WHO ORDERED THOSE CANS ?

September 2023. Farnborough.

There were a few restaurant options for our stay in Farnborough, including an ultra-rare Wimpy and Poppins, a Harvester (with Doom Bar) and Harvester (without).

But the Spoons was a minute’s walk from our Premier Inn, so that got the vote (I’d just done my 15k steps).

Not the most attractive, tucked under a Travelodge, but it is a GBG regular.

and it shows off the town’s little-known Wild West credentials.

It’s quite busy, so I nab the first table I see.

Yes, that one.

“Brrrr. Too close to the door“ says Mrs RM.

I move further inside the pub to a second candidate.

“No no, now we’re too near the kitchen”.

Just like Goldilocks, my third choice is OK, and gives a good view of two blokes who I sense are close to falling off their chair.

There’s a menu (with actual Tilly Shilling on the front),

but it’s always going to be Katsu Chicken Curry and (award-winning but slightly long-pull) Abbot, ordered on the App in 20 seconds. Am I becoming predictable in my near middle-age ? I guess not, or I wouldn’t be vacationing in Farnborough.

And then it goes a bit wobbly. I remember the inevitable salted caramel fudge brownie,

I remember four flat whites, and I remember the Wetherspoons App saying “Whoa ! That’s four orders in very short order; you OK hun” or something.

And here’s the culprits. Two interesting crafty cans at £3.33 each. The Purple Moose aggressively tropical and eventually undrinkable, the Exmoor Urban Fox rich and stunning. Yes, Exmoor, honestly !

.On the next table a man blows his nose aggressively, then falls off his chair. I saw that coming a mile off.

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Published by retiredmartin

Retired NHS, doing long walks around UK and the world to record the great bits. Focused on Good Beer Guide pubs and live music.

25 thoughts on “WHO ORDERED THOSE CANS ?”

  2. There’s an ultra-rare Wimpy three miles from us next to Greene King’s Barley Mow at Milford.
    There also used to be two in Stafford.

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  3. The Wimpy has been in Queensmead Shopping centre since it was built in 1965 all be it has moved premises there, impressive. Sorry I had to go to Cornwall to miss you 😜.

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    1. Three-quarters of them are in the south-east ( that’s where the money is );
      13 London
      13 Essex
      8 Kent
      4 Hampshire
      3 Buckinghamshire
      3 Hertfordshire
      2 Surrey
      1 Middlesex !

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      2. Yeah, there’s one in Worthing. I was down there a few years back and, after an afternoon on the craft murk, I went in and had a Bender in a Bun, because it would have amused the 10 year old me. It didn’t sit well with the murk and I was in turmoil throughout that evening’s Mark Steel gig at the Connaught, a show which over-ran by more than an hour because he was on sparkling form. I had to waddle-run to the khazi, and only just made it in time before releasing a flock of starlings.

        I may not visit a Wimpy again.

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      5. Have a great time, Paul. If you’re lucky, he’ll finish the show and then carry on with some wonderful anecdotes until the theatre ask him to stop because they have to close. It was on the stroke of 11pm when he finally finished in Worthing that night. He’d been on stage since 7.30!

        I’m hoping to see him in Aldershot on the 7th, if I can blag the night off work. I won’t be having a Wimpy. Or any craft murk!

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      6. Bobby,
        I only knew of Mark Steel from his “Mark Steel In Town” programme on the radio in ‘my’ van about ten years ago. I saw him in Stafford several years ago and it can’t have been much before 11pm when he finished. A fast talker too so plenty for your money.
        I don’t know anything about any other twenty-first century comedians.
        Incidentally I am one-sixteenth Scottish from a nineteenth-century Ellen Steel of Edinburgh.

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      1. Yes indeed, the National Milk Bar franchise was founded in 1933 by Robert William Griffiths as an ordinary café/restaurant chain which is related to the original milk bars in name only. They once numbered around 20 outlets, which were located in Wales and in England near the Welsh border.

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