we were so poor

we were so poor, our walls were that thin the next door neighbour used to dip his bread in our gravy, come on let's have em,
johnandeva

Mice were a luxury in our 'ouse

Brian

Hi there,

Let's start with the fact that there are four meals in a day, these being "Breakfast", :Dinner", "Tea" and "Supper".

The only "lunch" we saw was on a tin from Denmark that contained a rubbery textured block of ground-up meat.

Breakfast was a choice between porridge, bread and dripping or toast. In my Mum's case the first was served with the comment "One lump or two." and the last one with the comment "Burned black and scraped to a delicious golden brown."

Dinner was anything from "meat and two veg" to the rare treat of "beans on toast". The "meat" actually consisted of a slice of bread dipped into Dad's gravy!

Tea was often "bread and jam". Which meant just that! "Bread" and "Jam" NOT "Bread and Jam and Butter"! "Bread and butter" was a totally different delight altogether. With a sprinkle of sugar it became "Supper"!

Supper was anything from "bread pobs" (lumps of bread in warm milk) to the aforementioned sugar dusted bread and butter.

At that time no one in our family was fat!

Best regards,

The classic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1a1wHxTyo

Frank

Bread and dripping? I just love it when you talk dirty, Ian

Remember left over Yorkshire puds with Jam ...........

DuxDeluxe wrote:Bread and dripping? I just love it when you talk dirty, Ian

Remember left over Yorkshire puds with Jam ...........

JAM??

Jam was available on birthdays but as a general rule I had to make do with a sprinkling of sugar. (I still love it!)

However, my Mum's Yorkshire puddings were always super shiny with the dripping fat they contained. After she had sprinkled sugar on one she would then bang it vigorously against the side of the sugar bowl so that you could almost count the few grains of sugar that remained.

With regard to jam, I swear you would have needed a micrometer to measure the thickness of any jam Mum spread on anything, be it bread, toast or a Yorkshire Pudding.

On the very rare occasions when she made "jam filled doughnuts" (one per person for Tea) the operative words were "jam" and "doughnut". "Filled" was pretty redundant because you generally needed a magnifying glass to find any jam!

To be honest I don't like the ones you can buy in the shops nowadays because of all the jam they contain! My Mum would have used the amount stuffed into one doughnut to make a tray of jam tarts!

Talking of which, do you remember how hot the jam in a jam-tart was if you nicked one just after it had been removed from the oven? Do any kids nowadays finish up lisping for 24 hours after they find out?


Ian

HI There, Dutto you were travelling with the Gods! You mentioned 'Sugar' six times. Sugar was still rationed when I was a kid it didn't come off rationing until Sept 1953 (I was 9 years old) I can remember going to the sweet shop with my ration book and having to make a very careful choice of 2 ounces of sweets - you weigh a couple of chocs! Dolly mixtures looked a much better two ounces And as for Jam - made with a lot of sugar I believe? I think the jam after the war had a lot of strange fruit in it, potatoes and the like. Don't start me off on bread and dripping, my Dad was a miner from age 14 and it was a staple in the house'
Ah Happy Days - or not
Mick

shotley59 wrote:HI There, Dutto you were travelling with the Gods! You mentioned 'Sugar' six times. Sugar was still rationed when I was a kid it didn't come off rationing until Sept 1953 (I was 9 years old) I can remember going to the sweet shop with my ration book and having to make a very careful choice of 2 ounces of sweets - you weigh a couple of chocs! Dolly mixtures looked a much better two ounces And as for Jam - made with a lot of sugar I believe? I think the jam after the war had a lot of strange fruit in it, potatoes and the like. Don't start me off on bread and dripping, my Dad was a miner from age 14 and it was a staple in the house'
Ah Happy Days - or not
Mick

Mick,

Ditto on the rationing. I was ten when it came off rationing and my first buy (with pay from a dozen errands) was a round green lollipop that I could see through. Nothing has ever tasted so good!

My Dad was also a miner (Pleasley Colliery). On my Birth Certificate it gives his occupation as "Hewer" but by the time I was twelve he was a "Ripper" and ran his own team with his three brothers and a mate. The work they had to do to put food on the table and a roof over our heads was something most people can never grasp.

The weird thing in our house was that most of the time we weren't "poor" in the sense of not having any income. But we lived as if we were because my Dad had been injured a few times so something always had to be "put away for a rainy day".

My Dad's been dead for 25 years. He was 77 years old when he died from a combination of silicosis and pneumoconiosis and always maintained "For a miner living anything more than sixty years is a bonus!" Great times and I still miss him!

Best regards,

Ian

Hi there,

Just a quicky.

In the good old days a goose was something that ran around my Uncle's back yard until Christmas and it was then killed for the celebrations.

Obviously the meat was eaten but there is a lot of fat on a goose so it was clarified and utilised for other things such as:

o Mixed with a bit of cheap scent it challenged Brylcreem as a method of sticking down a kid's unruly hair.

o Mixed with some menthol crystals it became a vapour rub for a kid's chest when he had a cold.

o Straight from the Klinger jar it was a fine substitute for dubbin on shoes and boots to keep the water out in winter.

