Rimmer Shit (Childhood Memories)
Rimmer
Shit in Jan 2002; Sport, First Football Memories The Sound of Music,
Earliest Memory, Adverts, What’s on the Telly, Toys, Food, Cars, What I did on
my Holidays, Music, Pets, Pissing Contest, Mr Jones, First Day at School, The
Play Area, The Woods, Trespassers will be Prosecuted, The Pond, The River, The
Pipe, The Valley, Why Rimmer Shit?
Rimmer Shit so far
this month: Games,
Fancy Girls,
Troy Tempest,
Football
Cards, Stephen
Taylor, Stupid
Rules, Starting Sunday School, Monitors and Prefects, Old Money, House Points,
The
Titanic Story, story!, Milk, Cubs and Scouts and Crabs, Anthony, The
Mystery House on the Hill, Valley Drive Community, Tony Woolf’s Birthday, My Birthday, Throwing, Accidents
will Happen, Au
Pairs, Claire Jones, The Cows of Valley Drive.
Games
Must add some of
the weird games we played as kids.
I’m reminded of
weird games by this Coutie Catcher
We didn’t have a
name for it and it wasn’t just a girlie thing.
What else was
there?
Cat’s Cradle
Slapping hands
games
Making the
Skipping (Girlies
only) and their weird rhymes
Elastic Skipping
(Girlies only)
Hop Scotch
(Girlies only)
Daisy Chains
(Girlies only)
Pick Up Jacks
Pick Up Sticks
Split the Kipper
Gobbing
British Bulldogs
Kick Stone 123
French Cricket
Piggy in the
Middle (good for tormenting younger sisters)
Paper Aeroplanes
Anything
involving throwing stones
Conkers
Stick Races on
the River (Poo Sticks but never ever called Poo sticks)
Fancy Girls
Girls as a kid
were things to fancy but pretend not to!
Never ever admit
to fancying any.
Why? Why did I think that? Must have cost me lost of snogs and many
girlfriends and ended up with lots of shyness.
I look back now
and wish I knew then what I know now.
Don’t we all?
I can’t remember
the first girl I fancied. They say that
the women we fancy as adults is a combination of our childhood images.
In that case mine
would be a mix of;
Susan Stranks,
Penelope PitStop, Captain Scarlet Angels, The Hai Karate Woman, Catwoman, Some
of Pan’s People. You get the picture.
And as for the
girls I fancied. Claire Jones was my
playmate. And I mean my friend. Jane
Gunning was definitely one of them. She
looked a bit like Raquel Welch in her early years or so I thought. She once wrote and sent me a note,
“I think you’re
swell!”
I didn’t quite
know what it meant but it seemed something good and definitely worth hiding
under my bedroom carpet away from my Mum.
I think there
were a few on my road where I lived but I can’t really remember or I’m not
prepared to say even now!
There was of
course the triumvirate at my next
After junior
school I heard that Jane Burling had or did fancy me. But would I do anything about it over the
next few years after we left junior school, when we met at school sports day
and the boys and girls played cool and ignored each other. Would I heck.
Too shy, and I wouldn’t have known what to say. Easy now isn’t it. But then, it was a very wide uncrossable
chasm.
And as each year
passed, Jane Burling became more and more beautiful and less and less available. Of course No 3 became easily No 1 as the
years of our teens passed by. I should
have spotted the quiet unassuming No3!
Damn.
My Mum was right
she could always spot the future Miss Worlds.
More on girls
another time when the heat and red in my cheeks have calmed down!
Troy Tempest
Just the name
alone suggests hero with many facets.
Troy Tempest. TT, American,
Strong, Hero. Helen of
Apparently Troy
Tempest was modelled on James Garner so there you go!
Mind you, I
remember James Garner from the Rockford Files more than anything else.
So although
Thunderbirds was better, Troy Tempest of Stingray just
seemed the all round hero.
Maybe it was the
calm inside Stingray with Phones as your co-buddy.
It’s that tilted
hat and neat uniform.
The steady
steering of Stingray.
The silent bird
in the background.
The grouchy
commander.
The evil fishy
things to deal with.
But most of all
it’s the name.
My cartoon/puppet
alter ego is definitely Troy Tempest.
Football Cards
I must dig out my
old football cards and stickers.
Stephen Taylor
reminds me of some to the cards and stickers I collected, which I still have.
Three half full
albums of stickers of the First Division Football teams 68-69, 69-70, 70-71.
Hundreds of football
cards, coins, badges and booklets from bubblegum and Esso collections.
