Friends, are you maybe inclined to be a bit "stylish"? Perhaps secretly, maybe, you've somehow gradually managed to acquire a reputation for being a "snappy dresser", maybe over several years, or decades even, just like Yours Truly has?
Am I right? Or am I right?!
Me, I've always tended to have my "ear to the ground" when it comes keeping up with the latest fashion trends. Here's a picture of me sporting rolled-up jacket sleeves and "mullet" hair-style, way before they became "de rigeur", i.e. back in the 1990's.
me proudly sporting my new rolled-up sleevs and "mullet" hair style,
a few years before they became "must-have" fashion items, back in the 1990s
And that's, paradoxically, why I need YOUR help today, Friends. My medium-to-long-suffering wife Lois and I have suddenly, willy-nilly, found ourselves in danger of going on "skittles" outings at local pubs and skittle-alleys. Somehow, having moved last month from our former home in Malvern, Worcestershire to our new home in Liphook, Hampshire, we've somehow quickly managed to get in with a slightly dodgy crowd of locals, a "rum bunch" who like to go on "skittles" outings.
a typical "skittles night" a group of slightly "dodgy"
locals, seen here in a skittles alley attached to a local pub
All well and good, you'll be saying - it's nice to "network" with your neighbours, I agree, even the ones with slightly, some would say, "questionable" ways of spending their leisure hours (!).
However, you see my quandary. I obviously want to keep up my snappy dresser "vibe", but here's my problem: I haven't got the faintest idea of what the stylish man-about-small-town wears on such occasions as skittles evenings, believe it or not !!!!
Embarrassing, isn't it! However, "light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel time" - there's some guy in this morning's local Onion News for East Hampshire, Ron Spencer, who's maybe in a position to give me some pointers. Could he possibly come in trumps and "cut the mustard" as my new local style-guide, do you think?
I wonder.....!
But let me know your views - get one of your hopefully unused (!) postcards out of your bureau and drop me a line ASAP, will you. Thanks in advance, and don't forget the stamp!
Usual rules - best answer wins a guinea in old money, and remember: banks are still changing these wonderful old coins at £5.25 a "pop", but hurry, offer must end soon haha!!! [Health Warning - a real guinea famously contains a quarter ounce of gold, so if you take up my offer you'll only actually receive a guinea-shaped chocolate wrapped in gold foil paper, but friends will still be impressed, guaranteed!!!!]
man showcasing a piece of gold jewellery plus a rare 1793
George III golden guinea, a coin which got its name from the
West African region of Guinea, where most of the gold for these coins
was sourced - what a madness all that was !!!!!
"But who's this slightly dodgy group of skittles-lovers that you and Lois have somehow fallen in with, Colin?", I hear you cry. [Not me, I'm giving up and going back to bed. I've already got my "jim-jams" on! - Ed]
Well, seeing as how you're gagging to know (!), I can now exclusively reveal that this "slightly dodgy group" is none other than Lois's new church-friends. About a month after we moved to Liphook from Malvern on January 3rd, last Sunday she finally sampled one of this group's Sunday Morning Meetings, in a village hall just outside the small town of Petersfield, Hampshire.
(left) the village hall near Petersfield where the church holds its
Sunday Morning Meetings: the group's publicity material (right)
suggests a youngish crowd, although most are "old codgers" like Lois and me
We met about 25 of the church-members last Sunday, but you know how it's all a bit of a muddle, being introduced to a whole bunch of new people in a short time. Naturally Lois can't remember now who was who, so she has jumped at the chance of talking with a small number of the church's female members again this morning, joining them for their weekly "Sisters' Class" on zoom.
And once again this morning, Lois discovers that when the group aren't doing their Bible-study, they like nothing better than meeting up to knock down a few skittles in some local pub's "skittles-alley". And perhaps partly because of the group's average age, it sounds like it's lunchtime do's rather than evenings, that they favour, which is nice.
DVLA's strict eye-sight rules for driving at night
Most of us "old codgers" prefer not to drive at night if we can avoid it, you see. Incidentally that information is strictly confidential, so don't go "blabbing" to the DVLA (Driving Vehicle Licensing Agency) at Swansea will you! Only joking - Lois and I actually fulfil all the Agency's eyesight rules, but just don't give them any ideas about us all the same, just to be on the safe side (no pun intended!), will you haha!
Just saying!!!!