Finally, with care the "quack" (more like a "squawk" in a goose) could be removed undamaged from the goose's neck, slotted on to the end of a straw and provide endless fun for a child.

Best regards,

Ian

Dutto wrote:
Finally, with care the "quack" (more like a "squawk" in a goose) could be removed undamaged from the goose's neck, slotted on to the end of a straw and provide endless fun for a child.

Best regards,

Ian

Oh Ian, thats just gross!!

Paulmold wrote:

Dutto wrote:
Finally, with care the "quack" (more like a "squawk" in a goose) could be removed undamaged from the goose's neck, slotted on to the end of a straw and provide endless fun for a child.

Best regards,

Ian

Oh Ian, thats just gross!!

But true nonetheless! They lasted about 24 hours but were useless when they dried out!

Geese, ducks and chickens didn't come in plastic packs in those days; in fact they were usually running around in someone's backyard before their necks got broken or their heads fell off.

Out of all the fowl, geese were the worse ones to pluck and hens the easiest. When they were dressed hens always had a supply of "surprise eggs" if they were still in the lay!

"Surprise eggs" were those that were still in production. There were usually three of them that were useable. One in a shell as delicate as a wet tissue, one in a shell like translucent paper and one in a fully formed shell ready to lay.

They were always delicious but if the hen was being dressed for Christmas they were generally made into egg-nog (egg yolks, brandy, sugar, nutmeg, vanilla essence etc) for Christmas celebrations.

If you thing playing with a ducks "quack" is gross wait until someone gets round to describing the process of killing and sharing out a family pig!

Best regards,

Ian

Hi there,

Come on people I'm sure that I am not alone in having memories of a life before Tesco; and you can't all have been brought up in luxury!

Here's a situation worth pondering.

As a child our home was almost totally my mother's domain and typical for the period my father did little or no domestic work around the house.

But funnily enough Dad always:

o Made the blackberry vinegar and rose-hip syrup that was doled out a tea-spoonful at a time over the winter. As a very rare treat a desert-spoonful would be drizzled over any ice-cream that found its way into the house.

o Peeled and preserved the annual batch of pickled shallots. He had is own "sweet" recipe that meant the shallots could be eaten almost like sweeties!

o Prepared the pig's head for boiling. My Mum was tasked with cooking and pressing the tongue but Dad did the cooking of the head itself and the subsequent manufacture of the brawn. (Quaintly known in France as "Pig's Head Paté" and still readily available in most village butchers or charcuteries!!)

The weird thing behind this is that I have never understood why he did all of these specific jobs because, as a general rule, my Mum had to be at death's door before he would consider even making a cup of tea; and as for fetching a bucket of coal from the bottom of the garden his favourite phrase was "I see enough coal at work without having to start humping it around at home!"

Changed times now eh?

I have to stop. Helen wants me to go and do a bit of ironing before I hoover the carpet and hang out the washing!

Best regards,

Ian

Cor, you lot are bringing back some memories.

My dad bought the christmas goose from a livestock market one year and kept it in the back yard feeding it stale bread to keep it alive and fresh until christmas eve.

Now my dad was a fireman, and if you know, a firemans axe is quite blunt and made for knocking doors down not for the delicate art of butchery.After running round our yard trying to catch the goose one handed, the other had the aforementioned axe, he finally caught it and proceeded to try to kill it. He failed miserably and had to take the mangled bird somewhere my traumatised brother and I never found out where.

Remember TUFF shoes? They used to give twelve months guarantee on their shoes, something unheard of at the time, so my dad would buy my brother and I a pair each and juggle the guarantees and worn out shoes so he didn't pay out good money for years!

We never knew we where poor in those days as everybody was in the same boat. There was no T.V so no adverts.

Christmas and birthday presents consisted of something to wear and could only be worn for "best" I of course being the younger waited for my brother to outgrow his clothes and I was still going to school in short trousers at ten years old because he was still wearing his one pair of long ones

But it was a happy time where we played out 'till dark and could walk in the local woods on our own without having Mum worrying about our safety

Haydn

We. We're so poor our mom went to see the landlord, said I have come about the roof, what about it he said, we would like one she replied

Hi there,

I'm not really "Off-Topic" because I think what I am reporting is in line with "The way things used to be."

Sure, we were poor but we seemed to know a lot more about the world around us than the people of today.

My example is that last Friday Helen and I went down town, me on the bus Helen walking to meet me at the bus-stop.

When I stepped off the bus Helen said "I've been waiting to show you an injured pigeon over there. Dozens of people have just walked past it." I looked over to where she was pointing and there on the pavement was a young pigeon huddled up against a litter bin. Its failure to move anything other than its head when I walked over made it obvious that it was unable to walk or fly.

From the state it was in and the fact that its mother was walking up and down the pavement nearby it had been there some time. Ten seconds later it was put out of its misery and placed in the Litter Bin.

I loathe cruelty to animals in any form and how anyone can just walk past an injured pigeon (or any other animal for that matter) and not do something about it amazes me.

