retiredmartin

May 2023.

With a night in Worcester ahead of me, I had a choice of a tick in Malvern OR Evesham, both about 15 minutes away by train. BUT NOT BOTH. Rail companies really need to arrange their timetables around the needs of GBG tickers.

I picked Malvern, as it was a couple of quid cheaper and I’m principled like that.

And I had some vague notion of walking the hills in the sunset, but a day of hiking caught up with me as I approached Guide newbie Weavers.

Urban “craft” bars, from Westhoughton to Solihull, are a particularly 21st century phenomenon I expect to feature heavily in Boak & Bailey’s “difficult” follow-up to 20th Century Pub.

All the standard features are present. Shop conversion, pastel colours, unreadable keg list on a strange object, ABK and Polly’s and Cloudwater rubbing shoulders,

dogs welcome,

and Star Wars memorabilia in the loos.

Actually, that’s Star Trek, not Star Wars, isn’t it ? Or a condom advert.

The cask ranges in these bars are remarkably Old School. Hobsons, Wye Valley, Fownes.

I pick a pint of the Fownes “House Ale” as I’m a sucker for “house” beers; same with “Staff pick” or “Fast seller”.

From the usual choice of high tables where your feet don’t touch the floor or sofas you sink into, I picked the former and felt guilty for hogging a table for four.

The Fownes started off “OK”, and drifted a bit to “OK”, just as the pub itself got better. “Lovely laughter” I noted, which means little, but I sensed the average age of customers rising as the soundtrack switched to “Mr Blue Sky”, “Killer Queen” and “Good Vibrations”.

Mrs RM has given me her old phone. By old I mean it’s about 6 weeks old. It’s got a feature that allows you to make people disappear from photos.

Look !

Think of the potential. If you can make people disappear, surely you can make them appear, perhaps in pubs you can’t be bothered to visit in person. Perhaps it’s Simon’s best route to GBG completion.

I might have stayed for a Cloudwater, but instead I phoned Hong Kong to order a takeaway down the hill in Barnard’s Green, where the bus stop is a post-modernist gem.

Which was more than I can say for the Crispy Beef and Singapore Rice (NCTSS 3).

Remember, I do this stuff so you don’t have to.