Blame Whitehaven.

Workington made the steel rails that held half the world's railways together. Then the steelworks shut, and the point of the place went with it. What's left is pubs, bookies and Greggs, and more of each per head than most towns in England. Three Greggs. That's nearly five times the typical town's ration of sausage rolls.

And it pisses down. There's rain on 160 days a year, against 125 in the typical town, and 1,066 mm of it lands, getting on for half as much again. It comes in sideways off the Solway and straight down Pow Street, and the only places to get out of it are a bookies or a Greggs. Nothing makes a town more fucking miserable than a wet Tuesday with the shutters down, and Workington gets a lot of wet Tuesdays.

The vandals work harder than the steelworks ever did. Criminal damage sits at twice the typical town's rate, and the violence and the public order figures aren't far behind. The air, mind, is about as clean as you'll find anywhere. There's nothing left to pollute it.

Whitehaven people are Jam Eaters. Ask Whitehaven and it's Workington people who are the Jam Eaters. Nobody on either side can tell you what it means, and nobody's backing down. Once a year the town plays Uppies and Downies, a football match with no pitch, half the town in the scrum and the ball usually in the river. It's the only thing here that's ever on time.

The editor, who got called a Jam Eater