Some friends and work colleagues got together last night for a City pub crawl. The City of London has a lot of pubs - some very old, some bank refits, etc. Unfortunately Andy and I don’t get to visit them often because most are closed at the weekend and that is the only time we go to the City usually.
We met up at The Phoenix just up from Bank tube station at about 5:30. I had a half of Abbot Ale and Andy plumped for an Old Speckled Hen. Both perfectly respectable proper british ales. In fact the serving of real ale, as opposed to mass-produced lager <spit>, was the only non-negotiable criterion for having a pub on the list. The pub was crowded with banker types and quite loud but Simon managed to snag a sofa so we had a relaxing start to the crawl.
Next was the Cock and Woolpack and we were banned from sniggering about the name. Of course we did anyway. This was a smallish Shepherd Neame pub and we all had Spitfire. Very nice beer with a bit of a caramel taste to it. Very malty. Quite crowded in the pub - apparantly bankers aren’t feeling the credit crunch THAT much or perhaps they are just drowning their sorrows.
The Counting House was next on our plan. This place was first built as a bank in 1890’s and after a succession of banking owners was taken over by Fullers in 1997. They won awards for the refurbishment & redevelopment done on the building and one can see why. Three of our lot went for pints of Chiswick and two of us went for halves of Discovery. The latter was just a tad water-y to count as a proper ale. There is a small WW1 memorial plaque on the wall to the right of the entrance. It was put up by whichever bank was in situ at the time. Fairly unremarkable but apparantly the only such memorial in an English pub.
Then we went off plan. Dave took us to a couple of Nicholson pubs - The Red Lion and The Ship. Both were quite old, unique in character and tucked away in little courts and alleys that you’d would be unlikely to stumble upon by accident. Can’t remember what we had at the Red Lion. It had a younger crowd then the other pubs we visited and there was a band setting up for live music downstairs. At the Ship we all had Doom Bar - a cornish ale. Pretty obviously a naval themed pub with a brass plaque on the floor depicting a ship and the compass points. There were loads more people outside then in as it is tucked into a long courtyard alleyway between a very narrow church and a strange white building with funny architectural details like waves on it. We surmised that perhaps the building was built for a maritime insurance firm. It isn’t very far from Lloyds.
Back on plan we went to the Crosse Keys. This place too is an ex-bank and cavernous. Thankfully they’ve carpetted it or the noise would be deafening.
Crosse Keys
They had a massive selection of real ales, but sadly 8:15 is late for a City pub on a Thursday <shrug> so quite a few of them were finished. I think I ended up with a pint of Golden Fox. Andy ended up with a very nice pint but since it was his fourth choice I can’t recall what it was! Looked like a nice pub but don’t go on a Thursday. It was curry night and the place reeked of not particularly nice smelling curry.
Anyway the crowd had thinned considerably so we got a couple of sofas and some packets of crisps to relax at our final destination. I think the people who went for pints most of the night were a bit bloated. I couldn’t manage that pace without somebody pushing me around in a wheelbarrow so had stuck to halves all night apart from the last pub. A nice group of people and a fun night out.
On the way back to the tube Andy was caught short and headed into an alley. I thought he was going to have a pee(!) but really it was just an excuse to go to another pub, The Jamaica Wine House aka the Jam Pot. Using the facilities we felt obliged to have a swift half each. Very olde worlde pub, well worth a proper visit.
I turned 45 on Sunday. We started celebrating on Friday and kept it up all weekend. Well we ate, drank and were generally merry - so pretty much a normal weekend apart from the addition of cake. Yum!
45th Birthday Cake
I got some lovely flowers from my folks, the latest Neal Stephenson book from Andy as well as Adele’s CD and some gorgeous silver earrings. Trudy sent a beautiful dark pink scarf which I’ve been wearing ever since. Nice cards from family and friends too.
Partying came to an end on Monday. I am way too fat again so back on the straight and narrow. I’m going to try to stick to a MAXIMUM of 4 units of alcohol a week. And the takeaway dinners will have to be cut down considerably. Boring but necessary. So far I’ve made a lovely celeriac soup and salad that lasted two meals. Tonight we’re having Mexican Lime Soup.
This winter has been particularly cold and London saw its first significant snowfall in about 16 years. This a picture of me cavorting in the heavy snowfall outside our flat after midnight. The snow was about 5 inches by the time we got up in the morning. Andy trudged to the bus stop to go to work but soon came back.
Michelle in the snow
There was so much snow that anyone able to do so took a snow day. No buses ran, few trains and the London Underground petered out during the day. Much fun was had by all as snowmen popped up everywhere. Check out the Unripe Photo blog 2009/02 for more photos. It has since snowed again in London, twice! But not enough to stick overnight or to disrupt traffic overmuch.
At some point during this month Michael (my brother) invited me to play Pirates on Facebook. I accepted and started plundering, pillaging and burying treasure. Those of you linked to my Facebook profile are probably sick to death of the updates about this. I don’t know how you turn them off or why ANYBODY not in the game would want to read all that rubbish. So apologies to all my Facebook friends. Anyway I’m up to a Level 19 Pirate, and I think Michael has maybe played twice! Dunno how much longer I can be bothered with it. We’ll see.