Loads of football
programmes, mostly from matches I’ve been to.
We used to spend
all our money on bubble gum football cards.
Thin slice of bubble gum, the best smell in the world and then look at
the cards, keep them or swap them. Read
all the details on the card and memorise.
That was it. Hours of joy.
Putting the cards into order. By
football team, alphabetic, by favourite player.
Of course I’ve
just remembered the Typhoo Tea big football cards that Stephen and I collected.
Just the best.
Stephen Taylor
For a while,
Stephen Taylor was my best friend at school.
I think Stephen was the kid crying so much on my first day at school
that he puked on the school step and they put a chair over the area so we wouldn’t step in it!! Welcome to school Stephen.
We seemed to have
common bonds, mainly football and football cards. I also used to go back to his house after
school and fight!
Yes, we used to
have wrestling contests which sometimes got a bit heated and ended in a
spitting fight, but generally it didn’t’ get out of hand.
My sporting
trivia knowledge was second only to Stephen’s, we’d watch any old crap they put
on the telly. All in Wrestling with Les
Kellet, Mick McManus, Jackie Palo, Tony St Clair (I think!), Motor Cross, and
of course the football results and collecting the stickerbooks.
Alas Stephen
moved to
I never thought
I’d be able to track him down, but his brother has just emailed me to see if I
want to contact Stephen. You bet! I’m digging out my football cards and my
Tyrer writing book in anticipation. The
following is the first page from my writing book, probably aged 6.
“Yesterday I went
to Stephen’s house and we swopt football cards and I hadunt (hadn’t) opund
(opened!)all of the pacits (packets!), and I sed (said!) to Stephen, I hafut
(haven’t) opunt all of my pacits and Stephen sed cumon (come on!) open
them. And I did and we had a fit
(fight!) and first we spitted and I spited on Stephens fase (face!) and Stephen
spitid on my jumpu (jumper!) and then we cict (kicked!) and Stephen cict (kicked!)
me.”
Ahh Friendship!!
Stupid Rules
I was going to
write about the stupid rules at school but now when I think about them it’s beginning to make
sense!
Greenbank Prep
loved stupid rules.
- Keep off the Grass.
- Don’t go behind the Holly Bush to retrieve your
tennis ball
- Only play football with a tennis ball
- Address the male teachers as Sir
- Not allowed to keep more than two exercise books
at the end of the year
There was one
thing I wasn’t even sure about which was pronunciation. I can’t remember if I had to talk posh as a
rule or I just fell in with everyone else.
I have a
But at Greenbank
you had to not only keep off the Gr-Ass, but it had to be Grass like Arse, Keep
off the Gr-Arse. Get it!!
This is only time
that I changed my accent and fell in line.
Nothing since has
changed it. I went back to my
Maybe that’s why
I’m not Prime Minister or CEO of a big company, I don’t have a Received English
accent.
I get it now that
the Grass would have become worn down and our uniforms messed up. I get it that you can’t be seen behind the
Holly Bush even if just retrieving a tennis ball. Big Balls hurt and damage. Sir is respect in a posh prep school (they
have to do something to charge the money for).
I don’t get it
with the exercise books. What I’d
written was precious, especially when younger.
I think that rule was made up.
Don’t know why.
Can’t think of
any more stupid rules but I’ll come up with some more.
Starting Sunday School
Sunday School.
Well for me and
my sister Sunday school was a bit different.
Firstly because
it involved a bloody long drive in to the centre of
My parents used
to take us, drop us off and go all the way home. That was at least an hour round trip, and
then they did the same to pick us up again.
The got clever
though. They started sharing and pooling
the trip with other parents who lived in the area. So we had a variety of parents take us there
and pick us up.
I always felt
that I was being abandoned being so far away from home for a few hours.
The place we were
being taken to was
There wasn’t at
the time a Reform Synagogue in
Mind you the
parents from the North of Manchester had to make the drive as well but it
wasn’t quite as far.
This is where
North met South, both parties looking down on each other.
The hall where we
met was downstairs and consequently windowless.
A large windowless wooden covered hall.
A weird place. The Alexander Levy
Hall.
We’d then be
carted off to various classed to learn Hebrew.
Starting with the alphabet when learning over the years to become fluent
readers with the aim of performing for our Bar/Bat Mitzvah.
When I started
Hebrew Classes at
There were no
dead bodies in the classrooms!
Why did I think
there were dead bodies?
Well when we were
younger, my Dad used to take us into the Synagogue.
Whilst there, I
used to wonder where all the bodies were buried, given that all Churches have
cemeteries, and that Jackson’s Row being in the centre of Manchester didn’t
appear to have a cemetery.
