The great sitting down or standing up debate

By your leader

with the Rooster away for a bit i thought i would right about something close to my heart or my arse if you'd rather.

I don’t know why it started and I am certainly don’t know when it started but I do know where it started. It was the Abergwaun Hotel in Fishguard, through the bar door and just to your right. The weather was overcast and a selection of arch drinkers had converged here in the twilight hours of a Saturday to prepare for yet another caper of drinking and shenanigans.

The person I do remember who was there, who prompts me to write this raging debate, is the one and only master of Fencing Matty Miles. Not a Zorro-esque character who is an expert with the sword but rather a brash character with no social skills who is an expert with the hammer and a large sharp piece of wood.

However, I digress, we found out after being on this God’s earth for at least over a quarter of a century that

Blokes wipe their arses one of two ways and the other wau is abhorrent to the other (does that make sense?)

Now I can’t speak for everybody but from what I have gleaned from some of the boys is that I am part of a minority with my style of bottom cleaning. I am part of a group that actually stand up while wiping it.
Matty is part of the majority who sit down (crouch also applies) while wiping it. This is 2/3rds of everybody I have asked and I can only think that this must be down to misinformation or bad habits.

Now people can break these bonds and realise that there is another way. Surely you can’t get enough purchase when you are sitting down. Also one must look at comfort, sitting down and reaching around or through can’t be as comfortable as the good old fashioned stand which is manly. Anyone who has watched girls have a wee (Two fannies – I am thinking of you!) will know that they crouch down or sit therefore it is a girls thing and the other way is a mans.
My way.

I am glad we had this little chat and looking forward to you lot telling me you have changed your ways.

Overlord Fergatron
LC ½
The visible half of the leadership

My favourite pub by the Fergatron

Whilst I have my favourite gems of pubs throughout the country and even one in the USA I am picking a pub much closer to home to nominate as my favourite.

“A wretched hive of scum and villainy”

is what old Ben Knobi tells young Luke Skywalker when he attempts to comment on the space port Mos Eisley. If I’d have been Skywalker I would have probably forgotten about the Force, the princess and flying X wings and immediately organised an all-dayer in the beloved place because dark and dingy with interesting mutant life forms is my bag baby!!!
Dark and dingy with interesting life forms then leaves me straight on to my favourite pub in Cardiff – The Tavistock which is off City Road in Roath.

I have been a regular visitor to this pub and on many occasions was joined by Lovechickens in official and unofficial visits. The bar where we sit is particularly dark which is something I like in a pub – as our glorious treasurer once said in Brisbane

‘Darkness Is my medium’ and for once I tend to agree.

The floors are wooden and the seating comfortable however last time I went in there I noticed some chairs that wouldn’t look out of place outside a west Wales café. There are 2 telly’s and they are in great places – this is a fantastic place for watching Friday night rugby before getting into town. Another bonus which could be said for other pubs in the Welsh Capital is that it has a skittles alley which is a great place to start off a sesh in. I am brilliant at this game and I won £20 off Roberts the last time I played on his stag do. I now bet him a tonne that I could do it again.

As for personnel - the Tavistock is great, the locals love their drinking and their rugby and on one occasion when me and Tew (1988-2002) went to watch the Wales France match – the locals supplied cheese and red wine for half time. We only went out to watch the match but pissed up on wine we ended up on a big one – bloody cheese. The old landlord was Alan who was a legend but I cant help but think that the new one Keith is going the same way. A young landlord who is up for a laugh – during the New Zealand match last year he made me and the King of them all (Neil) neck 2 pints – oh how he laughed when I spued all mine back into the glass in front of a packed pub.

That was a great time however I have 2 favourites. The first one was watching the third test of the 2001 lions. The match was on about 8 or 9 in the morning and the Lovechickens had to show their ties on the door in order to get in. They had closed the curtains and left the heating on and this was in the middle of summer!!! It was boiling so of course we drank even more! There were about 15 of us and when the match finished they opened the curtains and the pub and most of us were absolutely twatted – how we laughed when we realised it wasn’t even midday.

My best memory was for pub golf in 2004. We had Lovechickens from all over the UK and were joined by our Chickens from over the pond. The period we spent in the Tavistock was extended as we were having so much fun and was the best laugh and then we had to order 8 taxi’s to take us to town – delight. I think that that was the only time it has ever featured in a proper cap but what I delightful day it was and I am proud to say – I was there!

Although unfortunately for Morg they don’t do food and I know Chez wished there was more skirt and King of them all wishes there was at least some sort of contemporary jazz and/or line dancing but it is a favourite of mine and I still wish to put forward the Tavistock as one of my favourite pubs and onto the official list of Great pubs for the Lovechickens RFC.

kind regards jessies
The Fergatron
Joint Overlord of the Lovechickens RFC
LC1/2

The Brood, the crude and the ugly by THE six foot jap

THE Jap has deliberated, confabulated, and decapitated the proceeding of the first of ‘THE pub golf grand prix’ session, and he has come up with this summary.

