Publican or…

I remember that some time ago I wrote some posts along the lines of ‘you know you are a publican if’ and I think that it is a pertinent time to revisit that format so sorry not sorry I guess.

So I am writing this sat at the place that most of the normal UK public want to be. I am sat on a bar stool with a pint of draught beer, come on I am rocking this. Oddly this is exactly the same space that I occupied on the Saturday after the Friday closure order and 4 weeks on it feels very similar.

So you know that you are a publican if you are drinking draught beer and you are alone, its a pretty good test. You also know you are a publican if you are currently facing the single biggest crisis pubs have ever faced. That is not an exaggeration, my pub has survived a couple of world wars but this is actually more of a threat. If the pub had been bombed out it would have been rebuilt, wars ended and we went back to the pub, this is different. Of all of the custodians of the Plough I am the one who has the keys when the future directly rests on my shoulders,

Yes we can succeed or fail that is always a risk but if you fail to hold the wolf away from the door during this then the pub is lost. All of that history, all of those landlords but if you mess this up you are the end. I will not fail, that is not even a question, but sometimes you realise you are holding the future of hundreds of years of history and all of those ghosts are looking at you thinking ‘wow never saw this coming’. On a bad day those thoughts can bring a cold hearted man close to leaking.

So right now you know you are a publican if…. hang on I need to clarify something here. A publican is defined by me (the only one that counts in my blog) as somebody who loves their pub, who feels the responsibility of generations, a true custodian. Some of us love our pubs, I don’t mean we like the building I mean we love the wonderful thing that we are custodians of. Some of us are proud to introduce every new face to our old lady, some of us can’t see a distinction between our pub and us, we are publicans. I am more Plough than I am Gav, that is what it is like, to me, to be a true publican this old lady is my everything.

Anyway where was I? So to be a publican now… well you smell of paint because there is no way those hundred odd jobs are not getting done while we have a chance is there? Arthritis may not be a qualification but typing is a struggle right now I can assure you. Feeling lost though that is a constant, feeling like you have taken hundreds of years of careful hard work and now you have somehow lost the helm. You are drifting with no idea where you are going and there is nothing that you can do to steer the ship.

I think that is the single word that sums this up more than any ‘lost’ I can deal with any situation, after all that is what we do but the unknown…. that is a struggle. I don’t know if I am shut for weeks or months. I know that we are all struggling but imagine if, rather than saying don’t go to work, they said stop being you. That is what true publicans are doing, we are working harder than ever but our personality is on hold.

The banter that we have with each and every one of you is what makes us without that we live a very strange, and newly emerging, life and I for one do not like it.

Frozen solder and pointless plans

Wow its February and this is my first post of the year, I apologise again for slacking!  You would have thought that I would have had a lot of time on my hands during these quiet months but, since I also predicted that, I have filled them with other tasks.

We have now almost completed the ladies toilet upgrade so I don’t have to spend every waking hour working on them. The new toilets have been well received and, more importantly, have enabled us to ‘steal’ the small space that we needed for the garden project.  We are now waiting on the architect so that we can get planning in for the external changes ready to push on in a couple of months.

For me the toilets has been mostly wiring, some plumbing and painting oh and paying invoices. It is great to get the tools out and do a bit of manual labour, just as it is for those of my ex-colleagues who are now consigned to desk roles. Soldering some pipe up, planning cable runs and installing all reminds us of when life was simpler I think. Of course I am not as young as I once was and a frozen shoulder is now a nagging reminder of that fact.

I continue to follow the exploits of Bombardier and am immensely proud to see Crossrail leading the way in securing new, and well deserved, contracts. I see the pride in people when they reach a stage in the contract and I know the blood sweat and tears that gets these things through and into production. I have the same pride now when somebody compliments the Plough and I can assure you there is plenty of blood sweat and tears so we are not so many miles apart.

I set out on this mission with the understanding that the pub could never compete with the complications and stress of my career, I may not be correct. As at least one of my locals will tell you, I only have to open two doors a day and in that lies the secret of this life, making it look easy. My office looks like a bomb zone. The desk is awash with paper, there are two whiteboards full of things that I need to remember but wont be able to remember why when I do. Two screens constantly nag me with spreadsheets and accounts packages and it takes a wall planner and a diary to help me forget what is happening tomorrow! Weeks race by with such an alarming rate that monthly tasks seem an insurmountable challenge and planning seems as likely as a white Christmas (please lets not say the C word again for at least a few months).

