retiredmartin

27th October 2022.

The new Good Beer Guide (done it, mate) arrived. Alfie and Baa Baa wondered whether I’d be wasting my life ticking this one.

We’ll see.

On the tickers WhatsApp group, talk turned to the venue for the AGM to discuss weighty matters like whether a shot of whisky at a wake counted as a tick, and progress on the audit of my completion.

Unexpectedly, Chesterfield emerged as the preferred venue with three (3) new ticks. This came as something of a surprise as I’d only been here a year ago watching women’s football and noted how unchanged the pub scene.

20 minutes from home; let’s go and do a recce;

Chesterfield is, of course, best known as the home of William Blunderbuss, a 27 foot giant and semi-pro footballer who could hold steam engines in his palm. Sadly, his ball control was lacking, and he never made the Spireites first team.

He never made a career in panto, either, unlike the irrepressible Michelle Collins who starts her stint as Sleeping Beauty tomorrow.

I started my stint as GBG ticker (you can only really start officially with GBG in hand) at the Rectory. Note the little known parish church behind the pub. Apparently it’s not crooked at all, but you try telling the tourist office that.

The T.I.C.would do better promoting its collection of cheery boozers. Not sure where the Rectory came from before GBG glory, but it’s a pleasing mix of smart and earthy, dining and booze, and was doing good business mid-afternoon on a Thursday.

It’s part of a small family of reliable pubs which includes the venerable Exeter Arms, so expect Dancing Duck.

Dancing Duck is a reliable choice, even the gentle folk drink it.

Cool, crisp, foamy, clean glass (NBSS 3.5+). I complimented the guvnor on his beer, but he was dealing with a mini-crisis on the big table opposite as a Chesterfield FC fan was singing Spireite songs at full volume.

“We’re the famous boys in blue and we come from Chester..”.

No idea why 16:05 on Thursday is why you start singing football songs, but alcohol does that to you. Anyway, he was ejected to huge cheers, and the volume dropped to a respectable level.

“I’m a Skinhead not a muppet” he shouted, oddly, as removed from the premises to a soundtrack of Hall & Oates

I set off through the cobbled market streets, wondering about a return to the Royal Oak and heard a bloke swearing at me at full volume.

Well, I assumed it was me. Who else could it be. Luckily, I am the fastest thing one two legs, just as well when the next two pubs are 2 miles out of town and it’s started to rain.