1089a. Thu 1/7/21: The Bricklayers Arms, Luton

Beer: Oakham Jeffrey Hudson Bitter 4.2%

Finish work (at home) and catch up with TJJ, from the faculty. We’re both pleased at the ‘normality’ of the situation, even if T’s taken aback by The Brickies now taking card payments. Otherwise, just to be able to sit, have a beer, chat and admire the sky, which we decide is about as ‘mackerel’ as a sky can get…. It’s nice.

Always worth catching up with TJJ. Chat inevitably turns to work, though that’s ok. We don’t really cross paths, professionally, and it’s nice to get a different view. To be honest, it’s nice to get any view.

T also has a few tips for film and music. I must try and follow some of these up, though my attention to such things has slackened over the last ‘however many’ years. Some talk of our mutual bafflement and negativity towards Milton Keynes and the way the country’s going all populist. TJJ thinks Labour’s screwed. He might be right; I’m more hopeful, on the back of, err, absolutely nothing.

1091d. Sat 10/7/21: The Vine, Kentish Town, London

Beer: Camden Pale Ale 4.0%

Final pub of the evening. We try The Southampton Arms, but it’s full. Which I was actually quite pleased about – if pubs are doing well enough to be able to turn punters away at 7pm, then hopefully they’ll be ok.

Like The Assembly House, The Vine is a big pub which will need to get an awful lot busier pretty quickly. The outside areas are reasonably well populated; inside, there’s one couple and a few forlorn looking bar staff.

Chat to RS about his plans and what he intends doing in his year moving to France. Sounds a really excellent adventure, and I’m envious. Plans are made for KG, MR and me to visit, and/or have a weekend in Paris and so meet RS half way.

We’ve been saving up our ‘Suck a Stone’ game for late on in the evening, and play it, fairly successfully. I can’t remember exactly what the rules were, but not sure I want to.

1090b. Sat 3/7/21: Mad Squirrel Tap and Bottle Shop, High Wycombe

Beer: Mad Squirrel Mister Squirrel 4.0%

AW, SW and I are here to visit AC and to be ‘wowed’ by Wycombe. Half past three in the afternoon may not be the peak time to visit the pub, but this evening’s big match means places like Mad Squirrel are booked out. So here we are, early doors.

Mad Squirrel is a small chain in some of the posher places around the Chilterns. A visit, some time ago, to Harpenden’s didn’t fill me with much enthusiasm, though I recall the beer being good. Which it is again. As is the pub itself – while a bit ‘crafty’, the place is neither groaning hip, nor that weird wine bar/canteen amalgam which prevailed in Harpenden.

Empty too. We brave the weather and sit outside, watching Red Kites doing their thing. Topics of chat include World Domination Enterprises and 10CC (rock bands), possible gigs at the 100 Club for Arndales, the evil and joys of Spotify and putting Clod Magazine into a book.

At one point, I’m attacked by a bee, in a weird throwback to a trip to Adams Park, many years ago, when the away end contained a wasps’ nest, which served up more peril and ents than the hapless Luton Town and Wycombe Wanderers teams playing that day, who slogged out a lacklustre 0-0.

1093b. Thu 22/7/21: The Bricklayers Arms, Luton

Beer: Purity Jimbo 4.0%

Sneaky pint with AW, who’s in town on an errand.

We chat about this and that. Much time spent on discussing music, both of us looking forward to the Sparks documentary and still coo-ing about the Nightingales thing Stewart Lee did. On the one hand, I’m not especially versed in either of these acts, but AW and I agree it would probably be hard for either of us to find common ground with someone who wasn’t interested in watching either programme. Especially if they’re music fans.

We run through what a relief it’ll be when we both feel happy to not wear masks, what a shitshow our Government is and how entrenched greed and self-interest is in the national psyche.

At some point, Nick comes out and waters the flowers.

1090a. Fri 2/7/21: The Bricklayers Arms, Luton

Beer: Oakham Jeffrey Hudson Bitter 4.2%

TPK’s suggested we get in a little earlier than normal, to watch the football. Fine by me; Belgium vs Italy looks a good game.

Pete’s in, with another regular, whose name I don’t know. Nice enough bloke. Unlike the table of three in the corner. Their leading light is a fast mouthed sweary arse. Pete won’t engage him in conversation. I do, but feel it wise to play down England’s chances of winning. Sweary doesn’t seem to have much fondness for England. Playing down their chances seems quite natural – from what I’ve seen, they’ve not been setting the tournament alight.