I awake every morning with two thoughts now, that thing that I think I forgot to do and that thing that I need to remember to do. That small mental exercise probably controls more in the pub than any of the notes, boards and books do. No matter how much praise the pub gets I feel continually guilty that I have not given enough time and attention to a person, a task or a plan. I can see so much more to come and it frustrates me that we can’t do it yet.  This comes from a person who has always proclaimed that slow and steady progress drives engagement and rapid change alienates, funny how sometimes it is so hard to practice what you preach.

For all the hard work I love what I do. Despite the gruelling shifts with people who you don’t wish to engage with there is a huge pleasure in the shifts when the pub works and becomes that which you are trying to mould. I guess that the true indicator of happiness for me is that I remain amazed that I am here. One night last week when I retired, exhausted, in the early hours of the morning I realised that I had left my cell phone downstairs. Since I use the phone as my alarm I was obliged to return and retrieve it and, as I am as a contrary as can be, I didn’t turn any lights on. When I eventually located the cell I stopped and looked around, in the glow of streetlights and emergency light indicators, and again I couldn’t help but smile at the thought that this is my home. To live in this pub, despite the hardships, is a privilege and one that I wasn’t always sure that I would achieve. To live on the island is an ambition achieved, I haven’t left Shanklin in 14 months and yet still I have no need or desire to.

Reflections of progressive lunacy

As we slide into the ‘pre-festive’ slump I thought a project update was in order so here goes.

The rebuilding projects this year have not been as obvious as they were last year but nonetheless the building has seen another year of significant investment and improvement. This year we have actually:

• Stripped, re-decked and re-roofed the majority flat roof with a membrane system.
• Replaced a further 7 windows, 1 door and porch with hand-made oak to match the first phase.
• Built a bin store to house the growing collection of refuse receptacles.

As an indication of the complications of pub life, especially when an engineer is commissioning works, let me expand on the last item the ‘bin store’. The task was as simple as it sounds, that is to build a store in which to place bins, but nothing ever turns out that easy though does it?

At the North end of the site there was a small, and rather pointless, patch of grass and this was (after some consultation) considered to be the best place for the bin store. Now if we are digging up the grass then we should, of course, replace the concrete all around the North end and improve the drainage, after all if a jobs worth doing…. The boundary fence in this area was supported by wooden posts set into concrete, if we are digging the concrete up it would make sense to replace with concrete posts wouldn’t it?

If the posts are being replaced it would make sense to replace the fence with close boarding wouldn’t it? after all there is no point in doing the job twice. A block work shed is all that is required for the bins but…. its roadside at the North end of site, wouldn’t it look better in pressed stone? are you getting a feeling for how the little tasks develop in the pub?

So what you see below is what two months of work culminates in, well its a bin store of course.

End

Front

Long view

It rests on new concrete, uses new drainage and is bordered by new fencing it is, in short, what happens when an engineer designs a shed!

After months of rumours regarding what we were building my bins are now comfortable and the envy of every other bin in the street! But the shed looks right, it suits the building and suits the longevity with which I view this project.

Of course what you don’t see and really can’t appreciate is the dance which I go through to engage the builder on these projects. I always kick off with ‘I’ve had a thought’ which is cleverly countered by the builder declaring that he has to be somewhere else and promptly leaving. Over the course of a month or so I keep bringing up the idea that I have had in order firstly to let him know that it won’t go away and secondly to persuade him that the more I am left alone the more elaborate my idea will become.

After four to six weeks I have the builders attention and we scale back my madness to a workable project with an idea of when it will start. As we get closer to the start date the builder will concede more points and also add several ‘we might as well’ items each of which is added with the requisite shake of the head.

Finally, just before we start, I will get a request for a drawing. Of course I don’t provide a drawing, since none exists, but we sketch some stuff over a pint and walk around the site. This last stage is critical and seals the deal, it also usually happens the day before we commence! In case he should ever venture on to this blog I will caveat this description by saying I wouldn’t want it any other way and he is a top class builder.

Next years project is the garden but again this is far more complex than it sounds. Firstly we have retaining walls to build and fencing to erect, then the soil level needs to be reduced to a workable level which will involve the removal of over 100 tons of spoil. Toilets have to be moved around in order to provide access to the garden and repairs made to the 1800s wall which has been rotting under the soil for decades. Like any project we have added some ‘while we are there’ tasks so an extension is going on to the rear in order to make a lean-to space more permanent and therefore more usable.

The architect has started work on the plans and after Christmas I will start the dance with the builder. For those of you who are wondering how we fund these projects let me let you into a secret, I am also wondering. In so far as the business I am a firm believer in a quote attributed to the American football coach Lou Holtz:

“In this world you are either growing or you’re dying so get in motion and grow”

In my view stagnation does not maintain a stable business rather it slowly erodes it. As business owners we need to reach out and take the risks that enable our businesses to grow and develop.

 

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.