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I've not got a lot of time today because I'm busy helping an African gentleman whose father was killed by mercenaries and whose uncle is now trying to steal away his precious inheritance. Luckily, he's come up with a scheme whereby he transfers the money into my bank account and I keep it for a short amount of time - presumably until his uncle has lost interest or found himself a blood diamond mine or something - then I transfer it back, minus a 25% holding fee. Easy money, right? And I need every penny now that I'm about to become a home owner...
Anyway, before I send Felix Fafona my bank details, I'll quickly bring you up to speed on another interesting weekend of house hunting. We were rather taken by a lovely cottage in the bohemian enclave of Hebden Bridge - a stunning woodland / meadow location, and all recently renovated to a very high spec. The only downside was that to get to it you had to drive for about a mile down an unmade-up road (really, you couldn't have made this road up!) that resembled the surface of the moon. Now remember - I'm a farmboy, so it's not like I've not driven my share of bumpy tracks, but there were entire families living in some of those craters, and the idea of making that journey every day - especially in the winter - forced us to reconsider our love for the house in question. Which was a shame, but you have to take these things into consideration.
At another potential favourite, the Estate Agent arrived to show us round as the vendor was on holiday. She let us in and started with the lounge, careful not to trip over the empty wine bottles, and trying her best to wrench open the curtains so that we could appreciate the room in all its splendour through the spliffy-smelling haze that hung in the air... when from the kitchen we heard the sound of music, and the sizzling of bacon.
"Oh," says the EA, "maybe someone's home..."
And indeed, someone was home. The man of the house. And strike me blind if it's not Keef Richards' younger brother - what are the odds?
"Hey, man... I wasn't expecting any callers this morning..." (It was 12.30.)
The EA explained how they'd booked the showing a week earlier, and how she'd understood the vendors were away.
"Oh, yeah, man - we came back early. Last night. Early this morning. Some time... what time is it? Hey, you're welcome to have a look around, except Rosie's in the bath, man, so don't go near the bathroom..."
Putting on a brave face, the EA endeavoured to sell us the back garden. Then, as we returned to the kitchen...
"Look, man, Rosie's giving me a hard time about showing the house while she's in the altogether and that... perhaps you can come back and look at the upstairs later, yeah? How about tonight? We could crack open a bottle and pass round the weed and, y'know, you can see the place in all it's glory... How's 10-30 sound? We should be up by then..."
“Kiss Dolls Commercial” Theme
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Rock God Cred Report: Click here to check the “Kiss Doll Commercial”
theme…the song still makes me laugh out loud.
30 minutes ago
15 rants and reactions:
And if you bought the place these guys would still be lurking about... Keef snuggled under your duvet toking on a bong and Mrs Keef still in the altogether in the bathroom. Maybe the ES ought to sell it as "fully furnished hippy commune and period piece"?
Hebden Bridge... might be wrong but isn't that Ted Hughes country?
I guess only you can judge the dreadfulness of that particular track, but I've lived down (and up) some near impassable ones, and never regretted it. The upsides are: good excuse to get an old Landrover; pretty hard for anyone to come and build bang in your view; deters three wheelers and people looking for B&Bs; somewhere to put your coal ash and rubble...
You know, you've actually made house-hunting sound rather appealing. I actually felt tempted for a brief moment. It is such good blog material snooping in other people's houses.
I love Hebden Bridge. My old boss used to live there - in a house rather strangely called Valhalla. He built it himself and used to bore us daily with the latest developments.
Oh that naughty Felix Fafona. He or one of his similarly unfortunate friends emailed us recently with much the same request. One can only wonder at the evidently shambolic state of the banking system in Nigeria.
Rockers are notoriously late risers! Sometimes they don't get up at all, so you were probably lucky anyone answered the door!!
I hear The Stones are on the verge of calling it a day as Keef and Mick have been having words. Or, maybe it's an excuse as they just want a lie-in after all that touring!
What? I gave that bloody Felix some money only the other week - no wonder I'm broke!
Do Keef and his missus count as fixtures or fittings?
I think you should look into whether they are grounds for a substatial discount personaly
If I were Keef, I wouldn't sell my pad to uptight straights. I would demand to see your music collection before exchanging contracts.
Yeah, sorry about the state when you popped round. At least the missus washed the bath afterwards...
Went to look at a flat myself the other day above a take-away where the window was broken and they'd used brown parcel tape to fix it. They were asking £115 a week for the place, and it didn't even have double glazing.
Laura - Felix told a friend of mine that he had sickle-cell AND malaria - which is, in fact, a medical impossibility. Although given how unlucky he is, who knows...
Rol - Don't let Sting put you off anything - after I saw him on the South Bank Show playing chess with Trudi in matching red velvet robes I laughed so much I can barely listen to the Police any more. LOVE the Robertson Davies song though.
That first paragraph made me snort. Do people still get those damn emails??
Moving on...I used to be an EA, in a former life. You really do see all sorts in that job!
Hebden Bridge? Full of people in silly hats and stripy tights who say they won't take medication because "it's not natural" and then pump themselves full of every recreational drug under the sun.
Of course my job may have made me somewhat cynical towards them.
My Uncle who had a farm in Herefordshire claimed that Black Sabbeth had a look round and then bought the place all in the space of a morning. But he used to grow Mushrooms to supplement the income from the hops so he may have been confused. Not sure why I mentioned it now. Another glass of red wine I think.
Sounds like a narrow escape on all points, however a lively start it may have seemed!
Plenty of real estate going cheap in Nigeria, I'll send you MY bank account details....
Ha ha - what larks. One house we saw had a dead pigeon in the middle of the living room carpet. Another had a man - top half a shirt and tie, bottom half - boxer shorts - playing Age of Empires at his computer. He just nodded at us and grunted as his wife showed us around.
Steve - Hughes was from Mytholmroyd, which is a couple of miles down the road from Hebden. But I was always a Larkin man myself.
Sorry, BT, I couldn't bring myself to buy a 4x4... that's almost as bad as driving an Audi!
RB - Valhalla seems like one of the more normal house names in Hebden from what I've seen.
TW - I don't think they were actual rockers. They could have been roadies though.
Laura - you're not supposed to give him money, just your bank account details. He's supposed to give the money to you! (Maybe that money he's putting into my account might actually be yours.)
Vicus - my record collection? That'd take a while...
Davey - yeah, but you'd never have to cook again.
Lucy - I think those comments should have been posted on your own blog. ;-) Actually, what a cunning ruse to get everyone to check you out... Hey everyone, go read Lucyfishwife!
Penelope - apologies, I was getting the abbreviation wrong, wasn't I? I've corrected it now.
Dan - your job made you cynical? I can't imagine that ever happening to me...
BW - did they have bats in the barn? Ozzy was probably getting a biot peckish.
Sag - send them to Laura, thanks.
Garen - there'sd no other way to play Age Of Empires, I find.
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