A speck and a duck huddle

So the last couple of days have not been the happiest of lock down. I am not sure why although the prospect of not reopening this year, as touted by some of the press today, obviously didn’t help.

I appreciate that the press and the government spend a lot of time briefing in opposite directions in order to deal with public expectations and to be honest I believe little, if anything, in the press. The one thing that we can take from the today is that we are in for the long haul but I think we kinda knew that.

I woke up this morning thoroughly motivated, the day has not progressed as it should have done though. To hear all day long that your business will stay closed longer than any other takes it toll and really makes you think about the seismic change this will have on the whole trade. I have long disagreed with the negativity espoused by many in the licensed trade and I blame that for the hard push back that we are seeing.

As I recall the last that I saw said that 40 pubs a week closed in the UK but, at last count 41 opened. So the aggregate growth in the pub estate was 1 a week, see how easy it is to use numbers to support whatever position you want? So if you shut the entire trade for 12 weeks 480 pubs will be struggling and 492 opportunities to open will not have happened. These pubs won’t all shut immediately because, despite the naysayers, the situation has thrown a lifeline to some who were about to leave the trade.

I heard the other day that we expect 10% of the over eighties to pass away each year and that is about where we we are with the pandemic. Both points are just statistical facts and the pandemic has done nothing but move the numbers around but this doesn’t make losing uncle Tom or your local pub any easier.

All this aside today has certainly been one of those days where the weight weighs heavier. There is still a lot going on but sometimes you are struck by the seeming futility of it all. This is not something that taps you on the shoulder and whispers, it hits you like a truck. We have a way of dealing with these days, it is tried and tested and has come into play more often lately.

A moment (could be minutes or hours) sat on the floor in the corner. It is important that its a corner, some would say this is defensive and some would say that it is about connecting, I would go with hiding but whatever. Just sitting there as a tiny person in this big pub and its massive history, a mere speck on its timeline but responsible for continuing that timeline is very grounding.

I am not sure that grounding is a good thing right now but the ducks are forming a huddle and I think they want help to drink that wine. I am going to wipe the paint off my hands (it can stay on my face) and go join the ducks for a large glass, honestly my work is never done.

 

Tricky shadows and guard ducks

One of my neighbours recently commented (from further than the mandated social distance) that it must be so hard for me having nothing to do as I am usually so busy. I said that I was actually busy decorating (which is normally obvious because I look like I have been in an explosion in a paint factory). The response was along the lines of “but after that” and it made me think that perhaps people underestimate the scale of the task.

The walls alone amount to 90 m² of real estate and need (or have had) a minimum of 2 coats. Being an elderly pub there is also a distinct lack of anything true, square or stable. Nearly 6 kg of filler has gone into this exercise and today the dreaded ‘window of doom’ resulted in me having to go old school and deploy newspaper to try and fill the acres of void. You kinda know its a a big job for filler alone when you drop your scraper into the hole and have to fish it out!

When the walls are finished there are ceilings to paint (if paint is available by then). Before anyone reminds me that one should start at the top when decorating let me remind you that paint is currently as rare as open pubs and also ceilings can be slotted in around trading hours. The floor and the deck still need doing as do all the windows, so don’t worry my 12 hour days will continue well into reopening.

I am sure we have all noticed oddities in the current situation but let me share two that I have witnessed recently. The first involves queuing outside of the small store in town. There were 2 people in the queue in front of me and about 4 behind me when one person left and the young girl ushered one person in. As luck would have it the guy at the front was waiting for the person who had just exited so this put me in pole position.

A minute or so later, with nobody else exiting the store, said girl ushered us in “you can all come in now”. I confess to being bemused as to what had happened between me not being able to enter and then everybody being allowed in. I did think that it may not have been pandemic related, perhaps somebody had gone into labour or maybe monsters had to be trapped? Perhaps they were relaying the hopscotch markings on the floor? I made the effort to check the entire store (it is not large) and nothing seemed amiss, damn they are good!

The second oddity is speaking to the guy in the chip shop on the corner who was stood patiently waiting for passing trade (they don’t do deliveries). The apparent innocence when he noted ‘it’s dead out there’ made me wonder if there is some alternate news source that is telling people life is back to normal. The fact that the government are telling people to stay at home at every opportunity appears to have completely missed the poor fella.

As I type this I have left Gav duck in charge of Henry who is complaining that his share of the workload is currently excessive. Apparently he never signed up for working the sort of shifts he is currently on and resents the term ‘key worker’ as he doesn’t want to come out, he just wants to get back in the cupboard.

I have tried the ‘all in this together’ chat and he just pointed to the ducks getting drunk every night. Gav duck is currently enforcing some social distancing for Henry as he is the only one large enough to defeat an attack. Meanwhile Terry and Sausage ducks are still grinning about my earlier discovery.

