In the mid-80s, my wife Jude and I ran a country pub in Wales. We were "manager and manageress," in the slightly archaic lingo of the land. Most of the stories in Tinker's Dam were pulled from actual events, though I deliberately wrote the two of us out of them. We learned one thing for sure: being a publican is a 24/7 job, especially in a village setting. And cultural misunderstandings abound.