First a famous quote to reach the heart of even ‘the social hand grenade from over the bridge’, and a quote that should be the motto of the Love Chickens RFC.

“A man who won't die for something is not fit to live.”

(Martin Luther King, Jr.)

How true is that fellow Fowls?! THE Jap knows everyone of us on that glorious day back in August left a piece of our souls (if not our lunch) on the Caerleon battle field. Not since the Celts fought off the Romans on the hallowed fairground patch outside the Drovers arms, did such an important battle take place. One of sabotage and tactics; one of wounds and fatalities; and one of alcohol and debauchery. THE Jap is a little confused to the meaning of debauchery but it sounds sinister (if any Fowls know of such as a word send the meaning to P.O.BOX KISS-MY-ASS).

The Jap is sat here rubbing his hands with anticipation about sharing the story to long lost Love Chickens who through no fault of there own (they were told they weren’t allowed out by their missus) managed to dodge the day of pain.

Now THE JAP is not one for story telling, as the Brood knows, but for those Fowls who stayed in that weekend and watched P-Ants and Dics Celebrity Golf series from the Celtic Manor there was a serious cock-up in filming and the camera’s were definitely in the wrong place to be for golf in Caerleon. For James Nesbit we had our very on ‘Cameraman’ who beat Mr. Nesbit in the uni-brow competition and the ‘fuck me he’s boring’ competition. We had Blue who through out the whole day slowly but surely turned into what can only be described as the Love Chickens one and only Alice Cooper. As for the ‘The Aggressor’ well come on, (THE Jap chuckles) and thinks of Ronnie Corbet. As for ‘Bannatyne’ who cares. And THE Jap thinks he is now getting on a par with Ross Kemp, both in baldness and flumpishness!

Anyway look at the Jap coming over all Steven Spielberg, back to the story. It started off at a leisurely pace for pre-round thirst quenchers in The Red Lion (A pub which will later in the story becomes the centre of mischief and mayhem). It was here at the beginning that THE Jap knew the day was going to be painful, when he realised that his son for the day was going to be the cameraman, the one they call ‘Unibrow’! Dun Dun Daaaaaah! We left The Red Lion and headed to the 1st hole in a more orderly fashion than when we head back there!

In The Ship THE Jap giving a quick lesson in Killer to the other Fowls. A pint of your choice was a definite good shout. And with the par being 10 many was well under par leading into the 2nd hole!

The Hanbury Inn was a bit of a let down (as for a bank holiday weekend, a fat man with beer stains down him was all that was on show, and as we had to look at him (The Rooster) for the next 7 holes, moral was low! Haha). After finishing in there many of the Love Chickens were looking at each other with horror, anticipation, and constipation, at the vast challenge ahead.

After The Hanbury the Brood made its way to the 3rd hole, The White Hart, where for many a Newport Fowl a tear was shed and fond memories reminisced of yester year, (for all 3 minutes till we supped our pints and left). As alcohol was consumed moral was lifting and even ‘Fat Lips’ was starting to have interesting conversations outside of Division 3 and Division 4 rugby.

Our next port of call was the 4th hole, Caerleons newly named pub ‘Boleros’, now THE Jap has been to Caerleon many a time and knows Baleros is the place to be at night, but at 4 in the afternoon, with 7 Love Chickens in it was definitely THE place to be in Newport (Nobody else thought so but us, we were the only ones there!). A swift Vodka, Lime and Lemonade the preferred and Patriotic beverage of the Love Chickens RFC and we was off again to the 5th hole.

Ye Old Bull was were the alcohol was beginning to take over blood in the Love Chickens systems, it was the last port of call for sober Fowls, and this is where THE Jap played his joker card, he wasn’t having Cider (I don’t know whether you have been out with THE Six Foot Jap when he has had a Cider, if you have you will remember it, if you haven’t you will never get chance. But that’s a story THE Jap will tell again). After finishing the pints in there a quick tally of scores were made and THE Jap saw he was joint first with ‘Bannatyne’, he thought he had him beat.

The walk between Ye Old Bull and the 6th hole The Red Lion, I will now refer to as THE GREEN MILE. Many of the Brood turned ugly within this stretch. We reach the tee in good humour, although the 2 minutes walk without an alcoholic drink in their hands was too much for some Fowls. What was too come I can only describe as monstrous!

To lift moral even further and too lift those Fowl from the depths of their glasses, boules was to be played, or as Blue (Geoff Capes) thought, they were mini-demolition ball and continuously hoyed them at the next door houses’ wall. Then the most terrifying (but absolutely hilarious) incident occurred, it was better than the Rooster-Cockney Boules-gate incident of yester year. It was the Swingball-gate scandal.

