Memoirs of a bar steward

By Scott Evans



http://www.Jacob.Cox.diary.com


Name:
Jacob Hank Cox

Age:
18 years old

D.O.B:
26th November 1981

Occupation:
Student

Home:
Birmingham

Family:

Twin:
Miller Hugh Cox age 18(Born 1981)

Brother:
Clint Lincoln Cox age 17(Born 1983)

Sister:
Marie Louise Cox age 10(Born 1990)

Mother:
Ivy Beryl Cox (O’Shea maiden name) age 48(Born 1952)

Father:
Johnny Paul Cox age 45(Born 1955)

Pet Dog:
Trix’s (The Devil) Cox age 10 (Born 1990)


Introduction

I have decided to keep an online blog (diary) now that I have got a brand new laptop computer, which my best friend Curly (actual name Michel Butler) kindly got for me on the cheap last weekend. I would get a real diary but if my brother Miller found it he would denounce me as a homo butt plugger on the grounds of the diary being concrete proof (Hence why I also could not and never can buy a Take That CD!). I also like the idea that people online can follow where I am going in life, because I think I will be going far! So these ‘accounts of my days’ are not only for me, but for future generations of Cox’s and all those interested in my great adventure through the years to greatness.

Monday 14th August 2000

1823 Hrs

DAY BEFORE A LEVEL RESULTS

I’m really excited about tomorrow because I will be getting my A level results and then I can at last escape from my repugnant family. That might sound a bit harsh, maybe nasty and you can be forgiven for asking what terrible actions they might be guilty of. Do they beat me, abuse me, ignore me? No. They do however fecking annoy me.

Until recently my tiny wild haired Irish mother (along with her raggy prehistoric side of the family) was in the business of beating the living pootang out of people and sticking their pet’s heads up where the sun doesn’t shine. Why? Because if you were unfortunate enough to run a pub, club, shop or even a paper round on the west side of Birmingham, you paid the O’Shea’s clan not to do these lovely things to you basically. A family to be proud of. Not!

My ratty face Father is in the business of running up debt and then running away. I have many fond memories as a child of listening to him answering the phone in a woman’s voice, proclaiming never to have heard of a Mr. J. Cox. He once took to wearing women’s clothes around the house. He wasn’t a cross dresser, really, it was just in case the bailiffs came unexpectedly. We expected their unexpected visits almost weekly.

Whenever you see a newspaper article reporting about today’s sh*t eating, fat bag, silly clothed, state sponging, abuse hurling, fuzzy face, scruffy haired yoofs, you are reading about my (allegedly) identical twin brother Miller. (There is, however, nothing portly nor disheveled about my appearance. I am well tailored and down with fashion)

There is also my brother Clint who is a bit of a slick Frank Sinatra wannabe, the cuckoo in the nest because he towers over the rest of his short arse family, looking down on us with his deep blue eyes and bastard good looks. Last of all is my sister Marie who is very quiet, in a disconcerting kind of way. She has lots of friends around her at most times but not one of the miserable ickle boggy nose munchkins look like they like her.

I feel that I have been trapped on an island of savages. I’m sure there has been a horrible mistake, I couldn’t possibly belong here. Perhaps a plane crashed or I was washed ashore, where I was unfortunate enough to be adopted by the local tribe. Now though I have become a man and I have built myself a boat. Tomorrow I will leave this god forsaken island. I will row away and leave the lords to their flies. Goodbye all. Return I shall not.

Yes tomorrow at 1400 hrs I will go to my old school for the last time to collect my exam results and then I can begin my journey to university. I need nothing less than C’s in English, Math’s and History (though I’m expecting B’s at least). My family is moving to Torquay at the end of the week to take over a public house that my Father has ‘somehow’ managed to acquire. He asked me the other day to be its licensee. HA! Noooooooo fookin way! I will be staying with Curly once my family has moved, and then I’ll hopefully be going to Oxford to study law.



Tuesday 15th August 2000

1435 Hrs

I’ve been thinking about my father’s proposition about being the licensee of his new public house and I think that it is in fact a stellar idea. University is just one big waste of time. Who needs it? Not me. While everyone else is living a grubby stinky little student life, watching babies crawling on the ceiling, wearing their skiddy pants inside out in order to get an extra days wear, I’ll be in sunny Torquay making good money and building my middle class business empire. In years from now I’m sure I will probably meet most of these students, when ordering a take away at the nearest drive-thru.

Dad said he would rather me have my name above the door so to give me a leg up in life. I don’t blame him, he probably realizes that since I have a sixth form education I will have the superior ability to run a business. Miller said he wouldn’t be stupid enough to put his name to anything Dad’s doing, but he’s just jealous that I was asked and not him. It’s obvious he wouldn’t take it seriously, while Dad recognizes that I will turn it into the very best public house in the town. In fact Dad shouldn’t of just ‘asked’ me, he should of dropped to his knees and bloody well BEGGED me to help him run his business because I’m gonna make us all rich!

So I’m off to Torquay at the end of the week. I’ll help the family get this pub up and running and once it is a massive success by New Years, I will go and get myself another bar. I’ll be the next Richard Branson. He started off with a music shop above a shoe store and I’ll start my empire off with public houses. I’ve already started to make some notes:

1. Make it the best establishment in the southwest
2. Make the family respectable, and law abiding!
3. Invite celebrities to stay at the hotel over the pub and drink in our bar for free. We’ll make the money back because people will come in from all around the country to see’em at our place. I could also invite a TV crew to film me, Jacob Cox youngest licensee in the country, run my bar better than most landlords twice my age.
4. Ban karaoke forever. We will be a class venue. Karaoke is stupid and we will have a finer type of people in our premise
5. Open up more venues in a few months when The Royal Ship is making a fortune. Maybe think up a brand name like Virgin. Cox Shop?
6. I will not drink!!!
7. DO NOT LET MILLER SLEEP WITH THE STAFF. In fact only hire ugly staff so Miller does not try to bed them and cause internal staffing problems.

Anyway, that’s all I can think of at the moment. I’ll keep updates as often as possible

Wednesday 16th August 2000

1512 Hrs

Clint and I played a trick on Curly yesterday and I feel we may possibly have gone a bit too far…maybe

I bought this laptop off of Curly for a hundred quid after he said he could get computers from where he works (Dixons) with his staff discount. Curly’s been my constant companion (not in a gay way) for near enough a decade now. He is a tall broom stick of a lad. Big fucking boggly goldfish eyes with mad silly string hair the poor bastard. Most people wouldn’t give him the time of day but Jesus the lad is a hoot. Nothing he says is remotely funny, most of what comes out of his mouth is verbal wank. However the boy is a walking disaster. He is proper You’ve Been Framed gold. If you want a laugh, then Popeeye here is your fall guy. Anyway, he brought around this computer to my house and it looked great. Top of the range. It wasn’t in a box but he said it was ex-display, which is why it was so cheap. The problem was that when I logged into the computer I kept noticing the name Erdington Mental Health Care popping up. It didn’t take too long for me to suss that the computer wasn’t brand new like Curly had said it was. The cheeky mop head twat!

Now I’m not fussed that it was nicked, the working classes have gotta make a living I suppose and we all know that minimum wage isn’t going to pay their wife beating lager costs. It is a foregone conclusion that everyone under middle class is on the rob. NO, I was pied off because he took a hundred quid off of me when I could have got a nicked computer off of Honest Bob for a tenner (He’s a noseless smack head who would steal his Moms in use tampon to order…an acquaintance of Moms, not mine). I was going to let it slide, but after telling Clint what had happened, he was adamant that matey should be taught a lesson for be liable with the truth. Clint is renowned (even feared) for his pranks and I must admit that his latest idea sounded quite good so I decide to run with it.

Following Clint’s instructions I called up Curly up just after 10pm and asked him where he got the computer from and he replied all innocently “Dixon’s J, why?”. “That’s alwright then” I answered dead straight “Cos when I hooked the computer up to the internet I got a message flash up asking where I got the system from. I thought it was a registration thing, so I put Dixon’s, your name and your address as reference, since I knew it wudda been on your discount card”. By this point I just heard Curly swearing like Nun getting one up the bum. At the time I was trying not to piss myself laughing because I wanted to sound as convincing as possible; so I continued “Anyway Curls, the message went really weird and said an officer would be visiting within 20 minutes. What does that mean? You work at Dixon’s, you know how this works. Does a sales rep come around to register your software package?” Curly completely ignored the last bit I said and started asking how long ago I got the message. I made the fooker sweat for a bit, saying that I wasn’t sure but then he started going as mad as Miss Piggy finding Kermit in a clinch with Fozzy, so I relented and said I had gotten the message ten minutes ago. Curly shouted something about only having ten minutes left. I heard him scream for his Mom and then the phone went dead. After that I didn’t think anymore of it, well I did. I went to sleep with a big Cheshire cat grin across my face because I’d got the jizz head back a good’un. What a great start I thought, August 17th was going to be even better though, one of the best days of my life…or so I thought.

Later in the night, well early in the morning actually, a drunken Miller came bouncing over me head at about 4 o’clock and woke me up because he spunked his guts up all over his duvet and pillow AND THEN PASSED OUT HEAD FIRST IN IT! It really stunk badly, like a bowl of sloppy shit in gone off milk. I couldn’t get back to sleep with that wafting in the air so I decided that I was going to kip downstairs on the living room settee.

I get downstairs and I hear noises coming from the back of our conservatory. I grabbed the nearest thing I could arm myself with (the end of the vacuum cleaner) and jumped outside ready to unleash my deadliest movie chops, but it turned out to be Curly.

I asked him what he was doing dozing in the back of our house. He said that he had to fess up, that the computer was nicked and that he was selling it for some geezer his Mom knew (Mom’s aye!). I was just about to laugh and shout ‘Gotcha’ but he continued ‘Our whole house is full of stolen stuff that this ‘friend’ of my Mom’s has been stashing there. After you called I tried to find my Mom but she wasn’t in. The thing is that this bloke Mom knows has been keeping loads of drugs in the house too. There were too many bags of pills and powder and too little time to figure out where to hid’em so I decided to flush the lot down the loo. At that point Mom came back and started screaming hysterically. I tried to explain why I’d done it but she said she’d rather have been arrested compared to what the dealers will do to her. She’s been working for someone she is really scared of but she wouldn’t say who it was! So now Mom has packed hers and Britney’s stuff and she’s is doing a midnight flit back to Ireland as we speak. She told me that I’d better hide too because they would use me to get to her! So please mate, you’ve gotta let me come to Torquay with you…please! We’ve had to leave Grandma behind. She’s probably hanging upside down from her wooly stockings as we speak’

On that note I said okay. What could I say? I couldn’t own up after that, ‘Sorry mate it was all a big joke!’ I’m pretty sure he’ll never ever find out that I was playing a prank on him, so I said he could come with us. Good’ol Curly, a total fuck up as usual.

Who knows, maybe I’ve actually done him a big favour? He’ll come live in Torquay, earn an honest living as my barman and I’ll try to help him out the best I can. Maybe I’ll teach him the ropes and let him run one of the next pubs I’ll get in a year or so time. His Granny was 70; she’s had a good innings.


Thursday 17th August 2000 (Moving Day)

2357 Hrs

What a day! I can’t believe I’ve made it to Torquay alive.

It was still dark when Dad came and woke us all up and he was in a right anxious temper. He said it was because he wanted us to get to our new exciting home as soon as possible, but it seemed more likely that the pointy nose twonk wanted us to get away as quickly as we could without being noticed by the neighbours (especially by the murderous Mr. O’Dowd at number 69 who is/was our landlord, and who, I’m quite sure, Dad hasn’t paid any rent to for almost four months. If Dad thinks Mr. O’Dowd will just let him slip away into the night, he’s a bigger idiot than I give him credit for).

Dad whizzed the hire removal van outside our house (which he had parked around the corner last night) and like some sort of rabble military operation we all had to rush the heap of manky boxes and torn black bags of all our shitty worldly goods into the van on the double. As soon as the last delicate cardboard box of kitchenware was tossed in, Dad shut the door and was swiftly half way down the road shouting back that he’ll see us down there. By ‘us’ he meant me, Clint, Curly (Dad is quite happy to be getting some slave labour he said) and a very hung over Miller who was driving us to Devon in his supped up, rust bucket, death mobile.

I felt more scared getting into a car with Miller behind the wheel than I did the time I had to see our camp doctor for a bowel inspection (How can you tell if it’s a finger he’s poking you with if you have to bend over the bed facing away from him. In fact is that normal? I really should ask someone. Maybe there’s a phone line about that sort of stuff). Even though he was having trouble driving in a straight line he still thought it was ‘cool’ to see how fast the snot box would go on the empty M5 motorway. I begged him to slow down but unfortunately I was not backed up at all by Curly or Clint who just egged him on to go faster. He actually managed to get it to go 115mph and it really felt like the shit box was going to shake out of existent. Miller was manically laughing at his own joke because he kept quoting Scotty from Star Trek ‘She canny take much more Captain!’ Where are the bloody police when they’ve got the best chance yet to arrest my muppet brother? Their never around when you need them.

If anything was going to kill us you’d have thought it was the fact that Miller was driving at brainless speeds when he couldn’t even see properly but no, that was not it. Miller soon slowed down when a police car was spotted in the distance and from then onwards he seemed content with only going 90 mph once they were gone.

I expected Millers toxic levels and excess speed to be the reason for us all to end up in the arsehole of a tree near Bristol but no, it was almost caused by his inane fear of birds. Miller can’t even walk down a street without making a tit of himself. It only takes a cooing pigeon to flutter nearby and he looks like some kind of bad 80’s break dancer with shitty pants. He’ll literally dive for cover with arms flagging about to protect himself from what he must think will be a violent attack by a feathered rat. So we’re cruising down the motorway, listening to some crap one hit wonder on radio 1 (the song is called Yellow, I dunno who it is by) and suddenly we swerve across to the slow lane and then back to the fast and all because a bloody low flying seagull was supposedly going to hit the car, or so Miller said. As he veered off the road he made one of the tyres pop and we were lucky to come to a stop on the hard shoulder without getting mangled. None of us are members of the AA and we couldn’t change the tyre because Miller didn’t have a spare one. We ended up walking for about two hours to the nearest service station to give Dad a ring to ask him to come and help us! I keep saying to Dad that I need a mobile phone but he thinks they are a waste of money, just another way to take more money off of the poor, the government’s way to keep the proles (his stupid made up word for the working class) down.

During our trek I gave Miller a real good telling off and told him exactly what I and everyone else thought of him. It really annoyed me though because Curly and Clint denied everything I said about what they thought of him, yet they laughed when Miller answered back that I had only changed my mind about moving to Torquay because I was hoping to pick up some nice sailors ass down there! When I pointed out that the only one with homosexual tenancies was in fact him, my oafish brother, because he cried when the bunch of men he obsessively love got knocked out of something called Euro 2000, Curly and Clint started calling me a knob and a bunch of other foul common names. As soon as I get to Torquay I’m going to make them regret the way they spoke to me! I sat at Michael Wood services reading The Daily Mail while the other three spanners played in the arcade until 7pm when Dad finally turned up to help us. We didn’t even set off for the car for over half an hour because we, me included (!), had to listen while Dad pointed out why each and every one of us was a fucking retard. I felt like pointing out that I was only here to save his business, thus too the family. He should have been rushing to see if I was okay, and apologizing for making me travel with by monkey wang brother. I certainly felt within my right to drop drawers and have him kiss my ass. I should have sternly pointed all this out to him, but as I feared he might have dropped dead of a heart attack any second as he face changed from red to purple, I decided to keep quiet (for now).

