• Bicycles and their riders.
• Norfolk accents.
• Keeping it local takes an age.
• Where’s my Uber?
• The rudeness of staff.
• You want me to buy what now?

It’s been a few months since I hit y’all up with my first ‘City Girl In The Village‘ post and as summer boomed over Norfolk showcasing blue skies and a sun shine filtered haze over the land I may have become somewhat more accustomed to the nuances of life out of the big smoke. That’s not to say I’m finding ‘normal for Norfolk’ at all regular (it really is quite odd at times) but a semblance of normal it is all the same and you know what? For the most part I rather like it.

People here can be remarkably entertaining if nothing else and I have had many conversations which have made me howl, recoil and even want to run as fast as my little legs will carry me towards the train station but… I’m getting used to it bit by bit and learning to laugh at some of the things which initially made me feel the need to cry. ‘I know how you feel’ one new friend told me, ‘I once moved away from home and it was really horrible to begin with but I got used to it, we all do’! I asked where this person had moved to and it turns out the next village along. About 3 miles to be precise. The thought was there and that’s all that matters eh?

We’ve spent the summer on the beach picking up shells, turning over rocks to find those famous Cromer crabs, catching waves on our boogie board and generally lapping up all that country living close to the sea side offers. It’s been bliss. Ney, it’s been idyllic. However, as the nights start to draw closer I am beginning to wonder if I’ll enjoy winter quite as much? Thoughts of the return of the mud and flooding of country lanes fills me with a bit of dread but I will invest in some practical wellies and I’m sure I’ll be fine. I’m sure I will. I will. I will. I will… And hey, we have a wood burning stove and post loft conversion a shed load of wood too! Perhaps some idyllic winter evenings in front of the fire (if only we could work out how to light the damned thing) are in the offing and this time in a few months I’ll be writing about the beauty of our Norfolk winter wonderland.

Perhaps?!

Now, back to my bullet points and here we go!

1. Bicycles and their riders.

I am not a fan of the push bike sur la route. They have always irked me and no less so in London but at least there you don’t expect to be overtaking someone with pedals. In good old Londinium we know the traffic moves incredibly slowly and riders on bikes weaving their way in and out of traffic with their nonchalant snub of a nose in the air (creating only what they can without two fingers to spare) is part and parcel of the horn filled traffic but in Norfolk it’s quite something else. In the countryside the riders don’t weave in and out, oh no! In the lanes near me they simply take over the entire road. There’s not just one of them whizzing past on a one man mission to be first at work either because here they seem to ride in packs. For fun. They make chit chat four deep carrying out a mother’s meeting on two wheels while wearing neon lycra as if it’s the norm and it PISSES ME OFF!

These days I do not expect to run my engine slowly, slowly as I wait patiently to make my move because I am now totally used to nipping about as fast as my little Corsa (Trigger) will carry me. I worry about the suspension on the old gal and have even considered buying my own 4×4 so that I too can bomb up the banks when I see an on coming car to get around them but… When you hit a gang of gung-ho bicycle riders this is never going to happen. Do they move out of the way? Do they heck as like! They wait until you’re on a bend and then the herd leader rotates his arm wildly, almost as if he thinks he might be about to bowl for England, trying to wave you on past.

Urm… just no! I’m not going to take it on the authority of a man wearing the cyclist equivalent of a tummy control pant that it’s safe for me to pass when I can’t see around the corner and by hook or by crook, as soon as we’re round that bend and I can see the all clear, back they form into a line of four blocking any possibilities for the driver behind them. I didn’t realise I had the ability to suffer road rage like I do but the other day, after following a man who was 70 if he was a day (gosh that’s an even better look in the outfit I can tell you) for about 3 miles while he rode solo yet still in the middle of the bloody road, I took action into my own hands and held my fist loud and clear on my horn so much so that he nearly fell off his perch. Well, HE won’t be doing that again but sadly they seem to be like rabbits. They MUST be breeding because each and every day there’s yet more of them with their pesky smug smiles of ‘look how healthy I am riding my bike while you piss about polluting the environment BEHIND me’ and gazes of ‘Well, I don’t see ANY need to drive when I get there faster than ALL the cars on my bike thank you very much’. Of course you flaming don’t you bike riding chimp! You rode in the middle of the road for 8 and a half miles at 10mph without letting me pass. How the hell did you expect you wouldn’t win the race?!

