replies)

Solihull
was of vast surprise to me. I expected it to be a dump and was pleasantly mistaken.
(berk, Mon 2 Nov 2009, 21:03, closed)

Me too!
I was a trainee pub manager in the Birmingham triangle. A nice little village called Berkswell, somewhere between Coventry, Birmingham and Nuneaton.

I was trying to find a good pharmacist after a Coventry based one told me I had 'foot and mouth'. The Solihull pharmacist reassured me it was Contact Eczema as I didn't have cloven hooves.

I'd always imagined Solihull to be a smoggy, industrial town. But as you know, it's actually quite clean!
(Big Smurf Brush me daddy-O, Mon 2 Nov 2009, 21:34, closed)

Interesting!
I too was born as raised in Colchester - and have posted about the place this week.

Yep, Ipswich is shite, so much so that killing prostitutes remains a frequent passtime.
(Bicycle Repairman "you're also a bit of a wanker", Mon 2 Nov 2009, 22:01, closed)

You were my inspiration...
(and Mrs Liveinbin) because the inbreds are slightly too proud of their dog shit laden, family-fuckin'*, crime-ridden town. And if they ever found out my real name and address, I am quite confident I would find 'Immigrant' or 'B3TAgrant' spray-painted across my front door.

And I still don't think they got the right person for the 'Ipswich Strangler'. I worked for the Suffolk Constabularly for a while and they got him waaaaay to quickly for a police force who concentrate on people peeing in doorways and livestock loose on public highways.

At least in Colchester all I had to do was avoid a squaddie or two. Now I have to avoid "We're not related, let's procreate"!

* Ipswich is bad for this, but Bury St. Edmunds is worse.
(Big Smurf Brush me daddy-O, Mon 2 Nov 2009, 22:22, closed)

Ipshit
True about BSE (always thought the acronym for Bury was particularly appropriate) - when I lived in Ipswich, a mate who lived in Bury used to come over to us for the nightlife. There wasn't any, but it was still better than BSE. Apparently everyone who worked in BSE lived in the villages around it, so come five o'clock they'd all feck off out of it, leaving the town to the dolies and inbreds that made up the population. Brrrrr....
(redexile, Wed 4 Nov 2009, 9:15, closed)

Oh
Look at me doing something.
*prouds*
( Mrs Entity is in hiding., Wed 4 Nov 2009, 21:15, closed)

Colchester AND Gilberd school....
SNAP!

Is the only club there still Hollywoods, or Cartouche as it was last time i was there years ago?
(radio_shak has questions, got answers, on, Tue 3 Nov 2009, 0:26, closed)

It got closed down
After someone was shot in there! There are a couple of other clubs now, but they are most definitely to be avoided!
(Big Smurf Brush me daddy-O, Tue 3 Nov 2009, 17:58, closed)

Ipsquits
That sounds EXACTLY how I remember the place. For the first 18 months, I didn't get to know anyone except people I worked with, despite being fairly gregarious (or a piss-artist, as I believe it's more correctly known). Eventually acquired a gf who was a local (I worked with her, needless to say), which helped considerably - still in touch with a few people I got to know from there, but, interestingly, none were originally from Ipswich, and none of them live there any more. As far as I can tell, everyone I knew in the place has either left it or died. Does it still have a major skag problem? Certainly, finding the 4-week old corpses of junkies in Piper's Court used to be a regular occurrence in my day. Lived there for a year or so - we were the only people in the place who weren't whores or junkies or both.
(redexile, Wed 4 Nov 2009, 9:23, closed)