I don’t get to the pub as often as I’d like these days. Our local shut down years ago and there’s nowhere within walking distance. Here on the Berwickshire Riviera our drink driving laws are pretty strict so it’s not worth the risk heading out in the car for a session. As a consequence I miss the pub stories, the ones your mates tell, even though you’ve heard them before, if they are funny, they never get old. Half the joy is watching the reaction of those who haven’t heard them before. I’ve been struggling to write a more serious piece recently, I have several unfinished attempts on my dashboard and I want to do I the subjects justice. So I thought I’d share a few pub stories instead. Easy writing…
I have three to tell right off the top of my head, The Bailifs, The Badger Story, and The Time I went Cottaging By Mistake. Here’s the first.
This is the true story, it happened in the late 80’s, The scene is set in the rough mining towns of West Lothian. My mate, (we’ll call him Steve) who is a little older than I am, was West Lothian born and bred. It’s a pretty rough part of Scotland and he had a pretty rough upbringing. The whole area was pock marked with mines at one time and was primarily populated by miners and their families, there was some other heavy industry too but coal mining was the main occupation. The men were tough and so were the women. In Linlithgow to this day there’s a pub called “The Black Bitch” it was apparently named after a female greyhound but I am reliably informed that the women of Linlithgow referred to themselves as black bitches on account of all the coal dust they must have been constantly covered in.
By the time Steve left school the mines were all gone, the last one closed during the miners strike and never re-opened. His father was a heavy drinker, and used to beat his mother. He once told me how as a little boy he jumped on his fathers back as he was beating his mother as he though he would kill her. I’m barely middle class myself but I feel like I had a very sheltered upbringing compared with Steve.
Steve was old enough to qualify for the Poll Tax when it was introduced by Margret Thatcher in 1989. Thatcher was never popular in Scotland, and even less popular with the miners, the tax went down like a lead balloon in these former mining towns. Many people simply refused to pay it. Steve was one of these, along with all his mates.
They simply ignored all the letters and reminders that came through the door and waited for their day of reckoning. It never seemed to come, but one day they got a call, it was a friend in Fauldhouse the next village. “The Bailiffs are here!” The Bailiffs, or Sheriff Officers as they are officially titled in Scotland are appointed by the court to enforce court orders; they were finally coming to collect. These days there are strict rules relating to which property the Bailiffs can take from a debtor, but back then they could pretty much empty your home to cover your debt.
After a few more phone calls a posse was raised and they all piled into the back of a van and set off for Fauldhouse. It didn’t take them long to track down their quarry, suits and ties are a rare thing on the streets of Fauldhouse today and they were even more of a rarity then. The two bailiffs dressed in black suits were spotted carrying a briefcase up the garden path of a house. The van pulled up on the kerb behind them. I don’t know what was said but things quickly turned ugly. These two men were the face of the machine that had taken away the jobs, the livelihoods and the soul of the region. Steve was a keen boxer in his youth, he then trained in a number of different martial arts and also competed in MMA tournaments later in life, not someone you’d want to mess with. I can only imagine the rest of the posse were cut from similar cloth. The Bailiffs would be used to a bit of agro but against this posse they didn’t stand a chance.
After a few seconds the bailiffs were on the floor bleeding. The posse were about to make their getaway when one of them had an idea, “take his brief case, see whose names they’ve got!” Keen to see if they were next on the list they grabbed the case and jumped back into the van.
After a short drive to a secluded area they stopped and broke into the case, ‘What’s this pish?” exclaimed one of them examining the papers inside; “Church of the Latter Day Saints!”
Turns out it was the Mormons!
This is one of those stories that if you hear it you tend to put your hand over your mouth when you hear the punch line, or even before it if you’ve guessed what’s coming. This is I believe to cover the fact that you are laughing at something they on the face of it you shouldn’t really laugh at. It’s still fucking funny though isn’t it.
I'll add the Black Bitch to my bucket list. I miss the pubs in the UK. A few years ago I went out for a lunch time (work) beer (which is about as a rare as a dodo sighting in my neck of the woods). On tap they had a brew with a lovely name, "My wife's bitter" . Needless there was lots of blokey banter, "What are you having ?";
My wife's bitter";
"I know that, but what are you having !"