Saturday, December 13, 2008
N.E.R.D.S. Ramble No. 229. Wed 10th Dec. 2008.
Christmas Ramble 2008.
Those Present – Sandyballs, Lafayette, Froggy, B.T., Bronco, Mystery Guest and
Mystery Guest’s mate.
It was a Wednesday and Sandyballs claimed it was bound to be good weather – and so it was. The sky was blue, the sun was out and Santa’s little helpers (aka The NERDS ) had taken time off from filling everybody’s stocking to spend a day pissing it up and trying to guess who the Mystery Guest might be. Lafayette reckoned it was Trevor (again) but the odds on this were fairly long. Various other dead people were suggested but even though Christmas was a time of ghosties and ghoulies most of us were pinning our hopes on someone sexy, female and preferably still warm so that general drooling and licentiousness could take place. Would it be Shirley or Carys or even Crunchie? We needed someone to cater for all tastes, but Sandyballs was not letting on and so rumor was rife.
The ramble started at Lewes station for the usual headcount. Matt was in Ireland negotiating a big lavatory sale, The Admiral, who sometimes came, was winding down to retirement and trying to frighten everybody with rumors of his staying on. Paco (another occasional guest) had forgotten what day it was and The Bish was way out to sea in his Pea Green Boat stuffing his face. That left the usual gang of wastrels (see above), and so we set off towards the golf course.
Half way up Golf Course Hill we were all knackered so B.T. stopped us for a photo shoot. Froggy sat quietly (for once) with a dog lead round his neck while Lafayette tugged the other end and announced that Froggy was his new Bitch. (This to go already with his Quazi, his Catamite and all his other infernal pets, so it looked like being a bumper Christmas for Lafayette). Remember, a Quazi, a Bitch and a Catamite are not just for Christmas…….
We rolled over the hills in the bright sunshine, some of us wearing silly hats and some of us swigging from hipflasks. We went wrong a few times, but hey! look who was in charge, and did it really matter as Glynde, our final destination is always a pleasure to visit. Eventually we rolled into the Trevor Arms where Peter, the landlord (Why are most landlords called Peter?) wacked a load of pints on to the bar and started to boost his annual profits.
After about three pints the “Mystery Guest Contest” ground to a halt. No-one had come up with anything original and Sandyballs was smirking. The M.G., however, had still not arrived and the NERDS were getting hungrier and hungrier and threatening to gobble up all the Old Trouts who were hanging about and who seemed to be getting served way ahead of them. Even the old English skill of beer mat flipping had lost its appeal.
Suddenly there was a clatter of high heels, and a burst of perfume wafted through the door closely followed by Sandyballs’ first born, La Bella Katherina, who it must be said, was well up to M.G. standards and made us all feel suddenly very, very old. Kisses all round, lunch got under way and the NERDS were happy again. The food was excellent, and much wine was drunk. Sandyballs kept complaining at one stage that he couldn’t pour the wine out until Bronco pointed out that the bottle he was holding still had the top on it. La Bella Katherina recalled Nerdling Picnics many years previously when most of the Nerdlings were teeny weeny, and where B.T. got his face smashed in for tripping over Lafayette’s foot. Oh, happy days!
Somehow everybody ended up on Glynde station having their photo taken (again) and training it back to Lewes to the Lansdowne Arms. Here La Bella Katherina introduced her own Mystery Guest – a luscious piece called Helen who had heard that the NERDS were all sexy old men and wanted to get a piece of the action. She was made very welcome and filled up with drink; nobody could believe she had a 16yr old daughter but plans started to be laid for a Grand Nerdlings Picnic in the Summer when we sexy old men would invite all the young crumpet around to an orgy on the Downs. Ho, ho, ho…
Finally we decamped to The Royal Oak where only “Young People” are normally allowed to enter. However an exception was made for The Sexy Old Men because of their charming companions. There Sandyballs promptly fell asleep and had to be hauled home by his daughter.
So, thanks go to Sandyballs for getting us lost and allowing us to letch at La Bella Katherina. Thanks of course go to Kathryn and to Helen for being beautiful, and to all the Nerds for being ugly. B.T. is to be congratulated for producing such an inspired blog
( Newhaven Eating Rambling Drinking Society), Bronco for dishing out most of his watches during the year and Froggy for his fantastic, autobiographical book which inspired Lafayette to produce his own deathless prose.
Happy Christmas, All.
Lafayette.
Christmas Ramble 2008.
Those Present – Sandyballs, Lafayette, Froggy, B.T., Bronco, Mystery Guest and
Mystery Guest’s mate.
It was a Wednesday and Sandyballs claimed it was bound to be good weather – and so it was. The sky was blue, the sun was out and Santa’s little helpers (aka The NERDS ) had taken time off from filling everybody’s stocking to spend a day pissing it up and trying to guess who the Mystery Guest might be. Lafayette reckoned it was Trevor (again) but the odds on this were fairly long. Various other dead people were suggested but even though Christmas was a time of ghosties and ghoulies most of us were pinning our hopes on someone sexy, female and preferably still warm so that general drooling and licentiousness could take place. Would it be Shirley or Carys or even Crunchie? We needed someone to cater for all tastes, but Sandyballs was not letting on and so rumor was rife.
The ramble started at Lewes station for the usual headcount. Matt was in Ireland negotiating a big lavatory sale, The Admiral, who sometimes came, was winding down to retirement and trying to frighten everybody with rumors of his staying on. Paco (another occasional guest) had forgotten what day it was and The Bish was way out to sea in his Pea Green Boat stuffing his face. That left the usual gang of wastrels (see above), and so we set off towards the golf course.
Half way up Golf Course Hill we were all knackered so B.T. stopped us for a photo shoot. Froggy sat quietly (for once) with a dog lead round his neck while Lafayette tugged the other end and announced that Froggy was his new Bitch. (This to go already with his Quazi, his Catamite and all his other infernal pets, so it looked like being a bumper Christmas for Lafayette). Remember, a Quazi, a Bitch and a Catamite are not just for Christmas…….
We rolled over the hills in the bright sunshine, some of us wearing silly hats and some of us swigging from hipflasks. We went wrong a few times, but hey! look who was in charge, and did it really matter as Glynde, our final destination is always a pleasure to visit. Eventually we rolled into the Trevor Arms where Peter, the landlord (Why are most landlords called Peter?) wacked a load of pints on to the bar and started to boost his annual profits.
After about three pints the “Mystery Guest Contest” ground to a halt. No-one had come up with anything original and Sandyballs was smirking. The M.G., however, had still not arrived and the NERDS were getting hungrier and hungrier and threatening to gobble up all the Old Trouts who were hanging about and who seemed to be getting served way ahead of them. Even the old English skill of beer mat flipping had lost its appeal.
Suddenly there was a clatter of high heels, and a burst of perfume wafted through the door closely followed by Sandyballs’ first born, La Bella Katherina, who it must be said, was well up to M.G. standards and made us all feel suddenly very, very old. Kisses all round, lunch got under way and the NERDS were happy again. The food was excellent, and much wine was drunk. Sandyballs kept complaining at one stage that he couldn’t pour the wine out until Bronco pointed out that the bottle he was holding still had the top on it. La Bella Katherina recalled Nerdling Picnics many years previously when most of the Nerdlings were teeny weeny, and where B.T. got his face smashed in for tripping over Lafayette’s foot. Oh, happy days!
Somehow everybody ended up on Glynde station having their photo taken (again) and training it back to Lewes to the Lansdowne Arms. Here La Bella Katherina introduced her own Mystery Guest – a luscious piece called Helen who had heard that the NERDS were all sexy old men and wanted to get a piece of the action. She was made very welcome and filled up with drink; nobody could believe she had a 16yr old daughter but plans started to be laid for a Grand Nerdlings Picnic in the Summer when we sexy old men would invite all the young crumpet around to an orgy on the Downs. Ho, ho, ho…
Finally we decamped to The Royal Oak where only “Young People” are normally allowed to enter. However an exception was made for The Sexy Old Men because of their charming companions. There Sandyballs promptly fell asleep and had to be hauled home by his daughter.
So, thanks go to Sandyballs for getting us lost and allowing us to letch at La Bella Katherina. Thanks of course go to Kathryn and to Helen for being beautiful, and to all the Nerds for being ugly. B.T. is to be congratulated for producing such an inspired blog
( Newhaven Eating Rambling Drinking Society), Bronco for dishing out most of his watches during the year and Froggy for his fantastic, autobiographical book which inspired Lafayette to produce his own deathless prose.
Happy Christmas, All.
Lafayette.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
N.E.R.D.S. Ramble No. 228.
Wednesday 19th November 2008.
Those Present – Froggy, Bronco, B.T., Matt, Lafayette, Sandyballs.
The Wetherspoons Ramble.
Most of us met chez Lafayette because Lavender Lodge was on the way to Brighton and Lafayette always had a full drinks cabinet. The NERDS had been expecting an early cheapo Christmas dinner to be taken at the famous Wetherspoons hostelry in the Marina, but sadly Froggy had logged on to Asian/Czech Au pair Babes Wearing Not Many Clothes instead of Wetherspoons . com and got all the information wrong. Christmas lunch did not start until 15 00hrs because, being a philanthropic organization, Wsp was committed to spend the morning feeding the destitute from the Congo who had bamboozled their way in via some lax port, so - no early fodder for the NERDS!
Never mind we could always turn up and eat monkey meat and spiders like The Unfortunates did, so everybody filled up on choccy biscuits and Irish Whiskey chez Lafayette and whiled away the time with the usual gossip. Froggy was bemoaning the fact that there didn’t seem to be any hot chix on the train any more until it was pointed out that at this time of day they were probably all in school. Somebody was wondering if they had enough walnuts to stuff up their turkey, and Matt was musing on collecting those little jam jars you get in posh hotels so that he could bottle his cut-up pubic hair and send it to his friends for Christmas (beats one of those round robin letters any day).
Disgusted at all this levity, Sandy balls threw us out into the street and told us we were here to ramble not to be smutty (now there’s a first!). So we all promptly got on the nearest bus and travelled to Rottingdean.
Now Rottingdean is a nice place full of cultured posh people, including the ex Chief Inspector of Immigration who still gets through a bottle of scotch a day such was the strain of the job (must have worked at Newhaven). The NERDS wandered round trying to look tidy ( good job Philby wasn’t with us) and came across The Plough near a duck pond - handy to fall into when you came out, and decided to have an aperitif. Inside we drank Harveys and had a competition between Lafayette and Sandyballs as to who had been Mutt and who had been Jeff in Dublin. It turned out (according to Matt) that Sb had been Mutt because of his hearing deficiency, and Lf had been Jeff because he was the intelligent one. Too intelligent to spend his holiday in Cork, at any rate.
We emerged from the pub blinking into the bright sunshine and managed to sidestep the duck pond. The weather was cheerful and mild so we set off up a crazy hill to an old windmill where we found some old bugger slumped in a corner wrapped round a bottle of Bells and blethering on about hot cross buns and the good old days. No, it wasn’t Philby but it was what Philby could have become with a little application and getting in to work on time. Oh, the chances we miss when Fate throws them our way!
Nearby there was a memorial stone listing all the good, local worthies who had died at sea. Lafayette was disappointed not to get a mention, but Sandy balls pointed out that just getting pissed on the Chartres a few times and having one or two (well, one) dodgy crossing didn’t actually qualify to get your name up in lights.
Los NIERDOS wandered down the other side of the hill and through St. Dunstans from the lofty paths of which we had a pleasant view of the shimmering sea and where nobody took a blind bit of notice at our presence. We had to put our best foot forward now as Bronco would be tapping his fingers on the bar of Wetherspoons being concerned by our tardiness and by his own vast appetite. And so we arrived, but no Bronco! Apparently he had stopped off at no fewer than six cafes en route to have a breakfast in each just in case they ran out of food at lunch. When he arrived we all sat and boiled in the sun together.
