Day One England - Part II

After visiting Groombridge we meandered over to Bateman's, the home of the late Rudyard Kipling, who incidentally was named after a lake in northern England and not the lake after him.

Must have been one heck of a lake for his parents to have named him after it.  And thank goodness it was Rudyard Lake and not, say, the Dead Sea that they were so fond of.

Truthfully, I don't recall much about this house.  Owned by the National Trust which is unfailingly stingy about photo-taking in any of their homes, I proceeded to forget about Bateman's as soon as I walked out the door.  Maybe it was the jetlag, maybe it was the fact that I couldn't snap any photos so I purposely pushed the house out of my mind out of pure American crankiness.

My father-in-law, whom we shall call Peter, plans to write the National Trust a letter of complaint for their stingy ways.  He's not American but he's admirably cranky so he and I got along quite grandly complaining our way from one National Trust property to the next.

I'm compelled, at this point, to tell you about Peter's crankiness and what has propelled him to the top of my "Favorite People" list.  I was not with him on the evening of this event but, there were two other people who corroborated his story, and they are credible witnesses.  His wife, my mummy-in-law, Sheila, and my red-haired and equally cranky sister-in-law, Josephine.  (Josephine is worth an equal measure of attention but I will tell you more about her later).

Apparently, as it was told to me, Peter and the fam had gone out to eat at the Little Chef up or down the road from them.  When they arrived, the restaurant was in complete disarray.  The servers, cooks, in fact the entire staff, had some sort of a free-for-all going on as they were running around snapping towels at each other and laughing and giggling and acting totally unEnglish.

Peter, after sitting quietly at his table waiting for service, finally got fed up with all the shenanigans, marched back to the kitchen, and in a loud voice gave the Little Chef crew a severe upbraiding - somewhere along the lines of "Quit your [mucking] around and do the job you are paid to do and WAIT ON THE CUSTOMERS".

He removed himself from the kitchen and as he walked back to his table, as it was told to me, he received a standing ovation from all the other customers in the restaurant.

As I said, I was not there that evening, but I believe, with my whole heart, that this tale is true.

Unfortunately, Peter has also been banned from the Cherry Trees Tea Room on several occasions because he has oft upbraided the staff (Dawn) there, as well.  But Dawn, the proprietess, keeps forgiving him because he's her best customer. But then Dawn has also threatened to ban my Draw who isn't cranky in the least.  So, it could, well and truly, be that Dawn requires a stern talking to every once in a while.  By the way, I personally find Dawn quite wonderful and so she has found her way on my list of "Favorite People", as well.

Back to Bateman's...

I did manage to snap a few photos...  outdoors, which I will share with you now.  I also went into the nice little giftshop to purchase my yearly National Trust baseball cap, even though the National Trust gets on my last nerve.  But this year they used a softer material in the construction so I passed.

And thus concluded Day One in England after a wonderful home-cooked meal prepared by me mum-in-law, the lovely Sheila.  The family agreed that, despite the National Trust, a good day was had by all.

Next installment: Day Two.  Stay tuned...

(And a bit of whimsy to tide you over)

Comments

[Draw]

You really need to write more, you have a style that is very enjoyable and readable. I too look forward to hearing about my sister. To steal a line from Mr Bennet, her crankiness has been my constant companion these 35 years.

[Lucinda]

OK, I'm hooked. I don't watch TV and don't do reality shows or soaps, but now I'm hooked on this trip-to-England blog? I like all the cranky characters. I like the PW dryad inside the tree. So what about red-headed Josephine? Couldn't we have two installments a day?