Countryphile

Hi there readers

First up, I feel I need to proffer up my all too usual apologies for a severe lack of regular posting recently. You wouldn't believe the last two weeks I've had. Although, if you're a long termer you might. I just don't ever seem to get the rub of the green. So far 2010 has been one of the worst yet. Which, if anyone takes the trouble to read 2009's postings, is saying something!

My misadventures with Dippy in Australia were followed by returning home jobless to find the Tories in charge. I was then unceremoniously kicked out of my own home. And if that wasn't bad enough, just when I managed to get myself back up and online, I was burglarized!

I've feel violated :-(

I thought South London was bad enough with its dog and bike thievery, not to mention its legally and positively encouraged by the powers that be Day Light Bloody Fucking Robbery. But I'd not been out in the sticks five minutes before my own domicile had been breached and evacuated of its contents.

On the night of my last post, I signed off the pages of Newsdesk and proceeded in a southerly direction to the local pub. To be totally honest I fancied a crack at the barmaid. Sadly, I didn't really make much progress. I sparked up a conversation fair enough saying that I was new to the area and wouldn't mind finding someone with local knowledge to show me around. I name-checked a few famous people I'd met as a successful writer down in London, names like Pete Andre, Bruno Brooks and Barry McGuigan, but I could tell she didn't really 'get it'.

That's the thing with these country girls, they lack sophistication, imagination and ambition. They end up working behind the bar of their local village pub, getting up the duff with the centre forward of the pub football team and then settling down to a life of domestic abuse, misery and dreams of what might have been.

In many ways that barmaid reminded me of my own poor mother. I still can't believe she's been blinded by Roger Leache. You would have thought she would have learnt her lesson when dad ran off with the lollipop lady. Some people are just born victims.

I can't really remember leaving the pub that night or indeed the long and dark stagger home. I woke up with a splitting headache and dragged myself out of bed only to discover that the front door of Greta's place was wide open and some git had been in and made it away with half my stuff. My laptop (and dongle), mobile phone, wallet, my TV (still boxed from the move), microwave which was brand spanking new - and while not technically mine, per se, was still something I was looking forward to using - my passport and the box set of The Wire!! Still at least they hadn't discovered the six pack of Cobra in the fridge. I had to have one just to settle my nerves.

Once I'd had the police around and spent about two hours going over the previous night's events and the details of the stolen contents, I had to walk all the way to Lincoln because the tealeaf had also nicked the keys to Roger's Ford Focus that he let me borrow for the move. Honestly, judging my his reaction when I got there you'd think cared more about his missing motor than the fact that I could have been murdered in my sleep.

I had to sleep on the sofa that night. IN MY OWN HOME! The indignity of it all!!!!

I did a lot of thinking that night on the sofa. I was going to have to sort my life out. I was going to have to get home. But, well, I was also pretty bloody excited about the World Cup. The thieves had at least not stolen Greta's ancient, but fully functioning telly.

Mum came up to me the following morning when Roger wasn't around and gave me a few quid. Not 'gave', as such though, because I will pay her back, natch. She's a great old girl really my Mum. Although, I think she's lost touch with reality a bit, I doubt she even knows how much a Frey Bentos pie is these days. Fortunately, I know where she keeps her spare credit card. I thought, if England get past the group stages I could be holed up in that cottage until July.

When I got back to the cottage the next day I was in for yet another unpleasant surprise. Roger's son Gary was on the sofa watching TV in his boxer shorts. He barely even diverted his eyes from the set to acknowledge my entrance. "All right Barry mate," he said, "have you got any booze?"

'Cheeky twat,' I thought as walked into the kitchen, 'there's no way I'm letting him get his hands on my Cobra.' "...only I've finished off that flat shit in the fridge and I thought you might have something decent on you.." bellowed Leache.

Even above the din of my internal rage I think I heard him scratching his balls. I went straight to my room, and I'm not afraid to admit it readers, I had myself a little cry.

Later that night Gary shouted up asking me if I wanted to go to the pub, I didn't bother answering, I thought I'd just pretend to be asleep. I heard the door slam a little later and I went down and polished off the contents of Greta's liquor cabinet while watching a documentary about sex tourists in Vietnam. Makes you sick really, hopeless, socially inept, middle aged men picking up girls young enough to be their daughters.

I woke in the night to the sound of rhythmic banging. Leache had clearly been more successful than I had down at the village boozer. Stands to reason really, he's exactly the sort of uneducated Philistine that impresses teenage barmaids. When I got downstairs the following morning both Leache and his companion were nowhere to be seen.

Gary has kept himself to himself since that first night. He turned up the day after England v USA with an XBox and a copy of FIFA 10, and he even bought me a case of Heineken to replace my Cobras. We played a few games and thanks to my management training with Zach Abrahams I didn't disappoint on the virtual pitch.

It turns out that Gary keeps quite odd hours and is sometimes away for days on end, but he seems to be amazingly successful with the ladies. I had to buy some ear plugs from the chemist just to get a full night's sleep when he's around!

Anyway, he turned up last Friday night and we sat down together to watch England/Algeria. I hate to admit it, but we had quite an entertaining night, despite the fact that he kept calling the Algerians "rag 'eds". Still, he's not really a man of the world like me, I think he's pretty much never moved away from the East Midlands and he certainly didn't go to university.

This morning he turned up at the cottage driving a black Peugeot 206. He was giving me a lift over to Mum's place for Roger's Father's Day meal.

I took a calculated risk, remembering comments that Gary had made to be about his father when we first met, and revealed to him that I knew about Roger being a nazi. It was as risky gambit as I had suspected during the England game that Gary might also being a member of the BNP. But it turns out he hates Roger even more than me. He didn't really have a decent word to say for the man. Gary's racism, it turns out, is not politically motivated, he's just a bit provincial.

Anyway, they're all downstairs as I write this post - I'm using Roger's computer which is set up in Mum's room. That's one in the eye for fascism!

I can hear the laughter and clink of glasses. I know for a fact that Gary has only really turned up to brown nose Greta. He reckons she'll be dead by Christmas and he'll have a third share in the cottage.

I'd best get myself back down there before the pigs in blankets have all gone.

Yours in News

Barry