Wherein James Kerr of Trent Radio demonstrates the silliness that could happen on the radio.
Some of you may have seen this high-jumping web-head “Spider-man” slinging his goop all over the Market Hall’s clock tower last Saturday, October 18. Some of you might even have thought, in the misguided gaze of the public education system, that his battle with Doctor Octopus was ‘exciting’ or, worse – ‘saved the city’.
Earnest Estford, the Market Hall restoration historian has a very different take on these events. “There’s some major damage to the surface of the (Market Hall) clock tower,” he lamented to the Bugle, hat in hand. “The clock has stopped ticking. Doctor Octopus’ tentacles did horrible damage to the surrounding structure, but it was Spider-man’s right haymaker that knocked off the latticework.”
Major structural damage, just on a whim for ‘old Spidey, who cares little for all the hard-working, working-class working people who are working every working-day of their work-lives while he goes off gallivanting. It’s the not-for-profits and the taxpayers that have to pay for Spider-man’s folly, not Spider-man.
But surely a little structural damage is enough to pay for saving the city? That is, if the city really was in danger! Regular readers of the Daily Bugle may remember that in July the City of Peterborough released a warning to swimmers and canoeists in the Peterborough area because of a large river octopus sighted near Inverlea Park.
Suspected of coming in on a yacht touring the locks, the apparently fresh-water octopus eluded capture for months, eating—according to the Ministry of Natural Resources, “mostly carp and zebra muscles”, invasive species themselves. Even Peterborough’s own Peterborough’s Public Aquatic Invasion Officer agreed that this “Otonabee Kraken” posed no immediate threat.
A harmless octopus, helping balance the local environment—saving the Otonabee from a far worse threat!
Regular and recent Bugle readers will know that this “Otonabee Kraken” turned out to be Dr. Otto Octavius, a.k.a. “Doctor Octopus”, recovering from his most recent beating at the bloody red hands of Spider-Menace.
I ask you, what’s so wrong about an eccentric University Professor sitting at the bottom of Little Lake eating zebra muscles? I’m sure there’s more than a few at Trent University! Are we going to beat them all up with Spider-fists? Is that what academic criticism has come to?
At best Spider-man is simply a menace, leaving corrosive web toxins dangling from gargoyles all around Peterborough just because he can’t be bothered to take the bus. At worst he’s a threat to all of us, polluting our society with his sloppy vigilantism.
Other ill-informed news sources may tell you this was all a hoax perpetrated by students as part of “Trent U @ 50” debauchery. To them I say: Baby, You’re no Bugle.
And to Spider-man I say: If you were an employee paying taxes and accountable for your actions during “Trent U @ 50” on Saturday, you’d be FIRED!
(This is the kind of stuff we do on the radio.)