I just couldn’t
work it out, so I assumed that on the other side of the windows to the
synagogue, where the classrooms were attached, the bodies were buried.
It was a relief
when going into the classrooms a few years later to find no gravestones or
trace of bodies!
Monitors and Prefects
Monitors. When you’re a kid, that’s the first step in
the hierarchy of life. Becoming a
monitor.
Especially if
there’s a badge to go with it.
In reality it’s
slave labour or laziness from the teacher.
Why can’t they
open the windows themselves?
Milk Monitor,
Window Monitor, Dinner Monitor. Are
there any other types of monitor?
Wasn’t there
pencil monitor, responsible for sharpening pencils with that whirly hand
cranked machine?
Of course monitor
is a way of fobbing off the plebs, and protecting the higher grade kids with
the big jobs.
House Captain,
House Vice Captain, School Captain, Prefect and of course Head Prefect.
In junior school
I certainly made all the monitor positions and earned my badges.
I also was House
Vice Captain for a term and finally the power of House Captain, second only to
School Captain on the pecking order.
Had the blue
badge but never made the big gold one.
In fact I was threatened with having the badge removed for arguing with
Mrs Eastope the dinner lady, who vindictively sent me to the Headmaster. I cried to keep that badge. It worked!
All it meant was
I picked our House football team to play the other two House teams.
My one claim to
fame (and only I remember this) is that our House football team was pretty
crap, so of course I wanted to pick the best players we had available.
Now in the
playground at break we kicked the tennis ball around.
And it was clear
to me as player, coach, scout, manager and House Captain, that one player stood
out a mile.
Suzanne Burling!
Yes, Suzanne Burling
(I think you can tell which one from the photo!) played football with the boys
and was good. She was two years younger
and better than some of the male dross I was supposed to cajole into the team. She could certainly hold her own.
So I made
history. I picked her for the House
Football match. Was I a man ahead of his
time?
Shame on you Sir
Brown, Headmaster, Sir Atkinson my form master.
Nowadays it would have caused a national scandal, good girl footballer
not being allowed to play in a House Team when clearly she was better than some
of the other boy players.
They refused to
let her play and I had to withdraw her from the team.
I’d like to think
that was my contribution to the advance of women, feminism, equality, and of
course football.
And as for
prefect, well that was a senior school thing and there was no way in a million
years they were ever going to make me a prefect.
Old Money
Old money. That’s Pounds Shillings and Pence.
Now as a child of
the sixties, the only thing that Old Money meant to me was how many sweets
could I buy with each denomination.
In fact decimalisation
in 1971 was welcomed by us kids because it caused sweetshop owner
confusion. Penny-Black Jacks and Fruit
Salads could be bought at 3 for a new penny in some shops. 2.4 pence to the new p caused the uncertainty
which we cashed in on.
I was born too
late to remember the farthing (quarter of a penny), withdrawn in 1965. Clearly I wasn’t spending money aged 4.
Half Penny –
Ha’Penny wasn’t very exciting.
A Penny was big
and had some buying power with sweets.
The main dream here was finding a 1933 Penny which would have allowed me
to retire aged 5. We used to look out
for 1933 Pennys and Penny Black stamps.
(Quite why someone would post a letter using a Penny Black stamp wasn’t
clear to me as a kid. I had a
fascination with the Penny Black (without quite knowing what it was!!)
Thrupenny
Bit. Now we’re talking. 3 Penny’s, a coin with a bit of weight,
enough sweets to at least feel mildly sick, and best of all coins, the weirdest
and best design – A 12 sided coin! Only the British could come up with a 12
sided coin.
Sixpence, Tanner
was the first silver bit of buying power.
This will give you sweets and some change. Small and easy to lose, but equally you might
find one!
Bob, a Shilling
is now really in the big spending league, that’s twelve pennys, there’s nothing
you can’t buy for 12 pence, including a slave (cub or scout) for Bob a Job.
Two Shillings
(never ever called a florin) obviously had some power for the week ahead. Also you can use one design of them to cheat
at heads and tails by feeling the tail side with the tips of your fingers and
flipping it to heads whilst in your clenched fist (does anyone know what the
hell I’m talking about?)
And finally we
come to my favourite. The Half Crown.
Half a Crown! My oh my that had some
spending power, 2 shillings and then some, I still go wobbly at the thought of
that extra tweak of spending power with the additional sixpence on top of the 2
shillings. Mrs E. Yates (sweetshop) here
we come.