2. Norfolk accents.

I’ve nothing majorly against the Norfolk accent at all. No, really! I mean… I don’t want one myself… No, no, no! And I seem to spend all my energy getting the children to re-say things without them using one but… Ok. Maybe I do have something against it? I mean COME the eff on… It doesn’t exactly scream anything other than ‘farmer Giles’ and by jove it can be difficult to understand. I’m from Norwich, I was born here. I feel I have the authority to take the mickey out of it (but I might bop you on the head if you do – much like we can be mean to our siblings but woe betide anyone else trying it…)!

So, here goes… They say things like ‘are house’ when they mean ‘our house’ and a ‘point’ does not necessarily mean you’ve scored but in fact you are (not our) probably about to have a beer (or a bare as they would say round these here parts). There’s an old man near me who clearly wants to make the time of day when I see him but frankly he could be talking in Greek… I’VE SIMPLY NO IDEA! These are the people who call ladybirds ‘Bishybarnabees’ and if they mean a pear (the fruit), a pair (of shoes) or the pier (on the beach at Cromer) which is pronounced in the exact same way as the previous two then it’s anyone’s guess.

Mind you, it’s an incredibly difficult accent to mimic and simply nobody gets it right on television when acting. Even John Thaw and Celia Imrie couldn’t manage it making that ever so common mistake of a west country drawl instead. There’s a rising inflection you see, it’s quite hard to hear but… Hear it on a daily basis and you start to twitch.

Oil leave ya hair wi tha wun moi boi.

3. Keeping it local takes an age.

Keeping it local (or loooocal as the loooocals would say) takes an age because much like the Spanish, the Norfolk sense of time seems to always err on the side of tomorrow. Trigger had a little problem recently when the ‘friendly’ helicopter sign appeared on my dashboard warning panel. I suppose I should have taken the fact it was one of the ‘warning lights’ as a hint but to me it genuinely did look like a little helicopter and I thought perhaps it just, oh I don’t know?! I didn’t really think much past the helicopter if the truth needs to be told but it turns out it was far from friendly and instead of a helicopter, it was in fact my ENGINE light. So I took it to the village garage. It wouldn’t have made it any further than that by the time I decided to get it looked at so not only did I have no choice but hey, why not keep my community (now I’m a part of it) business in a job?

After a 7 hour journey with my little lit up helicopter had been undertaken me supposing ‘it would be alright’, I’m surprised she managed to see another day at all. Poor old Triggs was practically in need of intensive care by the time I got her there and as the three guys sucked their teeth and told me ‘as praaarblee thu oil leakin’ I left her in what I thought would be the best possible care. I expected perhaps a couple of hours to wait before I had news so I waited. And waited. And waited…

And I shouldn’t fault them really because Triggs did eventually come home safe and well after some very effective doctoring but… ‘Eventually’ is the word. This was the Thursday and I was told they couldn’t check properly until they got a part from Vauxhall. Ok, ok, tomorrow’s ok I told myself. This might happen in London. It might! Hey, it REALLY might!

The next day the part wasn’t in either. Nor the next, nor the next. Apparently Saturday and Sunday would never have been an option in the first place? Whaaaaaaaa? Days of rest or some such nonsense! Monday came around and I was desperate to hear news of Trigger. Was she alright? Had she made it through the weekend? Was there any chance of her operation today? Oh no they told me, not on a Monday! And they laughed as if this was the most ridiculous thing they’d ever heard. But… They WOULD chase Vauxhall for the part… I had kind of been hoping this is what would have happened on the days previously while they were ‘resting’ because although they might not have been in the garage over the weekend surely they would have still been on the end of a blower? Apparently not.

Tuesday arrived and the part was in. Trigger was fixed FIVE days after I took her in and boy was I happy. I suppose maybe it made me appreciate her more. Yes, you CAN convince yourself of such things when you want to. Things in Norfolk are not immediate and no one else seems to care so I’m not going to either. Except I do. I really, really DO!

4. Where’s my Uber?

Let’s just get this out there: I don’t particularly like public transport. It’s expensive (rubbish Tory arses privatising everything in the 80s ensured that) and when you live in a village it’s also pretty infrequent. I’ve no idea what time the latest bus is out to where I live from the city but it’s not much past 6 and what good did that ever do anyone? In London I used the tube because EVERYONE uses the tube and buses are 24/7. I could see the merits there but in a country village where buses are NEVER like buses (TWO? seriously, that would be a blue moon) and there’s no knowing if it will take you where you want to go, I feel I can only really rely on one avenue. A taxi. But… Can’t do that it seems either!