It must be said that the scoff at Wetherspoons wasn’t bad and good value too. Lafayette particularly liked the crunchy spiders especially imported from Goma. Bronco’s ankle wasn’t any better but at least he didn’t have horrific gout like Sandyballs. B.T. said if his next deal with Sealink went through successfully we could all have our own yachts parked in the marina and ramble between them to save time pouring drinks. Froggy hoovered up the remains of Bronco’s chicken tikka and then cleared everybody else’s plate (Don’t you get fed at home ?) and Matt said Sandyballs looked divine in his blue denim shirt. In short, we were all very mellow and it looked like it had been a successful ramble and lunch.
After a brief zoom round Asda for a camera case for Matt, and a brief stay in MacDonalds for an icecream again for Matt, the ramble broke up. Lafayette elected to travel home (free) on the bus after having ascended the sheer cliff face, while Los Otros dragged Bronco into the centre of Brighton for all sorts of naughty goings-on, many of which will probably be revealed in the next write-up if Lafayette gets high on mescalin again.
Thanks be to all who took part and contributed. Remember, next month is the Christmas do so start collecting those little jam pots and walnuts now!
Lafayette.
Wednesday 19th November 2008.
Those Present – Froggy, Bronco, B.T., Matt, Lafayette, Sandyballs.
The Wetherspoons Ramble.
Most of us met chez Lafayette because Lavender Lodge was on the way to Brighton and Lafayette always had a full drinks cabinet. The NERDS had been expecting an early cheapo Christmas dinner to be taken at the famous Wetherspoons hostelry in the Marina, but sadly Froggy had logged on to Asian/Czech Au pair Babes Wearing Not Many Clothes instead of Wetherspoons . com and got all the information wrong. Christmas lunch did not start until 15 00hrs because, being a philanthropic organization, Wsp was committed to spend the morning feeding the destitute from the Congo who had bamboozled their way in via some lax port, so - no early fodder for the NERDS!
Never mind we could always turn up and eat monkey meat and spiders like The Unfortunates did, so everybody filled up on choccy biscuits and Irish Whiskey chez Lafayette and whiled away the time with the usual gossip. Froggy was bemoaning the fact that there didn’t seem to be any hot chix on the train any more until it was pointed out that at this time of day they were probably all in school. Somebody was wondering if they had enough walnuts to stuff up their turkey, and Matt was musing on collecting those little jam jars you get in posh hotels so that he could bottle his cut-up pubic hair and send it to his friends for Christmas (beats one of those round robin letters any day).
Disgusted at all this levity, Sandy balls threw us out into the street and told us we were here to ramble not to be smutty (now there’s a first!). So we all promptly got on the nearest bus and travelled to Rottingdean.
Now Rottingdean is a nice place full of cultured posh people, including the ex Chief Inspector of Immigration who still gets through a bottle of scotch a day such was the strain of the job (must have worked at Newhaven). The NERDS wandered round trying to look tidy ( good job Philby wasn’t with us) and came across The Plough near a duck pond - handy to fall into when you came out, and decided to have an aperitif. Inside we drank Harveys and had a competition between Lafayette and Sandyballs as to who had been Mutt and who had been Jeff in Dublin. It turned out (according to Matt) that Sb had been Mutt because of his hearing deficiency, and Lf had been Jeff because he was the intelligent one. Too intelligent to spend his holiday in Cork, at any rate.
We emerged from the pub blinking into the bright sunshine and managed to sidestep the duck pond. The weather was cheerful and mild so we set off up a crazy hill to an old windmill where we found some old bugger slumped in a corner wrapped round a bottle of Bells and blethering on about hot cross buns and the good old days. No, it wasn’t Philby but it was what Philby could have become with a little application and getting in to work on time. Oh, the chances we miss when Fate throws them our way!
Nearby there was a memorial stone listing all the good, local worthies who had died at sea. Lafayette was disappointed not to get a mention, but Sandy balls pointed out that just getting pissed on the Chartres a few times and having one or two (well, one) dodgy crossing didn’t actually qualify to get your name up in lights.
Los NIERDOS wandered down the other side of the hill and through St. Dunstans from the lofty paths of which we had a pleasant view of the shimmering sea and where nobody took a blind bit of notice at our presence. We had to put our best foot forward now as Bronco would be tapping his fingers on the bar of Wetherspoons being concerned by our tardiness and by his own vast appetite. And so we arrived, but no Bronco! Apparently he had stopped off at no fewer than six cafes en route to have a breakfast in each just in case they ran out of food at lunch. When he arrived we all sat and boiled in the sun together.
It must be said that the scoff at Wetherspoons wasn’t bad and good value too. Lafayette particularly liked the crunchy spiders especially imported from Goma. Bronco’s ankle wasn’t any better but at least he didn’t have horrific gout like Sandyballs. B.T. said if his next deal with Sealink went through successfully we could all have our own yachts parked in the marina and ramble between them to save time pouring drinks. Froggy hoovered up the remains of Bronco’s chicken tikka and then cleared everybody else’s plate (Don’t you get fed at home ?) and Matt said Sandyballs looked divine in his blue denim shirt. In short, we were all very mellow and it looked like it had been a successful ramble and lunch.
After a brief zoom round Asda for a camera case for Matt, and a brief stay in MacDonalds for an icecream again for Matt, the ramble broke up. Lafayette elected to travel home (free) on the bus after having ascended the sheer cliff face, while Los Otros dragged Bronco into the centre of Brighton for all sorts of naughty goings-on, many of which will probably be revealed in the next write-up if Lafayette gets high on mescalin again.
Thanks be to all who took part and contributed. Remember, next month is the Christmas do so start collecting those little jam pots and walnuts now!
Lafayette.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Thursday, November 20, 2008
NERDS Ramble No 227. Wednesday 12th November 2008.
Those Present – Lafayette, Froggy, Matt, B.T., Bronco, Sandyballs.
The Poorly Toe Ramble.
Sandyballs had a poorly toe. Not only was it poorly, it looked gross. All the NERDS practically threw up when he whipped off his sock and waved the vile, poxy object in their faces. Whispers of his having picked up syphilis in an overseas brothel abounded; people began to edge away from him nervously, dogs howled mournfully and a cloud passed over the sun. How could we ramble under these circumstances? Fortunately everything returned to normal once he had put his sock back on, except that Froggy was spotted with a lump of cotton wool in his ear. “ I’ve got a poorly ear,” he said, but by this time we weren’t in the mood for attention seeking trivialities and set off through Lewes in the hope that nobody’s leg would fall off. We were going to meet up with Bronco in Ringmer and thought we’d better get there quick before he died of overdrinking in the bar of The Anchor or worse, died of something unrelated to drink!
After the sun had reappeared it wasn’t a bad day. This was to be the first of two rambles in November because nothing had happened in October and the NERDS were by now getting thirsty. First of all we had to negotiate the golf course so we knackered ourselves by climbing up golf course hill at the edge of Lewes and appeared on some putting green or other where Froggy wanted to leave everybody’s balls alone (!).
The trouble with golf courses is that they get in the way of ramblers’ routes, there are lots of nasty quicksandy bits into which you can sink and they contain a lot of prats who think they can whack white balls at NERDS. Tolerance levels between the two factions is always fairly low, so when we were greeted with “ I say, you there, yes you with the gangrenous foot, would you mind awfully not making our nice green die by dragging your foot over it.” you start to plot a hideous revenge ( like coming back at night and
fire-bombing the place). However, Mr Poorly foot guided us off enemy territory and we tried to head towards Ringmer.
It was obvious that Sandyballs had failed to reconnoitre this walk since we kept going round in circles and getting disorientated (a bit). Mercifully the weather remained sunny and we negotiated fields of sheep and sheep-shit to cruise into Ringmer where the Posh
(Monied) People live and where they all drink in The Anchor.
Fortunately Bronco was still there and only half drunk. “ Christ! What’s that hideous smell of rotting flesh ?” were his first words to Sandy balls. “ Oh , just a little something I picked up in a bawdy house in Macau,” was the macho reply. “ Better have a drink, then, “ concluded the ever practical Bronco, and limped off to get the booze in . “ Still suffering from that old cavalry wound to your ankle then?” said Matt sympathetically when he returned with the drinks.”No, actually, some bloody whore tripped me up in a brothel in Macau,” replied Bronco. Sandyballs remained guiltily silent.
The food wasn’t bad here, and while we ate Froggy told us about his new literary project entitled “The Loneliness of The RearEnd Surfer” (Don’t ask), while B.T. told us the last time he had paid for sex (apart from with sailors in his first job) was in Africa 45 years previously (monkeys? anacondors? Wildebeest?). Lafayette said that the women in Islamabad used to clamour around his back door for sex waving 100 rupee notes in his direction, but nobody believed him such was his reputation for exaggeration.
Sandyballs thought we should be heading back to the Metropolis so we all got our bus passes out (except Froggy and B.T. ha ha!) and got on a bus with thousands of screaming schoolkids from the local school. Most of the NERDS felt quite comfortable sitting next to nubile nymphets upstairs and holding their satchels for them, while Sandyballs (because of his poorly toe) sat downstairs and made some new friends with the wrinklies.
Eventually we arrived at the John Harvey Tavern where peace reigned for a short while until nobody could work out how to “manage “ the final whip (not even Lafayette with all his life skills) and where we decided to honour Philby in January with a Dead Dog Layby Ramble – something to do with La Fete des Morts both dogs and NERDS. The idea was to sit in the layby and drink red wine and remember the dog, and then to proceed to Philby’s grave nearby to show a bit of respect for a defunct NERD.
And so the ramble fizzled out. Thanks to Sandyballs for organization etc. and for letting us see his manky toe, and thanks to B.T. for returning Lafayette’s notes which he had absentmindedly left in the pub. Next week we all descend on Wetherspoons in Brighton for a cheap Christmas meal thanks to Froggy’s vigilance in scouring the internet for … erm other subjects.
See you all chez moi next week for biscuits – Bring your hipflasks!
Lafayette.
Those Present – Lafayette, Froggy, Matt, B.T., Bronco, Sandyballs.
The Poorly Toe Ramble.
Sandyballs had a poorly toe. Not only was it poorly, it looked gross. All the NERDS practically threw up when he whipped off his sock and waved the vile, poxy object in their faces. Whispers of his having picked up syphilis in an overseas brothel abounded; people began to edge away from him nervously, dogs howled mournfully and a cloud passed over the sun. How could we ramble under these circumstances? Fortunately everything returned to normal once he had put his sock back on, except that Froggy was spotted with a lump of cotton wool in his ear. “ I’ve got a poorly ear,” he said, but by this time we weren’t in the mood for attention seeking trivialities and set off through Lewes in the hope that nobody’s leg would fall off. We were going to meet up with Bronco in Ringmer and thought we’d better get there quick before he died of overdrinking in the bar of The Anchor or worse, died of something unrelated to drink!
After the sun had reappeared it wasn’t a bad day. This was to be the first of two rambles in November because nothing had happened in October and the NERDS were by now getting thirsty. First of all we had to negotiate the golf course so we knackered ourselves by climbing up golf course hill at the edge of Lewes and appeared on some putting green or other where Froggy wanted to leave everybody’s balls alone (!).
The trouble with golf courses is that they get in the way of ramblers’ routes, there are lots of nasty quicksandy bits into which you can sink and they contain a lot of prats who think they can whack white balls at NERDS. Tolerance levels between the two factions is always fairly low, so when we were greeted with “ I say, you there, yes you with the gangrenous foot, would you mind awfully not making our nice green die by dragging your foot over it.” you start to plot a hideous revenge ( like coming back at night and
fire-bombing the place). However, Mr Poorly foot guided us off enemy territory and we tried to head towards Ringmer.
It was obvious that Sandyballs had failed to reconnoitre this walk since we kept going round in circles and getting disorientated (a bit). Mercifully the weather remained sunny and we negotiated fields of sheep and sheep-shit to cruise into Ringmer where the Posh
(Monied) People live and where they all drink in The Anchor.
