flippin 'eck. Everything seems just a little bit unglued at the moment.
There was a 'friendly' International football match last night (that's soccer to you heathens), in the last stages of England’s assault on the World Cup (please, please let it happen in my life time). And I belong a rag taggle group of fans who've watched 4 successive World Cups (bear in mind the World Cup only comes around every 4 years), 4 all too early exits, every game live (even those in the early hours of the morning) from the same smoky corner of the same dingy pub. We've hugged, cried, screamed, shouted, lamented, raged at the referees and the injustice of it all and thrown our beer heavenwards in rapture after scoring a goal or defeating an arch enemy.
It was a bit of a dull game last night.
Still I managed quite a respectable hangover and was propelled towards the bedroom carpet all too soon this morning by the alarm. I'm fuzzy at the best of times, but on mornings like these the world appears to me through a glass darkly, very darkly indeed. Somehow I manage to simultaneously feed the dogs, make tea, fish a towel out of the washing machine with my toes and minister to my headache by bashing down a couple of aspirin.
Except that I noticed, on the way out, feeling a lot better after a shower and extensive oral hygiene that the packet said "Nytol" and not aspirin, which wasn't exactly what I needed.
Consequently I felt right at home this afternoon waiting in line to renew my road tax in the local Post Office. "Post Offices" in the UK dispense stamps, pensions, rubber bands, packing tape and biros. They are also the Grim Reaper's waiting room, constantly occupied by the elderly, infirm and permanently befuddled, who spend their remaining coffin dodging hours waiting in line for a form, which they return to the back of the queue with...to ask for a pen, or another form, or to weigh their colostomy bag on the scale, or advice on the right blend of loam to grow artichokes from seed.
I rocked and reeled with the queue and had a little hot flush where I thought for a moment I might go down under the shuffling ranks of rubber footed zimmer frames.
And this is on the end of a 'Bank' holiday, a long weekend, which means that Sunday had potential for a late night too.
That's not to say I've not been "good". I have. I've done my chores, been on some very long walks with the dogs, caught up with friends, sanded the bathroom walls, begun to paint and even weeded the garden (deep joy).
What's more I got to meet Sandra, who is adorable and fun and great company, as she and her friends were spending a week packing in more to do in and around London than the average Londoner will ever accomplish in a lifetime. Goodness knows where they found the energy, but I would never have been able to keep up. Even after one very gentle evening - and it can't possibly be the beer, (we drank sociably and responsibly, the very epitome of gentile restraint and decorum I tell you!!!) - I put it down to the impromptu and very relaxing head and neck massage offered by the demented, infinitely camp, engaging and quite deranged, French, ('but I was an Inca in a former life'), jongleur in a crowded cobbled courtyard of a pub.....that caused me to slump over my desk in a dead coma the next day. (Thank you Yvonne for the tea, and the discreet nudge).
I must be getting old. Go leave me in a Post Office.
Oh, and ironically, as I could sleep all day but couldn’t catch a wink last night elle gave me the gift of poetry to keep away the night sprites
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Monday, May 22, 2006
the magic caravan (part iii)
They stumbled to the car to find what they needed for the night. Derek fumbled in the dark, in the boot, for the sleeping bags and meagre toiletries, tooth brushes, paste and aspirin while Colin recovered eight cans of lager and a packet of “Jammy Dodgers” from the back seat.
“Breakfast” he declared.
“Breakfast of Kings” agreed Derek.
A beam of light swayed across the yard and paused at their feet, followed by footsteps in the gravel. The light twitched to the right, along the length of the pub, then back, beckoning to a pathway in the overgrown grass.
“Oi’ll show you the way” softly as if not to wake others, though there was not a single light elsewhere in the village to suggest a sign of life.
They caught Stanley up at the corner of the building and it was a surprise to see that he held a large torch and not a lantern on a bent stick. He shone it down the side of the pub where an alley had been formed from the overhanging trees which met the wall by the eves of the sloping roof. The torchlight gave the impression of walking in a dark green tunnel, it’s arc of light moving with them as they went, over short soft, mossy grass.
Stanley led, they followed, out onto a small lawn overlooked by the sightless glazed rear facing eyes of the pub. Through an overgrown arch in a ewe hedge they emerged, as the moon appeared from behind a ruffle of cloud, into an orchard. It was a bright moon sailing high in the sky, not yet full as if the quirky smiling face were wearing a flat cap at a jaunty angle.
Stanley turned off the torch revealing rows upon rows of twisted apple trees, dark and grotesque, writhing shapes given preternatural semblance of life by the moonlight that dusted their uppermost branches. They stood for a moment, their breath making plumes in the chilly late summer night air, and the trees breathed back.
“Do you get many pixies?” asked Colin in a small voice.
“Not since the war” said Stanley, breaking the spell, “they was all rounded up and deported, funny pointy-eared little buggers”.
They all laughed a little too loud and Stanley set off again picking his way through the groping trees.
In a very short while they passed the last of the old apples, the largest, looking like all the world as if it were lifting its gnarled and twisted limbs to bathe in the light of the moon. The ground sloped down slightly feeling grittier, less grassy under foot towards the edge of a large, gently sparkling pond.
Imbued with an ancient animal urge, wherever man meets water, Derek tucked the sleeping bag in his right hand under his left arm and stopped to pick up a flat stone. He stooped, bent at the knee and skipped it across water. “Splat…splat..splatsplatsplat" it went followed by a dull thud and then a sudden great caterwauling “Quaaaaaaaaack, quaccck, quack, quack quack!!! and a furious flurry of wings.
“It’s a duck pond” said Stanley sagely and quite needlessly.
“Shot” whispered Colin.
Derek mumble a "sorry", fidgeting with his baggage and followed them just twenty yards along the bank to where Stanley had stopped. He pointed, “here we are”, at a dark shape standing ten yards back from the bank.
The boys looked at each other sharing an unspoken thought, the cramped comforts of the car suddenly seemed so much more inviting.
