Tag: Ashley Fletcher

The Six O’Clock Alarm Would Never Ring, Starting My First Keele Summer Term, 24 April to 9 May 1981

It’s sometimes difficult to get up in the morning when you are a first year Keele student. Who knew?

Back then, I had an alarm clock a bit like the one depicted above. I could easily sleep through the ringing of that alarm. I remember bringing back a metal biscuit tin after the Easter holidays with the sole purpose of increasing the volume of the ringing, by placing the alarm clock within the biscuit tin. Didn’t work, I know, I know.

The Key To Getting A Good Night’s Sleep As A Keele Undergraduate

Mind you, it doesn’t help if you start the term as described above. Here is a transcript for any readers not so well versed in the rarefied script that is my handwriting:

24 April 1981 – Exams today. After dinner went to Mark’s [Bartholomew] -> Union. Talking till late with Sim [Simon Ascough], [Mad] Harry & Dave [Johnson, I think].

25 April 1981 – Easy day. Went to Union in evening -> Roy’s for drinks – Melanie [Print], Ashley [Fletcher] & Louise [Lorenc] – locked out – stayed…

26 April 1981 – …overnight. No sleep. Found keys in morning- had lunch – wandered aimlessly & slept from 6 pm until 8 am.

With thanks to Ashley for recalling Melanie & Louise’s names. Neither of us really remember what passed that night, other than a lot of bullshit chat no doubt and Ashley probably went to town with his Adolf Hitler and Ian Paisley (senior) pastiche/parody speeches.

“The flag of my country is hanging upside down outside this building”.

I simply cannot imagine sleeping 14 hours straight through any more. It’s not just that I know I couldn’t do it; I really cannot even imagine it.

Still, that extended night’s sleep got me up in good time for the first FY lecture of the term. What a fresh start.

My First Rolo & My Last Rolo

That peculiar sleep pattern got me up in time to see Professor Paul Rolo’s 9:00 history lecture and Professor David Adams’s 11:00 American Studies lecture.

I recall being fascinated by both of those lectures. Peculiarly, the allure of Russian and Fascist revolutions did not enable the alarm to rouse me on the Tuesday, but the idea of another Paul Rolo lecture somehow enabled the alarm to interrupt my slumbers on the Wednesday and get me to the FY Lecture Theatre for 9:00.

Similarly, the prospect of order in the post-war international system, combined with the alarm clock, failed to get me out of bed on the Thursday morning, yet the subconscious thought of another David Adams lecture woke me and got me to the Chancellor’s Building for the 9:00 lecture on the Friday for the third time that week.

This is the first sign of a pattern that persisted throughout my student years; I was able to get up for lectures, even at 9:00, if I thought they’d be worth the candle. Otherwise I tended to skip the lectures, read up on stuff at leisure (if need be) and sleep in like a teenager…which is what I was.

I didn’t get to know Professor Paul Rolo – he left a year or so after I did FY – but he could lecture and he sounds like a fascinating chap.

Professor David Adams I did get to know when I sat on Senate and also prior to that, when I sat on the train from Stoke to Euston or from Euston to Stoke. He must have gone to London quite a lot because I remember encountering him several times. A really interesting and lovely chap.

What Else Did You Get Up To, Kid?

Ok, ok, I’m getting to it.

Monday 27 April 1981 – First lectures etc. – finished moving etc [all the way from pokey Lindsay F1 to salubrious room with a view Lindsay F4] after dinner -> Union, quite pleasant

Tuesday 28 April 1981 – Light day. Went to see film in evening (Fame – v good,) -> on to union with gang – quite good.

Wednesday 29 April 1981 – OK day. Went to Concourse meeting – on to Mis [Miriam Morgan] & Heather [Jones] for heavy evening

Thursday 30 April 1981 – easyish day. Did little. Short stay in Union – reasonably early night.(Simon [Jacobs] & Sim [Ascough] came back after)

Friday 1 May 1981 – not bad day. Busy afternoon (Kallah photos). Went to see film (yuk). Went back to union – bon.

