h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

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lil xxx

Gawd Lil! ah feel better awreddy! :0)

Good!

Now, we need to sort out your Entry in PeerReview

As it stands, it isn't quite suitable for the Guide. The house style is for Edited Guide Entries to be submitted in the 'Third Person'. So this may mean a lot of changes would need to be made

However, if you would like your diary/story to be used in your own words, then you could try the <./>UnderGuide</.>. We have a gentleman writing in our fortnightly paper, <./>ThePost</.>, who sometimes tells us tales of his time in Singapore. If you contact Len (Snowie) Baynes, on U240737 he might be able to advise you where your stories would be best placed.

If I can help you any further, just come back here



lil xx

CHERRY RIPE
True story from about the 1930’s

When I was a lad of about nine I remember my Mum coming home in a Salvation Army bonnet.
We lived at No 11 Market Place, Barton-on-Humber in Lincolnshire. U.K.
My Uncle Jack had fixed a new electric bell to the door to replace the old brass one that did not work when it was held by one robber’s hand thus giving his accomplice ample time to empty the till and take whatever they fancied while my Mum was out hanging the washing in the back yard.
Dad was unemployed and drew his dole money from the labor exchange.
Asleep on the couch in the kitchen he was oblivious to all that was happening around him.
But when Mum opened the door to the shop from the kitchen and screamed, “Lawks a mussy, we have been robbed”
The scream of alarm must have penetrated me Dad’s lug ‘ole that resembled an African swamp, and having sallied thus far through all the curly hairs and wax found it’s way to his brain where it sorted out what was stacked up there and sent alarm messages to all of me Dad’s muscles which responded each in turn to any given event.
On this occasion the brain checked the eyes but wi’ no luck so decided to gi’ the lids a quick poke because Dad opened one eye and mumbled, “Wassamarrer?”
Now because one eye could see all was well but the gob not being too sure had to stick it’s oar in, to coin a phrase, “Wot’s up! ah wuz aif asleep!”
Uncle Jack worked on a Farm just outside Barton.
When he came home he assessed the situation and commented, “ There’s nae chance o’ catchin’ they theivin’ beggers noo so we hev ti mak’ the best o’ it”
Then he painted the shop front and what had been a small sweet shop now became, “The Corner Café”
With a new electric bell the shop began to make money.
“Harraway man Charlie, waddye think?” warbled Uncle Jack with his Geordie lilt to my Father.
My Dad yawned, spat into the fire grate, turned over on the black horse hair couch with just enough effort to make a spring creak or break wind and went back to sleep.
From previous experiences I did not hang around to determine the cause of the noise but I knew from previous occasions I would be sorry I had tarried long enough to taste it.
Mum was counting the takings on the kitchen table and jotting little notes while holding a hanky to her nose.
She gave the horizontal Hippo on the couch a look of disgust and carried on totting up in the notebook.
Suddenly she had a bright idea, “We could do out those two empty rooms and we could do bed and breakfast for travelers.”
Then gasped and replaced the hanky to her mouth.
She broached the subject the next morning at the breakfast table and Uncle Jack thought it was a good idea.

Dad said, so long as they kept out of his way he couldn’t care less.
As long as Dad got his, “Smokin’ baccy” he was happy.
.
Then Mum came home one day and opened a hat box.
If one has ever observed the Coronation of the King as the priest holds the crown aloft for all to see and gasps of awe ascend to the heavens, this situation was a bit like that.
My sisters and I, along with Uncle Jack and my Dad were all silent and wide-eyed as my Mum withdrew the Salvation Army bonnet.
It looked like a black bonnet from one of those Western movies where the Woman is driving the covered wagon among the rampaging Indians.
This bonnet had a crimson ribbon that was splashed right across the front of the bonnet and in huge letters of gold there were three words.” BLOOD AND FIRE”
“Bloody ‘ell!” exploded me Dad, “Wot did that cost yer ?”
With the bonnet in place my Mum walked to and fro past the full-length mirror in her bedroom warbling something about Sampson and Delilah.
That bonnet had everyone in our house bewitched.

Uncle Jack bought a trombone and joined the Salvo’s band
A little later my Dad bought an Oompah Gizmo that coiled round and round and had a flared end where the sound came out.
He also joined The Salvo’s, but because his notes were two bars behind everyone else he got chucked out and began beating the bar in the Pub instead, “Weers me pint?”
He could not read the music and get his fingers to press the right buttons on the Oompa
Gizmo at the same time.
But he was good at filling football pools coupons ‘cos he had a week’s grace before the game was played.

Then Mum bought a tambourine.