Fortunately Bronco was still there and only half drunk. “ Christ! What’s that hideous smell of rotting flesh ?” were his first words to Sandy balls. “ Oh , just a little something I picked up in a bawdy house in Macau,” was the macho reply. “ Better have a drink, then, “ concluded the ever practical Bronco, and limped off to get the booze in . “ Still suffering from that old cavalry wound to your ankle then?” said Matt sympathetically when he returned with the drinks.”No, actually, some bloody whore tripped me up in a brothel in Macau,” replied Bronco. Sandyballs remained guiltily silent.
The food wasn’t bad here, and while we ate Froggy told us about his new literary project entitled “The Loneliness of The RearEnd Surfer” (Don’t ask), while B.T. told us the last time he had paid for sex (apart from with sailors in his first job) was in Africa 45 years previously (monkeys? anacondors? Wildebeest?). Lafayette said that the women in Islamabad used to clamour around his back door for sex waving 100 rupee notes in his direction, but nobody believed him such was his reputation for exaggeration.
Sandyballs thought we should be heading back to the Metropolis so we all got our bus passes out (except Froggy and B.T. ha ha!) and got on a bus with thousands of screaming schoolkids from the local school. Most of the NERDS felt quite comfortable sitting next to nubile nymphets upstairs and holding their satchels for them, while Sandyballs (because of his poorly toe) sat downstairs and made some new friends with the wrinklies.
Eventually we arrived at the John Harvey Tavern where peace reigned for a short while until nobody could work out how to “manage “ the final whip (not even Lafayette with all his life skills) and where we decided to honour Philby in January with a Dead Dog Layby Ramble – something to do with La Fete des Morts both dogs and NERDS. The idea was to sit in the layby and drink red wine and remember the dog, and then to proceed to Philby’s grave nearby to show a bit of respect for a defunct NERD.
And so the ramble fizzled out. Thanks to Sandyballs for organization etc. and for letting us see his manky toe, and thanks to B.T. for returning Lafayette’s notes which he had absentmindedly left in the pub. Next week we all descend on Wetherspoons in Brighton for a cheap Christmas meal thanks to Froggy’s vigilance in scouring the internet for … erm other subjects.
See you all chez moi next week for biscuits – Bring your hipflasks!
Lafayette.
Monday, October 06, 2008
The WASH-OUT RAMBLE
THE N.E.R.D.S. RAMBLE No.226 - The Wash-out Ramble.
Tuesday 30th September 2008.
Those Present - Matt, Froggy, B.T., Bronco, Sandyballs and Lafayette.
Remember “ The Darts in Lewes” ramble last month when bad weather prevented the NERDS from getting any form of wholesome exercise? Well this month was no better. Froggy had originally arranged for us to go around Arlington Reservoir and eat at Pete’s Pub (The Yew Tree) at Arlington, but Fate inflicted shitty weather on us and decided that we were going to spend all day drinking yet again.
It was rainy and windy and it was decided to meet at Seaford station. Dead easy you might think - buy a ticket, get on the train, don’t drink until you get off at the right stop (for obvious reasons) and then meet up together and plan what to do next.
Ho, ho, ho! Why is nothing simple? First off you’d got three lots of NERDS coming from three different directions, and to complicate matters a little bit five cows decided to walk across the railway line between Lewes and Newhaven and tried to commit suicide in a spectacularly train fucking-up way.
God, the utter chaos! The cows were on their mobile phones to each other trying to get off the track, some of the NERDS were on separate stationary buses dying of thirst, it was still pissing down with rain and clearly the ramble was out of the window. Luckily, by dint of snatching the phones off the cows and communicating with each other, we all met up in The Wellington to talk about our terrible experiences. Lafayette said he hadn’t come across such a mess since he’d tried to sail over to Dieppe one stormy day in 1990 - Did I ever tell you about that? And Froggy said he hadn’t been so depressed since his book had been rejected for publication for the twenty-ninth time ( Did he ever tell you about that?)
And so we drank and began to accuse each other of lots of nasty, vicious things . Matt said he’d seen Froggy hobknobbing with Nobby and how dare he when Nobby hadn’t bought Matt an icecream two years ago. Lafayette remarked that B.T. was getting a little worn as his catamite and he was thinking of getting a new one, this time from a girl’s school. B.T. threatened Lafayette with a costly divorce. Sandyballs said he’d recently gone to Lourdes on Philby’s advice to get his ear done, but he’d wasted all his money and was still deaf. Consequently he was thinking of deleting Philby’s number from the memory on his mobile…..
Lafayette, peeved at the thought of having to pay B.T. for not having sex with him, threatened to kill Bronco’s horse and roast him on a massive barbecue. The nice friendly atmospheres of previous rambles seemed to be being undermined.
Luckily, just then we transferred to The Plough and B.T. remembered it was Jewish New Year and got up to buy everyone a round of drinks. Good humour was restored all round; we ordered lunch and began to take bets on how big a steak Bronco was going to buy. We weren’t disappointed either as Bronco got himself an Elephant burger with extra chips and then wondered why he’d got tusks sticking up out of his sesame bun. Meanwhile Matt was fantasising about how sexy Sandyballs was looking in denim and how he reminded him of Paul Newman when he was shagging Robert Redford in that film about cowboys. (Brokeback Mountain, wasn’t it ?)
Just then Matt’s dreams were shattered when he counted up how many scampi he had been served. Only seven? How could this be? Needs a recount, GET THE MANAGER IMMEDIATELY, DON’T YOU KNOW WHO I AM? Some poor girly was despatched to pacify his rants - no avail, Matt was not satisfied with a rational explanation nor even a grovelling apology. In desperation the girly offered to show him her tits but Matt wanted to be the centre of attention and demanded a free dessert or else he would get really cross. We’d all seen this schizophrenic behaviour before when someone had got shit all over his newly hoovered carpet so hastened to advise the girly to bring him a giant sized strawberry pavlova with salad cream tout de suite.
Order was sort of restored. Froggy finished off Bronco’s crappy steak and ordered a froggy bag for his leftovers. He soothed Matt’s ruffled feathers by relating how he had met this big Nigerian on line who had promised to publish his second autobiography -”All Shagged Out at Thirty” as long as he paid him a small administration fee of $10,000 direct to Lagos.
Sandyballs suggested that Froggy might have more success if he went to Lourdes and threw his manuscript at a few statues of Our Lady. Time for a change of pub so we went back to The Welly.
A nice game of darts - good robust, physical exercise for all the NERDS, none of this namby pamby walking rubbish. B.T. had forgotten to bring his darts so had bought a posh brass set in the catamite shop (special offer to those who split little boys). So we played the usual game - Dinky Ports against Real Ports. Sandyballs and Froggy were good, devious even, maintaining that brass darts gave an unfair advantage against Froggy’s nickel tungsten jobs but B.T. got the high scores and Lafayette doubled out. Sandyballs threw his darts on the floor in a strop and wouldn’t play any more after having been beaten twice in a row. No miracles today then!
Thereafter everyone scowled at each other and buggered off home. We are going to have to pick a day with fine weather next time otherwise we might risk getting on each others’ nerves. Sandyballs reckons Wednesdays are OK but Lafayette does his shipwreck training on those days just in case he gets hit by a second tsunami while crossing the Channel. Matt can’t make Fridays because he‘s usually having a new lavatory installed then, and Bronco can’t make Saturdays because he’s usually up at Cartiers buying watches. What are we to do? I know, arrange two rambles for October and hope there won’t be any cows on the line next time.
Mille Baisers, Lafayette.
Tuesday 30th September 2008.
Those Present - Matt, Froggy, B.T., Bronco, Sandyballs and Lafayette.
Remember “ The Darts in Lewes” ramble last month when bad weather prevented the NERDS from getting any form of wholesome exercise? Well this month was no better. Froggy had originally arranged for us to go around Arlington Reservoir and eat at Pete’s Pub (The Yew Tree) at Arlington, but Fate inflicted shitty weather on us and decided that we were going to spend all day drinking yet again.
It was rainy and windy and it was decided to meet at Seaford station. Dead easy you might think - buy a ticket, get on the train, don’t drink until you get off at the right stop (for obvious reasons) and then meet up together and plan what to do next.
Ho, ho, ho! Why is nothing simple? First off you’d got three lots of NERDS coming from three different directions, and to complicate matters a little bit five cows decided to walk across the railway line between Lewes and Newhaven and tried to commit suicide in a spectacularly train fucking-up way.
God, the utter chaos! The cows were on their mobile phones to each other trying to get off the track, some of the NERDS were on separate stationary buses dying of thirst, it was still pissing down with rain and clearly the ramble was out of the window. Luckily, by dint of snatching the phones off the cows and communicating with each other, we all met up in The Wellington to talk about our terrible experiences. Lafayette said he hadn’t come across such a mess since he’d tried to sail over to Dieppe one stormy day in 1990 - Did I ever tell you about that? And Froggy said he hadn’t been so depressed since his book had been rejected for publication for the twenty-ninth time ( Did he ever tell you about that?)
And so we drank and began to accuse each other of lots of nasty, vicious things . Matt said he’d seen Froggy hobknobbing with Nobby and how dare he when Nobby hadn’t bought Matt an icecream two years ago. Lafayette remarked that B.T. was getting a little worn as his catamite and he was thinking of getting a new one, this time from a girl’s school. B.T. threatened Lafayette with a costly divorce. Sandyballs said he’d recently gone to Lourdes on Philby’s advice to get his ear done, but he’d wasted all his money and was still deaf. Consequently he was thinking of deleting Philby’s number from the memory on his mobile…..
Lafayette, peeved at the thought of having to pay B.T. for not having sex with him, threatened to kill Bronco’s horse and roast him on a massive barbecue. The nice friendly atmospheres of previous rambles seemed to be being undermined.
Luckily, just then we transferred to The Plough and B.T. remembered it was Jewish New Year and got up to buy everyone a round of drinks. Good humour was restored all round; we ordered lunch and began to take bets on how big a steak Bronco was going to buy. We weren’t disappointed either as Bronco got himself an Elephant burger with extra chips and then wondered why he’d got tusks sticking up out of his sesame bun. Meanwhile Matt was fantasising about how sexy Sandyballs was looking in denim and how he reminded him of Paul Newman when he was shagging Robert Redford in that film about cowboys. (Brokeback Mountain, wasn’t it ?)
Just then Matt’s dreams were shattered when he counted up how many scampi he had been served. Only seven? How could this be? Needs a recount, GET THE MANAGER IMMEDIATELY, DON’T YOU KNOW WHO I AM? Some poor girly was despatched to pacify his rants - no avail, Matt was not satisfied with a rational explanation nor even a grovelling apology. In desperation the girly offered to show him her tits but Matt wanted to be the centre of attention and demanded a free dessert or else he would get really cross. We’d all seen this schizophrenic behaviour before when someone had got shit all over his newly hoovered carpet so hastened to advise the girly to bring him a giant sized strawberry pavlova with salad cream tout de suite.
Order was sort of restored. Froggy finished off Bronco’s crappy steak and ordered a froggy bag for his leftovers. He soothed Matt’s ruffled feathers by relating how he had met this big Nigerian on line who had promised to publish his second autobiography -”All Shagged Out at Thirty” as long as he paid him a small administration fee of $10,000 direct to Lagos.
Sandyballs suggested that Froggy might have more success if he went to Lourdes and threw his manuscript at a few statues of Our Lady. Time for a change of pub so we went back to The Welly.
A nice game of darts - good robust, physical exercise for all the NERDS, none of this namby pamby walking rubbish. B.T. had forgotten to bring his darts so had bought a posh brass set in the catamite shop (special offer to those who split little boys). So we played the usual game - Dinky Ports against Real Ports. Sandyballs and Froggy were good, devious even, maintaining that brass darts gave an unfair advantage against Froggy’s nickel tungsten jobs but B.T. got the high scores and Lafayette doubled out. Sandyballs threw his darts on the floor in a strop and wouldn’t play any more after having been beaten twice in a row. No miracles today then!
