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NUCLEAR FREE The city of Manchester, which is only fourteen miles from my home town, just twenty-five minutes on the train on a good day, God knows how long on a bad, is a place I only ever visit out of absolute necessity. If I wanted something and the only two places I could get it were Manchester and Cracow I would probably have to apply for a Polish visa and check out the condition of my thermal underwear. That is not to say that Manchester is not without its pockets of charm - the Lowry Centre and the Castlefield area, with its concert hall and fine museums, are excellent - but these are more than outweighed by its abundance of rubbish-strewn streets, grubby buildings and more Big Issue sellers to the square yard than anywhere else in England.      However needs must and I had to visit it yesterday, and because of that visit I shall be visiting it again at least one more time, and when I do it will be because I want to, eagerly, and in great haste.      Why has Manchester, once a city of dark satanic mills, now a city of dark satanic gay bars, suddenly become so attractive to me? Simply because quite by accident I have discovered that it is safe from nuclear attack, a haven from any future holocaust. Really. Well it is according to the official City of Manchester Council notice I saw on my way from Piccadilly station to Kendals. 'Welcome to Manchester,' the notice proclaimed, 'A nuclear free city'. That's me, I thought, first sign of World War Three breaking out and it's me, The Trouble, my children and my grandchildren Manchester bound, to stay there until it's all over and safe to leave it.      I don't quite know how being a nuclear free city works - but I'm sure the City of Manchester Council will have worked out something with the Russians - probably there'll be some sort of sensor in the nuclear missiles bound for England and when they lock in on a plethora of Big Issue sellers they'll pass over; or more likely when their sensor homes in on the 'Welcome to Manchester, a nuclear free city' sign the missile will see it, say to itself "Ah, a nuclear free city, I musn't transform this into a nuclear desert where nothing will be able to live for the next fifty years", then continue on and lay to waste the next place it comes to that isn't a nuclear free city, possibly Stockport. I hope so because I dislike Stockport even more than I dislike Manchester. Check, more than I did dislike Manchester. Because I've taken quite a shine to the old place now.