At 9pm we finally rolled into Torquay and I soon forgot about my stupid fellow passengers on the journey from Hell as I arrived in Heaven. Our new home is in a part of Torquay called Babbacombe and it is beautiful. Our new pub overlooks the serene sea and the awe inspiring scenery fills your entire view. I just stood and stared for ages. I felt like I was on a beautiful alien world. In Birmingham you are surrounded by depressing concrete everywhere, concrete towers, and concrete block council houses, its all so grey, but here it is gorgeous. Blue sky, turquoise sea, red cliff faces, an assortment of different greeneries and PALM tree’s too! This is where I belong. This is class.

None of us really went into the pub part tonight. Partly because it was the leaving do of the previous tenant but mainly because we spent ten minutes piling all of the boxes out of the removal van into a storage room and then spent hours trying to find things like the kettle, and my computer, which was buried at the bottom of that mountainous pile. The pub sounded really busy though, very lively.

I can’t wait to introduce myself to my people. The old King is dead, long live the KING! I've got a good feeling about this place. This is going to be a good chapter in the book of Cox!

From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 09:29 AM
Subject: Koopa O’Shea

Alwright Cox Cheez

Haven’t heard much off your lot since ya Mom and Dad left the business last month. Me Dad tells us that you’ve all gone and moved to Turkey down south. Is that far enough away from the family then? Well you kept that all quiet didn’t ya. What happened to you going to uni?

Anyway, how did z move down to the bucket and spaz town go? Let me know how the new crib is hanging.

K. O’SHEA


From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 09:52 AM
Subject: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Hello Koopa

Yes I’m fine thank you. I hope you are too.

The move to Torquay was torturous but as you will no doubt find Millers antics so amusing I will not divulge how your wonderful cousin almost killed us all. (All I will say is that he is THE COX CHEESE, not me!)

Torquay (Not Turkey. School wasn’t just for selling drugs at, you know!) is beautiful. I know you don’t care for Gods Earthly craftsmanship so I won’t describe our new exquisite surroundings as you will most likely find someway of devaluing it to a crude insult. The new ‘crib’ however is amazing. There was a party last night when we arrived. The locals threw it for us especially. They said the last landlord was crap and they couldn’t wait for the new reign. Wonderful people.

It’s a shame that Mom has fallen out with all of her brothers but I do feel that it is most understandable. Mom specifically said to Uncle Connor that if he tried to push the business into the North of Birmingham you would suffer terrible consequences. I take it the rest of Uncle Macky has still not been found. Is his head still in the fridge? Perhaps if Uncle Connor had listened to Mother, Uncle Mackey would have been let go with only his balls missing! And how is Uncle Bernard? Is he still in hospital. The poor bastard.

You need to watch your back. The Donnelley might have lost the battle but I don’t think the war is over. You might be in control of the doors in Sutton for the minute but they’ll be back!

Give my best to the surviving members of the family while they are still alive.

Jacob.

From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:14 AM
Subject: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea


Hay Cock

It’s a shame about Mackey 4 sure but lookee what we av now. We’re Lords of the manor baby. Uncle Connor was right on the money. The North side is full of rich brats who are happy to piss all of Daddys hard money on our cheap nasty drugs. The punters on our old patch were just a bunch of bum picking dole beggars who can’t afford a decent pint of piss, let alone a gram of snow. We’re making a fucking mint now man!

We’re all gonna be fucking millionaires before Christmas. You lot should throw everything in the van and just come back to us! Oh, Uncle Bernard will be fine; he still has his left leg and main member.

While you’re around watching grannies sip on their lemonades by da seaside (which I bet you fooking love you kinky shit), I’ll be watching me Hoes sipping on ma juices. YEAH!

K. O’SHEA

From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:20 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Koopa

I will be getting the women too, don’t you worry about that! Power my friend, women love strong powerful men and that is what this position offers me. Koopa my ol’pal, envy me because I’ve won the sex lottery! I’m gonna be trying out plenty of love cushions. In fact I’m a bit worried that all the loving might get in the way of work, but I’m sure I can be professional.

In regards to returning to the family, we are quite happy here thank you. In fact if you have any sense you should get out of there now. Yeah you might be ‘minted’ for the minute but big wads of cash won’t do you any good when you’re dead in six months, in hell, getting a pitch fork in your love spuds.

Uncle Connor will keep on pushing. Even if you manage to hang onto Sutton without any more epic bloody battles with the Donnelly’s, I bet he won’t be happy. He’ll want Town next and then you’ll be fecked. Grandad Mickey might have been a vicious ol’bastard who started the whole thing off but he knew his limits, which is why the family have stayed in business for so long but now that Uncle Connor is in charge, he’ll go too far and he is gonna crash his joy ride with you lot in the car. He thinks that he is some kind of a God and he isn’t.

So thanks for the offer but I’ll stick to a proper business thank you!

Jacob


From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:24 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Cox

This is a PROPER biz. We have trainee PAYE staff, area managers, monthly targets, bonus schemes. Everything properly organized ya know. We even have an office with a well fit secretary that I get to bang on Thursdays. It’s all thanks to your Mom you know. She turned Granddads little paddy gang into a bleedin corporation. Miller should have stayed. He was doing good. If he had stayed here, we’d have given him his own team and the Erdington area to manage!

Will Miller be joint manager with you? Why isn’t he the licensee, he’s been a barman since he was 15 at our place. I suppose Uncle Johnny asked you because Miller has a criminal record, hasn’t he?

K. O’SHEA


From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:28 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

WHY ISN’T MILLER THE LICENSEE? Because he is a feckin retard and I’m educated brilliance. That’s why!

WILL MILLER BE JOINT MANAGER? HA HA HA HA bloody HA! Noooooooooooooo. On the journey down Miller told me one of his ‘amazing’ idea’s to boost business. He said he was going to go around town to all of the AA meetings to lure all of the alkies to the pub! He thinks he is going to be the Pied fecking Piper of the pub trade, dancing through town with a line of pissy pant hobbo’s and drunks merrily following him to our distinguished abodes. MY public house will be a place of sophistication. A meeting place for the great minds of the English Riviera. Not a place to get rat arsed! That is not the upper class way.

From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:31 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Sounds fucking boring to me then. Do you want any of us to come down and man the door for you?


From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:35 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

No we’re okay thank you. You stay where you are. This is Torquay, not Birmingham. People are quite docile here. Simple folk. They’re not street, not like me. I think they are probably a bit scared of us city lads, I’ll keep them in line. I will be a firm Monarch of my Kingdom. The problem with society nowadays is that the threat of authority is getting more and more distant. Everyone behaved in the old days when they were worried they’d get hung for stealing a loaf of bread but today you can kick a copper in the pink elephant trunk and get off with just a warning. Nope, I’ll be fair but firm. No one will mess with me.

It’s been good catching up with you. Stay good, stay alive.

I’m off to ascend my throne now

Best regards

Jacob

Friday 18th August 2000

1730 Hrs


I wanted to be down in the office by ten this morning, sorting out my new government cabinet and laying out all of our new policies but instead I ended up getting sidetracked by one of my cousins (Koopa), who bombarded me with dozens of emails. Terribly jealous he is, but of course I don’t blame him. I know I don’t have a high opinion of my Irish connections, and when I become an actual politician in the future, I am fully aware that I am going to have to bribe an awful lot of reporters to make sure that the connection is kept out of the public domain in order to preserve my majestic reputation, but I must secretly admit that Koopa is the only O’Shea cousin that I kinda like. Actually tolerate is a more appropriate and accurate word in fact. Why?

When Miller and I were in school, it is with regret that I have to admit that we weren’t entirely popular. To be more frank, we were as popular as a lollipop man wearing a sign saying I’m a big fucking paedophile. Reason? Well peers will always feel jealous of greatness and as you will already be aware, I possess a natural wealth of it. However, you may also be surprised to learn that before one particular school incident, Miller seemed to too.

My twin and I were just small lads for our ages. However, our teachers said that we were the best, most dynamic hall monitors that ever patrolled the corridors during break times. Back in the day, Miller and I were magnificent law enforcers. Oh you should have seen us! If one cheeky publess spack face dared have the balls to step into our hallway without permission from a dinnerlady, we would run straight to our teacher's classroom as fast as our tiny legs would carry us and tell on them straight away. Law and order was the rule of our play ground!

Over the course of our first year in secondary school, we reigned supreme. From the halls we were promoted to playground assistant supervisors and we governed with a merciless, iron fist, until one cold and wet winter’s afternoon when the peasants revolted! The revolutionaries came for us! We were chased through our corridors by a mob positively oozing with venom and hatred. That last occurrence where we managed to get football banned for the rest of the term was the straw that broke the camel's back. The proles had taken their time to hatch their vindictive plan and we were as fecked as a schoolboy alone with a P.E teacher. We ran to our teacher’s room but it was empty. We then ran to the next room but there was no teacher in there either. Fighting the urge to piss ourselves, as we were bombarded with pencils, rubbers and rulers, we made a last dash to the Headmaster's office but to our horror we found that his abode was vacant as well. We later found out that a group of boys in our year had made some weedier kids take laxatives and then forced them to unleash their spluttery mud chunks all over each and every school teacher’s car. Once they raised the alarm and saw all of the teachers running out to inspect their chocolate dipped vehicles, they came for us and they got us.

I fought hard against our attackers but there were hundreds of them. I took down as many as I could. They knew if they took me on one at a time they had no chance, but instead the sheer number of bodies toppled me. As I lay squashed at the bottom of a colossal pile-on, Miller managed to somehow break free, and in the mayhem of the moment he escaped. I hoped that he had run to find help, but instead he ran all the way home like the bastard little piggy he was.

The mob eventually stripped me of my uniform and dirty underpants and tied me naked to a tree at the bottom of the Playground. Almost every boy and girl who was a pupil of St Margaret Mary’s R.C School gathered around to watch the vigilante punishment being sadistically doled out to me. Numerous chants about my ‘tiny Cox’ rung loud and proud in the chilly air and just as I thought it couldn’t get any worse, it did. The ring leaders of this revolt stood forward. John Harding, Shane Tufnell and Mickey Hillier. As I stood in my wet, cold birthday suit, the three boys produced a big white bag that was full of…bird seed. It didn’t take long for the sky rats to begin throwing themselves at me, especially at my one eye monster, since my persecutors took careful effort to make sure that most of the seeds nested in my newly sprouted curly mane. As the flock of birds grew in numbers, the crowds eventually fell away as the Heaven opened with even more fury. Not one teacher noticed I was missing from subsequent classes and so I was still tied to the tree for last break when everyone came out to have one final laugh and poke.

From that day onwards Miller never again strove to follow the rules. He saw law and order as something that was despised. I however fought to reclaim my crown but I was menaced at every turn by my three nemeses! The teachers quickly tired of my new zest for tale telling and I found that I was a sheriff without power. These were dark days where I was constantly harassed and ultimately bullied. Miller slunk into the background, only to re-emerge and completely reinvent himself as the class clown with a new scruffy appearance. Basically a rule breaker. I suspect it was a case of ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’ but that just wasn’t an option for me. Visionaries often stand alone, isolated, revered and targeted by those who do not understand their higher purpose. Look at Jesus, they crucified him!

At that time Miller wasn’t the only member of family I had at St Margaret Mary’s. I also had six cousins from my mother’s side of the family. The O’Shea clan. Virtually all of them turned their backs on me. I was an embarrassment and they did not want anyone to know that the fearsome O’Shea family had anything to do with a Cox. That was except for one. Koopa. Koopa was in the year above and he must have watched for some time as I was targeted daily. It was not unusual to see me being verbally abused or physically attacked. Without football to occupy my bullies' time, they focused their attentions on me. Then one day they suddenly stopped. The terrible trio pulled me into an empty classroom and I waited for a smack that didn’t come. Instead they gingerly offered me their sincerest apologies and said that they would make sure no one else harassed me again. I thought that they had finally decided that enough was enough and that they respected that I never once cowered from them or hid in lonely cupboards or empty classrooms for weeks at a time while everyone else played happily outside. But just as they were leaving the room we were in, Tuffy turned back and asked if I could make sure that Koopa knew about what had just happened.

I would like to say that my older, so surely more mature cousin, had approached my bullies and through a reasonable discussion he had quelled the negativity that was being forced on me every day by them. However, he quite simply borrowed my uncle's sawn-off shotgun and brought it into school with him in his Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rucksack. He then cornered Hard, Tuffy and Hitler and told them that if they went near me again he would sneak into their houses in the middle of the night and blow their fucking heads off. I must admit that Koopa did show some restraint. Had I told my mother what was happening, she wouldn’t of snuck into anyone house but kicked in their fecking front doors and blasted every last mother fucker in the house. Their puppy included.

Koopa looked out for me and from that day I have tried to do the same for him. My mother might be as ruthless as her family and I’m sure I don’t know half a percent of what she has gotten up to in her life but she has always tried to keep her children away from the ‘business’. When Miller started to get sucked in by our Uncle Connor, Mom decided that the family had to get away for good, and somehow my Father got us the pub we’re in now. Koopa has never had this support. His father, my uncle Danny, is just one of Uncle Connors little bitches who will gladly push all of his sons to the front line of Connor’s mad battles. I hope that I can one day show Koopa that there is more to life than the O’Shea Empire.

I know I keep mentioning a lot of uncles and cousins but that’s because there are a lot of 'em. Here is a brief family tree of the immediate O’Shea clan:

O’Shea Family Free

Place of origin:
Limerick, Ireland

Granddad Mickey
Deceased 1998. Heart attack.
Buried in Grandma garden.

Grandma Marion (66)

Uncle Connor (52)
Not married and no children.
New Head of the family business

Uncle Joseph (50)
?

Mother Ivy Beryl (48)
Married to Johnny Paul Cox
Children: Jacob (me, 18), Miller (18), Clint (17) and Marie (10)

Uncle Danny (45)
Married to Anne
Children: John (29), Billy (27) Anthony (25) and Koopa (19)

Uncle Jimmy (41)
Married to Sue
Children: Danny Jr (25), Mackey Jr (22), Joe Jr (19), Luke (15) Suzy (10)

Uncle Finnegan (39)
Married to Linda
Children: Peter and Paul (Twins, 22), Kelly (18), Lisa (16), Catherine (11) Annie (8), Poppy (4)

Uncle Rocky (36)
Not married
Known children: Spike (15)


Uncle Mackey (34)
Deceased 2000. Murdered.
Buried with Granddad in Grandma garden
Children: Robert (16)

Uncle Bernard (20)
Not married. No children.
Currently in hospital, minus one leg.


Anyway…

My first day in OFFICE

First morning and already the family is fecking everything up royally! Completely useless they are. I bet Richard Branson didn’t have to put up with The Simpsons sabotaging his every brilliant business move. They’re like those bastard, jockey-less horses in the Grand National. You know your stallion should be winning but they get in the way and fuck him up at every hurdle.

First of all there’s Dad. He deliberately got up before me at 9 o’clock and did all of the work I wanted to do. He ordered all of the drinks, dealt with the staff and then fecked off to get the food in for MY party tonight. Has he consulted me on anything? Like fook has he! He’s off his bleedin rocker. Last night I specifically instructed him on what the menu should be for our grand opening tonight. A fine, exquisite À la carte selection to entice the wealth of superior sophisticated clientele that our surroundings offers us, but I bet you, I BET YOU MY BASTARD PLACE IN HEAVEN that he comes back with gawd awful drum sticks, chipolatas, scotch eggs and general repulsive snot that you always find on those evil tiny ickle STICKS!!! It is this kind of madness that must have ruined his previous business ventures. He has no vision. It’s like hiring Michelangelo to paint your sixth chapel and then deciding you’ll give it a bash yourself regardless. ARGH! Don’t these people realize I am their winning lottery ticket? Use my numbers, I have the winning balls!

