January 2024. Stockton-on-Tees.
A pint of banked Bass in the Sun, then straight back on the train to Seaton for a Parmo Platter and an early night. That would have been the sensible thing.
But I’m afraid I bullied Mrs RM into a second Stockton revisit,
though to be fair it would have been a crime NOT to take her in the Golden Smog, what with it being open.
I hoped, somewhere down that lovely alley.
I’m really not saying the Smog has limited opening to have a dig at micro pubs, it opens at 2pm EVERY DAY; it’s just I’ve timed my (non) visits very badly of late.
If you can’t see it, look for the sign.
Actually, the bigger risk in the Smog is finding it full, but Mrs RM found the table by the barrel,
and eyed up the lemon drizzle cake as she headed to the Ladies. “Take pics” I said.
A regular’s birthday, the letters rearranged at regular interval to spell out Smog-friendly phrases.
Perhaps. I reckon anything said in the Golden Smog should taken with a pinch of salt, a bit like my blog.
Anyway, I took a bit of cake (NLDCSS 4.5) without letters on it, just in case a high stakes Scrabble match is on.
Mrs RM descended regally down the stairs,
and I had to confess that I might just have got her a third of the 11% Breakfast Stout to go alongside my pint of Most Normal, both from Scarborough’s finest.
“**** it it’s fine” she might have said. But didn’t.
I popped to the Gents to take the obligatory loo shots,
and on my return found Mrs RM chatting about the benefits of rainwater to the skin, quiz answers and the rearranging of the drizzle cake to spell “Heron. He Lies“.
I didn’t believe a word the barman was saying, and was warming to him by the second as he claimed that he’s served London Pride bankers at the smog.
Unwisely, I insisted on having a half of the “unpronounceable one”,
which turned out to be a Knaresborough/Kelham Island collaboration. “Oooh, we live near Heist” squealed Mrs RM, sensing an Untappd badge.
I ushered her out, into the Stockton night before she made a third raid on the drizzle cask.
retiredmartin 