Category: indoor games

Driving home for Advent

Published on by mickyrichards19572 Comments

Assuming everyone has been good this year, you should all be expecting Santa to visit.  If you’ve not been good, expect your chimney to suddenly develop large cracks in its masonry.

As a child, waking up in my Balham flat, I would eagerly look forward to what Christmas Day would bring (preferably in the form of presents). 

One year I remember receiving the Rupert annual.  I was never a fan of his column (obviously not written by him) nor of the Daily Express in general; they seemed to be obsessed with finding Martin Bormann (the Nazis’ answer to Reggie Perrin). 

I was quite disappointed – I had wanted the Supercar annual and it was on that Christmas morning I decided to invest in a decent pen and start an “improve your hand-writing” course.

Christmas lunch would be held one floor down in my flats at my Nan’s.  She was an excellent cook. Although, in later years, she would mistakenly place threepenny bits in the turkey, rather than the Christmas pudding.  Many a Christmas afternoon was spent at the emergency dentist. 

I was always allowed to have a glass of Pimm’s.  There was little alcohol in it; this was replaced with more fruit than you’d find on a Carmen Miranda hat.  

The evening was spent playing Newmarket, with many halfpennies up for grabs.   I would get very involved and still wake up screaming “Whose got the ace of spades?”. 

Hoping not to get the 2026 Rupert Annual – or his distasteful trousers – this Christmas.

Happy Advent.

Three O-level trick

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

Playing cards have had a continual presence in my life; no more so than when I was growing up in ‘60s London.

As a young child I’d play Snap and Beat your neighbour out of doors.  The latter made me think we had violent neighbours who came round for cups of sugar and needed to be discouraged.

At secondary school Whist was a popular game – especially when it was wet playtime and you’d forgotten your Owzthat kit.

I went to two secondary schools; at the second (marginally posher) they played Bridge:  this is like Whist – only for toffs and numerate toffs at that!  Sadly, for me, the more I played, the less revision I did.  This was reflected in my exam results.   If there’d been a question during any of my O-levels asking “what are trumps?” I’d probably still be at university or running for office in the US.

During the ‘70s, there was a gaming club on Balham High Road.  My friend’s dad ran it. I would visit on Sunday afternoons; we walked through the very quiet snooker hall and upstairs to the gaming rooms – still smelling of Saturday evening’s cigarettes; beer and the Kray brothers.  

Having failed Maths O-level three-times, I’d never knew if my cards were anywhere close to adding up to twenty-one, so, I stuck to Snap during my twenties, rather than playing Pontoon.

Wonder if they ever found the lady?

Tell the invisible man I can’t see him

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

There was a joke shop in Tooting which was the ideal destination for anyone who was an aspiring Dennis the Menace or Beryl the Peril.

Because everyone likes to scare their grandparents with a pretend severed finger or plastic tarantula casually placed next to their February 1965 edition of the Reader’s Digest and glass of Complan.  Or create a smell which really couldn’t be blamed on the dog (whether you had a dog or not) and that, after you’d created the accompanying noise with a whoopee cushion placed under an aged relative.

For me, the best thing in the shop was invisible ink.

Watching Dangerman (like Danger Mouse only with less cheese) in the sixties, I wanted to be John Drake – or anyone on TV who was a spy.

I would leave notes, written in invisible ink, for the cleaners of our Balham flats (they were my nemesis and I knew, while on their fag break, they’d automatically reveal my messages).

Having run out of the shop-bought invisible ink, I’d create my own, using lemon juice.  My mother would often wonder why her bottles of Jif ran out so quickly.

I left messages for my mum, but these always backfired because a. her reading skills weren’t very good and b. her lighter was modelled on a make that Red Adair wouldn’t have recommended.  So, rather than knowing I was going to be late for my tea, my mother was busy ringing the Fire Brigade.  To be fair, she did like a man in uniform.

Dear Diary…

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

It’s that time of year when you think about New Year’s resolutions.