The Brood made its way over to play swingball (a childish game for drunken adult men to show off their manhood) or in the case of ‘Bannatyne’ to pick up swing around and smack ‘The Agressor’ squire on the back.

THE Jap has seen many a grown man cry and shed a few himself, but he has never witness anything so funny as a grown man squeal like a pig at slaughter, run around the edge of the garden like a Cheetah trying to swipe a gnat off his back. And hold back tears like the camera crew on Steve Irwins last adventure. Jackass would have been proud. But that’s not all! Oh no.

The Rooster in all his wisdom decides that then is the time to flush his system of toxins in a public manner, much to the dismay of THE Six Foot Jap who with weak stomach has no option but to clear his system too (A big thanks to the Rooster)! But what was funnier was seeing Fat Lips and then Unibrow raking the sick over to hide it on the boules court.

So onward and downward with our travels to the 7th hole, The Drovers, a quite little pub in the heart of the Caerleon community, where father and son, brother and sister could all be the same person. Now bare in mind there are seven in our Brood and it is THE Jap’s round, so with my son ‘unibrow’ in tow I go to the bar. My mistake entirely! From this point on I take no blame. Unibrow took command demanding the bargirl (a 14 year old novice with huge breasts) poured the pints exactly how he said, he turned into Adolf Hitler (I was proud to be his dad until…..)! The daft bastard had ordered 9 pints of beer for 7 of us! So we made him drink two and luckily there was a little troll in the corner (reminded me of the cockney wanker) who would have the other. And once again off we went.

By this time competition was rife between me and Bannatyne, we were still level. Leading on to the 8th hole banter was in abundance even if it was slurred.

In the Angel it was a bit surreal with all the mayhem of the previous holes, there seemed to be a quiet calm across the brood, as if we were suddenly waiting for the next bit of mischief to appear, only we had took it to its limits of human decency and the next step would have to be human sacrifice. And none of us wanted to go to the Royal Gwent Hospital (apart from ‘The Aggressor’ who thought it might be better than sleeping in the streets for another night).

The 9th and final hole Minstrels, what can be said about the place that hasn’t already been said. The place looked how we felt, like shit. The pool table turn into a big beer mat, chair, penguin, bed, Christmas tree, for most of us anyway (it had got that bad). With arguments occurring for silly reasons like, ‘You like Barbara Dixon!’, ‘No I don’t!’. After downing the Red Wine and celebrating a joint victory between THE Jap and Bannatyne it was time to get the fuck out of dodge, via town cabs to THE ‘PORT.

First port of call was Wetherspoons to meet up with ‘The Llanelli Wonderboy’, then onto Walkabout (Remember guys it was 8 o’clock!). The brood had consumed the best part of two barrels of ale between the 7 Fowls and at 8pm was being refused alcohol in Walkabout. So someone suggested The Meze Lounge, gooooood idea, not! All day THE Jap had felt something was missing that empty feeling inside THE Japs stomach, that aching, yearning feeling, for something. Then there was something Bannatyne did that triggered off what it was. Bannatyne booted fuck into the telephone box (someone wants to tell him money doesn’t buy everything, he’s spoilt!). Like lightening flashes the essence of ‘The Social Hand Grenade from over the Bridge’ was with us. That sense of team completion was there. The fat little Peck was with us in spirit.

THE Jap and The Wonderboy spent some quality talk time catching up on the way to the lounge, only to pay for entry, then two seconds literally after entering having to leave, as the other Fowls came flying towards the exit after being thrown out. This wasn’t looking good for an enjoyable night in Newport.

After having a quiet few in some pubs around the area we tried to venture into Walkabout again, whilst walking down the street THE Jap met someone who resemble Alice Cooper, but later realised it was Blue. Who got refused entry, because according to him, ‘Like come on man I like paid about 5 times now’. Although, he had been chucked out 4 times.

Then there was Fat Lips being led out of Walkabout like Bruce Forsyth, off the 18th hole stumbling, shaking and muttering to himself (probably at the same time in the day too, it was a killer round!). THE Jap has never laughed so much in my life when the doorman asked Fat Lips to leave and the Jamie Oliver look-a-like said ‘Pukka’ and walked out! Although THE Jap did have an accident whilst dancing to THE HOFF’s new song when he slipped and landed on his back infront of everyone and had to be helped up by a bunch of lads. He thought he had gotten away with it until he seen Wonderboy laughing. Goddamn it!

And as far as THE Jap is concerned that’s the end of his story, he left at 1.30am to meet MRS Jap had a curry and went home, he’s sure you all have your Gems from the day but he’s never laughed so much in one day and cried so much the next!

So THE Jap proposes a Love Chickens RFC motto

“A man who won't die for something is not fit to live.”

(Martin Luther King, Jr.)

We all died that day for the Love Chickens which means we all live for each other and the brood. Bring on the next challenge