Three Big Poos
An awful incident, they still speak of it today

August 1979
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The silicon chip inside her head
Gets switched to overload.
And nobody's gonna go to school today,
She's going to make them stay at home.
And daddy doesn't understand it,
He always said she was as good as gold.
And he can see no reason
'Cause there are no reasons
What reason do you need to be shown?

 I don’t like Mondays, The Boomtown Rats, No 1 UK Singles Chart, August 1979
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They still speak of it today, 25 years after the day that left two old ladies severely traumatized and their “ye olde tea shoppe” business in ruins, the good people of Seahouses still operate an early warning system to prevent the return of the three scruffy hombre’s who turned their collective lives upside down on that fateful day ...

It was August Bank Holiday, 1979, a long weekend with fine weather predicted and as was our custom, myself, Charlie and Burty, two fine compatriots, needed a location to pitch a tent and drink some serious beer for the three day weekend.

I was working and lodging in Whitley Bay at the time and my two buddies had asked if it was worth a visit, I wasn’t keen as I’d been there for a year already and was seeking different pastures for the break, but then my manager at the office came up with a solution - he told me of the fabled coastline of Northumberland. Not 20 miles away from where we sat every day was a region of long sandy beaches backed by high sand dunes and fringed with small villages each of which had a plethora of pubs - just for a laugh he offered to take me up there to have a look around that evening.

And so it was that a three night stay was booked at perhaps the most beautiful bay location on the North East coastline - Budle Bay, a whole wide bay with its tidal flats and the mysterious Holy Island, all owned and managed by the National Trust.

Not that this information meant anything to us, bank holiday weekends started with the large tent being erected (a not inconsiderable feat in itself) and continued with mainly pub visits and perhaps the odd bit of walking when we had to travel the short distances from one pub to another.

My two friends traveled up from Leeds on the Friday evening and I met them in a pub in a village just up the road from Budle Bay, the idea being to have one or two pints in there and then travel the short distance to the camp site, put the tent up and then walk to whichever fortunate pub was near to the campsite.

Unfortunately the chosen pub happened to be a damn good pub, full of local farm workers all intent on filling themselves with beer, singing songs and generally having a good time - far to good to leave, so we stopped there until closing time and then carefully, very carefully drove the two cars down the narrow winding lanes to the Budle Bay campsite where we ever so carefully and quietly erected the huge tent that was home to us on such weekends.

The tent had belonged to a local scout troop and was built to sleep at least 20 adults, more like a circus tent really it was supported by two 3x3 wooden posts each of which were eight foot long and had to be buried at least a foot into the ground, the whole thing being finally supported by thick guy ropes that extended several feet away from the tent, you may have the idea now that erecting such a construction could not be achieved quietly or without access to a large square yardage of space, nor could it be erected quietly whilst intoxicated, in the dark and without falling about in fits of laughter every time one of the posts fell over, again and again.

So we set off on the wrong foot with our neighbouring campers, all of whom had large multi-coloured canvas erections with several internal bedrooms and fitted furniture, and all of whom had arrived there several hours before and had settled down to a good nights sleep, until we arrived.

The next morning we were scowled at whilst plumes of lard-generated smoke billowed from our frying pan as three cooked breakfasts were prepared despite the hangovers. Our cheery “good mornings” were cold-shouldered and black-balled by assorted bank managers, school teachers and civil servants, all of whom regarded our dirty brown stained ridge tent with disgust

t didn’t matter, the weekend lay ahead of us, 72 hours of fine weather in prospect, a wallet full of money and pubs galore to drink from, what more could three 22 year old single lads wish for ?

Three days of merriment did indeed follow, the staple diet of three lads in a tent being beer, bacon sandwiches and more beer, repeat the bacon sandwiches three times a day and repeat the beer for as long as you like, it was a damn good weekend, including daring each other to climb up the cliff face underneath Bamburgh castle. The castle location had been picked four hundred years ago for its impregnability, several pints of ale one lunchtime convinced us that we could achieve what generations of invaders had been unable to do - scale the cliff face - about a quarter of the way up we could go no further and took the advice of several worried people on the beach who were waving frantically at us to come down.

And so it was that Monday morning dawned, slightly damp and drizzly as are all days when you are camping, and we took down the circus tent and packed our bags to leave, but with a full day still in front of us it was agreed that we should head down the coast a short way to the little harbour village of Seahouses, a small settlement that had pretensions of being a tourist attraction, but was really a small fishing harbour with some tea shops.

It was while enjoying a gentle stroll along the harbour wall that one of us suggested a cup of coffee in one of the very gentile tea shops might just be the ticket and as all agreed we retired to such a shop, a small quaint traditional tea shop with gingham curtains tied into big bows at the window and nice checked table cloths with lace doilies and a perfectly pristine sugar bowl on each table, none of the crusty tea deposits beloved of transport cafes in these sugar bowls.

The shop was run by two equally quaint old ladies - in most of the early “Carry On” films was a quaint old lady character who was always the sidekick to Hattie Jacques, she was small, very nervous and giggled a lot - one of the old ladies in the tea shop was her twin, the other one resembled Pat Coombes, who was another archetypal “Carry On” tea shop lady character.

