retiredmartin

My lawyers have reminded me that even though I’ve just issued an Annual Report for 2024 I do need to do a December highlights post. I know how litigious old CAMRA members are; they’re still trying to get CAMRA to reinstate their monthly edition of What’s Brewing on papyrus.

Gives me chance to recall that roaring fire in the Orange Tree in Baldock back on Mrs RM’s disastrous birthday,

one of two disastrous birthdays in-month.

Actually, despite being condemned to a month in Waterbeach I still managed a few trips to old favourites,

though of my fifty (50) different pubs only ten were new GBG ticks.

A month of revisits, including a family Thai supper at the always great Wrestlers,

and a tiny bit of colouring in Kent, which I left tantalisingly one tick short of completion (Blean) after a top night out in Faversham.

Parental needs meant I could only join Mrs RM down in Rye Harbour for a night

but at least on the rail trip back home via St Pancras I got to tick a few Bass mirrors like this corker in Camberwell.

But that frontage of Faversham’s Elephant was the most glorious sight of December,

and that’s my Pub of the Month.

My Beer of the Month was a mead,

and if you think I’m only picking Superstitions Crystal Sails Mead because it was bought in a BrewDog you’d be right.

Duncan, Dr John, Will and Jim kept me sane on a couple of snatched Sheffield pub crawls last month, and I look forward to resuming my acquaintance with my home town soon.

Grief, I’d settle for a night in Maidenhead right now.