Stephen Lawrence

Stinkley Bottom. Stephen Lawrence

The village of Stinkley Bottom is situated somewhere in the middle of the West Yorkshire dales between Otley and Ilkley. It is a quiet village, and its population although not large, has a majority of its residents being middle aged. Then there is a contingent of older ones, those of which believe there is no life outside of the village. The village has two public houses, which host two types of clientele. "The Gruntin Pig" is your regular working men's type pub, selling real ales, cider, and all the regular spirits. Food is; pie and chips, fish and chips, sausage and chips, in fact anything, but mostly with chips or mash potato. Whereas "The Bat & Ball" is slightly more up market. They tend to sell more wine than beer, and more gin and tonics than whiskey. Food is `A La Carte` with a free glass of house wine. To say there was rivalry between the two pubs would be an understatement. There are regular events in the village where one pub is trying to "outdo" the other. The annual cricket match being one of them... There is a cricket ground with a pavilion in the middle of the village, and the pavilion doubles as a meeting hall for the various committees that are run in the area. One of the main characters of the village is Major Wilbur Farquhar. He's a local land owner, and along with his wife Camilla they tend to try and rule the roost by heading the various committees, then they lean on the members to get decisions that are favourable to themselves. There are the other types who live in the village, by that I mean; the village idiots, the rogues, the lovers, extroverts and introverts, the nosey parkers, the amorous neighbours, and of course their mischievous offspring and pets... There are I must add, also a few normal types amongst the residents. This is a tale of what life in a small village could possibly be like...