The most severe critic that any writer faces is himself. Believe me, self doubt can kick the legs out from under the biggest ego.

And as I am now well into my fifth year of writing in the Manx Independent I can speak from some experience. You would think that, by now, I would have either dried up or become fed up.

The question that I am asked the most is ’how do manage to think of something to say’?

That, would you believe, is the easy part.

I just keep my eyes open. I watch and observe and write it down, and that is when the doubt rears its head.

But so far so good, I get many kind comments from you the reader, and I thank you all.

There still is no cure for Parkinson’s Disease, but you, the followers of ’Pullyman’ make it much easier to live with. Thank you all.

So now I want to tell you about something that happened the other day.

Brown eyes had delivered me to the Legion Club on Market Hill for my usual late afternoon hour in the cocktail lounge, and it was obvious that ’something was going on’. It was a wake, or whatever it is that you call the the party that follows a funeral.

In this case, the recently departed had been a member of a well known Pulrose family, and the room was full of mourners who were celebrating the life of their dear friend.

It has long been a custom for an individual to be given a nickname. Sometimes affectionate, sometimes unkind, but in Pulrose, it was more than likely that the whole family would carry the name.

For example there were the Marshies, the Taffies, the Scratches, the Chuckies and the Skippers.

In the case of the late lamented, he had been a member of the Ciggies’ clan.

The Ciggies were a large family that lived about 200 yards or so from us. They were what I would describe as typical Pulrose stock.

They were tough, hard-up and, like many of their neighbours, they lived from day to day.

Pulrose was a close knit community. We all knew each other, the women all knew the gossip, the men all knew which pubs the other men patronised and the kids all knew just how much they could get away with.

Our education began in the Sunshine school under the care of Miss Pickett and Miss Faragher.

I remember big, bright classrooms, and sunny playgrounds.

I also remember a grassy bank with a bed of nettles at the bottom. Many a short trousered lad was rolled down that bank, but we all lived to tell the tale.

There was a Methodist Church that was in the care of a lady who was known to all as Sister Eleanor, and a Sunday school superintendent, Mr Killip, who was also a policeman.

We also had a Roman Catholic church with a resident priest, who in my innocent childhood, I really believed was called ’Father Bunloaf’.

Pulrose also had a police station, situated directly opposite the Catholic church, and next door to a war-time air raid shelter that had been converted into a barber’s shop.

The first policeman that I can remember occupying the station was Constable Kneen, and was succeeded by Constable Cannell.

The barber in the air raid shelter went by the nickname of ’Snotty’.

We had a building called "the Hut" where the Salvation Army held weekly film shows, we had a youth club in the Legion Hall, and a football field that was the home ground of Pulrose Utd.

We had a coal fired power station, we had three bedroom houses with open fires, and we had wire cutters. We had the Municipal tip, and an 18 hole golf links, and Johnny O’Hanlon’s shop.

We also had folk like the ’Ciggies’, and we are blessed with our memories.