In theory there
was a Crown but I don’t think one ever existed except the Churchill ’65
commemorative Crown.
Tony Woolf (ex fat
chubby kid in previous entry) has asked me to mention the 10 Bob
note. Now I don’t know where he comes
from, but he must have been a millionaire even to touch one of those brown
things. I can’t remember one ever
crossing my path. I would have been sick
for a week on ten bobs worth of sweets.
Of course pound
notes (a quid) and five pound notes were visible in my Mum’s purse but nothing
we ever came across unless we were given some money to buy birthday presents
for other people.
I kept my money
and spare change in a blue plastic upright pig(gy bank) with a red hat slot,
easily removed for lots of spending power.
Decimalisation
came along in 1971.
“One pound is a
Hundred New pence, a hundred New Pence to the Pound.” sang The Scaffold (John
Gorman, Roger McGough, and Mike McGear (Paul McCartney’s brother)
The Fifty Pence
piece which replaced the Brown Ten Bob note was the highlight. A seven sided coin!
But not as cool
as a 12 sided thrupenny bit.
House Points
Competition. You either love it or hate it as a kid. I loved it.
From day one, especially being quite good at sport and some subjects, I
loved the buzz of winning house points either for your Team/House or
individually.
Except of course
when things are going badly! At my
senior school we had monthly grades/reports posted on the noticeboard. Fine if you’re doing well, but my English was
so bad (still is ha ha) that I often received an ‘E’. Two ‘E’s and you were put on report and had
to have all teachers sign your card. Just like a Leaving Card!!!! And once one teacher say, in English had
given you an ‘E” the rest followed like Bloodhounds, so even your best subject
just like Ice Dance scoring was marked down.
There’s nothing
like a big red tick on a piece of work which teacher has marked. Especially if it contains a silver or gold
star.
Or teachers
randomly awarding a house point to your house based on some flippant comment
you made.
Throughout my
school career I was always in the Blue team.
Blue for sports
day at Handforth C of E (even thought super hero Graham Hayes was in the Yellow
Team).
At Greenbank I
was in
At senior school
I was in
Most recently
I’ve started awarding Silver and Gold stars to people who I’m training
(Adults). It’s an amazing experiment in
cruel child psychology and those memories.
Some don’t want
to play. Some not only want to play but
spend the next three day working out how to win more stars. Some say they don’t want to play but secretly
do. Some pretend to not mind that they
don’t have any stars but are really sulking.
Some want to see totally fair play in the award of stars (but when were
our teachers ever fair?). Some want to
know why a silver star or why a gold star.
Some don’t want others to get stars even if they don’t either.
That’s Life!
The Titanic Story, story!
Confession Time.
This hidden truth
has plagued me for most of my life and it’s time to confess and bring it out in
the open.
In 1970 I changed
schools. I moved from Handforth C of E
to Greenbank, a posh private preppie school.
My parents didn’t
think that Handforth C of E was getting the best out of me, and they were
probably right.
So Greenbank it
was, Sept ’71 new school uniform, sitting next to Jamie Marseden.
At Handforth C of
E we could pretty much did as we liked.
Open classroom, sitting at tables in groups, going up to teacher for
work or them coming to you.
Greenbank was
more formal. Rows of desks, two at each
desk.
Homework as
well. Holy Shit homework, which was then
marked! I don’t remember any of that at
Handforth C of E.
What it meant at
Handforth C of E is that I was 4 years ahead of my age at Maths and 1-2 years
behind with English, largely because I could get away with it and concentrate
on the Maths.
I’ll never forget
Mr Parker at Handforth doing a review of each pupil for the next year with his
hopes for them, and one of Mr Parker’s hopes for me was,
“Hopefully Anthony
will be able to write his ‘S’s smaller and do joined up writing next year!”
The shame of it,
a 9 year old who couldn't make his ’S’s smaller and do joined up writing. So I left and moved to Greenbank (Ha Ha)
Actually Mr
Parker was a great teacher and begged my parents to let me stay at Handforth C
of E (that’s what my parents told me!)
So first week at
Greenbank and ‘Sir’ Geoff Atkinson (you had to call them Sir, so it became Sir
Atkinson) read us a wonderful story about The Titanic, his story telling was
magic and he illustrated his stories with drawings he’d put up on the walls of
the classroom. This is fantastic,
sitting here listening to stories, how hard can this Greenbank be.
Payback
Time. “Now kids, I’d like you tonight to
write about The Titanic from what I’ve told you today!!”
Oh my God,
write! I can’t write! I can do advanced
maths and play chess to county level and special puzzles but write. Oh No!