Caravans come in all shapes and sizes, from those towed by geriatrics and sadists who seem interminably lost, to the enormous comfortable semi-permanent habitations of those who disdain “package holidays” but are happy to spend two miserable weeks in a large tin can.
This was a beast of a different colour, literally. Oxidised, blackened, formerly galvanised tin to be precise, it reflected no light, a tiny, squat mushroom of darkness suspended on a cushion of rising mist.
They stood transfixed, appalled.
“You’re havin’ a giraffe” complained Derek.
“It’ll do for the noit” said Stanley.
“Its derelict, I mean look at it, it’s falling apart”.
“T’aint that bad” said Stanley chirpily, “old Natty lived in it for years”.
“What was he, the local hermit?” asked Colin blackly.
“No, the mole catcher”
“Perfect. That’s what it is isn’t it, they got their own back and smothered him in a ginormous fucking mole hill?!!”
“Don’t be darft” said Stanley, “if you want to know, he drowned, roit there in the duck pond….”
The boys turned to look at him and Stanley stuttered realising his mistake.
….dead drunk he was” smiling a little cheesily
“Timing”, said Derek, pausing for emphasis “is the secret of comedy”
“Breakfast” he declared.
“Breakfast of Kings” agreed Derek.
A beam of light swayed across the yard and paused at their feet, followed by footsteps in the gravel. The light twitched to the right, along the length of the pub, then back, beckoning to a pathway in the overgrown grass.
“Oi’ll show you the way” softly as if not to wake others, though there was not a single light elsewhere in the village to suggest a sign of life.
They caught Stanley up at the corner of the building and it was a surprise to see that he held a large torch and not a lantern on a bent stick. He shone it down the side of the pub where an alley had been formed from the overhanging trees which met the wall by the eves of the sloping roof. The torchlight gave the impression of walking in a dark green tunnel, it’s arc of light moving with them as they went, over short soft, mossy grass.
Stanley led, they followed, out onto a small lawn overlooked by the sightless glazed rear facing eyes of the pub. Through an overgrown arch in a ewe hedge they emerged, as the moon appeared from behind a ruffle of cloud, into an orchard. It was a bright moon sailing high in the sky, not yet full as if the quirky smiling face were wearing a flat cap at a jaunty angle.
Stanley turned off the torch revealing rows upon rows of twisted apple trees, dark and grotesque, writhing shapes given preternatural semblance of life by the moonlight that dusted their uppermost branches. They stood for a moment, their breath making plumes in the chilly late summer night air, and the trees breathed back.
“Do you get many pixies?” asked Colin in a small voice.
“Not since the war” said Stanley, breaking the spell, “they was all rounded up and deported, funny pointy-eared little buggers”.
They all laughed a little too loud and Stanley set off again picking his way through the groping trees.
In a very short while they passed the last of the old apples, the largest, looking like all the world as if it were lifting its gnarled and twisted limbs to bathe in the light of the moon. The ground sloped down slightly feeling grittier, less grassy under foot towards the edge of a large, gently sparkling pond.
Imbued with an ancient animal urge, wherever man meets water, Derek tucked the sleeping bag in his right hand under his left arm and stopped to pick up a flat stone. He stooped, bent at the knee and skipped it across water. “Splat…splat..splatsplatsplat" it went followed by a dull thud and then a sudden great caterwauling “Quaaaaaaaaack, quaccck, quack, quack quack!!! and a furious flurry of wings.
“It’s a duck pond” said Stanley sagely and quite needlessly.
“Shot” whispered Colin.
Derek mumble a "sorry", fidgeting with his baggage and followed them just twenty yards along the bank to where Stanley had stopped. He pointed, “here we are”, at a dark shape standing ten yards back from the bank.
The boys looked at each other sharing an unspoken thought, the cramped comforts of the car suddenly seemed so much more inviting.
Caravans come in all shapes and sizes, from those towed by geriatrics and sadists who seem interminably lost, to the enormous comfortable semi-permanent habitations of those who disdain “package holidays” but are happy to spend two miserable weeks in a large tin can.
This was a beast of a different colour, literally. Oxidised, blackened, formerly galvanised tin to be precise, it reflected no light, a tiny, squat mushroom of darkness suspended on a cushion of rising mist.
They stood transfixed, appalled.
“You’re havin’ a giraffe” complained Derek.
“It’ll do for the noit” said Stanley.
“Its derelict, I mean look at it, it’s falling apart”.
“T’aint that bad” said Stanley chirpily, “old Natty lived in it for years”.
“What was he, the local hermit?” asked Colin blackly.
“No, the mole catcher”
“Perfect. That’s what it is isn’t it, they got their own back and smothered him in a ginormous fucking mole hill?!!”
“Don’t be darft” said Stanley, “if you want to know, he drowned, roit there in the duck pond….”
The boys turned to look at him and Stanley stuttered realising his mistake.
….dead drunk he was” smiling a little cheesily
“Timing”, said Derek, pausing for emphasis “is the secret of comedy”
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
the magic caravan (part ii)
Derek stood alone by the bar while Colin went to relieve himself, appropriately, in the toilets at the rear of the pub.
It was really quite dark in the pub by now. The small windows to either side of the old iron shod wooden door were leaded, the panes had run with age, like wax, thicker towards the bottom, glass being after all a liquid, drawn down inexorably with the passing of time.
Time lurched in small fragmented moments as the setting sun, it’s graceful arc interrupted by the unevenness of the window panes, made slow progress towards the dusty sill.
Through the windows to the side of the pub, equally dusty and misshapen, it was already night. Not yet pitch but dark heraldic blue, cerulean with a promise of stars.
Dust hung in the air in shafts of skimpy light. The corners of the room were vague and cast in shadow and from behind the door, ajar, by the bar came the sounds of a soft continuing struggle.
