The Reflourishing Act and The King Salmon

Ever so often, from behind the miraculous Cabinet Of The Future that I bought in a car boot sale in Yoker, back when such events weren’t hijacked by skag addicts toting skips of stripped-out copper piping for paying for that bloodshot habit, I find an article from the future. I have kept this mostly to myself, as releasing such information generally plays havoc with bookmakers, who have a nasty habit of setting about your knees with crow-bars, and also, frankly, because I am evil. But here I thought I would share one such article, from a local newspaper about 20 years hence:

EVENING CHIMES, 3 July 2027,
Glasgow, People’s Democratic Republic of Scotland.

Our Illustrious Leader, King Lexus Salmon, decreed a year ago this day the commencement of the 2026 Reflourishing Act, that we may all in the near future revel in the beauty that has become of our fair city in the years since independence. It is the duty of this esteemed organ, which is in no way affiliated or steered by Our Illustrious Leader or Our Highly Esteemed Government, peace be upon them, to detail the ways in which every Scot’s life, be they man, woman, child or botch-job post-op hermaphrodite, has been enriched by our Leader’s policy founded on the principles of love, beauty and freedom.

Already, the impact of the Tartan Army’s invasion of North and South Korea five years ago has meant the disabling and dismantling of their ship-building industry, meaning the re-opening of yards up and down the Clyde. Happy workers could be seen hobbling with mirthful delight etched upon their faces, meatball tins in hand, apprentice workers shirking off playful cuffs to the ear from their elders. The ripping up of tarmac has continued unabated, with rail-layers working around the clock to re-instate the tram lines torn up decades before by Folk from the Labour Side.

With the oil crises precipitated by the Iran War, the Venezuela “Police Action”, and the 2nd American Civil War which has resulted in Bush gaining an unprecedented sixth term in what is now termed the United States of Florida, King Lexus Salmon was quick to defend Scotland’s policy of shunning oil. “We have seen, in our lifetimes, the horror, hatred and sheer belligerence resulting from this little black substance which, truth be told, doesn’t even taste that good. Except the North Sea variety of course”, several people were seen to swoon at this oratory genius, theatrically pressing hand-back to forehead as they went under, “The time has come to look forward!” he went on, bellowing at the fire afore, “Trams! These are the vehicles of the future”. No sooner had these words been uttered, than these green and orange contraptions were wheeling about the roads, though a manufacturing fault meant that within a day the vast majority had piled up in depots and route-ends, reverse gears having been mistakenly omitted. This was palmed off eloquently by the administration as a minor hitch, and “A price worth paying for progress”.

Those cynics who dubbed the “Let Glasgow Reflourish” campaign “The Great Leap Backward” are starting to eat their words, watching with awe as thousands take to the motorways with their jack-hammers, breaking up the tarmac before the stone-masons cart in their quarried sandstone to once again thrust their solid tenement edifices skyward. Progress comes at a cost, of course, and a dubious decision was made not to close the roads before their destruction, “Can you imagine the carnage? All of Scotland gridlocked! We will close the roads when there is no road left to close”, Transport Minister Scott Raille was quoted as saying while striding to his waiting tram, before lifting a briefcase in front of his face and punching a photographer. Meanwhile, several drivers were admitted to the city’s hospitals with injuries after driving into lumps of sandstone, and, in one notable incident, driving into a freshly-planted tree on the Seaward Street off-ramp. Thousands queued up along the Broomielaw to buy souvenir pieces of the Kingston Bridge in scenes reminiscent of post-Cold War Berlin. Commentators speculated that pieces sold so far amounted to three times the volume of the original bridge.

Clattie Dreg, Owner of the Stomped Englishman chain of pubs that has been one of Scotland’s most outstanding success stories since independence, reported that there had been a 200% upturn in alcohol sales, as people drank away the misery of living in the newly re-built slums, part of the much-lauded, “Drive for Authenticity” that has adorned the banners in George Square since the enactment. The upturn in numbers of children admitted to clinics with rat-bites in the new hovels was trumpeted as “A tremendous achievement” by Health Secretary Annie Chess, and a true sign that “Scotland is embracing the character and grit, warts and all, that got us through two World Wars and will get us through the impending Third”. All around city centre streets last night as every night these days, joyous crowds in varying degrees of consciousness swaggered and laid about, sipping on their greened-with-town-gas milk bottles.

In the east end, many dance halls that had not seen the light of so much as a solitary disco-ball for some decades suddenly kicked themselves into life; men in cloth caps mingling with the glad-ragged girls, all frolicking together in scenes reminiscent of a late-night film in which romance is interspersed with moody exchanges of glares, standings of pints, and the odd sharply-curtailed scuffle in a piss-stained alleyway. Elsewhere, the old gangs made their return to the centre, the peripheral housing schemes being gently bulldozed street-by-street and coaxed into piles of masonry and concrete, never to rot, only to crumble and exfoliate with the battering of the seasons. Shug Sharpe, CEO of Silhouette Razor Blades went teary-eyed in front of our reporter as he recounted how he had longed for these days to return. “It is so nice to see us return to our values, namely, the use of the good old-fashioned razor blade to settle a score. I have watched sadly as the youth of yesteryear turned their backs on these beautiful implements, in favour of more coarse items like bog-standard knives or, dare I say it…”, he looked around and when he was sure they were alone, whispered, “Guns”. Business had been booming, especially at the newly constructed Tram-Thru facility in Garscube Road where punters can merely lean out the tram window and swap their Five Jock Note for a ready blade. He plans to open another branch in Cumberland Street in the autumn.

The final touches of soot-daubing were being added to the tenements lining Dumbarton Road last night, in a city-wide drive to undo the sand-blasting that ‘disfigured’ the city in the 1980’s, reinstating the industrial heritage that, as King Lexus put it, “Coloured our past with eye-dazzling shades of grey and so will colour our future for evermore”. King Lexus also hinted last night that the HMS Thistle Bru was in the final stages of fit-out in preparation for its voyage of discovery to Panama. Admiral Lyon Jackson was said to be wetting himself with anticipation.

Next Week: How has it affected the pigeons? Our “Whatever Happened To…?” series concludes with a piece on Lulu, and The Truth Behind the Squirrel Killings.

Other Famous Salmons:

Though our illustrious leader be a great salmon himself, there are other lesser salmons around. Here, courtesy of the Evening Chimes, is a guide:

Salmon Hayek – Famous actress, best known for her role in popular flick “Leaping the Falls”, about a coming-of-age Texan girl-salmon and her trials at the hands of her mischievous snake-charming stepfather and his playful goat, Sonny.

Salmon Rushdie – In the heady days following the lifting of his fatwa for offending a notable religion practiced by Puffer fish, he has gone on to found a successful college for young salmon writers. Following complaints from the Racial Equality Commission, this was broadened to include all fish, except halibut because said religion disapproves of getting battered.

Osalmon Bin Laden – Notorious terrorist and harbinger of doom. Often seen toting a Kalshnikov while his latest video release is played on infinite loop on Al Quatic, a cable channel dedicated to the mercenaries of the deep.

Salmon Flaps – Pornographer extraordinaire, who specialised in the much-coveted “waterfall shot” and who choreographed zoological masterpiece, Deep Stoat.

Jaws – Vicious bastard of a fish. The Great White Salmon is said to have outwitted Captain Ahab and his harpoons long before the advent of whales in 1772.