Well now...where to start?
As this is my first real attempt at blogging, I hope you'll forgive any errors I make - all this 'pooter stuff frankly gives me the willies.
The decision to start blogging has been rattling around in my mind for a while now, only held back by my ability to write anything half way decent that anybody might enjoy reading, and the belief that little happens in my life of any real note. However this was given a push by Donna (Life of a Stranger) after I'd told her about a character I knew in my past during her recent visit with me. True her hilarity may have been aided by a pint or two of cider, but there you go. So without further ado - I give you "Little Murph"
Way back when, in the latish seventies, a group of us curiously confused and oriented friends used to frequent a pub in Ealing called the Three Pigeons. We knew it as the "Three Pigs" , our purpose behind visiting this regular den of iniquity was to listen to good old Rythm and Blues being played by "Colin Tozer and the Toe Rags". Before the central figure of this tale is brought in to the story, I think a description of the pub might be in order so as to set the scene so to speak.
Imagine if you will, a street off a high street with on one side a long frontage of a slightly aged department store that has seen better days (although like a Grand Dowager still retaining an old fashioned dignity) and on the other an assortment of small shops, a bomb site and wedged between the hoardings of that bomb site and a gentlemen's outfitters...the Three Pigs. I use the term wedged because as you walk into this pub, you realise two things - one is should carpet actually be sticky ?... and the other is that the place is actually somewhat triangular - there are other things about the place which you notice after getting a drink, but you'd rather not have - so, there we have the place.
We would arrive at about seven or so and the band would start playing at between eight or nine. During all this time people would be coming or going, but in a small and gloomy corner (well gloomier then the rest of the place any how) would be "Little Murph" hunched up over a pint of Guinness. At this point little is obvious except that he is almost totally bald - only a sparse ring of hair around the edge of his scalp - he has been here some time and also that he is obviously Irish. It's not until the musicians begin bringing in their equipment setting up and tuning instruments starts that Murph begins to awake - his head lifts,he looks around then he rises unsteadilly and works his way from behind the table at which he was sitting. As he works his way to the bar for another pint of the black stuff... you realise that Little Murph is not very tall,or rather he is incredibly small - erm.. no that's not right either - he's more like something that has been washed at 90 degrees when it should have been at 40 on the special fabrics setting, his creased,rumpled and flthy trenchcoat (I assume it was a trenchcoat - on him it was impossible to say) trailing on the floor like a gown's train.He now dissapears into the throng at the bar - where he passes from sight.
Later in the evening...the band is playing, people are jiving about (admittedly carefully due to the stage being at the narrow end of the pub) when suddenly Little Murph erupts into sight again , his eyes by now sparkling with a maniacal glee... unfortunately the light also sparkles on Little Murph and the full effect is revealed. Gyrating like a dervish amongst us is what appears to be a partially shaved orang-utan/human cross breed, the tails of his coat flying about him , his lips part to reveal a distressing lack of teeth and a stream of what you suppose might conceivably be communication is directed in your general direction, he whirls back to the bar and dissapears again. Slightly shaken you continue enjoying the music when suddenly there is a familiar simian presence, only this time he appears to be taller. Is he saying something again? Yes, he is asking to join us in a drink....we sit down and miraculously from under his coat he draws a tray of drinks. We sit and talk with Murph for a while, or rather he talks and we understand about one word in seven.... he doesn't seem to mind, we drink some more and then the music finishes, the bell rings and it's time to go. Murph now stands,we do too and realise that he's now up to our shoulders, he waves his coat sleeve at us (he wes never seen without that coat on) and is gone. " How does he do that height thing?" one of us asks the barman who looks back with a twinkle in his eye,before replying in a wonderful Irish brogue "Well now.... you'll be knowing those hovercraft machines does ye? Well with aul that Guinness an' him with his coat an' aul........"
