The adventures of a girl called Rosey

I have friend called Rosey. Single, attractive, amazing sense of humour and a naivety worthy of a five year old! A sweet girl, but she is not too good at holding her drink! As a result she invariably finds herself in very amusing situations when approaching the bottom of a bottle of chardonnay! She knows that she is a constant source of amusement to her friends, and I’m certain she will have no objection should I relate some of her adventures to you from time to time!

Here's a couple of stories to give you an idea what I'm talking about.

Rosey recently felt the need to clear out her kitchen cupboards. She often had these urges after a glass of wine or three! Rummaging through the piles of out-of-date packages and bags she came across a shelf crammed with canned food which she felt was surplice to requirements. An hour later she had amassed a considerable amount of rubbish – too much to cram into her diminutive garbage bin. The obvious solution was a bonfire! So after setting alight a pile of paper and wood she placed the kitchen rubbish amid the flames then retired to her newly emptied kitchen for a celebratory libation.

As she relaxed glass in hand, she was suddenly jolted to her senses by what sounded like rapid gunfire! Rushing outside to see what was happening she found herself gazing in amazement at the side of her house which was completely plastered with baked beans, sliced peaches and marrowfat peas!

A few weeks ago we were in Belgium on a long weekend break. Well, the choice of beers there is legendary. The bar we were in offered 150 different brews, all produced in this one small country. We had one particular beer that looked fantastic in the glass, but once in the mouth had an indescribably acrid taste. A few sips later however we were hooked! It also had the strange effect of turning us all an alarming shade of red! But that’s not all it did to Rosey! It went straight to her head!

Anyway, she suddenly became aware of an urgent need for a lavatorial facility! She needed a loo and she needed it straight away! Unfortunately, access to the ladies room required the unfortunate girl to negotiate a flight of steps! Being somewhat unsteady on her legs she decided that the best way to tackle the stairs was on hands and knees! What she didn’t know however was that on the first floor was the restaurant. Unable to stagger to her feet she had no choice but to continue her journey to the toilet on all fours weaving between tables of startled onlookers!

Sometime later she came wobbling back to our table displaying a somewhat oddly shaped frontal area! Diving down the top of her blouse she commenced pulling out no less than 9 bread rolls which she had helped herself to on the way back!

‘lez av anuver dwink’ she said then slithered down the wall and fell asleep on the floor like a discarded doll.

That's our Rosey!

A few of my favourite things!

I quite like raindrops on roses, but whiskers on kittens don't do a lot for me. I can take or leave brown paper packages tied up with string, but I must admit to finding girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes very appealing.
A recent visit to the London Palladium to see The Sound Of Music got me thinking about what exactly are my favourite things.
Some mornings, I wake up, look and my bedside clock, and suddenly panic because I think I'm late for work. The feeling of euphoria that drifts over me when I realise that it is my day off if one of the most satisfying sensations I ever experience That definitely qualifies as a favourite.
Speaking on the phone to my kids and grandchildren is very special - email just isn't the same.
I love flying. I am one of the few people who can list an airport as one of my favourite places. A complete melting pot of nationalities and cultures. The thrill I get when a plane rushes down the runway then rises into the air is indescribable. The feeling that your stomach has stayed on the ground, along with a slight dizziness, gives an amazing adrenalin rush. And the free bar on long haul fights is great!


I belong to the Friends of Cathedral Music, and whenever I can, I attend concerts by Winchester Cathedral choir. When I sit with my eyes closed and hear the magnificent organ and the voices of the choristers fill every corner of that ancient building I feel transported to another place. When the music stops, the sound just hangs in the air then slowly fades away before the silence is replaced by rapturous applause.


When I'm tired, hot and thirsty, my first sip from a freshly pulled pint of Harveys Sussex Bitter is satisfaction personified. The frothy head, and the aroma from the hops and malt. Bliss!


Walking on the beach, strolling across the hills and wandering through the forest. Getting soaking wet in the warm Summer rain, and throwing snowballs in Winter. Daffodils in Spring and golden Autumn leaves.


France is just a fifty miles or so across the water, yet the way of life there is so different from that which I lead. My favourite way of spending a day is to drive onto an early ferry - the Eurotunnel just isn't the same - then drive a few miles South for a few kilometres and simply soak up the atmosphere of the tiny rural villages. Men in the square playing boulle, and others sitting around outside scruffy little bars. Huddles of ladies passing the time chattering and tiny children chase each other and roll in the dust. Then lunch at my favourite restaurant, the Bon Aberge in Ardress. Ah, the french lunch. Not so much a meal, more of an event! No hurry, no rush! Then back again along roads lined with tall tress as straight as soldiers, dotted with chateau and farmyards.


'When the bee stings, when the dog bites, when I'm feeling sad. I simply remember my favourite things, and then I don't feel so bad!

