24th February 2020
LifeAfterFootball has admitted the area of North Notts between Kimberley IKEA and Mansfield’s picturesque Field Mill is a bit of a mystery to him.
That’s the joy of being a GBG ticker; you can become quite an expert on lesser-known Midlands by walking around old mining towns suspiciously as schools close, killing the half hour before micropubs open.
Geography gets lovably mucky round here in Ashfield district. My new GBG pub is in Annesley parish, Annesley Woodhouse to be precise. Just south of Nuncargate and served by Newstead station, though looking to Kirkby for its chippy Spoons.
For most of us it’s Larwood and Voce Land, where miners honed their bodyline by bowling lumps of coal at craft beer salesmen.
It’s a shame Russ is off the radar at the moment (hurry back, Russ), as there’s much to enjoy hereabouts. Pamela’s Larches, Davis’s Bottom, Cockshutt and probably worse.
Against that background, the Squires Musters doesn’t even sound that weird a name. No weirder than the Badger Box (rejected Netflix script ?) down the road. Or the presence of both men’s and women’s specialist boutiques, as they still call them in Notts.
20 years ago the GBG pubs round here were the unfussy brewery-owned dining pubs in picturesque with Kimberley, Theakston or Abbot on the pumps.
Now they’re micros of the “homely” variety.
It’s just opened, and inevitably two blokes at the bar are already half way through their first pint.
It’s more a mini pub than a micro, bar the obsession with keeping Lilley’s in business.
Nice people, one of them told me what NBSS 3.5 beer I’d randomly picked (something called Bread from Magpie) before going back to a tale which ended with “She never gave me that lap dance”.
I asked them why they were on the Guinness.
“Used to drink the Plum Porter, but they changed the recipe; it’s too sweet now”.
Is Plum Porter doomed. We’ll find out later.
retiredmartin 
No teeth and walks with a limp, has Zucco not been spotted on a Proper Day Out recently?
I’d also assumed that Larwood & Voce were new competition for Brunning & Price.
LikeLiked by 3 people
There is a pub called Larwood and Voce where staff call you m’duck rather than Sir.
LikeLike
https://whatpub.com/pubs/NOT/444/larwood-voce-west-bridgford
Time for a preemptive?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Paul, thought I’d walked past one of that name near Trent Bridge,, 👍
LikeLike
I would say that whatever the outcome, Zucco has seen better days, which leads me to……..
LikeLiked by 1 person
Chairs too high; chairs too low. You’re going to need to carry a custom collapsible chair at some point.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Nah, Martin is just going to get a mobility scooter pimped out with a very adjustable seat..
LikeLiked by 1 person
Went to Field Mill back in the 90s and there was an advert on the roof of the home end for a firm of estate agents called Sankey. It read “More people use Sankey than for any other reason.” I still haven’t got my head around that.
LikeLiked by 1 person
My head is spinning as to what that could mean, Bill.
LikeLike
That split in the woods on the A611 is one of the weirder features of the road network. Possibly the widest divergence between the two carriageways of a dual carriageway.
LikeLike
One has to wonder (brace yerself), Who takes better Pictures Of Lilleys?…
Anyway, it’s towers of syrupy shite like that which explain why I never go on cider crawls in the East Mids.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Winner.
LikeLike
I’d think you’ve got a better than even chance of drawing Russ in to comment, by way of the sheer gravitational pull of that “She never gave me that lap dance” line. 😉
Not sure how old this micro is, but judging from the photos of the bar they’ve done an excellent job of creating that “we’ve been around for decades” look.
LikeLike
There’s some lines you hear you just couldn’t make up.
Possible BRAPA will hear the same line in 5 years time!
Yes, it’s a lovely job.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Fantastic! A place I’ve never heard of, a pub I’ve never heard of and old boys ditching plum for Guinness 👍
LikeLike