spogga, the story so far

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

57 years and 1 day ago I was thrust into a cold uncaring world covered in blood,mucus and other bits of debris.
The midwife picked me up, tenderly wiped my tiny face and uttered those immortal words “Fucking hell he is one ugly bastard” she then punched my dad straight in the nuts before throwing me towards my mother and running screaming from the delivery room.

Fast forward to age 6 or 7.
I discover books, real books with writing in them, I’m hooked.
A whole new world opens up to me, I spend hours just reading and searching for words I don’t understand in the dictionary.
I discover that England isn’t the only country on Earth, I’m further hooked on geography.
I find that America was once ruled by the UK, I’m hooked on history.
I realise after a short time than geography and history are close allies, I’m well and truly hooked on literature of all kinds, I will read most anything.

Fast forward to age 13.
I fall in love…with Lorraine Shenton.
Despite her deformities [which I later learn are called breasts] I love Lorraine. We swear undying devotion to each other, we go for long walks in the country lanes, we go swimming together, we go everywhere together…we are in love people.

All good things must come to an end,we fall out of love when she discovers that I find her best friends ‘deformities’ are softer,bigger and much more accessable than Lorraines.
She falls out with her best friend [Margaret Flood] but I don’t care I’m in love again and this time it’s forever.
…and it was if you count forever as about 3 months.

At school I’m good at English, History, Geog, Math and falling in love…especially with breasts.
I represent the school at athletics and win a few awards for running and swimming and gymnastics, my sights are firmly fixed on future Olympic Championships.
I break a leg, my hopes are dashed, my life is a dark and meaningless void whilst I am in plaster…I return to my first love, books.
I discover chess, I am fascinated by the intricate patterns that are woven on a chess board, the thrust and counter attack.
I become quite a decent player and am picked to play for the school on board 4.

Fast forward to age 15.
I am now playing on board 1 and am the school chess captain.
At age 16 once again my world comes crashing down about me, I am beaten in the final of the Inter Schools Chess Congress by a youngster of 14.

At age 16 I leave school and go forth to earn a living in the outside world.
I did not want to leave school, I enjoyed my schooling, I wanted to go on to college and from there to Uni but my family were a poor family, they needed the money I would bring in.
We were so poor that until I was 8 I thought knives and forks were jewels and that only royalty ate meat.

[colour=red] This narrative takes me to the age of 16, if the dopers give consent I will continue, if not, ces’t la vie. [/colour]

It gets better I promise you.

2

…and why did the colour gumsmack not work?

3

I know not, dear spogga. The codes are mysterious and will not reveal themselves to me…
Awaiting your next installment.

4

Ah my dear spider I am afraid that I will have to wait until the rest of the Dopers give permission for me to carry on.

Thanks anyway.

5

Please continue

6

All of the rest of the Dopers? That could take a while. But FWIW, and to get in on the ground floor, you’ve got my request to continue the narrative.

7

Oh for fucks sake Spogga, just get on with it will you?

:smiley:

8

I think I know why the colour gumsmack [colour=blue] did not work[/colour] but if I’m wrong :smack:

I will contine this fascinating saga as soon as enough members of the SDMB consider it worthy.

9

Please continue.

10

It’s an American message board and its creators never thought to recognize the English spelling of “colour”.

[color=red]
[color=blue]

Do continue.

11

Another vote for you to continue.

12

OK here we go.

When I left school jobs were pretty easy to get and I began work with the National Coal Board as an office junior, a job which bored me shitless, I stuck it out for almost 2 years then along with a pal of mine we decided to say our goodbyes to our vast horde of female admirers and join the Army.

Good move this.
Upon hearing this news my current g/f decided to give me a parting gift and one balmy evening behind the back of Ogburns Farm barn I broke my duck!!
I did it…with gusto and frenzied thrusting.
I then did it again, then summoning up all my energy I greedily went in for thirds…I failed miserably.

Fast forward to Catterick Camp.
I was an ‘erk’ the lowest of the low, something less than human, a mere private.
This was all to change very quickly.
We took aptitude tests, Brian [my pal] was deemed fit to stay in the infantry as a common or garden footslogger whilst yours truly was seconded to the RAF to be trained as a Special Operator.

Off to Richmond RAF base I was shunted not having the faintest idea of what a Special Operators duties were.
I almost shat myself when it was explained to me that it involved learning Morse Code and frigging PARACHUTE drops.
In the event of hostilities I was to be dropped behind enemy lines armed with a bleeding transmitter.
Well whoopee!!! and thank you God.
However I did my 'chute training and really enjoyed it [apart from the first major drop from a DC3 from 2000 feet]
I did 11 drops in total and then was promoted to the dizzy rank of corporal…3 weeks before my discharge.
A cunning move this 'cos they wanted me to sign on for a further 5 years, I had done 3 and figured it was time to return to the real world and women who needed ‘seeing to’
I politely declined the offer and was duly discharged.