I’d started going to Film Society by the end of the second term and went a lot in this third term. I am pretty sure the 1 May film which I did not name but described as “yuk” was Fellini Satyricon. If I remember correctly, there weren’t all that many of us in the FY lecture theatre at the start of the movie and by the end I think just three or four of us had stuck it out.

Saturday 2 May 1981 – Easy day. Shopped in Newcastle – went to see David [Perrins] & friends, supper they came over -> Sneyd, Union bop -> Amanda’s.

Sunday 3 May 1981 – Lazy day – went to Lloyd’s [Green] and Amanda’s -> Union in evening.

I feel bad saying this, but I cannot remember who Amanda is/was, but she was unquestionably a diary highlight that weekend. Simon might remember. Lloyd might remember. But I feel that it is me who should remember. Apologies. If you are out there, Amanda, please do get in touch and jog the memory…if by chance you remember anything about it.

Tuesday 5 May 1981 – Busyish day. Saw All That Jazz in the evening. Simon’s [Jacobs] for coffee after – good.

Wednesday 6 May 1981 – OK day. Went to see Discipline and Lounge Lizards in evening – v good.

Dave Lee’s forthcoming (as I write in April 2021) book The Keele Gigs! will no doubt review Discipline (whom in truth I don’t really remember), and The Lounge Lizards (a gig I remember well and very fondly). You can see something quite similar to the gig we saw on YouTube – click here:

Thursday 7 May 1981 – Easyish day. Laundry etc. Easyish evening.

Friday 8 May 1981 – Busyish day. Went to Burslem in evening. Enjoyable evening. (Came here for coffee).

Saturday 9 May 1981 – Late start, Newcastle shopping – ate – Union in evening – back here after.

That new room of mine, Lindsay F4, was salubrious enough to become a focal point to the extent that people had started coming back to my place. It might also have had something to do with the fact that I was going in to Newcastle on the weekend to buy food so always had something to eat – possibly even some left overs of cooked food but at the very least plentiful biscuits. My mum would have approved.

I should highlight the fact that Simon Jacobs gets a couple of mentions in this piece – he wrote to me saying that he was mightily put out that he didn’t get a mention in the previous Keele piece.

Bless my cotton socks, I’m in the news…

Getting My Head Around Hormones, Three Parties In Four Midweek/Mid-term Nights, This Was Keele, Late February 1981

In truth, I don’t think mushrooms were central to most of those parties

The diary & scribbles in my FY programme suggest that I wasn’t going to let lectures get in the way of my planned activities much that week, or indeed for the rest of the term. It seems I managed three FY lectures in the last three weeks of that term.

Well, it was cold and icy.

Also, I had worked out by then that you could get pretty much everything you needed from the FY lecture notes. Keen scouts who liked attending FY lectures would bring fistfuls back to F Block Lindsay for the rest of us to read. It looks as though that system broke down for the last week of term, but that’s another story.

I did attend a swathe of topic tutorials and write a couple of essays that week, though, so it wasn’t all parties and student journalism.

I think one of the essays was part of my law double topic, finishing off my law studies for that year but sealing my decision to study law along with economics for my degree. Thank you, Michael Whincup.

I remember doing a topic on Hormones & Reproduction with Dr Peter Chevins and I think I wrote my essay for that topic that week. There were 10 to 12 of us in that class; I think I was the only male (other than Dr Chevins).

I don’t think I was taking it all in. I blame my riotous teenage hormones.

I have a feeling I spent most of the class time ogling the girls and not enough of it getting my head around the relevant reproductive aspects of endocrinology. Still, I think some private study (unfortunately for me there was no practical experimental learning in pairs for that topic) meant that I managed to write a decent essay. Clearly I also learnt enough then and subsequently to get me started when I wrote a student guide book on sexual matters, Sexplanations, when I was Education & Welfare Office in 1984/85.

