The first weekend of July; I visited my parents to make sure they’d got enough garden tools, had the obligatory Crispy Beef from Chung Hwa, and sneaked out like a naughty schoolboy to meet BRAPA when they’d gone to bed. Talking of Crispy Beef, Cambridge has been celebrating its bovine heritage (visit Midsummer Common or… Continue reading CAMBRIDGE AWAITS BRAPA
Month: July 2021
THIS IS THE PERRY GREEN, THIS IS SOCIETY
When the going gets tough, squeeze a Jam reference into your blog post. Life After Football will get it. A trip to the Herts/Essex borders west of Bishops Stortford and Stansted Airport is a rare treat for me. The “Stort”, as BRAPA will no doubt call it, is a dull old place, but those tiny… Continue reading THIS IS THE PERRY GREEN, THIS IS SOCIETY
THE CASE AGAINST TABLE SERVICE Vol 73.
Mudgie asked me what beer I had in Matlock and I confess I’ve no idea, as I wasn’t allowed to see the hand pumps as I was shown to the table. I know it was their Moot Ales homebrew, and I’m sure the enthusiastic barperson gave me a lengthy answer describing “A crispy hoppy beer,… Continue reading THE CASE AGAINST TABLE SERVICE Vol 73.
IT’S HILLY IN MATLOCK, ISN’T IT ?
Short posts, I’m not in the mood. Grrrr. Moving to Sheffield puts the gems of the Peak District in easy reach. Let’s go to Matlock, with its annual new GBG pub and improbable hills. Underrated industrial buildings too, though scarred by the occasional micropub (can you spot it ?). The obligatory non-pub cat looked a… Continue reading IT’S HILLY IN MATLOCK, ISN’T IT ?
ODDIES
My second Halifax tick opened at 16:00, despite not being a micropub. So I had time to squeeze in a quick curry in Dean Clough, via one of the UK’s great urban walks. Babar Khan is a recommendation of Curry Heute (the Pubmeister of curry), and although Covid has put paid to the famous lunchtime… Continue reading ODDIES
NEW ‘FAX EMERGE
Just before we left for Scotland I managed a trip to Halifax, the beer capital of the world. But I couldn’t find my notes, till this morning when I realised that Mrs RM had bought me a new phone for Scotland and my ‘fax facts were on the now abandoned Huawei. But here they are,… Continue reading NEW ‘FAX EMERGE
RUMINATING ON SCOTTISH BEER QUALITY
“Of all the beer you had in Scotland, what proportion of it came up to the standard you would expect in the Good Beer Guide? And how does that compare with south of the Border ? ” asks Pub Curmudgeon. What a good question. Let’s see the evidence; BEER SCORING I scored 28 beers (a… Continue reading RUMINATING ON SCOTTISH BEER QUALITY
BUYING A HOE IN LONGTOWN
On the way back from Wishaw we had to divert off the M6 at Gretna to avoid a hold-up, probably a spill of peanut butter stout, and stopped for 20 minutes just over the border in Longtown. It’s only a couple of months since we were walking this part of the world. Some weird stuff… Continue reading BUYING A HOE IN LONGTOWN
When you Wishaw upon a star
And so our Scottish sojourn come to an end at Wonderful Wishaw. Or “AnyWhere but Wishaw” as it’s affectionately known. Only the Good Beer Guide brings English people to post-industrial steel towns like Motherwell and Wishaw, and we should thank it for that. Mrs RM was less convinced as we drove through the challenging streets… Continue reading When you Wishaw upon a star
FORGETTING THE WEDDING ANNIVERSARY AGAIN
I expect you imagine that Mrs RM and I share a glamorous lifestyle punctuated by glitzy celebration of life events. Well, we spent our 29th wedding anniversary in a campervan parked in the far corner of Blairgowrie’s unglitzy car park, whose sign I checked seven times to ensure it didn’t prohibit overnight parking. We left… Continue reading FORGETTING THE WEDDING ANNIVERSARY AGAIN
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