Going Back in Time and Daytime TV

That's it; I'm obsessed, today I've gone back and created blog entries for 1976, 1981 and 1986. The interesting thing is how much you remember once you start chasing down memories. Often it's the frustration of trying to find something on the inter-web (just see how much info you can find for 1976 for example) that actually stimulates your little grey cells ...as M.Poirot might have put it. I've relived starting university, my first proper job, getting married, buying our first house, working in a pub for a year and so on.

I'm afraid that I've had Daytime TV on in the background and Jesus H Christ it is so banal. I'm sick of hearing about what's happening in "The Soaps" as if they were reality. I can't believe that TV employs people to watch TV so that they can tell the viewers what it is they are going to view in case they are to stupid to follow the plots themselves without these handy spoilers. It's not exactly Rocket Surgery to follow the plots of one or more soaps, is it? I know it's supposed to be arrogant to look down one's nose at "the Peoples Culture" and I know quite how addictive they can be, I got hooked, for a while,  when I was home in the day during some of the 1990's, but for flipps sake this is celebrating and encouraging the dumbing down of society. I'm not a drama snob, if you'd seen what I've read and watched that would be obvious, but I do think that Lord Reith had a point about the purpose of TV and that perhaps we would all benefit if it returned a little way, at least, toward his original vision. If Karl Marx was alive today I think he'd claim that, in the twenty first century, "The Soap" rather than Religion is the opium of the People.

Mothering Sunday at The Chequers...300 Meals at Lunch

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It turned out that that first day did prove to be a baptism of fire; I'd not worked behind this bar before, didn't know what beers we served, the prices or where anything was. We served 300 meals and didn't close until 5:00pm when we cleaned up, Barbara prepared everyone something to eat, steak in my case, and we prepared to open for the evening. I've never, before or since, ever worked in a busier bar that that one that afternoon; it was brilliant  I loved it! I started there at 11:00 am and we didn't finish closing up and clearing up until gone midnight!
I worked there for almost a year and gradually gained the confidence of the landlady. I took over the control of the stock and managed to end the petty pilfering that was going occurring. I stayed until they left and new tenants took over. I didn't really get on with them, by then I'd got use to virtually running the pub, as being relegated back to the position or A.N. Other barman made the job awful. Got drunk there one night, drove home, met the police, lost my driving license and that was that! I'll never know why I didn't knock on Andy's door and kip there...oh yeah it was because I was totally arseholed and coherent forward planning insn't something you do in that state.

Another Night in Rugby

Drove to the Chequers and again to Rugby where I filled in for a second night. Luckily I only worked there for two nights and never ever went there again. Unfortunately it meant was that the next day, Mothering Sunday, was to be my first actually working day in the Chequers itself. I'd got the job there because a fried, Andy, lived in a flat a few doors further down the road from the pub and he had worked there for a while in the evenings. He wasn't able to continue doing so and had suggested that I might want to take his place. The Chequers was a food orientated country pub and very popular with the Sunday lunch crowd. Mother's Day was always one of the busiest days of the year. Tomorrow, it appeared, was going to be a baptism of fire.

First Night The Chequers, Ullesthorpe - Diverted to Rugby.

This was the night I was supposed to start work at the Chequers pub in Ullesthorpe but it turned out to be a very different evening all together!!! When I arrived I met the landlady Barbara and her husband, can't remember his name. Her husband ran another pub way out in the sticks somewhere near Rugby. He had injured his back and needed someone to go to his pub and run it for him. It seemed that yours truly had drawn the short straw and  I was to follow him there in my car. This was to be the first problem; he was driving a high performance car, something with a Rolls Royce engine in it if I recall correctly, and drove like a maniac whereas  I was driving an old banger. Keeping up with him was almost impossible and a few times I thought I'd lost him. Eventually we arrived at his pub, I don't recall the name, which was a small village local in the middle of nowhere. It was virtually empty until 10:00pm but shortly afterward the regulars started putting in an appearance; apparently licencing laws counted for nothing. I eventually shut up shop at about 1:00am and, somehow after clearing up, managed to navigate my way home. I think I made it home for about 2:30 am and I'll never know how I managed it in the dead of night from a place in the middle of nowhere that I'd never been to before! What an interesting first night!