Sadly missed tramp.
I live in a small village which has more than it's share of...... normality impaired people, I suppose is the PC term. These days there's loads of junkies, weirdos and oddballs, but when I was a nipper, being eccentric made you a novelty, and one old fellow became legendary.

I'm not sure if "tramp" describes him fully as he did have a house, but apart from that he ticked all the boxes..... incoherent rambling? Check. Dirty, dishevelled appearance? Check. Rampant, special brew fuelled alcoholism? Check. The kids tortured him, but secretly we all loved old Wullie.

You'd see him every day, staggering round to the local shop. The shopkeeper would only sell him one can at a time, so every half hour he'd make his pilgrimage..... usually without much more than some loud incoherent ranting, but occasionally with a bit of indecent exposure to the girls who worked in the shop thrown in. When he was allowed into the local pub, he'd have hushed, intense arguments with an imaginary drinking partner about whos round it was. But two incidents really stick in my mind as the defining moments in his legendary career.

The first incident was when he was caught short, evidently after a huge bout of boozing. The fact that he was at home must have slipped his mind, as he burst out his front door, bollock naked, closed the door, pissed up it and with a tirade of abuse at onlookers went back inside.

That's nothing though. He set his house on fire.

The fire brigade arrived and put it out though, and not much damage was done. Before that though, Wullie managed to evacuate the building. Following fire safety guidelines rigidly, he did not attempt to take any valuables with him. Or any clothes. He burst from his smoke filled house in a hail of unintelligible ramblings wearing only a pair of slippers and a hat. That's not the best part though, oh no. His slippers were on fire.

He died a few years back and passed into legend. I heard that his wife had passed away when she was very young and he had never got over it, turning to drink to help cope. I found that very touching and sad.
( baw__bag contains traces of nuts on, Sun 5 Jul 2009, 19:11, Reply)