They had on display in the chilled cabinet the most gorgeous looking black forest gateaux, perfectly formed and as yet uncut, it would have been rude not to have a piece and so three strong black coffees were ordered and three slices of black forest gateaux, the two quaint old ladies were very nice to us and enquired about the weather and our camping trip and being very polite they totally ignored the fact that we were disheveled, dirty and smelt terrible after three days camping and boozing without attention to our toiletry needs.

It was shortly after selecting our table and taking the first few sips of coffee that Charlie mentioned that he hadn’t been to the toilet since he had arrived in Bamburgh, and we mused on this random remark Burty and I realised that no, neither had we. This was not an unusual occurrence, the camp site only had one toilet which was constantly occupied and the bacon sandwiches took so long to cook every morning over a single flame primus stove that it was always time for the pub as soon as they’d been scoffed.

It soon became apparent however that the combination of strong coffee and black forest gateaux has a very loosening effect on a bunged up digestive system and after just a few minutes Charlie excused himself and made a visit to the café’s single toilet.

The toilet appeared to be an afterthought in the cafe as it was a simple wooden structure placed in the corner of the room, a timber frame clad with thin hardboard, it contained the obvious toilet (a pink one) and a small sink for hand washing. It probably sufficed for the usual gentile old lady customers who simply wanted to powder their noses but it was about to receive a severe testing in the next half hour.

Within seconds of closing the small cubicle door behind him we realised that the toilet may as well have been placed right in the centre of the room without the walls and door, for you could hear everything that went on in there, from Charlie shuffling himself around to get in position to the unzipping of his jeans and the slap of flesh against the toilet seat.

A family of four who were sat at a table closest to the toilet cubicle looked at each other with concern and quickened their pace on the pot of tea, toast and jam that was their late breakfast.

Seconds later the air was rent by a rasping fart, followed by a relieving groan, he may as well have been sat there right at the table with us, and of course he had no idea that the toilet cubicle had no means of soundproofing or even rudimentary privacy.

A long agonising “eeeeeuuurgh” followed and a tense silence descended over the Olde Tea Shoppe, then a series of short sharp “eurgh, eeeeeurgh, maaaaaa” and then a deep Ker-splooosh confirmed that Charlie had ejected at least part of the bowel blockage, and a barely whispered “Jesus Christ” was heart felt in the Olde Tea Shoppe as we spectators had been straining along all the way with him.

We heard the toilet roll rattle on its holder and for a few seconds a few of the customers believed that it was all over and they could get on with their mid-morning tea and scones, but Burty and I knew Charlie better than that – rare was the time when Charlie had ever spent less than fifteen minutes on his ablutions - the toilet paper was to wipe his fevered brow in preparation for the next projectile.

This time however he tried a little too hard and after a short “eeeaaaarrgh” we were treated to a thunderous 20 second explosion of pent up gas followed by several smaller follow through parp-parp-parps, then a long period of further straining and grunting during which we could see the thin toilet walls bow outward slightly on either side as he pushed against them for better leverage, changing the angle of attack several times to encourage the obviously oversized bolus to edge closer to its drop into the lavatory bowl.

Looking around the room we could see numerous shocked faces, mums and dads were trying to divert the attention of their kids for whom this was obviously the first overt experience of toilet non-etiquette, some kids giggled behind their hands, others simply looked as shocked as their parents, and when suddenly the smell hit them straight in the face they all flung their hands to cover or frantically waft their noses to move the awful stench on.

And the horror was not finished, Charlie still had no idea that his bodily movements were being amplified to the customers gathered just a few feet from his arse, and after three days of toilet abstinence he was starting to enjoy himself, humming along tunelessly in between strains, gasps and foot stomping.

The first chairs scraped along the floor as an elderly couple arose to leave, having gulped down a whole pot of tea in record time, burning their mouths as they did so, and despite the fact that a small queue of new customers had built up at the door, no-one would come inside to take their place.

They were swiftly followed by a family of four who left most of their late breakfast uneaten on the table and who exited the Olde Tea Shoppe with great haste to reconvene at another chintz and camber Olde Worlde Tea Shoppe over the road. The two little old ladies behind the counter raised their hands as if to wave or catch their attention, but they were gone and the old ladies mouthed their speechless good-byes to the slamming door.

By this time Burty and I had given up on our pretence that it was perfectly normal practice to eat breakfast in a café whilst a man at the next chair had a huge dump sheltered only by a wooden screen, after the first ker-sploosh we had both glanced over at the counter and smiled and nodded at the old ladies, they being polite had smiled and nodded back, we had raised our mugs of coffee and smiled again at the second ker-sploosh, they had not smiled back, one had glared at us the other, well she was just shocked at the violation of her powder room, they now stood behind the counter perusing their diminishing customer base as yet another family of four made a break for the door following another rasping release of foul smelling gas.

