Needs, adages and evictions

So , for the unfamiliar, let me start this post with a little scene setting. My name is Gav and I am single in fact I believe that the correct term is ‘confirmed bachelor’. Don’t worry I am not about to launch into some online advertisement for a partner I am just making things clear.

So this week I was asked, by a concerned customer, why I ‘don’t have a woman’ after all, apparently, I “deserve” a good woman. My answer, which took some consideration, I think was fair. I need a relationship like I need cancer and the reason that you are enjoying your time in my pub is precisely because I do not have a woman.

OK so the analogy may be a little harsh but the theory is sound. It was gone midnight when I started to  write this and I was exhausted but still  up for work at 7 am. I am driven by the pub and its needs there is no space for any other demands, other than my beloved children, and frankly we (me and the pub) have no time for relationshits*.

I need to point out that this is not a sexist thing for I am sure that there are as many woman saying this as there are men. The simple truth of the matter is that in a very complicated world I am as likely to have a successful relationship as I am to solve a Rubik’s cube underwater in the dark. In all of these conversations, they are reasonably frequent, there is a constant and that is that the person espousing the benefits of a relationship is not overly happy with their own.

There are some wonderful exceptions to the rule, I am privileged to know some of them, but as a rule the sexes are not designed to play well together. So when you next visit the pub and tell me that I need a lady think on, at least for a minute, and wonder would it be the same place if I was off out kowtowing to the irrational demands of a ‘partner’?

We have ditched the old adage of ‘behind every good man there is a strong woman’ so can we also now drop the idea that men need women like they are physically and emotionally bereft without this contract, we are grown up now and this is  way down the needs list.

In other news this week has raced past and I feel as if I am slamming into the weekend bereft of ether planning or energy. In fairness this is the usual consequence of a week of achievement so all is normal. The start of the season has brought some repeat visitors over the week, some who know the pub of old and some who know the pub since I have been here and all have been pleasantly surprised by the changes.

My battle to evict the spider who has taken up residence on one of the external cameras continues. I remove every trace of web every day and will then only spot the occasional incursion by the little fella as he prepares his lair. It would seem that the infrared night-light always spurs him into a spurt of energy resulting in a full web at the most inconvenient of times. Quite why the spider is so attached to the camera I cannot understand and would have expected that the constant destruction of hard built webs would have caused him to move on but he is nothing if not determined.

 

*I am forever grateful to Davina for this excellent word

Brilliantly stony stress and private signs

A random call from my old career today reignited some thoughts that I had the other day about the sheer enormity of the changes that I have made in my life. As I have noted before my nickname is ‘pikey’ and this is, oddly, unconnected to growing up for a number of years in a caravan. I have gone from a caravan to a flat to a space that is larger than most houses, such a massive step. So now when I lose a screwdriver and then remember that it is in the back bar toilets I enjoy walking to get it, this whole space is mine and it is significantly more than a hotel dwelling pikey is used to. 

I think that this is, in part, where my fascination with the secret world of ‘private’ doors comes from. I am not an explorer but I love those places where the public are not allowed to go. Despite the stress of three-inch black iron pipes I loved working in the Albion blue room loft, its cellars and various other lofts, these are spaces that have existed quietly behind the scenes for generations and I feel it is an enormous privilege to spend time crawling through them. To put this in some context think that for every five thousand people who have partied in the bar 40 have been behind the bar, 15 in the cellar and one in the loft. The behind the scenes crew work in a slow-moving space that hands history between the generations gently and with a great deal of care. The same is true of railway work, for every million passengers maybe 30 people see a cab, 15 see the kit and 2 walk the track, this is our world and ours alone, I remain privileged to have been one of the two. 

The other side to this is the engineer in me. I don’t see a wall or a pint, I see a cellar, a beer line, a gas pump and the complexity of cooling. I don’t travel on public transport without evaluating performance, fit of panels, quality of parts and design. Even infrastructure I am compelled to challenge why they welded rather than bolting, why that edge is open to the environment and whether they have considered freeze/thaw. This is what I do, it is how my mind works, there are no ‘givens’ everything is open to challenge until I am convinced. 