The Brewers Arms

A couple of years ago I said goodbye to a very special pub.  The Brewers Arms it was called, although the locals knew it by its nickname 'The Clappers'. 

It was built in 1753 as a hostelry and has been open uninterrupted to this day.  It's not easy to find, and without Sat Nav or local knowledge, you wouldn't stand a chance!  It's in deepest East Sussex, in a web of country lanes surrounded by fields, farms and hedgerows. 

The car park doubles up as a paddock and a tractor park!

My decor was somewhat unorthodox!  The public bar (the drinker's room for those not familiar with the English pub layout) was enormous. A cavern of a place with ceilings that almost touched the sky!  From there I suspended a collection of antique cycles, along with lots of ancient wicker baskets and a 200-year-old wheelbarrow. Cleaning

them required your host to climb to the top of an equally old set of wooden steps - feather duster in hand- whilst the floor swayed around several yards below. For some unknown reason, I always felt the urge to perform this hazardous task after partaking in copious quantities of IPA, much to onlookers' horror.

The saloon bar had a more practical ceiling height, and this was adorned with vintage farm implements.  In the restaurant I again continued the theme of ceiling covering, only this time it - and the walls- were completely covered with plates, cups and saucers!

There was also an enormous inglenook fireplace which remained unused, so this was filled with the contents of an old farmhouse kitchen which were given to me.  Add to all this, several hundred paintings and fading photos, and loads of very old books, and I guess you get the picture!  Dust ruled, but that was all part of the charm! Or so I told myself!

During the war, the public bar doubled up as a schoolroom to cope with the increase in kids due to evacuation from London.  Yet many of my locals had been in the village all their lives and had never even visited the wicked city.  

The regulars were a diverse bunch as you can imagine.  Farmers, local crafts folk, tradesmen and an ex-bank robber!  Mix them up with the well healed, the odd lord and lady, and a couple of reclusive celebs and I think you get the picture.  All ages too.  Some not old enough to be drinking, and others old enough to know better.

I could always spot the underage drinkers though because when I rang the bell for last orders, they'd put their chairs up on the tables and go outside to play!  I saw babies take their first steps in my bar, and others their last ones too.  One of my customers sat on the same bench week in, week out, for 80 years.

My pride and joy, however, was my cellar.  Deep underground and said to be haunted, it was dark and full of atmosphere, a constant 15 degrees with a wonderful beery smell that will remain with me forever.

From there I pulled up pints of Greene King IPA, spectacular Speckled Hen and ravishing Ruddles County.  The marvellous Moorland Original and my personal favourite, Abbot Ale.  Add to that a couple of guest ales which changed every couple of weeks.  I think that you can tell that we were THE place to enjoy a pint of frothing real ale, served in a dimpled tankard or a straight thin glass, filled almost to the brim, then topped with a creamy head.

Alongside my real ale portfolio, I grudgingly sold a couple of draft lagers. This was for the benefit of those whose taste buds were not sufficiently sophisticated to appreciate the joys of a proper pint of beer!

Our food was simple and traditional. Ploughman's lunches - crusty chunks of bread with strong cheddar and pickled onions - and steak and kidney pie.  Sausages with bubble and squeak. And my special baked ham, with hand-cut fries and free-range eggs from Mary down the lane. We were always fully booked for our famous Sunday Roasts! 

It could be a bit of a noisy place at times!  I used any excuse to put on live music.   Locals would turn up with a fiddle or a banjo.  Big Al would bash seven bells out of my piano in a performance of boogie-woogie and R&B, rivalling anything you'd hear in town.  

Every now and then, the main drink of the night changed to Guinness because Seamus turned up and entertained us with songs and odes from Ireland which became bawdier as the evening went on.

It is often said that Guinness is one of God's miracles. It goes down as black as coal, and comes out a stream of pure gold!  

I even gave in, and got a Karaoke machine! Unfortunately, I tended to hog it - particularly when I was feeling a little bit merry!

My customers loved their bar games.  Dominoes and crib. Chess, and shut-the-box!  I held quiz nights and video horse racing. There was never a dull moment at the Brewers.  

Every New Years' Eve our fancy dress party was the place to be!

Licencing laws stated that we were supposed to close at eleven. Somehow that didn't really bother us too much, and we tended to go on until everyone

had had their fill. On many an occasion, we'd continue right through the night, and watch the sun come up over the Brewers Field, leaning on the fence with a cup of coffee in hand. On others, we would all adjourn to a neighbour's house and return in the morning for a good old fry up and a 'hair of the dog'.

We loved our outings too! Twice a year we hired a coach, and off we went to the horse races. Stand by Goodwood - the Clappers are on their way!