Clints hasn’t exactly helped either with all of his moaning this morning about Dad. He says that he is spending a fortune and it is my fault apparently. He reckons that Dad will have spent over £15,000 before the doors even open tonight, on drinks, food, staff and a new sound system, for a party that no one in town will have heard about because there has been no advertisement. If he had his way we wouldn’t do anything for a week or two, but just wait to see what the locals are like and what they want from us. Bullshit. I don’t know where I get my brilliance from, but it must have been a freak accident, because no one else in my family has it. Me coming to Torquay is like the Romans coming to Britain. The locals are going to flock here to see what new and exciting ideas I am bringing here from the big city. Clint shouldn’t worry about the money either. 15k will be pocket money compared to what we’ll make; even Dad recognizes that, so I commanded Clint to stop worrying and to have faith in the ruling class. I do feel sorry for him, he hasn’t got a clue. No doubt he’ll be working for me for the rest of his life. I suppose that’s the curse of family, you have to look after the unfortunate buggers. Except for Miller that is, he can piss right off.

My twin is such a shit. A constant itch in my ass that I need to offload down the nearest bog. He is so insanely jealous of the respect that I have, that he will stop at nothing to diminish it.

Today I had to interview for new bar staff. Before Dad went out earlier he showed what little business acumen he had by making the ludicrous assumption that I should be working behind the bar tonight. Does the Queen wipe her own ass? No! And this King doesn’t either. I’m a General. I’m behind the lines, devising the plans, sending the orders for the troops to go over the top. I can’t be stuck behind the bar. It’s demeaning if nothing else. After pointing this out to Dad over and over and over again, until it registered in his thick head, he finally relented and told me to get someone else in then. That was the first sensible thing he’d said all morning. So I rang the job centre and they sent out three potential bar stewards within the hour.

All of the prospective workers arrived together. One was a beautiful 18 year old girl called Miss Summer Hits. She had long blonde straight hair, which shimmered like a golden sun that deserved to be worshipped by all its minions. Her curvaceous, tasty legs were showcased virtually right up to her muff because she had ditched a sensible skirt in favour of a slutty belt to cover her modesty. Her eyes were like looking into the blue skies of Heaven and she was also blessed with two lovely big tits that I wanted to take a nap on right there and then. The others were a fat bitch and a speccy twat. Miss Bertha Tunc and Father Connelly. They each handed me their C.V’s and I quickly directed them to my new office so that I could conduct my interviews. I got in there only to find that Miller was in my swiveling manager’s chair. For five minutes or longer I commanded that he must vacate the area but the grinning chimp flatly refused and argued that he should be allowed to jointly interview. He soon left in a sulk however when I told him that I would get Mom down from upstairs if he didn’t fuck off immediately. He stood up and agreed to leave, but only if he could have a word with me outside first. I apologized to my perplexed candidates and excused myself.

“You’re gunna hire Boobzilla right?” Miller asked desperately

“Ssssh, keep your voice down! I don’t know do I? If you hadn’t noticed, I’ve not had the chance to interview them yet have I?”

“You’re pulling my swinger, aren’t ya? If you don’t hire her now, you might as well drop to your knee’s and suck every donkey dick that comes through the front door, because if you don’t BEG HER to work behind our bar, you are admitting that you take it up the lubed arse”

I pointed out to my brother that I abided by the good law of the land, and that stated that everyone should be treated respectfully and equally. I would interview each and then make my decision fairly. At this moment he snatched the C.V’s from my hand and began to read them aloud.

“FATHER CONNELLY! A priest! I thought you wanted a respectable pub, Jacob. We can’t have no fookin pervert working here. I’m prime meat me. I wanna be able to get pissed in my own bar without worrying that he is gonna take advantage and take me up the altar. Though I suppose you’d love that, ya spunk guzzler”

I tried to wrestle the papers back but unfortunately Clint had taken an interest in what we were vociferously arguing about and decided to take Miller’s side. The great lummox somehow managed to tangle me up and lock me flat on the floor as he sat on my back.

“I’m not even going to read the burger burglar’s C.V, she is a definite no. A fookin health risk to all our eyes. Now, here we have the lovely Summer. Experience. None. La de da dad a. Whoa! Hang on. Am I reading this right? Oh my GOD. LOOK. AT. THIS!” Miller shouted as he came flying over to Clint and I, with animated excitement. “It appears that the heavenly Summer Hits only suffers from O.C.D! Obsessive Compulsion Disorder. She’s the fookin Grail man. How wicked is that?”

I had no idea what the hell he was on about and I begged him to keep his voice down as I was sure the three interviewees could hear us very clearly on the other side of the office door.

“Do you realize what this means. She’s the perfect woman” Miller claimed. “I’d just have to tell her that if she didn’t have sex with me, then her gran or something would die a horrible death. It’s brilliant. She’d drop her knickers faster than a midget prostitute!”

“It’s more likely she would have to flip the beer tap a 100 times before every drink she poured. No way. No way,” I protested

“You’re not taking this away from me bro. I’m going in there right now and giving her the job”

Miller left me with no choice and with every last breath in my body I screamed for Mom to come and help me. Clint darted off like a shot, leaving me and Miller alone once more. I should have battered him right then but I wanted to remain professional in front of the three bar steward contenders. I stole back the papers and reminded Miller how one day he’d be in the gutter giving hand jobs for a couple of pence while I’ll be sitting in my penthouse with dozens of ‘Summer Hits’ willing to do my every desire.

The little shit however had one last Ace up his sleeve to ruin my respectability.

“I’m sorry Jacob” he whispered “You’re right. I’m just jealous. Obviously I am. Look at you. We’re twins. Don’t you realize how hard it is to know that there is a version of me out there who is perfect when I’m not. You will get all of the top bitches and I’ll be lucky to get a gobble off of a blind spaz. I suppose I was just desperate to get to Summer before you blinded her with your immense presence”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He was right of course. Perhaps there was some of my old hall monitor partner still him. Some of Anakin that resided in Darth Vader. For a moment I forgot about everything. My brother was back. Together we could rule the galaxy! But then out came the red light saber and he struck me down.

“She is gorgeous, isn’t she? Summer I mean” he said

“I suppose so but…”

“Come on, she is fookin tip top. Admit it, go on”

“She’s definitely attractive, there’s no denying but that isn’t…”

“She’s a fookin bike you wouldn’t mind riding in your birthday suit across some very bumpy, dirty tracks aye!”

I really thought we were having a moment of union that we hadn’t enjoyed since it was stolen from us all of those many years ago, on that very dark afternoon. We both suddenly found ourselves laughing and Miller had his arm around me.

“You could just imagine her” Miller continued in a hushed, gentle voice “Butt naked on your bed right now, or better, kneeling before you… Red lips licking. Heavy breath tickling your free monkey. It ready to feed her his banana. Can you imagine it, Can you?

I was completely lost in his words. Her sensual physical being consumed my entire thoughts. Miller cracked the office door open ever so slightly.

“Look at her. I bet you’d love to run in there now and fookin have her right across your desk wouldn’t you”

I so would have….the bastard. At this point my little man had certainly woken up and wanted to know what all the fuss was about. He liked the sound of this bird and wanted to get a look in. I soon came back to reality with a slap when Miller broke out into a loud belly laugh, more evil than any Bond villain. He pointed to my attentive trouser member, smacked me on the back and swaggered off, wishing me luck with the interview. The fucker.

I tried everything to get mini me to go away. I shouted into the office that I wouldn’t be a minute, that I was just calling references. I tried jogging on the spot, star jumps, punches, I tried going to the toilet, and I tried thinking of unsexy thoughts (such as putting my bastard little man through a pencil sharpener) and eventually it worked, he went away. Thank God, I thought. So I finally walked back into the office, right in front of the three sitting down in front of me and the sneaky little sod popped back up (obviously playing dead) to get a good long, hard look at this Miss Summers. I almost head butted Father Connelly I bent over so fast. Jesus knows what they thought of me but I flounced around that room like a demented ballet dancer, trying to twist my body in shapes and positions, so that they couldn’t see the trouser tent I was sporting. I was going to give that little guy such a beating later!

I couldn’t conduct a correct interview with all that going on, so I thanked all three for attending and told them that their C.V’s and references were enough for me to make an informed decision. I had to go with experience and so the job was Miss Bertha Tunc’s. Rule 7: DO NOT LET MILLER SLEEP WITH THE STAFF. Hiring Summer would have been a nightmare. All the lads would have wanted her and she would have wanted me. This would create a division in my troops and threaten my authority. Of course I could have rejected her advances, but then she would have quit in a storm of tears and it would have proved pointless hiring her in the first place. No, hire the ugly fucker I thought. Safer all round.

I also offered Father Connelly some hours as well. Miss Hits left quickly. She must have been devastated the poor thing.

As they left my little man obviously seemed content with what he had seen and went back off to sleep.

As the three left Curly appeared and he asked who I had hired. When I told him it was Bertha who took the main job, he said I was crazy, and that I should have hired Summer. I then told him what I thought, that it was time for less talk and more work sunshine. I reminded him that he wasn’t here on a holiday and that he had to earn his keep. The bogs were over flowing and it seems that the people from last night’s leaving party had taken to shitting in the bin bag next to it. All the used paper was in the puddles all over the floor, so I got him to clear that up immediately. Once that was sorted I told him he could clean up all of the dusty bar. When that was finished he can sort out the lorry load of beer we were expecting and then he could help Clint put up all of the decorations for the party tonight. Oh, and I wanted all of the furniture moved around too.

Curly asked if I was going to be giving him a hand. I couldn’t believe the cheek of it! I reminded him of his position in the company, one which he should be most grateful for. He is really trying my patience already the stupid pube hair fecker..

After that I felt quite knackered, so I decided to have a lie down. You can’t get any sleep in this place though. All I could hear was the delivery turning up and Curly and Clint banging all the barrels and crates around. They know I’m trying to get a rest before the big night. I’ve got to look my best when I meet and greet my new subjects.

That’s all I can be bothered to write about at the moment. Tweedledum and Tweedledee should be finished in a minute, so I’ll try and get some shut eye again!



Friday night. 23.30

If there is a God, then he is testing me! Or maybe it’s the Devil. Most of my lot are on a one way ticket to his fiery parlour, so perhaps they’re trying to drag me along for the ride. Either way, God or the Devil, whichever, they’re both fuckers!

This evening started off with me feeling really good about the night ahead. I had managed to get a couple of hours shut eye before I started, though it was a struggle since I had to constantly ignore Clint banging on my door, demanding that I should be downstairs helping everyone. I generally hold my younger brother in higher esteem compared to the rest of the family but he has been a right pain in the arse today. He should have known not to disturb me on account of how much I had to do tonight!

When I got up I made sure I looked my best. I wore a really slick black shirt, grey pants and a silver tie with a tribal symbol of power on it. I put aside my contact lenses in favour of my glasses and I also gelled down my trendy cropped spiky hair into a flat side parting. I wanted to replace my youthful good looks with a mature image that projected serious management. I want people to look at me and know instantly that I am the main man in charge.

Already I am proving myself as a managerial maestro as my delegation of jobs to Dad, Mom, Clint, Curly and Marie proved fantastically successful in turning my pub from a dirty, unkempt mess into a smart looking establishment ready to wine and dine the most elite members of society that the English Riviera has to offer.

All the staff was accounted for and ready at their stations:

One chef in the kitchen and Clint and Curly ready to take orders. (Dad totally ignored my better judgment and went for cheese burgers, chips, hot dogs, pizzas, the typical common shit that usually gets spat on and arse wiped in takeaways around the country)
One DJ playing carefully selected vintage records, as vetted by moi
Three doormen at the entrance
Four bar staff ready to pour drinks (Bertha, Father Quinn, Dad and Miller)
And myself poised ready to steer the Royal Ship public house to Treasure Island.

I left it to Dad to open the doors because I had one last important task to complete before I could let the people see their Saviour. Mother. I went upstairs and sat down with Mom in her bedroom and reminded her of a few things.

1.We weren’t in Birmingham anymore.

2.Nobody knows who you are. You do not need to uphold the O’Shea reputation. You’re just a nice ol’ Irish woman.

3.You don’t have to look like you’re going to put someone in hospital. Smile, be happy.

4.If someone looks at you, it doesn’t mean they’re asking for it.

5.If someone bumps into you, it doesn’t mean they’re asking for it.

6.If someone swears in your presence, it doesn’t mean they’re asking for it.

7.Do not threaten anyone you feel are being disrespectful. Come to me first. If someone is acting unpleasantly, I will address them. If that fails to fix the problem, then I will alert the door staff who will calmly get the troublesome individual to vacate the premise in a reasonable manner.

8.This is a new start for the whole family. THIS is the family business now. It is a nice business. We like people. We want people to like us. Fear is not the way. BE NICE.

Mom actually surprised me with her tranquil answer. In her wispy small voice she said she had no intention of causing any trouble. She was just as eager to carve out a new peaceful life for the family. She did however assure me that a Rottweiler can never entirely lose its bite, but as long as no one antagonizes her, or her family, in an obviously threatening manner, then she would be happy to allow the door staff to do their job. This, the pub, is her retirement. With that she said she was knackered from all of the tidying she had done today and she was going to stay in her room and watch television. She wished me luck and kissed me on the forehead. At first I felt a bit pissed off that she weren’t going to come down to witness my triumphant opening night but then it dawned on me that she had meant every word about turning over a new leaf but knew that it wouldn’t be easy for her, so she’d decided to stay out of the way. Bless’er, she can be good when she wants to be.

With Mom sorted it was time to make my grand entrance. I slowly made my way down the spiral stairs, trying to keep the big grin off of my face. I wanted to look cool, not gimpy. I stood in front of the side door that would take me into the main bar. I could hear a lot of noise from the other side of it. Naturally; I expected it would be packed by then. I took a deep breath. I was really excited and that bloody grin just wouldn’t go away. Oh fuck it, I was happy. I straightened my tie, ran my fingers through my hair and opened the door. It was manic!

There were loads of excitable voices bouncing around the bar; however it was a shame that it was all coming from our lot and nobody else. From first glance it appeared that there were no customers at all inside of the pub. As I had stepped into the room I was almost knocked over by a trolley. My DJ was being wheeled out of the pub and into the back of an ambulance. His hair was all singed and smoking and his skin was covered in dark patches of painful looking scorched skin, bubbling from his arms and face.

“I’m gunna facking sue ya all, ye BASTARDS!!!” he screamed in pitched agony as he went by. It was obvious that his one finger salute and vicious anger was specifically aimed squarely at Miller, who wasn’t paying him any attention.

I ran over to Curly and asked him what the hell had happened. He said that Miller was making everyone a round of flaming Sambuca’s and just as the DJ was about to douse his flame, Miller had gotten all excited about something and threw his arms up into the air. Next thing you know, the flaming drink has gone all over the DJ and his arm was all on fire.

“I tried to put it out” Miller shouted over to me. It was then that I noticed that we did have some customers, two old men with whom Miller was deep in conversation with at the other end of the bar.

“You threw YOUR glass of Sambuca over him and his HEAD CAUGHT ON FIRE!!!” Curly shouted back to him.