Another significant change is alcohol. I come from a regulated industry since I was a nipper there has been no beer at lunchtime and there has been a policy of D&A testing. What does this do to the people in the trade? It turns them into binge drinkers, probably the very thing that the policy was trying to prevent. Dry mouthed and sweaty after a night out everybody is trying to tell themselves that they only had ‘a few’ last night. So my digital swap is that I have spent every day of the last 18 months smelling of beer, every single day and most hours of the day. My washing machine is an alcoholic rarely, if ever, does it wash a load that does not include alcohol. I probably don’t drink any more than I used to but I do it over the week. It is now not only socially acceptable but obligatory for me to drink on a school night and I am certain that industry got it wrong. Competent, successful and brilliant trades who are at the top of their game drink with me daily and they know when they have pushed too hard, they take a late start. Does this affect their output? no they still get done on time but that’s the thing, they are adults, they can regulate themselves and they are allowed to, it might be old school but it works. 

For those of you who don’t follow the website but are interested in the pub please do keep an eye on http://www.ploughandbarleycorn.pub as I will shortly be adding a gallery for the next terrifying project. The Plough started as a square two storey building with 4 equal sized rooms on each floor, before me they have removed three of the dividing walls to turn it into three rooms upstairs and two downstairs. But I have never been one for the easy story so why not take the last wall out downstairs and turn it into one room? Ok I know that there are many reasons but…… it’s the right thing, probably, for the modern world so let’s just get it out right? The next four weeks will see huge volumes of stone being knocked out, 7 chimneys leaving the building and one serious (15″ thick) wall leaving us forever. I am slightly sad to see the loss, excited as to what the pub will become and just terrified about the whole undertaking so tune in and check out the pictorial gallery, for the haters this may be the one that pushes too hard so stay tuned. 

 

 

Dreams, toilets, company and characters

There is a well-known ‘dream’ story, one to which I actually subscribed when younger, of a couple running a pub. When they retire at the end of the night they will, of course, discuss business and the people involved. When one is sick the other will always be available and when one needs to escape the other will, of course, be on hand.

Those of you who know me will know that it is many years since I have subscribed to this model. I am a firm believer in making one’s own path in life and carrying no dead weight. So the Plough is Gav and Gav is the Plough, there are no shareholders, partners or other support what you see really is all you are going to get until I shuffle off.  So what does this change? what is different here to everywhere else? Well tonight I will share one thing that is unique to the Plough.

The symbiotic relationship that is Gav and the Plough runs very deep. I couldn’t be Gav without the Plough and, to a lesser degree, the Plough just wouldn’t be the Plough that it is today without me. I am a single man , there is only me and the ghost here every night so I don’t have the immediate luxury of a sounding block, although my mate Andrew gets it at least once a week and Jo is always on hand for a message.

So what happens when I close the doors and give Henry his nightly walk around the pub? I actually talk to the pub, in fact there is not a night that I haven’t headed up the stairs with some words for the old girl. This, you see, is not just a pub, not just a place to drink beer, it is my home and my sole purpose. I walked around the pub tonight, in that delicious peace that descends when you go home and I start cleaning, and once again I told her that she had done well. People enjoyed their evening and the atmosphere was great, in short the old lady performed the magic that she does.

In other news this years barmaid, our Lucy, has gone from being so timid as to give me cause for concern to being confident and professional behind the bar. I have said many times that for me the development of people is one of great things about this trade and I am really pleased to see that the Plough has been good to Lucy.

My stern view once again entertained my regulars recently when I ejected somebody with directions to the public toilets. In this instance the person came up the drive, paused to read the sign which advises that there are no public toilets, and then headed straight to the gents. When I challenged him the response was that he was aware that the sign said he “shouldn’t” but could he just use the toilets? I refused this first offer and asserted that the sign was more certain than ‘shouldn’t’ but, if he was having a drink…..

