The Old Lady Caff

Sock Monkey had to go to Hatton Garden recently to have a ring repaired. Between 1995 and 1999 I used to work on Saffron Hill which is just around the corner and so I used to know the area really well.

It was strange going back there one lunchtime last week as it brought back loads of good memories. And there was one in particular...

Not long after I started working there I discovered a caff (note not a cafe, this was a proper old London caff) which was run by two old ladies and an old bloke. I christened it "The Old Lady Caff". The old dears, who reminded me of Mortimer Brewster's maiden aunts (but not as jolly) from Arsenic & Old Lace worked on the sandwich counter and he was the cook. You could see him in the kitchen through the serving hatch.

There were also two extremely downtrodden looking waitresses who I can only assume were their granddaughters. Although one day there was only one waitress and we assumed that the other one had tunneled her way out to a better life in Venezuela or somewhere.

I used to go there on Fridays as I had to take my lunch break at 2pm. I liked their roast chicken and chips and would have that every week. My conversation with the waitress was always the same:

Waitress (robotically and a bit dead behind the eyes): "What can I get yew madamm?"

Sock Monkey: "I'd like the chicken and chips please"

Waitress: "Would you like grwayvee wivf that madamm?"

Sock Monkey: "Yes please"

Waitress: "Any brwedd and butter madamm"

Sock Monkey: "No thank you"

She would toddle off and shout my order to the 'chef' through the serving hatch. Soon

afterwards my lunch would arrive and I was always amused that my 'grwayvee" came in a little jug on the side.

Best fun though was when the waitress was away. The old ladies would get in another of their old lady friends to cover for her

and I swear to God that she wore an outfit just like this points right. Bear in mind that this old lady looked about 80 years old and

was about 4 foot 10 so it looked somewhat...odd.

In fact, this advert reminds me of them.

I started taking my friends there and they thought it was as weirdly entertaining as I did. Except Shelly. She came once and wailed, "Its not funny! Its just dirty in here!"

They had a bar upstairs. Not an actual bar but one of these:

I remember it being pink though and I'm sure it had a plastic ice bucket in the shape of a pineapple on top of it.

One Christmas they invited me to have a free glass of wine with my lunch because they were "offering it to all our customers today." I decided against it in case it disintegrated my teeth. I just enjoyed the tatty and sad Christmas decorations instead.

The very last time I ever went there I just went in for a takeaway sandwich. One of the old ladies made it for me. She was halfway through when she sneezed into her hands than continued making me my sandwich without washing her hands!! It was then that I decided that this place was possibly as unhygienic as it looked and there were only so many germs I could safely digest.

I looked for the caff last week but couldn't find it. It was 15 years ago so the owners are possibly dead now. They were certainly ancient when I was a regular customer. And I wonder what happened to the downtrodden waitress.

The chicken & chips (wivf grwayvee) were good though.

Don't get out much then love?

Sock Monkey has been nagged by so, so, so many people about the utter lack of updates but I never have the time to write anything! So quickly then before I get spotted...

Last Saturday afternoon Sock Monkey was on the tube. Two women were sitting across from me: one was about 60 years old, the other was about 50. They were discussing in extremely broad Glaswegian accents how to get the Leicester Square. Bear in mind that at this point we were on the northbound Northern Line from Balham (non-London people: its a straight line from Balham to Leicester square on the Northbound Northern Line...)

Eventually the older lady asked the guy beside her, "Excuse me does this train go to Leicester Square?" He looked at her as if she was speaking in Martian so I can only assume that:

a) he didn't speak English
b) he couldn't understand a word she was saying
c) he didn't have a clue where he was going either

Anyway he grunted at her then got off at the next stop. Being extremely helpful I leaned over and said, "You need to change at Kennington and get the other branch of the Northern Line. I'm going there so I'll show you."

See - how helpful am I?

We all got off the train at the correct station, changed trains and continued to Leicester Square. I had noticed that they had theatre tickets for a matinee showing of Jersey Boys. So I asked them, "Do you know where you are going when you get there?"

Of course they didn't so I said that I'd show them where the theatre was. The older lady chuckled to her friend, "All these years I've lived in London and I've never been to Leicester Square."

I beg your pardon?? I looked at her sideways and asked,"How long have you lived in London?"
She laughed and said, "Ages. Since 1968."

Nineteen-sixty-bloomin'-eight????

She has lived in London almost the same amount of time that Sock Monkey has been alive and has never been to somewhere so utterly slap-bang in the middle of the West End that I can't bear to set foot in it!!

Managing not to gasp I asked, "How can you have lived here for over 40 years and have not been to Leicester Square? Where do you live in London?" I was assuming that she would say somewhere so back of beyond that the postcodes are all funny. "Battersea", came her reply.

For those of you who don't know London you could walk from Battersea to Leicester square (if you really wanted to). Its about 3 or 4 miles.

On our short walk from the tube station to the theatre she said, "Oh look there's China Town" and her friend asked her if she had ever seen Buckingham Palace. "Only on the telly," came the reply. Really most taken aback I mentioned that I had thought that they were visiting London for the weekend. Note the following clues:

a) Bloody strong Glaswegian accents (and I can tell one when I hear one)
b) Not having a bleeding clue how the tube works. It's not exactly difficult. They made all the lines different colours on the map so that people who can't read could find their way around
c) They had matinee tickets for a musical

They just laughed and told me that their sons had bought them the tickets for Mother's Day.

When Sock Monkey was in Australia I met of number of quite charming people (is the sarcasm dripping off the page at this point?) who kindly said, "Why would I want a passport? I've never been out of Queensland. Wouldn't want to." But honestly, never going further than about a 3 mile radius from your house in 43 years is a bit much. Unless you are under house arrest.