jonab

Or, as in two old Edinburgh ladies talking: "What do you do about sex?" "Ah have ma tea."

I assume the rat-infested steak problem at 'Spoons (and some other eating places in England) is over with now. (I read about that in another thread on here).

When were you there, colly? I left in 1960. I'd forgotten Mrs Daft although I have written about the Dafts elsewhere on here. I can't recall Bill Driver at all. What did he teach?

If you're not an oik or a townie then my comments don't apply but I well remember when I was in the UK living in Kent and Sussex villages (after Nottingham) that our local pubs were plagued by the aforementioned, lots of them from London "out for a good time", even though the drink drive laws were in place. At the time the alcohol limits were much higher than they are now so these people amply able to demonstrate their position on the evolutionary scale yet remain within the drink driving limits. The village pubs that are suffering nowadays are probably the ones which over expanded

The Death Knell for out of town dining was first sounded with the introduction of The Road Safety Act of 1967 which introduced the first maximum legal blood alcohol (drink driving) limit. No bad thing in itself but it did mean places like The Chateau, The Hut and many others couldn't attract anyone "out for a good time". The Act was a good thing for village pubs, though. It meant that they could regain their proper customer base - the locals - and not be continually spat* upon (figuratively and factually) by oiks and townies. *That could well be "h" in there rather than a

When I lived near the Savoy we fairly often went to the restaurant at Clarendon where we had absolutely top class meals costing next to nothing cooked by the students as part of their courses. Full silver service as well.

The dreadful US import of "Happy (insert event of your choice) Day". Just seen one for Happy Pancake Day. I am not in the least bit religious but Pancake day signifies the start of one of the most solemn parts of the Christian calendar and to wish a "Happy" greeting for this seems most inappropriate.

Did the clinic move to Postern St. - in with the General Hospital or is that a miss-memory? I remember well regularly walking past the Glasshouse St clinics on my way from the technical college through Victoria Station to Huntingdon St bus Station to catch the Trent 84 bus to Hucknall.

I well remember Stilton sandwiches at the Bell. They were excellent! This was early 1970's

Shhhhhh! I'm trying to get you of some work here!

I agree with LizzieM. I doubt that the Savoy was a Berni - why would they buy or build an eaterie directly opposite a well established and popular venue? I lived opposite the Savoy and watched it being built. There was great concern among the hierarchy of Berni Inns at the time about the competition but, in the end, it turned out they were servicing a completely different class of clientele - not many people went to the Grosvenor dressed up in dinner suits and ball gowns - which was the norm at the Savoy, certainly during the early years. We did have Berni executives come up to our flat (

How about this for getting out of drying the pots: Tea towels/dishcloths etc are potential breeding grounds for all sorts of nasty organisms which easily get transferred to the pots during hand drying. Far more hygienic to allow the pots to drain and air dry before putting away.

Might well have been. I remember the Duke of Edinburgh opened the place and was then photographed drinking some of the effluent, it was supposedly so pure. I doubt if it was really effluent - more like some expensive foreign mineral water imported specially for him at great cost to the water company.

Not quite like that, Ozt, but very similar. It was more the Mateus shape with the loop as per your example. I think Mateus and Vinho Verde came from the same vineyard (or chemical works).

Seeing the bottle of Mateus reminded me of its sister, Vinho Verde. This was in a pale greenish colour bottle, the same shape as Mateus but had a loop handle at the base of the neck. The wine itself was a very pale green and tasted absolutely awful - a bit like I imagined battery acid would taste. But still, Vinho Verde had "class"!?!?! much more so than Mateus. I went in an offie once (on Hucknall High St.) and asked if they sold Mateus. The response was "Of course we do, we've got Bryant & Mays and Swans."

I worked at hatra* (Hosiery & Allied Trades Research Association) from 1964 to 1974 doing research into all the kinds of things mentioned previously in this thread. I remember the names of (almost) all the knitwear companies and the dyers & finishers and had contact with them all. The premises are now used by Page & Kirk (accountants) but I can't imagine why an accountancy firm would need such a large workspace. *the lower case is deliberate.

I've just been for lunch in the old town in Nice and thought I'd have a wander around (which is not quite as easy for me as it is for some, being stuck in a wheelchair) but, anyway, that's beside the point. I came across a secondhand bookshop and in the window, I saw a quite splendid copy of Industrial Archaeology of the East Midlands by David Smith, pub 1965. Complete with dust jacket and library type cover it was priced at €5 (a bit less than £5). The original price was 45/-. I bought it. I have seen the book before, a very long time ago and I think it's very fortuitous that

Our number was 3420 with a dialling code 35 (Hucknall). I happened too often that people would use the Mansfield dialling code (dunno what that was) but our number with that dialling code then became the number for Rampton hospital.

trogg, thanks for the info

Rats and mice (and rabbits, hares and squirrels) are endemic here - which is one reason I keep two Norfolk terriers. Pretty and cuddly as they may be, they are also extremely efficient killers of vermin. I loan my dogs out to the neighbourhood to keep the rodents in check - not the squirrels, though, the dogs haven't learned how to climb trees yet but they do try. If you want to use terriers for vermin control, it is better to have two as they work best in pairs.

I recall Imps being in a small cardboard carton. Melloids in a tin. The tin had an inner lid with a small hole in it to enable one Melloid at a time to be shaken out.

The " Banana flavoured ice cream with a chunk of toffee inside" reminded me of Palm Toffee: slabs of very chewy toffee (tuffy) usually presented as a sandwich with a different flavour in the middle layer. My favourite was banana with a caramel outer. I think I had this before I'd ever seen a real banana. Choc Stix, each the length of the sweet jat they were in, 3d each. Black Jacks (there was a fruit equivalent but I can't remember what they were called). 4 for a penny. Don't remember the price of Palm Toffee. Edit - I think the fruit equivalent of Black Jacks was called Fr

My dad would keep the soot from chimney sweeping and use it, mixed with soil, for growing celery. Our house had the best celery of anywhere. One thing I remember you must not do is to use fresh soot - it has to be at least a year old otherwise it's corrosive.

Victory V's were banned in the 1970's (ish) as they contained a very tiny amount of chloroform. This was present to give the characteristic "kick" in the flavour of the lozenge and without it, they became just ordinary liquorice sweets and they were no longer interesting. Several other things contained chloroform in those days such as Throaties and Fisherman's Friends and it was also used as a sweetening agent in a number of brands of toothpaste. I know this because I was working on toothpaste flavours at the time. The amount of chloroform necessary to be noticeable was extremel

Slightly off-topic but, in my cart/trolley making days, I had acquired a set of wheels, just needed the box to go on top. Off I go to the local Co-op (the one that was on the corner of the High St and Station Rd, Hucknall) and asked the girl behind the counter if they had any orange boxes (the carts being known then as orange box carts). "No" was her reply "but we've got the ordinary brown ones."