I live in Reading, Berkshire, 40 miles due west of London. It's not a glamorous town. When I first came to live here I thought it dull and dirty, writes Roisin McAuley.
There was a prodigious amount of rubbish in the streets. There still is. The town centre is awash with polystyrene fast-food cartons, empty crisp packets, wrappers from chocolate bars. The bins are badly designed and there aren't enough of them. But at least they are emptied every evening, and the additional rubbish on the street is swept into large plastic sacks.
We live a few hundred yards from the town centre in the wonderfully named Zinzan Street. Less wonderfully, it lies just outside the cordon sanitaire and so the bins are emptied and the street is cleaned only once a week. Within a day, the bins are full again and the street is littered with wrappers and empty juice cartons and half-eaten burgers and slimy chips in polystyrene boxes.
I bought a long-handled pincer device for picking up litter in the street. I do the best I can. Our neighbour, Cathy, originally from Co Mayo, is even more assiduous at keeping the street tidy. The local Labour councillor, Tony Page, who walks along Zinzan Street on his way to the council offices, is often waylaid by one or other of us and berated about the rubbish.
For all that, it is a cheerful and cosmopolitan street. The residents greet each other with a friendly nod. In the summer, children play hide and seek and kick football in the road.
"Come and visit me," I urge my friends and relatives. "There's lovely countryside all around." I don't mention the rubbish. Instead, I recite the hidden charms of Reading. The ruins of the 12th-century Abbey, where the first four part harmony, "Summer is Icumen In" was written down by Benedictine monks. Chestnut Walk, between Reading gaol and the river Kennet, where wrought iron gates are inscribed with a poem by Paul Muldoon, commissioned by the Borough Council to commemorate the centenary of the death of Oscar Wilde. The biggest and most valuable Samuel Beckett archive in the world at Reading University. The hand-embroidered replica of the Bayeux tapestry in the town museum. The walks along the river Thames. The excellent golf-courses nearby.
Then I throw in what I think is the clincher. Reading is only a 25-minute train journey from London and our house is just a 10-minute walk from the station. It doesn't work. They never visit me. Reading just doesn't appeal, somehow.
But in the past few weeks, I began to think my PR for the town was working at last. A relative, then a couple of friends, telephoned and suggested visiting me next year. Almost as an afterthought, they mentioned Reading Football Club. Did I live near Madejski stadium? Near enough. It's a 45-minute walk away. Did I know Reading Football Club had been promoted to the Premiership? I hadn't given it much thought. In fact, in my first few months in Reading I had been caught out by local billboards saying: "Royals in fresh shock!" Or: "Rampant Royals!" I thought they referred to the residents of Windsor castle.
Now that a weekend in Reading is suddenly attractive, I've been doing a little research to impress my visitors. I've been to the stylish, all-seating-with-lots-of-leg-room Madejski stadium. (Rugby fans probably know it's also where London Irish play their home games.)
I know that Reading FC's manager, Steve Coppell, used to play for Manchester United until he was forced to retire through injury, aged only 28. He took Crystal Palace into the Premiership as well. He is one of the few graduate football managers; he has a degree in economics from Liverpool University.
I know Reading has five Irish players - striker Kevin Doyle, from Wexford, who made his international debut for Ireland against Sweden earlier this year; striker Shane Long, ex-Cork City; left midfielder Stephen Hunt, from Wexford, who played for Coppell at Brentford; goalkeeper Graham Stack, formerly with Arsenal; central midfielder Conor Sinnott, Steve Coppell's most recent signing, from Bray Wanderers.
The top price for seats was £22 last season. Prices for next season, and fixtures, won't be announced until July. That's when our friends and relatives will decide on the best time to visit.
I hope they won't have to walk past the rubbish that fills the ditches on both sides of the road that leads from the centre of town to the stadium. It's an ugly, depressing sight. We'd like the town to look its best for the expected influx.
We're optimistic the council is gearing up to tackle the litter problem. It has begun to exercise new powers under the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005, although our way of discovering this was a shock.
We came back from a week's holiday to find a letter from the council imposing a £50 fine because an inspector found litter in the street with our name and address on it. It probably fell out of our recycling bin when it was being emptied. Cllr Page spoke up for us, pointing out that we were unofficial, unpaid street cleaners. The fine was waived.
The councillor agrees that the litter is mostly snack-bar wrappers and polystyrene fast-food containers. Unfortunately, these don't come with names and addresses.