Thereafter everyone scowled at each other and buggered off home. We are going to have to pick a day with fine weather next time otherwise we might risk getting on each others’ nerves. Sandyballs reckons Wednesdays are OK but Lafayette does his shipwreck training on those days just in case he gets hit by a second tsunami while crossing the Channel. Matt can’t make Fridays because he‘s usually having a new lavatory installed then, and Bronco can’t make Saturdays because he’s usually up at Cartiers buying watches. What are we to do? I know, arrange two rambles for October and hope there won’t be any cows on the line next time.
Mille Baisers, Lafayette.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Tuesday, September 09, 2008
At Last the "Double" write-up
THE N.E.R.D.S. Rambles 226 & 227.
No.226 Thursday 31st July 2008.
Those present - Froggy, Bronco, Sandyballs, Matt, Lafayette
The Morpheus Ramble.
Those endowed with a Classical education, and who may have read Ovid, will know that the deity who presided over this month’s ramble is the god of
forgetfulness. Lafayette had lost his contemporaneous notes, alas, and so had to rely on his failing memory. What is more, when he ‘fessed up to this peccadillo he found that the rest of the Nerds had memories just as crap as his and so nobody really knows exactly what happened.
Although the she-devil alcohol may have warped our collective memories a bit, Sandyballs remembers taking us to Cooden Beach on the train. Shirley wasn’t there this time, more’s the pity, since she gets quite articulate when drink is thrust upon her, and she may well have been able to tell us what we got up to,
(or not, depending on what we may have done).
Most of us remember that the weather was dull and that we walked over a lot of fields arriving finally at The Star at Cooden Beach. The food and drink were very good involving a buffet lunch and four different sorts of meat. We walked back along the stony beach which made for difficult locomotion (Lafayette remembers remarking about this to Bronco) and we all had an icecream. Then we had a few drinks in the pouring rain in a pub near the station and came home.
So you see, a bloody boring ramble really, and one hardly worth writing about even if Lafayette’s notes had been discovered. If only Shirley had been there things might have been so different…
Now this next ramble on the other hand.
Publishers Note.
It is really sad when the one tasked in recording the annals looses his marbles. As you may see from the photographs there was another member of this group who actually ambled on this promenade and recorded the findings in celluloid. Perhaps of ghosts of ramblers past are f***ing up the “Ramrod”.
Ramble No. 227 - Thursday 4th Sept. 2008
Those Present - Lafayette, Sandyballs, B.T., Froggy, Bronco.
The Darts In Lewes Ramble.
Well we had hardly rubbed the sleep from our eyes when the telephones of the Nerds began to jingle off the walls. Outside the weather had decided not to shine on the righteous and the rain was falling in stair rods. ( Who writes this shit, anyway?) Sandyballs was concerned that the Nerds would all drown if he took us on his proposed route and Lafayette agreed. One fatality per year in the Nerds is more than enough, we didn’t want to commit mass suicide. So…. a bit of darts practice was mooted and the boys were all told to bring their weapons.
Froggy met Lafayette on the train. It could have been a fairly banal journey apart from the fact that they were squeezed in among about 1500 female teenage students all in very short skirts, casual decollete white blouses and all madly texting each other so that they did not see the slavering, lust ridden expressions on these Nerds’ faces, nor did they realise the awful effect they were having on the nether regions of these upright citizens. Imagine my surprise (as the saying goes) when all of a flash Froggy and Lafayette suddenly found themselves in Lewes as though time had accelerated and they had both been in Moslem heaven.
Anyway, enough of this porn. L. and F. met the others outside the station all except Bronco who was not answering his phone and seemed to be incommunicado. Finally he turned up wearing immaculate suede boots, a smart jacket and sporting a stylish umbrella to qualify for Best Dressed Nerd of the Year award. B.T. , our newly promoted Nerds photographer, had a field day recording this piece of sartorial elegance - especially the umbrella. Bronco said he didn’t want to get his suede boots wet and we all told him not to be such a fairy otherwise we’d go over to his house and confiscate his horse and eat him (the horse).
Sandyballs mooted a mini ramble around the ruined priory but luckily it started to rain at that instant so we had to turn about and head for the nearest drinking hole. This turned out to be the King’s Head which did not seem to be very open -even at gone half past eleven in the morning. There was a postman outside with what looked like a parcel to deliver, so we hung about thinking to dash inside once the door was opened , however, sadly, the postie decided he’d got the wrong address and moved on.
Fortunately The Swan at Southover was open so we all piled into the well proportioned games room and got stuck into throwing darts at each other.
The more we drank, the better we played. Lafayette and B.T. (The Real Ports) against Froggy and Sandyballs (The Dinky Ports). The results see-sawed back and forth with The Real Ports winning most of the games where some mental agility was called for (like adding up a score and taking it away from what you got last time), and The Dinky Ports who managed one good shot to win at cricket. Meanwhile Bronco was in dispute with the very helpful barman over the lack of black rats in his cider, but the barman said they didn’t make the cider out of black rats any more because folks were getting peed off with the results.
Since The Swan had a suspect kitchen (too many rats) we decided to proceed to The Brewers for lunch where Sandyballs had family connections. This became
very obvious when the landlady, Cathy, upon seeing Sandyballs come crashing over the doorstep, went and brought out her love-child, Elena, held her up in his face and said “You’re late with this month’s maintenance again !” Sandyballs told her to chalk it up on his account once again since he had the promise of a lucrative short posting to Brussels due to the sad demise of the previous incumbent and where you got free red wine and were paid in euros.
We had an excellent lunch in the Brewers - Froggy was so taken with the food that he even had a second meal while he pondered the compelling question of
“ What exactly is a Quasamite?” and where once again the Proper Ports trounced the Dinky Ports at darts. On the way out we saw Cathy’s Dad, Jasper, sat on the steps outside the back door. He collared Sandyballs and said “ You see moy daughter all roit and I ’ll put you forward for a position in the masons, but spurn ’er and I’ll put the word round an’ yorl never get another point uv Harveys in Lewes agin.” Sandyballs thought a rapid escape abroad again might be to his advantage.
But first it was decided to visit an old friend of Sandyballs in the Crown Hotel down the road. Yes, the Ugly Barmaid was still there, and even uglier if that was possible. Froggy thought he had found the answer to his compelling question at last - a Quasamite is whatever turns you on - until Lafayette gently reminded him of all the untapped nymphet crumpet that was due to come out of the Tertiary College in the next few hours.
And so we rolled down to the John Harvey where Bronco suddenly realised he’d left the whip back at the Crown. Oh no! The Ugly Barmaid was probably spending it on a costly face-lift to lure yet more innocent young men in to her exotic boudoir where she would fill them full of drink and do wicked, horrible things to them. Apart from wanting to rid themselves of this vile vision, the Nerds wanted another drink so Bronco and Froggy were despatched to rescue our money and to save the Lewes youth from certain perdition. Luckily the wip was still intact and the day was saved.
This had certainly been a “ramble” with a difference. Just the right amount of walking and we had renewed aquaintance with a number of interesting characters. Well, you can’t do a lot outdoors when it’s pissing down with rain, can you? Lets hope the weather is kinder for our second ramble at the end of September.
Los Nierdos para siempre!
Lafayette.
No.226 Thursday 31st July 2008.
Those present - Froggy, Bronco, Sandyballs, Matt, Lafayette
The Morpheus Ramble.
Those endowed with a Classical education, and who may have read Ovid, will know that the deity who presided over this month’s ramble is the god of
forgetfulness. Lafayette had lost his contemporaneous notes, alas, and so had to rely on his failing memory. What is more, when he ‘fessed up to this peccadillo he found that the rest of the Nerds had memories just as crap as his and so nobody really knows exactly what happened.
Although the she-devil alcohol may have warped our collective memories a bit, Sandyballs remembers taking us to Cooden Beach on the train. Shirley wasn’t there this time, more’s the pity, since she gets quite articulate when drink is thrust upon her, and she may well have been able to tell us what we got up to,
(or not, depending on what we may have done).
Most of us remember that the weather was dull and that we walked over a lot of fields arriving finally at The Star at Cooden Beach. The food and drink were very good involving a buffet lunch and four different sorts of meat. We walked back along the stony beach which made for difficult locomotion (Lafayette remembers remarking about this to Bronco) and we all had an icecream. Then we had a few drinks in the pouring rain in a pub near the station and came home.
So you see, a bloody boring ramble really, and one hardly worth writing about even if Lafayette’s notes had been discovered. If only Shirley had been there things might have been so different…
Now this next ramble on the other hand.
Publishers Note.
It is really sad when the one tasked in recording the annals looses his marbles. As you may see from the photographs there was another member of this group who actually ambled on this promenade and recorded the findings in celluloid. Perhaps of ghosts of ramblers past are f***ing up the “Ramrod”.
Ramble No. 227 - Thursday 4th Sept. 2008
Those Present - Lafayette, Sandyballs, B.T., Froggy, Bronco.
The Darts In Lewes Ramble.
Well we had hardly rubbed the sleep from our eyes when the telephones of the Nerds began to jingle off the walls. Outside the weather had decided not to shine on the righteous and the rain was falling in stair rods. ( Who writes this shit, anyway?) Sandyballs was concerned that the Nerds would all drown if he took us on his proposed route and Lafayette agreed. One fatality per year in the Nerds is more than enough, we didn’t want to commit mass suicide. So…. a bit of darts practice was mooted and the boys were all told to bring their weapons.
Froggy met Lafayette on the train. It could have been a fairly banal journey apart from the fact that they were squeezed in among about 1500 female teenage students all in very short skirts, casual decollete white blouses and all madly texting each other so that they did not see the slavering, lust ridden expressions on these Nerds’ faces, nor did they realise the awful effect they were having on the nether regions of these upright citizens. Imagine my surprise (as the saying goes) when all of a flash Froggy and Lafayette suddenly found themselves in Lewes as though time had accelerated and they had both been in Moslem heaven.
Anyway, enough of this porn. L. and F. met the others outside the station all except Bronco who was not answering his phone and seemed to be incommunicado. Finally he turned up wearing immaculate suede boots, a smart jacket and sporting a stylish umbrella to qualify for Best Dressed Nerd of the Year award. B.T. , our newly promoted Nerds photographer, had a field day recording this piece of sartorial elegance - especially the umbrella. Bronco said he didn’t want to get his suede boots wet and we all told him not to be such a fairy otherwise we’d go over to his house and confiscate his horse and eat him (the horse).
Sandyballs mooted a mini ramble around the ruined priory but luckily it started to rain at that instant so we had to turn about and head for the nearest drinking hole. This turned out to be the King’s Head which did not seem to be very open -even at gone half past eleven in the morning. There was a postman outside with what looked like a parcel to deliver, so we hung about thinking to dash inside once the door was opened , however, sadly, the postie decided he’d got the wrong address and moved on.
Fortunately The Swan at Southover was open so we all piled into the well proportioned games room and got stuck into throwing darts at each other.
The more we drank, the better we played. Lafayette and B.T. (The Real Ports) against Froggy and Sandyballs (The Dinky Ports). The results see-sawed back and forth with The Real Ports winning most of the games where some mental agility was called for (like adding up a score and taking it away from what you got last time), and The Dinky Ports who managed one good shot to win at cricket. Meanwhile Bronco was in dispute with the very helpful barman over the lack of black rats in his cider, but the barman said they didn’t make the cider out of black rats any more because folks were getting peed off with the results.
Since The Swan had a suspect kitchen (too many rats) we decided to proceed to The Brewers for lunch where Sandyballs had family connections. This became
very obvious when the landlady, Cathy, upon seeing Sandyballs come crashing over the doorstep, went and brought out her love-child, Elena, held her up in his face and said “You’re late with this month’s maintenance again !” Sandyballs told her to chalk it up on his account once again since he had the promise of a lucrative short posting to Brussels due to the sad demise of the previous incumbent and where you got free red wine and were paid in euros.
