Tricky little job at the chippy

Beatrice at the counter & some fish and chips that were made earlier.

Friday Nights:

It is a tricky job to slit the cellophane on a still living pizza with a modeling knife. Jeremy could easily do it if Beatrice actually did it for him. It was at times like this that their eyes met, over the counter, the sink and across the great vat of oil that is like the Middle East of Moray. “Fishers Fish Bar” is what I wish we had called this bloody place instead of “Jeremy Fishers’”” says Jeremy with too many inverted commas. Well you can’t always get what you want can you?

When it is hot in a fish bar it is very hot, condensation pours, fans whiz, expelairs suck and swinging doors breathe in gulps of cold night air and release chunks of fried flavours into empty streets. Salt n sauce, salt n vinegar, closing time at the pub, a coach load of football fans, old ladies on a jaunt, white stretched limos full of country girls in shiny black dresses and stilettos all getting oil on their artificial nails. Customers are a rare and strange breed, almost human at times say the friendly fascists.

Everywhere in the village there are villagers, hungry for tea and dreams of Camberwick Green and Trumpton and being made of sponge rubber. Jeremy feeds the reckless, feckless dreams and deep fries the past. They return to bungalows at length but without height. Some park cars in driveways or with up to two wheels upon the pavement. Homes without a proper post code.

If you put your nose into the fish freezer or the haggis cupboard chiller it gets cold, red at the end and numb. Jeremy likes that feeling and enjoys taking stock, even when he doesn’t have to, even when he knows all is well and that the supplies are in. The cold nose thing is a treat and measure.

If you ever drive through Wipeourasses and I expect you will, these words will come back to you, you will stop, you will buy, you will enjoy. The rich fare of the JF establishment and its garish soft drink selection straight from the lemonade factory in Buckie via the cash and carry awaits even the most casual of visitors. Sleep well / eat well.

Jeremy Fisher

Jeremy Fishers’ is a fish and chip shop situated in rural Aberdeenshire in a small Lego built town called Wipeourasses. Kurt Cobain was born but a few doors away. The speed limit is a little over thirty five, Jeremy is about 38. He may have spoken in class at one time. Jeremy’s secret recipe for deep fried pizza was also well known as the blinking neon sign proclaimed to all passers by and those who chose to observe the speed limit. The signs themselves were wind powered but worked quite well in flat calm, on days of hysteria they worked really well. The fathers of Wipeourasses were also puzzled that their small town remained small but were glad that Jeremy’s shop was in some people’s eyes successful. Cars would stop in town, particularly on Saturday evenings and Friday afternoon, the occupants would get out, or maybe only the driver and they or he or she would enter the fast food bar. Inside a wide range of tasty, tempting foodstuffs were on display, some behind glass, and some in fridges and described on white boards and some in plastic dustbins. All in all and enthralling experience for the hungry and reasonably well off.

Every day the place was ignited by a single spark from the spark gun that sparked the gas burner that ignited the fryer. “Like the space shuttle taking off” said a local who had recently seem footage of a NASA launch on “Good Morning Scotland” on the radio (810 medium wave), (81000 Mexican wave). A precise program of events was always being planned but no quite arrived at and so it goes that Jamie Oliver had never even heard of the place. The Mars Bars were however not battered until required as per the hand written recipe book.

Promotion

Nothing really to do with the fine art of Fairytale Management and all it's complex, quirky and misunderstood processes. I just like this photograph. It was taken by Norman Lamont at last years FerryStock II. An event we ran in order to a) promote the local arts festival and b) promote ourselves.