Uncle Jack would be in the back yard giving it “Waaayuuup ”as he pulled and pushed the sliding bit on his trombone back and forth while blowing through pinched lips into the mouth piece.
Some notes sounded remarkably like a Suffolk Punch plow horse as it strained in the harness to pull the plow through heavy clay soil, and us kids were standing there giggling at the red faced effort being used to get something resembling a tune.
Uncle Jack said he thought his top lip was a bit weak so he explained to me Dad that if he grew a moustache it would strengthen his top lip enough to help him play better.
Then Uncle Jack with his big moustache an’ got arrested cos the Fuzz thowt ‘e were Wyat Earp on the run.
My Dad smiled and looked like he was in pain but replied, “Why don’t yer paint yer gob wi’ a mixture of two of sand an’ one o’ cement an’ if that don’t work try some anisette but don’t put t’ bottle on a chair cos if some bugger sits on it they will not be able ti’ use the toilet for the next fotneet. (fortnight)
Dad was in the kitchen giving it, “ Oompah oompah.
Mum was upstairs in the top room singing, “ When the Saints” rattle rattle, ching ching, “Come marching in,” ching, rattle ching.
Then next doors mob were banging on the wall in time to the music so we now had drums.
The Cops called and wanted to see an entertainer’s license.
Then I bought a Harmonica with a slide built in and began practicing “The Colonel Bogey march.”
Dad was going to show me how to play it, but all I heard was a four-letter word pertaining to procreation when his lip got trapped by the narrow crack in the front cover and the brass reed carrier.
Me Mam said I had to joint the Salvos “Cos she didn’t fancy living with sinners”.
So I went one Sunday evening just to keep me Mam happy.
The meeting had just started.
There was snow on the ground outside.

