Woodfarm Barns & Barges

1 week ago

Morning Woodentops.

What a night down the Woodfarm Arms, with Mugs, a T-Shirt, and THREE FREE BREAKS given away, plus some 'Quizzy' fun had by all.

Well done to Kirsty Jukes and Adele Houlding, the lucky recipients of our two NHS Heroes Holidays, and well done to Gunilla Ward who won our 11th Birthday Competition!

Sounds like the start of a diary entry doesn't it? Well although it isn't, we have made headway in getting the whole diary onto the website thanks to Woodentop Louise, so more news on that soon!

Louise also went through the diary and pulled out all the names that I came up with for the malignant narcissist voted in by the American electoral system to take care of their country. That's going well. Thought I'd share them with you. There's only 82 of them to choose from... 🤣🤦‍♂️🤷‍♂️.

Which is your favourite?

Clump
Dalton Drump
Damp Old Runt
Dick Trump
Dick Van Trumpling
Dickwad Dump
Dickwad Flump
Dickwad Trumplingberry
Dul Don Tramp
Flubber
Flump
Flumple Stiltskin
Flumpster
Flumpty Gumpty
Flumpty Trumpty
Flumpy McTrumpburger
Glibwald Gump
Gob the lump
Gob-mould Gump
Gobwald Grump
Gobwald Gump
Gormwald Dump
Grimwald Dump
Grumple Trumpskin
Gump
Gumpy McGumpface
His Flumpiness
Humpty Numpty
Humpty Trumpty
Jabba
Jabba the Clump
Jabba the Flumpton
Jabba the Lump
Jabba the Trump
Jabba the Trumpty
Jabster
Lard Dumpton
Lord Dampnut
Mister Flump
Mr. Gump
Mr. Tango-Blobby
Numpty Flumpty
Oompah Trumpah
Orange blob
Orange thicktard
Orangey Tangoed Useless Slimeball
Orangey tinted guy over in America
Petulant orange child
POTUS (Particularly Orangey Tangoed Useless Slimeball)
Rancid orange American friend
Ronald Bump
Ronald Dump
Ronald Flump
Scumty Trumpty
Sleazy orange one
Tangoed one
The big orange chief
The insidious orange leader of the United States
The orange blimp
The orange fella
The orange one
The orange panda-eyed slug
The slimy orange gutter-crawler
The tangerine Flubster
The Trumpmeister
Trumpah Loompah
Trumpah Lumpah
Trumpeter
Trumple
Trumple Guiltskin
Trumple Von Tango
Trumple Wiltbin
Trumple Wiltskin
Trumple Stiltskin
Trumpness
Trumpton
Trumpty
Trumpty Numpty
Trumpty Scummity
Trumpty Scumty
Turd Pondlam
Wimple Trumpskin ... See MoreSee Less

Woodfarm Barns & Barges

1 week ago

Meet me at 6.30pm this evening down the Woodfarm Arms on Facebook Live.

Quite possibly the only pub in Britain that'll be giving away THREE FREE BREAKS and at least one 'Bizzy with the Quizzy' T-Shirt and a Woodfarm Mug!!!!

Carlspub. Probably the best pub in the world ... See MoreSee Less

Woodfarm Barns & Barges

1 week ago

That was easy, dunno wot all the fuss was about!

#goteamwoodfarm #wegotthis #pieceofcake ... See MoreSee Less

Woodfarm Barns & Barges

1 week ago

Right then, bookings and stress levels back through the roof and it's all systems go!

Time for me to chill and read my new book. I've been so lucky to have some very lovely gifts from you lot; you're too kind. I've had Beer, T-shirts, a Ferrari, Wellness Products, Chocolate, a Baseball Cap, a Wilson and more!

And now this lovely book arrived yesterday, courtesy of Woodentop Deborah, along with a note to say "thank you for entertaining us all for 101 days". The book was chosen because of my 'love of words', and it's spot on! A flick through revealed a whole bunch that appeared in the diary, but one of my favourite words that didn't appear in the diary was "Boorish".

A 'Boor' is a clumsy, insensitive person, usually a man, and his manners are likely to be 'Boorish'.

Now far be it from me to cast aspersions or to confess who springs to my mind, but 'Boorish' just happens to be an anagram of "oh Boris".