The pigeon in question had been passed by hundreds of people and I presume it is yet another "sign of the times" that no-one took any action. I can only assume that nowadays people are:

o Indifferent to their pain.

o Uneducated on how to despatch or otherwise deal with an injured animal, or,

o Just plain scared of getting involved in case someone "reports" them!

We may have been poor but we seem to have a lot more "nowse" than todays generation.

Best regards,

Hi there,

Cycling was a bit different back then!

1. When was the last time anyone saw someone pedalling along on a bike with no pedals? I would reckon that when I was a kid at least 10% of the cycles had no pedals and the owners just used the spindles. This was OK if you had footwear with a heel but if you were wearing a pair of plimsoles it was potentially lethal. It was a whole new sensation in pain when your foot slipped off and the end of the spindle raked the inside of your ankle!

2. By the time I bought a new inner-tube the old one looked as if it had some form of exotic "rubber acne"! It was not unknown for an inner-tube to be mainly repair patches with small bits of inner-tube showing through.

3. Bike tyres were NEVER changed until the canvas was showing!

4. A "lightweight" bike meant that it weighed less than yourself!

5. Finally, remember "valve tubing"? We described it as "a Johnny for mice"! (To get that one you have to know the terminology of the time!)

Enjoy!

Best regards,

Ian

Certainly know the terminology. Dutto.
Also remember all the hybreeds.
You now the ones. Odd wheels. Handle bars of any discription. Definately no mudguards. Brakes optional.
But the best bit The done on the backyard hand paint job.

Whisky.

Cow-horn handle-bars, 'fixed' wheel-hubs, (don't lean over too far !!)

Was going to post a pic of me cycle / camping to Lands End (from Sarfend) at age 15yrs, but know you will take the out of my 'Yogi bear' mascot, riding 'shotgun' (street cred. gone )

Brian

deckie wrote:Cow-horn handle-bars, 'fixed' wheel-hubs, (don't lean over too far !!)

Was going to post a pic of me cycle / camping to Lands End (from Sarfend) at age 15yrs, but know you will take the out of my 'Yogi bear' mascot, riding 'shotgun' (street cred. gone )

Brian

Brian,

Yogi Bear is permitted but at 15yrs I hope you had removed the playing card from the spokes. The one that made it sound like a motorbike!!


Ian

Whisky,

My first three bikes were of very uncertain lineage and as you noted "hand-painted" with spare brown gloss paint from the house and then embellished with the remains of tiny Humbrol tins used for models.

To anyone with taste they must have looked like an explosion in a paint factory but the "positive side" was that they were very easily recognisable and therefore almost impossible to steal without breaking them into component parts plus sanding down and re-painting the frame!

I even had a front wheel with a built-in dynamo on one bike!! It looked impressive but as the dynamo didn't work ..........

Happy Days!

Best regards,

Ian

Dutto wrote:
Yogi Bear is permitted but at 15yrs I hope you had removed the playing card from the spokes. The one that made it sound like a motorbike!!
Ian

Hi Ian,

Had removed the 'lolly stick' (a more powerful motorbike ) before then

Brian

PS .... Mum's CO-OP divi number 039709 ...... indelibly ingrained for life

Yes Ian and Brian,

The best bikes were always the ones you 'built' yourself from the local tip.

My 'grid' (as they were known at school) was a heavy black beast, cowhorns, rear 'nobbly' tracker tyre, no mudguards and rare 4 speed Sturmey archer gear hub, and as Ian mentioned a front 'dynohub', but no lights.

I also rescued a 'trades' bike from the local green grocer, (less front basket) which I wasn't allowed to ride to school (spoilsports!)

I learned to ride on a girls bike, donated by my first best friend Susan. -Easy as I could reach the ground with no cross bar, BTW I was only 8 at the time! (Susan was 12, the bike had 24" wheels!)

I wouldn't be seen dead on a bike nowadays!

Mike D

1b449 wrote:.........

I wouldn't be seen dead on a bike nowadays!

Mike D

Mike,

As someone who can wear stretch Lycra and get away with it due to my svelte form and bumps in all the right places; I believe you!



Ian

Flipping heck Ian. I bet you are a sight to behold in your lycra.
Bet it makes your neck swell up, and your face go red for other reasons.

Whisky.

The only way we could have a new bike was if we passed the 11plus.
I failed but eventually inherited my brainy brothers On the first day I had it I "kerbed" it to go for a game of football and a car reversed over it.
I still feel like crying just to think about that!!

hillwalker wrote:The only way we could have a new bike was if we passed the 11plus.
I failed but eventually inherited my brainy brothers On the first day I had it I "kerbed" it to go for a game of football and a car reversed over it.
I still feel like crying just to think about that!!

Ooooh! Life is harsh and I can readily sympathise with that feeling!

With regard to Lycra Cycling Shorts they are worn by three types of people:

1. The well endowed who want to show off. (I swear some of them don't even own a bike!!)

2. The totally unselfconscious who couldn't give a flying what anyone else thinks.

3. The people who want to ride a bike without suffering chafed and sore buttocks and other delicate parts.

I fall firmly into Category Three but to save frightening small children and the very old I wear an extremely long shirt!

Best regards,

Ian