I had noted that the vinyl wall paint is quite a nuisance and often looks patchy even after the second coat. In part this can be attributed to rushed, rubbish or just lazy painting but it also seems to change by time of day. I have noticed that some areas that looked great in light then spring a light patch in the dark. This morning I noticed a patch of red that looked light and made a mental note to grab the red roller whilst muttering that I am sure I have already hit this patch.

It was a couple of hours later that I got around to touching this area up and low and behold I could not find it. I studied the wall from every angle and it was fine. It would appear that what I am seeing, in paint blinded state, is reflection from a rough surface. Hence I now have the ducks in fits of hilarity that I have been chasing my arse trying to paint over bloody shadows!

 

 

Sod the dodo this phrase is nearly extinct!

As we have already established today I am a fan of accuracy in language similarly I am in favour of a wide vocabulary. There is a phrase that I would like to bring back into more frequent use, in fact there are two but they are similar. The first is the phrase to ‘man up’ and the second, which should be reserved for cases that need a little more emphasis, is ‘man the f*ck up’. This phrase should be applied regularly with regard to any situation where somebody just needs a dose of, well man up. I suggest that we start of with some examples so that we can all understand where this almost lost phrase should be used.

In the news yesterday there was the story of a policeman who smashed the window of a range rover driven by a 71-year-old who had been unable to open the door (as requested) due to central locking issues. This man was filmed taking 8 strikes to break the window and disable the dangerous 71-year-old whom he had pulled for not wearing a seat belt; the driver was subsequently awarded £20,000 for the incident. The policeman was subject to “ridicule” by his colleagues and has sued the police for constructive dismissal, he was successful and awarded a significant sum. I suggest that a more appropriate sentence for a policeman who couldn’t handle a little ribbing from his colleagues was a solid dose of  ‘man the f*ck up’ with costs against him.

The police  also offer our second example which comes from today’s news. Apparently a pig’s head was left on a police vehicle’s bonnet and they are reviewing CCTV to identify the culprit. Now the interesting thing in this is that the police acknowledge that no crime has been committed, so why try to track anybody down? Are they looking to return the head? of course not they are looking to bully some poor idiot into saying something that they can arrest him. Just a thought lads but how about feeding the head to one of the dogs and grabbing a hot mug of ‘man the f*ck up’.

Flu is next on the list or, to be more accurate, colds. We all hate colds, they are horrible, annoying and generally unpleasant but they are not the flu. As a 40-year-old man I can count on one hand the number of times that I have had the flu, amazing eh? not twice a month throughout the winter or every January, go figure? Trust me you know when you have flu, it is a serious infection and lemon flavoured powder is not going to help. In 2009 there was a relatively minor outbreak of flu in the UK and nearly 400 people died, you do not die from a cold*. Flu is hideously debilitating and potentially life threatening. There is no such thing as man flu of course, research has shown that men suffer more in fever situations because they have more temperature receptors in their brain but that just makes it worse. The root cause of the illness is a cold, C-O-L-D, get it? When you are crawling along the floor in agony you may have the flu, but if you expect sympathy then I want to see a doctor’s note otherwise, go buy a box of tissues and help yourself to dose of ‘man the f*ck up’.

Lets finish with the concept of Health and Safety teams, it is an established point of fact that they are the enemy. In world war terms they are speaking German, if they had been present in the world war we would all be speaking German. They are not your friends and they are not your ticket out of work, if you call the H&S to come to your work site then I think they should answer “hello son” just to make it feel more like you have called your mother. You are supposed to work around these people not engage with them. There is a reason that they prowl the workplace like Nazi officers, asking them if the job is OK is like asking a commandant in a prison camp if he minds you digging tunnels! Real men work under the alternative rules of Stealth and Hasty, much more accomodating of our ways.

Of course it is too hot, too cold, too hard, uncomfortable and downright bloody horrible doing that task, that is why we pay you. When you smash your car up you expect somebody to cut the broken bits out and rebuild it not stroke their beard and say “hmmm looks kinda sharp perhaps we’re better off scrapping it”. You are part of mankind, the champion of your environment and capable of overcoming all hurdles, so it’s a dirty/dusty/sharp if everything was made of lavender-scented marshmallow do you think we would need you? Next time you toy with the idea of downing tools because the sun is in your eyes, your shoes itch or you have a splinter hit the vending machine, £1 will buy you a tin of ‘who cares man the f*ck up’.

 On reflection the world has gone too far for simply ‘man up’ we clearly need to move to ‘man the f*ck up’ immediately. The good thing about this phrase is that it is self-regulating, if your child has never heard you swear then they need cuddles and strawberry flavoured pain relief. If, on the other hand, they are as fluent as you in profanity then next time the whinge bend down, tousle their hair and tell them to man the f*ck up. I ask each and every one of you, when next confronted with a demand for sympathy, to consider the use of the phrase. Your default position should be ‘man the f*ck up’ and the more that you use it the less you will be faced with demands for sympathy.

*Unless you sneeze in a full face crash helmet whilst taking a high-speed bend, then it is possible