I went home and
cried and cried and cried about this writing I had to do about The Titanic.
What was a Mother
to do? Reassure. Advise.
Help?
Well if you’re my
Mother, you’d kill or maybe burn the school down overnight so that Anthony
wouldn’t have to face the following day.
Those can be the
fallback plans.
The solution was
obvious.
She dictates. I write.
Problem
solved. Just a little helping hand in
the first week, get me up to speed.
So the following
day I handed my work in on the Titanic.
And that was that. Receive it
back with a good mark and get back to the maths.
But of course
there’s always rough justice, what goes around comes around.
Sir Atkinson
reads all The Titanic Stories and when he gave them back he singled me out!!!
Oh no what’s
going to happen, I could be thrashed to within an inch of my life, or worse
sent to the Headmaster.
“Anthony,
excellent work, I’m going to give you 2 House Points (Hurray) and put you’re
writing on the wall by the door (Holy Shit!)
Well firstly too
right it should receive awards, My Mum wrote it and she was competing against
the other 9 year olds.
But then this
satanic punishment dawned on me.
Every day when
going in and out of the classroom my evil lie would be staring at me with its
two House Point Starry eyes, rubbing it in.
Every day for
months I had to walk past that damn Titanic Essay and curse the Rough Justice
meted out to me.
Day after
Day. When will this end? It seemed to go
on for ever and ever. The Titanic. More like my Titanic struggle with writing.
Incidentally, I
have never before or since had work good enough to be commended or put on a
wall, so that makes it even worse, the one piece of work of mine nailed to a
wall and awarded 2 stars was my Mum’s.
Later in life
I’ve discovered that I’m probably dyslexic (and Autistic going by the www.wired.com geek test) that would explain my large ‘S’s, my
hating writing, my chess ability and spatial skill) so even writing down my
mother’s wonderful words was maybe a reward for the struggle I always had with
writing.
As you can see
from all this writing!
Milk
Milk is a strange
fluid that seems to flow through childhood.
Obviously it
starts with being breast fed but I can’t remember that far back.
But of course
there is the milkman with his electric milkfloat.
Are milkmen the
only people with electric cars?
Why, what did
they do to deserve that?
What special
properties does a milkman have that allows him to drive an electric car?
Now let’s get on
to the Cow’s milk, the real stinky stuff.
The older you get
the less you like milk, am I right?
As kids we used
to fight over the cream at the top of the bottle so that we could put it on our
Frosties.
But I think my
love of milk started going down hill when I became a milk monitor.
Can you think of
a more stinky job than pressing your finger through 30 small milk bottles to
feed your classmates?
By the end of
each day I had milk fatigue. And milk
pressers thumb.
The last straw
(get it?) was much older when I spilt some milk in my first car.
That was it, the
end of my relationship with milk.
I couldn’t get
rid of the smell in the car.
And as for Cows
the provider of milk. They’re just plain
weird. Don’t you think?
Mind you the cows
did provide me with Cow Pats to run my firework experiments with.
That’s another
story for another day.
Cubs and Scouts and Crabs
Cubs and Scouts,
what was that all about?
Thank God my Mum
didn’t let me join the Cubs or Scouts.
Now I don’t have
any embarrassing memories to think about which involve earning badges doing
strange things
My sister was a
Brownie and Girl Guide. Ha Ha Ha! Must get her badges out some time.
The only reason I
ever wanted to join the cubs was so that I could play Crab Football with
Stephen Taylor.
In standing
position crouch down, put the palms of your hand on the floor behind you,
gather in a team and kick a football around.
That was Crab
Football for you and the only temptation I had with Cubs.
Phew, close
shave.
Bob a Job. I was too lazy.
Anthony
Anthony don’t
contradict your mother.
Anthony be an
accountant and the world is your oyster.
Anthony behave
like an adult and we’ll treat you like an adult.
Anthony turn the
volume down just for a minute.
Anthony go and
dance.
Anthony what did
you do at school today.
Anthony let
Carolyn watch what she wants.
Anthony let your
sister join in.
Anthony it will
be ready in a minute.
Anthony we’ll be
home soon.
Anthony we’re
going to your grandparents.
Anthony come down
and say hello.
Just a few things
my parents used to say. Actually mostly
my Mum.
My Dad didn’t say
much, He earned the money.
The Mystery House on the Hill
Along the Valley
(in the opposite directions form The Rimmers and their shit!) was a mystery large
house set in grounds.
No-one knows what
happened in this house except young teenage girls would go in and emerge with
babies and prams.