We had friends over for a BBQ which went on rather late so, ‘Get a cab’ I said and they peeled over in two as if I’d said the most ridiculous thing in the world. Apparently there are no cabs in the village. None. Not one. Not even a little’n. There’s not even UBER IN NORWICH?! Not just on that day or at that moment but, like, EVER! What the actual???!!! No Uber. No Uber. No Uber… I have to keep saying it because it seems so foreign. No flipping Uber.

HOW DO PEOPLE GET PLACES?!

They don’t. They plan ahead, drive, get lifts with family or pay for pricey mini cabs from the city out to the village but not anywhere else… Apparently taxis will come out to the village to take you into civilisation but simply to take you from one village to another and it’s a big no no no no no no. NO! Just like there’s NO UBER. Did I mention that?

I am used to having an Uber account charged and ready to go. An Uber man arrives to the exact spot I am standing anywhere in London to pick me up and take me from destination A to destination B. This is good right? No. Doesn’t work here. And they don’t even get it either. I mention Uber and people look at me blankly like I’m cray cray and have gone insane. As if I’m just making a noise that comes out in the sound of UUUUBBBBEEEERRRR but it doesn’t actually mean anything.

People of Norfolk. It’s does have meaning and it’s bloody amazing you manage without. But manage you do so… Can someone PLEASE tell me when the darn buses actually do run?!

5. The rudeness of staff.

Now while the rudeness of staff is not out of place in London, the entity of it is entirely different. People can be extremely rude and off hand when in the capital city and I’ve seen it loads but there we have the ability to say ‘fine, sod you then’ and go elsewhere in the future. Really decent places know they will never see your face again if they dare to give you bad service so for repeat business it’s in their interest to be as nice, as kind and as hospitable as humanly possible. Here in Norfolk, in my little village especially, this is not so much the case. In Norwich city centre for example I can think of one nail bar. ONE! Coming from East London where every other unit on the high street is dedicated to nail technicians and I find this fact alone a bitter pill to swallow. HOW MUCH for a full set? I think not, I’ll do my own thank you very much and then because doing my own often makes me look like a five year old who’s found her Mother’s nail varnish box, I am likely to end up with my tail (and nails) between my legs as I bow down and reach in to spend a small fortune because they have the monopoly. And that’s exactly it when it comes to service too.

People know you don’t have any other option so they also know they can be as rude as they like and in our village, which has one cafe and one pub, rudeness is rife. The cafe, on paper, should be really cool. It’s a converted double decker bus (a London double decker bus I hasten to add) and they have things on the menu like ‘a single ticket’ and a ‘return’ which consists of various differently priced cakes. They all sound scrummy and I’m sure that they are but having sat on said bus for over an hour waiting for a bottle of water before my order was taken and then waited a further 45 minutes more for them to bring me the wrong sandwich and I was more than a tad disappointed. When I mentioned (and at this point it WAS a mention and not a complaint) that we were a bit upset about it, the woman manager practically shouted at me, Peggy Mitchel style, to ‘Ger off moi BUS’! Ok, she didn’t say that but she may as well have done. She was useless, disinterested, annoyed and frankly rather nasty.

Will I be back? Will I heck as like and even if I HAD thought I might give it another go, when the same said portly woman (it must be all the cakes she doesn’t sell after being so rude to the patrons) pointed at me when at the village picnic, telling her friends that I was the woman who dared to complain, it certainly made my mind up that I would not be back. So now, as far as I’m concerned, we don’t even have a cafe!

And the pub is the same. It could be a GREAT pub! Loads of gardens with play equipment and a conker tree abundant with little round balls of conkerage fun for the kiddos to pick up, a huge bar area and a kitchen which could serve amazing food… But the word to pick out here is ‘could’. The garden aside and the pub is pure shite for a few reasons. The food is slop, the drinks are expensive, the decor reached its peak in 1974… And to top it off? You guessed it, the land lord is a beast of rude non thanking misery.