And then it was all over, we heard the toilet roll rattle again, and again, and we heard the toilet seat rock slightly as Charlie stood up, we heard the slight rasp of the toilet paper as he wiped at his arse again and again, his jeans were tugged up and the zip zippered up and then we heard him tell himself with great pride that “ooooh, that was good” and we imagined him looking down at the toilet bowl to inspect his handywork.

He flushed the toilet and for a few seconds we could only hear the thunder of the water as it desperately tried to wash out the pan, then it went quiet again and we heard Charlie mutter “oh bugger” and there was nothing for it but for the whole café to wait as the cistern refilled.

A second flush obviously cleared away the remaining detritus, the lock slide back on the door and Charlie stepped back into the world of the living and made his way to our table, still oblivious of the ruination he had wrought on the two sweet old ladies on what should have been their busiest day of the year.

He sat at the table and leaned forward conspiritously, “I really needed that” he confided, “and I bloody enjoyed every minute of it”, we just nodded as he sipped at his coffee, it was cold and he asked if we wanted another one as he walked across to the counter, the two sweet old ladies stepping back in horror as he approached them.

Two minutes later and three more coffees and three slices of black forest gateaux were on the table in front of us – and then it was Burty’s turn. Charlies fifteen minutes of farting fame proved too much to resist and after a mouthful of strong coffee and chocolate gateaux he excused himself and headed for the toilet cubicle – the two sweet old ladies could do nothing but stare in open mouthed terror.

Except of course that Burty knew now that his every movement could be heard by the now sparse crowd of customers in the shop, and so he tried his best to muffle his bodily noises with coughs and shuffling feet, but the bowel contains some of the strongest muscles in the human body and when the bowel says its time to shift some waste matter then there is very little that you can do to stop it or disguise the fact that you are having a shit.

It wasn’t quite as bad as Charlie’s dump, but it was still very audible and there is no noise known to man that can disguise the heavy ker-ploosh of a large turd making its entrance into a toilet pan, Burty tried hard, shuffling his feet around on the floor so that at one point Charlie started laughing and asked me if I thought Burty was having a shit or a tap dance in there.

The Olde Tea Shoppe was now almost empty, and hardly suprising too as it bloody stank, the queue of potential customers outside was now non-existent, although the similar Olde Worlde Tea Shoppe over the road was doing a roaring trade and every so often we could see some of the customers over there point and stare at our Olde Tea Shoppe and shake their heads in wonder.

Only ourselves, the two sweet old (but stunned) ladies and an old man in the corner with a terrier dog remained when Burty exited the cubicle, wiping tears of exertion from his eyes, the poor lad had put a great effort into emptying his gut as quietly as possible and he looked exhausted, so much so that Charlie went straight to the counter and ordered three more strong coffees and three black forest gateaux – it was while he was distracting the two sweet, but now frightened old ladies, that I made a sprint for the toilet, believing that the main damage was now done and I could sneak in an ablution of my own, un-noticed.

The toilet cubicle was quite simply devastated, shreds of wet paper all over the floor, the toilet roll hanging helplessly on its holder with only a few sheets remaining, a knitted doll lying forlornly on the cistern top where once it had disguised a spare toilet roll, but now it lay useless and used, the surprised expression on the dolls face thinly disguising her disgust at the aroma which clung to the very fabric of her knitted dress.

And the smell, it was simply indescribable, three days worth of backed-up bacon sandwiches, pans full of baked beans, and beer too volumous to count, the half-digested food had lain in our guts for up to 72 hours, rotting down and producing the most sickening obnoxious gas – if bottled this stuff could persuade political prisoners to reveal their innermost secrets in an instant, we were only very fortunate that the Olde Tea Shoppe had evacuated by choice before someone had lit a cigarette, the conflagration would have been horrific and one spark is all that would have been required.

But it was the inside of the toilet pan that held the worst horror, the first assault from Charlies deposits had resulted in huge smears from the waterline right around the bend and subsequent excretions had left their mark too – the once pink toilet bowl was now a health hazard with severe pebble-dashing above the waterline and horrible brown tramlines below – one of the sweet old ladies was going to use up several sets of marigold gloves to restore the original pink glow to this porcelain throne.

I took my place on the black plastic seat and let fly, this was my moment, there was no audience any more save my own friends and two old ladies who frankly were too shell shocked to care anymore, and I had waited for three days for this. It was a most satisfying shit, both in its large quantity and in its relief when it was all over, I was several pounds lighter and the belt around my waist could be hitched up another notch.

I flushed the toilet for its last time noting that none of the staining had gone, and left the cubicle to be ultimately sanitized by a team of industrial cleaners who specialised in clearing up after rock festivals and slurry pit explosions.

Sitting back down at our table I noticed that the old man and his terrier had now also left and that the two sweet old ladies were still standing absolutely rigid still behind the counter, they were in shock and would probably need medical attention if they were ever to survive this ordeal.

We decided that a discreet exit was called for and leaving a ten pence tip for each of the sweet old ladies we left their establishment, waving and bidding them a hearty farewell at the door, and after a short walk around the harbour we noticed on returning to the car park that they were still stood, mouths agape, as if frozen to the spot behind their little fresh cake counter, they still had no customers as we drove off to leave them to their fate.