Due to a certain degree of financial mismanagement, for which I am not entirely culpable, I find myself reaching the Gruts for Tea stage of the month a little earlier than usual. For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, “Gruts for Tea” is a comic monologue by the sublime Scottish artist Ivor Cutler. We never find out what gruts are, but we know they are cheap, and disgusting, but better than leaves, bark or grass. Actually, it was worse than that for me: I had to borrow money off a friend before I could even afford gruts.
The cavalry appeared just in time, in the form of S— and his partner, F—, long-term fans of this very column. They had galloped all the way from Glasgow so they could meet me, buy me drinks, and dinner. As I am nothing without my readers, I could only say yes. And thank you; and sorry, but I have literally no money, so I can’t stand my round. They told me, in no uncertain terms, that my money was no good. (I should also point out that they were on their holidays, because they are teachers, and they’d always wanted to go to Brighton anyway.)
I can be a little shy when meeting new people, but it usually goes well. The best example was K—, who insisted on meeting me before accepting me as a friend on a social media platform. I said OK because her photo was rather attractive, base man that I am. She turned out to be rather more beautiful than her photograph. Our lunch lasted three days, and could have gone on indefinitely if I hadn’t had to meet someone else for another lunch. I ended up falling in love with her, inevitably, and I still bear the scars of rejection, although had it worked out we might have ended up killing ourselves with cirrhosis. Man, could she drink.
Anyway, no danger of falling in love now – not only was I meeting a couple, but that emotion is now, thank heavens, dead to me. Bitter experience has taught me.
S— and F— wanted to have fish and chips in Brighton, and to go to the best pubs, and since I have lived here for, oh, seven years now, they were able to draw on one of my few areas of genuine expertise. We met in the Prince Albert, handy for the station (Brighton bucks the trend of pubs near stations being sleazy hellholes), had a couple of pints – well I did: I was thirsty – and then we walked down the road for fish and chips at a place in North Laine called Trawlerman Fish & Chips.
“It’s not the best fish and chips in the world,” I said, “but it’s the nearest fish and chips in the world.” (It was more than fine.)
Then to the Basketmakers, where I showed them the huge framed photograph of a child laughing at a Punch and Judy show on Brighton beach taken by my late and much-missed friend Roger Bamber. I told F— to open up one of the hundreds of old tobacco tins lining the walls. In this pub, it is the custom to write notes on scraps of paper and deposit them in these tins.
“A note from the future,” read the message she pulled out: “enjoy things while you still can.” Then on, via the Hove-l, where I could pick up one of the last remaining copies of my latest collection of these columns, whose sales have been unusually dismal, sign it, and proceed to the Lion & Lobster, which was handy for their hotel.
It really was the loveliest evening. We posed for selfies outside the Pavilion, and I hit them with a selection of my best stories.
“Who’s the most famous person you’ve ever met?” S— asked. I thought I’d jump straight in with the big guns. “The King,” I said. “Although he was only a prince then.” I then told a story about meeting Stephen Fry that is unrepeatable here, not because Fry did anything wrong, except act like a wanker, but because I did. (Not behaving like a wanker. Something else.) But they got the chance to tell their stories too, and towards the end of the evening I was commended for having understood their accent without having once asked them to speak more slowly and clearly. I know Perthshire isn’t the same as Glasgow but a year of living there gives the Sassenach a certain edge when it comes to comprehension. At one point they even used the word “murder”, which is probably the best word a Scot can say, to English ears. (They stretch it out dramatically: “mur-rer-der”. It makes me writhe with pleasure.) F— also asked me what I read for fun. This is a hard question for a book reviewer to answer, because the critical brain is always ticking over. All I could think of was Great Expectations, which I’d found in a carrier bag by the side of the road a few weeks ago. It’s awfully good.
So, two free meals in two weeks, two very different restaurants and circumstances, both delightful. I had been feeling pretty bad, for reasons that shall remain private, and feeling like a lowly spotted thing, but I must be doing something right. I really ought to go to Glasgow and return the favour. I have been told that they do very good fish and chips there.
[Further reading: My dinner table chat repels fellow diners]