Tuesday 24 February 1981

Not bad day – wrote essay. In evening, went to see California Suite. Late night in Harry’s // etc.

Somewhat cheesy movie if I remember correctly – great cast though, with Jane Fonda, Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, Alan Alda, Michael Caine, Walter Matthau, Maggie Smith…

I have written about Mad Harry previously, at length in this piece – click here or below:

Winter Draws On At Keele, FY & The Union & Lindsay Bar & My First Concourse Article, 18 to 31 January 1981

In late February, then, I guess we were still in the period twixt Harry’s small trouble and big trouble. My guess is that this party was a fairly impromptu affair centred around Harry’s room. The // symbol indicates that we imbibed some dope and that I didn’t even then remember much about the gathering. We probably talked a whole load of rubbish while convincing ourselves that we were putting the world to rights. Possibly we even did put the word to rights – in which case it is such a shame that none of us the next day remembered the answers we came up with that night. Oh well.

Wednesday 25 February 1981

Easyish day. Went to party in evening // at Miriam’s – pretty good.

Miriam will be Miriam Morgan, who, along with her partner Heather (Jones) was the doyen of the Keele Gay Society. I have written up an earlier party with that crowd the previous term, at which I first met Ashley Fletcher – click here or below:

A Typical Keele Weekend For A Bunch Of Freshers, 15 & 16 November 1980

Discussing those parties with Simon Jacobs in late 2020, Simon recalled that, at one of them, there were some magic mushrooms doing the rounds. He and I both very tentatively sampled the mushrooms, probably being too timorous to take enough of the mushrooms to get enough effect to impact on the senses beyond the drink and the (if the // symbol is anything to go by) dope available at the party.

I have a feeling that this party was part of Gay Lib week, as Simon wrote that week (and party) up in the March 1981 Concourse and I cannot imagine another Wednesday night being the party night to which he refers, given my documented events of the various Wednesdays that term:

Reading Simon’s article again after all this time (I probably typed it up for that Concourse – I typed up much of the darned thing), I am struck by how tiny and nascent the Gay Soc was at that time – a dozen or so people – perhaps including me and one or two other “supporters”. Within a year or so that tiny group of active students transformed that Society and well done them.

Ashley reminded me (in correspondence late 2020) that, at one point, I was designated the Gay Soc Mascot, by dint of my support for the group. I had a feeling that honour came later than this, but perhaps it was at this event that the honour was bestowed.

Thursday 26 February 1981

Not bad day. Concoursed in evening etc.

This is a bit of an anti-climax, don’t you think? I can only apologise to readers for interrupting this programme of parties with such an ordinary-sounding day. Note that “working on Concourse” has become a single-word verb; concoursed. Let us move swiftly on.

Friday 27 February 1981

Busy day academically. Anna’s party in the evening // pretty good.

Hostess with the most-ess

Anna Summerskill’s party was probably quite a low key (perhaps a dozen or so of us) but almost certainly a dope-ridden affair. I’m trying to remember where Anna lived that year; I think Harrowby House, but I could be wrong and someone out there might correct me.

I have written a fair bit about Anna already in the same “Winter Draws” piece as Mad Harry – click here or the links above. Mark Bartholomew – also written up in that earlier piece, would no doubt have been there. Probably (but not necessarily) Simon Jacobs and one or two others from that mini dining club in Lindsay refectory, which by sacred tradition included Anna’s ceremonial fellating of a banana at the end of almost every meal, before Anna would roller-skate off to her next engagement. It’s hard to believe she’s no longer with us (sadly she died of lung cancer in 2012), she was such a force of nature, was Anna.

Not quite sure what came together to make that a (rare) busy day academically, but I was probably trying to get work out of the way ahead of my anticipated marathon efforts towards the looming Concourse deadline over the next five days…

…and there’s a story to the meeting of that deadline, I could tell you. Indeed I shall tell you, in the next episode.