Have a nice day y'awl and I'll see you at the Pub Quiz tomorrow evening!!! ... See MoreSee Less

Woodfarm Barns & Barges

2 weeks ago

A very close friend in America has been giving me guidance on how to wear a mask so that I not only look like the Lone Ranger, but I stay safe.

Yes, oh orange one, this is exactly how it's done 🤦‍♂️

#yacouldntmakeitup #plonker ... See MoreSee Less

Woodfarm Barns & Barges

2 weeks ago

Dear Diary

Day 101 of Lockdown in the UK - 2nd July 2020

Morning Woodentops

That’s it then.

See ya.

You still here?

Just kidding, I’ll spout some more nonsense before I go, but I really need to get a few hours back each day now as it’s gone kinda busy! I will still be posting every day as I always have done, so do ‘Follow’ and ‘Like’ us as it helps to know you’re all out there, as indeed you have been through all this mess! Thank you so much to every single one of you! You’re are fopping awesome!

I am hoping that we can present this whole thing to you very soon, thanks to the assistance of Woodentop Louise, as a downloadable PDF from our websites, so stay tooned. We’ll try and raise a few quid with it.

101 days. How jolly apt, as much of this roller coaster has been a veritable cornucopia of ‘Room 101’ ramblings and rants from me about everything from COVIDiots, to the orange one and his cronies, to adverts and plebeian behaviour on beaches or protests. I’ve also been known to pipe up once or twice over the last 101 days on those we have the pleasure and fortune to be led by. I was initially very supportive of our own government as you will recall, right up until they proudly displayed their true colours and utter ineptitude at almost everything. I pleaded for a situation where the major parties would work together for the greater good, and we all supported them. But that never happened. Our country is too full of selfish, self-centred ignoramuses. And that’s just at the top, being repeated at the bottom. The only difference in the tiers is the size of the ego and sense of entitlement. Hey ho, I tried. But I didn’t make a difference. The only thing it seems that I did make a difference in, is adding a smile to your faces every day during this, so I’m happy with that.

As you know, I went to Londontown to spend the day with Lauren yesterday and we had an amazing time. On the way down I passed a car boot sale at Marks Tey, and even from the A12 I was disheartened to see that it was rammed to the gills with Burgertards, desperately hoping they can pick up some new old tut with which to emblazon the mantelpiece back at their lair.

As it’s Day 101 I'd like to submit the parking app ‘Ringo’ for Room 101 please. I last used it with my previous car, which bore the same number plate. As I tried to input my details yesterday in the London Borough of Hackney, the app insisted I was trying to park a Mercedes, even though I told it I wasn’t. I then went into ‘my vehicles’ and updated the manufacturer, even getting confirmation that I'd done so. Head back to square one to attempt to do it again, and it still insisted that I was trying to park my old car. I repeated this process four times, and as you can imagine my demeanour simply remained calm as this was really how I wanted to spend 20 minutes of my Daughter's birthday. All of that is true apart from the calm demeanour. I may have told an itsy-bitsy vegan porky pie on that bit. I'm afraid that I can't share with you the names I was calling the ‘Ringo’ app. In the end the only solution was for Lauren to register her Range Rover and successfully park it, as she and Ringo have no history. Oh how I miss being able to put coins in a machine.

We decided to have a go at that thing we used to do in the old days, called shopping. It’s where you walk around big buildings with things on shelves for you to look at and buy. We drove to Westfield in Stratford with some trepidation, but actually it was okay so we didn’t turn back and head home. There were a lot of people in there, but not too many to stop us distancing from them. Most of the shops were open, so Lauren was able to have a good browse and pick up some extra birthday treats. We then went back to Lauren’s garden for lunch as she’d made us yummy vegan burgers and fries. We had great fun as I tested out some of this Sunday’s quizzy on her, sent in by Woodntops Neill, and Debbie. What you may not know is that Lauren has also been involved in doing a weekly quiz for her company too, so some of her questions may appear as well. For this weeks quiz, She had evolved our logos round, spelling out the name of her organisation in letters taken from well known brands, so we proceeded to do the same for Woodfarm, and you’ll see that this Sunday for definite. We had fun doing it and we think you’re gonna like it! It was hard to leave her without a hug again, and I hope the day will come soon that I can do so.

