Southport Day Two: A Day Out In Liverpool, Tate Liverpool, International Slavery Museum, The Cavern Club and More, 10 June 2017

On the evening of 9 June, when Daisy and I returned from the Trafalgar Ground, Southport, we had an excellent dinner with Charlotte and Chris (Lavender and Escamillo Escapillo) in The Bold Hotel restaurant.

We agreed that the weather forecast for Saturday looked shocking and (I thought) agreed that a day out in Liverpool would be a good substitute for sitting around in (probably) vain hope of any cricket. We also agreed to liaise in the morning.

About 9:00 a.m. Daisy received a text from Lavender to say that, as the weather was so poor, they had decided to take the train to Blackpool for the day.

Liverpool – more front than Blackpool?

“What’s Blackpool like?” asked Daisy.

“I’ve never been on a wet June day and I’m not about to either,” was my reply, “what the hell was wrong with the Liverpool idea; I thought we’d all agreed a plan last night?”

Daisy phoned Lavender to ascertain that she had, in fact, confused the names Blackpool and Liverpool. The whole of the north of England is just one huge swathe of vaguely-named towns and cities to some people.

So we were as one with the plans and headed off to Southport railway station. For the princely sum of £5.10 each we were awarded the freedom of the Wirral and Northern Lines for the day.

We ran into some Middlesex supporters as we went to board our train. They seemed to think there might be play from 11:30 and wondered why we were fleeing town. The truth will have dawned on them as the day panned out – there was no cricket at all that day.

From Liverpool Central, we headed towards Albert Docks; our first stop being the Tate Liverpool. Daisy took some photos along the way.

Are you SURE we weren’t in Blackpool?

We were really impressed with the Tate Liverpool and spent quite some time there.

Tate Liverpool, Albert Dock

We started with the Tracey Emin and William Blake in Focus exhibition. I’m not 100% sure about the connection between Blake and Emin – this seemed to me more a marketing ploy than a genuine connection – but I had never actually seen the Tracey Emin bed before, nor had I ever seen so many William Blake pictures gathered in one place. Well worthwhile.

We then went through the upper floor (i.e. same level as the Emin/Blake) of Constellations – which is the main regular exhibition at Tate Liverpool. We all enjoyed that enormously but felt in need of a sit down and some refreshment at that stage, so we went to the cafe for a while and then looked at the rest of Constellations.

Buoyed by our refreshments, we wandered round the block to the Beatles Experience, where there were long queues and a rather touristic look to the place, so we decided to go to the Cavern Club instead but, before leaving the docks area, to take Mike O’Farrell’s advice and visit the International Slavery Museum . I’m really glad we did.

I find it hard to try and articulate how that International Slavery Museum made me/us feel. It is very interesting. Some of it is shocking, not least the matter-of-fact inventories and documentation that makes it so clear that people were seen as commercial commodities. But much of first section of the museum is a wealth of information on the African culture from which so many of the slaves came and much of the last section is a celebration of the modern culture that has emerged through the descendants of former slaves.

One especially thought-provoking section is about modern slavery – in particular sex workers – which reminded me that slavery in all its horrible forms has not entirely gone.

Between the museums and the Cavern Club, we wanted to see Judy Chicago’s Fixing A Hole mural, at Stanley Dock near the Titanic Hotel. We took a cab there, on the advice of some helpful police-folk:

Judy Chicago’s Beatles-Inspired Mural “Fixing A Hole”

We didn’t hang around in the plush Titanic Hotel, nor the Stanley Dock. We were told we’d have no trouble getting a cab to the Cavern up on Great Howard Street, but we walked 5 minutes or more along that road without a sniff of a cab.

Chris cleverly suggested that we try Regent Road (along the side of the Mersey) instead. That worked rapidly…and we landed up with a Scouse cabby from central casting who told us his life story, how many he smokes and yet how far he walks, tales of seeing John Lennon’s ghost, everything he thought we ought to see in Liverpool…you get the picture. He was great.

That late afternoon slot on a Saturday at The Cavern Club turns out to be great fun. We saw The Shakers – one of the house bands.

Yes, it is possible for Ged to look this spaced out after just a few sips of wine and no narcotics, honestly, officer.

As always, Janie was keen to demonstrate her skills at Sixties-style dancing in a hippy-hippy-shake-stylee:

These pictures look even better in the iPhone mini vid mode, but you should get the idea from the still. Escamillo Escapillo feigns not being with Daisy.
As we leave, Daisy chats with security but does not have her collar felt.

You can see all the photos from the Southport/Liverpool trip, including a couple of Daisy’s well dodgy vids, by linking through to Flickr, here.

We decided to head for a train between 18:00 and 18:15 to get us back to Southport in time to freshen up before dinner.