With a sudden squeal of hinges a figure emerged into the quiet of the bar. Or at least, accompanied by an exhalation of dust and cobweb, a bottom appeared, a very large bottom clad in hairy britches bulging and gyrating under the strain of towing the rest of the figure with which it was connected into sight. What finally appeared could be loosely described as a man but appeared to Derek to be more likely a Narnian giant.
“That’s better” broke the spell as Colin came back in through the front door, “time for a refill”. And took two steps into the room, adjusting to the gloom, before standing rooted and transfixed like Derek who was still motionless at the counter.
“Fucking hell” he muttered.
“Evenin’” said the figure, “Oi’ll be with you in a tick”.
The man was huge. He moved at a crouch to avoid the beams on the low ceiling though from the various lumps and protrusions on his head he had not always done so. He hauled a keg, a very large keg, by sheer brawn backwards through a lifted section of the counter in forearms as thick as thighs. He wore a check shirt with the sleeves loosely rolled to the elbow under braces for his britches and huge shoulders worked mightily below it. Heaving and pulling he settled the barrel below the counter top and with great gnarled hands brought it to a halt and then turning, stood to face them.
“So, what can I get you?”
“Taxi?” suggested Colin in a whisper.
The boys plight was now revealed in all it’s Shelleyesque horror. Great tufts of ginger hair protruded from the open vee at the neck of the strangers shirt. He was almost as wide as he was tall and had it not been for the additional height of the ceiling behind the bar all above his shoulders would have disappeared in the gloom. Derek, just feet away on the other side of the bar rather wished it had. The man’s head was roughly the size and shape of a very large turnip, for which it bore some not inconsiderable similarity in terms of texture and colour. Except there was a flush of beetroot in the cheeks and a shiny polished pate be-smattered in liver spots or large, dark freckles.
This 'head' had obviously been completed by a child who’s crayons either could not or wilfilly would not stay within the lines. Nothing of proportion in the eyes or nose or mouth, or of colour, that bespoke anything that might suggest itself as a human characteristic but generously worked as a whole to complete a fascinating, ruddy face.
This already outlandish countenance was framed in dusty grey and wheat wisps of hair, (hair that also protruded from the ears and nostrils in bushy profundity and equally formed a bristly awning for surprisingly shallow wells wherein sat large rheumy eyes). Most remarkable of all were an enormous pair of bugger grips extending bushy and uncultivated from ear to jowl, pale and darkening towards their tip, like the poorly groomed ends of a donkey’s tail. They yelled “danger, yokel!” more fiercely than any flat cap or clay pipe.
(A note to the happily uninitiated; bugger grips are overgrown, thicket like sideburns so named because, as rumour has it, they provide leverage for an uphill gardener intent on entering the rear porch).
The turnip spoke again, “What’ll you ‘ave, this oint a bloody public urinal you know?”.
“Bitter” said Derek, “two pints of bitter” finding his voice and a crumb of comfort in something he knew how to do.
“Nope”, said the hairy apparition, “no beer”, rolling the vowel of the “beer” around the room as if it had wheels.
“erm, larger then”
“none of that either” Sasquatch replied, “not much call for it”.
A fact that neither of the boys had noticed before suddenly became apparent. There were no taps at the bar, no hand pumps of any kind, nothing at all to indicate that the place sold alcohol in any shape or form not even, in fact, a single bottle or optic.
“Well what do have a call for?” chimed in Colin from what he hoped was a relatively safe distance.
“Zoider”, “there’s a lot of call for zoider”.
“Two pints of that then please”.
“Oi think you’d be better with halfs, that is your motor outside” the hulk suggested in such a way that brooked no refusal and bent, doubling at the waist, behind the bar.
Derek took the opportunity to catch Colin’s eye and mouth “what the fuck?”. Colin just shrugged and made a small open armed gesture with his arms and nodded imperceptibly over Derek’s shoulder to indicate the re emergence of Big Foot from behind the counter. It held in it’s giant hairy hands two pots of pale, cloudy yellow broth that sufferers of sclerosis would recognise as urine but which they were obviously intended to drink.
“Ta” said Derek and sipped on his. It was warm, tangy and quite sharp, it was still and not at all sweet and despite the suspension of soft apply curds was all in all quite pleasant. He downed half of it and smiled brightly at his hairy host who looked back at him from the advantage of considerable height with a knowing look and rueful shake of the head. “Oi ‘ope your droivin” he said to Colin.
Three glasses of cider later they sat on a bench seat by the fire. By the fourth, Colin sat on the bench while Derek occupied the dusty space under it.
They had discovered that their host answered to the surprisingly unprepossessing name of “Stanley”, and he in turn, had discovered who they were and most of what they were about. Stanley turned out to be quite affable in a gruff sort of way, not talkative but not indisposed to answering questions and adding a little humour. When Colin had asked the name of the pub he had told them straight faced “The signs in the cellar”. “Yes but what does it say” asked Derek. And he had explained how, in 1958, there had been a tremendous storm which had ripped, bodily, a limb from a giant oak standing in the green opposite the pub. “It’s still there” he assured them although it was far too dark outside to see it now. That limb had carried the pub sign, ‘The Oak Tree’, and in deference to the venerable and injured giant the sign had been removed to the cellar and never replaced.
At which point Derek said “Ahh” softly and slid slowly down and off the bench like a pint of treacle as the cider closed circuits in his head.
Stanley left him there for some time content that he had, for once, a little company. “Two more please” said Colin.
“Oi think he’s all done”
“You’d be surprised”
“All roit but he can’t stay there” said Stanley bowing to the barrel behind the bar, “Oim goin to loit the fire”.
Colin delicately tapped Derek in the groin with his foot, enough to stir him, and Derek slowly uncrumpled. Looking vague at first and then, in fact, refreshed for his short stupor he struggled across the table to reach his glass and looked very disappointed to find it empty. “It’s on the way” Colin reassured him.
Stanley retuned with two half pint pots in one hand and his very favourite thing in the whole world in the other; a gas poker. It was Stanley’s toy. He loved to light the fire with it, in fact he would light the fire simply because of it whether it was warm or cold. He’d lit bonfires outside, made toast, tried to set fire to a cabbage and on one occasion made a particularly nauseating cup of tea by immersing it, dangerously, in the kettle.