Again without looking at either of us Miller argued that he instinctively threw the first liquid he could get his hands on. I was fucking livid! Had anyone paid for these drinks? No, it appeared not. We’re not likely to be making any money if we are giving drinks away. ARGH! I would have set Miller on fire but he was talking to my only customers and I wanted to present a dignified front. I was dreading what my brother could be saying to them so I quickly made my way over to introduce myself.

“All I’m saying” I heard Miller saying to the two old men as I approached the trio, “is that the best way to deal with the paedophile problem is to wean the fuckers off kids by introducing them to midgets”
Oh shit, I knew I should have just given Miller a few quid and told him to fuck off for the night.
I was just about to barge Miller out of the way when he caught sight of Clint and ran off after him. It wasn’t appropriate behaviour but I was just glad that he had fecked off. I then introduced myself to the two old fella’s and they introduced themselves as Bertie and Antony. They were proper Devonshire boys and I just about understood what they were banging on about. It appears that they were best friends and had known each other for as long as they could remember. They had grown up together, even gone to war in France together and had drunk in this pub, The Royal Ship, together for over 60 years. A right gay pair I thought.

I asked the two coffin dodgers if they knew why the pub was so quiet. At this point my Dad had come in from talking to the bouncers outside and had joined in with our conversation. Bertie said that the locals were boycotting the pub to make the brewery suffer. He said that everyone loved the previous landlord and objected to the way that he had been forced out by the brewery which had penalized him too heavily for buying in drinks that weren’t theirs. Because of the fines he had to sell up as he couldn’t afford to keep the business going.

At this point my Dad’s gummy happy face crumbled. He thought that the pub was quiet because people must have mistakenly thought that it wasn’t open tonight.

Antony, old shit-ya-pants number two, obviously took no heed of my father’s crest fallen mug because he carried on exactly where Bertie left off. He laughed that the boycott wouldn’t make much difference anyway. He said that in the 60’s and 70’s, loads of hotels were converted to pubs because Torquay was swamped by grockles (tourists), you couldn’t move. However, over the last 20 years the number of people visiting the Bay had dropped drastically because everyone goes abroad nowadays. So down our street alone we have over ten pubs fighting for the scraps of holiday makers who do manage to make their way to the South West.

Stuttering, with blind panic in his eyes, my father pulled himself up from his stool and argued that this couldn’t possibly be right. He said how he had been to visit the pub on numerous, separate occasions, over the last few months and it was always rammed packed. Bertie bet my father that it was always on a weekend, around 10 o’clock at night, when he visited.
“It was the only time Harold (the previous landlord) could see me” he answered.
Of course it was, Antony laughed. It appears that every Saturday and Sunday, for about one hour, the pub does indeed become busy with the bar crawl crowd. They come in for karaoke (which Bertie and Antony love by the way), drink their one round and then piss off to the next pub along.

I could see that this news caused my whitened-face father to collapse back down on his stool. His breath had become raspy and short and I thought he was about to keel over. He was muttering something about money, but to himself rather than anyone else who could hear. I tried to cheer him up by explaining that I’ll get this place thriving but for some reason it didn’t seem to make him look any better (he mustn’t have heard me), but the two old farts just laughed again. Apparently the pub has had over 10 new landlords in the past 10 years. The pair had seen it all apparently, all different ideas tried but I assured them they’ve not yet seen me. They then started to declare their undying loyalty, that they weren’t bothered what everyone else was up to because we could always count on their custom. To be honest I didn’t catch much else what they said because Miller had reappeared, on the wrong side of the bar, acting suspiciously. I was just about to ask what he was doing when Bertha said that the beer wasn’t coming through. It appeared that neither her, nor Father Quinn, knew how to change a barrel and my Dad, who looked like he had been bashed around the head with an iron bar, was not responding to anyone. In the end I decided to just sort it myself. With everyone else making a complete tit up of everything, the only person I could trust to get the job done right was me.

After giving myself a sticky beer shower, when trying to change an obviously faulty barrel, I came back upstairs to the sounds of mayhem. Maybe the bar crawl crowd that Bertie mentioned was in. Nope!

“I saw’t first!”

“Givvy’ere. I saw’t it on da bar first. Ye gurt big robbin bastard!”

“Well I ad it first, so tuff shit Bertie”

Bertie and Antony were rolling around on the floor. Antony was holding something tight to his chest and Bertie was beating down on him with his hands clasped together in a tight club. No matter how hard Bert pummeled Antony’s face, crunching and cracking the old fellas nose with every blow, Antony refused to let go of whatever he was desperately holding onto.

To my right I could hear heavy laughter. Miller was sat in a corner seat with Clint, laughing his head off at the fighting old pair.

I was momentarily stunned but I quickly came to my senses and knew what to do. I shouted to Curly to fucking do something quick. So he ran over to separate the battling ol’twosome but was greeting with a bloody smack to the hooter and a swift kick to the knackers. Obviously Bert still remembered his war training. Bert was now towering over Antony, who was still rolling around on the floor, trying to dodge his friends stamping feet.

“Ye ol’cunt, I’m gunna tear ye a nuw shit bag!” Bertie shouted down at Antony, whose face was now a red mushy mess.

“Fuck ya, yer ol’Jerry cock cuddler” Ant barked back and he launched himself up onto Bertie and sunk his false gnashers right into his droopy old balls. I swear I heard a pop sound. As Bertie doubled over and collapsed onto the floor, Antony continued his fearsome comeback. He lifted his heavy glass handled beer mug off of the bar and struck it down with all his force onto Berties crown. Hundreds of shards of glass splintered and embedded themselves gruesomely into his skull. Just as Antony was about to strike a second devastating blow, Bertie came roaring back to life and sprung at his adversary, knocking him onto his back. Bertie quickly grabbed hold of Antony’s arm and placed it over the top of two over turned stools and stamped his foot down upon it with all of his power, snapping it, with a loud horrible crack, like a twig. As Ant rolled around the floor, cradling his floppy wrinkly limb, Bert crouched down and picked up what Antony had finally dropped. A scratch card.

“Tis mine, oh precious, tis mine” Bertie cried happily, as he jigged about, covered in blood, holding the card aloft in his hand.

Then, unbeknown to Bert, Ant silently rose up behind him and launched over his shoulder, grabbing hold of Berts hand, which was proudly and victoriously clutching the scratch card, and with one almighty snap of his awesome choppers, he chomped down on Berts fingers, separating them from the knuckles.

“Geezus, grab him! He’s covering the wall in blood” I shouted to Curly but it was futile asking him to do anything as he was still lounging about on the floor in an idiotic daze, cupping his balls. What a fookin loser, getting beaten up by two geriatrics, typical Curly. The rest were just as hopeless. Clint had ran off for some reason, Miller was still in his corner in fecking hysterics and Dad hadn’t moved, he was slouched on his stool rocking back and forth in muttering shock, reeling from Bert and Ants earlier revelations, oblivious to the carnage besides him. Do I have to do everything? Did the generals go over the top? No, but this fucker has to. So I ran and got the bouncers. Had the three not been half pissed, they might have noticed the trouble themselves. I was hoping the hefty trio would be able to bring some calm to the storm but instead they darted into the bar like Spanish bulls and between them they lifted the warring pair into the air. The two old bastards were still going so the bouncers showed them the door, head first. I watched as the two airborne war veterans landed hard on the tarmac floor outside. I worried for a second they might have been hurt but the pair soon got up and disappeared off down the street, still kicking the living shit outta each other.

“Right, they’re barred. For a month!” I told all of the staff.

After that the only people in the pub all night were the staff and they were basically being paid to get pissed. Earlier in the evening, before his funny turn, Dad had told the staff that they could help themselves to one or two drinks. This was a typical ‘buy your friends’ technique that Dad usually employs and the end result sees him getting walked all over. I, however, am not in the business of making friends. Sure enough Dads invitation had seen the beer flowing freely and the three meat heads on the front door were getting jollier and merrier. Had any potential customers walking by even thought about entering the pub, the site of this ugly rabble on our doorstep would of surly put them off. The only time they didn’t look so happy was when I quite politely told them that they had drunk enough free beer.

“The gaffer said the beers free mate” One of my henchmen barked back at me.

“The ‘gaffer’ said no such thing. The small rat face man, who just happens to be my father, told you that. I am the person in charge.”

“Where’s ye Dad gun to?”

“He has retired to bed.”

“Who owns t’pub then?”

“Well, my father does.”

“So ee’s the gaffer!”

“Er no. I am in charge.”

I stood my ground, looking up at the three burly, towering gorillas, making sure not to break eye contact with the one in the middle, who looked like the leader of the pack. These people are like dogs, I know the kind, you have to show them whose boss. Give them an inch and they’ll take a mile. First impressions count. We were all locked in an uncomfortable stance for what felt like hours, and I would have stayed there all night but at that moment I saw Clint and thought it was best to find out what had happened, so I decided to let’em off for now and deal with them later. I’m sure however, that they know I won’t take any shit, and I don’t expect that I’ll have to tell them again. If I do, they will have my fury to contend with.

I caught up with a sheepish Clint who was helping Curly sit down next to Miller, who was still in his corner, wiping the tears of laughter from his drunken red eyes.

“What the hell just happened?” I asked the three Stooges

Clint told the story. It turned out that the whole series of events had started earlier with the DJ incident. Clint had foolishly decided to play a trick on Miller. He had a bunch of fake scratch cards. They looked completely authentic. They appeared no different to the official cards that you could buy from a shop. The only difference however was that when you scratched them off they revealed that you had won £250,000.00. You only found out that they were fake when you looked at the small print on the back that told you how to claim your prize. ‘Place this card under the Christmas tree in December, and when Santa arrives, suck him off to receive your reward’. Miller had thrown his arms up into the air when he thought he had won, hence knocking the DJ who then spilt his flaming Sambuca all over himself. Miller had then quickly noticed the joke when he read how to get his money. He had then chased after Clint and after a few digs to his nugget, confiscated the remaining fake tickets that Clint still had. When I had earlier noticed Miller acting suspiciously, it’s turns out that the feckin knob’ed had placed one of the joke tickets on the bar, and sat himself in the corner to watch what would happened when one of the old bastards picked up the ticket. What a prick. Was he sorry? Of course not, though I didn’t get time to point out why he was such an utter twat because a group of raised, cheery voices were shouting out for me.

“Oi Boss, BOSS, cum ova’ere”

I was being summoned back to the three amigos at the door, who now had with them our tiny, crazy chef who was performing a dance of kung fu moves, doing his best to impersonate Bruce Lee, with sound effects.

“Show us what ye wudda dun with them two fackin ol’farts if you’d gotten hold of’em first” The big fat bouncer in the middle, with the strange little piggy face, said to my theatrical chef.

One minute I was stood in the middle of this happy group, the next I was on my back, staring up at the yellow ceiling with my eyes popping outta me head and the breath squeezed out of me. This tiny little bastard had flipped me over and had me in a choke hold. I didn’t want to look like I couldn’t take a joke but I didn’t want to look like someone who could be tackled so easily. I tried to reassert myself but only succeeded in looking like a fish out of water, flapping wildly. I ended up lying on the floor motionless, trying to ponder my next move. It was hard to think with all of the laughter going on, the loudest howls of approval coming from Miller who seemed to be having the time of his life.

I tried to do a crocodile roll, to break the midgets grip but this just resulted in him twisting my arm up my back and over my head. Eventually he let me go and though I really wanted to plant a killer right hook on the bastard’s chinless jaw, I thought I’d better let it go. 1, He was just a little man, 2, I didn’t want to look like a poor sport and 3, it isn’t good management to go around beating up your staff. Everyone was just having a laugh I suppose and I’m sure this was just some kind of retarded initiation. They all thought it was funny and I didn’t want to be sour grapes.

All fun and games tonight but from tomorrow, no more Mr Nice Guy. I’m not gonna be a King John figure. My rule will be absolute and brutally strict. The nicely nicely touch, which is my Dad’s favoured technique, is all wrong. People need tough rules and tougher leaders. We’ve got it all wrong today as a society. The flower power ideals have us brain washed. We think that we, people, humans, are basically good. We’re not. The only reason we’re not killing each other for scraps of food and other desirables is because law threaten to incarcerate us, or worse, if we break the rules. However, nowadays the threat of law is getting further and further away and so society breaks down, people are playing up. Well not on my watch, NOT IN MY PUB.

Later, when the pub had finally closed and I’d waved off the last of the staff, I stood outside and looked out to the swooshing sea. Even in the dark it was astonishingly beautiful. The moon cast an exquisite milky white light over the breaking gentle waves. It was so calming, and it allowed me to gather my thoughts on my first day as captain of the Titanic. Success wasn’t going to be as easy as I initially thought, but that is fine. Success that comes via hard work is all the sweeter.

I stood alone and embraced the tender night breeze and took deep breaths of the new clean air. My ears had been enjoying the soft rolls of the waves on the beach below but they were interrupted by the sound of big ugly sirens as the second ambulance I had seen tonight whizzed past me. As I looked down the road, towards the direction that it had come from, I noticed a large buzz of activity. There were police cars, more ambulances and the fire brigade. A young couple were walking past the front of my pub and I called out to them, asking what was happening. They told me that two old men had been killed. One had pushed the other over, who fell into the road. SPLAT. Hit by a drunk driver. The other old git must have shit himself and jumped off of the Downs (the cliffs) across the street. The couple wandered off, heckling the stupid old drunks. Fucking hell. First night and we’ve already lost our best customers. Fucking Miller.

I was just about to go back inside, when another person passed the front of my pub.

“Is that your place mate?” A police officer asked.

Yes, I answered, with a stir of pride.

“Well what the’ell is that?”

Just then I heard the long spluttering of wind breaking. I spun around and saw my bedroom window open and someone’s arse sticking out of it. Thankfully not bare.

I apologized to the officer and said it was just some stag party guests that we had in residence and I would deal with them immediately. He seemed fine with that and plodded off but groups of drinkers who were coming out of our neighboring pubs had begun to take notice.

“What the hell are ya doing?” I shouted in a hushed voice

With his ass still sticking out of the window, Clint’s voice answered

“It’s the beer. Fuck knows what’s wrong with it but it’s giving me evils”

“Get ya fecking arse back inside ya muppet”

“Oh no he isn’t” Miller’s voiced called out from inside the same room. “He can keep it out there until he’s emptied it. He fuckin stinks. I’m not having that smell in here. It gets into the fucking wall paper. I’m trying to get ready here. We’re going into town on t’pull and I don’t want my snappy slacks smelling of shit!”

“Well go the bathroom then”

“It’s all the way downstairs!” Clint shouted

“I don’t care!”

We might have argued longer but the group of drunks, who had now gathered to watch, began to start throwing stones, betting each other who could hit the target first. Clint soon shifted his arse when they smashed one of the glass panels next to him.

What a fucking day.

The greater the man, the greater the test…That says it all.



From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 11:01 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Alwright Cox Chops

Just a quicky email to see how ur first night in da pub went?

K. O’SHEA




From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 11.35 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Hello Koopa

Thank you for your previous e-message. You will be glad to learn that my first night was a magnificent success. We had to open up early because of the queue of locals waiting to get in. We stayed rammed all night and my people just didn’t want to leave when I rung the bell for last orders. I must confess that I didn’t get to pull too many pints because clients kept taking me aside to tell me how fantastic the pub was now that I have taken over (and also the ladies were more interested in me pulling them, wink wink ;-).

Please do let the rest of the family in Brum know that we are all very happy here in Torquay and that we are doing fabulously.