It’s not unlike Lent, except the resolutions rarely last for 40-days (or nights).

Is this the year I give up chocolate (and make Bournville village a ghost town) and try and get that bikini body ready for the summer of 2024? 

Should I start adding semolina to my diet (having lived without it since an unfortunate episode during a lunch in my Balham primary school in the early ‘60s; this is unlikely – plus, I promised my then probation officer the incident would never happen again).

I’ve wondered about writing a diary?  The last time I wrote one was in the summer of ’76 and wrote the word “hot” for so many weeks I became bored.  I assume it was never continually hot for Samuel Pepys?

Last year, in the UK, the most popular New Year’s resolution was to exercise more. Should I get my Bullworker down from the loft?  Should I ask Charles Atlas for his promised set of muscles – and a duster for the Bullworker?

Or, I could combine several of the above and write in my new 2024 diary: “Have applied to Opportunity Knocks.”  I mean that most insincerely.

Mini bannister

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

Until my auntie Vera took me on a trolley bus from Wimbledon to Belmont (which seemed so far away from Balham, I could have been on Neptune), my second favourite mode of transport was bannisters.  (My first was the train, as I enjoyed climbing into the rope luggage rack.  I think I had been a monkey in a previous life).

In my Balham flats the cleaning ladies had done such a fine job with their tins of Pledge on the bannisters that, going down them, was like the bobsleigh at the winter Olympics.

Perhaps it’s a boy thing, but going down the flight of stairs from my fourth-floor flat, I’d slide down the set of bannisters rather than testing my multiplication skills by taking eight or nine steps at a time or take the lift.  

Oddly, I never did this on the stairs at Balham Tube station.  I think the metal studs fixed regularly on my potential downward “course” were off-putting.  “Vasectomy” was one of the first Latin words I learned.

A consequence of this constant sliding meant one side of my trousers became quite worn.  When questioned by my mother about this one-sided wear and tear, I said that one of my thighs was larger than the other and therefore rubbed.  Explaining why I’d drawn Olympic rings on her best tea tray was less convincing.  You win some, you luge some 😊

Thriller minute

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

I was eight when I wrote my first novel.  It was called The Windy Night; it was a thriller and had nothing to do with cabbage.

I only wrote four-pages; and most of that were drawings (the sign of a good book is one which contains pictures).

One evening my dad brought home a few sheets of slightly used Letraset letter transfers.  My book suddenly had a very professional front cover, courtesy of these discarded sheets.

The book was never published.  My theory was the lack of semi-colons in the prose (or perhaps, too many?).  Sadly, there were no vowels left on the sheet, so the title became Th Wndy Nght – possibly many publishers rejected it as they thought it was written in Welsh or Shakespearean English?

There was a shop in Balham High Street which sold stationery.  They not only sold these transfer sheets with letters (including ones with all vowels still intact), but you could also buy a piece of card depicting landscapes where you could create your own scene.   I had sheets which had a beach showing the D-Day landings (with soldiers and tanks to manoeuvre) and a field, where you could place flora and fauna.

I mixed the two and had a giant caterpillar landing on Omaha beach and several Wehrmacht officers blowing dandelions. 

Blowpipe dreams

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

I’m surprised I never ended up in Madame Tussaud‘s Chamber of Horrors given the toys I had as a kid.

By the age of six, I’d become very adept at using a tomahawk.  Luckily, it was made of rubber and therefore the chances of me chopping people’s scalps off was remote.  

As if encouraging the art of decapitating wasn’t enough, my father once brought home a blowpipe.  A German client of his had sent it to him.  I scoured all my Christopher Isherwood, Goethe and Sven Hassel novels, but never found any mention of blowpipes. 

When I was given the gift, I had the sudden fear we’d be leaving the safety of our Balham flat and moving to New Guinea; my new-found prowess with a blowpipe ensuring we’d become self-sufficient the moment we got off the boat or plane from Croydon Airport. 