This was a house
of ill repute for unmarried mothers.
A sinful place!!
I say this
because as children we seemed to think this.
A place to be avoided the people who lived there to be avoided.
Occasionally we
saw a group of the girls outside the grounds pushing their prams.
But why did we
not like them?
Where did we get
our prejudices from?
I don’t think it
was my parents. My Mum explained what
the place was but as far as I can remember without any opinion.
Why were we
slightly scared to the place and its mystery?
Don’t know.
Recently I
revisited The Valley and walked past the entrance to the home.
I walked up the
drive for the first time in my life.
To my surprise
the place was derelict.
In fact the
buildings had been knocked to the ground.
The area was
eerily deserted like secrets had been buried there.
Very strange, and
a reminder that in the so called liberated 60s, even us kids were very
conservative and there was great prejudice.
Valley Drive Community
We lived at 25 Valley Drive.
Valley Drive was
one drive of 4 that formed a square around a central field called “The Play
Area”.
There was only
one road on to the estate so consequently there was no through traffic, which
meant we could play out on the street in relative safety from cars.
And play we
did. The 60s, baby boom, lots of kids.
Bikes, football,
tennis, skipping (for girls), running from house to house, hide and seek (or
Kickstone
And neighbours
that we knew. At least neighbours that
we knew the name of, and to say hello to, and to know a lot of their personal
business!
This was a modern
estate built in ’62, not some old community, but we more or less knew everyone
and everything that happened.
Nowadays you’re
lucky if you recognise your next door neighbour.
The neighbours
weren’t partying every day or round at each others house (although some were!!!
and even as kids we know who you are!).
Actually my Mum
seemed to be friends with so many of the people on our street.
I suppose young
estate, lots of kids, brings neighbours together, but I still don’t see a whole
road of neighbours knowing each other nowadays.
And it was far
from being young families. There was a
real mix of ages.
One of the terms
of the lease on the houses originally was that you couldn’t put fencing at the
front, this meant that all the gardens were open.
I think maybe
this meant that people were more open, rather than hiding in their castles and
behind their gates. As time went on this
changed a bit with people building extensions and lots of closed porches, not
quite as open as it was early on.
I wouldn’t say
there was real community there but as a child it felt safe and known.
Tony Woolf’s Birthday
Tony Woolf’s
birthday is the day after mine.
He’s my oldest
friend, or at least let’s say I met him first before he was my friend.
Although he
became a sleek slim babe magnet in my teens I remember him initially as a
boring chubby kid.
We were at Sunday
school together and talked at the break.
All he seemed to
talk and brag about was the schools he’s applied for after junior school.
“I’m thinking of
going to MGS,
I’m taking the
exam for William Hulme,
Altrincham
Grammar is one of my options…..etc etc etc, blah blah blah.”
Not the kind of
thing you want to here from a chubby kid in the break from studying the Old
Testament.
Years past, and I
wondered what happened to chubby boring Anthony Woolf.
I found out with
a nasty jolt a few years later!
My sister came
back from youth club one day to announce that she had a crush on this cool guy.
Oh yeh, who?
He’s called Tony
Woolf.
Holy shit, not
the boring chubby kid who appears to have changed his name.
My sister is
snogging a boring chubby kid. Yuch
Maybe he became
my best friend so that I could stop my sister going any further with him!
He made up for
all of this several years later with the biggest favour to me of my life.
He got me laid
before my teens evaporated.
One dark
Christmas night, he pretended to get off with my sister again.
Why would he do
such a chivalrous act.
Only so that the
way was made clear for me and Lisa (apple of my desire) to be on our own.
And it
worked. My wish came true of getting
laid before I died. I never thought it
would happen.
Thank you boring
chubby kid.
And the moral of
the story. If a boring chubby kid starts
talking to you, at least pretend to show some interest because you never know
where it may lead.
Oh and have a
younger sister if you can, that helps big time with getting the girlfriends.
My Birthday
Anthony Henry
Goodson was born this day
It’s my birthday
today.
So what are my
early birthday memories?
The one I most
remember was 1966, I think it was, aged 5.
I got Scalextric for my birthday.
Quite the most
exciting thing ever in my life.
I was so exited I
seemed to remember taking part of it across the road, walking through the snow,
to the Davisons.
The set was a
black standard track either oval or figure of eight.
Three racing
cars, a white Cooper, a red Ferrari, and a blue Lotus (my favourite) (the Minis
and the green BRM came along later) and an electric transformer with a reset
button (very important)
Of course it was
about racing the cars on the track, but it was also about building the track,
working out how the cars worked,
And most of all
the smell. The smell of wire brushes
burnt on metal. Ahhhhh beautiful
Quite the best
present ever.