Jacob




From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 11:42 AM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Fee Fi Fo Thumb. I smellz da BULLSHIT! of an Englishbum, coz Milla sent me sum emails earlier and he tells me about a completely different movie. I’ll forward’em onto ya.. Have a looky at’em

K. O’SHEA





From: Supa.Cox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 10:28 AM
Subject: Coxman ere

Yo Koopa Cuz

Torquay is wicked man. You shud see the tits on the sticks. The birds ere are well fit and PROPER E Z!!!! I’ve just had to kick one outta me bed of dirty luvvv. Though I did the gentleman thing and let her stay for breakfast (I gave her a double portion of YES! Protein special)

Hope the sun is still shining brightly on the O’SHEA Empire. Catch ya latta

Cox MASTER




From: koopa@webworld.com
To: Supa.Cox@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 10:32 AM
Subject: RE: Coxman ere

Alwright Milla

Sounds tip top. I’ll defo come down and crash with you some time soon. How woz da first night in de new crib then?

K. O’SHEA




From: Supa.Cox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 10:35 AM
Subject: RE: RE: Coxman ere

The pub is shocka mate! Gaycob doesn’t have a Scooby-doo what he’s doing. We had fuck all people in the pub, except for loads of staff who spent the night beating up J (a good night in the end then).

I think I’m gonna have to step in and help brown fingers out because I don’t wanna come back to Brum just yet. It wouldn’t be fair on the birds down here, I’ve gotta give’em all a fair chance of a go don’t I.

Right, I’ve got some serious sleeping to catch up on. Another big night ahead of me! Me luv-gun got some hussies in a barrel to shoot.

Catch u latta man.

Cox MASTER




From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 12.20 PM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Miller is a fecking LIAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He is just jealous that I am in charge of a business that is going to bring me wealth, respect and Dolly birds by the barrel load and he is just gonna be my work bitch, standing around fingering his bum, for the rest of his sad little life. I wouldn’t be surprised if he is going down town, pretending to me? In order to pick up the little whores he probably pays for his 1 second fumbles!!!!

OH OH OH, BY THE WAY, that ‘woman’ he kicked out of his bed of dirty love (which IS dirty b’cos the amount of times he has pissed, shit and gotten sick on his one and only bed sheet and NOT put it in the wash is disgusting) was a MAN! No lie. He got ‘her’ from a gay bar!

Last night, after I DID wave off a conga line of locals, who left our establishment deliriously happy, I was all ready to go bed but the lads begged me to go out with them. They said they wanted to check out the nightclubs down town. I didn’t really see the point when we have the best place in Torquay but Clint and Miller insisted so I relented. It never hurts to spy on the competition. Curly stayed in though. He said he was worn out, knackered. HA. Lightweight! He wouldn’t know hard work if it smacked him in the face. Well I’ll soon see to that.

Anyway, if I was going into town, I wanted to look the bomb, so I told the lads that they shouldn’t wait for me and I would catch up with them. I eventually tracked them down in a harbourside club called Gladrags.

After a hard days work, I thought it was time to reap my rewards, but I’ll admit I did give myself a scare. I didn’t wanna find Clint or Miller straight away, because they would just cramp my style. I thought I’d find’em when I had a couple of bitches hanging off my arms, so I propped myself up at the bar, and went into PULL mode. I acted aloof, cool, like a cucumber. I checked out the room and looked for the juiciest rumps that I deserve (no slops for my dinner plate). When I found the honeys that my Bee wanted to sample, I gave them my best come to bed stare but NOTHING! In fact one girl came up to me, all in me face, asking what the hell I was looking at. I said an angel (all slick like) but before I could finish my line I swear she was gonna punch me, but her offensively ugly friend pulled her away and had the nerve to call me a weirdo, when they were the ones coming up to me acting all violent.

I should have clicked then, but as you can imagine, I was worn out from doing all the work in the pub earlier. I finally realized that something was up when I changed tactics and decided just to introduce myself to some girls and told’em that I was the new licensee of the Royal Ships in Babbacombe. I didn’t want to do that originally because I would have had less respect when they threw themselves at me but not a dicky bird of interest. As the last dyke turned her back on me laughing, it finally dawned on me. Muff munchers.

It must have been a gay bar. Only women who REALLY hate men, would be able to resist a man of my status now. I should have clicked straight away but I didn’t (Glad = happy and an old word for happy is Gay). There weren’t any signs saying what sort of place it was but after so many rejections, it’s obvious. Phew. Lol. However, in hindsight I am appalled. The club is obviously trying to trick fit young men like me in. Surely that’s illegal. I could have got bummed in the toilets!

Just a little earlier in the night I must admit that I was a wee bit jealous when I saw Clint throwing some shapes on the dance floor with two blonde stunners all over him. I also saw Miller getting it on with a right ginger minger. At first I couldn’t understand it. I did the look, the pose, the talk, and Clint did none of that and pulled loads. However, once I had my moment of clarity, I raced over to save Clint (fuck Miller) from the winky fiddlers, but he wasn’t having any of it. That’s the evil of drink for you and that is why you’ll never see me embarrassing myself, I’m 100% teetotal. I’m just a dealer of the nectar poison. I don’t need alcohol to have a good time.

So Miller and Clint pulled a couple of guys. HA HA HA HA HA

I couldn’t sleep in my room though because the pair were ‘entertaining’ in their adjacent beds. Unfortunately I ended up kipping at the foot of me Mom and Dads bed, but it was better than getting some stray shit in me eye.

Hope that puts the record straight!

Jacob




From: koopa@webworld.com
To: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 12: 32 PM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Cox head

Soundz like u had an interesting night, I’ll have ta give Milla a bell and find out what he’s playing at!

Milla said your staff are disrespecting you. You didn’t comment. You can’t be aving that. No fookin way! You gunna av ta man up! You need to handle ya staff like a strict parent. Bring out the naughty stick. A broom with 6 inch nails through the top of it is my favourite. Smack’em a few times when they play up and they’ll soon behave. Oh but you have to threaten to smack their folks too if they run crying to the law. OR do u want me to come down and deal with’em?

K. O’SHEA




From: mr.jacobcox@webworld.com
To: koopa@webworld.com
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 12.20 PM
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Koopa O’Shea

Koopa

Thank you for your concern but it isn’t needed. Once more Miller is lying. Me and the boys on the door got along great. Again, Miller was jealous. Me and the door staff had a good laugh at Millers expense. If any of them dare have the balls of steel to even give me an off look, I’d soon slap’em down to size.

Don’t bother ringing Miller up about any of the things that I have told you, he’ll just lie his head off as usual. Also, don’t ring Clint, it would just embarrass him.

I’ve gotta shoot now, me Dad's called an emergency meeting for some reason.

Be good.

Jacob


Saturday 19th August 2000

1542 Hrs

THE MEETING

Dad should be French. He gives up too easily. He spends too much time feeling sorry for himself, and not enough time doing anything useful. He woke me up early this morning at 10am to tell me that he was calling a critical family meeting this afternoon (secret from Mom of course) at 1 o’clock, because he had something very important to discuss with all of the family. Dad of course didn’t really have the authority to call meetings about my business but I thought I would indulge him; he might surprise me and have something useful to say.

“Last night I learnt new information which caused me to shit my pants”. Well done Dad, what a great way to start a business conference, I should use that line when I’m in Parliament in a few years. He went on to explain to Miller, Clint and Curly what the late Bertie and Antony had told me and him before they killed each other last night (basically that the pub makes fuck all money).

“I’ve got enough dough to keep this place running for roughly a month. If it isn’t making any money by the end of that period, then we’re fucked. We’re gonna lose the business, we’re gonna lose the roof over our heads and I’m gonna lose….well we’re all going to lose our shot at the good life. What I want from you lot are ideas to get the punters and the money rolling in”

I tried to tell Dad that he was worrying for no reason, that I had a Masterplan but he wasn’t having any of it. He said that he wanted us all to go off and have a good, long, hard think. He has called another meeting (yet again he stressed, no word to Mom about it) for 3 o’clock tomorrow, where he wants to hear what we have come up with. He said he will be picking only one idea and then we all must concentrate our combined efforts on it. Well if it makes the Umpa Loompas feel like they are contributing, then I suppose it will make for a happier chocolate factory, but I’m sure everyone will see that I am the big Willy Wonka here!

Saturday 19th August 2000

2358 Hrs

DEFENDING MY CASTLE FROM ASSAULT

Great leaders are not always popular leaders. Tough decisions sometimes need to be made and they don’t always endear you to your countrymen, but what the peasants don’t realize is that we make those decisions to give them better lives. Tonight I learnt what it must have felt like for Maggie Thatcher being in office. People just don’t understand the plans of a superior mind.

It was 10pm and as Bertie had warned, a crowd of Karaoke loving losers came stomping up towards the entrance, singing their heads off (badly), all screaming with excitement about what terrible song they wanted to murder first. There must have been about forty of the feckers at least. Unfortunately this drunken rabble had forgotten all about their plan to boycott the pub so I ran as fast as possible to get to them before they even stepped foot into my palace and informed them loud and clearly that I was in charge now and Karaoke was cancelled FOREVER! For the uproar that greeted me, you would have thought I had shat on their babies’s heads. Clint came running up to me and asked what the hell I was doing. I told him to feck off and not to question me in front of the lower classes. The little shit then ran off upstairs to my parents’ bedroom and told my father what I had done.

I was sitting at the bar, quite pleased at the disaster I had just averted when my father came racing down stairs in his underwear, bawling his head off at me, in front of everyone! He has absolutely no idea how to run a business and clearly demonstrated that tonight! I tried to explain that by loosing a few tawdry customers, you will actually gain a lot more elegant clients. Once the word is out that I have swept away the filth, the decent fringes of society will come pouring in, bringing with them all of their lovely money. Did he listen, no! Instead he threw on a coat and without a shred of dignity, chased after the tacky posse of wannabe singers down the road. Ten minutes later he came back with a bald headed hunchback with a demented smile and a woman the size of a child whose eyes and teeth looked as if they were trying to escape from her hideously ugly face. Before you could say Jim’ll fix it, Clint had manned the karaoke set the previous landlord had left behind and the gruesome twosome were on the stage, introducing themselves as Dicky and Elaine, then launching into ‘Angels’ by Robbie Williams. I almost cried as I realized that I would no longer be able to listen to that beautiful song in the same way ever again.

I was so angry that I was almost tempted to have a pint of lager but I took a hold of myself and remembered that I was not a part of the underclass.

Tonight didn’t end on a completely sour note however. After most of the staff had left, me and Curly were having a laugh with the new digital camera my Dad bought yesterday for the pub. We were taking pictures of each other pulling karate poses, basically taking the piss out of the chef who thinks he is something he isn’t. Miller tried to join in but he was so drunk he smacked Curly right in the face and knocked him spark out. Luckily for Curly our barmaid Bertha knew first aid and she made sure he was alright.

I’ve come to bed now so that I can begin work on my presentation for tomorrow’s meeting. Miller’s gone out with Clint down town and I’ve left a sozzled Curly downstairs with Bertha.

Sunday 20th August 2000

1123 Hrs

Curly ATTACKED

I woke up this morning and I thought I was dreaming. Curly was stood at the foot of my bed with his fists clenched and his face white. His eyes were bloodshot and frantic like a rabbit that sensed danger.

“Curly, what the fuck are you doing waking me up so early!” I angrily shouted at him, pointing out that it was only 10 o’clock.

At first he didn’t answer. He looked panicked, scared. Once I had come to my senses and sat up (trying to conceal my enormous morning glory) asked him again what the matter was. This time he replied. I couldn’t make out what he was saying, so I asked him again and I told him to speak louder.

“I was raped” he muttered

“What?”

“I WAS RAPED!”

“What?” “Where?” “When?” “How?”

Curly rushed over to my side and grabbed a hold of my arm, forcefully dragging me from my bed. Before I had a chance to wipe the sleep from my eyes, I was being hurled down the corridor that separated all of our rooms and inside Curly’s stinky cesspit. He let go of me and walked beside his own bed, furiously pointing at the centre of it, which had caved in.

“What are you pointing at? Just tell me what has happened”

Since I have the misfortune to share a room with Miller and Clint, they had borne witness to this strange spectacle and the pair had followed us to the scene of the apparent crime. The three of us stood in Curly’s doorway, waiting for an answer. Slowly, he began to talk.

“After you went to bed last night, me and Bertha continued to have a few jars”

“I hope you paid for those”

“YES!”

“Alright, just checking no other crimes, such as theft, took place last night.”

“Shuddup dick face” Miller interrupted “Carry on with your story pube head”

“Well me and Bertha started drinking spirits after we polished off a few pints, and then we moved onto slammers, before having the last drink I remember drinking with her, which was that bottle of Absinthe that Miller brought back from Ibiza with him last year. The next thing I know I’m waking up completely naked and (sob) she’s lying next to me with no clothes on!”

The image of the rotund, sweaty Bertha in her birthday suit instantly made me and my brothers gasp in unison!

“But it got worse” Curly continued, barely able to talk as he hyperventilated “I started to get flashbacks. I can see her now, in my mind, on top of me. It hurts. OH GOD NO! I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER! She has a hold of my head and…” momentarily he couldn’t talk, so slowly he made a motion of his head being pushed downwards. “I almost choked”

The picture he painted for us caused Clint to throw up on the spot. The thought of Curly’s forced expedition into the black, slippery Chasm of Doom was too much for my baby brother’s hungover, beer-gurgling belly to handle.

“I thought it was going to swallow my head!” Curly cried “I couldn’t breath!!!”

“She must have spiked my drink right?” he reasoned.

“Nope” Miller answered “You’ve just been fucked by a fatty. Classic case”

“What are you on about, dumbass?” I asked Miller

“That is what all fat bastards do. That is how they get da sex. It’s the circle of life. Dick hunters. They go out late; when they know that the drink is making us fellas do bad things. I swear ta God it’s true. Many a nights I’ve been at a bar, with me pint in my hand and the little amber fucker begins to talk to ya. Whispering in your ear. ‘Go on, shag her, it’s a great idea. I bet she’ll take it up the choc shop’ and so on. Drink is a bastard for playing tricks on you and before you know it, you’ve agreed with your tasty friend that it would indeed be a fine idea to ride that mucky bouncy castle like a wild pony”

“It’s rape MILLER!” Curly protested

“Lol. The beer made you do it. Not her! She just didn’t stop you! Don’t worry mate. Any hole’s a goal. Anyway, we all love a fatty once in a while, you’ve got so much more choice with all of those folds”

On that note I had to leave the room. I left it to Clint to convince Curly not to get the police involved, while Miller had decided that he was off to track Bertha down, so he could get raped too!

I’m going downstairs now to set my presentation up for the meeting this afternoon. This ship needs steering away from the iceberg dead ahead.

1611 Hrs

THE MEETING PART 2

I should leave right now! I should pack my bags and leave the lot of’em! Why won’t they listen to me! I have vision! I am the one with the key to the fecking vault! MADDNESS!

At 3 o’clock Miller, Clint, Dad (Curly was still too traumatized to come downstairs, he feared it would spark more flashbacks) and myself were seated at my round table. I didn’t want to rain on my brother’s idea’s too quickly, so I thought I would let them go first, before I dazzled everyone with my amazing plans.

Miller went first. I don’t know if he was being serious but he looked very impressed with himself. He had two ideas.

Idea No. 1

We should go around all the local AA meetings and all of the homeless shelters and hand out two-for-one vouchers to the winos. They love drink, so why shouldn’t they buy it here. Brilliantly simple he proclaimed.