11:00 And the driving licence issue is very much on my mind this morning, because while Lois is upstairs on zoom, I'm wading through a mountain of paperwork connected with selling our old house in Malvern, Worcestershire, and selling it to a nice Greek Cypriot woman, Katharine, who seems keen to buy it.
flashback to January 2nd: we move out of our old house
in Malvern, Worcestershire
Because of the all the identity theft around these days, however, our solicitor has asked Lois and me to tear our fast-thinning (!) hair out, in an effort to prove that we are who we say we are, even when it's a solicitor, Sue, that we've met with in person several times - what utter utter utter madness!
Those identity thieves have certainly screwed things for up for us honest people, haven't they.
What utter utter utter bastards !!!!!
a typical modern identity thief
And currently we're concerned that our solicitor won't accept Lois's driving licence because she hasn't got around to updating it with our new address on - we moved house on January 3rd, and I've changed mine to the new address, but then I've got "sod all" to do, compared to Lois, so fair enough, we think. It's not a priority for her anyway, because in practice I do all the driving. Well, I've got to "earn my keep" somehow, haven't I, and persuade her not to throw me over for some younger "hunk" (!). I'm just her "older hunk", but I've still got to fight to keep my "job", that's for sure.
And it's a bit of an outrage frankly, that somebody with my extraordinary brain-capacity [I'd like documentation for that statement, Colin, when you've got a moment! - Ed] has to spend the better part of a day answering footling little questions on the scads of forms that our solicitor Sue has sent us.
just one of the pages of information about our old house
that I've got to "wade through" this morning. Here I'm checking some
of the pages Lois has filled in, ridiculous for a man of my calibre [???- Ed]
What utter utter utter madness !!!!
21:00 After a taxing day, Lois and I unwind on the couch, and get ourselves in the mood for bed with this week's latest episode of Ben Fogle's Life in the Wild, now incredibly in its 19th season would you believe. The focus of Ben's programmes are people who've opted to leave civilisation behind and somehow carve out a life in the back of beyond, "out in the boonies" or "out in the sticks" - one of the two usually haha!
As presenter Ben Fogle observes, it's very much like being in a permanent COVID lockdown, with Bec and Reece spending most of their time hobnobbing with each other 24/7, mostly hobbing but with a bit of nobbing thrown in (!).
Luckily the couple obviously like each other a lot, and they've got really similar interests, both of them being scientists with a passion for animal conservation - they're working on a State Government-funded project to "rewild" the area and encourage the area's many endangered species such as the cute little quolls, threatened by predator species such as feral cats and others.
And one of Bec and Reece's spare time hobbies is suggested by the fact that in their 8 years out in the bush, they've managed to produce 3 children. And for this educated couple with a strong scientific bent, the children's schooling is a big priority - luckily the State Government organises a high standard of online schooling.
in their 8 years out in the sticks, near Fort Grey, New South Wales
Bec and Reece have produced 3 children and counting (!)
Bec and Reece live in the parish of Fort Grey in the remote Poole County of New South Wales. They also like to visit the "local" pub, "Cameron Corner", although the bar is often a bit on the quiet side, apparently, to put it mildly.
In tonight's programme we see presenter Ben trying to find the pub, which is locally famous for its extreme remoteness.
And for Bec and Reece's 3 kids, today's outing is all about the chips, and a "chip-athon" is on the agenda today, that's for sure. Chips are a luxury that their health-conscious parents, Bec and Reese, normally don't provide for the kids when they're at home.
For much of the rest of Cameron Corner's regular adult customer base, it's mostly about the beer, rather than the chips. And any time of day is "Beer o' clock" (!).
the clocks on the wall of this remote pub show the time of day, weirdly
one hour out of whack in South Australia - Australia is a big country.
But then who cares? It's always "Beer o'Clock here"!
What's not to like haha !!! And who doesn't like quiet pubs? [Most people actually, if they aren't screwballs like you, Colin! - Ed]
Lois and I always like Ben's programmes because we feel he's genuinely interested in the people he visits, and doesn't push himself forward into the limelight at their expense.
We didn't know till he tells us tonight that he gets invitations from people in remote locations all over the Anglosphere, Canada, the US, you name it, to come and do a programme on them often like Bec and Reece with a view to publicising the work they're engaged in, in this case for their animal conservation work.
Will this do?
[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzz!!!!
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