We had an excellent lunch in the Brewers - Froggy was so taken with the food that he even had a second meal while he pondered the compelling question of
“ What exactly is a Quasamite?” and where once again the Proper Ports trounced the Dinky Ports at darts. On the way out we saw Cathy’s Dad, Jasper, sat on the steps outside the back door. He collared Sandyballs and said “ You see moy daughter all roit and I ’ll put you forward for a position in the masons, but spurn ’er and I’ll put the word round an’ yorl never get another point uv Harveys in Lewes agin.” Sandyballs thought a rapid escape abroad again might be to his advantage.
But first it was decided to visit an old friend of Sandyballs in the Crown Hotel down the road. Yes, the Ugly Barmaid was still there, and even uglier if that was possible. Froggy thought he had found the answer to his compelling question at last - a Quasamite is whatever turns you on - until Lafayette gently reminded him of all the untapped nymphet crumpet that was due to come out of the Tertiary College in the next few hours.
And so we rolled down to the John Harvey where Bronco suddenly realised he’d left the whip back at the Crown. Oh no! The Ugly Barmaid was probably spending it on a costly face-lift to lure yet more innocent young men in to her exotic boudoir where she would fill them full of drink and do wicked, horrible things to them. Apart from wanting to rid themselves of this vile vision, the Nerds wanted another drink so Bronco and Froggy were despatched to rescue our money and to save the Lewes youth from certain perdition. Luckily the wip was still intact and the day was saved.
This had certainly been a “ramble” with a difference. Just the right amount of walking and we had renewed aquaintance with a number of interesting characters. Well, you can’t do a lot outdoors when it’s pissing down with rain, can you? Lets hope the weather is kinder for our second ramble at the end of September.
Los Nierdos para siempre!
Lafayette.
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Monday, July 07, 2008
N.E.R.D.S. 20TH ANNIVERSARY RAMBLE
Dublin 23rd – 26th June 2008
Those Present – Sandyballs, Froggy, Lafayette, Matt.
About two decades ago three pissheads decided to combine the pleasures of binge rambling in the countryside and drinking (I may have got this slightly wrong ). And so it was that Sandyballs, Matt and Lafayette founded the Newhaven Rambling and Drinking Society and set the world alight. They were duly joined by various other pissheads with like minded interests – notably Philby, B.T., Bronco, the Bish etc and occasional glamorous (except Paco and Trevor) Mystery Guests for the Christmas celebrations. Mystery Guests were not actually expected to ramble as such, just to roll up, wear a nice frock and look sexy ( except of course Paco and Trevor).
So now the NERDS were celebrating 20 years of liver damage by returning to Dublin where we had been before but which Lafayette had previously neglected to record being too busy writing PADRs at Gatwick at the time.
Day 1.
We were a little short of members for this trip. One was broke, one was ill, and one was dead (Requiescat in Pace). So the three founder members and Froggy took off for Gatwick and a huge breakfast in Wetherspoons while Ryan Air did its usual trick of delaying and forcing everyone to get well oiled in the airport bar. Eventually, however we made it to Ireland and the Arlington Hotel in Dublin.
Now the Arlington is a vast hotel with many winding corridors and places to get lost in –so naturally we got lost trying to go from our rooms to the bar. We finally emerged from some emergency exit round the side and ran slap into a load of Chinese servants hanging about gambling, smoking opium and generally practicing to be Snakeheads. They cheerfully directed us back to the bar where we had our first pint of Irish Guinness (ugh!) and then we decided to hit the town.
Dublin is a delightful city full of beautiful young people (besides the Nerds) so we had no trouble fitting in. First of all we went to the Bank Bar, the coolest place in town where the waitresses are all hand picked for their good looks and where you get poncy candles on your table. It’s also very expensive, Guinness is about £4 a pint; so of course we indulged only in tea and biscuits and didn’t look at the waitresses once.
That evening we returned to the Mill Restaurant specializing in delicious (and expensive) French food and drink served by some Algerian who Philby had once let slip past him on to the Eurostar. Sandy balls and Matt spent their time talking about “work” despite neither of them being currently actively engaged in it, while Froggy and Lafayette looked out of the window into the square below where there were lots of pretty girls young enough to be their granddaughters (Who said they were actually lusting after them?)
Then back to the Arlington by another entrance which confused the poor fuddled Froggy who thought he was just going into yet another bar for yet another nightcap.
The wip was hemorrhaging funds by this time and Matt observed that not only was there an ATM machine situated next to the bar, but that every room had one for the convenience of the hotel’s clients. We were to need them all in the days to come.
Day 2
Down to breakfast and we were recognized by the efficient and energetic Carmel, mistress of the breakfast room who allocated the places according to preference and rank. Luckily, on a previous visit we had honoured her with the gift of a NERDS teeshirt (only reserved for the most favoured) and so we got a prime table with the option of taking a second or even a third extra breakfast.
And so to rambling. Due to somebody’s bright idea we had each bought a three day bus pass which allowed us unlimited travel, and so walk number one was to begin from Dunlaoghaire (or Dunleary, as it’s better known). Travelling by bus had become a constant pastime for those pensioners among us who were used to travelling free: poor Froggy hadn’t yet been granted this honour but liked the idea and couldn’t wait to get to sixty!
We walked past Dunleary port as the weather started to deteriorate. Out along the pier where we watched yachts racing each other and a large ferry coming in. Lafayette took lots of photos, including one of Sandy balls pretending to be the Ancient Mariner and one of Matt having a wazz up the harbour wall. Some old bloke welcomed us to Ireland – they’re all very friendly over here, obviously word had got round about how much money we were spending on booze and contributing to the national economy.
Back in town we had an aperitif in Weirs Bar where we met a nice well rounded barmaid from New Zealand, and then took a 59 bus to Dalkey where in Finnegans bar we met a charming waitress with crooked teeth, a wicked figure and (allegedly) a huge Scottish boyfriend. (See photo of waitress). Some toothless old bugger stumbled out past us and the waitress told us reverently that he was the famous author, Hugh Leonards. (Who?) Froggy told her he too was a famous author but she didn’t seem quite so impressed.
After lunch Sandyballs took us through the posh area of Dalkey where Enya and other famous people lived and where Matt could smell the money all around him. He reckoned they were all so friendly that they’d let you pee in their pockets. Just then around the corner we bumped into none other than Madonna who had descended from her split level ranch style mansion to go round to Enya’s to borrow a cup of sugar. We warned Matt about trying to pee in her pocket, have you seen the muscles on that woman lately?
Sandyballs marched us up to the top of a hill where it began to rain and where Lafayette felt the need to imitate a bear in the woods. Must have been a bad pint of Guinness. Then we got lost and decided to use our bus passes to zoom back to Dublin in the dry for a quick drink.
Back in the centre of town we asked a doorman of a large shop where Neary’s Bar was and he had no problem directing us. Matt peed in his pocket to thank him and we went there and shortly afterwards to a cheapo Italian restaurant where we drank some concoction called rock shandy at Matt’s suggestion and then had an argument about sending flowers to Philby’s funeral. Sandyballs wanted to send a huge wreath in the shape of a crate of wine but the rest of us thought this was a waste and said we’d spend the money on drink and toast his memory in a more practical manner.
Finally we ended up that evening in Merchant O’Shea’s, another famous Dublin bar, (yawn) where Sandyballs got a superb picture of his own backside while trying to put Lafayette’s camera on auto shot for a group photo. Hairy Mary wasn’t there like on the last occasion so we didn’t have to break any sad news to her. Sadly we were all too knackered to stay up late so we went back to Froggy’s room for a night cap of Jamiesons and so to bed.
Day 3.
Day dawned, the Chinese were making their usual racket outside Lafayette’s window – clacking mahjong tiles and shifting heavy furniture around, it seemed like. What was needed was a nice cup of tea. Except that Sandyballs seemed intent on bollocksing up even this simple task. First of all he failed to put sugar in Lafayette’s tea, then he tried to pass off coffee sachets instead of sugar. Honestly you just can’t get the staff these days! Bring back Shirley, at least she could open a bottle.
After another couple of mega breakfasts we headed out on the bus again for somewhere called Hoath. Matt kept insisting on opening all the windows on the bus saying it was good for his complexion and Lafayette was trying to take photos of road traffic accidents to pass the time. Arriving at Hoath we sheltered from the weather in a carpark (yes, it was raining softly again) until Froggy nearly got run over by a car and we decided to move on.
We walked along Hoath pier (a lot of pier pressure on these rambles) and then decided to have a gargle. Unfortunately the bar in the hotel we headed for was shut – at half past ten in the morning and this was Ireland! Fortunately help was at hand in the form of a friendly workman, who seeing our plight said “ Would youse boyz be lookin’ for a drink?
And directed us to the Fishermans Bar along the quay which he said had been open since half past seven that morning. Sure enough it was full of old gnarled fishermen yelling
“Feck!” and “Drink!” so we immediately felt at home.
After failing to solve a problem in lateral thinking which Lafayette had posed in memory of Philby, Sandyballs started marching us up urban hills again. Half way up this particular hill we ran into a naked man in a bathrobe standing in the middle of the road (this is Ireland). Lafayette enquired politely if he had perhaps lost his bath but he grinned and said No, he had lost his house. It seemed a bit windy round there, but even so…..
Up and up and up we went; the weather improved and we even got some sun. Finally we arrived at the Summit Inn which wasn’t quite at the summit but was as near as dammit.
There we had a huge meal thanks to the two nice waitresses from Slovakia and ogled the party of young Norwegian nymphets who had rolled up in a coach to join us. It was at this point that Sandyballs came out with the best quote of the whole trip “I can’t stand
Any more of this fucking Guinness” he said “It’s always raining here and there’s no decent bitter.” Obviously his Irish roots weren’t so Irish after all.
Exercising our rights as free pensioners we took the bus back to Dublin. We had missed out the Bog of Frogs which had looked interesting but took a bus tour round the city instead during which Froggy decided to go into a moody strop followed by a strop in the Arlington bar. (Probably missing the Bog of Frogs). Lafayette retired to his room to watch Shaun the Sheep on telly (his latest role model) while everybody had a little rest and calmed down.
That evening we returned to the Bank Bar in Temple Bar where we drank expensive drinks and where Lafayette cultivated the attention of a nice looking French waitress
who came from the area in which he had once been an English assistant about fifteen years before she had been born. God, don’t kids make you feel old! Thereafter we went to an Italian restaurant and listened to Germany smashing Turkey in the quarter finals of the European footy on the telly in the next room, and where two drunken Irish women got slung out of the place for supporting Germany.
Sandy balls wanted to get back to his roots after his previous gaffe about the national drink so he led us to a bar where they were playing diddly dee music and where there was yes you’ve guessed it, a Chinese barmaid. This was not with the approval of all parties some of whom got all moody again but things livened up at the Arlington where we closely followed the lack of progress of the girlie in the skimpy dress who failed to score despite displaying her wares to all and sundry.
Day 4.
Lafayette was woken once again by what sounded like Chinese goblins carousing in the next room and celebrating the noisy arrival of the opium supply wagon. He made his own tea that morning. This was the last day so down to breakfast and took pictures of Carmel.
“ Where’s my new teeshirt?” She said. “ Blame Froggy” we said. Matt wanted to go out by himself and look around a few dubious clubs so the rest of us took off for the Jamieson’s distillery in the hope of getting free liquor. Sadly they were running behind schedule and wouldn’t let us go round. It started to rain. It got heavier; we had to shelter in a bar. Lafayette remembered it was his sister’s birthday and phoned her up.
“I’m in an Irish bar ,” he yelled over the traffic noise. “Well, that makes a refreshing change,” she replied.
And so after hanging round Dublin airport for what seemed most of the day we flew back to Gatters where Froggy and Lafayette had a drink to celebrate their home coming and where Sandyballs suddenly decided he didn’t want to drink any more!!!!! It had been a good trip and we had done some interesting rambles and met the usual friendly Irish/Slovakian/French/Polish barmaids. Dublin is a great place to go if you have a lot of money and you like Guinness. Thanks go to Sandyballs and to Matt for the organizing. Pity you missed it, you others; you would have enjoyed it. Start saving up for next time.