Worryingly Dad didn’t slam this idea; he just kinda nodded his head and gestured for Miller’s second idea.

Idea No. 2

Let’s hire prostitutes as barmaids.

He didn’t back this up with any reasoning. He thought it was self-explanatory. Fortunately I saw my Dad drop his head into his hands in despair so, no, the lunatics weren’t running the asylum just yet. Next it was Clint’s turn.

He suggested a charity event. He said this would be a great way to build the reputation of the pub and more importantly get us free, positive publicity with the local newspaper and radio station. He said we should take advantage of how popular Karaoke was in the pub and make a big competition out of it. It would appeal not only to locals, but also to karaoke fans across the bay. We would make it known that every Saturday and Sunday night we would be entering the best singers into our major, big prize, karaoke competition, all in aid of a good cause. We’ll tell everyone that we will judge not only on performance but also on public appreciation, which would mean that participants would bring their friends and family along to cheer them on, thinking that it will improve their chances of getting into the final. Each week we’ll put virtually everyone through. The ones we don’t put through, we’ll tell them to come back and try again next week. Eventually we would end up with a massive final, where the pub would be rammed solid! We would have to offer a cash prize of about 200 -500 quid but we’ll make a fortune over the bar. We would pick a local charity, like the hospital or something and we would tell everyone who makes it into the final that they need to get sponsored, and that would be the cash that we donate. To make it extra special, we could make the final a big fancy dress event, like Stars in their Eyes.

Just like Miller, Clint seemed very impressed with himself and he waited to hear what the rest of us thought. Dad was just about to say something but I wanted to spare my little brother the humiliation of being told that his idea was utter crap. Instead I thought I would wade in with my own superior plans. THE MASTERPLAN. I handed everyone at the table the proposal I had prepared.

1. Triple the price of all our drinks.
2. Triple the price of all our food.
3. Change the name of the pub to THE OFFICE
4. Charge £50 entry, or £1,000 annual membership.
5. Do not refer to business as ‘a pub’; it is an ‘establishment’.
6. All staff members must wear a suit.
7. Sack the door staff. They won’t be needed.
8. Sack Miller. He definitely won’t be needed.
9. Sack Bertha. She may rape again.

Dad, Miller and Clint looked at me in amazement. I knew their feeble little minds wouldn’t understand what I was pitching, so I spelt it out very simply for them. We overprice everything. Food, drink, the lot. Hell, maybe even charge an entry fee to the shitter. I am going to make this place classy. By doing all of this the upper classes will know that none of the undesirable common people will be able to tarnish our establishment with their grubby presence. This means the rich won’t have to worry about the underclasses bothering them. I’ll make this a meeting place for people on the council, yacht owners, land owners etc. They all have more money than sense. If we do this now, we will be millionaires this time next year.

I stood before my family and awaited praise. I should have known I wouldn’t get it, or more to the point, they didn’t get it. They gobbed their poisonous venom all over my magnificent MASTERPLAN. They said it was ridiculous, that it was an insane idea, that I was an idiot. I felt like Galileo telling his unenlightened peers that the Earth was not flat. I am too far ahead of my time. I have a greatness that ordinary people like my father and brothers just don’t comprehend. I pleaded with them to understand, and I tried to explain it even simpler. Bring in the rich people, make lots of money, but my father was having none of it. He proclaimed that it was Clint’s idea; the idea that would beg the dregs on society to descend on my beautiful kingdom and kill me slowly with their vulgar songs sung badly, that was the brilliant idea, a plan that might just save us all! HA! The lunatics have taken over the asylum, and I’m trapped in it.

Dad finished the meeting by saying that our game plan has been decided. He would pour the last of his resources into promoting the event. It was a tremendous gamble and it was now our job to make sure the odds are stacked in our favour.

“Make sure we don’t lose our shirts” he warned “because you have no idea what will happen to us all if that happens”

Dad is so melodramatic.


2334 Hrs

ANOTHER PROPOSITION

My Garden of Eden is being besmirched. No wonder God took such vengeance out on Adam and Eve when they desecrated the wonder that he had given them. I have offered paradise to my family. I told them that it is all there for the taking but they must not, under any circumstance, eat from the KARAOKE tree! So that is exactly what the bastards have done! Tonight I watched as the first weedy thorns crept into my wonderland, digging their evil roots deep into my scarred grounds. Dicky and Elaine were back, and they had with them more freaks from their musical horde of Hell! I managed to vanquish a band of foul singing demons when I heard them swearing at the bar. I quickly tried to march them out, but the Devil, my Father, let fly his terrible wrath and they were permitted their place in my Kingdom. I sense a battle of biblical proportions is on the horizon. Good versus Evil. The Devil is as powerful as I, so I must use all of my cunning to smite him once and for all!

If that wasn’t bad enough, another rabble of yokel locals came bursting through our doors an hour before closing. If this group of grubby, bloated, cackling scum had a theme tune, it would be the Dueling Banjos. At first they kept themselves to themselves. They came to the bar, gruffly demanded their drinks without so much as a please or a courteous smile and then huddled in a dark corner. The group consisted of about thirteen men and seven women, whose ages ranged from teens to O.A.P’s. Most of the men either looked obese or built like a brick shit house. The women looked like painfully thin witches, with soulless, dead black eyes. I could see them all sizing us up. Snarling. Laughing. Plotting. I have seen this behaviour before.

Suddenly the only small man in the group stood up. He had only two yellow buck teeth that protruded over his lower lip, and his grey skin blended with his horrible, greasy grey hair. He came walking towards me and Dad with the biggest, gummy smile on his face and positioned himself between us two. He smelled worse than the hairy open drain that Curly’s face was forced into last night.

“Ma name’s Arry, and those folk over there are me family. You’re new in town so I’d like to introduce us. We’re the Barkers. We’re a big family in these ere parts. We can trace our lot way back over 15 generations. Everyone knows us around this town.”

Harry necked his pint of bitter and slammed it onto the bar. Dad gave him a nervous grin and told Curly to top his glass up.

“As I said. We’re well known around ere and we could have this place packed in no time”

My father was definitely listening. As Harry slammed down his second empty pint glass, Dad personally refilled it, at no charge, and asked how he could do that.

“We have a big family, and we have lots of friends. It wouldn’t take much to encourage them to drink here”

I take it all back! Give me the karaoke freaks! Please don’t send in the Hells Angels

“All we would ask for…” Here we go “is that we, the family, gets mates rates on all of our drinks”

Bingo! I knew it and I knew what was coming next, a threat delivered with a smile.

“And what if we couldn’t offer mates’ rates” I asked.

For a second his weasely smile dropped to flash me a hate filled glare before turning his head back to my father with a sickly smirk. “We all wanna be friends ere don’t we? It’s too small of a town to be falling out” He playfully, with an undercurrent of intimidating menace, slapped my father on the cheek and then shook his face. “Whadda you say then?”

Dad gave me a look and I shook my eyes left to right as feverously as possible. No, tell him NO! I would have told him so myself, but since my Dad wants to play Boss, well then he can deal with the local wannabe mafia.

“That sounds like a great idea” my father said.

The ghastly little man shook my Dad’s hand and asked for a bottle of our finest champagne, as a token of our new friendship. My father duly obliged. The nasty troll then returned to the rest of the ghouls and they welcomed back their champion warrior with a thunderous round of applause. The battle had been won without a drop of blood. The invaders had come into our castle and my Dad had bent over.

They left not long after that, cheerfully letting us know that they would be back…soon.

I really don’t know what will be worse. The Barkers trying to take control of the pub, or my mother finding out and launching her attack on them. If she calls for back up from our Irish family in Brum, then I’m just gonna hide in the nearest bomb shelter!

I am starting to have grave concerns about Torquay; it might not be the delightful haven that I believed it to be. I hope that the English Riviera isn’t like dog turd in a fancy chocolate wrapping. It looks a treat but actually it’s shit!

Monday 21st August 2000

1022 Hrs

Once we closed up last night, I was happy to follow the lads and some of the staff into town. It’s good to show the workers that though I am their Master during opening hours, once the doors are shut, I am in fact one of them (just more likely to do something worthwhile with my life that is).

Being a seaside town, the clubs are less strict in Torquay than in Brum. Here there are no dress codes, so Miller is in his element, wearing his flowery shirt and shorts, sporting big sunglasses under his straw beach hat that hides his long straggly hair. Actually it’s Curly who comes out best. I don’t think he has ever owned a decent set of clothes in his life. Every school has a stinky kid wearing hand me down clothes, and in our class, Curly was that kid. Many a nights out back in Brum were spoilt because Curly got turned away for wearing old trainers and crumpled t-shirts but down here the clubs don’t give a shit. Curly can look like a tramp and still have a good night out. I, however, like to look stylish. Unlike Clint, I am not a sheep following the flock. I’m a shepherd, leading the way. While Clint wears ‘trendy’ clothes, and has a quiffy blonde haircut that is currently popular with celebrities, I want to look like a person of power and influence, which of course I am. Flouting the free and easy dress attitude, I garbed black pants with Suede shoes and wore my prized red velvet shirt, which I nicely topped off with a pencil leather black tie. I still look professional, but with snazz. Looking as slick and as good as I do, it amazes me even more that me Miller, the bearded buffoon doing the monkey dance in the middle of the dance floor, is my twin.

We went to a new club last night, Café Rouge and it certainly provided a lot of eye candy. I was felt like a boy in a sweet shop and I was taking my time choosing what lolly I wanted to lick. Unfortunately, our Bruce Lee wannabe chef (Phil) wouldn’t leave me alone. He had decided that I was his new best friend and as he was completely incoherently pissed, he wanted me to have a drink with him. I tried to politely say no, informing him that I was above the need of alcohol to have a good time but he just wasn’t having this and soon he had me in one of his customary headlocks. I should have kicked his midget ass right then and there but I didn’t want to spoil my refined clothes with his blood, so I relented and accepted his offer of a drink. Out of nowhere Miller appeared.

“Whay hey! Hank’s coming to the party” he shouted to Clint and Curly and they both answered with a hearty cheer.

As you know, my full name is Jacob Hank Cox. It is very very rare that I drink but on the few occasions that I have, Miller has spread vicious rumours that I am some kind of Jekyll and Hyde character, that once I have a drink, Hank (Hyde) comes out to play. Everybody seems to love this imaginary fella. Three times this morning I was awoken by each of my brothers and Curly, so that they could tell me in explicit detail what Hank apparently did last night?

The lad’s version of last night

Clint said that after a few rounds with Phil, I was on the dance floor, with my expensive tie wrapped around my head, Rambo style, grabbing any bird that passed my path, trying to force them to do the Latino tango with me to the latest techno beats, while Curly swore blind that I was table surfing, and while riding a table that had a group of fit young lovies sat around it, I threw up, Exorcist mode, all over their exposed, lovely bouncy cleavages, filling’em with my crisp chunks and tangy lager spray. Miller was the last one to wake me up, so that he could inform me that the pair of us had supposedly bullied two small geeky lads into giving us piggy back rides while he and I whipped each other with our beer soaked shirts. He then went on to say that I had found it incredibly funny to run around with my willy hanging out, dipping it into girls drinks, asking if they wanted to ‘down it’. According to him this was the final straw and we were all kicked out, so we went back to the Gladrags club (which according to Clint it IS NOT a gay club).

What horrible, terrible nonsense! I will admit that some of my memory from last night is somewhat patchy and my head is killing me but I have a perfectly sound explanation for that. I was drugged! Yes, that bastard chef Phil must have spiked my drink. Miller and the lads are obviously having a laugh at my expense. I am sure that they are making it all up. The lewd photo’s Clint showed me as evident must have been faked on Photoshop!

My memories of last night

What I do remember is waking up in Gladrags at about 2am, but the night still seemed young for all of the pilled up clubbers dancing like morons around me, with their dumbass glow sticks waving in the air. I felt extremely sick! God knows what the lads did to me while I was out but my prized shirt was soaking wet and my gorgeous black tie was missing.

I was just about to attempt getting my sorry wet arse off of the seat I was slumped in, without vomiting, when through all of the greasy, jumpin, semi naked yoofs writhing about around me, I caught a sight of Heaven, whilst there in Hell.

The usual, dreadful, Club beats had been replaced with cheesy party hits, and Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’ started blaring out through all of the speakers. There, in the middle of the dance floor was this girl. She was dancing all alone beneath a bright spotlight. I don’t know if my memory is faulty but it was as if she was moving in slow motion. Her hips were swaying side to side, while her sweet curved bottom slowly grooved up and down to the pulsating beat of the disco classic. I couldn’t help but stare at her. She was absolutely beautiful. Her silky brown hair was parted in the middle, she had moist alluring lips and she was dressed in black skin tight leather trousers and a low slung, boob hugging top. She kept her eyes closed as she danced, completely immersed in the music. I found that, and everything else about her ever so sensual. Suddenly she opened her eyes. They were a summer sky blue and even more beautiful than I had imagined and then they were looking right at me. She gave me a Mona Lisa of a smile and a soft, inviting wink, before closing again. I stood up to act, being led by my over excited pecker no doubt, but my body acted against me and the next memory I have is having me head down da toilet, getting sick all over a stinky floater!

Eventually I remember getting back out to the dance floor but the girl, the winker, was gone. I felt complete and utter despair. I felt even worse when my attention was drawn to an argument near me, only to find a group of guys were surrounding Miller, Clint and Curly.

It turned out that Miller, who had reached his ideal stage of super drunkenness, had gone up to a girl and started getting off with her. She seemed quite happy about it, or so Miller was shouting, but her fiancée, who had had his arm around the girl at the time, was obviously not as pleased. He was a mountain of a fella, and so were all of his friends, a team of rugby players, and they were now threatening to kick the living daylights out of my twin. Don’t ask me why, cos I dunno, but I went over to protect my idiot brother. Clint was already trying to reason with the gang but he was having difficulty doing so while Miller kept shouting ‘let me at’em’ (Scrappy-Doo style), as Curly tried desperately to hold him back. You see there is a male code. If one of your mates gets into a fight against more than one person, you HAVE to join in and help, even if it looks likely you will get battered. It was blindingly obvious to Curly and Clint that if they had to help Miller, they were fucked. I waded over and instead of sticking up for Miller, like Clint was, I told the group that I totally agreed and he was a fecking dickhead. I pointed out was a joke he was, but added that he wasn’t worth the hassle of getting arrested for. What I was saying seemed to work because they started to back off, content with just throwing verbal insults at him. This was obviously more than Miller could bear and he managed to break free from Curly and made a bee line for the boyfriend. Luckily Clint and I both pushed Miller away before he could reach the bloke, and he went flying on his ass. The stupid bastard was too pissed to realize that we were trying to save him and the next thing I know he had sprung back up off of the floor, like a Jack in the box, and punched me square on the chin. I saw stars and then everything went black.

My Winky

When I came to I was flat on my back and my head was killing me worse than ever. People were still dancing around me, oblivious to my state. I opened my eyes and I saw Miller wobbling off, being held up by bleedin Bertha, without a care in the world! The pair of’em disappeared out of the club together and Clint had raced off to see if Curly was okay, as the poor knob had run away in tears, due to seeing his rapist so soon after the event.

I don’t know how long I was lying there on the floor. I was just about ready to give up and go to sleep right there when I experienced a second vision of wonder. The Winker girl was kneeling over me, looking right into my eyes. Yet again she winked and gave me a huge, happy, gorgeous smile. Her eyes shone and melted my heart.

“Are you alright down there?” she asked. Her voice made my blood swirl around inside, I felt like I was being tickled from within.