Of course this
meant I hated train sets and people who have train sets. Couldn’t and can’t see the point when you can
race cars on a track!
The second
favourite was Subbuteo. The green felt baize, the colour of the
football teams, the goals, the goalkeepers.
Wonderful.
I loved it more
to treasure it than to play it.
Finally and later
on, I think for one birthday I got a gun and target system which shot soft
rubber sticker darts at a metal target with moving bits!
Cool.
Of course there
were the obligatory bikes at the obligatory stages.
Birthdays were
always the big things for us, not Christmas.
And of course
birthday parties. I don’t remember any
specific parties. I did have a wire
recording (yes wire recording preceded tape recorders) of me saying who I was
inviting to my fourth birthday. One
girls name gets repeated several times so she was obviously the object of my
affection!
Of course the
usual cakes, birthday cake, crisps, jelly, and other assortments. And of course balloons, which I’ve always had
a fascination with.
Must be the
rubber!
And games of
course. Pass the Parcel, Musical
Statues, Musical Chairs.
My Birthday was
always the highlight of the year.
Throwing
Seems strange
that even a word like Throwing evokes so many memories.
Of course when
you’re a hunter gatherer down in the Valley, throwing is a key skill.
Roy our plumber
could throw a stone over the top of the very tall tree at the back of our
garden.
How did he do
that?
Of course I was
only 4 the first time he showed me, and no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t
throw a stone more than a few feet.
Given I was 4
this wasn’t surprising, but being 4 it seemed mysterious, almost a miracle of
Later on though
with
The low point
being my first attempted throw of a stone on to the car-port roof, under which
the car was parked.
Whilst aiming to
sling a stone on to the flat roof, I held the stone a bit too long and it
smashed the garage window which was at my own height. This was the first of many smashed windows.
Dad wasn’t as
angry as I thought he’d be.
Throwing
continued throughout my childhood, either competing to hit something from a
short distance, or the straight long throw.
It must have been
the young male hunting instinct that made me throw so much.
The one thing I
can’t resist even today is being on the sea shore and skimming stones.
I learnt on The
River in The Valley. There’s nothing I
don’t know about stone skimming.
The stone became
the main weapon of choice.
Sometimes
carelessly used!!!
I can’t believe
that when one boy was spraying me with a water hosepipe I threw a stone at him
through the water.
Doesn’t seem like
a fair fight!
It hit him on the
head Klunk.
What was I
thinking?
I could have
killed him.
No more stone
throwing for me.
I can’t resist
even today, it’s in my genes.
Accidents will Happen
My childhood was
surprisingly accident free. No
breaks. No serious Injuries. No serious illness.
The usual mix of
Measles, German Measles, Mumps, Chicken Pox.
No breaks. No Hospital.
So all this
leaves is my near death experience!
Just back from
our holidays. Early morning. I awake.
Sister awakes.
Let’s play with
the empty luggage cases.
No problems so
far.
Let’s play with
the big grey luggage case.
“Tell you what
Carolyn, why don’t you climb in the suitcase and I’ll shut you in it and then
let you out.”
No problems so
far. In she climbs. Has a scream, and I let her out.
“Now I’ll climb
in the suitcase and you lock me in and then let me out.”
I climb in, my
sister shuts the suitcase, clips the locks closed.
“Let me out now
Carolyn”
“How?”
“What do you mean
How?”
“I can’t get it
open, I don’t know how!!!!!!!!”
“Carolyn, let me
out, NOW!!!!!!!!”
So there I was
shut in a suitcase, and there was my sister outside the suitcase and not
knowing how to open it.
It’s early
morning and no one around, the air is running out.
How long will
Anthony survive locked in the suitcase?
“Go and get the
Au Pair Carolyn, quickly”
Carolyn goes and
gets the Au Pair. Useless.
Doesn’t
understand what’s going on.
Doesn’t
understand English well enough.
Doesn’t know how
to open the suitcase either.
Anthony is now
dying (it’s my story and I’ll exaggerate as much as I like) air is running out.
And then a
miracle. For some strange reason my Dad
woke up early, and in passing our bedroom, realised what was going on and let
me out.
That’s it. A bit anticlimactic eh?
Nothing else to
report, except a Lacrosse ball in my eye, and I temporarily lost my short term
memory for a few hour by hitting the
back of my head, long jumping on to a foam mattress which slipped and I hit the
back of my head on the grass.
