Issue 25

A Word from Our Leader Although the month is the May edition of The Jungle Telegraph, I think the best news came this week on June 4th, when the unions voted not to strike – common sense prevailed. During the month of May our fortunes have been mixed with the production levels being met and in fact clawing some of the lost bricks back, but with the price of gas and electric going through the roof it nullified the good work we had done. Sales are up and down and the recent news from house builders doesn’t paint a rosy picture, but there is some signs that merchants are slowly picking up which of course is good news for us. The new factory project has now been passed by the secretary of state and the deal has been done with the farmer, so all boxes have been ticked at this end. The state of play at the moment is that the Capital Paper is being re-written to submit to Heidelberg for there approval. The plans have not been scrapped! Good news at the works, Big Nick Hunter has got his certificate and tankard from the ICTA 1of7

for passing the foundation exam, well done to him. Finally the moment we have all been waiting for, Billy has finally got the “Wonderbike” RC8 ICTM, and it’s called “Wonderbike” because of the amount of time he’s been wondering where it is

Interview With Lee Hi my names Lee Ruecroft and I am both the strongest person at Swillington and the best looking bloke here, I was born and raised in the city of Leeds and came to work at Swillington after a superb interview with Mr Lardner in 2005. In the 3 years I have worked at Swillington the main thing I have noticed is that one of our forklift drivers seems to be getting balder, I mean bolder and health and safety has got stricter and Bob Jolley has got rounder. Before I worked at Swillington I used to be a glass collector, I then had a brief stint working on the switchboard at the Samaritans which is how I got to know some of the guys who work here and finally I had another stint as an Airconditioning Fitter working as a custom welder and fabricator.

I think my best memories of working at Swillington centre around the Yuletide season when we all go out partying and all the pranks that are played… Dan, you old cuss, you've just got to forgive me for that little prank I played on you. If I had known you were goosey, I'd have never done it. It would have been a lot worse if that fat lady hadn't been standing right under the window you jumped through. She really broke your fall a lot. People have been killed falling three stories. Rich, I regret telling the fireman it was you who turned in the false alarm. But, of course, I had no way of knowing they would make such a bad report of it. Those fire hoses sure have a lot of pressure don't they? And the water is cold!! Rico, I know how you must feel about me. Opening the door to the broom closet suddenly must have startled you and Millie quite badly, and to think how hard you bumped your chin on the shelf when you bent over to pull up your pants, it makes me sick. We'll have to get together for dinner some night after the dentist finishes your plates. Andy, the only excuse I can offer for stealing all your clothes and hiding them when I found you passed out in the mens room, is that I was drunk. Also, I want you to know I was very embarrassed when I couldn't remember where I hid them and you had to go home in that old sofa cover. Running your falsies up the flag pole was a bit too much, but like I said, I was a little drunk. I think like many before have said, the saddest time here at Swillington has got to be the death of Geoff Whiteley, he was a really funny guy. My best mate here at Swilly has got to be Rico, he has taught me tons of stuff over the few 2of7

years I have been here and he also has a rather nice tash, but I think really everyone loves me here hahaha. My foreman here is Darren Bell, I first remember seeing him when I was a kid, he was shy and spotty in them days and used to sit in the corner of the club, fidgit and play footsies under the table. He’s a good bloke really and quite funny sometimes… but also a bit strange. If I won the lottery tomorrow, I might not work here anymore but I would still have a job, I think I would probably open a gym somewhere nice. Life after death, I dunno… I hope there is one though. My nickname is Flea, well that’s my proper nickname which I had for years until I came here, I don’t know why or where it came from but now I am here its “Baby Beast”, “Barry” or “Rideon” My favourite singer has got to be Celine Dion, that song “My Heart Will Go On” makes me cry, the first time I heard it at the cinema watching Titanic I was inconsolable. I often lock all the doors in my bedroom and gently dance on my own to the above song and “The Power Of Love” plus many of her other love songs, I also like being down at the gymn pumping Iron to her wonderful tracks on my walkman. My hobbies include playing for Swillington Rugby team and of course lifting massive weights down at the gym, the other week I managed to lift the equivalent of nearly one Bob Jolley! I am not married and have no kids but I love my dad Sean who works at the other end of the factory, he is a real role model for me. I myself am No1 Dehacker operator here and I am learning a bit about operating the kiln, well I say that but “Belly” hardly ever puts me on there. Eddie and Nick have joined my gym because I am there hero and don’t change anything I have said like you do to everyone else okay…