The poker was attached to a gas bottle and when lit Stanley adjusted the flame by means of a little knob from a rosy glow to a cold blue flame which he then plunged into a gap between the logs settled on an old iron pig in the grate.
Sparks crackled off the bark and they all watched in admiration as the first red tongues of flame licked the sides of the sappy, seasoned wood.
The smell was delicious, adding flavour and tang to the musky stone scent of the room. And the fire, as it rose and gathered and warmed them became a relentless, unavoidable soporific.
They next awoke to the sound of two full glasses thudding into the wooden table by their faces.
“Bert’s bought you a drink” said Stanley gesturing towards a shadowy form in the corner. On inspection, and adjustment helped by the light of the fire, Bert revealed himself to be clad in a dun woollen suit and be made up almost entirely of creased leather, an octogenarian weir lizard sporting a bulbous, pitted nose.
“He wants to know if you play dominos?”
And so they sat for hours in front of the fire, playing rubber on rubber of dominos for glasses of cider and losing every single game. They lost with good humour, beaten soundly by Stanley and Bert who was obviously a savant. With a flourish he would reveal exactly the right domino to stump them or win the rubber and gurn at them with a smile which appeared to be made of two uneven rows pickled peanuts.
Eventually his constitution could afford to win no more. His cup, or at least the pewter jug that the boys had kept replenishing, spilled over and he pushed himself slowly back from the table.
Laboriously he rose and leaning on the tables edge spluttered “arglebarglemorblewhoosh” by way of a well natured parting speech and slowly and deliberately staggered out into the night via, it seemed, every piece of furniture in the room.
They sat for a little while, silently except for the crackling of the fire and the chink clink of the dominos as Stanley replaced them in the box.
“Car” said Derek.
“Have to” agreed Colin, who knew that Derek was thinking exactly the same, it was time to lie down for the night and they’d sleep in the car as they often had in the past.
As if he knew what they were thinking, before they had chance to issue thank yous and farewells, Stanley interrupted this groggy exchange:
“O’course you won’t be droivin anywheres tonoit, and Oi doubt you’ll be pitchin that tent o yorn either”
“Still", he said, "thee’ll not be sleepin’ in the cold….”
And he bent closer and almost conspiratorially told them his plan;
“…..there’s a caravan out the back”
It was really quite dark in the pub by now. The small windows to either side of the old iron shod wooden door were leaded, the panes had run with age, like wax, thicker towards the bottom, glass being after all a liquid, drawn down inexorably with the passing of time.
Time lurched in small fragmented moments as the setting sun, it’s graceful arc interrupted by the unevenness of the window panes, made slow progress towards the dusty sill.
Through the windows to the side of the pub, equally dusty and misshapen, it was already night. Not yet pitch but dark heraldic blue, cerulean with a promise of stars.
Dust hung in the air in shafts of skimpy light. The corners of the room were vague and cast in shadow and from behind the door, ajar, by the bar came the sounds of a soft continuing struggle.
With a sudden squeal of hinges a figure emerged into the quiet of the bar. Or at least, accompanied by an exhalation of dust and cobweb, a bottom appeared, a very large bottom clad in hairy britches bulging and gyrating under the strain of towing the rest of the figure with which it was connected into sight. What finally appeared could be loosely described as a man but appeared to Derek to be more likely a Narnian giant.
“That’s better” broke the spell as Colin came back in through the front door, “time for a refill”. And took two steps into the room, adjusting to the gloom, before standing rooted and transfixed like Derek who was still motionless at the counter.
“Fucking hell” he muttered.
“Evenin’” said the figure, “Oi’ll be with you in a tick”.
The man was huge. He moved at a crouch to avoid the beams on the low ceiling though from the various lumps and protrusions on his head he had not always done so. He hauled a keg, a very large keg, by sheer brawn backwards through a lifted section of the counter in forearms as thick as thighs. He wore a check shirt with the sleeves loosely rolled to the elbow under braces for his britches and huge shoulders worked mightily below it. Heaving and pulling he settled the barrel below the counter top and with great gnarled hands brought it to a halt and then turning, stood to face them.
“So, what can I get you?”
“Taxi?” suggested Colin in a whisper.
The boys plight was now revealed in all it’s Shelleyesque horror. Great tufts of ginger hair protruded from the open vee at the neck of the strangers shirt. He was almost as wide as he was tall and had it not been for the additional height of the ceiling behind the bar all above his shoulders would have disappeared in the gloom. Derek, just feet away on the other side of the bar rather wished it had. The man’s head was roughly the size and shape of a very large turnip, for which it bore some not inconsiderable similarity in terms of texture and colour. Except there was a flush of beetroot in the cheeks and a shiny polished pate be-smattered in liver spots or large, dark freckles.
This 'head' had obviously been completed by a child who’s crayons either could not or wilfilly would not stay within the lines. Nothing of proportion in the eyes or nose or mouth, or of colour, that bespoke anything that might suggest itself as a human characteristic but generously worked as a whole to complete a fascinating, ruddy face.
This already outlandish countenance was framed in dusty grey and wheat wisps of hair, (hair that also protruded from the ears and nostrils in bushy profundity and equally formed a bristly awning for surprisingly shallow wells wherein sat large rheumy eyes). Most remarkable of all were an enormous pair of bugger grips extending bushy and uncultivated from ear to jowl, pale and darkening towards their tip, like the poorly groomed ends of a donkey’s tail. They yelled “danger, yokel!” more fiercely than any flat cap or clay pipe.
(A note to the happily uninitiated; bugger grips are overgrown, thicket like sideburns so named because, as rumour has it, they provide leverage for an uphill gardener intent on entering the rear porch).
The turnip spoke again, “What’ll you ‘ave, this oint a bloody public urinal you know?”.