The blowpipe darts were, of course, rubber-tipped.  The worst I could do was take one of my parent‘s eyes out as they entered my bedroom brandishing my evening hot chocolate. 

As you get older, there’s a medical test where you have to demonstrate your ability to blow.  Little do these doctors know, I’d been trained by Pygmies from an early age with my blowpipe and, during the test, I imagine I’m trying to kill a mammoth.

It was a few years ago now. 

Playtime conkers all

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

As you get older, so you complain more about the vagaries of the weather. 

During my south-west London school time, during the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, I can never ever remember there being “wet play”. 

We had two 15-minute breaks. (I still think of a quarter of an hour as one-playtime).

As boys, we would invariably play football.  However, there were two dangers in our playground.

The only boy who didn’t play football, ran round the playground pretending to be a Ford Zodiac.  There was the danger that he’d take out our team right-back when mis-timing his turn round the school water fountain.  And a Ford Zodiac, for those who can remember, was a very big car.

The other ever-present danger was the girl who thought she was a golden retriever.  Not only could her lead get caught up with your legs as you sped down the wing towards the opponent’s goal, but there was the constant danger of catching rabies if she bit you (she had a note from her mum saying she didn’t need a muzzle).

If it had ever rained, we’d have been in our class struggling against pretend carbon monoxide fumes and the smell of wet dog.  Still, it was preferable to Music and Movement.

Setting a small bar

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

The few times I was allowed to go with my parents to socialise at other SW17 houses, I was always amazed where the drinks where kept.

In our flat, if you were a visitor, you’d assume my family were sponsored by Bell’s or Gordon’s.

The drink wasn’t stored in some fancy cabinet; in our flat, it was in the mandatory brown sideboard, next to dad’s old Chelsea programmes.

In other peoples’ places the Black & Decker had been working overtime as one wall had been transformed into a small bar – albeit without the dartboard and cardboard sleeve of packets of pork scratchings.

One family had a globe.  The globe would open up and a selection of alcoholic beverages were instantly displayed – I assumed Marco Polo had a similar container?  I tried spinning it once and nearly broke my wrist.  Although, only until recently, I thought gin came from Abyssinia (it was an old globe) and Soda Stream was a lake in Africa.

Some families had clearly won decanters at various fetes; many had collected glasses from Esso.  In 1970, they may have swapped them for a card featuring Martin Peters.

Once, trying to help out, I thought I’d move the pineapple off the Borrowers-sized bar; having picked it up by the top, ice-cubes suddenly scattered to all parts of the shagpile. 

For the remainder of the evening I was condemned to sit, and not move, by the Dansette record player.  It’s not unusual.

Saving the bacon

Published on by mickyrichards1957Leave a comment

At sixty-six, I tend not to get invited to as many sleep-overs as I did many years ago.

Within my Balham block of flats, there lived another family with kids my age.  If our respective parents went out, I would sleep in their flat.  I loved it; and loved it for one reason: crispy bacon.

My friend’s dad was a salesman for a toy manufacturer, so there was always be the best new toys in their flat.  However, you can keep Flounders; Happy Families and anything involving attaching something to a magnet and a bit of string, it was the morning fry-up I looked forward to.   I probably already had high cholesterol at six!

I didn’t need waking up the next morning, as the smell of frying bacon would waft into our bedroom.  Auntie Sylvia (she wasn’t my real auntie) could have won countless worldwide competitions for cooking bacon.

However, before the morning food fest begun, we’d still have fun the previous evening – staying awake (to the babysitter’s probable annoyance) until 9.30 – which we thought must be tomorrow already!  We’d plan night-time expeditions to the kitchen – although, I did think to myself, we’d better not eat all the bacon or anything which would have made me still full the following morning.

At sixty-six, I’m still getting up at midnight, only not to raid the fridge – or to find Penelope Plod, the policeman’s daughter. 😊