we were so poor

Ian,

If you are anything like my shape, it would have to be a very long shirt!

(And I'm 5'7")

Mike D

1b449 wrote:Ian,

If you are anything like my shape, it would have to be a very long shirt!

(And I'm 5'7")

Mike D

Mike,

It is. I think "voluminous" is another word that can be applied!

Ironically, it is the ONLY shirt I own that Helen hasn't managed to shrink by at least three sizes!


Ian

I blame my wife for shrinking my clothes in the wash!!

She says it is me getting fat. Do you believe that?

Haydn

hillwalker wrote:I blame my wife for shrinking my clothes in the wash!!

She says it is me getting fat. Do you believe that?

Haydn

Hi Haydn,

Get your wife to use a 30degree wash, it won't clean the clothes, but they won't shrink either!

Remember 'middle age spread' is natural insulation!

Mike D

Hi Mike D

I don't know about middle age spread being the problem it could be Clover spread or one to many scoops!!

cheers

Haydn

We only moved house once when I was a child but I can remember vividly the sight of my father taking down the wallpaper.

you had wallpaper !!!!! we had only newspaper on ours (lol)
mike
vwt4

vwt4 wrote:you had wallpaper !!!!! we had only newspaper on ours (lol)
mike
vwt4

We dreamed of having a newspaper!

But then we would have been spoiled for choice! Roof or Toilet Paper!


Ian

We did not have a roof on our shoebox !! we had take it turns to shield the others from the rain
mike

I remember scraping ice off the inside of my bedroom window to see out each winter as a kid.... No form of heating... Lino on the floor with a small square piece of carpet in the centre of the room... Not really that long ago either

CC

Been there and bought that "T" Shirt!!

My bedroom was occasionally so cold in the morning that it was best to take my clothes into bed with me at night so that I could get dressed before I ventured out from under the blankets in the morning!

Also, I never remember the school closing due to snow; despite the fact that we lived in Derbyshire and at least three times a year all the kids had to wade through waist-deep snow to get there!

But we lived in hope that one day ...... !

Best regards,

Ian

Four Yorkshiremen Sketch

Monty Python


Four well-dressed men sitting together at a vacation resort.

Michael Palin: Ahh.. Very passable, this, very passable.
Graham Chapman: Nothing like a good glass of Chateau de Chassilier wine, ay Gessiah?
Terry Gilliam: You're right there Obediah.
Eric Idle: Who'd a thought thirty years ago we'd all be sittin' here drinking Chateau de Chassilier wine?
MP: Aye. In them days, we'd a' been glad to have the price of a cup o' tea.
GC: A cup ' COLD tea.
EI: Without milk or sugar.
TG: OR tea!
MP: In a filthy, cracked cup.
EI: We never used to have a cup. We used to have to drink out of a rolled up newspaper.
GC: The best WE could manage was to suck on a piece of damp cloth.
TG: But you know, we were happy in those days, though we were poor.
MP: Aye. BECAUSE we were poor. My old Dad used to say to me, "Money doesn't buy you happiness."
EI: 'E was right. I was happier then and I had NOTHIN'. We used to live in this tiiiny old house, with greaaaaat big holes in the roof.
GC: House? You were lucky to have a HOUSE! We used to live in one room, all hundred and twenty-six of us, no furniture. Half the floor was missing; we were all huddled together in one corner for fear of FALLING!
TG: You were lucky to have a ROOM! *We* used to have to live in a corridor!
MP: Ohhhh we used to DREAM of livin' in a corridor! Woulda' been a palace to us. We used to live in an old water tank on a rubbish tip. We got woken up every morning by having a load of rotting fish dumped all over us! House!? Hmph.
EI: Well when I say "house" it was only a hole in the ground covered by a piece of tarpolin, but it was a house to US.
GC: We were evicted from *our* hole in the ground; we had to go and live in a lake!
TG: You were lucky to have a LAKE! There were a hundred and sixty of us living in a small shoebox in the middle of the road.
MP: Cardboard box?
TG: Aye.
MP: You were lucky. We lived for three months in a brown paper bag in a septic tank. We used to have to get up at six o'clock in the morning, clean the bag, eat a crust of stale bread, go to work down mill for fourteen hours a day week in-week out. When we got home, out Dad would thrash us to sleep with his belt!
GC: Luxury. We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!
TG: Well we had it tough. We used to have to get up out of the shoebox at twelve o'clock at night, and LICK the road clean with our tongues. We had half a handful of freezing cold gravel, worked twenty-four hours a day at the mill for fourpence every six years, and when we got home, our Dad would slice us in two with a bread knife.
EI: Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night, half an hour before I went to bed, (pause for laughter), eat a lump of cold poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad would kill us, and dance about on our graves singing "Hallelujah."
MP: But you try and tell the young people today that... and they won't believe ya'.
ALL: Nope, nope..