“Bitter” said Derek, “two pints of bitter” finding his voice and a crumb of comfort in something he knew how to do.
“Nope”, said the hairy apparition, “no beer”, rolling the vowel of the “beer” around the room as if it had wheels.
“erm, larger then”
“none of that either” Sasquatch replied, “not much call for it”.
A fact that neither of the boys had noticed before suddenly became apparent. There were no taps at the bar, no hand pumps of any kind, nothing at all to indicate that the place sold alcohol in any shape or form not even, in fact, a single bottle or optic.
“Well what do have a call for?” chimed in Colin from what he hoped was a relatively safe distance.
“Zoider”, “there’s a lot of call for zoider”.
“Two pints of that then please”.
“Oi think you’d be better with halfs, that is your motor outside” the hulk suggested in such a way that brooked no refusal and bent, doubling at the waist, behind the bar.
Derek took the opportunity to catch Colin’s eye and mouth “what the fuck?”. Colin just shrugged and made a small open armed gesture with his arms and nodded imperceptibly over Derek’s shoulder to indicate the re emergence of Big Foot from behind the counter. It held in it’s giant hairy hands two pots of pale, cloudy yellow broth that sufferers of sclerosis would recognise as urine but which they were obviously intended to drink.
“Ta” said Derek and sipped on his. It was warm, tangy and quite sharp, it was still and not at all sweet and despite the suspension of soft apply curds was all in all quite pleasant. He downed half of it and smiled brightly at his hairy host who looked back at him from the advantage of considerable height with a knowing look and rueful shake of the head. “Oi ‘ope your droivin” he said to Colin.
Three glasses of cider later they sat on a bench seat by the fire. By the fourth, Colin sat on the bench while Derek occupied the dusty space under it.
They had discovered that their host answered to the surprisingly unprepossessing name of “Stanley”, and he in turn, had discovered who they were and most of what they were about. Stanley turned out to be quite affable in a gruff sort of way, not talkative but not indisposed to answering questions and adding a little humour. When Colin had asked the name of the pub he had told them straight faced “The signs in the cellar”. “Yes but what does it say” asked Derek. And he had explained how, in 1958, there had been a tremendous storm which had ripped, bodily, a limb from a giant oak standing in the green opposite the pub. “It’s still there” he assured them although it was far too dark outside to see it now. That limb had carried the pub sign, ‘The Oak Tree’, and in deference to the venerable and injured giant the sign had been removed to the cellar and never replaced.
At which point Derek said “Ahh” softly and slid slowly down and off the bench like a pint of treacle as the cider closed circuits in his head.
Stanley left him there for some time content that he had, for once, a little company. “Two more please” said Colin.
“Oi think he’s all done”
“You’d be surprised”
“All roit but he can’t stay there” said Stanley bowing to the barrel behind the bar, “Oim goin to loit the fire”.
Colin delicately tapped Derek in the groin with his foot, enough to stir him, and Derek slowly uncrumpled. Looking vague at first and then, in fact, refreshed for his short stupor he struggled across the table to reach his glass and looked very disappointed to find it empty. “It’s on the way” Colin reassured him.
Stanley retuned with two half pint pots in one hand and his very favourite thing in the whole world in the other; a gas poker. It was Stanley’s toy. He loved to light the fire with it, in fact he would light the fire simply because of it whether it was warm or cold. He’d lit bonfires outside, made toast, tried to set fire to a cabbage and on one occasion made a particularly nauseating cup of tea by immersing it, dangerously, in the kettle.
The poker was attached to a gas bottle and when lit Stanley adjusted the flame by means of a little knob from a rosy glow to a cold blue flame which he then plunged into a gap between the logs settled on an old iron pig in the grate.
Sparks crackled off the bark and they all watched in admiration as the first red tongues of flame licked the sides of the sappy, seasoned wood.
The smell was delicious, adding flavour and tang to the musky stone scent of the room. And the fire, as it rose and gathered and warmed them became a relentless, unavoidable soporific.
They next awoke to the sound of two full glasses thudding into the wooden table by their faces.
“Bert’s bought you a drink” said Stanley gesturing towards a shadowy form in the corner. On inspection, and adjustment helped by the light of the fire, Bert revealed himself to be clad in a dun woollen suit and be made up almost entirely of creased leather, an octogenarian weir lizard sporting a bulbous, pitted nose.
“He wants to know if you play dominos?”
And so they sat for hours in front of the fire, playing rubber on rubber of dominos for glasses of cider and losing every single game. They lost with good humour, beaten soundly by Stanley and Bert who was obviously a savant. With a flourish he would reveal exactly the right domino to stump them or win the rubber and gurn at them with a smile which appeared to be made of two uneven rows pickled peanuts.
Eventually his constitution could afford to win no more. His cup, or at least the pewter jug that the boys had kept replenishing, spilled over and he pushed himself slowly back from the table.
Laboriously he rose and leaning on the tables edge spluttered “arglebarglemorblewhoosh” by way of a well natured parting speech and slowly and deliberately staggered out into the night via, it seemed, every piece of furniture in the room.
They sat for a little while, silently except for the crackling of the fire and the chink clink of the dominos as Stanley replaced them in the box.
“Car” said Derek.
“Have to” agreed Colin, who knew that Derek was thinking exactly the same, it was time to lie down for the night and they’d sleep in the car as they often had in the past.
As if he knew what they were thinking, before they had chance to issue thank yous and farewells, Stanley interrupted this groggy exchange:
“O’course you won’t be droivin anywheres tonoit, and Oi doubt you’ll be pitchin that tent o yorn either”
“Still", he said, "thee’ll not be sleepin’ in the cold….”
And he bent closer and almost conspiratorially told them his plan;
“…..there’s a caravan out the back”
Saturday, May 13, 2006
I feel sick
If you’ve met me you’ll know I’m not the most reliable person in the world, in fact if you’ve been reading this for any time, you will have reached the same conclusion.