Talking of that there Londonshire, I hear that whilst mask wearing is mandatory on public transport, TFL and the transport companies have told their staff that they must not enforce it, and in some cases have issued written warnings to those who have tried. Can please somebody explain that one to me? Those that have somehow been thrust in front of us as our leaders are nothing short of pathetic in my humble. This comes right from the top, and is embarrassingly inadequate. Is it any wonder that this virus is not going away? I cannot begin to tell you some of the words that I want to use right now, but as it is our last diary day together I won’t do it. I get that they’d face abuse from knuckle-dragging simians and anthropoids, but surely they should be allowed to say “Could you please put a mask on for my safety and that of all our other passengers” in attempt to stem the flow of the virus?. But no, what they do is make it mandatory, but not. Stay home, but don’t. Don’t go to Barnard Castle, but do. Clear messages all the way.

Apparently Transport for London is “confident that its passengers will just understand the rules”. Yeah, like they understood that they weren't to go elbow to elbow when they were protesting the other week throughout London? How the hell do these people get senior jobs?. It is totally and utterly beyond me? I spent a great deal of my earlier working life in the corporate world, and it was very much dog eat dog to get to the top. But most of the time I saw a lot of smart people at the top. I think it’s a little different in the commercial world to that of the civil service, which I started my career in, so am fully qualified to comment on.

Whilst I’m having a pop at the top, I can confirm I have nothing but disdain for Michael Gove. He’s been useless in every post he’s had and lost, but I’m not going to talk about him. I want to stick his vile wife Sarah Vine in Room 101 now. For months we’ve been applauding the work of our NHS Heroes, and she’s come out and shown exactly how much respect she and her ilk have for them. In her vastly overpaid column for the Daily Mail she has publicly stated that she is not siding with Doctors getting anxious about the tide of beered-up COVIDiots flooding A&E this Saturday as the pubs re-open. She feels that this will be a sign that we are returning to normality. "What better sign that Britain is getting back to normal than a load of Saturday night drunks clogging up A&E". You pathetic, ignorant, piece of over-entitled scum. How fopping dare you to think that this can be a good thing. If anyone knows her, please forward this as I’d love to have a chat about what’s right and what’s wrong. Oh, and please ask her to bring her husband too. “Super Saturday” she’s calling it. I’m calling it “Stay at home Saturday”.

I have decided that this whole debacle is merely a spelling mistake though. For years we have referred to ‘The Upper Class’. But all we’ve done is spell it wrong. It’s us versus ‘The Upper Crass’. We are merely cannon fodder for economic health versus public health, getting back to the ‘Herd immunity’ that they spouted at the start of all this, which I never really understood as a good thing. This air of celebration about getting going again is wrong. So wrong. I’m starting again with real caution and trepidation, knowing that my business can do this very safely, sensibly and securely. We need to put one foot in front of the other very gingerly, but I fear that a stampede is just on the horizon, with you and I sandwiched in-between the Upper Crass and the Pond Life. Our PM has publicly stated that the “real hero” of ‘Jaws’ was the Mayor of Amity, who kept the beaches open, whilst the Great White Shark circled and picked off victims. That’s art imitating life right there dear Woodentops, and we are merely players. All we can do is stay off the beach.

And one last time from the land of the free, The President of The United States has bought up virtually all stocks of the drug Remdesivir, shown to reduce the recovery time of COVID-19 patients. Scientists say it could delay the UK’s access to the treatment until October. I love it when we stick together and look out for each other. All this yesterday, on the day that they saw their highest number of new cases again. He said "I think we're going to be very good with the coronavirus. I think that at some point that's going to sort of just disappear”. He said that in. March, remember?. When they had one death, not 120,000. I think he’s started waking up with his fingers crossed now.

The Flumpet announced yesterday that “the President is the most informed man on planet Earth”. Really Ms McDoolally?. I’m not sure if she meant deformed instead, but it is no secret that he merely skims and makes up his own version of events. I will sign off my ramblings about this man, that you have all followed and agreed with over the last 101 days, by saying that in my opinion by the end of 2020 he will not be the President, but will have been responsible by his actions and inactions, for the deaths of thousands and thousands of innocent Americans. It wouldn't surprise me if he was also among that number, if not from COVID-19, then a heart attack. I don't wish that upon anyone and I am not saying I hope that’s what happens at all. But I hope that for whatever reason, this man is no longer in office come November. That is their only chance of survival. I have a feeling he may remove himself to protect his ego from not getting voted. He’ll probably just say “I’m not doing this any more because you are all stupid. And fake”.

