Sheep as a lamb, Sheep as a lamb
When I was a lad we didn’t have alcohol in our house. My dad was not a big drinker, the most he ever touched was about three pints on a Sunday afternoon, when he met up with his brothers at my nans house. My mum was teetotal and so it wasn’t like the continent where kids have a glass of something with the meal, it was just absent.
It was the same at my nans, so whenever there was a family ‘do’, dad and the uncles would get ‘jars out’ from the pub, which happened to be the ‘cuckoo’ in Bootle.
Jars out would consist of jugs of draught ,crates of double diamond and a few dozen bottles of stout.
And so it was on the occasion of my cousins christening that I had my first taste of the evil alcohol. The whole family was there, uncles, aunties, cousins, brothers, wives, second cousins – there must have been a hundred people in that house and garden, and me and my cousin John, aged about ten, were sneaking along behind the chairs hunting for half bottles of double diamond.
I wasn’t even looking for a half bottle. Any old dreg was good enough, provided it didn’t have a ciggy end in it, and it tasted fantasic. I still remember the taste today. They never made beer so tasty ever since than those few swigs of double diamond.
Of course, the adults knew what we were up to and they made a game of it, loudly proclaiming that the cat had been at their ale, which led to a lot of meowing and scratching of the chair legs. Then nan decided enough was enough and came in , chased us out and promised us ‘the flat or the round’ if we ventured back indoors.
…
A few years passed by, and I was in senior school, in a ‘gang’ and we used to spend our long dinner breaks (90 minutes in those days) looking for adventures or some excitement at least.
We used to bunk out of school dinners and spend our two bob in the chippy or the kiosk, and one of the lads, phil, was always bumming money for ‘loosies’,(single cigarettes).
One day we were up in Ford, near the canal and we decided to pop into the Liverpool arms, because they had a little off licence that sold crisps and pop and loosies. We waited for a few minutes then banged on the counter but nobody came. We shouted SHOP and looked through the door into the bar…nothing. Then phil leaned over the counter and took a loosie. He jumped back down and stood there , all inoccent. We were all expecting someone to burst in and arrest us for nicking a ciggy, but no one appeared. Phil looked around, then he said, ‘Sheep as a lamb’ and got over the counter, put the loosie back and took a packet of ten woodbines. Steve, the gang leader said Sheep as a lamb and piled over the counter and grabbed a few bottles of ale. I got four bottles of cherry B and stuck them up the sleeves of my blazer. Phil said 'Sheep as a lamb' again and put the ten back and took a packet of twenty.
Finding somewhere to swig the evidence was tricky. The canal bank was too public, under the bridge stank of wee, so we ended up back at my place in the back garden.
We never made it back to school that afternoon and one of the lads who was lounging on top of the shed shouted ‘here’s yer mum’ so we scattered up the street, through the flats and did a runner in the opposite direction.
Later on, at tea time, my mum was fuming. She had a bin full of empties and she said if she ever got her hands on the swines who had thrown their empties into our garden she would leather them.
I kept my gob shut and beat a hasty
When I was a lad we didn’t have alcohol in our house. My dad was not a big drinker, the most he ever touched was about three pints on a Sunday afternoon, when he met up with his brothers at my nans house. My mum was teetotal and so it wasn’t like the continent where kids have a glass of something with the meal, it was just absent.
It was the same at my nans, so whenever there was a family ‘do’, dad and the uncles would get ‘jars out’ from the pub, which happened to be the ‘cuckoo’ in Bootle.
Jars out would consist of jugs of draught ,crates of double diamond and a few dozen bottles of stout.
And so it was on the occasion of my cousins christening that I had my first taste of the evil alcohol. The whole family was there, uncles, aunties, cousins, brothers, wives, second cousins – there must have been a hundred people in that house and garden, and me and my cousin John, aged about ten, were sneaking along behind the chairs hunting for half bottles of double diamond.
I wasn’t even looking for a half bottle. Any old dreg was good enough, provided it didn’t have a ciggy end in it, and it tasted fantasic. I still remember the taste today. They never made beer so tasty ever since than those few swigs of double diamond.
Of course, the adults knew what we were up to and they made a game of it, loudly proclaiming that the cat had been at their ale, which led to a lot of meowing and scratching of the chair legs. Then nan decided enough was enough and came in , chased us out and promised us ‘the flat or the round’ if we ventured back indoors.
…
A few years passed by, and I was in senior school, in a ‘gang’ and we used to spend our long dinner breaks (90 minutes in those days) looking for adventures or some excitement at least.
We used to bunk out of school dinners and spend our two bob in the chippy or the kiosk, and one of the lads, phil, was always bumming money for ‘loosies’,(single cigarettes).
One day we were up in Ford, near the canal and we decided to pop into the Liverpool arms, because they had a little off licence that sold crisps and pop and loosies. We waited for a few minutes then banged on the counter but nobody came. We shouted SHOP and looked through the door into the bar…nothing. Then phil leaned over the counter and took a loosie. He jumped back down and stood there , all inoccent. We were all expecting someone to burst in and arrest us for nicking a ciggy, but no one appeared. Phil looked around, then he said, ‘Sheep as a lamb’ and got over the counter, put the loosie back and took a packet of ten woodbines. Steve, the gang leader said Sheep as a lamb and piled over the counter and grabbed a few bottles of ale. I got four bottles of cherry B and stuck them up the sleeves of my blazer. Phil said 'Sheep as a lamb' again and put the ten back and took a packet of twenty.
Finding somewhere to swig the evidence was tricky. The canal bank was too public, under the bridge stank of wee, so we ended up back at my place in the back garden.
We never made it back to school that afternoon and one of the lads who was lounging on top of the shed shouted ‘here’s yer mum’ so we scattered up the street, through the flats and did a runner in the opposite direction.
Later on, at tea time, my mum was fuming. She had a bin full of empties and she said if she ever got her hands on the swines who had thrown their empties into our garden she would leather them.
I kept my gob shut and beat a hasty
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