Went upstairs for
a “Short Sleep” and woke up an hour later to find out I didn’t know what year
it was!
Or anything
associated with time.
I knew who I was
and everyone else, but no time context.
Fortunately, on
the way to hospital, it gradually came back to me.
It’s like that,
on the way to the doctor you always get better!
Au Pairs
Au Pairs. Why?
Couldn’t see the
point as a child.
May have been
useful to my Mum, but as a child they seemed worthless.
What were they
good for that my Mum couldn’t do?
We’re talking
child’s perspective here.
And we had them
in all shapes and sizes. Let’s see how
many I can remember and what memories it prompts.
Andrea – Spanish
Kirsten – Swedish
Margarita –
Swedish
Françoise –
French (Quote my Mum “One week in bed, one week did nothing but sunbathe.”)
Margaret – Polish
Michelin – French
Deni –
Yugoslavian
Marta –
Czechoslovakian
Nada –
Yugoslavian
Karen - English
Yep, it’s Marta’s
arse that stands out. It’s the biggest
and most terrifying arse I’ve ever known, the reason being that when you’re a 7
year old child, that’s what you see, Marta’s arse is at head height. My, it was big. She looked like a Bulgarian Shot Putter,
except of course she was Czechoslovakian.
And how did I know I was 7? Well,
she was with us in 1968 when the Soviets invaded
The Au Pairs I’ve
listed are the ones I remember for outstanding achievement in the line of duty
of looking after me and my younger sister, we generally tried to make their
lives a misery. There were several
others, some of which only lasted a week but I can’t remember them right now.
Andrea was our
first. Spanish, not much English, Spanish Omelettes, and she cried a lot in her
bedroom because she was homesick. I
remember going to her bedroom to comfort her.
Nada smoked a lot
and had short hair. Er that’s it. Oh and visited us a few years later.
Kirsten was
Swedish and had short hair. Er that’s
it.
Margarita was Swedish
and had short hair. Er that’s it. (So
much for Swedish Au Pairs and their image)
Margaret was
stunning looking and my Mum left her with my Dad when we went on holiday to St
Ives. She also couldn’t linguistically
hear the difference between, “Butter” and “Batter”. Just an interesting fact if
you ever want to torment Polish people.
Michelin, was
short, stocky, looked like the Michelin tyre man, and Olive from On the Buses,
and couldn’t speak much English except “Anthony play Monopoly!” for some strange
reason.
Demi I can’t
remember.
Franciose bought
me a large toy car when she arrived (I liked her), but I think she lasted 4
days (now confirmed as 2 weeks).
Karen was of
course the most exotic one. Why, because
she wasn’t any of this foreign rubbish like all Au Pairs. Karen was English. Not only was she English but she came from
and lived in Wythenshawe. Now how can I
put it politely without getting my head kicked in. Yes that’s it, if I say anything bad about
Wythenshawe I’ll get my head kicked in.
It was rough. So of course Karen
knew all about life, generally leading my sister astray and wanting to
introduce us to Bonnie and
What did Au Pairs
do? They didn’t feed us, we spoilt kids
wouldn’t dare have any of their food.
They taught us nothing, except Karen of course. They used up space (the
spare bedroom) we could have used to play with, and it wasn’t the same as
coming home to Mummy.
We were spoilt
brats. I feel like Bart Simpson
describing my life.
Claire Jones
Claire Jones was
my friend.
From the earliest
days I can remember I played with Claire Jones.
Claire lived
opposite us on our estate.
We did everything
together (except snog Robert Bongwell, which only she did, behind my bed aged
5!) We played out in the street
together, our speciality was two wheelers on our tricycles. Claire was also in love with Paul McCartney.
My favourite
memory was Claire and I playing in the soil at the side of our house. We took the soil and totally plastered it on
to our faces so that we were completed covered in it, walked into our house and
declared to my Mum,
“Look Mum we’re
Black Men!”
The Cows of Valley
Drive
How did the cows
know to come into our garden?
Any time of the
year I could throw back the curtains in my bedroom and look down to see 10 Cows
standing in our garden.
Sometimes there
was just trace of cow, with hoof marks in the garden, the Cows had been.
Why us? Once they knew about our garden, no matter
what fencing we put up they broke in, in the middle of night.
How do Cows do
that?
Why do Cows do
that?
Was our garden
Cow heaven?
Was this some
kind of secret meeting place?
They don’t seem
such intelligent creatures, but you never know, perhaps they disguise it well.
My Mum always
said we were lucky to have Cows, some children have never seen a Cow (except
those concrete ones in