I’m not. I’m a bit of a gad fly. I have friends when I want them and ignore them when I don’t, apart form the dogs I come and go pretty much as I please. I’m not well off by any means, but there’s sufficient income to allow me to indulge myself in whim and folly to keep me happy and all in all it’s a comfortable, happily selfish lifestyle.
Except that there’s one thing I miss, a part of me that isn’t fulfilled, at all. I miss children. I’m broody.
I always thought that I would have children, actually I thought I’d have lots of them.
This isn’t an option for me as I understand the process. It is apparent that you need a significant other to make children, which quite clearly doesn’t appear to be on the cards. And I’m not so self absorbed as to wish to adopt, although it is an alternative, because I’d prefer to think that for every child in need of adoption there must be better prepared parents than the single parent alternative that I could offer.
So the route that I took was that of fostering. Short term fostering for children that come from a single parent family say, who’s parent needs a break, or is perhaps hospitalized or simply transient short term care for children with difficulties or special needs. It gives me the opportunity to be with a child, to share a big, unused bubble of love with somebody who may need a feeling of security.
I’ve worked on this for some two years now. I’ve worked with my coach and mentor, been to the meetings, had all of the gory details the what ifs and why you should nots explained to me without any lingering doubt. But as yet I’ve never been offered the opportunity, even though I know (though I was disbelieving at first) they need people exactly like me.
And so I called my mentor, as I do regularly to simply chat, but this time with a question, “why?”.
And she shouldn’t under any circumstances tell me but she did. Somebody has said something. Someone has said that I’m not reliable, that I keep late hours and I come and go irregularly, that I drink, that I have people round to my house and we are rowdy, and that , most awfully, perhaps I like children but for the wrong reason.
She can not ignore this information, it’s said, it can’t be unsaid and is now a matter of record.
Only my ‘friends’ know about my wanting to foster, and you of course.
Who would do that, and why?
I’m not. I’m a bit of a gad fly. I have friends when I want them and ignore them when I don’t, apart form the dogs I come and go pretty much as I please. I’m not well off by any means, but there’s sufficient income to allow me to indulge myself in whim and folly to keep me happy and all in all it’s a comfortable, happily selfish lifestyle.
Except that there’s one thing I miss, a part of me that isn’t fulfilled, at all. I miss children. I’m broody.
I always thought that I would have children, actually I thought I’d have lots of them.
This isn’t an option for me as I understand the process. It is apparent that you need a significant other to make children, which quite clearly doesn’t appear to be on the cards. And I’m not so self absorbed as to wish to adopt, although it is an alternative, because I’d prefer to think that for every child in need of adoption there must be better prepared parents than the single parent alternative that I could offer.
So the route that I took was that of fostering. Short term fostering for children that come from a single parent family say, who’s parent needs a break, or is perhaps hospitalized or simply transient short term care for children with difficulties or special needs. It gives me the opportunity to be with a child, to share a big, unused bubble of love with somebody who may need a feeling of security.
I’ve worked on this for some two years now. I’ve worked with my coach and mentor, been to the meetings, had all of the gory details the what ifs and why you should nots explained to me without any lingering doubt. But as yet I’ve never been offered the opportunity, even though I know (though I was disbelieving at first) they need people exactly like me.
And so I called my mentor, as I do regularly to simply chat, but this time with a question, “why?”.
And she shouldn’t under any circumstances tell me but she did. Somebody has said something. Someone has said that I’m not reliable, that I keep late hours and I come and go irregularly, that I drink, that I have people round to my house and we are rowdy, and that , most awfully, perhaps I like children but for the wrong reason.
She can not ignore this information, it’s said, it can’t be unsaid and is now a matter of record.
Only my ‘friends’ know about my wanting to foster, and you of course.
Who would do that, and why?
Friday, May 12, 2006
the yellow peril
I spent the evening sanding the kitchen walls. Which is unusual for me, preparation is usually anathema. I simply can’t be arsed, can’t wait to change the scenery and slap on the colour. So the final two hours, the last thing I did before going to bed, were spent slapping on the fresh paint on the long plain wall so that I would wake up to a cheery new colour.
It’s probably already been mentioned that I’m not at my sparkling best in the morning, In truth I hardly noticed the freshly painted wall, in any case the kitchen doesn’t get a lot of sunlight in the morning.
I went through the usual tedious routine of trying to make sense of my world in the mornings. (I have a strange relationship with inanimate objects. Packets fall on my head when I open cupboards, I stub my toe on a protruding mop handle, and for some reason will find a sheet of newspaper sticking to the sole of my foot. There’s a perfectly rational explanation, I know, I simply don’t put things away properly, I just jam things into gaps in the other clutter from where they, or a neighbour, eventually escape and fight back).
So, wrestling with the kettle, and absorbed with the food label that had become attached to my hip I called the dogs for early morning ablutions.
It takes three goes. They lie in. The first call is polite “c’mon guys”. The second call is more forceful, half way through the first coffee “Oy, come on!”. I need the in the yard you see, before I go for my shower. Eventually I have to go and poke them with my toe and force them, ruthlessly, out of the door.
So, I’m squeaky clean, freshly laundered, smelling of lemons, with polished teeth and mouthwash fresh breath. Standing at the door actually enjoying the sunshine this morning, wrapped in my towel, because having got the little sods out I now have to coerce them back in with promises of breakfast. (Goodness knows what my neighbours make of this routine).
Then, and only then, did I notice that I now have a beautiful, doe eyed, brown, and white Springer Spaniel.
Who is bright yellow down one side.
Sod it, tonight I’m going to paint the rest of him purple.
It’s probably already been mentioned that I’m not at my sparkling best in the morning, In truth I hardly noticed the freshly painted wall, in any case the kitchen doesn’t get a lot of sunlight in the morning.
I went through the usual tedious routine of trying to make sense of my world in the mornings. (I have a strange relationship with inanimate objects. Packets fall on my head when I open cupboards, I stub my toe on a protruding mop handle, and for some reason will find a sheet of newspaper sticking to the sole of my foot. There’s a perfectly rational explanation, I know, I simply don’t put things away properly, I just jam things into gaps in the other clutter from where they, or a neighbour, eventually escape and fight back).