“Yeah” I answered coolly “I’m just trying some new moves. Vertical dancing is sooo yesterday. It’s for ya gran you know. I’m trying out some New York moves. This is all the rage over there at the moment. Do you wanna try?”

She just laughed. I laughed. I have no idea if she believed me, but it was obviously a good line. She helped me up and asked if I wanted a drink. I should have said no, but I didn’t. She asked, she smiled and I said yes. I would have said yes to anything.

We went to the bar and we had a couple of shots, which we washed down with some alco pops. I could feel the floor beginning to spin again. We couldn’t really talk because a different DJ took to the stage and he had decided to ditch the cheesy pop tunes, in favour of some ultra loud, ultra beats.

Once again the movie in my head of last night begins to miss some scenes as I polished shot, after shot, off. I do remember showing Winky (I can’t, for the life of me remember her name!) some of my moves. She must have been impressed with my Jiving because she started dancing with me and she laughed so warmly and affectionately as I span her around. She felt so good against me. I badly wanted to kiss her but I didn’t want to get it wrong. I didn’t want to scare her away. I tried to wait for the right moment but time was escaping me. Every time I held her close she took my breath away. Every time she smiled at something I did, she took the strength from my legs. I was having the time of my life and I didn’t want to ruin it. However, after one last spin, when she had collapsed into my arms as I dipped her, she lent forward and kissed me. The club didn’t need music because my heart was pounding away like an epic summer anthem.

The next thing I remember is her whisking me outside of the venue and then us being in the back of a taxis together, kissing more! I don’t know who suggested it, it must have been her, but we went back to mine instead of hers. Considering how much of a tip Miller has made of our room, I must have been quite drunk, or just too randy to care. Luckily when we got upstairs to my room, Miller wasn’t there being raped by Bertha. I had the room all to myself and my Winky.

I wanted to make the moment really special. I didn’t just want a quick fumble. I wanted her to remember me for being the best she ever had. I decided I would be dead sexy and copy a scene I had seen in a movie. I turned on the shower and invited her to join me. She just laid on the bed in a fit of drunken giggles and egged me on. Before I knew it, I was humming the song from ‘The Full Monty’ and I was doing my best attempt at a strip tease. I got down to my pants and began wiggling my bum, sliding up and down the en-suite door seductively. The more she clapped and laughed, the worse I behaved. Eventually I was completely naked and I was wiggling my bits and bobs like tassels. Oh the horror. I can’t believe I did that! Maybe I was Hank! I have a bottom that looks like it’s got a hamster clenched between its buttocks. It’s so terribly fluffy. What on Earth could she had thought. Obviously in my drunken, horny state, I gave no thought to that. I jumped into the shower, ready to invite her in but then I remembered that it was on the blink. It blasted skin peeling hot one moment, and frost biting cold another. I was hoping in and out like a bloody Morris dancer. I kept shouting for her to wait a minute while I got it sorted but eventually I gave up and decided it was time to give her the ride of her life.

I stepped back into the bedroom and she was spread eagled on the bed. I crawled on top of her and gently whispered “Are we about to make love my sweet?”, but she didn’t answer, she was out cold, fast asleep (or after seeing my hamster, pretending to be asleep?)

I must have passed out next to her because the next thing I know I am in bed, under the blanket, being woken up by Curly.

What happened to Winky? Why did she sneak off without saying goodbye? Was she embarrassed? Regretful? Ashamed? Was she even real? Maybe after I passed out from all my drinking with Phil, the lads put me in a taxis home and I dreamt the whole thing?

Will I ever see her again?

Monday 21st August 2000

2347 Hrs

Curly is in a terrible mood with everyone. He doesn’t think we are taking his attack seriously enough. He got into this sulk because he told me and Clint this morning that he was going to go and report the incident to the Police. We tried to explain that he would just make himself look like a knob and he accused us of being unsupportive. How can stopping your friend from looking like a knob be unsupportive? Miller didn’t help matters when he came rolling into the bar this morning, still in last nights clothes, and boasted that he too had been raped by Bertha. “Did she do that thumb thing to you too? Nasty eh” he asked Curly. This was too much for our pube headed friend and he stormed off. Miller said he was going to form a support club for the pair of’em.

The pub had a couple of people in today. The weather was scorching hot so Babbacombe had a few tourists enjoying the beautiful sea view and some of those came in here to have something to eat for lunch. In all we did about seven meals, mainly sandwiches and salads but the way Kung Fu Phil was running around the kitchen in a rampant panic, you’d have thought we had the entire British army in for dinner. Dick head. God I hate him!

However, someone I hate even more came in tonight. Harry Barker. Old laughing boy. The ugly little git came slimming up to the bar, all smiles and asked if he could speak with the boss. I tried to assure him that he was speaking to him but his happy grin was swiftly replaced with something all the more threatening and he whispered with a hiss “Go get ye facking Daddy, BOY!” For all I knew he was ready to stab me, I swear his face suddenly looked that evil, so I thought sod it, let Dad deal with his new pal. It turned out that Harry was coming in to TELL Dad that he was having a party in the pub on Sunday night for his daughters 40th. He wants a buffet laid out for the occasion, but he never once allured to whether or not he would be paying for it and Dad didn’t ask either! After Harry had fucked off I asked Dad about that and he basically snapped at me and said we should be grateful for the customers and added that I had done fuck all to get people in so far! I was utterly shocked!

My father and brothers have squashed every brilliant idea I have put forward so far. The pub is doing crap because of them! I should have said that to Dad, instead I just told him that I had something planned for Friday that will get the customers piling in!

So what is this new genius plan? Well earlier Clint was banging on about adverts he was putting in the newspaper and on Torquay FM, for the charity karaoke competition we are unfortunately organizing. I pointed out that nobody ever reads ads in the local paper, and nobody even listens to the local radio station, so it’s all a waste of time and money. I explained to him that you’ve gotta go out and catch new customers. It’s like fishing and I’m gonna reel loads in on Friday night because I’ve got a new Masterplan. I’m going undercover to steal customers from the rival pub down the road. The Queens Legs is always packed and though it doesn’t have the sort of clientele I would prefer, it does have a lively karaoke crowd and I am sure I can get them to come to our pub while Clint’s competition is running.

The Queens Legs look quite nice from outside, but if you go in, it's a right shit hole. It’s full of the sort of people who know their place in life and their place is at the bottom of the social ladder, the underclass. They’ve got no aspirations other than getting through the day anyway they can, until The Queens Legs open and they can all go in for lots of drinks. Not the sort of place you would expect someone respectable like me to venture into but I’m willing to take one for the good of the business. Once the competition is over, I’ll bar the lot of’em, but in the mean time they’ll keep Dad happy and keep him off of my back while I work on my much bigger plans.

For my undercover operation in The Queens Legs, I won’t be able to wear my usual smart attire, because if I do I’ll attract too much attention from the pubs landlord and his thug doormen. I need to blend in with the common people, dress down to their level. Blue jeans, stained t-shirt, crap hair and NO glasses (they’ll give my sophistication away immediately). So I guess I will be going out disguised as Miller. Once I’m in, I’m going to approach people and point out all of the superior facilities The Royal Ship has to offer, compared to the dive they are wasting their time in. I’m sure they’ll be flocking out en masse when they realize what they are missing out on. I mean, it’s not often people of their level get invited to somewhere as classy as my establishment.

2358 Hrs

I was just popping down stairs to get a bedtime glass of coke when I heard a voice shouting somewhere in the darkened bar. I armed myself with a broom and slowly crept towards the noise. The aggravated voice was coming from the office. As I snuck closer, I realised it was Dad on the phone. I kept quiet and listened to the heated conversation he was having.

“I’ve not been avoiding you” … “You said you didn’t need it back for at least six months!” … “There’s no need for that sort of talk” … “Please mate, I just need a little more time than that” … “No! You don’t need to come down here, okay I’ll sort it…I’ll…”

It sounded like the person who was shouting at him on the other side of the phone hung up. Dad just collapsed into my swivel chair and buried his head mournfully into his hands. I didn’t bother going in to ask who he had been talking to; he would never have told me. Dad has always been secretive, especially when he is up to no good, or is in trouble. God I hope this is nothing that will affect the pub!

Koopa’s just emailed me, asking me to go on the Brummy Chat webpage, so I’ll see what he wants and hopefully he’ll help take my mind off of my knob head father.

http://www.brummychat.co.uk

Online:
The Bar Steward (Jacob H. Cox)
Brum Gunz (Koopa O’Shea)

Brum Gunz:
Alwright, Cox Boy, how’s it going in da deep south then? I hears off Milla that Hank came out to play last night.

The Bar Steward:
Here we go. No Hank did not make an appearance because Hank does not exist!

Brum Gunz:
No need to get stressed knobba. Milla told me some well funny stuff that you did! It sounds like you had a wicked night!

The Bar Steward:
Wicked?

Brum Gunz:
You had a laugh, yeah? Milla said you and him were ripping town apart.

The Bar Steward:
I can assure you that my brother and I do not share the same idea of fun! His idea of fun is getting wasted and punching me in the gob.

Brum Gunz:
That soundz like my idea of a good night!

The Bar Steward:
I LOST A BLOODY TOOTH! He’s lucky I didn’t kick his fat hairy ass all over the nightclub. I would have done it but I had my reputation to think about.

Brum Gunz:
Milla said you was sticking ya cock in peoples drinks!

The Bar Steward:
Miller is a lying fecker!

Brum Gunz:
Ha. Calm down, at least you’ll get a quid off of the tooth fairy.

The Bar Steward:
Yeah, and maybe Santa Claus will bring me a new twin for Christmas.

Brum Gunz:
Nah, he won’t be doing that mate.

The Bar Steward:
Why not?

Brum Gunz:
Cos he’s dead.

The Bar Steward:
Whose dead?

Brum Gunz:
Santa Claus. Father Christmas. The big HO HO HO fella.

The Bar Steward:
He doesn’t exist Koopa.

Brum Gunz:
Lol, I know that dildo! He doesn’t exist anymore cos he’s dead. He died during WW2.

The Bar Steward:
What?

Brum Gunz:
He got shot down over Nazi Germany in 1944. Unidentified flying object. Evil bastards those Nazi’s were! That’s why we won the war?

The Bar Steward:
Aye?

Brum Gunz:
Yeah. Da Allieds dropped leaflets all over Germany saying “Hitler killed Santa, revolt now”, and they did. Hitler shitted himself, knew the game was up and shot himself. War over. We won.

The Bar Steward:
Well that’s news to me.

Brum Gunz:
I suppose it’s a good thing really though.

The Bar Steward:
What? That Santa and Rudolf got shelled outta the sky.

Brum Gunz:
Yeah. Some old fat, sweaty bloke breaking into your kid’s bedroom in the middle of the night, giving’em a special present. That doesn’t sound right does it?

The Bar Steward:
I guess not.

Brum Gunz:
And he’d be dangerous for other reasons!

The Bar Steward:
What reasons are those then?

Brum Gunz:
Well he’s got the ability to get into anywhere he wants. There isn’t a government or criminal on the planet that wouldn’t want some of that technology! Either they’d try and recruit him or put a cap in his ass themselves. Imagine if Bin Laden took some of his elves hostages. Santa would be forced to into knocking off the US President quicker than the tubby bastard eats his mince pies. He’d have people trying to get him left, right and centre, man! He’d probably be like some badass 80’s action hero, fighting hard to stay alive!

The Bar Steward:
So I suppose I won’t be getting a new twin for Christmas then.

Brum Gunz:
Fraid not Cox.
So, did Milla or Clint manage to dip their dick last night or Curly even?

The Bar Steward:
What about me?

Brum Gunz:
What about ya?

The Bar Steward:
Why didn’t you ask if I pulled anyone?

Brum Gunz:
Alwright. Did ya pull any Cox last night?

The Bar Steward:
I’m not gay Koopa! In fact I pulled the fittest bird in the whole club. The whole town in fact.

Brum Gunz:
Yeah yeah, course you did.

The Bar Steward:
I DID! I pulled the most beautiful girl I’ve ever saw and she came back to ours with me!

Brum Gunz:
Did anyone else see her?

The Bar Steward:
No. But only because Miller fucked off with Bertha the rapist whale and Clint was running after Curly!

Brum Gunz:
So no one can back up ya story then.

The Bar Steward:
STORY! I’m not lying! It’s true. She was gorgeous and she was all over me!

Brum Gunz:
LOL. Okay Cox, I believe ya, I really do. You’re a big stud. A walking, rock hard Cox!

The Bar Steward:
That’s right. I am.

Anyway, forget about us. How’s it going with you lot back home? Any sign of the millions you said you were all gonna be making from the new patch?

Brum Gunz:
Nah, not yet. Uncle Connor said he is investing all of the extra cash we are making.

The Bar Steward:
Investing it into what?

Brum Gunz:
He said he is gonna start shipping in drugs himself, directly from Columbia. He’s got a big shipment all lined up. Do you know that Pablo Escobar use to make 20 billion a year! He made so much money, he use to lose about 5 billion a year cos the rats ate it in his lockup. We’re gunna be RICH!

The Bar Steward:
Wow, a family to be proud of alright. Look, don’t tell me anymore. The less we know the better; plausible deniability when the police come knocking.

Brum Gunz:
The money we’ll be making, the police will be working for us.

The Bar Steward:
Sure they will. Look Koopa, interesting chat but I’ve gotta go. I’ve got some emails to write.

Brum Gunz:
Who to?

The Bar Steward:
I’m writing to celebrities and inviting them to our pub for free. They can stop for nothing, eat for nothing and drink for nothing!

Brum Gunz:
Why do you wanna be doing that for?

The Bar Steward:
Publicity! Look at all of those idiots who go around all the Beatles old haunts in Liverpool. People love celebrity stuff. Once fans know their heroes have been into our establishment, we’ll have’em flocking here!

Brum Gunz:
Soundz like another great Cox idea.

The Bar Steward:
It is, and this time I’m not running it by Dad, Miller or Clint cos they know feck all!

Brum Gunz:
HA. Good luck with it then.

The Bar Steward:
Cheers. Night.

Brum Gunz:
Laterz.

The Bar Steward has left Brummy Chat



Tuesday 22nd August 2000

1522 Hrs

It was raining today so the pub was dead. Thankfully that meant I didn’t have to put up with Kung Fu Phil crashing around the kitchen in a temper, as Dad told him not to bother coming in today.

I spent all afternoon wishing someone would actually come into the pub and have a drink, but then I wished I hadn’t when the most boring bugger in the whole world came plodding in and super-glued himself to a barstool for over three hours! Miller was in bed, Clint was in town getting some Karaoke CD’s and Curly was down the cash n carry with Dad, so I was bleedin stuck with this train obsessed dwarf, who was as welcomed as diarrhea in the local swimming baths. I felt like a whore. Now I know how a prozzie must feel. There I was, bored shitless, but I still had to smile and pretend I was happy with this dickheads company! I hope he never comes back.

Anyway, forget that. After the twatty imp fucked off I decided to kill some time by cleaning the bar. Not a job I should be doing but I was so bored! I began removing some old photos that had been taken before we took over the pub, when I saw my Winky on one of them. I instantly tore it off of the wall and examined it intensely. Her beautiful smile, heavenly blue eyes, made me go all goose bumpily and light at once. It must have been a taken recently because she had the exact same top on as she did on Sunday night. The photo is just of her alone, waving and smiling at whoever is taking the picture. More importantly the photo is of her inside this pub! Is she a local? Does she come in here often? Maybe I will see her again! This is the happiest I have felt since I’ve moved down here.