LOS NIERDOS PARA SIEMPRE
Lafayette.
Dublin 23rd – 26th June 2008
Those Present – Sandyballs, Froggy, Lafayette, Matt.
About two decades ago three pissheads decided to combine the pleasures of binge rambling in the countryside and drinking (I may have got this slightly wrong ). And so it was that Sandyballs, Matt and Lafayette founded the Newhaven Rambling and Drinking Society and set the world alight. They were duly joined by various other pissheads with like minded interests – notably Philby, B.T., Bronco, the Bish etc and occasional glamorous (except Paco and Trevor) Mystery Guests for the Christmas celebrations. Mystery Guests were not actually expected to ramble as such, just to roll up, wear a nice frock and look sexy ( except of course Paco and Trevor).
So now the NERDS were celebrating 20 years of liver damage by returning to Dublin where we had been before but which Lafayette had previously neglected to record being too busy writing PADRs at Gatwick at the time.
Day 1.
We were a little short of members for this trip. One was broke, one was ill, and one was dead (Requiescat in Pace). So the three founder members and Froggy took off for Gatwick and a huge breakfast in Wetherspoons while Ryan Air did its usual trick of delaying and forcing everyone to get well oiled in the airport bar. Eventually, however we made it to Ireland and the Arlington Hotel in Dublin.
Now the Arlington is a vast hotel with many winding corridors and places to get lost in –so naturally we got lost trying to go from our rooms to the bar. We finally emerged from some emergency exit round the side and ran slap into a load of Chinese servants hanging about gambling, smoking opium and generally practicing to be Snakeheads. They cheerfully directed us back to the bar where we had our first pint of Irish Guinness (ugh!) and then we decided to hit the town.
Dublin is a delightful city full of beautiful young people (besides the Nerds) so we had no trouble fitting in. First of all we went to the Bank Bar, the coolest place in town where the waitresses are all hand picked for their good looks and where you get poncy candles on your table. It’s also very expensive, Guinness is about £4 a pint; so of course we indulged only in tea and biscuits and didn’t look at the waitresses once.
That evening we returned to the Mill Restaurant specializing in delicious (and expensive) French food and drink served by some Algerian who Philby had once let slip past him on to the Eurostar. Sandy balls and Matt spent their time talking about “work” despite neither of them being currently actively engaged in it, while Froggy and Lafayette looked out of the window into the square below where there were lots of pretty girls young enough to be their granddaughters (Who said they were actually lusting after them?)
Then back to the Arlington by another entrance which confused the poor fuddled Froggy who thought he was just going into yet another bar for yet another nightcap.
The wip was hemorrhaging funds by this time and Matt observed that not only was there an ATM machine situated next to the bar, but that every room had one for the convenience of the hotel’s clients. We were to need them all in the days to come.
Day 2
Down to breakfast and we were recognized by the efficient and energetic Carmel, mistress of the breakfast room who allocated the places according to preference and rank. Luckily, on a previous visit we had honoured her with the gift of a NERDS teeshirt (only reserved for the most favoured) and so we got a prime table with the option of taking a second or even a third extra breakfast.
And so to rambling. Due to somebody’s bright idea we had each bought a three day bus pass which allowed us unlimited travel, and so walk number one was to begin from Dunlaoghaire (or Dunleary, as it’s better known). Travelling by bus had become a constant pastime for those pensioners among us who were used to travelling free: poor Froggy hadn’t yet been granted this honour but liked the idea and couldn’t wait to get to sixty!
We walked past Dunleary port as the weather started to deteriorate. Out along the pier where we watched yachts racing each other and a large ferry coming in. Lafayette took lots of photos, including one of Sandy balls pretending to be the Ancient Mariner and one of Matt having a wazz up the harbour wall. Some old bloke welcomed us to Ireland – they’re all very friendly over here, obviously word had got round about how much money we were spending on booze and contributing to the national economy.
Back in town we had an aperitif in Weirs Bar where we met a nice well rounded barmaid from New Zealand, and then took a 59 bus to Dalkey where in Finnegans bar we met a charming waitress with crooked teeth, a wicked figure and (allegedly) a huge Scottish boyfriend. (See photo of waitress). Some toothless old bugger stumbled out past us and the waitress told us reverently that he was the famous author, Hugh Leonards. (Who?) Froggy told her he too was a famous author but she didn’t seem quite so impressed.
After lunch Sandyballs took us through the posh area of Dalkey where Enya and other famous people lived and where Matt could smell the money all around him. He reckoned they were all so friendly that they’d let you pee in their pockets. Just then around the corner we bumped into none other than Madonna who had descended from her split level ranch style mansion to go round to Enya’s to borrow a cup of sugar. We warned Matt about trying to pee in her pocket, have you seen the muscles on that woman lately?
Sandyballs marched us up to the top of a hill where it began to rain and where Lafayette felt the need to imitate a bear in the woods. Must have been a bad pint of Guinness. Then we got lost and decided to use our bus passes to zoom back to Dublin in the dry for a quick drink.
Back in the centre of town we asked a doorman of a large shop where Neary’s Bar was and he had no problem directing us. Matt peed in his pocket to thank him and we went there and shortly afterwards to a cheapo Italian restaurant where we drank some concoction called rock shandy at Matt’s suggestion and then had an argument about sending flowers to Philby’s funeral. Sandyballs wanted to send a huge wreath in the shape of a crate of wine but the rest of us thought this was a waste and said we’d spend the money on drink and toast his memory in a more practical manner.
Finally we ended up that evening in Merchant O’Shea’s, another famous Dublin bar, (yawn) where Sandyballs got a superb picture of his own backside while trying to put Lafayette’s camera on auto shot for a group photo. Hairy Mary wasn’t there like on the last occasion so we didn’t have to break any sad news to her. Sadly we were all too knackered to stay up late so we went back to Froggy’s room for a night cap of Jamiesons and so to bed.
Day 3.
Day dawned, the Chinese were making their usual racket outside Lafayette’s window – clacking mahjong tiles and shifting heavy furniture around, it seemed like. What was needed was a nice cup of tea. Except that Sandyballs seemed intent on bollocksing up even this simple task. First of all he failed to put sugar in Lafayette’s tea, then he tried to pass off coffee sachets instead of sugar. Honestly you just can’t get the staff these days! Bring back Shirley, at least she could open a bottle.
After another couple of mega breakfasts we headed out on the bus again for somewhere called Hoath. Matt kept insisting on opening all the windows on the bus saying it was good for his complexion and Lafayette was trying to take photos of road traffic accidents to pass the time. Arriving at Hoath we sheltered from the weather in a carpark (yes, it was raining softly again) until Froggy nearly got run over by a car and we decided to move on.
We walked along Hoath pier (a lot of pier pressure on these rambles) and then decided to have a gargle. Unfortunately the bar in the hotel we headed for was shut – at half past ten in the morning and this was Ireland! Fortunately help was at hand in the form of a friendly workman, who seeing our plight said “ Would youse boyz be lookin’ for a drink?
And directed us to the Fishermans Bar along the quay which he said had been open since half past seven that morning. Sure enough it was full of old gnarled fishermen yelling
“Feck!” and “Drink!” so we immediately felt at home.
After failing to solve a problem in lateral thinking which Lafayette had posed in memory of Philby, Sandyballs started marching us up urban hills again. Half way up this particular hill we ran into a naked man in a bathrobe standing in the middle of the road (this is Ireland). Lafayette enquired politely if he had perhaps lost his bath but he grinned and said No, he had lost his house. It seemed a bit windy round there, but even so…..
Up and up and up we went; the weather improved and we even got some sun. Finally we arrived at the Summit Inn which wasn’t quite at the summit but was as near as dammit.
There we had a huge meal thanks to the two nice waitresses from Slovakia and ogled the party of young Norwegian nymphets who had rolled up in a coach to join us. It was at this point that Sandyballs came out with the best quote of the whole trip “I can’t stand
Any more of this fucking Guinness” he said “It’s always raining here and there’s no decent bitter.” Obviously his Irish roots weren’t so Irish after all.
Exercising our rights as free pensioners we took the bus back to Dublin. We had missed out the Bog of Frogs which had looked interesting but took a bus tour round the city instead during which Froggy decided to go into a moody strop followed by a strop in the Arlington bar. (Probably missing the Bog of Frogs). Lafayette retired to his room to watch Shaun the Sheep on telly (his latest role model) while everybody had a little rest and calmed down.
That evening we returned to the Bank Bar in Temple Bar where we drank expensive drinks and where Lafayette cultivated the attention of a nice looking French waitress
who came from the area in which he had once been an English assistant about fifteen years before she had been born. God, don’t kids make you feel old! Thereafter we went to an Italian restaurant and listened to Germany smashing Turkey in the quarter finals of the European footy on the telly in the next room, and where two drunken Irish women got slung out of the place for supporting Germany.
Sandy balls wanted to get back to his roots after his previous gaffe about the national drink so he led us to a bar where they were playing diddly dee music and where there was yes you’ve guessed it, a Chinese barmaid. This was not with the approval of all parties some of whom got all moody again but things livened up at the Arlington where we closely followed the lack of progress of the girlie in the skimpy dress who failed to score despite displaying her wares to all and sundry.
Day 4.
Lafayette was woken once again by what sounded like Chinese goblins carousing in the next room and celebrating the noisy arrival of the opium supply wagon. He made his own tea that morning. This was the last day so down to breakfast and took pictures of Carmel.
“ Where’s my new teeshirt?” She said. “ Blame Froggy” we said. Matt wanted to go out by himself and look around a few dubious clubs so the rest of us took off for the Jamieson’s distillery in the hope of getting free liquor. Sadly they were running behind schedule and wouldn’t let us go round. It started to rain. It got heavier; we had to shelter in a bar. Lafayette remembered it was his sister’s birthday and phoned her up.
“I’m in an Irish bar ,” he yelled over the traffic noise. “Well, that makes a refreshing change,” she replied.
And so after hanging round Dublin airport for what seemed most of the day we flew back to Gatters where Froggy and Lafayette had a drink to celebrate their home coming and where Sandyballs suddenly decided he didn’t want to drink any more!!!!! It had been a good trip and we had done some interesting rambles and met the usual friendly Irish/Slovakian/French/Polish barmaids. Dublin is a great place to go if you have a lot of money and you like Guinness. Thanks go to Sandyballs and to Matt for the organizing. Pity you missed it, you others; you would have enjoyed it. Start saving up for next time.
LOS NIERDOS PARA SIEMPRE
Lafayette.
Saturday, June 14, 2008
May's Ramble with Obituary for Philby
N.E.R.D.S. Ramble 224. 15th May 2008
Those Present – Sandyballs, Lafayette, Froggy, Matt.
The Bad Leg Ramble
Lafayette reviewed his contemporaneous notes scrawled contemporaneously about a month ago and, unable to decipher his shaky handwriting on the back of two manky embark cards, decided to make up the whole episode for a change.
He vaguely rememembered Sandyballs picking everybody up at Lewes station and taking them back to his place for coffee and stuff. Matt was going on about smelling the money at this end of Lewes but all Lafayette could smell was an unpleasant odour from Sandy balls’ garden where all his cats were buried. The usual aperitifs were taken and over this working breakfast more ephemeral plans were discussed about the on coming Dublin celebratory bash. This must be to celebrate twenty years of erm rambling or was it just another excuse to get arseoled in a foreign country again ? I forget.
Anyway, after getting his guests well oiled, Sandyballs drove us all to The Bells at Chiddingly where another pre ramble aperitif was taken to fortify us for the route ahead.
Lafayette’s notes refer to Sandyballs’ ‘ festering face with a skull peeping out,’ but whether this referred to a gargoyle in the local church or yet another Sandyballs skin cancer death threat is unclear. He’s ugly enough at the best of times.