The biggest night of the year was November 5th - Guy Fawkes night.  For weeks beforehand we would build an enormous bonfire in the Brewers Field.  On the night we would have a torchlight procession around the village with 3 marching bands, ending with one of the biggest firework displays in the county.  The car park was turned into a market of stalls selling crafts, soup, and flashing hats and necklaces.  Beer flowed straight from taps in the barrels, and 2500 people would pack into our tiny village centre.

My lot liked to dance. I had a brilliant sound system which could shake the building to its foundations! There was a special secret way of letting the locals know when I was up for late-night bop. I simply played 'Mambo Number Five' and they knew that Keith was having a party after the strangers had gone home to their cocoa and bed! The heavy curtains would close, the volume wind up and by three in the morning, the party was in full swing. 

Dancers on the floor, on the tables, and even on my precious bar top! 

There is so much more that I could write about the Brewers Arms. Perhaps one day I will.  My only regret is that I had to give it up. 

One February day, my doctor told me that if I didn't change my lifestyle straight away, I'd be lucky to see Christmas. Something had to go, and I preferred it not to be me!

It's all different now. The mountains of bits and pieces have gone. The walls are trendily modern, and the decor is minimalist. The regular drinkers have gone too - driven out by the 'townies' who travel from afar to imbibe fine wines, nibble posh food, and gawp at those funny old country people outside the window.  I returned once and was moved to tears when amid the silence, my head filled with the sounds of those happy reckless days of not so long ago.

I need a drink!

It goes straight through me dear!

It's the start of the lunchtime session at the Bulls Head. We eagerly await the army of pensioners that invade our restaurant to take advantage of the oldies special deal.

Cars manoeuvre this way and that - engines revving wildly. Drivers,who should have thrown their keys away years ago, attempt to position themselves between white lines painted on the forecourt surface. Their partners wave their arms around like demented windmills under the mistaken impression that they are helping the hapless drivers.

Eventually, they totter across the car park and stumble on the step as they make their triumphal entry through the bar doorway.

" Are you doing food dear?" they cry! "You know we are you silly old bat" we think. "Why else would we be standing here with menus?"

"We'll sit there dear" says an elderly lady, pointing to our largest table with her walking stick.
"Rather you didn't" says our barmaid. " there are only two of you, and that table sits eight"
" We'll sit there then" gestures the old biddy. "
"That's reserved" says barmaid " They booked".
" So did we " says old lady.
" But you didn't specify a table" says barmaid".

And so the conversation goes on until the old couple agree to sit on a small table in the corner despite the fact that they claim not to be able to see anything because of the dark!

"Miss!" calls out an old codger. " Will you close the window - there's a draft".

" Miss" calls another. " will you open the window - it's so hot in here"

Another couple are struggling with the menu. Every time the barmaid makes a suggestion it is met with an objection. They don't like spicy food. They don't like cod - they prefer haddock. He wont eat any 'foreign muck', and she dare not eat lettuce." It goes straight through me dear" she says.

Several times a week Glass Eye Gary comes in for his lunch. One eye darts hither and thither like a Big brother camera, whilst his false one stares straight ahead! After about an hour he makes his regular journey to the toilet, but not before he pops out his glass eye and drops it into his beer! "Someone drank some of my beer once" he says! He says it every time! " Won't do it again" he says. I had an old lady at my previous pub who did a similar thing, but it was her false teeth that she dropped into her Guinness! " Drink this and they'll bite your nose off" she used to say to startled onlookers!

One old boy comes in every week and always asks, without fail, if we have found his leather belt. "It was a good one. Quarter of an inch thick" he says. Seems he left it in the pub 37 years ago and he still lives in hope of its safe return! No one has ever asked him how or why he left it here in the first place!

Then there is Bert. He is 92 and has been coming to the Bulls Head since he was a boy some 78 years ago. And for all of his pub-going life he's sat in the same place and smoked his smelly old pipe! We have a smoking ban now, and he is really having difficulty in understanding why we have to help him to an outside bench when he wants to light up. " Bloody government. Like a police state"

Bowls of soup go out followed by plates of steaming steak pies and roast beef. Most don't finish their meals. " I eat like a sparrow" we are told several times a day. " May I have a doggy bag dear? I'll have the rest tomorrow"

We give them a small bowl of ice cream to finish their meal. Today one poor lady was struggling with two of her friends who were stone deaf. She was attempting to explain the various flavours of ice cream that were on offer, whilst my waitress patiently awaited a decision.
" She says that she has coffee, vanilla or strawberry" she yelled." But no toffee flavour today"

"I'll have toffee " says one of her friends.
"No dear" she says " There is none. Have coffee today"
" Oh yes, I like toffee"
" NO! C-coffee, not T-toffee!"
" No, perhaps I won't have toffee. I think I'll have raspberry"

And so it goes on! Five days a week! Every day the same as the last but with a different cast of characters uttering the same tired old lines!