I am now aged 22 and up for it. Fortunately I discover that so were a whole bunch of comely wenches, my seed was scattered haphazardly about Manchester and surrounding areas, I fall in love so many times I sometimes forget who the hell I’m in love with. I even called one girl Ann [her name was Susan] for some reason she broke off with me the day after.
I stagger out of a boozer one night and meet my soon to be wife, Joan.
It was most certainly love at first sight, at least for me, she thought I was a drunken lout [which I probably was]

Fast forward to Sep 17th 1968

We are married, Joan is up the duff and on March 1 my one and only sprog is brought into the fray. I am 22 and have a family and I’m the happiest man on God’s good earth.
We don’t as yet have our own home, we live in rented accomodation but I am earning good money working for a brewery company.
I am also studying at the Manchester College of Commerce and working on a Sat and Sun at a newsagents.
I am determined that my lady will have her own home and bloody quickly at that.

Fast Forward 3 years.
We move into our first home. Nothing much but it’s all ours and we are both as happy as pigs in shit.
I have passed my exams to become an engineer, commerce I found boring and as engineering was on the up I figured go for it.
To be Cont’d (maybe, all depends on you lot) :slight_smile:

13

Yep, keep going.

14

Do continue…

15

dont stop

16

How did you meet Joan, you staggered out the pub and met your soon-to-be wife . . . ?

(the first part I can do, the second I’ve never managed)

17

I vote for continuance.

18

do continue.

19

Back by request.

OK so we have our first home, it’s all ours and everything in the garden [well back yard] is rosy

No it bloody well isn’t, not by a long shot.Being naive young people both Joan and myself had failed to allow for expenditure which whilst living in rented accomodation we had not had to worry about.
Rates,Home Insurance,House repairs and so on, pretty soon we found ourselves in deep shit financially.
At first I never told Joan of the problems because I loved her so much I didn’t want to worry her. She wasn’t a stupid woman and one evening she asked straight out if we were in a mess and of course I had to fess up.
We both knew that to ignore shitty letters from utility companies,estate agents and the like did not make them vanish and so I made an appointment to see the manager of our building society, a Mr Bernard H. Robinson.
I laid my cards on the table and asked if there was any possibilty of an extension to our mortgage in terms of years.
This GENTLEMAN asked me if we had any other problems and when I told him yes he told me to call back later that day with all the details.
I walked out of the society after our 2nd meeting in an absolute daze.
Not only had Mr Robinson granted a 5 year extension he had suspended our payments for 12 months and given us a loan of £500 which in those days was a lot of money.
I shall never forget the kindness of that man and his understanding of the problems that a young couple face in their early married days.

Fast Forward to 1974
I had been working for what was the best engineering firm around and in the last 2 years I had been promoted to head miller/progress chaser, my salary had increased tremendously, we were back on our feet and debt free, we had also started repaying our mortgage before the 5 years extension kicked in.
Things were on the up.

1977
Lee was 8 years old and I taught him to play chess, within a few short weeks he was beating the pants off me, it got to the stage when he would tell me “I wouldn’t do that if I were you dad” just as I was about to make a move.
Joan was working, we had moved home again and made a tidy profit on the sale of our first house and now lived in a semi-detached in a quite nice suburb of Manchester. We also had a car…and a colour TV set!! also a cat named Scoo.
Yep the spoggas were doing fine

This was also the year we first went abroad on holiday, to Italy [Cattolica]
1981
Disaster
Lee was diagnosed as having Hodgkins Disease [cancer of the lymph glands] but fortunately this was only in its early stages and chemotherapy did the trick although he still has to go to Christie hospital twice yearly for checkups, he is now 34 years old.

1991
After many years with the same engineering firm it went tits up due in no small part to the introduction of CNC machines.
Computerised Numerical Control.
These machines dispensed with the need for skilled man, all you needed was one person to programme and load the cutting tools, press a button and Bingo off it went, did the job in less time than a ferret shits.
Trouble was our company just didn’t have them and customers went elsewhere so redundant we all were, Dec 1991, the whole fucking workforce O-U-T…up the bleeding road without yer shoes Jack.
Oh the pay-off was decent enough but it wasn’t gonna last forever.
I was out of work EXACTLY 4 months and then I became the postman you all know and love.

I’ll be back.

20

carry on