1825 Hrs

Clint just brought in the local newspaper, The Torquay Express, to show me. On the front page is a grainy black and white CCTV image of a man in a nightclub. Basically the article said that the Police are looking for a flasher who exposed himself in Café Rouge on Sunday night. He is approx 5’7, slim with short brown hair and has a Brummy accent. It then said if you saw him, or have any information about this man, please ring this number: 01803 322 8333.

The reason Clint was showing me the paper was because he claims that it is me in the photograph. Bollocks. They’re going too far with this Hank joke now! The man in the picture could be anyone, and loads of the people in Torquay are from Birmingham, Liverpool, Newcastle and Scotland, so the accent thing proves nothing!

However, I think I might grow a beard, so that I fit in better at the Queens Legs on Friday. I’ll get that scruffy look going, so that I’m totally unrecognizable.

Weds 23rd August 2000

2249 Hrs


You know you’re having a bad day when the rest of the family are acting worse than Miller!

I was sitting in the office earlier, working out how I should best liberate customers from the Queen’s legs on Friday, when I noticed a little hoody raiding the till. I didn’t go out and unleash hell unto the fiend because the thief was none other than my baby sister Marie. By the time I dashed out of the office, she was stood on a chair, playing the fruit machine. I told the little brat to get off at once and return whatever money she had left to the till. I won’t repeat what she said back to me. Had anyone been witness to it, they would have thought that she was the vile mouthed girl out of the Exorcist, but they would have been wrong. She is not possessed by the Devil, but possessed by my Mothers nature. Of all of us, little Marie is truly an O’Shea child. After she had stopped shouting, and accusing me of getting in the way of her winning the jackpot, I told her once more to get off of the chair and get out of the bar. She then slapped me and told me to f-off or she’d do me.
I had no choice but to go and tell on her. I couldn’t find Mom as she was out walking her demon dog, but Curly told me that he had seen Dad go down into the cellar.

As I made my way down the deadly loose stairs that descend into our pit of a cellar, I saw my Father crouched over one of our beer barrels, with a large tube in his hand. It didn’t take me too long to realize that he was putting liquids back into the barrel. Watering the beer down would have been bad enough, but Dad was actually putting old beer, from the slope bucket behind the bar, back into the barrel.

‘DAD!’ I shouted, immediately displaying my utter contempt for what he was doing ‘what do you think you are playing at?’

You would have thought that he would be all coy and embarrassed at being caught doing something so deceitful and disgusting, but then I suppose you don’t know my Dad. Of course he wasn’t remorseful. He tried to pass it off as normal pub practice and then rounded on me for shouting at him.

‘If you get caught doing this, we would be fined massively. I could lose my license!’

‘Everyone does it J. I can’t afford to pay the breweries prices. They’re way over the top. I need to keep the costs down some way or another.’

‘I don’t care Dad. You’ll get caught. You AWLAYS get caught!’

‘I’ve got worse things to worry about that the brewery finding out’

‘What?’

‘Look, never you fucking mind what! I’m doing what is needed to be done to keep this place going! What are you doing, how are you helping? All you do is moan, moan, moan. I bet you’ve come down here to moan about something or someone’

‘No I haven’t’

‘So what do you want?’

‘I came down to ask if you wanted a cup of tea actually’

‘You lying little bastard. I can tell when you’re lying. Stop worrying about what I’m, or anyone else is doing, and be more concerned about yourself! What are you doing useful at the moment?’

‘I’ve been looking over the books’

‘How’s that going to help us’

‘Well it’s what managers do. They look at the books’

‘Managers get people in. Managers get money in! What are you doing to promote Clint’s karaoke competition? It’s the first heat on Sunday and so far I’ve only seen your brother running around putting posters up.’

‘Well I’m doing something much better than that. I’m doing something on Friday that will have this place heaving’

‘What’s that then?’

‘You’ll see’

‘So you’re doing nothing then’

‘I fecking well am! So get back to sticking the old fag ashed beer back into the barrels, and leave me to act like the only professional person working in this place!’

So after putting my father well and truly in his place I stomped back upstairs, just in time to see Marie collect her 150.00 jackpot out of the fruit machine and celebrate by giving me a one finger salute.

A couple of hours later I thought I had a reason to be happy. I should have learnt by now however that fate conspires against me.

At about three o’clock this afternoon we had quite a few people come in for food. The weather had been glorious this morning and so Babbacombe was busy with tourists, but when it started to rain we benefited from some of those people coming into here for shelter. So once again Kung Fu Phil was running around the kitchen like a headless chicken when the food orders started coming in fast. A particular couple, an old pair in their 50’s, ordered sausages in buns. I was busy serving drinks while Clint took orders, Curly brought out the food and Miller slept in bed. I imagine Dad was still in the cellar fiddling the drinks. Anyway, I had to go into the kitchen to get some glasses out of the washer where I was confront by Kung Fu Phil’s bare ass. Not only was I staring directly as Phil’s saggy, battered love cushions, but I was shocked to find him mincing around the kitchen with a large sausage wedged up his bum like a tail, wagging side to side.

‘What the HELL are you doing Phil?’

Phil dropped the meat and turned around in surprise. Now you would think that he would be all coy and embarrassed at being caught doing something so disgraceful and disgusting, but then I suppose you don’t know our chef. Of course he wasn’t remorseful. He tried to pass it off as normal kitchen practice and then rounded on me for shouting at him.

‘This is what you should expect if you insult a chef’ he shouted, whilst wedging the sausage back between his bottom in defiance.

‘How have you been insulted Phil?’

‘The bitch sent her meal back’

‘Why?’

‘She said it was ‘too cold’ he answered in a mock feminine voice.

‘Well that sounds fair enough’

‘Well if she’d had eaten it when Pubic head brought it out to her, instead of chatting away to lover boy, it would have been warm enough! Well if she’s gonna talk shit, she can fucking eat it too!’

At this point Phil yanked the sausage from his arse and rubbed his tiny knob on it for good measure. He then slapped it back into the bun it had originally came from and shouted for Curly, who promptly appeared.

‘Take this back out to the ol’cow and tell her to enjoy’

I quickly snatched the plate off of Curly and told him he would do no such thing.

‘Get your stuff Phil, YOU’RE FIRED. Now fuck off you spotted arse weirdo’

‘You’re not the boss of me, you jumped up, spoilt little mummy boy’

It took every last restraint in my body not to ram the hotdog into his face.

‘You’re quite right, I am not your boss, because YOU’RE FUCKING FIRED. NOW PISS OFF!’

It looked like Phil was about to advance on me and try some of his moves, but luckily for him my Dad appeared.
‘What’s all this fucking noise about? All we can hear out there is fucking this, and fucking that. Watch your fucking language will you!’

‘You’re boy ere has just told me that I’m fired’

‘You’ve done what Jacob?’

‘That’s right Dad. I’ve just walked in here and found gay boy there with a customers sausage up his chocolate factory. Of course I’ve fecking sacked him!’

‘You did what Phil?’

‘That’s right. That stupid old bird out there was pulling my plonker, taking the piss and I was showing her what we do to people like her in the trade! So Johnny, is Jacob right? Am I fired?’

To my astonishment Dad yanked the plate out of my hands, handed it to Curly and told him to give it back to the silly old twat. He then apologized to Phil about me, and ordered me out of the kitchen. In case I didn’t make myself clear, he basically told Phil that he was not fired and made me look like a tit. I left with the image of Phil’s smug face violently burnt into my mind.

As I walked out of the kitchen I saw this silver haired lady delighted to have her meal back. I felt sick, but then I didn’t know whether to feel a little better when the dirty old cow started making crude oral sexual gestures with the hotdog, for the benefit of the old man. My stomach however couldn’t take anymore and I quickly took off after my Dad, leaving Clint to man the bar.

‘What the hell was that about Dad? You’ve just made me look like some sort of moron. You should have been as eager to drown the stupid fecker in the dish water as I was’

‘Oh Jacob, you are so inexperienced aren’t you. This is how the trade works. The beer fiddling, the sausage abuse, it’s all part of the trade. You just need to wise up’

‘That’s bullshit Dad. Fucking rubbish. You know what, I’ve had enough. You can stick this place up YOUR ARSE! I’m going’

I then turned my back on my Dad to storm off but he grabbed a tight hold of my shoulder

‘Look Jacob, if you go, we have no licensee. No licensee, no business. No business, no me!’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean without the business the family is out of a home!’

‘You said ‘no me’

‘No me, no us, no nothing. That is what I meant! You’re not going to do that to your family are you?’

‘Why didn’t you back me up Dad’ I asked, and then came the truth. It appeared that King Fu Phil has been getting us all of the food on the cheap! From where, Dad doesn’t know, or wouldn’t admit to.

‘We’ve got the Barkers birthday party on Sunday and we wouldn’t find another chef in time for that, or food as cheap. So Jacob, forget the stupid woman out there, and worry about your family instead. We need Sunday to go well for us. I need that money. We’re losing dough left right and centre. I’ve got bills coming out of my ears and there’s hardly any money coming in to keep us above water. Please son, just help me out’

Dad looked so deflated, so downtrodden that I just nudged my head and we left it at that. Dad covered the rest of my shift so that I didn’t have to see the stupid sausage jockey in the kitchen again today.

Unfortunately that wasn’t the last falling out me and my Pappy had, because not an hour ago, we had our final bust up of the day. I found myself working again behind the bar because Miller was AWOL. He was last seen dressed in a suit, heading into town. Curly said he was on the pull and was playing the part of a jilted groom. I would call him utterly pathetic but I know the stupid gimp will con some stupid, legless old tart into sleeping with him, via his routine.
So I was stood behind the bar when a big gang of kids came in, looking all of 14 years old. One spotty face twonk came strutting up to the bar and ordered 20 pints for him and the rest of his classroom of friends. I gave him a hearty laugh and then told the lot of’em to piss off. As the mob of bad hair cuts and filthy ragged kids vacated the pub, my Dad appeared and asked where they were going. I laughed and told him how they had tried to order 20 pints for their first round. I momentarily thought my Dad might join in with my laughing, at the nerve of the children but then I should have remembered who I was talking to. He went mad.

‘DO YOU SEE? This is what I mean. You have absolutely no fucking idea how to run a pub do you!’

‘What now? Surly you can’t have expected me to serve them. If the old Bill came in they’d have shut us down in a heartbeat, possibly even arresting me!’

‘Arrest you. Fucking drama Queen. When was the last time a copper came in here? When was the last time any fucker has come in here for a drink on the night time? The Police would have thanked us! We’d be keeping’em off of the streets, keeping them away from annoying nice little old ladies. We’d be doing a fucking public service and making a few hundred quid. You’ve got a hell of a lot to learn. Kids are our best customers. All that money, but no bills to pay, no family to maintain, mortgage or anything. All that lovely money that they just wanna spend on getting pissed! Once they find somewhere that’ll serve them they will keep going every night like it’s Byker fucking Grove! You’ve just lost me a fortune you stupid moron!’

With that I dropped my dish cloth and told my Dad he could close up because I have had enough for today. There is no reasoning with the man! Come the weekend, when we are enjoying the fruits of my master plan, he will be praising me to high Heaven, worshipping me like the business God that I am. Until then I do not wanna hear another word from his stupid mouth!

Thurs 24th August 2000

1811 HRS

My plan today was to sit in the office and work out every last fine detail of what I’m gonna do when I’m inside the Queens Legs tomorrow. I’ve gotta slip in undetected, get what I want, then get out fast! It’s such a great plan, I’m almost giddy with excitement because it is gonna feel great pulling it off, even though someone like me shouldn’t have to go into such a shit hole. God my family don’t deserve me and my brilliance. After yesterday I almost felt like saying bollocks to the pub, bollocks to the lot’em. Let’em roll in the shit they make for themselves, but then I remember that I’m not doing this for them, this is for me. Tomorrow is when my Empire grows like a beautiful flower out of compost. Though it’s quite hard for such a wonderful rose to grow when the shit keeps getting piled on.

Every two minutes there was a knock at the office door. First Curly asking for a hand with the beer delivery (really, would a maid ask a King for a hand serving the dinner?), so I told him not to be so bleedin cheeky and bugger off. Then Miller rung down to the office phone and asked me for some money to make the fat woman in his bed go away (he swore he never knew she was a prossy). I had Clint badgering me every two minutes about his crappy Karaoke contest. He wanted to discuss what sort of ad we should put in the local paper and how we should organize the event. I didn’t have time for his stupid little plans, not when I have a proper master plan to sort out! Then there was Marie. She didn’t knock on my door. In fact she was very quiet today, which worried me even more. All day I saw her on my CCTV, sat huddled in the corner of the pub, but she wasn’t on her own. It seems Marie has a new little friend, a little ginger head lad. White as ice cream, he has the kinda dead blue eyes you would see in a horror film. The sight of the pair of them hunched over a piece of paper finally got the better of me and so I went out to inspect what they were up to. Maria, being as sharp as a vicious cat, quickly noticed me coming and I saw her snatch the paper in front of her, into her fist.

“You two okay?” I kindly asked

“Fuck off spac face” came the charming response from my little sister. Many times I have wondered if I could convince a court that I was not a child abuser if I punched the little fecker in the head, but British justice being what it is I thought I’d best not try my luck and so let her remark go. I turned to the boy and asked him if he would like a drink (best treat him nice, then he can tell his family what a lovely pub his new friends family has). He didn’t say anything; he just seemed to stare at me with pant shitting frightened eyes.

“Come on Macky, we’re going outside now!” my sister shouted to the little boy. She jumped off of her chair and darted out of the front door, with the strange little lad quickly following after her. For the rest of the day I saw the pair on my office CCTV coming in and out of the pub, the whole time Marie’s new friend seemed glued to her side, though he looked like he didn’t actually wanna be anywhere near her. I’ll have to keep an eye on her, cos no one else will. I’m sure she is up to no good.


20.42 HRS

OMG SOMETHING AMAZING HAS JUST HAPPENED!!! I’m sure I mentioned it a few days ago; well one of my big ideas was to get some free publicity (it was idea number 3 on my list). I’ve been emailing celebrities and offering them the chance to drink and stay here for free. The idea was that they would turn up and then I’d let the press know, and then all of their fans would turn this place in to some kinda Mecca and flock ere, thus making us a fortune while we exploit them. On TV at the moment there is a reality program about an old 80’s rocker and his famous porno model girlfriend, well they were one of the people that I emailed and just ten minutes ago their manager rang me up. He said (in real bad cock-knee) that the couple (Mick Champagne and his partner Sunshine) would love to come and stay with us and enjoy our kind offer of free booze. He asked if I minded if the TV crew came with them too. Do I mind? I almost fell off my fucking chair. I played it dead cool though and said the more the merrier. I’ve hit the fucking jackpot! I’m such a fucking genius. I’m gonna be rich! Probably famous too. When people see such cool celebs in my pub, everyone in and out of town is gonna queue around the block to get in here. My family will have to queue to kiss my hairy ass in thanks of my mightiness, for all the money I will make us! The manager (Chas) asked if it was okay if Mick and Sunshine came down this Saturday and Sunday because they are flying out to America next week to record a new album together. I said that was fine and that we would look forward to having’em.

I’m more determined than ever now to get as many people as possible out of The Queens Legs tomorrow and into here. I want this pub looking busy when the cameras are rolling. I want the whole of the UK to see what kind of pub this is…OH SHIT! Fuck fuck fuck. It’s the Bakers birthday party on Sunday SHITTTTTTTT!

Fri 25th August 2000