So we roamed over hill and dale and got lost around somewhere called Clarky’s Farm which inspired Matt to start to make morbid plans for his own funeral and insist that Curly Clarke be given a special invitation. (something to do with atonement and reconciliation). However, just as we were crossing a perfectly flat field Froggy spotted an old clapped out foot ball and, imagining he was still in the first flush of youth, gives it a hearty wack, misses and snaps both hamstring and femur in his fervour. The others completely ignored his piteous cries for help - we know all about attention seekers - whereupon he got to his feet and stomped after us cursing.
We proceeded to East Hoathly and asked a postie the way to the Kings Head , but he couldn’t help us (obviously a damned teetotaler). When we found the pub we enjoyed an excellent meal plus the pick of the local beer whose name escapes me but which was brewed in the pub. Froggy kept complaining about gangrene and threatening to die but I expect you can guess what the response was to that.
Shortly afterwards we enquired at the post office where a second pub, The Foresters, was, and got given the right directions by a proper postman who obviously liked a drink. So we sat out side under an umbrella and quaffed our final pint of the day. Froggy was writhing on the floor and screaming at this stage but again we took no notice apart from telling him to pull himself together.
Sandyballs drove us back to Lewes station where on the train we met a young tree surgeon who Matt tried to chat up, and from whom Froggy tried to elicit some sympathy for his broken leg. The tree surgeon offered to help Froggy by amputating his leg but the lad declined on the grounds that he wouldn’t be able to walk home from the station. Aint life tough!
In Memoriam
It was on a very sad Friday the Thirteenth of June after the above ramble that we learned of the premature death of our fellow NERD, Philby. He had rambled with us for many years before getting posted to Belgium where he had gone to carry on the fine traditions of the Nerds. Often disorganized and frequently pursued by his demons, Philby was nevertheless a totally social and sociable animal. He had a few years ago organized a celebratory ramble to his cousin’s Mill in Belgium where the Nerds had the opportunity of meeting all his interesting cousins and where he exercised his tour leader qualities by taking us all round Louvain. He loved to party and no party was too long for him. He was individual and often eccentric but he always enjoyed a good time.
He was unique, a fellow Nerd and a mate, and we shall all miss him.
Lafayette.
Those Present – Sandyballs, Lafayette, Froggy, Matt.
The Bad Leg Ramble
Lafayette reviewed his contemporaneous notes scrawled contemporaneously about a month ago and, unable to decipher his shaky handwriting on the back of two manky embark cards, decided to make up the whole episode for a change.
He vaguely rememembered Sandyballs picking everybody up at Lewes station and taking them back to his place for coffee and stuff. Matt was going on about smelling the money at this end of Lewes but all Lafayette could smell was an unpleasant odour from Sandy balls’ garden where all his cats were buried. The usual aperitifs were taken and over this working breakfast more ephemeral plans were discussed about the on coming Dublin celebratory bash. This must be to celebrate twenty years of erm rambling or was it just another excuse to get arseoled in a foreign country again ? I forget.
Anyway, after getting his guests well oiled, Sandyballs drove us all to The Bells at Chiddingly where another pre ramble aperitif was taken to fortify us for the route ahead.
Lafayette’s notes refer to Sandyballs’ ‘ festering face with a skull peeping out,’ but whether this referred to a gargoyle in the local church or yet another Sandyballs skin cancer death threat is unclear. He’s ugly enough at the best of times.
So we roamed over hill and dale and got lost around somewhere called Clarky’s Farm which inspired Matt to start to make morbid plans for his own funeral and insist that Curly Clarke be given a special invitation. (something to do with atonement and reconciliation). However, just as we were crossing a perfectly flat field Froggy spotted an old clapped out foot ball and, imagining he was still in the first flush of youth, gives it a hearty wack, misses and snaps both hamstring and femur in his fervour. The others completely ignored his piteous cries for help - we know all about attention seekers - whereupon he got to his feet and stomped after us cursing.
We proceeded to East Hoathly and asked a postie the way to the Kings Head , but he couldn’t help us (obviously a damned teetotaler). When we found the pub we enjoyed an excellent meal plus the pick of the local beer whose name escapes me but which was brewed in the pub. Froggy kept complaining about gangrene and threatening to die but I expect you can guess what the response was to that.
Shortly afterwards we enquired at the post office where a second pub, The Foresters, was, and got given the right directions by a proper postman who obviously liked a drink. So we sat out side under an umbrella and quaffed our final pint of the day. Froggy was writhing on the floor and screaming at this stage but again we took no notice apart from telling him to pull himself together.
Sandyballs drove us back to Lewes station where on the train we met a young tree surgeon who Matt tried to chat up, and from whom Froggy tried to elicit some sympathy for his broken leg. The tree surgeon offered to help Froggy by amputating his leg but the lad declined on the grounds that he wouldn’t be able to walk home from the station. Aint life tough!
In Memoriam
It was on a very sad Friday the Thirteenth of June after the above ramble that we learned of the premature death of our fellow NERD, Philby. He had rambled with us for many years before getting posted to Belgium where he had gone to carry on the fine traditions of the Nerds. Often disorganized and frequently pursued by his demons, Philby was nevertheless a totally social and sociable animal. He had a few years ago organized a celebratory ramble to his cousin’s Mill in Belgium where the Nerds had the opportunity of meeting all his interesting cousins and where he exercised his tour leader qualities by taking us all round Louvain. He loved to party and no party was too long for him. He was individual and often eccentric but he always enjoyed a good time.
He was unique, a fellow Nerd and a mate, and we shall all miss him.
Lafayette.
Friday, June 13, 2008
In Memorium
It is with great sadness that I publish the news of the demise of Philby. He had been so much a part of our lives both on rambles and in absentia. I will say more on this later but presently I cannot say mpre because I am too overcome.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Dublin arrangements
It's that time of the year again when young NERDS' (is that possible?) thoughts turn to Irish nights in the arms of comely colleens and pints of black stout and irish jigs. We seem to have all booked the appropriate flight out to Dublin on the 23rd. Some with luggage some with just a napsack on a pole, in view of the Ryanair baggage restrictions. We'll probably all end up sharing each others underware - if we can find any that fits - but who cares? We are now waiting for one of us to gird up his credit card to organise the accommodation for us all; who will it be? Will any accommodation be arranged? Will we all end up sleepining under the halfpenny bridge?
Return later to this blog for the next installment. Meanwhile, the next ramble is 20th March for the next conflagration of the Sussex countryside.
Return later to this blog for the next installment. Meanwhile, the next ramble is 20th March for the next conflagration of the Sussex countryside.
Friday, February 08, 2008
The cheap lunch ramble
NERDS Ramble No 221. Thurs. 7th Feb. 2008.
Those Present – Sandyballs, Froggy, B.T., Bronco and Lafayette, ( plus Andy Capp and Jules Capp).
The cheap lunch ramble.
Sandyballs had heard of a watering hole that did massive lunches at bugger all cost (well, actually about £10) so the Nerds all raided the wife’s milk money and turned up for coffee chez Sandyballs with about 9/4d between them. Never mind the lunch, Wot about the wip(s) we wondered . Never mind , we’ll all stay skinny cos we just won’t eat, as the song goes. But Nerds get hungry, so after going through Mrs Sandyballs’ wardrobes we sold all her jewellery quickly on e-bay and had enough for 5 caribbean cruises each and lunch for most of the Third World as well.
Then after mucho calvados et stuff we struggled up the Downs, admired the view, had attacks of altitude sickness and ran into some eccentric denizen of The Brewers called Jules. Mr. Biggest Brother Thomas (for twas he) had come out of his cave on the Downs where he alternates dwelling between there and the scummiest brothel in Hong Kong which happens to have Harveys on tap at the time. The call of The Wild had brought Jules forth to join the NERDS wolfpack in search of lunch, and so he was duly initiated, assimilated, and told to put his cap on straight (even NERDS have standards).
The weather was pleasant and sunny ( Luck of the NERDS again) so we roamed up and over the Downs trying not to spit at golfers or to talk about work (difficult). Jules kept us amused with profound discussions about the deprivations of Lent and the size of the tits on Chinese chicks, and those of us who’d never been abroad wondered if all foreign girls looked like they did on the Google porn sites. (They don’t.).
The route was a well worn track to Glynde to which we descended remembering the very first NERDS ramble about 20 years ago. At that time we had all been younger (geddaway!), and eager to start a groundbreaking new organization that would sweep away all the stuffy, bourgeois constrictions of the Dimaline era (at work). And so the NERDS were born to raise hell with the world and piss off everybody (a bit like the Rolling Stones, except they play more exciting music and probably don’t quarrel as much).
We crashed into The Trevor Arms where Bronco was waiting for us having galloped over on Crunchie from Ringmer that day. Crunchie was tethered outside eating all the non existent apples of the (now) non existent trees in The Trevor’s garden. Bronco was wrapped around a pint, as is his wont, and despite this hubbub of activity the pub still looked in good nick with beer to spare for us all. Big Pete, the landlord advised us not to go near the hot, chillee soup for lunch so we all ordered that to be iconoclastic. “You’ll regret it, “warned Big Pete “It’s got lots of hot stuff in it.” Are we not NERDS, we thought. “Actually I’ll have egg mayonnaise.” Said Bronco “on account of my bum’s sore from all that riding.” Jules doesn’t eat anyway so he started to give his slant to the locals about the charms of Chinese chicks.
At lunch we were joined by Jules’ baby brother, Andy, who had come fresh from making a couple of million in his lunch hour by selling sub prime hedge fund collaterals in the City (of Lewes). Many were his tales of high finance and legal shenanigans. Did you know, for example, that Nicholas van Hookstraaten was actually the illegitimate heir to the Dutch crown, or that Chinese girls are all built funny? Nor did I. Anyway several hours later, after a really big filling meal, easily up to the usual standard of The Trevor, we decided we’d better ramble home. This simple plan was however thwarted by Sandyballs insisting that he be allowed to use his brand new Old Age Pensioner’s Rail pass – just so that he could be as good as Lafayette who had already clocked up five thousand miles on his since last year.
Pity we weren’t allowed to walk any more, but to stop Sandy balls from sulking, we broke with tradition and took the train back to The Old Volunteer in the city of Lewes where we took over the (empty) pub and sat by the traditional gas fire. This was where Lafayette started drinking Mocha coffee in a desperate attempt to show that he too had been abroad as well as Sandyballs and had middle class pretensions and sensitivities.
Didn’t work, though. Does going to Dublin count as Abroad?
So another ramble completed on the path paved with good intentions. Thanks be to Sandyballs for selling his wife’s jewellery to enable us to eat, and to the Thomas Bros for being our guests. Jules is going to e-mail us some pictures of one or two of his friends in H.K. so that we can attach them to our Favourites and amuse ourselves of an afternoon. Can hardly wait!
Happy Chinese New Year and Feng Shui to you all,
Lafayette.
Photographs to follow
Those Present – Sandyballs, Froggy, B.T., Bronco and Lafayette, ( plus Andy Capp and Jules Capp).
The cheap lunch ramble.
Sandyballs had heard of a watering hole that did massive lunches at bugger all cost (well, actually about £10) so the Nerds all raided the wife’s milk money and turned up for coffee chez Sandyballs with about 9/4d between them. Never mind the lunch, Wot about the wip(s) we wondered . Never mind , we’ll all stay skinny cos we just won’t eat, as the song goes. But Nerds get hungry, so after going through Mrs Sandyballs’ wardrobes we sold all her jewellery quickly on e-bay and had enough for 5 caribbean cruises each and lunch for most of the Third World as well.
Then after mucho calvados et stuff we struggled up the Downs, admired the view, had attacks of altitude sickness and ran into some eccentric denizen of The Brewers called Jules. Mr. Biggest Brother Thomas (for twas he) had come out of his cave on the Downs where he alternates dwelling between there and the scummiest brothel in Hong Kong which happens to have Harveys on tap at the time. The call of The Wild had brought Jules forth to join the NERDS wolfpack in search of lunch, and so he was duly initiated, assimilated, and told to put his cap on straight (even NERDS have standards).