It was at this point that the man in question made a counter offer. He didn’t want a drink you see but he would ‘happily give you some money’. Having considered this new offer I decided to reject it and reiterated the absence of public toilets on the premises. The person grumbled and left at which point my regulars proceeded to dissect the interaction. Because my locals know me they quickly picked up on the flaw in the miscreants second bid. If, as he had suggested, he was happy to offer to purchase the use of the pubs facilities then that would surely have been his first offer to me. By choosing to enter the property with no intention to even acknowledge his misuse of the facilities he forfeited any option to negotiate terms.

Let me finish with an explanation of the word ‘character’. This is a term applied, usually fondly, in the third-party so for example ‘old Bob he’s a character’. It generally indicates that the person has something about them that makes them memorable, a quirk, a mannerism for example. It is not a blanket apology for being a moron! You cannot explain your bad behaviour, your stupidity or your generally irritating demeanor by simply repeating the statement ‘I’m a bit of a character’. In fact you don’t have the right to declare yourself a character, those you encounter will call you a character if they feel that you are one, otherwise we will call you many other things none of which are either pleasant or complimentary. Sorry, I just felt the need to clarify that point.

Have you seen that?

What is it like to live with your most crucial limbs held together by metal and good luck? It’s a question that gets asked probably once a fortnight when somebody spots a scar. On a tattooed man scars are great because they take some spotting but when they are spotted they seem to be a prize. For spotting the sodding great scar you get a free question, apparently….

So the question is always pain related, as humans its our lowest common denominator. They ask ‘did it hurt’ then ‘did surgery hurt’ then ‘ did recovery hurt’ and finally ‘does it hurt now’. Luckily all of these questions can be answered with three letters….’YES’ The wrists are one of the most flexible, and complicated, joints in the body and mine are written off. Every day you make thousands of movements that I can’t but will still try to do. Of course it hurts, look at the X-rays they scream pain on their own without looking at me.

The next thing is always how long it took you to notice. Lets be clear you can’t hide this, when you notice I know that you have, I see the look and the way that your eyes follow the scars. You don’t notice because I will not let you notice unless you see the scars, I will not kowtow to the nefarious Ms Nature because I am better than that. But yes it does hurt and, to be fair, it hurts a lot. When I was typing a social media status earlier an unseen hoard of psychopaths stabbed blades into righty and I actually yelled out in pain. I don’t do this often, wont give her the ground of course, but this is pain, and she managed a level of pain that required my audio support, in short it bloody hurt!

So yes in simple terms it hurts, a lot, all of the time, day and night, but I can still type. The deal that I have struck (ish) with Ms Nature is that I will live with the pain, I will laugh it off on a daily basis, I will wake up every day (and have for years now) and say “ouch” and every now and again she will test my limits. She will test me so hard that I will shout out or, if I am trading, I will drop something . This is not the nagging, grinding, crunching pain that is daily toil  but a special and targeted pain that crucifies me and she knows that she can do it, almost at will.

So when you see a barman drop a glass and you do the comedy cheer think on, one of us is in so much pain that I am close to blacking out. Normally when I drop a glass it takes every single ounce of self-control to recover, this is my battlefield with Ms Nature and this is where she can gain ground. When the simple action of using an optic can bring a grown man to his knees then we know it’s not a battle its a war. I will never let her win I am , after all, an Engineer so I never have trusted nature but don’t be mislead, it is a fight and its a daily/hourly battle. Once again, you wonder why I look tired, every minute of every day I am battling. Just writing this is hurting like you wouldn’t want to believe but I am me and Ms Nature? well she has the long game but otherwise she is just a loser.

 

Smelly memories & toilet rolls

I am growing more convinced that the pub is ageing me faster than anything I have done before. Because the weekend is not time off of work there is no longer a border between weeks and no sooner than the beer is in the cellar it is time to place orders again. The pub is like one of those hamster wheels the faster you run the faster you have to go to keep up.

I have worked all of my life at full speed but this is different perhaps because there is no longer even a faint line between life and work. One of the best examples of this is night-time reminders, something that I have always done. When I was in Engineering I would awake during the night and think of a task that I had forgotten or needed to add some priority to and write myself a note for the morning. I would wake up to pages of notes on hotel notepaper every morning, it didn’t disturb my sleep as such it is just how I function.

