There's a town very close to me, called Ashton-under-Lyne, and I hate it. In fairness, it's got a couple of bloody good markets, and it's a perfectly pleasant little market-town. Every time I go there, though, it's like Invasion from the Valley of the Dwarven Fuckwits.

  Now, I'm not exactly a giant - I'm not small, considering I'm somewhere between 6'2 and 6'4 (around 180-190cm, for our metric colleagues) but whenever I go into Ashton, I know how Gulliver felt, visiting Lilliput. Walking through the "shopping centre" (not quite four shops and a cafe, but not far from it either) I'm head and shoulders above a good 99% of the population. Kind of weird, knowing that I stand out that much - but even weirder, realising how many bloody short people live in one town, and seem to stay there. I sometimes wonder if I've missed the height-bar, similar to the ones by Rollercoasters, only this one says "you can only visit this attraction if you're under 5'8"" - but if that sign exists, well, I've missed it every time I go into Ashton.

  In fairness, Ashton's not too bad - so long as I get in before about 10am, before the Dwarves are out of bed, and the Pixies haven't shaken the sleepy-dust from their eyes. Much past that time, and the little fuckers are everywhere, and Ashton becomes a place where only psychotics and retards can get through the crowd. I don't know what causes it, but the entire town seems to be short on brains, as well as on legs. I've never seen a place before where the entire populace moves so slowly, with what appears to be no conscious process, but Ashton's managed it.

  So if you get into town past about 11am, you've got to be prepared to face the land of the munchkins, with them milling around mindlessly, wavering off at random, stopping to talk to relatives or friends in the middle of walkways/doorways/gangways. Ashton, twinned with Oz. Dorothy should have visited Ashton as a practice run - OK, no Wicked Witch of the West, but definitely munchkins and (probably) a flying monkeys or two. But the only ruby slippers in evidence would have pink marabou fur around the edges, or would be made by Nike or Reebok.

  Of course, if I had half a braincell, I'd avoid Ashton like the plague - but sometimes I do need to go in, to sort out stuff that (amazing as it may seem) I can't do in the city centre. If I had even quarter of a braincell, I'd sort my life and clock out enough that I didn't go in after about 11am (well, didn't go in after 9.00am, so I can be in and out before 11am) but of course I'm not that smart, so I always seem to end up sharing my space with fuckwit dwarves from planet Ashton.