The weather was pleasant and sunny ( Luck of the NERDS again) so we roamed up and over the Downs trying not to spit at golfers or to talk about work (difficult). Jules kept us amused with profound discussions about the deprivations of Lent and the size of the tits on Chinese chicks, and those of us who’d never been abroad wondered if all foreign girls looked like they did on the Google porn sites. (They don’t.).
The route was a well worn track to Glynde to which we descended remembering the very first NERDS ramble about 20 years ago. At that time we had all been younger (geddaway!), and eager to start a groundbreaking new organization that would sweep away all the stuffy, bourgeois constrictions of the Dimaline era (at work). And so the NERDS were born to raise hell with the world and piss off everybody (a bit like the Rolling Stones, except they play more exciting music and probably don’t quarrel as much).
We crashed into The Trevor Arms where Bronco was waiting for us having galloped over on Crunchie from Ringmer that day. Crunchie was tethered outside eating all the non existent apples of the (now) non existent trees in The Trevor’s garden. Bronco was wrapped around a pint, as is his wont, and despite this hubbub of activity the pub still looked in good nick with beer to spare for us all. Big Pete, the landlord advised us not to go near the hot, chillee soup for lunch so we all ordered that to be iconoclastic. “You’ll regret it, “warned Big Pete “It’s got lots of hot stuff in it.” Are we not NERDS, we thought. “Actually I’ll have egg mayonnaise.” Said Bronco “on account of my bum’s sore from all that riding.” Jules doesn’t eat anyway so he started to give his slant to the locals about the charms of Chinese chicks.
At lunch we were joined by Jules’ baby brother, Andy, who had come fresh from making a couple of million in his lunch hour by selling sub prime hedge fund collaterals in the City (of Lewes). Many were his tales of high finance and legal shenanigans. Did you know, for example, that Nicholas van Hookstraaten was actually the illegitimate heir to the Dutch crown, or that Chinese girls are all built funny? Nor did I. Anyway several hours later, after a really big filling meal, easily up to the usual standard of The Trevor, we decided we’d better ramble home. This simple plan was however thwarted by Sandyballs insisting that he be allowed to use his brand new Old Age Pensioner’s Rail pass – just so that he could be as good as Lafayette who had already clocked up five thousand miles on his since last year.
Pity we weren’t allowed to walk any more, but to stop Sandy balls from sulking, we broke with tradition and took the train back to The Old Volunteer in the city of Lewes where we took over the (empty) pub and sat by the traditional gas fire. This was where Lafayette started drinking Mocha coffee in a desperate attempt to show that he too had been abroad as well as Sandyballs and had middle class pretensions and sensitivities.
Didn’t work, though. Does going to Dublin count as Abroad?
So another ramble completed on the path paved with good intentions. Thanks be to Sandyballs for selling his wife’s jewellery to enable us to eat, and to the Thomas Bros for being our guests. Jules is going to e-mail us some pictures of one or two of his friends in H.K. so that we can attach them to our Favourites and amuse ourselves of an afternoon. Can hardly wait!
Happy Chinese New Year and Feng Shui to you all,
Lafayette.
Photographs to follow
Thursday, January 17, 2008
January (Wet and Windy) Ramble 14.1.2008
N.E.R.D.S. Ramble No. 218(a)
allegedly.
Monday 14th Jan. 2008.
Those Present – Lafayette, Matt, Froggy, Sandyballs, Bronco, B.T.
The Very Windy Day Ramble.
Guess what, it was a very windy day. Los Nierdos met up at Bishopstone station, one of those wind streaked places where nobody was around to greet them off the train (probably because of the wind). There they found Lafayette cowering behind a stanchion in the initial phases of hypothermia because of the wind. He had come on the cheapskate
(free) bus so that he wouldn’t have to pay any fare and, of course, to keep himself out of the wind.
This was to be, in effect, Sandyballs’ birthday ramble; but since it wasn’t actually his birthday till next week we had to call it something else - and change the number too (!)
Froggy was route-master, but the weather was against him ( it was a little windy after all )
So the route had to be modified and everyone made a beeline for the snack bar wagon opposite the wildlife wetlands on the other side of the main road. It’s always fun crossing a very busy main road en masse because our legs all get tangled together, we fall over and somebody usually gets killed. Today it was Bronco’s turn (again) but with a remarkable burst of speed he defied the grim reaper (yet again) and scampered to the snack bar. Must have been the smell of food that inspired him.
How many times had the NERDS traveled along the A259 towards Seaford and been totally unaware of the young vision of beauty who inhabited the Snack Bar Van. This siren could not have been more than 16 years of age and was called Maddison (after the Avenue). Her first reaction on seeing six rapacious middle aged men was to get on the phone to her Mom, not, she hastened to say, because she was frightened, but to come and give her a hand with the large amount of cholesterol type sandwiches which we had ordered. In the event, she coped very well, even parrying Matt’s rude enquiries about whether she had a steady boyfriend and whether she had regular sex, and “did she like it and please tell me what it’s like.” We reluctantly tore ourselves away from this vision of jailbait heaven and headed for Foxhole farm where Bronco had told us that the more erotic pleasures of an equine nature were to be found.
Now some people visit houses of ill repute where they collect stamps, or whatever, some keep mistresses in luxury flats where they can go to whisper sweet nothings into their orifice(s), but Bronco, it can now be revealed, has a boy horse hidden away in the Sussex country side who he slyly visits on the days that his wife is out knitting socks for the Women’s’ Institute. Heh, heh, how about that then?
Bronco decided, as we were his good friends, to share his guilty secret with us, and took us to meet Crunchy, the Sussex Stallion. Wow wot a horse! and so big in parts. Some of us could immediately see the attraction of a large throbbing piece of horseflesh but Lafayette, cynic that he was, and knowing Bronco’s carnivorous tendencies, vaguely wondered if he was actually breeding him more for the table than the boudoir. However Bronco assured us that he and Crunchy were just good friends and he was only feeding him peppermints because Crunchy liked them and not to improve his taste (when he got him on a plate – oops!)
We struggled on with the ramble. Did I mention that it was windy? Well it still was and almost as bad as that day on the Chartres when Lafayette…………but I don’t have to remind you of that do I, dear readers? Froggy led us up a hill, into the teeth of a screaming gale and down into Bishopstone, thence round the coast road where Sandyballs kept getting his silly hat blown off, and into the Beachcomber where the beer was OK and where we bumped into Tina (baby lambs) Sheridan seeking refuge from her husband who had been insisting that she should wipe his steering wheel for the fifth time that morning. (Dirty bastard!)
Eventually lunch was taken at The Old Plough where The Old Trouts had already settled in for their lunchtime tasses de café, and where the NERDS all ploughed into vast quantities of steak, chips, beer, cognacs, ice creams and wounded strops, not to mention defensive petulance’s (skate over, skate over) However peace was finally restored, one of us robbed The Halifax of yet more money and we spent a pleasant afternoon in The Old Boot on comfy sofas in front of the fire chatting, drinking, mutually admiring each other and quarrelling about the preposterous amount of money a round cost in Seaford. Happy Days!
So, thanks go to Froggy for providing a route again despite being the victim of bad weather, and for providing a present for some poor, needy geriatric; thanks go to Matt for getting a free bus pass form for the same geriatric – see photo; thanks go to Crunchy for eating our peppermints and thanks to the rest of the NERDS for all being so wonderful. Crunchy is our new mascot now, by the way, because he’s bigger than Rusty and because we like Bronco’s tales about what they get up to together in the hay.
Hasta la proxima, Los Nierdos-
Lafayette.
[Ed: - this appears to be a somewhat edited account and seems to miss out all the interesting bits.]
allegedly.
Monday 14th Jan. 2008.
Those Present – Lafayette, Matt, Froggy, Sandyballs, Bronco, B.T.
The Very Windy Day Ramble.
Guess what, it was a very windy day. Los Nierdos met up at Bishopstone station, one of those wind streaked places where nobody was around to greet them off the train (probably because of the wind). There they found Lafayette cowering behind a stanchion in the initial phases of hypothermia because of the wind. He had come on the cheapskate
(free) bus so that he wouldn’t have to pay any fare and, of course, to keep himself out of the wind.
This was to be, in effect, Sandyballs’ birthday ramble; but since it wasn’t actually his birthday till next week we had to call it something else - and change the number too (!)
Froggy was route-master, but the weather was against him ( it was a little windy after all )
So the route had to be modified and everyone made a beeline for the snack bar wagon opposite the wildlife wetlands on the other side of the main road. It’s always fun crossing a very busy main road en masse because our legs all get tangled together, we fall over and somebody usually gets killed. Today it was Bronco’s turn (again) but with a remarkable burst of speed he defied the grim reaper (yet again) and scampered to the snack bar. Must have been the smell of food that inspired him.
How many times had the NERDS traveled along the A259 towards Seaford and been totally unaware of the young vision of beauty who inhabited the Snack Bar Van. This siren could not have been more than 16 years of age and was called Maddison (after the Avenue). Her first reaction on seeing six rapacious middle aged men was to get on the phone to her Mom, not, she hastened to say, because she was frightened, but to come and give her a hand with the large amount of cholesterol type sandwiches which we had ordered. In the event, she coped very well, even parrying Matt’s rude enquiries about whether she had a steady boyfriend and whether she had regular sex, and “did she like it and please tell me what it’s like.” We reluctantly tore ourselves away from this vision of jailbait heaven and headed for Foxhole farm where Bronco had told us that the more erotic pleasures of an equine nature were to be found.
Now some people visit houses of ill repute where they collect stamps, or whatever, some keep mistresses in luxury flats where they can go to whisper sweet nothings into their orifice(s), but Bronco, it can now be revealed, has a boy horse hidden away in the Sussex country side who he slyly visits on the days that his wife is out knitting socks for the Women’s’ Institute. Heh, heh, how about that then?
Bronco decided, as we were his good friends, to share his guilty secret with us, and took us to meet Crunchy, the Sussex Stallion. Wow wot a horse! and so big in parts. Some of us could immediately see the attraction of a large throbbing piece of horseflesh but Lafayette, cynic that he was, and knowing Bronco’s carnivorous tendencies, vaguely wondered if he was actually breeding him more for the table than the boudoir. However Bronco assured us that he and Crunchy were just good friends and he was only feeding him peppermints because Crunchy liked them and not to improve his taste (when he got him on a plate – oops!)
We struggled on with the ramble. Did I mention that it was windy? Well it still was and almost as bad as that day on the Chartres when Lafayette…………but I don’t have to remind you of that do I, dear readers? Froggy led us up a hill, into the teeth of a screaming gale and down into Bishopstone, thence round the coast road where Sandyballs kept getting his silly hat blown off, and into the Beachcomber where the beer was OK and where we bumped into Tina (baby lambs) Sheridan seeking refuge from her husband who had been insisting that she should wipe his steering wheel for the fifth time that morning. (Dirty bastard!)
Eventually lunch was taken at The Old Plough where The Old Trouts had already settled in for their lunchtime tasses de café, and where the NERDS all ploughed into vast quantities of steak, chips, beer, cognacs, ice creams and wounded strops, not to mention defensive petulance’s (skate over, skate over) However peace was finally restored, one of us robbed The Halifax of yet more money and we spent a pleasant afternoon in The Old Boot on comfy sofas in front of the fire chatting, drinking, mutually admiring each other and quarrelling about the preposterous amount of money a round cost in Seaford. Happy Days!
So, thanks go to Froggy for providing a route again despite being the victim of bad weather, and for providing a present for some poor, needy geriatric; thanks go to Matt for getting a free bus pass form for the same geriatric – see photo; thanks go to Crunchy for eating our peppermints and thanks to the rest of the NERDS for all being so wonderful. Crunchy is our new mascot now, by the way, because he’s bigger than Rusty and because we like Bronco’s tales about what they get up to together in the hay.
Hasta la proxima, Los Nierdos-
Lafayette.
[Ed: - this appears to be a somewhat edited account and seems to miss out all the interesting bits.]
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
JANUARY 2008 RAMBLE
The first "ramble" of 2008 is on Monday 14th January. Hopefully we'll have the 'write-up' and photographs on site by the 15th.
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