I don’t have a pen by my bedside any more because I no longer need one. The last thought in my mind at night is always the first thought in my mind in the morning, again I have always been like this, and that is now enough for my morning reminder. Rather than waking up to a list of calls to make, items to price and decisions to make I now wake up and think ‘the ladies needs another toilet roll’* Everything is now somewhat more holistic in that every thought and action is related to the pub.

Amongst this madness I still get embarrassed when somebody asks how the works are going or what is happening next door. There are tasks in the planning but the brutal truth is that standing still is actually so demanding that it seems to be consuming my very soul. The Plough is literally consuming every moment of my life and I am acutely, and always, aware that she needs more.

The structural engineer’s work is in though and builders are now quoting, well chin scratching, the task of removing the centre wall in the old pub. Replacement windows for the bar area are also being quoted again with much associated chin scratching on account of the most peculiar angles involved. The windows mean that we can tidy their general appearance which is a source of much, humorous, consternation to at least one of my neighbours.

 

In other thoughts from here isn’t the memory a weird thing? I recently saw a picture in some trade press of a tired looking class 91 loco in a service shed at night and it occurred to me how odd it is that, amongst many memories, I can remember the smell of those buildings. Diesel or electric there is a smell associated somewhere in my mind with rolling stock sheds but I don’t know why? I have no idea why I stored this memory or what use I thought that it would have. So that is next on the list of things to fathom out about memory just as soon as we have worked out why I can remember every word of a song from 1980 but not why I just walked into a room!

A quick check up for those that worry about me, you lovely fools. Ms Nature continues to cause me issues but aggressive ‘physio’ allows me to alternately push her back or give me another reason for the pain and at least stop her gloating. I do eat, its erratic and strange but that is not new and in fairness my lifestyle is as healthy as the next workaholic publican! I am now even known for wandering away from the pub to remind myself of the stunning views that are the reason that I live here. One of the problems with being a publican though is that invariably if I walk into a different pub I attract the very people that I and the respective bar staff are trying to avoid!

Since I am ending this post at the end of my week, god only knows when I actually started it, it seems fair to share the trading position of the Plough. Once again she has shown herself to be erratic, eclectic and nearly as impossible to live with as any of the women that I have met! A fair, but unexciting, bank holiday led to a slow week and a momentous push on Thursday to close up in the top five trading weeks. That is the thing with the Plough, something that I am becoming more confident in, just when you think it’s all gone wrong she will pull one out of the bag that you neither saw or could have predicted.

It may be a tough lonely life but it’s still the best one that I have had.

 

*actual thought may vary

Still here and fizzy cigars

I thought that it was time for an update which actually means that I have a pile of paperwork to do and am avoiding it by writing to you guys!

We are now entering the ninth month of trading at the Plough and things are looking OK. The plan was always for the business to develop slowly and steadily rather than peak too soon and fail so things are certainly heading in the right direction. The pub has a lovely ambience and I spend less time growling at customers that I would rather not have than I did when I first opened, in short the pub is finding its place.

I remain immensely proud of the pub and what she has achieved. Just looking at the cellar in advance of my first Easter compared to how it looked before I opened was a pertinent reminder of far we have come, that isn’t to say that we don’t have a long way to go yet though. From a personal view it has been great to see friends visit and experience the Plough at its best so that can see what it is that makes this place so special.

I should see part-time staff starting this month and I now have a girl staring for the summer as well, yes this will be the first staff in the pub. Taking on staff is a daunting thing on so many fronts but without them I will hold back growth in the business so best foot forward and all that. For those who thought that it was not possible to work 130 hours a week, every week I would like to point out that you were wrong, clearly it is possible.

I am more conscious than ever that this is a lot of work for one person, the back room stuff, the maintenance, planning and running the bar has to take its toll. I remain adamant that my way is the right way but the business is relentless, I think that word best sums it up. There are times when it feels as though the business is consuming me and that even when it has finished it will have done little more than stand still . As we move into the summer season and I see tourist faces return I am often embarrassed at the lack of progress that has been made since they were last here and have to stop myself explaining that I am still functioning on a maximum of five hours sleep a night and remembering what they drank for that week on their holiday last year.