A Typical Keele Weekend For A Bunch Of Freshers, 15 & 16 November 1980

With grateful thanks to Martin Ladbrooke & Steph for the above photograph of Ashley Fletcher

I suspect that I met Ashley Fletcher for the first time this weekend.

My earlier pieces about starting at Keele should leave readers in no doubt that Simon Jacobs was totally to blame for my presence at Keele…

Getting In To & Starting At Keele University, 8 October 1980

…and a fair smattering of my activities during my early weeks at Keele…

In The Absence Of Glittering Prizes…Stardust Memories, Keele Freshers Week, 12 To 18 October 1980

It seems this weekend was no exception. Unfortunately, my diary keeping was poor that term and got poorer as the term went on. The mid November scribblings were, by the looks of them, written several weeks later while inebriated.

Still, I can just about make out the following:

Saturday 15 November 1980. Easy day. Got up late. Went over to Simon’s for shopping, lunch etc. Went to town for supper – ??

…and then it reads, sprawling over the Saturday and Sunday entry

Heather’s party v late // & drank etc.

I am pretty sure that this particular Heather was “Miriam & Heather” Heather, who lived, if I remember correctly, in The Hawthorns. Not the Heather who lived (or at least dined) in Lindsay, whom Simon nicknamed “The Heathertron Bomb” on account of her unfeasibly high-decibel-registering laugh.

The double-slash marking in my diary I believe was to indicate that I partook of some cannabis, which would probably have been in the resin form illustrated above.

This was not my first experience of smoking cannabis; I was weened in Mauritius in the summer of 1979:

Gris-Gris, A Wedding Feast And More, Mauritius, 21 July 1979

It probably wasn’t even my first toke at Keele, but I think it is the first time I used that symbol, probably suggesting that the rest of the evening/night was somewhat of a haze for me.

This photo of Simon Jacobs, from 1979, was tobacco only I am sure

But not a total and utter haze, so I am fairly sure that I met Ashley at that party and he might be able to confirm or deny the matter.

Simon Jacobs had thrown himself into Keele’s gay scene as soon as we arrived at Keele. I think Simon might have started going out with Roy 25 minutes after arriving at Keele; that was the rumour anyway…a rumour proliferated mostly by Simon, I suspect. Anyway, the gay crowd was a welcoming bunch, supremely tolerant towards my unfortunate lack of gayness. I made a great many good & enduring friends, such as Ashley, while enjoying “honorary membership” of the clan throughout my years at Keele.

With thanks again to Martin Ladbrooke & Steph for this quintessentially 1980s photo of Ashley

“So what did we discuss late into the night at Heather’s party in the early hours of 15 to 16 November 1980?”, I hear you ask. Well, if anyone pretends to remember that level of detail, they are probably making it up as they go along.

I do however recall, from those early days, one particularly shocking party trick of Ashley’s. So shocking that I suspect he didn’t pull the trick on this first occasion, but he did so soon after.

Ashley pretended that he knew Hitler speeches by heart and would rant at length, in mock German, sounding just like a Hitler speech. Eventually, someone’s limited knowledge of German brought the blessed revelation that Ashley’s rant was a mock speech and not, as advertised, a vile feat of memory.

Get Ashley inebriated enough today and it’s just possible that he could still pull off the trick. Of course trigger warnings and safe spaces hadn’t been invented back then. The trick might not be appreciated in quite the same way today.

Anyway, despite all that, 40 years on, Ashley and I remain in touch and it wasn’t that long ago that we last met up…

A Get together With Ashley Fletcher In Finsbury Park, 10 April 2019

…while Simon Jacobs was the most recent person (ahead of Lockdown 2.0) that Janie and I have seen in person:

A Prescient Visit To Simon Jacobs’s Place, 10 October 2020

Enduring friendships indeed.