Aaaaah , happy days they were
The decision to start blogging has been rattling around in my mind for a while now, only held back by my ability to write anything half way decent that anybody might enjoy reading, and the belief that little happens in my life of any real note. However this was given a push by Donna (Life of a Stranger) after I'd told her about a character I knew in my past during her recent visit with me. True her hilarity may have been aided by a pint or two of cider, but there you go. So without further ado - I give you "Little Murph"
Way back when, in the latish seventies, a group of us curiously confused and oriented friends used to frequent a pub in Ealing called the Three Pigeons. We knew it as the "Three Pigs" , our purpose behind visiting this regular den of iniquity was to listen to good old Rythm and Blues being played by "Colin Tozer and the Toe Rags". Before the central figure of this tale is brought in to the story, I think a description of the pub might be in order so as to set the scene so to speak.
Imagine if you will, a street off a high street with on one side a long frontage of a slightly aged department store that has seen better days (although like a Grand Dowager still retaining an old fashioned dignity) and on the other an assortment of small shops, a bomb site and wedged between the hoardings of that bomb site and a gentlemen's outfitters...the Three Pigs. I use the term wedged because as you walk into this pub, you realise two things - one is should carpet actually be sticky ?... and the other is that the place is actually somewhat triangular - there are other things about the place which you notice after getting a drink, but you'd rather not have - so, there we have the place.
We would arrive at about seven or so and the band would start playing at between eight or nine. During all this time people would be coming or going, but in a small and gloomy corner (well gloomier then the rest of the place any how) would be "Little Murph" hunched up over a pint of Guinness. At this point little is obvious except that he is almost totally bald - only a sparse ring of hair around the edge of his scalp - he has been here some time and also that he is obviously Irish. It's not until the musicians begin bringing in their equipment setting up and tuning instruments starts that Murph begins to awake - his head lifts,he looks around then he rises unsteadilly and works his way from behind the table at which he was sitting. As he works his way to the bar for another pint of the black stuff... you realise that Little Murph is not very tall,or rather he is incredibly small - erm.. no that's not right either - he's more like something that has been washed at 90 degrees when it should have been at 40 on the special fabrics setting, his creased,rumpled and flthy trenchcoat (I assume it was a trenchcoat - on him it was impossible to say) trailing on the floor like a gown's train.He now dissapears into the throng at the bar - where he passes from sight.
Later in the evening...the band is playing, people are jiving about (admittedly carefully due to the stage being at the narrow end of the pub) when suddenly Little Murph erupts into sight again , his eyes by now sparkling with a maniacal glee... unfortunately the light also sparkles on Little Murph and the full effect is revealed. Gyrating like a dervish amongst us is what appears to be a partially shaved orang-utan/human cross breed, the tails of his coat flying about him , his lips part to reveal a distressing lack of teeth and a stream of what you suppose might conceivably be communication is directed in your general direction, he whirls back to the bar and dissapears again. Slightly shaken you continue enjoying the music when suddenly there is a familiar simian presence, only this time he appears to be taller. Is he saying something again? Yes, he is asking to join us in a drink....we sit down and miraculously from under his coat he draws a tray of drinks. We sit and talk with Murph for a while, or rather he talks and we understand about one word in seven.... he doesn't seem to mind, we drink some more and then the music finishes, the bell rings and it's time to go. Murph now stands,we do too and realise that he's now up to our shoulders, he waves his coat sleeve at us (he wes never seen without that coat on) and is gone. " How does he do that height thing?" one of us asks the barman who looks back with a twinkle in his eye,before replying in a wonderful Irish brogue "Well now.... you'll be knowing those hovercraft machines does ye? Well with aul that Guinness an' him with his coat an' aul........"
Aaaaah , happy days they were
posted by Kat Maul at 3:15 PM
2 Comments:
I went there in '79(ish) I think. There was a band (I think). I was extremely drunk (I know). I went there several times but the memory is very hazy. What happened to Murph?
Hiya Dinners :-) ..... no one knows, Murph seems to have moved on. I think he was really an off duty Leprechaun.It's as good a theory as any. I don't think anybody was sober in the Three Pigs, anyway not by closing time they weren't - I know I never was!
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