I resisted the urge to read all the messages and listen to the voicemails from crazy town for a couple of hours that morning but eventually the temptation got too much, and I answered the next phone call.

“He’s quit” I was told by a voice who sounded positively beaming.

“Who?” I replied.

“The manager” The voice told me, in a more exasperated tone.

“Which one?”

Within a couple of hours, I was on the train (well, two trains and a bus) back to the Scottish pub. Everyone was excited to see me, and the air was filled with gossip “he went mad”, “he kicked a door down”, “he took money from the safe”. There seemed to be little evidence any of that was true. I half expected somebody to say, “he got caught stealing kittens to put in a stew and ran away to Cambodia”.

I had been gone for less than two weeks but it felt like about half the staff had changed. Having said that, the same problems remained. A pipe had burst in the attic and water was flowing the whole way through the building to the basement, which was slowly flooding, packets of crisps were floating around. An engineer had been booked to find out why the phone hadn’t rang for days. He quickly discovered the reason was that it had been unplugged, presumably by somebody who couldn’t be bothered answering it and charged us £120 for his time. There was also a pen lid served in a bowl of pasta.

Always two steps behind, HR called regarding the general manager situation. “If anyone asks, just say he isn’t feeling well”. By this point even the customers knew the general manager had resigned, although the reasons for this were still a topic for discussion. I pointed out that to HR and was told “there is somebody on the other line, I have to go”.

Things started to improve quickly. Many outdated practices were removed, people who had left in frustration were asked to return, opening hours went back to normal and it was finally confirmed that we were to let dogs sit on the carpet.

My time at crazy town ended when the lady who I was covering for was persuaded to return and a second assistant manager was recruited. Crazy town seemed happy for the first time since I walked through the door. The takings were higher, the staff stopped leaving, the crisps stopped floating around the cellar and foreign objects disappeared from the food (well, mostly).

It felt like my job was done and I went back home on the two trains and one bus with a reasonable level of confidence that the Scottish pub would survive without me.

What I have learned from my time at crazy town is that in future, if I get a group email asking if anyone wants to help out at another pub, just ignore it.

               Since I arrived in crazy town, I had been filling a void left by a manager who would be generously described as ‘hands off’. It was tiring. Living above the pub wasn’t great either. I missed being able to cook my own dinner, I missed not having to take a bus to get my laundry done, I missed peace & quiet, and I missed my own space.

Being the only person in the building able to sort out till errors was a particular challenge due to the sheer number of errors that were being made. My team of lovable idiots seemed to struggle knowing the difference between pounds and pence, table numbers were a constant problem with things being charged to the wrong customers on a minute-by-minute basis and I was regularly called to translate between our Scottish guests and our team members who often seemed to communicate via Google Translate on their telephones. It was a lot.

               What I really wanted was a general manager to take over and sort it all out so I could go home and resume my normal life. However, what I didn’t need was two of them…

               The two general managers were both under the impression that head office had put them in charge and consequently, both asked me to ignore the other one. The new manager would change something, then the existing manager would change it back again. This could happen several times a shift. The team would ask me what they were supposed to do and which one to listen to. The result was everyone just followed whichever version of the rules they most preferred.

               One thing that didn’t change is that the existing manager carried on working from home while his wife continued to come in and take photos, I imagine a boring scrapbook full of pictures of incorrectly set tables is being created. The new manager called a team meeting (without inviting the existing manager) and the two of them started sending each other messages publicly criticising the other one, “can I ask why” and “please explain” were phrases that featured heavily. At least now they were not being aimed at me. The new manager changed the rotas while the existing manager changed the passwords. Crazy town was getting crazier, and I had been through enough.

               I broke the chain of command and called head office directly, asking to go back home. That afternoon, I packed my bags and took the bus to the station. I sent the two general managers identical messages thanking them for the opportunity but my time at the Scottish pub had come to an end.

               It was so lovely to be home and in my own space. I did three loads of laundry, went to the supermarket and slept for 13 hours. What I wasn’t expecting is to have 17 missed calls from a variety of people while I had been asleep. It was obvious that something had happened. But what? Did I even want to know?

To be continued…

               Somehow, I had managed to get a slightly better room above the Scottish pub, this one had a window so I could see the rain falling rather than just listening to it, which was the case in the old room. It had a single bed, stool, wobbly table and a small clothes rail.