Brilliant sketch that, Paul

From Monty Python's number one fan

Brian

And Monty Python's No.2 fan! (Hence my avatar!)

The newspaper was on the window not the wall at "our 'ouse" as it cut down on the thickness of the ice!

My first morning chore was to fill the bucket in the coal 'ole for the boiler and the range. This was preferred to taking the pee pots down to the outside 'bog' especially on an icy morning.

(1950's Victoriana?)

Happy days!


Mike D

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

This was preferred to taking the pee pots down to the outside 'bog' especially on an icy morning.

........

Ah, the much loved "Po"!! I till wince when I see one being used as a flower-pot!

I once got evicted from my bedroom so that some impoverished couple could have the room for their honeymoon night.

To ensure that they remembered this "special night" my parents had made the bed "Apple Pie" style, tied a couple of dozen empty tins to the springs under the mattress and as a final touch poured a tin of Andrews Liver Salts into the dreaded "Po"!

My parents had a peculiar sense of humour eh?

Happy Days!


Ian

Hi Ian,

A funny (or not so for her) story. When mum was single and at home, it was her job to empty the 'pots'. To make the task easier they were all tipped into a large bucket. This worked well until one morning she tripped at the top of the stairs, she and the full bucket completed the entire 'flight'. My Gran used to tell this tale over and over, much to mums disgust!

Mike D

Mike,

Mum's are like that!

I weighed 11lb 4oz (5.1kgs) when I was born and as she got older my Mum would tell complete strangers that I had "ruined her insides"; and then go on to explain how!

The last time it happened she was 92 years old and we were sitting at a breakfast table on a Warner's Holiday at Thoresby Hall with a couple of other guests.

If the poor souls who sat through Mum's explanation manage to read this (and for sure they will remember the conversation) "I apologise!"

Best regards,

Ian

We weren't so poor, as odd. Saturday was a a treat day. I would be dispatched to Northampton fish market to buy chitlens for lunch and fresh lard, not dripping, and not the stuff flavoured with Rosemary,, and half a pint of cockles and half a pint of winkles for tea. mum kept special sewing needles that had gone black from vinegar to remove the winkles from the shells, which were then doused in vinegar and pepper and salt, but I always had to use the needle as a fork. Sunday tea was a tin of fruit cocktail that had to be eaten with bread and butter. When work beckoned, I trained as a nurse at the local asylum, and what a revelation. The patients ate much better than I did at home. I could have things called omelettes, and chip butties. Butter on bread on the rare occasion we had chips at home was forbidden as it meant too much fat in one meal. It was more to do with meanness than health awareness. The only good things I can remember about my youth was getting out every evening train spotting; then I discovered girls and the whole world changed for the better. I miss the trains though.

Ours was a large family and I looked forward to Thursdays. It was my turn to wear the shoe.

you had a shoe!! we only had the shoebox to live in
vwt4

'SHOEBOX', you jammy sod

It might have been a shoe box, but it had no lid !!
VWT4

'Luxury'!

We were so poor we had to live in 'ole in 't road!

Mike D

We were evicted from *our* hole in the ground; we had to go and live in a lake!

Yep, tell that to the kids today, & they wouldn't believe a word of it ( Monty Python )