I popped in to see my local soothsayer on the way back from Londonville yesterday, and can confirm that I know, as I bid you farewell in the diary at least, how it is all going to end for Ronald Stump. I have it on high authority that as he spirals ever downwards as the numbers spiral ever upwards, one morning the Secret Service are going to find him taking his dying breath on the White House front lawn in just his underpants, with a couple of pencils up his nose and a pair of empty bottles of disinfectant by his side. His last words? “I made wibble great again”.

Right then, that really is it. Over the last 101 days I’ve written 193,548 words in this diary, starting it with no idea of what I was doing, what I was saying, where it was going or when it would end. I’ll be honest, I thought it’d be about three weeks, but that was not to be. I genuinely have no words that can sum up how grateful I am for the support you’ve all shown me, and the community we’ve created. It wasn’t me, it was all of us. It was a team effort. As we’ve seen so much crumble around us, we somehow found some sense of strength and community on here, simply because we are ordinary, decent people, doing our best to get through this.

I’ve sworn a little bit, which I never thought I’d publicly do, for fear of damaging my professional reputation. But somehow it’s not seemed important and these seem to have been forgiving times. I’ve been very open with you. I’ve shared my feelings at losing my business that I’ve spent over a decade working quite hard on, and I’ve told you about my new-found job as Deli-Boy, which became my salvation as it got me out of the house twice a week. Today marks the day that Deli-Girl will be out there doing my old rounds for her first time. Good luck Michelle, you’ll be great. That makes me smile, as they are her customers! I just felt that they became mine. It was awesome being in the Deli-gang. I’ve told you very openly some of the ways I go about marketing my business, as we prepare to open the doors once more. You’ve all been involved. Don’t forget it was you guys who added the Doggos to our new posters, which are being framed as we speak. £35 a pair for limited edition framed prints, including P&P. Jolly good value if you ask me. Actually it is, as there’s no profit in there.

My business isn’t rocket science. It never has been and it never will be. I just do what I love doing, and I care about it, that’s all. I’ve created places to stay, that I would want to stay in, and treat people how I would wish to be treated. My guest experience is everything to me, and that’s how every business should be run. Michelle is exceptional at it. Phil is too. My mate Mark at The Orange Tree in Thornham is. My mate Justin is in his IT business. My mate Bryan is with his catering business, and my Chef mate Mark. All of my friends that I’ve mentioned with their own businesses throughout the last 101 days simply ‘get it’. But that’s what makes us quite good at what we do. I hope that doesn’t sound big-headed as it isn’t meant to be. I truly wish every business ran this way as although we’d have stiffer competition, the world would be a nicer place. That said, I confess once more to enjoying the sense of schadenfreude when I see it not happening. Repeatedly.

I’ve ranted. A lot. A helluva lot. And it’s been cathartic. I’ve needed to. Because I’m human, just like you, and I’ve gone through a tough time, as we all have. And you’ve listened to my rants, and you’ve tended to agree most of the time with them. Because we are all a certain type of person. Hopefully the sort that will get through this by doing the right thing. And if we don’t, at least we tried. So many of you are my regular guests who are booked in to come and stay soon. I can’t wait to see you, even though we can’t hug. But when we can hug again, I’m gonna squeeze you all like toothpaste! And so many of you are new guests who have been along for this journey and have booked a Barn or Barge break. I can’t wait to see you guys too, as it’ll be great to meet new friends. And one day you will get the toothpaste tube treatment too. And many of you I will never meet, but you’ve still been on this coronatrain with us all, and I’m grateful for that. I truly hope that you all stick with us as I post some normal stuff on Bookface. I will still post stupid things, I promise. I always have done. And please stick with us as regulars at the Woodfarm Arms for the Pub Quiz on the first Sunday of every month. We’ll be starting this Sunday at 6.30pm. I’d like to see you all there as we have such a laugh, but I’d also appreciate your presence for no other reason than I’ve got loads of bloody T-Shirts I need to give away!

Oh, and on Sunday I'll be giving away two free holidays to NHS Heroes, as well as announcing the winner of our 11th Birthday Competition, who will also be getting a free break! This ended yesterday, with the highest number of entrants we have EVER had for one of our competitions. We had 4,252 entrants, which is bonkers! I will be drawing all three of those on Sunday using an online random number generator. So make sure you're there, it could be you!

As I bid thee farewell on this chapter I want to close by simply saying one last thing from the bottom of my heart;

Thank you. We did this together and you all f*****g rock!

Stay safe

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