…..we’re going down the pub!

This is a very appropriate title as Sham 69 were (and probably still are) big Hammers fans I believe, as is my buddy Colin who was sporting his West Ham top to support his team in today’s footie.

There is some confusion evident in this piccy – the dogs think it’s this way and the boys think it’s the other way…..and that’s before we get to the pub.

I’m not sure whether any human being on earth could have a better walk to their local boozer than we do! We decided on a trip to the pub for lunch – easier to organise at no notice than a night-time trip out and decidedly less problematic with Colin whose night blindness makes walking at night a major challenge.

Many years ago, on the third occasion that we met, we decided to go to the pub because we’d run out of wine at home (don’t ask) and walked to the pub from my flat in Southall along the banks of the Grand Union Canal. On the way there, it was daylight so not too much of a problem. On the way back it was decidedly dark so not exactly a problem….or so Shazbop and I thought – neither of us knew about Colin’s eye condition then and we walked the canal bank with him failing to point out that he’s completely disabled by the dark. I still have heebeegeebees each time I think that he could have ended up in the canal and we’d have needed to go in and rescue him. He later told us that he’d been too embarrassed to mention his sight problems and had navigated his way along the towpath following the sounds of our giggles!!!!

Anyway, a quick call to Iain and Becks this morning and we had a ‘date’ at the pub on the other side of the hill for lunch. We walked there, staggered back and in between times had a delicious lunch and a couple of pints of Doom Bar – a good, old-fashioned Cornish hand-pump ale.

Rosie and Archie found themselves needing to do a u-turn from this point and follow David and Colin – now they really should have worked out that David and Colin wouldn’t be heading away from the pub! The dogs and the babies (Iain and becks children) behaved like angels….partly because of the bribery involved – dogs got a pack and a half of crisps fed to them, followed by the scraps of meat off the plates, then they really hit the jack-pot as the landlady appeared in the bar with a handful of chunks of roast beef from yesterday’s lunch table. She proceeded to feed them to our babes, who wolfed them down with glee.

When all seven of us were sated, we managed to haul ourselves back over the hill home, despite a strong preference for finding a bush and having a snooze under it for a couple of hours.

So, did the Hammers do the business for Colin? You betcha. Did the Spurs do the business for us? You betcha socks they did – four games left and still fourth…..yee haaa!

Did the planting of potatoes, onions and carrots get done – er, well, er, ‘Please Sir, I didn’t do my homework….’. There is a small, well, tiny actually, chance that I may pop out now and do it……we’ll see about that!

I was in recovery this time last year....