BBS (before betting shops) I worked in the 'credit office' owned by Albert Cook and Son. Manning one of the eight phones, I took the client's bets and later worked them out, along with nine other members of the office.
Recently Google told me that this old building was now a newsagents. I telephoned them and learned that when Albert Cook senior died they bought the premises from his estate. I felt sad about this as I'd hope the business was still operating under Albert Cook junior. However, I asked the lady on the phone if she knew how I could contact young Mr. Cook only to learn that he too had died. I was really sad now.
This kind lady then said she could give me the phone number of his son, whom I'd met a few times when he was a schoolboy. So I managed to speak to him on the telephone. He told me his Dad had died a few years ago of a stomach problem. I asked if I could phone his Mum but he just said that she lives alone in Bournemouth, declining my request for the phone number. I quite understood and said cheerio to him.
This all reminded me of a day way back in 1960-ish when the 'Sausage Incident' occurred, involving the now deceased Mr. Cook senior (my boss) and his son, now deceased. I wish now that I'd not felt the urge to backtrack to those days but that's life. The link to the 1960 incident is below.
http://bit.ly/1bv0mrW
I no longer eat sausages, unless they're veggie ones.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
18 comments:
Love the original story, sad though it is that you weren't able to re-connect with those you knew. You've led an interesting life Philip, and it's still going on! Veggie sausages - good man *beams*. X
I did follow the link back to read about events from their beginnings, Philip, and I enjoyed your story very much. You appear to have led an interesting life, in more ways than one.
By the way, meat sausages are the only sausages in my "book."
Thanks Michelle. Yep, I've been around a bit, an itinerant one could say. Best memories: RAF. Best living place: Scottish Borders. Best job: Now - house-husband looking after my missus who did her share for 40 years of our 58 years together.
Hi Mr USA, Fram Actual. Your blog name is something I'd like to know about. Or is it something you don't discuss, or a journalistic secret? Just a tad intrigued, dat's all.
Those were different days back then, honourable ones...
That's a truism Shadow, and no mistake. Thanks for dropping by.
Happy to oblige on your question, Philip. I have mentioned the reason for the name a time or two in past posts.
"Fram" was the name of the ship Fridtjof Nansen intentionally allowed to be frozen into the polar ice pack in an attempt to reach the North Pole in 1893-94-95. The word means "forward" in Norwegian. Other Arctic and Antarctic explorers, including Roald Amundsen, used the ship, as well. I named a river raft I built as a young boy "Fram" -- you know how boys are -- and, since then, a few other water vessels I have owned. I decided I would call myself Fram when I began my blog because it was part of a new, forward-looking chapter in my life, and I wanted to see where it might lead.
Use of the word "Actual" comes from Marine Corps radio specifications when exact designations are not assigned. For instance, calling for or responding as "Dog Actual" means the actual commander of Dog Company is speaking; calling for or responding as "Dog Interrogatory" means the Dog Company radio man or some other subordinate is on the air.
Thanks so much for the blog name Fram. You probably hark back to those earlier days with a deal of pride and nostalgia.
I will close with some standard terms from the RAF:
Roger, Wilco and out.
You don't eat meat. All Consuming will only love you more as she's a vegan. I'm a pescatarian. It sounds like a religion, but it simply means that I'm a vegetarian around everything but fish. I became a vegetarian around 1980, and for years, I didn't eat fish, but one winter I was sick a lot and craved it, so I decided I needed it. I don't miss meat or fowl though.
Snowy, we shied away from meat products a while back but we do eat a lot of fish. Fish and chips is, after all, almost the national dish in the UK. Always have a cooked brekkie, usually egg, mushrooms and tomatoes. Poached, scrambled, fried or an omelette - depends on how I feel. Sometimes it'll be beans on toast, which I LOVE, but my Pat is less keen. I particularly enjoy curried beans but Pat abhors them.
Well. I was reading that story, trying to figure out a connection between sausages, greyhound racing, and you not eating meat sausages anymore. You had me convinced that someone had been making sausages out of the losing dogs! (Not that there would be much meat on a greyhound, come to think of it.)
A real sparkling comment lol.
Albert Cook sounds like a wonderful man. I suspect his son got a 'flea in his ear' too.
Sausages are known to the uncouth here as 'surprise bags' or S'prise bags. And what is in them could well be an unpleasant surprise. No snossages here either. Even vegie ones.
Sad that you couldn't connect with them, but lovely memories to have.
Thanks EC.
Looking to yesteryear is what many of us do as the years pile up and we wonder how the world has treated those we knew way back when. Hope you are doing as well as possible.
The older we get, the more there is to look back on and see those who are no more. And someday, it will be us. I don't want to go into history for I'd leave no one to remember me.
Thanks for popping in Dana. If I knew'd you were a-coming I'da banked a cake. Good job you didn't let me know 'cos my cakes are inedible.
I've forgotten scores of people I once knew. At times I'm reminded of some when sleeping; a dream just insists that I remember them. Strange, odd even, but then it's the way I am - odd. :-)
I just dropped by to say hi, and to see if I had missed any new posts.
Thanks Snowy. I tend to read more than write posts lately. Cheers, Phil
Post a Comment