Grandma was a card shark - a ‘hustler’, if you will.

Grandma was a card shark - a ‘hustler’, if you will.

While she was a demon knitter, and a sorceress when it came to crotchet and other grandmotherly things of the like, the glint in her eye always belonged to the more traditionally immoral pleasures of the world.

For this, I will love her for all eternity.

I haven’t thought properly about my dear old gran in some months. Sadly, she passed away a couple of years ago, shortly before my daughter was born. But with her birthday coming up next week - December 25 of all days (the apple fell incredibly far away from the tree) - the last few days have seen her at the forefront of my mind.

I always thought of her as being a deliciously unconventional grandma. She preferred cherry brandy to tea, never opted for a Wherther’s Original when a shot of cherry brandy was going, and in the ‘scone debate’ of cream first versus jam, she’d scrape the thing clean and down a cherry brandy.

Yet, as I’ve happily come to realise from talking to pals and acquaintances over the years, a lot of grandmas are like this, and it’s absolutely bloody fabulous.

Though undisputedly ever-ready with a cuddle, a wise old ear and the best roast dinner in the land, Grandma was at her happiest at the card table, winning hand and favourite........

© Shropshire Star