So, wrestling with the kettle, and absorbed with the food label that had become attached to my hip I called the dogs for early morning ablutions.
It takes three goes. They lie in. The first call is polite “c’mon guys”. The second call is more forceful, half way through the first coffee “Oy, come on!”. I need the in the yard you see, before I go for my shower. Eventually I have to go and poke them with my toe and force them, ruthlessly, out of the door.
So, I’m squeaky clean, freshly laundered, smelling of lemons, with polished teeth and mouthwash fresh breath. Standing at the door actually enjoying the sunshine this morning, wrapped in my towel, because having got the little sods out I now have to coerce them back in with promises of breakfast. (Goodness knows what my neighbours make of this routine).
Then, and only then, did I notice that I now have a beautiful, doe eyed, brown, and white Springer Spaniel.
Who is bright yellow down one side.
Sod it, tonight I’m going to paint the rest of him purple.
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Sunday, May 07, 2006
the magic caravan (part i).....
…come the end of the long summer, with two weeks left to the beginning of term.
They’d worked hard and despite a frenzied, prolonged period of drunken debauch they’d managed to save enough for a…a two week drunken debauch, elsewhere. A road trip.
Unfortunately they hadn’t saved enough to fix Derek’s car. The MOT confirmed their worst suspicions, Derek owned a useless lump of dilapidated tin with a wheel in each corner, rather than something that could be reliably described as vehicular transport.
The solution was simple, they stole Derek’s fathers, and left a note.
It was a beautiful old blue Zephyr, with fins and bench seats, and a tank that held 20 gallons of petrol. The cavernous boot took all the clothes (6 T shirts and one pair of underpants each) they’d need for two weeks, a tent, sleeping bags and various camping paraphernalia – and the rear seats held a copious amount of lager in cans). Perfect.
Cornwall is a long drive from Manchester, almost due south, and boring too. Miles upon miles of motorway, until at last the motorway runs out below Exeter and thankfully gives up to country lanes.
They’d wiled away the tedium of the first part of the journey by making slow, steady inroads into the mountain of lager on the rear seats. And talking jibberwaffle.
“So what did you tell Janet?” asked Colin.
“I told her I was going away for a couple of weeks”
“And she was okay about it?”
“Not exactly”, said Derek “She wanted to come too”
“Oh dear”
“It’s okay, I told her she wouldn’t enjoy it”. “How did I know?” she said. “I told her I’d make sure”.
“I don’t think we’re going out any more”.
While Derek drove Colin studied the map. There was no plan, he was just looking for places with funny names, as good a destination as any to head for he reasoned. But looking down in a car isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, and a large quantity of tinned warm lager and a full bladder wasn’t helping to dispel the nausea, so he rolled it into a ball and hurled it into the back seat. Bugger it, we’ll go blind.
They drove and drove, powered by lager, crisps and chocolate bars, denying the need to pee or stop for any reason, heading progressively deeper and deeper into the country side, south west according to the sun. It was a question of tacking like a boat under sail, what looked like a way south would angle unexpectedly and they’d have to find another lane, occasionally a dead ending in a farm, to continue to head in the direction they generally intended.
Here, in Devon, the countryside is ancient. The hedgerows and venerable ash and oak have seen the Romans, the Normans and the Cornish Kings come and go. There are trees, markers in the landscape and in history, that are mentioned in the Magna Carta. The sky is as old as the as the rolling hills and copses, the air is thick, rich and azure, the sun does not burn as brightly here, the redolence of the atmosphere prevents it.
They were oblivious to it all.
Sometime around 7 o’clock they, by dint of mutual need to toilet, decided almost telepathically that they needed to find somewhere to stop and pitch the tent.
An hour later, in the glooming, with the trees casting short, fading shadows above, they were still travelling down tiny lanes, denied any view or clue by the bordering hedges. There was a growing air of desperation in the car. The beer consumption had slowed dramatically partly due to distended bladders, and partly because of an ‘incident’ a little earlier when Derek had braked suddenly and the massed ranks of empty cans had hurried forward under the seat and lodged themselves in the front foot wells, and under the pedals. Looking down Colin thought there were quite an impressive number, and suffered a mild cramp in his stomach.
Eventually, in extremis, they rounded a corner into a village green. A tiny hamlet, with a scattering of houses set back arbitrarily from a stone cross in a junction in the road. More importantly there was a pub.
“Fancy a pint?” said Derek and added, ironically, “I’m parched”.
“Dry as a nun’s tit” said Colin
The pub door opened with a squeal of hinges, into a dun brown room, marinated in memories of wood smoke. The floor was stone, the windows, tiny, were leaded and let in only sufficient light to make out the shapes of the tables and the forms around far wall. The bar was unoccupied, there were no hand pumps, or any visible bottles or glasses, no ashtrays, or bar towels, and more to the point, no bar staff or customers. A large ginger cat emerged from a door, ajar, by the side of the bar and walked sanguinely between them towards the still open front door.
“Dead loss”, said Colin, “I hope there’s a loo though ‘cos I’m bursting”.
“You could go in the bloody fireplace and no one would know” said Derek.
“Oi wouldn’t do thart if Oi were you”, said a gruff male voice from the other side of the half open door. “The toilet’s outside, roun' the back, an’ Oi’ll be with you in a minute”.
tbc...
They’d worked hard and despite a frenzied, prolonged period of drunken debauch they’d managed to save enough for a…a two week drunken debauch, elsewhere. A road trip.
Unfortunately they hadn’t saved enough to fix Derek’s car. The MOT confirmed their worst suspicions, Derek owned a useless lump of dilapidated tin with a wheel in each corner, rather than something that could be reliably described as vehicular transport.
The solution was simple, they stole Derek’s fathers, and left a note.