A Word By Daniel We would like to start this weeks news letter by saying a big congratulations for not using the wrong fuel this month and sympathy for Daz on his recent bit of bad luck. First getting conned in the purchase of some goods and also for being so stupid and buying a Juniors Sailormade Golf Bag, but then this is Dodgy Daz. The third item in his string of bad luck is getting turned down after preposing to his missus Jilly. We now have the date when Mr Cobblepot goes under the knife this will take place as soon as the recent disaster in china is over and has left us with a Rhino and an Elephant to choose our replacement hip from. Now coming out of the office we move more into the yard where our spies inform us that there is an epidemic going on which some say 3of7

is a result of stress and our lads are loosing their hair. Last week a few of us actually mistook Gaz “Nose” Smith for Neil “Claude Greengrass” Chamberlain or Charlie, but there is help out there if needed at http://www.wigshop.com

We quickly move back inside to the de-hacker where our man “Riddion” who is this weeks interviewee tried to lay the low down at the gym however it turned out that Mr Muscles had to be bailed out by Mr Universe (aka Dougie) because he couldn’t lift the weights. We nearly had a tragedy when Rico was sleep walking the other day with a razor in his hands, but its okay lads the porno tash survived. Big Kev has returned from the rain forests in Brazil where he lost a bit of his tan, we didn’t tell him that the sun beds were useless. As we tell this tale we must mention that these last few weeks have reminded us of an old friend that

we miss dearly, yes Sue because the Sausages are just as bad now as they were when she was here.

Gossip Dave “Gandalf The Grey” Zinis’s 4x4 failed its MOT during the month of May, he was a bit upset because he had to spend some money on it, he confided (mistakenly in the editor) that his tyres had not much tread, the brake disks on his back wheels were worn, the handbrake had no adjustment left and there was a big gaping hole in the floor which he used to keep his feet cool Darren “Father” Bell got a bit upset after getting beaten by Big Bob “Mr Blobby” Jolley at Golf, Darren who was once right into The Ninja Turtles in his younger days was reported to be suffering a right tantrum, throwing his clubs about and swearing and cursing excuses before handing over the promised ten pounds On the subject of Golf, our leader and the works manager Mick “Dolph” Lardner has just purchased a new ten wood and swears it sends his ball 300 yards further than his driver. On a better note Swillington Pool team which Darren is the captain social beat Garforth to get into the final and when asked for comments Darren said “the boys are back in town” Steve “Oswald” Todd has confessed to getting a semi on when the new cleaning lady comes to wipe his desk, he says she has a gorgeous figure and you can see her black tights… Okay enough Steve Lee has come up with a great suggestion for the works, he says since he believes he is the strongest man here that we could have an arm wrestling knockout which he would be certain to win Gary “Rubber” Robinson who this month accidentally swallowed a moth told me two 4of7

jokes to put in this issue of The Jungle Telegraph, he said he bought his girlfriend a car but it was too slow so instead he bought her some bathroom scales, I didn’t get it though? On a sad note, Daniel “The Pop star”’s band has now split up, apparently Daniel our Quality Inspector who visits every few months says that their singer got delusions of grandeur, the drummer got fed up and he was left on his own on base.