Mrs Thinner who sang like those people do in the German Opera was there sitting on the wooden latted seats in the Salvo’s main hall and every time they asked for a volunteer for a song she was always the first on her feet to mutterings from the rest of the audience of, “Oh Gawd, not again, if she ivver gits a chuffin’ nose bleed ah’ volunteer ti tie a bluddy tourniquet rahn’ ‘er neck.
The Salvation Army Captain who bore such a remarkable resemblance to a South American vulture that some in the audience referred to him as El Condor and in the pulpit and I remember him saying “Nah aw yo sinners come and kneel at the repentance bench, y’hear?
Mum kept nudging me to go.
So like a good boy I went, it was a mistake, oh boy was it ever a mistake!
No sooner had I got there and knelt down when a Lady wearing a hat like my Mum’s new Salvo’s hat came and put her arm round me.
“Ayeup, wot’s goin’ on” I asked, trying to edge away.
But with a face like a mummified fruit bat the mad old Sheila was clinging onto me and began whispering sweet nothings inter me shell like lug ‘ole, and I could smell violet cashews on her breath and every time she moved hers arms it was like having ones nose shoved up the ass of a month old dead rabbit.
I had heard that cashews hid the smell of garlic and Vampires didn’t like garlic.
I didn’t like the smell of month old dead rabbits.
Then because I was not responding to her sweet warbling, she almost snarled, “Is tha’ chuffin’ deef or wot?”
I paid attention and it was not long before she had convinced me I was Old Nick Himself.
It was like being whipped with words.
The lady thought she had won when suddenly I burst into tears and when she let go of me I fled sobbing all the way back to my seat.
But it was a ploy to get away from the clinging arms that would not let me move as the voice kept on telling me what a rotten little sod I was.
Boy was I glad to get back to my seat
I never offered to go there again but I did attend Sunday school and I got a book for good attendance.
The book was called “ Cherry Ripe”
Well I did think it was better than getting two shiners from me Dad for disobedience.
And me Mam was forever showing our visitors when we got any that I had been awarded a prize for attendance every Sunday.
Then a year later I figured out that the book prize was not for free since we had to pay sixpence to have a card stamped with a little star to prove we had been there every Sunday and I summed it up that for fifty two sixpences I could have bought a years supply of Comics and they could stuff their ripe cherries complete wi’ stones in em.
Later when I saw any Salvo ladies in the street I would dive into the nearest shop and pretend to be looking round.
Trouble was as I began to grow up and used this ploy, the bloke behind the counter would stop what he was doing and reach under the counter and put a baseball bat on the counter within easy reach until I left the shop.
Skewey’s toyshop in George Street got really smart one Christmas when the shelves were loaded with toys.
The Manager had the entrance modified between the till and the door.
When someone came into the shop they walked over one part of the floor and a little window in the wall registered their weight.
On passing the till going out the numbers would be the same as the person left if they had not used the till to pay for what they had picked up in the shop.
But if the numbers differed and the till had not been used the door would automatically be locked and the would be shoplifter would be trapped inside the shop.
Unfortunately the idea had to be scrapped because one time the door locked and the owner had to ring the Fire Brigade to come and take the door off to let a lot of extremely de-chuffed people out
The watch and clock merchant next door to Skewey’s Toy Shop decided to have his own electric power unit installed in the brick shed at the back of his shop.
A huge engine was installed onto the new concrete floor and a generator was ordered and all the local kids got news by installments from the proud son of the owner of the shop as to the progress of the job.
“ Us weern’t be bothered wi’ power cuts not no moor! He chortled to the crowd of us kids gathered around asking when was the big day?
We got bored with, and got used to Winter setting in with power cuts when it rained a bit heavier than usual or snow began to fall, or the local Blacksmith got p----d as a nute last night, and someone fetched the Fuzz to drag him out of the local duck pond where he had staggered to have a leak, cos the last time he thought he was leaking in the doorway of an empty house the occupant of said empty house suddenly opened the door and doused him with a bucket full of ice cold water, and told him in to,
“P--s off some weers else.!”
However the bloke next door to Skewey’s Toy Store, who had the radio wired from his Shop Premises to lots of other houses in Barton finally got his home built generator going and was even now dancing with delight and with his gob puckering up like a duck’s bum about to squirt mud at a wandering lost rodent and he was whootlin’ “Over the waves Waltz” in quick time.
Cos yu see sum folk in Barton couldn’t afford tu buy a radio, but fer Seven and Six Pence per Annum could get the B.B.C. every day wired from the Shop next to Skeweys Toy Shop.
The radio rental idea was a good idea at the time, but when any power cuts happened due to storms or whatever, and the radio went kaput, (dead) and irate people would line up at the shop and threaten to lay one on the unfortunate owner who finally decided to remedy the situation by building his own power house in his own back yard.
But in Skewey’s Toy Shop one afternoon the silence was suddenly shattered by what sounded like a fully loaded B 47 four engine Bomber was beginning it’s take off run on the roof tiles of the George Hotel at the top of George Street and was then taxiing over Wilner’s shoe shop, then over the Chemist’s shop and picked up speed over the Kid’s Sweet Shop.
By the time the noise had got half way down George Street was when old man Skewey noticed that the hundreds smart ranks of lead toy soldiers that had been lined up ready to do battle on the top now vibrating shelves with some plastic Dinny saw us Rex of the Store were now doing an inching kind of shuffle movement to the front edge of the shelf and falling head first onto the floor.
Trouble was some of the plastic animals landed first only to be stuck up the root canal by the next lead Sodger wi’ his bayonet fixed.
All the wooden shelving in the store seemed to have come alive and everything on them was dancing to the vibrations that seemed to be getting louder.
Then suddenly the noise stopped and the silence was so loud that one young lady assistant jumped about a foot into the air when old man Skewey spoke to her from behind.
“ Go outside Missy and see if you can see someone playin’ a gob organ?” he pleaded.
“ Chuffin’ ‘eck!” replied the Lass, “ Me Dad cin fart louder than any chuffin’ gob organ!”
“ Be that as it may be” warbled owd Skewey, “Ah wants tu naw who’s responsible fer aw this racket?”
“ An look at all me stock o’ toy sodjers on’t floower!” he wailed.
Well! ah meen! I knew that the bloke next door had been fiddlin’ wi fittin’ a new generator en at, but it weren’t up to me to clue owd man Skewey in.
Besides that I remembered the time I walked though Skewey’s shop to browse when it was done up for Xmas and I was searched before I left, and despite my angry protests the assistant pulled a toy glider kit from my pocket and called the Fuzz and I stood there and let him.
When the Policeman came and listened to the Assistant he finally turned to me and said, “ I will also have to search you boyo !”
In my top pocket the Fuzz found a receipt for Two Shilling and Sixpence for the glider kit.
The Fuzz then asked, “Why did thee not tell me tha’s paid for this kit. App’n?”
“Cos thee nivver asked!” I replied.
“Don’t get smart with me boyo!” replied the Fuzz.
“No sir” But then it wasn’t me as called yer” I replied.
Then old man Skewey turned up.
“Aha! yu caught him then?”
Then the Fuzz turned to old man Skewey and asked him, “ Did thee sign this ‘ere docket fer a two an’
a tanner glider kit?” and shoved the docket under the nose of Skewey.
“That’s my signature and I remember writing it for a glider kit this afternoon” warbled Skewey.
“ I don’t believe this” grated the Fuzz bloke and let go of me and was walking out of the store when I shouted after him, “ Cheers Mate, don’t bother offering an apology an’ watch out for the dog crap an’ have a merry Xmas”
And the Cop turned a very red burning face around just in time to see my one finger salute, but when he got to where I had been I was about three hundred yards up the road and still running.
Ah indeed! those were the days. :0) T

Tom, this is wonderful!


My I enter it into <./>ThePost</.> on your behalf?


lil xx