               It was there I answered a phone call from somebody in head office. They had heard about yesterday’s environmental health visit. A lady from the council had arrived unexpectedly having received a complaint about a cockroach in the food. As a side note, there was no cockroach in that food, she was mistaken. It was actually a wasp. It didn’t seem worthwhile to correct that detail.

               I phoned the general manager, who according to his own rota, was due to be at work. He took the phone call from a caravan by the seaside. Turns out he had gone on holiday and not told anyone. He told me to just leave the report on his desk and he will look at it when he gets back. Anyway, the environmental health inspector spent an entire afternoon going through the kitchen and generally irritating the chefs (although, in my experience, irritating the chefs is very easy to do). She found a number of problems, including products that expired five years ago, but miraculously the pub kept its 5* food hygiene rating.

               So back to the phone call. “We are concerned with the way this pub is being run”. It was hard to argue that it was completely smooth sailing. “So, a relief general manager is joining you tomorrow to take charge”. This was, on the surface, very good news.

               He arrived like a hurricane, within moments of his arrival, the head chef was dismissed, procedures were changed, a new set of opening times were published, and the team were stunned. He even got my wobbly bedroom table replaced.

               His first night was beset with a predictable number of problems. Somebody managed to delete the booking sheets so we had no idea how many people to prepare for, the outdoor lighting failed, a blind fell off and hit somebody on the head and we served chicken to a vegetarian (twice). To him, it was crazy, to me it was becoming normal.

               The following morning meeting was called. We were told the changes that had been introduced were permanent and he wanted to change the culture, make things more positive and boost morale, hopefully earning more money for the business in the process. So far, so good.

               That was until the general manager returned from his caravan… Nobody had told him another manager had taken over…

To be continued…

The following morning in the Scottish pub began with a call from the general manager asking me to fire the chef with the fishy hands and also his girlfriend. They were both still in probation periods which drastically reduced the amount of admin. A couple of points on this…

1. The general manager was ‘working from home’ that day and home was in a cottage directly opposite the pub, it wouldn’t have been so hard for him to fire them personally.
2. As far as I was concerned, the girlfriend hadn’t done anything wrong. When I asked about this, he said “well, ask her to resign then”.

I had done a management training course on how to fire people but sadly all my notes from this course were at home. I relied on guesswork and that the people being fired also wouldn’t be sure about the procedure. It also didn’t help that because I wasn’t ‘directly employed’ by that pub (just drafted in to help out), I wasn’t allowed access to the passwords for the computers and nobody else knew them either. So, I had to write everything down with a biro and call them both in. The chef with the fish on his hands knew what I was about to say and brought his keys, uniforms and induction booklet to the meeting. He signed my form, and the job was done. Now came the tricky bit, how do I ask someone to resign? Fortunately, I didn’t need to. She had already decided to go too. I asked her to write a letter which she did (in broken English with the ‘help’ of Google translate) blaming ‘company policy’ for her decision. I never asked for any further clarification. Weeks later, I realised that the general manager never asked to see any of this paperwork.

The following morning the general manager’s wife arrived. She walked round taking photos and then left again without speaking to anyone. Then messages started arriving…

• “Why has the coffee machine not been refilled properly”?
• “Please explain to me why the barrels are not stacked”.
• “The expenses should have been done last night but you didn’t do them”.

“Are you working from home again today”? I replied, the answer surprised me…

• “No, I’m upstairs in the office” (Nice of him to say hello when he arrived) “I’ve spoken to HR this morning and they have agreed to let you stay for another month”.

Another month? That wasn’t part of the deal… I didn’t even have enough clothes…

               Then came a phone call from head office…

To be continued…

               While I was on holiday, I got a message (which had been sent to all the managers in the company) asking if anyone was willing to help out at another rural pub, this time in the Scottish Borders. I sent a message back asking if there would be any accommodation available, then carried on with my holiday. Two days later I got an email from somebody at head office thanking me for agreeing to go to Scotland.

               During my time with the cruises, being moved from ship to ship with little notice was commonplace. They often overstaffed anywhere with spare cabins and then moved people elsewhere as vacancies arose due to visa problems, medical situations, missed flights or just changes of mind. It made sense for the company but for the crew members who had packed for Alaska and then found themselves in Fiji it was less convenient.

               At least this move gave me a few days of notice to pack and the move from Northern England to Southern Scotland was not such a culture shock. My line manager had agreed to drive me rather than take the risk of being stranded for hours at a train station nobody can find on a map. Plus, it was only for ten days… How bad could it be?

