Every time she saw a pub like this, she found part of her drifting back to the early eighties. We all knew this pub, there was one near you, and you've been there, often. It's the whitewashed one on the bend of the old 'A' road, the Nags Head, the Royal Oak, The White Hart, never a modern name. There's a pasture behind it with a couple of old horses, the beer garden is under a couple of oaks, with a swing or two alongside, and the car park always seems to have the same Ford Cortina and Austin Princess parked in it.
Those summer afternoons, dizzy with swinging and fizzy with R Whites lemonade. The tables sticky with beer slops and that one overturned pint pot with a wasp in it. Fingers dusty with salt from the peanuts or greasy from the crisps, the ground littered with little blue sachets from the salt and matches and dog ends. The air full of those smells which talk of adventure to us townies, either the dusty, sweet, dry air near a corn field, or the pungent manure hum, or simply the sweat of the horses, or the acrid taste of an oast house. Mum in a floral print dress, dad without a tie and sleeves rolled up, big brother in brown corduroy pants and paisly shirt.
For Bunty those afternoons also meant Grandad. He'd be sat there, pin stripes on his cotton shirt, braces, flat cap, pipe. He'd be sat there, warm smiling eyes, silly stories, and a couple of shillings extra pocket money. Gramma had moved on years ago. After a pint or two Bunty would help grandad carry the flowers down the bridal path which lead across the canal to the parish church half a mile away.
The bridal path met the B road at the corner of the churchyard where a rickety lych gate gave admittance through an ivy covered stone wall. The sandy gravel path led past a couple of impressive marble headstone to the church, and then forked providing passage around the Norman structure to a quiet grave yard shaded by apple trees. There they talk to Gramma for a while tidying the grave. Buntys job was to get the trowel and watering can from the shed at the back corner, while giving Grandad a few private minutes, then the two of them would get busy, pulling weeds, and replacing last weeks flowers. They would only be there half an hour, but Grammas grave was the tidiest there, looking much as it did when first laid there 10 years earlier.
You just can't trust modern technology. I was testing the auto posting from Google Docs to Blogger, and was sending this to my online twin blog. It somehow ended up here.
The above is just a few paragraphs writing exercise. I have a new character I want to work into a series of stories. Since she is a mid 30's English gal I have plenty I could write about her. Who knows what will happen.
There is also a play area for the kids, as if acres of gopher holes to fall into wasn't enough fun. This is the sort of play structure that's popular in a regional park, a whale breaking out of the Pacific.
That's right, the headlights are regular 2x2 slopes, turned so their studs are to the front. They make good headlights like that. The internal cylinder looks like a lens element.
Keen observers will notice the nose is on at 45deg to the main body on the shuttles.
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