Last weekend Andy and I went to an art fair in Covent Garden. It was a selling exhibition with works on offer from £200 to £15000. We didn’t buy anything but we saw some very cool contemporary works. Then we went to Pacifico and had margaritas. Oh and some food, but mainly margaritas. This is Andy trying not to get salt in his mustache and me after Andy asked if I wanted any dessert.
Ok - been slacking on the online front apart from a somewhat addictive Facebook game called Pirates (more on this later). So get ready for some updates.
Tim Minchin at the Roundhouse
In January, Andy and I went to see Tim Minchen at the Roundhouse in Camden. We had excellent seats at a table right at centre stage - excellent! Have a look at January’s Unripe photoblog for more photos.
Neither of us knew too much about Tim before the gig but we loved his show. Those readers of a religious bent should steer clear but everyone else, if you enjoy biting satire gently but intelligently and liberally applied along with some wicked musical skills then check out Tim Minchin.
One of his best songs is, “If I Didn’t Have You..” Sounds like a love song right? Well it is - sort of. But it’s really about math, statistical probability and the role of chance. Hilarious!
I found this website, Factcheck which debunks some of the rubbish politicians say as well as examining the political ads, internet and other media rumours. I looked at a handful of the examples and it is kind of interesting. While there are only a small number of downright lies, there are tons of gross distortions with a little grain of truth to them that might as well be lies. There were so many republican or anti-Obama lies listed that I thought it might be a left-leaning site so I checked the About Us page, which says,
“We are a nonpartisan, nonprofit “consumer advocate” for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. We monitor the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews and news releases. Our goal is to apply the best practices of both journalism and scholarship, and to increase public knowledge and understanding.”
Claims of non-partisanship are no guarantee of lack of bias. However the citation of verifiable sources is reassuring. In almost all instances the alledged “real” story or statistic is pretty mundane bordering on boring and the candidate’s actual position in relation to those circumstances seems quite reasonable even if you might disagree with it. While the more hysterical and largely invented story or position which has encased the grain of reality makes the candidate seem a monster or a moron.
There are such fabrications on both sides and in other, non-presidential, political races. I guess the preponderance of anti-Obama stuff is just indicative of the mindset of the Republican’s campaign. I guess they know that fear seems to be a great motivating force and aren’t adverse to using it even if it is unethical and fairly baseless.
Um… I wrote this a few days before the election and then forgot to publish it. (Muppet)
I’ve got no interesting news this week unless you want to hear about the cold that Andy had and has now passed to me. Or the stench in our bathroom caused by a leaking pipe which I’m struggling to get someone to come out and fix. Boring and unpleasant both so here are some stories that I found interesting today.
“Right to bear arms” strikes again - 8 year old shoot himself in the head with a submachine gun at a Massachusetts weapons fair. Father says, “I really don’t know why it happened.” Really?! I mean c’mon!!
We watched Later with Jools Holland on telly last night. The highlight for me was Glen Campbell singing “Wichita Lineman“. It’s a great song. He sounded good (better than the cover of Greenday’s song) and his guitar playing was superb. If anything I preferred this version of the song using guitars rather then the more typical orchestra backing. I’m sure the Later clip will show up eventually online either on Youtube or the BBC site.
Had a mild argument with Andy: I love the song; he hates it. That just gives me the opportunity to torture him by singing it to him ad nauseum. <evil laugh>
We have added a new photo album of the pictures we took on a day out in London last Saturday.
Early in the morning we went to the Tate Modern to see a Mark Rothko exhibition (including the Seagram series). Rothko claims that people break down and cry in front of his pictures. I think that’s just the ones that have paid to get in. Luckily, Michelle is a member of Tate so we didn’t have to pay.
After breakfast at the Tate we decided it was such a lovely sunny day (and maybe the last of the summer) that we would go for a wander in the City of London.
A tourist stopped us and asked for directions. The odd thing was that she showed us a map, pointed out where we were, pointed out where she wanted to be (a block away) and asked, “How do I get there?” As we were pointing the way there was a loud crash nearby. Turning to the source of the sound, we saw a car full of young ladies plowing it’s way through the two barriers on an island in the middle of the road. Apparently, she had just missed her turn and was looking over her shoulder saying, “Oh, we should have turned the…” CRASH!
Wandering further in from the river we thought we could hear a band playing. Following our ears we turned a corner and came face to face with a band of pensioners practicing. We watched them for a while then moved on, again following our ears once more to find the source of crowd noises. That’s when we stumbled upon the Costermongers’ Harvest Festival at Guildhall.
There were various bands, pearly kings and queens, people dressed in victorian outfits, cart horses and cart dogs(!). The Lord Mayor of London was there with a bunch of other people in fancy clothes who we assumed to be heads of guilds.
We’re moving Unripe to a new host which gives easy access to blog software so we thought we’d try our hand at some blogging. Hopefully it will be updated more regularly then my previous blog - last edited seven years ago! I’m sure Andy will keep you all amused and informed. I’ll try my best but judging by my feeble facebook efforts, I wouldn’t count your chickens.
Feel free to add your comments. Keep it (reasonably) clean, some of my nieces and nephews might pop in occasionally if they are really bored. Andy’s kin are all old enough to look after themselves. LOL!
We don’t have specific plans for the blog as of yet. I’m guessing we’ll use the blog for in depth comments on the photos we post and I might vent an occasional rant on here just to save Andy having to listen to it.