Well, the general manager was away. His assistant was new in the role and didn’t know I was arriving. The entire kitchen team had resigned at the same time and the whole place seemed to be staffed by people yelling in a wide variety of languages. It was like a really angry version of the UN.

               I have written before about the wonders of temporary staff, well at this place everyone (including me) seemed to be a temp. Luckily, all the systems were the same so I could get into the computers and work the tills, unlike most of my colleagues who seemed barely capable to work out what shoe goes on what foot.

On my first night, I refunded one meal that contained a metal screw and a salad that came with a dead wasp. I dealt with a waiter who didn’t understand the difference between starters and main courses (“its all just food, whats the big deal”) and persuaded the bar tender that it was his job to clean the mould from the bar fridges.

               My second day involved a major row in the kitchen involving a chef who refused to make desserts as he was too busy preparing his own dinner (for nearly an hour). I was asked to come and talk to him. He told me he wasn’t able to make desserts, even though customers were waiting, as he had fish on his hands. This caused more yelling in a variety of languages. Later I found out that the chef ate his dinner and then went home three hours early without telling anyone. All of this made for a very entertaining handover report (which I later found had been widely distributed around the company).

               The following morning the general manager, who had been away, turned up unexpectedly. From the reactions of the team, it seemed like this was a rare event. I went over to introduce myself to him but he said he was too busy to chat, asked why I hadn’t tested the fire alarm and then left again.

Oh well, eight days to go. What else could happen?

To be continued…

Something I find incredibly boring is people talking about their rubbish journeys. I am not interested that your thirty-minute commute took forty minutes, that your train spent half an hour sitting at Milton Keynes Central or your flight was an hour late boarding. These stories are dull because they are so common, they happen to all of us.

One thing I have noticed is that when the train is busy, coming across the ticket inspector is especially unlikely. The train station by the rural pub doesn’t have a ticket machine, neither do many of the other stations on the line. If the ticket inspector doesn’t inspect any tickets, it is not possible to buy one. Perhaps this is something the railway operators may want to consider…

Anyway, I will save you the monotony of explaining how late and how crowded the train was and instead start with the fact I had to stand for twenty minutes next to the toilet on a recent journey. One problem caused by standing by the toilet was that people kept thinking I was waiting to use the facilities and queuing up behind me. Eventually I moved and people queued up behind somebody else instead.

There were five of us standing in this section. My fellow travellers were a curious bunch. One man had a pair of the largest headphones I have ever seen. People digging up roads with large drills wear smaller headphones than these. Still if he was using them to drown out the sound of people moaning about how late the train was, I fully support him.

Another woman was eating a fruit corner. This is a product I have never understood the attraction of. Why would anyone want to mix their own yoghurt? Isn’t it better just to have a completed product? What is the difference between that, and a Gregg’s sausage roll where the sausage and pastry come in separate bags? Or a new car turning up with an engine you must add yourself?

Apart from that, the fruit corner is a weird choice of train food especially when standing. It seems fraught with potential risk of spillage. Particularly when (as this woman did) both sections of the fruit corner are tipped into a Tupperware box then muesli and a small box of raisins are added. She then stirred it all together. It was a sight to behold. If it was me, I would have prepared this before getting on the train. After about three mouthfuls, the train jolted, and the fruit corner/muesli/raisin combo fell on the floor and was promptly demolished by a nearby dog. The man with the headphones laughed out loud.

An announcement was made informing us that the train shop was about to close although how anyone was supposed to get there when the train was so busy remained unclear. It was also explained that there were no sandwiches left, the coffee machine was broken, they couldn’t take cash, but they “accepted most major credit cards but not American Express”. It was little wonder the shop was about to close.

Even odder than this was a man who changed his clothes while standing on the train. I feel like most people would have done this in the nearby toilet cubical, although knowing the state of cleanliness of train toilets maybe he didn’t want to risk catching some deadly disease. First, he took off his shirt and replaced it with a t-shirt, then tied a jacket around his waist, removed his trousers and put on a pair of shorts. Fortunately, there was no jolt at this point. He did this so nonchalantly, it made me think he must do it all the time. Then he put on a pair of trainers, got off at the next stop and begun jogging. Remarkable behaviour.

