December 2025. Hastings.
You’ll know that I fund my hedonist lifestyle by not buying clothes, but by Monday I realised I was going to have to replace my dark fleece, inexplicably left on the 17:35 from Uttoxeter after 4 pints of Bass.
20 minutes by rail brings you to Hastings, which has shops and pubs.
Oddly, I still haven’t revisited any of the Old Town’s marvellous pubs; Dolphin, FILO, Jenny Wren and all.
Four (4) heritage pubs too ! But look west of the lift, below the station.
Shoppers apart, who even visits the New Town, cut off by that scary underpass at Pelham Place ? Well, folk like me and James, who didn’t even realise there was an old bit for a while. See also : Bridlington.
So I thought, let’s explore the pubs the real Hastings uses. Goodness, they even get deliveries of Hobgoblin.
I think that’s Yates.
Playing safe, I’ll start at the Spoons, a very disappointing GBG tick just before COVID and a surprise re-entry in this year’s Guide.
Mobility scooter guarding the door, half the trade women meeting up to share a bottle of wine, Chinese couple on the fruit machine, two Old Boys with six pints of lager adorning their high table,
terribly dull carpet.
What can the John Logie Baird offer the New Town ticker ?
A perfectly poured pint of Plum Porter, that’s what, rich and chewy and NBSS 4. Oh, and there’s a new dish, Sticky Korean Fried Chicken Bowl and a pint for £10.52. Sadly no option to add black pudding.
One slight problem.
That lone 4.9% pint leaves me ever so slightly intoxicated, it’s the Sussex sea air, and I still have to go shopping.
I ask Chat GPT where to buy a fleece, and start walking towards shops.
Look ! A Register Office. Shouldn’t that be Registry ? Russ will know.
Another odd building.
So much to explore when sober.
I particularly like this statue of an England cricketer playing a defensive stroke in the Ashes.
And there in the background is the Primark that ChatGPT has been urging me towards,
no doubt prompted by the 0.01% commission that it gets on my purchase of a £10 fleece, my entire clothes shopping for 2025.
retiredmartin 
The shopping centre is built where there was previously the cricket ground. Did you see the cricket ball which is on the wall of the building behind him.
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No I didn’t, Jon. Something to look out for should I ever go shopping again.
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I only know that the ball is there because someone kindly pointed it out to me, one day, when I was admiring the cricketer.
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I thought for a moment you were going to say you hit it there, John!
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Shouldn’t you be buying overpriced merch, such as fleeces, at gigs, so as to advertise obscure Peruvian singer-songwriters that nobody else under the age of 25 has ever heard of?
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Surprisingly buoyant bedroom pop/sadcore scene in Lima at the moment, Scott.
That £10 fleece will last me till one my hot 2025 music tips makes it big, whatever big is.
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“Big” is somebody else over 25 having heard of them.
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John Logie Baird might well have been a pioneer of television, but the system he developed was sidelined in favour of a far more workable electronic version, developed by EMI.
The pub itself, isn’t one of the better Spoons, and surely there are far better candidates in Hastings for the GBG than this one?
As for clothes shopping, a branch of Primark opened in Tunbridge Wells, a few weeks ago. Complete chaos, with only four tills open, all of them self service, according to a work colleague, who was brave enough to venture inside.
I’m currently downsizing my wardrobe BTW, and wishing Mrs PBT’s would do the same! 😀
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The Good Beer Guide is about beer quality, not pub “quality” (even more subjective !) and based solely on that Monday lunchtime NBSS 4 it deserves it place.
On the other hand, if you or I did a “Guide to Hastings pubs” it wouldn’t feature.
In 2019 I had to take a beer back, so Spoons aren’t infallible.
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Assert your authority on your wife as Master of the House then, Paul.
Like what I do.
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I’m not a fan of hospital food, Martin.
More importantly, in case I forget tomorrow (which I probably shall), enjoy your special day. How many years young, is it?
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Older than CAMRA, younger than the SPBW.
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“You’ll know that I fund my hedonist lifestyle by not buying clothes, but by Monday I realised I was going to have to replace my dark fleece, inexplicably left on the 17:35 from Uttoxeter after 4 pints of Bass.”
Love your attitude towards clothes buying. And, have to snigger slightly at the ‘oopsie’ with the fleece, and the most likely reason for it. 😊
“So I thought, let’s explore the pubs the real Hastings uses. Goodness, they even get deliveries of Hobgoblin.”
Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?
“Mobility scooter guarding the door, half the trade women meeting up to share a bottle of wine, ”
You meant ‘trade’ not ‘trad’, right? Over here ‘trad’ women is one who stays in the kitchen cooking up nice things for when her man comes home.
“two Old Boys with six pints of lager adorning their high table,”
One of them probably owns the mobility scooter and it’s easier on the legs to order a whole bunch at the bar rather than going back and forth for one at a time.
“terribly dull carpet.”
We could ask Si for a 2nd opinion?
“A perfectly poured pint of Plum Porter, that’s what, rich and chewy and NBSS 4.”
Blimey. You’re getting some gooduns lately.
“That lone 4.9% pint leaves me ever so slightly intoxicated, it’s the Sussex sea air, and I still have to go shopping.”
Sea air? See here! Pull the other one!
“Look ! A Register Office. Shouldn’t that be Registry ? Russ will know.”
Pfft. Register is correct. But, it’s where they keep the registries so over time lazy folk have gone with the latter.
Then you have the Registrar; a person who is responsible for keeping a register of official records, usually in a registry. 😉
“Another odd building.”
I shall keep mum, as I’ve been advised to lay off the ‘M’ word, as well as the burly thingy.
“I particularly like this statue of an England cricketer playing a defensive stroke in the Ashes.”
It looks to me like he grabbed his wooden leg and held it up in the air.
(isn’t there a popular saying with a blind man doing that?)
“no doubt prompted by the 0.01% commission that it gets on my purchase of a £10 fleece, my entire clothes shopping for 2025.”
Sigh, got me beat there, alas.
Cheers
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I always wonder when you don’t understand my serious comments, Russ, although there’s no obligation on me to explain. I assume ChatGPT’s owner gets commission if it recommends a particular store to you. Do you use ChatGPT.
No idea why I’m asking you when you’re on a 2,000 mile drive !
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Shopping in Hastings is great. There are so few shops which stock anything worth buying that I end up with almost as much money as when I left home. The John Logie Baird is pretty rough, even by Spoons standards, but an absolute bargain.
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Well, Morten, that’s my sort of shop ! Both New and Old Town shops were pretty busy today.
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Such a bummer when you leave clothing behind on public transport especially when there is a decades wear left in it. No-one ever hands it in.
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That’s a good point. No-one ever hands it in, or if they do the rail staff clearly stick them in the bin. Few stations seem to have lost property points these days.
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Everything going directly on Ebay. Possibly.
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I remember the John Logie Baird as a pub in Muswell Hill, one that had been opened by Courage in September 1959.
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