Scrubbing Dixies

[GoneToTheCanner]

Hi Tony
There is none so blind as those who cannot see! How about a proper Don punishment like scrubbing dixies in the cookhouse or whitewashing rocks or polishing the corridors of the Hostel?
The Noratlas was a fine aircraft,very reminiscent of World War 2.I had a good look around them and have some pictures,ifI ever figure out how to put them up here.
regards
GttC

[John K]

Nice one Gttc! Scrubbing dixies, with wire wool and carbolic soap, in the snow with a senior throwing a bucket of cold water over you! Ahhh! Those were the days!
How we weren't all down with food poisoning I don't know!
Of course I was a 'cushy' senior, ask my juniors!

[GoneToTheCanner]

Hi John K
"Cushy Senior!" That's up there with "I was only following orders". The cooks in the Dining Hall used to call the dixies " Bam-ber-ee-iz", the Dub pronunciation of "Bain Marie". It took ages for us non-Dubs to figure out what they were saying.Either way, scrubbing congealed scrambled egg or potato out of them was an awful job. Nuclear waste is easier to get rid of....
regards
GttC

[John K]

Dead right! those cooks used to deliberately boil them dry for a laugh! Did you ever have the 'privelidge' of scrubbing "Big Bertha" she was a mother of a dixie!

[Hi Bypass]

John,by "Big Bertha" are you refering to that contraption in which the stew was made?
It was like a hybrid double dixie mounted on top of the cooker and it tilted up to pour its contents into regular dixies for serving.
Many's the evening we spent head first into it with the brillo pads.Most of us had never even heard the expression "overtime" back then!
Has anybody ever calculated the man hours worked by apprentices outside of school hours?

[Claudel Hopson]

Ah lads it was like only yesterday. Lighting the fires at 5:30 in the dark, scrubbing the stairs with a toothbrush from the bottom up, robbing your juniors blankets for pads so you could pad your corridor to get out for the weekend. Oh it goes on and on. And the animal express at 10:30 on Sunday morning so you could go to town and walk around like an eejit so you would have to stay in for Killer's home cooked meal and the clean up afterwards. Yelruf with his whip for the scrub up on a Friday evening was pure class!

And the VD and Choc buns for your supper in the wagon with the wife.

Joy oh Joy!

[John K]

What about cheese sangers with a bag of Tayto before the iced bun?
"Char up 'round the back!" in the bike shed!
 
How did we survive the Killers cooking?
Or Tony 's motorbike chains!

[R.P.Y.]

Anyone remember the time (way back) during Christmas 'festivities' when Peabrain's Bambino car was lifted up and carried away by a group of hard necked apprentices ?

[RMR]

Does anyone remember a contraption known as a "lead swinger" used for cleaning floors..?

[John K]

Yeah I remember the lead swinger, it was a lump of lead on the end of a stick with a dodgy gimbal that used to break and send the lump of lead with a bit of a juniors blanket carreering off down the corridor!
RMR, the Big Bertha I was refering to was, as Claudel Hopson said, lit at 05.30. It was just a huge dixie full of water, that sat on the low gas cooker in the appt. kitchen, there were two turf fires with ovens either side of them that had to be lit and the gas under Big Bertha so that when we got up at 06.45 the 'waiters' could get breakfast ready. Some unscrupulous 'waiters' used to put loads of sugar in Stevie Currans porridge!
Right. Well what about burning your boots on the pot belly in the Courtmartial hut 'cos you'd filled it up with coal instead of turf! And it was glowing RED! The stink of burning rubber!

[fil the fluter]

I know of somethin' a lot worse than sugar that was put in the Beamish's custard.
I don't know how those pot bellies did not crack with the heat I remeber havin' to light them to keep Shinners and Johnny Big warm - we used to use a gallon of polish to kick them off God knows how we never burnt the place down there certainly were a few burnt fringes and eyebrows during the punk and new romantic era.    

[John K]

Hey Fil, up in Gormo on my NCOs course, after a hectic day doing platoon in attack scenarios, Beaker chucked a couple of blank rounds into the pot belly in our billet! They blew the chimney off and filled the billet up with smoke!

[fil the fluter]

Beaker - what a character - wonder where he is now, probably Seargent Major  

[GoneToTheCanner]

Hi all
Beaker went to Intel or one of that lot. He was dead sound and always good for a laugh....Johnny Big,eh? He took a lot of heating up, that lad.Keeping those fires going on Fire Picquet was a major pain. New fellas always got the job of going, to the Kipper, for the "key" of the Square, not knowing that it was the water hydrant "key". There were 24 water cocks and evil BOSs would pick out the most awkward ones to test....nostalgia ain't what it used to be.
regards
GttC

[John K]

I think Beaker finished his 21 years, then went to work as a plant fitter in Mulingar. I still keep in contact with him, now that you mention it I'll try to call him this weekend!
His 'wagon' was across the corridor from mine as a gungy junior, and he was a great laugh!