We eventually got to our destination too late to make the connection and were met with a cheery pre-recorded announcement thanking us all for travelling and hoping we enjoyed our journey (we hadn’t). Luckily since there was no ticket inspector or working ticket machine, I hadn’t been able to pay. Although if I had, I don’t think I would have asked for a refund. The entertainment value of the woman with the yoghurt had been worth the price of the ticket alone.

The rural pub attracts a certain level of celebrity guest. The level you have to look up on the internet to remind yourself what they were famous for.

• The Eurovision Contestant

The Eurovision contestant visited with their parents. It was another customer who alerted us to their presence (we had all forgotten who they are). The parents had normal pub favourites, pie & mash and fish & chips with two pints of beer. However the Eurovision contestant wanted a vegan Caesar salad. I went over to double check this but it was clear. No chicken / bacon / egg / anchovy / cheese / sauce. It was at this point they told me not to put the croutons on either. I said that because of the way the till is set up, we won’t be able to take any money off because of all these modifications, they said it was fine. So, one bowl of mixed lettuce was dispatched for £12.95. Half the bowl was left uneaten as it “wasn’t what I was expecting”. From the weary looks given by the Eurovision contestant’s parents, it seemed like this was standard behaviour.

• The TV Talent Show Winner

Despite winning the TV show decades ago, this person was holding a meet and greet session in a nearby town. For £48.50 you could meet them, get a photograph taken with them and ask one question. It seemed to be little more than that. Their website also stated that questions will be one per ticket holder due to reasons of time, it also stated that tickets were still available. I am not sure I would pay £1 for that package. Anyway, before the show, the talent show winner came for lunch on their way to the venue. I completely failed to recognise them and since they hadn’t got a reservation, I sat them on a terrible table at the back which didn’t go down well. Within 10 minutes of the food arriving, they had left. I would have asked if the food was ok but was worried that I would be charged £48.50.

• The Soap Actor’s Wife

We were aware that the soap actor was not just eating but coming to stay the night too. This was because his wife had phoned several times to tell us. She wanted upgrades, free drinks and a private dining area and in every call took considerable time to remind us who the soap actor was. On the morning of their arrival, the soap actor’s wife called four times. Apparently, she had chosen our pub for his birthday party (which was news to us) and told us to be ready for them at 10:30pm that night. Our duty manager deliberately closed the bar at 10pm before they arrived.

• The 80s popstar

The 80s popstar arrived in dark glasses and a baseball cap. Her manager checked her in, and she scuttled off upstairs. As many famous people appreciate their privacy, we didn’t think anything of it. It was a surprize then when she descended in the staircase in a ballgown and very high heels (like Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard). I wasn’t sure if she was expecting applause. She came to the bar and made a show of how many gold credit cards she had. This is not normal behaviour in a rural pub (or anywhere else really). She then went on to decline all requests for photos or autographs, which was weird considering her general attention seeking behaviour. Over the course of the evening, her and her friend got through a bottle of whiskey (and a packet of crisps to share). At one point another guest tried to take a photo of her from across the room and she screamed, “no photos” at such a volume everyone stopped and stared. She also left a cash tip of £160. The next day she was back in the dark glasses and baseball cap.

They say celebrities are just the same as the rest of us… I am not so sure.

               I can never remember my star sign, perhaps because I don’t really care enough. For the purposes of this blog, I looked it up and it turns out I am a Scorpio (tomorrow I will have forgotten this piece of information). Apparently, this means,

“You can have a sharp edge, but this isn’t always a negative quality. It gives you an appreciation for authenticity and a strong sense of independence. However, you’re not always as tough as you appear. Once you let people into your life, you’re a bit of a softy”.

This is not a long way off true although I would be interested to meet somebody who doesn’t appreciate authenticity. Anyway, I read the other 11 and they could also all apply to me. I have trouble understanding why anyone would think an oil millionaire from Texas would have the same character traits as a two-year-old in Sub-Saharan Africa just because they share a birthday.

               This brings me to Mystic Meg. Famous people, like all the rest of us are prone to death. Not a week goes by without the sad news of a Hollywood star or beloved singer passing away. Many of them are names we recognise but can’t remember anything they did, while others it comes as a surprise that they didn’t die years ago.

               However, reports of the death of Mystic Meg touched me much more than I expected. I hadn’t really thought about Meg in twenty years and had no idea she wrote for the Sun newspaper until very recently but I was always strangely fascinated by this TV astrologer who interrupted the National Lottery every week throughout the 90s. She was a middle-aged cape wearing woman who held a crystal ball and was surrounded by fake smoke. Her predictions were mad…

               “People who wear flip flops on holiday, like watching The Bill or have ever seen a peacock will be celebrating toooooooo”.