There were in last month a few complaints from readers who were pictured in some shots wearing “Leeds Rhinos” shirts, well apparently I got the wrong team, it should have been Castleford Tigers. One person got so would up about it I was threatened with legal action unless I wrote an apology in the next issue or instead put Don “Blade” Fox in a Rhinos shirt instead All the office personnel except the poor lad on despatch have now attended the companies latest team building exercise at Howley Park where it was reported by Mick “Alf” Brayford that they actually play with them pre-school building blocks with letters etched on them, designing bridges and other artefacts, he added it was “great fun” With our yard once again approaching the 18½ million bricks mark people were suggesting places to store the extra bricks we aren’t selling someone suggested that they could be placed at the side of the runway at Leeds/Bradford Airport another suggested the Moon but with the cost of diesel being what it is the last suggestion seems prohibitively expensive. Darren “Father” Bell who is upset about me keep pinching his printer has been having problems with his car alarm keep going off for no apparent reason, it was suggested that he let our electrician Dave “Gandalf” Zinis have a

look at it but this was rejected because Darren thought he would then have far more than his car alarm to worry about. This week as I write this our Assistant manager is on a Ocean liner somewhere in the Mediterranean for his holidays, the nearest I got to a cruise on my recent spring bank break was cruising across our local canal on a huge slab of polystyrene with my dogs and my son Luke

The Three Peaks

The only person to drop out after the first summit, Pen-y-ghent was Hazel which was devastating for me who was enjoying being behind her taking photographs and so after our dinner at the support van at the foot of the Ribblehead Viaduct just 11 of us continued the long shallow accent up Whernside. As usual the wind and rain obscured any of the spectacular views from the top of this peak which according to a lot of literature I read you can actually see Morecambe bay where the Chinese cockle pickers were sadly swept to sea from up here We all once again met at the 18th Century Old Mill Inn which saw Victor Meldrews Daughter drop out and embarrassingly Rimmer collapse, by the time the main party had arrived there Billy Bullsh*ts Son and Rideon had long gone and were well on the way to completing all the three peaks, however since we didn’t see anything of them since walking up Pen-y-Ghent this fact is unsubstantiated So it was just Jamie, Action Man and his dad The Gollum, the events organiser Victor Meldrew plus Mental Mickey and his 13 year old son Luke Baggins who was this year also accompanied with his 11 year old little brother Lord Farquaad who set off for the final peak of Inglebrough. The above 5 people completed the journey in some 11 hours and Lord Farquaad was ecstatic to be the youngest ever to complete it and even more over the moon that his Uncle Rimmer hadn’t and he would be able to take the p*ss for evermore We raised £940 in sponsorship plus Hansons charity matched this with £500 bringing the total raised to £1440 which will be sent to the Yorkshire Air Ambulance. It was a great day out and an event that Victor Meldrew tries to organise every year, this year it was very muddy after the very wet April we had and probably explains our time going from 10½ hours to 11.

Once again 12 members and families of members at Swillington arrived to complete the three Yorkshire Peaks in aid of The Yorkshire Air Ambulance Left to right is Jamie, Action Man, Billy Bullsh*t, Victor Meldrew, Rideon, Gollum, Victor Meldrews Daughter, Hazel (who had a nice bum), Billy Bullsh*t’s Son, My son Luke Baggins, Lord Farquaad, Rimmer and Mental Mickey Taking The Photo was Sean “The Beast” Ruecroft who was the driver of the support vehicle along with Billy Bullsh*t which met our group at the bottom of each summit completed which allowed members to drop out. So it was 12 of us to conquer 3 large summits of Yorkshire- Pen-y-ghent at 694m that’s 2277ft which is in fact the 129th highest peak in England (not including Scotland and Wales which have far higher peaks); Whernside at 736m thats 2414ft which is No84 and Ingleborough at 723m that’s 2372ft which is No94. I have given £107 of my sponsor money in to Victor Meldrew, my sponsors were; £10 N-man (Area Manager) 5of7

£10 Dawn Raider (Area Managers missus) £5 Stumpy (wagon driver No1 for May) £5 Wurzel (wagon driver) £5 Keith Chicken (wagon driver) £5 Harry Potter (wagon driver No2 for May) £5 Bruce Forcyth (wagon driver) £5 Steve Crow (wagon driver) £2 Jason Rudge (wagon driver) My own total collected was £57 plus have Trevor from Archers (£5) and Blackbird (£5) still to collect from

