The plumber finished two days of work today disem-bowling my bathroom of anything that resembled a piece of bathroom furniture. So, with my car full with one bath, one toilet & cistern , one sink & pedestal and several chunks of wood that made up the bath panels I headed of to my buddies at the local tip, oops sorry I mean the local recycling centre.
Being aware that they like to charge you every time you take something to be 'recycled' if it is anything more than a Nat's wardrobe I planned my trip with cunning. I chose lunchtime, figuring that there would only be one person on duty, then I filled the bathtub with the half tonne of wood that came out of the bathroom (mainly bath panel and flooring). The idea being that I would pull up unnoticed next to the 'Timber Bin' which is the furthest away from the 'teams' office and speedily off load my mini forest. Then I would take the old carpet and dump it in the 'un-recyclable bin' then off loading the bath and checking where one puts a bath.
Well the first part of the plan went well as I was unnoticed, but a man with a bath was worthy of being checked out and they looked in my car to see a bog and a sink. He took the obligatory sharp intake of breath (I knew exactly where we were going with this after the tour of tips a few months back),
"There'll be a charge for that lot I'm afraid" he informed me"
"Oh," I naively said adding "But I've got no money" I lied.
"Well I can take one thing but you will have to spread the others over the next few weeks" He clarified.
Now I thought this might happen which is why I made sure the biggest, most awkward thing was out of the car (the bath) and we agreed that I could dispose of that. This left me with the Bog & cistern for next week and the sink & pedestal for the week after. Yer, as if! Over the next few days I shall alternate cars until it is all gone, but how ridiculous that in the name of being green the Recycling centre itself causes me to spend 3 times the amount on petrol only to end up having to recycle the items anyway! Lets not get bogged down with that as it just leaves a sinking feeling....
So having returned from that sortie I then set about removing the 70's style tiles from the bathroom walls. I had already spent an hour removing tiles from a square metre in the bedroom, which I began to wonder if they had been affixed with the same glue that NASA famously used on their space shuttle, actually that is not appropriate as some of their tiles actually managed to work loose! It was a very hot day and my safety goggles were filling up with sweat, I felt that I would have a fish swimming past infront of my eyes at any minuet!
Anyway, I mention the 70's style tiles, well they were nothing to the hideous 60's purple wall paint behind that, honestly there are not many colours that make you feel actually nauseous but this is one of them. The 70's guess was backed up by the discovery of an old Daily Mail newspaper that the plumber found screwed up in a cavernous hole in the wall, frankly it served no purpose other than being a literal time-capsule. As he gave it to me he said he could tell it was from the seventies as everyone is on strike. He himself was just 1 year old when this paper was printed, God that made me feel old!
Jack Jones was demanding an increase in pensions& the Union of Agriculture and Allied Workers were bemoaning the fact that the minimum wage for an Agricultural worker was just £39 a week. Well frankly my dear they were on a good wedge, because I can remember my first years full time employment weekly wage was just £19 a week and that was in 1978.
A Datsun Laurel Six is advertised at just £3,500 including the state of the art 'executive features' "push button radio with stereo auto-change cassette player, reclining front seats with adjustable head restraints, electric clock with sweep second hand, illuminated ignition switch, automatic reversing lights, side indicator repeaters, cigar lighter, heated rear window an lots more! Whilst the price included the special car tax (whatever that was) and the VAT it DID NOT include seat belts which were an extra luxury if you wanted them.
Billie Jean was entering Wimbledon again at the age of 33. The Queen was preparing for her Jubilee. I remember she was touring the country to be seen by all her 'subjects'. Caught up in the Royal frenzy I took my little Instamatic camera and waited patiently along with hundreds of others on the side of the road on her planned route in Solihull.
Eventually her car appeared and I got ready to take the photo. It got nearer and nearer whilst the anticipation became greater and greater. No pressure, I can do this. Firstly the nose of the Bentley appeared, hold off, not yet....
Then the driver appeared, wait..... Then a window appeared, NOW! Snap, snap, snap.
I duly sent the film way and waited the two weeks or so for them to be processed and returned. Picking them up from the doormat I hurriedly opened the envelope to see my pictures of our Queen, My Sovereign, Her Majesty and what did I get? One empty window, one with a portion of a white glove in it and one with the back of the Bentley disappearing stage left! Humphhh,
An advert for "PEER The Worlds First cigarette with Cytrl tobacco substitute" adorns the TV guide page. There was a cigarette that went down the metaphoric pan!
Radio 1 line up was Colin Berry, Noel Edmonds, Tony Blackburn, Paul Burnett, Diddy David Hamilton, D.L.T. (Dave Lee Travis) and John Peel.
Radio2 had Brian Matthew, Pete Murray, Jimmy Young and John Dunn.
Radio 4, well it hasn't really changed at all, if you want to know what was on then just pick up the paper today!
Rod Stewart was at No.1 with "I don't want to talk about it" and with the 70's being the 70's you had the bizarre dichotomy of Kermit being "Halfway down the stairs" at No.5 whilst at No.6 The Sex Pistols were screaming "God Save The Queen".
Still what was on TV then?
Firstly remember there were ONLY THREE CHANNELS, that was your lot mate and the earliest that they started was at 6:40am and even then that was with bearded scruffy men on Open University on BOTH BBC1 & BBC2!
Well John Noakes was still doing his thing on Blue Peter with Peter & Lesley, Play School, Scooby Doo, Rainbow & the painfully risqué Captain Pugwash.
Crossroads was the only Soap and both Thunderbirds and Little House On the Prairie were still going strong. The best films you could hope for were an Abbott & Costello in the foreign Legion (1950) or John Wayne as The Magnificent Showman (1964).
Finally there was the inevitable Closedown just before midnight (so we all knew that Nanny State says it's time for bed) and we all stood up and saluted as God Save The Queen was played religiously, then off the picture went with only a pinprick of light in the centre of the screen and a high pitched noise for the next 10 minutes to remind you to turn your set off as they had all gone home. Sometimes, if you were lucky, they would squeeze in a 2 minute Public Information film warning you of the hazards of chip pan fires or falling asleep whilst smoking. A bit of a waist of time as most of those people were probably already in the land of nod and the fire engines were rushing to the scene as they spoke, whilst the rest of us just had night mares. Thanks a bunch for that!
Ah, those were the days.
So my time capsule in the wall has nothing more than a Newspaper dated June 9th 1977, no gadgets of the day or toys of the moment. Nor does it have any messages for those that found it, but it does and has prompted memories of a very specific time when the newspaper was crunched up by a dodgy plumber to semi fill a hole some 34 years ago.
And the sad part is that I know, in some box, somewhere in this house I have a souvenir newspaper celebrating that Silver Jubilee along with a couple of unopened bottles of Silver Jubilee Beer and for the life of me I don't know why I keep them.
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