               “People who eat toast cut into triangles, used to play the guitar or recently attended a family occasion will be celebrating tooooooooo”.

               “People who drive cars, live in a house number divisible by 72 or can spell the word halloumi will be celebrating tooooooo”.

               “People who pull Christmas crackers, occasionally stroke dogs or are Yorkshire pudding enthusiasts will be celebrating tooooooo”.

               How did she come up with this stuff? People all over the country were given hope simply because they enjoyed action films or had a relative in the civil service. To prove Meg’s accuracy we were introduced to lottery winners with giant cheques who (as Meg said the previous week) had once been on a train to Wales or had a parent who wore carpet slippers.

Now I wonder if it matters… I suspect deep down everyone knows this stuff is rubbish but if it gives people a welcome distraction or a slice of hope, does it really matter? After all, perhaps “people who have ever ridden a pony, use a funny voice to talk to babies or receive adverts in the post” should be celebrating tooooooo.

RIP MEG (I think she knew tooooooo….)

Following the exam, we all retreated to our hotel with an 86 page handbook we were asked to read before tomorrow’s day two of the training course at head office. Of course, that never happened. I did at least open the handbook, but it was so boring I put it down in just a few seconds and decided upon a nap instead.

When I woke up, I went down to the hotel restaurant for dinner. This was all paid for by the company so having my normal evening meal (petrol station sandwiches) was forgotten. What I found was my classmates surrounded by a lot of empty glasses. Considering we had spent all day learning about beer, it was worth nothing that none of them were consuming lagers but had all gone for wine or spirits instead. It seems the tutor’s inspirational words had been discarded.

We swapped stories over a steak dinner, then the waiter came to take a dessert order. I went for a chocolate brownie. My colleague said she wasn’t hungry so would take a rose wine instead. ‘What size’ enquired the waiter, ‘bottle, actually make that two’ came the reply. I wonder if this is what the company had in mind when they agreed to pay for dinner.

Next morning we somehow managed to get back to the office without serious incident and even more fortunately, there were no team building exercises. I would happily never do another team building exercise ever again, the assumption that we all want to get to know each other better always appears misplaced.

Instead, we were straight into the course. I had remembered to bring the handbook so although I had failed to read it, I was doing better than many of my colleagues. The sighing tutor asked who had completed the book as asked. One person raised their hand, the tutor asked them a question about the final section ‘oh sorry, I thought you asked something else’ came the reply. The sighing tutor sighed again.

The topic of the course was the legal requirements affecting pubs. Licencing authorities, health & safety, insurance, operating schedules, child protection and the affects of alcohol on the body (something many of my colleagues were current case studies for). It was as dull as you imagine. The screen was still in the same place as yesterday so the interruptions of the people walking in front with their coffee cups continued although this was a welcome distraction from the tedium of what was actually on the screen.

Lunch was an identical platter from yesterday although this time people had brought their own food, mainly crisps, chocolate bars and free biscuits from the hotel rooms. This meant that there was a lot of food left over but at least there were no piles of egg scraped from sandwiches. It also gave the chance for one colleague to go back to his car to sleep.

The afternoon session was taken up by going through the handbook we were supposed to have completed in the hotel. Later I considered that as the sighing tutor had set aside so much time for this must have meant she knew nobody was going to do the homework. One interesting fact was that a binge drinking session is less than one bottle of wine. At this point my colleague with the two bottles of rose for dessert excused herself and ran to the toilet.

Then came the exam. At least we were aware it was happening this time. The desks were separated and the handbooks removed. We were each given a Mini Bounty bar ‘for luck’, the sighing tutor quickly realising the chance of success was falling by the moment. It was also stressed that we only needed 65% to pass and it was multiple choice. Just as we were about to begin, an invigilator turned up for a surprize visit. At this development, the sighing tutor made her most dramatic sigh of the day so far.

Two weeks later, a letter arrived. I had somehow managed to pass both courses and I have certificates to prove it. I suspect this was due to an admin error at the exam board, but I won’t query it. Instead I put them in a draw with the handbook which I am unlikely to ever look at again, in fact I can’t even remember which draw I put them in.

I notice that they are offering this course again in a couple of weeks, although with a different tutor. Upon investigation the accommodation being offered at the course is now ‘room only’. I wonder why?