It was a beautiful old blue Zephyr, with fins and bench seats, and a tank that held 20 gallons of petrol. The cavernous boot took all the clothes (6 T shirts and one pair of underpants each) they’d need for two weeks, a tent, sleeping bags and various camping paraphernalia – and the rear seats held a copious amount of lager in cans). Perfect.
Cornwall is a long drive from Manchester, almost due south, and boring too. Miles upon miles of motorway, until at last the motorway runs out below Exeter and thankfully gives up to country lanes.
They’d wiled away the tedium of the first part of the journey by making slow, steady inroads into the mountain of lager on the rear seats. And talking jibberwaffle.
“So what did you tell Janet?” asked Colin.
“I told her I was going away for a couple of weeks”
“And she was okay about it?”
“Not exactly”, said Derek “She wanted to come too”
“Oh dear”
“It’s okay, I told her she wouldn’t enjoy it”. “How did I know?” she said. “I told her I’d make sure”.
“I don’t think we’re going out any more”.
While Derek drove Colin studied the map. There was no plan, he was just looking for places with funny names, as good a destination as any to head for he reasoned. But looking down in a car isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, and a large quantity of tinned warm lager and a full bladder wasn’t helping to dispel the nausea, so he rolled it into a ball and hurled it into the back seat. Bugger it, we’ll go blind.
They drove and drove, powered by lager, crisps and chocolate bars, denying the need to pee or stop for any reason, heading progressively deeper and deeper into the country side, south west according to the sun. It was a question of tacking like a boat under sail, what looked like a way south would angle unexpectedly and they’d have to find another lane, occasionally a dead ending in a farm, to continue to head in the direction they generally intended.
Here, in Devon, the countryside is ancient. The hedgerows and venerable ash and oak have seen the Romans, the Normans and the Cornish Kings come and go. There are trees, markers in the landscape and in history, that are mentioned in the Magna Carta. The sky is as old as the as the rolling hills and copses, the air is thick, rich and azure, the sun does not burn as brightly here, the redolence of the atmosphere prevents it.
They were oblivious to it all.
Sometime around 7 o’clock they, by dint of mutual need to toilet, decided almost telepathically that they needed to find somewhere to stop and pitch the tent.
An hour later, in the glooming, with the trees casting short, fading shadows above, they were still travelling down tiny lanes, denied any view or clue by the bordering hedges. There was a growing air of desperation in the car. The beer consumption had slowed dramatically partly due to distended bladders, and partly because of an ‘incident’ a little earlier when Derek had braked suddenly and the massed ranks of empty cans had hurried forward under the seat and lodged themselves in the front foot wells, and under the pedals. Looking down Colin thought there were quite an impressive number, and suffered a mild cramp in his stomach.
Eventually, in extremis, they rounded a corner into a village green. A tiny hamlet, with a scattering of houses set back arbitrarily from a stone cross in a junction in the road. More importantly there was a pub.
“Fancy a pint?” said Derek and added, ironically, “I’m parched”.
“Dry as a nun’s tit” said Colin
The pub door opened with a squeal of hinges, into a dun brown room, marinated in memories of wood smoke. The floor was stone, the windows, tiny, were leaded and let in only sufficient light to make out the shapes of the tables and the forms around far wall. The bar was unoccupied, there were no hand pumps, or any visible bottles or glasses, no ashtrays, or bar towels, and more to the point, no bar staff or customers. A large ginger cat emerged from a door, ajar, by the side of the bar and walked sanguinely between them towards the still open front door.
“Dead loss”, said Colin, “I hope there’s a loo though ‘cos I’m bursting”.
“You could go in the bloody fireplace and no one would know” said Derek.
“Oi wouldn’t do thart if Oi were you”, said a gruff male voice from the other side of the half open door. “The toilet’s outside, roun' the back, an’ Oi’ll be with you in a minute”.
tbc...
Monday, May 01, 2006
turn off the light...
Ladies and Gentlemen, members of the press….
I had a day drinking healthy liquids and a little workout in the gym. I swam in the pool and had just an hour lozzocking in the sunshine round the pool. And then, feeling horrible (my god, I’d forgotten what an abominable place the world can be without a pair a beer goggles), I went to the mall - along with, apparently the entire population of Houston.
New sunglasses were the order of the day. I get through sunglasses at the same rate that other people get through bic pens or Q-tips. The Dutch are currently embarking on a plan to reclaim a square mile of land from the sea by mounding my mislaid sunglasses into a 10ft high dyke.
In Houston it seems you can walk into a restaurant naked so long as you are wearing the latest Prada eye fashion.
It may be me, but Houston doesn’t really seem like a place to wander around in. Apart from anything else it’s far too bloody hot and humid for someone who comes from a slightly more temperate clime, and I hate making a squelching noise when I walk. The insides of my fat little thighs chap after a while.
And it’s even less photogenic than I am so I won’t inflict any pictures on you, unless you’ve a fetish for concrete, in which contact me privately, (well, any fetish for that matter).
I had a day drinking healthy liquids and a little workout in the gym. I swam in the pool and had just an hour lozzocking in the sunshine round the pool. And then, feeling horrible (my god, I’d forgotten what an abominable place the world can be without a pair a beer goggles), I went to the mall - along with, apparently the entire population of Houston.
New sunglasses were the order of the day. I get through sunglasses at the same rate that other people get through bic pens or Q-tips. The Dutch are currently embarking on a plan to reclaim a square mile of land from the sea by mounding my mislaid sunglasses into a 10ft high dyke.
In Houston it seems you can walk into a restaurant naked so long as you are wearing the latest Prada eye fashion.
It may be me, but Houston doesn’t really seem like a place to wander around in. Apart from anything else it’s far too bloody hot and humid for someone who comes from a slightly more temperate clime, and I hate making a squelching noise when I walk. The insides of my fat little thighs chap after a while.
And it’s even less photogenic than I am so I won’t inflict any pictures on you, unless you’ve a fetish for concrete, in which contact me privately, (well, any fetish for that matter).
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