He doesn’t even make eye contact as he grunts displeasure at you daring to disturb him from his reverie of goodness knows what? He bangs your order down on the bar and takes your money before returning to his perch to over lord the pub with his steely glare. He is not welcoming and if there was any other pub in the village I’d not be back but… There we are. There IS only one pub and while it may not do food well, the alcohol is wet enough and alcoholic enough to keep me going back.

The rudeness of staff. They can just get away with it here and there’s nothing anyone can do about it!

6. You want me to buy what now?

Where we used to live you couldn’t leave anything outside your house for more than 30 seconds without it being pinched. Not so great when you momentarily forget the scooter as you haul 2 kids, a buggy and a bag big enough to fit your entire kitchen contents into the house but absolutely excellent when you want to get rid of stuff. Seriously, they would take ANYTHING!

Jonny and I got to a point when we were moving that we actually made a game of it ‘put this ropey old frying pan out and see how long it takes to go?’ I’d say and then 30 seconds later we would mark it off as quicker by 5 seconds than the toaster without a plug but a little bit less than that old bit of pipe no one ever knew the purpose of. Totally bizarre!

Here in good ole ‘folk and we’ve had a bath tub, a toilet and a crate load of wood outside for two days while we masquerade as Steptoe and Son waiting for our skip to be delivered with not a sniff of interest. It’s a tin bath as well, surely someone would want it to feed their cattle or make avant-garde planters but no. There it’s stayed and there it shall stay until skippage removal takes place when it will presumably go to the tip.

To be honest we’re being a bit village naughty by littering up our front yard with such stuff because people simply don’t do that round these parts. The only time you see anything outside someone’s house is when they’ve set up a little selling stall and I don’t just mean sweet little children having garage sales of all their old toys. No, not at all. People sell their wares here and personally I find that a bit strange – have they not heard of ebay?!

They leave stuff out, all kinds of sh*t (literally, you’ll see in a minute) and leave a price tag with a pot to leave the money in. And while I can sort of get on board with the eggs of all proportions and kindling (where DO they get it from I wonder?), I draw the line at stuff they’ve filled with home cooked produce. The other day I went past someone’s house who was selling jam and pickled onions. In old used jam jars. In front of their house. Oh how lovely and Little House On The Prairie you might think but how the hecky becky does the buyer know the jam is clean, and was made in a ‘pristine would pass a health check’ kitchen? How do we know that the maker wore gloves? Call me mean, call me un-villagey, call me little Miss Lonodn if you will, but when I buy jam I want it in a brand new Bon Maman jar with the pressy thing on the top well and truly not popping because then I KNOW it’s been made totally hygienically. As for the pickled onions… Bleurgh at the best of times but the same goes… Can you imagine a pickled onion with some random hair on it? Seriously, ALL the old women round here seem to have whiskers to rival any Hoxton-ite bloke and the thought of finding one in a ropey old jar of jam fills me with the horrors!

But it’s not just home grown produce, honey made from bees in their garden, bits of old wood and the ‘stirred with a potential death spoon’ jam that I’ve seen. Oh no… Remember I said ‘all kinds of sh*t’? Well, take a look at this picture from a house near where I live.

Muck. Poo. Cr*p… Essentially a bag of sh*t. for the grand totall of forty pence… I know gardeners go crazy for this shizzle. My Grandpa used to make us stop the car so that he could get out and shovel it up when he saw it but, my word! It’s certainly not for City girl me! This particular house, this very smelly particular house, with the bags of you know what outside, is on our school run. On the main road in and out of our village. There’s no hiding it from visitors and when I have friends come to stay I have to explain to them why this crazy, scuse the word but, sh*t, is happening.

Not once has any of them ever said ‘Oh yeah, I’d love a bag of poo’! Mind you, you have to take the bag back once it’s empty so perhaps if they lived closer I’d be proven to be the mad one and they’d all be buying bags and bags of it…

So there we have it for another The Only City Girl In The Village post… This is my world now people and though I try to embrace it, there are still these things which make me wonder… ! I’ll leave you with that thought and bid you a farewell for now. As I move into the next season I’m sure country life will bring more unusual happenings and I’ll be able to report back when they do but until then, boy boy moi man!

Oh and P.S, I’m waiting, waiting, waiting to offer someone some Ovaltine Light, if only they’d just ask me for a loight boi!

And… P.P.S… Can someone please help me remove my toungue from my cheek? It’s well and truly welded to it after all that!