Dinner was at a family-run Italian restaurant named Volare, about 30 seconds crawl on hands and knees (not that we did it that way) from the hotel. The food was excellent and the staff helpful/friendly. The highlight (or perhaps low-light) of the evening was towards the end, when the staff with great fanfare played “Happy Birthday To You” at full volume over the sound system and presented a rather embarrassed-looking lady at the table behind me with a candle-lit tiramisu.

Unbeknown to me, Daisy signalled to the staff that it was also my birthday (which of course it wasn’t), so five minutes later they went through the rigmarole again for me, much to my discomfort and the glee of the other three. I shall exact my revenge; don’t know where, don’t know when, but the dish will be served cold.

In truth, we’d done many interesting things and had a lot of fun that day, despite most of it being distinctly “Plan B” activity.

The Immaculate Conception Of H. Ackgrass: At Keele With Pete Wild & On Merseyside With Bobbie Scully, Early January 1984

Pete Wild c1985 – with thanks to Mark Ellicott for the picture.

As had become my habit, I returned to Keele very early in the year, well ahead of the start of term, after lunching with Caroline on the Tuesday and Jilly on the Wednesday.

5 January 1984 – Got up early – bought amp – lazed around – returned to Keele – v tired.

6 January 1984 – did v little all day. Visited Andrea [Collins, later Woodhouse] – she came back for dinner – went on to Union

7 January 1984 – Did litle today – lazed and shopped – visited Michelle [Epstein, later Infield] – went union with Hippo in eve

The “amp” will have been for my parents’ house. I still only had a ghetto blaster at Keele that year.

I don’t remember nicknaming Pete Wild “Hippo”, but I write it that way twice in the diary around that time so it must have been a thing. His initial nickname was “Hippy” on account of his long hair. but there was a certain hippo quality about him, clumsily rushing about the flat, sometimes causing carnage.

The thing I do remember is that I had decided over Christmas to vent my frustration with the Students’ Union committee by writing secretly a gossip column for Concourse. I’m not sure that I had, by early January, settled on the name, “H Ackgrass”, but I had done a fair bit of thinking about my methods of secrecy.

Espionage-Style Tricks: Two Typewriters & Several Collaborators

I had two portable typewriters at Keele. One that I was using for my work, which was a decent quality item, I think acquired second-hand from a departing student the year before. It was a Smith-Corona that looked a little like this:

Image borrowed from ebay – this item for sale here at the time of borrowing

My other typewriter was a cheap generic which I had bought/been given several years earlier and had bashed into decrepitude – hence my procurement of a better one for my studies. The old generic (ghastly orange case) languished in a cupboard and almost certainly no-one at Keele had seen the tell-tale skew-iffy-look typing that emanated from it. In my earlier, Concourse journalist, days…

…I had always used Concourse’s own typewriters.

The quirky old generic was to be the gossip columnist’s tool (as it were). It was to remain hidden except when used for producing the Ackgrass column.

I also worked out that I would need collaborators…aka spies…to help gather information for the column and help keep my identity a mystery. By necessity, I would need to take all of my Barnes L54 flatmates and Bobbie into my confidence about this idea, as it would be nigh-on impossible to hide it from those people anyway.

That much I’m sure I discussed with Pete on my return to Keele in early January. Pete loved the idea and was keen to be one of my spies. He had already set ambitions to run for Union Committee 1984/85, as had his girlfriend, Melissa (Mel) Oliveck. I recall that those nascent conversations included the idea that Melissa should also be one of my spies, as she was spending so much time at the flat it would be awkward to keep the secret from here. Also, Mel could probably could acquire intelligence on some union people that the rest of us would not be able to access.

Our other flatmates, Chris Spencer and Alan Gorman, were not really involved with the union at all, but would still be helpful foils for testing material and honing jokes. Alan, in particular, enjoyed lampooning student politics and had a wicked sense of humour.

8 January 1984 – busyish day cataloguing etc. Went Union in evening with Hippo

9 January 1984 – Left Keele – went to Liverpool. Went with Bobbie to Karate Club – went on to pub with friends after.

10 January 1984 – Went to Chester in afternoon & stayed in Wallasey in evening – went to pub etc.

11 January 1984 – Went into the City today – shopped etc. In eve B[obbie] graded Karate & I went on after – we went to several pubs etc.

The cataloguing was probably to do with my music – not least my cassette collection at Keele, which was getting large enough that I needed documentary help to find things.

A Brief Interlude On Merseyside With Bobbie

Bobbie was an exponent of Shotokan karate. Rather a good exponent of it. I seem to recall that the grading she took while I was hanging around was for brown belt with two stripes. I had no idea what that really meant, other than the fact that “rather a good exponent” becomes a fair description at that level.

