Heavy sigh.

[Sweder]

Refreshing and slightly pleasing to see/ hear Starbucks getting a kicking. I only wish it were McDonalds, the real terrorists in the war against the last vesiges of urban individuality. But it's a good start.

Aside from maintaining a proudly independant (and still, based on last nights extensive field test with SP & Cap'n Tom, excellent) brewery Lewes is holding out against the commercial tide. We've lost a few battles; Costa Coffee, Pizza Express, Prezzo and Cafe Nero have all planted their synthetic flags in the high street. But we resolutely refuse to let the urine-yellow arches cast their oderous stain on the castle walls; it's one of those things that makes me proud of my fellow Lewesians.

There are evil plans afoot to build some form of monstrous shopping arcade on the site of the old brewery out-buildings. The wailing and gnashing of well-enamelled teeth is rising to a crescendo but I sense the Fear on this one. Money talks; the developers are cruising through town waving shiny baubles in the direction of the elders. We're a bolshy lot, hunkered down in our hill-clasped utopia, as the corporate toads at Green King found to their cost. Our MP is Norman baker, the lib dem ostracised by fellow Westminster greedheads for his call for transparency on members' expenses. If it's a fight you want in Lewes best bring rusty blades and hungry dogs.

It will get ugly; blood, and many pints of Harvey's, will flow.