Then I realised the batteries on my camera (which seem to work on a one battery per photo ratio) had run out and I couldn't. And so I got depressed.
In the last week I have spent £20. £20. Yes I have been working virtually every day, and nights at that, but really, twenty quid suggests I might well be spending a lot of time at home, which, last time I looked, wasn't a pub. (More like a IKEA showroom cum nursery with random Nick Cave CDs and half-hearted electrical equipment)
So. I propose either another lock-in style spin o
ff blog dedicated to bottled speciality beer, or I appropriate the Lock In to write about bottled beer, as, frankly, I've been drinking a few over the last couple of months.
Basically since ordering a crate of proper beer from the Vale Brewery in order to decide which would win the Will Jackson Celebration Ale TM licence, (and the stronger stuff was too sweet, thanks Alastair) I've realised the difference between real beer and the usual offy crap.
actually it was more down to trying to drink a can of Grolsch after drinking some of the Vale Brewery's finest and it was just horrible. So, to start, a true story:
I went to my local offy on Willesden High Road. Not the every-other-shop offy, but the dedicated offy, the branded offy, the Unwins.
The Unwins is run by the sort of person you'd be if you were a scouser, divorced, quite bright, in love with booze, and in charge of an off licence. The temperature in the Willesden off-licence is never less than sweltering. ever.
I would think it was a ruse to divert people to the chillier (and more expensive) fare in the fridges, were it not for the fact that I know he's thinking: "Fokkin 'ell! Heat! Not lettin' that go! Best not do anything in case it goes cold."
So I go into the sweltering (and, almost smelly, but saved by the level of wood chip) offy and ask yer man if he's got any quality bottled ales on special.
"no."
he says.
so, I browse. and frankly, the only downside about drinking offy real ale rather than lager is that the price per unit of alcohol doubles. At least. But hey, if you want quality...
So I picked three innocuous bottles of ale out of the top shelf (they're always on the top shelf... exciting moment). and let's say it was something like Adnams Broadside or whatever - and it was £1.79 a bottle. So I took it to the till and he rang it in and it came up £4. So I looked at him, he looked at me and he rang it through again and it came up £4.
So I said "I'll pay for this before it changes its mind" and handed him the money.
As I was leaving he said
"Wait a minute"
I turned.
"Le'mme jus' 'ave a leuwchk."
And he started looking through a pile of price cards which were due to go on the shelves. After flicking through a few he said
"Owww yeh! 'ere we are. Buy 3 Adnams Broadside for £4!"
What are the chances of me picking not just the only real ale on offer, but exactly the right number of ales to qualify? Serendipity, baby. Actually someone clever can work it out - let's say there were 15 different bottled ales in the offy and I could have bought between one and 4. So... fifteen to the power of four to one? I don't know.
So anyway - tonight, in order to watch the test match I bought 2 bottles of Fullers Lord's Ales TM.
Lord's Ale - pah!
Now - a cricket ale... yes. A licensed TM (Entertainment Rights Ltd) of a "brand" grafted onto a lacklustre ale in order to take advantage of the fact that people are starting to take more of an interest in bottled ale and so might be drawn to "linkages" like cricket can fucking well fuck off.
Shit ale too. 4% of tastelessness. The only upside was that it was so lagery Nic liked it when we shared the second bottle for dinner. It's the first bitter I've ever seen her drink. If it gets her into real ale it'll be like when Chris (one of my ushers) got his girlfriend into nick cave. Nirvana. Well, Cavopia, whatever.Amy is fine and sends you all her regards.
Nx
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