Statistics P ▲ ▲ ▲ ▼ > ▲ ▲ > ▲ ▲

L 2 9 15 1 5 60 20 8 31 13

T 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

May-08 Name Stumpy Harry Potter Keith Chicken Wurzel Hotpot Deuce Bigalow Tito Santana Jason Rudge Dixon Bruce Forcythe

Total 134,192 87,201 75,084 67,228 62,565 41,801 37,944 36,196 32,896 24,018

I am pleased to introduce a couple of new drivers into our hall of fame, Deuce Biggalo – The Male Jiggalo who has a different girlfriend every week according to his fellow Dunnets driver Hotpot He has replaced Tim Terapin who has now semi retired because he has moved from doing bricks to blocks and is running transport out of bootle with the Scallys

Also we have Tito Santana (The Man From Bradwell Transport) who climbs this week from No20 to No7 and of course holding steady at No1 is Stumpy with a huge margin over Harry Potter who climbing strongly to No2 Sold

456,972

326,036

375,600

366,792

442,888

319,376

445,824

390,904

Stock 18,008,70 0 18,027,94 0 18,154,87 8 18,157,74 8

347,848

194,092

18,311,504

YTD Grn

YTD Rd

-354,000

-493,000

-344,888

-470,480

-342,368

-469,592

-332,144

-465,768

-356,186

-470,920

We have put on stock every week during the month of may in fact compared to May 2007 when we had sales of 1,841,064 this year we have just sold 1,454,952 Sales 2007 vs Sales 2008

2.00 1.80 1.60 1.40 1.20 1.00 0.80 0.60 0.40 0.20 0.00 January

February

Sales 2007

Last

6of7

Produce d

Week Com 28/04/200 8 05/05/200 8 12/05/200 8 19/05/200 8 26/05/200 8

March

April

May

Sales 2008

Top 20 For May 2008 pos Name

Quantity

mth > 1 > 2 ▲ 9 ▲ 8 ▼ 4 ▼ 3 > 7 ▲ 11 ▲ 10 ▲ 17

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

73 Class B 73 City Mlti 65 Man Red 65 Golden Brwn 65 City Mlti 65 Cream WC 73 Farmhse Brwn 73 Victorian 73 Golden Brwn 65 Rydale WC

291,072 155,520 98,536 93,564 84,072 64,636 63,744 44,928 43,392 42,488

And of course our best selling brick remains as ever the Class B Engineer.

Jokes

A NZ sheep farmer traveling with his flock from North to South Island was washed up on a beach after a terrible shipwreck. Only a sheep and a sheepdog were washed up with him. After looking around, he realized that they were stranded on a deserted island. After being there awhile, he got into the habit of taking his two animal companions to the beach every evening to watch the sunset. One particular evening, the sky was a fiery red with beautiful cirrus clouds, the breeze was warm and gentle - a perfect night for romance. As they sat there, the sheep started looking better and better to the lonely man. Soon, he leaned over to the sheep and put his arm around it. But the sheepdog, ever protective of the sheep, growled fiercely until the man took his arm from around the sheep. After that, the three of them continued to enjoy the sunsets together, but there was no more cuddling. A few weeks passed by and, lo and behold, there was another shipwreck. The only survivor was Hillary Clinton. 7of7

That evening, the man brought Hillary to the evening beach ritual. It was another beautiful evening - red sky, cirrus clouds, a warm and gentle breeze - perfect for a night of romance. Pretty soon, the man started to get 'those feelings' again.. He fought the urges as long as he could but he finally gave in and leaned over to Hillary and told her he hadn't had sex for months. Hillary batted her eyelashes and asked if there was anything she could do for him. He said, 'Would you mind taking the dog for a walk?'

Happy Birthday So that brings to an end two years of Jungle Telegraphs which I hope you have enjoyed and lets look forward to another 2 years of crazy news stories from our infamous Swillington Plant, we like to think here at Swillington we take peoples minds away from their problems but on everyone’s lips at the moment is the escalating cost of fuel, it is now costing me £50 per week to get from Huddersfield and hence why Stumpy, Harry

Potter, Bruce Forcythe and Oswald Cobblepot can be seen protesting on the front cover