Alan Gorman also took up Shotokan karate at Keele and I understand he continued his interest in it when he moved to the USA some years later. I cannot remember whether Alan was already doing karate when I got together with Bobbie or whether it was Bobbie’s inspiration that got him into the sport. Bobbie can’t remember either, but is sure that Alan was far enough behind her in the karate progress that they didn’t really overlap (e.g. as sparring partners) at the Keele karate club.

I think that early evening session at a Liverpool Club was the only time I watched Bobbie practicing karate.

My recollection of the evening out with her Liverpool karate mates is of a friendly, mostly working class bunch of lads (I think Bobbie might have been the only lass). They made me feel very welcome when we all went to the pub afterwards, while at the same time letting me know that I was incurably southern and “posh”. Bobbie, on the other hand, rather like the character Zelig in the then recent film, slowly but surely morphed from a middle-class-accented lass from Wallasey into a scouse-accented Liverpudlian, “one of the lads”, especially by around the third drink.

The following day in Chester was more genteel, of course.

Citroen Dyane, Alexander Migl, CC BY-SA 4.0

Bobbie pootled us around in a Citroen that looked a little like the one depicted above. I vaguely remember seeing her in my second year (her first) peering up from below the steering wheel of her dad’s Jag, which seemed a rather incongruous vehicle in Lindsay Hall, but it did get Bobbie noticed. Bobbie’s dad worked abroad a lot and thought (perhaps mistakenly) that the car would be safer in Bobbie’s hands at Keele than untended on a suburban street in Wallasey.

Let’s just reflect for a moment on the fact that, in the karate guys eyes, I was deemed posh, while Bobbie was deemed one of the lads.

Let’s move on.

I don’t really remember the pub in Wallasey, but that is one detail that Bobbie might actually remember when she reads this. Bobbie still spends much of her time up there these days (forty years later), when she is not in London.

I remember warm hospitality from Bobbie’s mum and dad (I think just her mum on that occasion, as dad was away), plus a font of wisdom in the form of their “family retainer”, a Merseyside lady you might choose from central casting to fulfil that role, slightly confusingly named Robbie.

The final day in Liverpool was great fun. Bobbie gave me a guided tour, then left me to my own devices for a while when she went for her karate grading. Successfully graded, we then went on a bit of a pub crawl.

I don’t remember all the pubs we tried – I doubt if Bobbie remembers all that much about it – but I do recall that we ended up in The Grapes.

Sue Adair / The Grapes, Mathew Street

I’m pretty sure it was in The Grapes where we got roped in to an impromptu Irish sing song, which would not have looked out of place in a Disney-style movie depicting such a place and event.

I vaguely knew what was going on in Whiskey In the Jar and The Wild Rover, but got more than a little confused when “Mush-a ring dumb-a do dumb-a da” and/or “right up your kilt” came into play. I remember trying to get Bobbie to explain to me what I was supposed to be doing/singing and Bobbie telling me not to worry about it and just join in making noise.

I probably sounded as Irish singing those songs as Dick Van Dyke sounded cockney singing Chim Chim Cher-ee. But then I’m not sure how Irish everyone else sounded in that pub.

I didn’t visit Liverpool again for several decades…

…yet still felt a bit of an old hand/expert when visiting Liverpool all those years later. It’s that sort of unforgettable place.

…Then Back To Keele…

I expect I broached the matter of H Ackgrass and the proposed spy network with Bobbie while we were in Liverpool…or at least on the way back to Keele on the Thursday. I think she quite liked the idea without really wanting to be involved, other than as a sounding board and one of the group that was in the know.

12 January 1984 – Left Liverpool today – returned to Keele – shopped etc. Met Ashley [Fletcher] in Union & drank – Bobbie came back – had restless night – felt bad.

13 January 1984 – Felt really funny all day – had loads of visitors today etc. Not very well at all. Feverish all night.

14 January 1984 – Didn’t feel too bad in the morning. Shopped and did a few things. Took Bobbie out for dinner in eve – very pleasant evening.

There is a wonderfully memorable episode in I Claudius, when Caligula falls ill and then emerges relatively soon after his indisposition refreshed, announcing that he has, in the meantime, become a god.

Reading those three diary entries, I just wonder whether I emerged from short but nasty-sounding fever fully formed in the matter of my nom de plume, Herbert Ackgrass.

Parenthetically, I also wonder where I might have taken Bobbie for that very pleasant “out for dinner”. I do remember one acceptably good bistro in Newcastle-Under-Lyme but I cannot remember the name. Perhaps the hive mind of readers will help me out with that one.

I, Ackgrass…I mean, Caligula

Be that as it may, having emerged from my fever alive and therefore stronger, the fruits of those H Ackgrass scribbles, or should I say skewiffy typings, would start to emerge soon enough.