Phil Street

Phil Street was born on a Tuesday in September 1948, at seven-thirty in the morning in Warwick Hospital. He was born into a class-ridden society, that had,up till that time, been ruled mainly by old men like David Richard Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty, Admiral of the Fleet, a distant cousin on his mother's side. He had missed the Winter Olympics, held in St Moritz in the January of 1948 and the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi also in January, by just eight months but he had not missed the birth of something that would play an important part in his teenage years, the LP Record.

A monkey called Albert, named after the famous scientist, Albert Einstein, had managed to escape the gravitational pull of our planet, but back on earth, England still appeared to be stuck in those years that had led up to the outbreak of the Second World War. The country was to remain stuck in a cultural lethargy until the 1960s and the birth of pop music. Phil was born into a cruel world, well not so much cruel, unless he was to be a Hull City football supporter - they were beaten by Accrington Stanley in a midweek match. Victor Alekseyevich Krovopuskov was born on the same day - not at Warwick Hospital but in a Moscow one, 1600 miles away. Krovopuskov went on to achieve great things as a champion sabre fencer but, as Phil and everyone else knows, the pen is mightier than the sword.

It was a wrinkle-free pre-television age when film stars were looked upon as gods and goddesses. So very different from today, where transient stardom through television reality shows, finds performers shot, momentarily, through the sky and into virtual obscurity.

Phil's earliest attempts at putting pen to paper were made after he was first able to accurately scratch the letters of the alphabet on a slate, using a slate pencil. Paper was expensive in those days and it could not afford to be wasted. He was educated at Kenilworth School, a fine educational establishment that had excellent teachers, one of which, Vera Williams, ignited his love of literature and writing.

After leaving school Phil took a job at Flowers Brewery in Stratford upon Avon, where he tasted free beer for the first time - both illegally and for free. He soon realised though, that unlike a crystal ball, he couldn't see a future through the bottom of a beer glass. So, at the tender age of 17, he joined the GPO – later to become British Telecom - as an apprentice, where he spent the next 33 years as a Switching and Transmission Technical Officer, in a company where he made many good friends. An opportunity then arose, enabling him to retire at the grand old age of 49.

Golf had begun to play an important part in his life, outside of work and a chance to pursue his love of the game presented itself. However, finding opponents to beat proved rather difficult - so difficult in fact, that he became convinced he wasn’t as good at playing golf as he at first thought.

Following some advice from a friendly neighbour, Phil took on a job as a hospital porter at The Horton in Banbury, only a stones throw away from where he lives with his wife, Mary. For the first time in his life, he received thanks on a daily basis from people he was only too happy to help. The sick, the frightened and the vulnerable. Sadly, although the mind stays forever young, the body starts to age and after 16 years of physical involvement with his hospital work, his body was overruled by his mind and he finally retired from the hospital - a sad day, to say the least. It had been a privilege and an opportunity, to work with some of the finest and most dedicated people anyone could wish to meet.

It's now 2015 and with time on his hands Phil, his brother and an old school chum, decided to meet up once or twice a week and take day trips out and about in the Midlands, using their bus passes and senior rail cards. Phil kept a diary of all the places visited, the amusing and funny things that happened and one day an idea surfaced - why not share their adventures in a book. And so, The Funboy3 was born and Phil wrote the first series – a trilogy – Days Out... with The Funboy3. There followed a second series – The Antidote to... series. The first three books - The Antidote to BREXIT Boredom, The Antidote to Sense & Insensitivity and - The Antidote to Normality - are available to buy in paperback or as an ebook download. The fourth in these series - The Antidote to Stupidity - is now in edit with a publication date towards the end of the year.

Following suggestions by Phil's editor to write a book (or maybe several books) on some of his interesting life experiences he has written two novellas – Treading The Boards – based on his time living in Stratford-upon-Avon, and - Up The Stick - an insight into his GPO Apprenticeship back in the 1970s. Both books are available now in paperback and as an ebook download.

Wanting to try something different, Phil wrote a short murder mystery novel - Murder Most Foul - an amusing story with a twist. This was published early in 2021 and is available in paperback and as an ebook download. His second novel - Out Of The Darkness - a gripping murder mystery will be in edit soon and with a publication date of early 2022.