There seems to be a view that once I have staff I can get my feet up and smoke a cigar or two whilst counting the cash, this is so far from the truth. Staff add complexity to the business and more tasks to my never-ending list. There are some that understand though and I congratulate Laurence, who has just returned from holiday, for noting that I to can have a break in “5 years or so” I think that he was remarkably accurate.

I am often told off for not discussing my wrists and updating on the war with Ms Nature so I must include the current battle here. We have felled a number of trees recently with the timber stacked for firewood in advance of the log burner installation and obviously these need chopping. I didn’t think that the motion of swinging an axe was that different to that of swinging a hammer but apparently Ms Nature does, very much so. I am chopping a few logs a day just to remind the nefarious one who is in charge but at the moment she is not listening. The ‘new’ movements have resulted in significant pain, a weird tingly/fizzy feeling and the obligatory random numbness which in turn has resulted in some broken glassware. I am sure that, just like every other battle, she will eventually wind her neck in and accept that it’s not all about her, bloody nature!

I will leave you with the latet sign on the door, I think it holds just enough humour:

 

WARNING

Drunk adults often mistake children for snacks.

This is not a ‘family’ pub please ensure that children are kept under control and do not disturb the adults or you will be asked to leave.

Angles, Chinese and chairs

So Christmas is not my time of year by any stretch of the imagination but decorating the pub is obligatory. The decorations arrived some time ago but didn’t get put up last week because I had a cold and wasn’t in the mood for much more than opening up and trading.

After trading on Sunday I took to the task with all due vigour and so it was that I could be found at 1 am surrounded by tinsel and the other accoutrements of the season. It was at this early hour that I discovered something that I had no previous knowledge of. Apparently in the global financial crisis they laid off the small Chinese children who tied the string onto Christmas baubles. This harsh move means that the things now come flat packed for self assembly, I know it’s just crazy right?

They don’t , of course, pack them with string because this would be too expensive, oh no they pack them with angel hair. I am not kidding this stuff is finer than human hair and how do they keep it together? they tie it in a bloody knot!! it took me half an hour to untangle the knot and god knows how long to thread the first decoration. By 01:30 I had solved the conundrum and knotted a string only to discover that I had tied it to my finger.

By 02:00 all decorations were safely compressed (stamped on) for disposal and the tree bedecked in tinsel. I have to reserve praise for Jo who, upon hearing the story at 10:00, mentioned that they sell metal clips not that I needed them then !!!

To understand the Plough you have to understand the good natured spangled that is our way. When faced with a young blonde baby faced lad the other day one of my locals was keen to speak to him but kept addressing him as ‘sweetheart’. Eventually the lad succumbed and when I next walked past they were in a discussion over beards. That story would end there if there were anywhere else but this is the Plough. So our local legend actually wanted to call matey in to explain that he may need a shave, think this is odd? Well our local had decided that this was probably a “gay lesbian” (god only know what that entails) and in an effort to be PC thought it was best that he pointed out that the glimmer of stubble was ruining the ‘girl look’.

Please don’t take offence when you read this, this was a wonderfully enlightened transgender moment unfortunately it was directed at a straight guy but hey we can’t win them all right? many drinks, cuddles and explanations later all was good and best friends ensued. It may all seem odd but that is how we roll. Don’t expect us to be enlightened, modern or PC but we will always be nice you just may need to to take a breath and count to ten before your realise!

I will close by sharing with you what I do when I am stressed. Christmas is a horrid stress of trying to balance stock and double guess the future. I have no idea what I need, how quickly I can get out of stock or just what to do in general. So you stress, well I do, about these things and all the time try to keep a smiley front of house face but you are still stressed. So this week has been a chair in the back bar week but you guessed that , there is more. I paced the pub tonight and compared my trading space to my peers and friends.

These are the moments, as a single man with no staff, that you realise the enormity of what you are doing. For those who live in Walton my ‘little’ pubs trading space is easily three times the Bathhouse, double the Tavern and I could fit the Vic in half a bar. This is no small pub, this a huge and intimidating venture and there remains only me here and I am writing this. The Plough is most definitely home but don’t be fooled for a minute she scares me to death most of the time.