Sweary’s companions – a father and son, I think – struggle to keep Sweary in check, though their technique is questionable, as they spend half the time goading him. Alison’s much clearer and asks him to reign it in a couple of times.

It’s a relief when Sweary leaves. 

Italy are far too good for the Belges – the 2-1 score doesn’t tell an accurate story.

1091. Fri 9/7/21: The Bricklayers Arms, Luton

Beer: Slater’s Premium Bitter 4.4%

AJK and Anj in tonight. We discuss at the outset our prevailing diluted enthusiasm for England’s footballing exploits (that’s me brother and I, one doubts AS has ever been much bothered). There was a time, we recall, 15-25 years ago, when we’d be down the Brickies en masse to watch so much as an England friendly. Are we bothering the Briqs for the European Championship final, England v Italy, on Sunday? Nah.

Still, should England win – and we hope they win – it will be fantastic night down The Brickies… just not a night you’ll read an account of here. Sorry.

In the meantime it’s another quiet post-lockdown Friday evening down the Bricks. Leightron isn’t out.

Someone (not me) asked if “Limp Bizkit” get their curries flown in from a specific Luton curry house to wherever the heck they were touring. We don’t know. Luton, we agree, especially in the Wellington Street environs, isn’t the hot spot for curries that it used to be.

1092. Wed 14/7/21: The Rising Sun, Slip End, Luton

Beer: Farr’s Lock In 4.5%

Hot’n’balmy Wednesday early evening. I’ve walked, from the gym, across the park, to meet me Dad. It’s too warm.

I renew my faltering acquaintance with Farr’s Lock In. I can’t decide about it tonight… it’s not off, but it’s not in tip-top condition. It’s ok.

DGK arrives, and decides we’re sitting in the Lounge rather than the (perfectly acceptable) public bar.

We have a couple of pints. I stick to the FLI. Dad talks of the foreign trips he’s already had to cancel, and those which he hopes to enjoy once these bloody covid restrictions are gone.

1098a. Fri 30/7/21: The Bricklayers Arms, Luton

Beer: Nethergate Azza Hatter 3.7%

I’ve had a few troublesome days. Nothing long lasting (it’s a cat thing) but I’m very pleased to be in the pub. So much so, I decide not to seek out L8s straight away, but first enjoy my first pint with my book in the otherwise deserted front bar.

A plan which works well. My Nethergate is low strength, but robustly flavoured. Once my chakras ‘feng’, I tune into the disdain shown for the new, even shorter form of the cricket. This one’s been invented for the kids – gaudy uniforms, trashy American-ised names, adverts for snacks on the shirts and in commercial breaks. I try and like it and TPK’s irritation is amusing when he arrives, but it’s hard.

Anyway, we’re joined by L8s, then a little later, by AP. My wearing a Fred Perry is remarked upon. No, I haven’t gone all right-wing. Besides, it’s a green one. On a right wing theme, there’s some discussion and enthusiasm for a Hitchin based sitcom, all about a group of nationalists who meet up at the local micropub.

1090. Fri 2/7/21: The Bricklayers Arms, Luton

Beer: Leighton Buzzard Brewery Restoration 4.6%

AJK and I. In the front bar. Italy v Belgium (European Championships) on the telly. Pete’s in, and sat on an adjacent table. A group of old boys are sat at the table in the corner. Two of the three are fine. The other is soused and loud and apparently, from the admonishment Al administers when he starts singing, has been tedious in the pub for some time this afternoon/evening.

Italy 2-1 Belgium.

Atmosphere in pub is fine, really, during the football, but gets markedly better when its finished. The old boys in the corner leave (the other two apologise profusely to the landlady, after their loud and slightly obnoxious pal shuffles out). Another group of young folk – late 20’s, early 30’s – drinking Hoegaarden and a little noisy – leave. The pub is left to us old farts – Pete and us and Steve (not that one, or those ones, but an amicable fellow… nice chap, likes his non-league football). Lovely.

Nothing more noted.

1095. Tue 27/7/21: The Angel Vaults, Hitchin

Beer: Portobello Stiff Lip IPA 5%

Bus from town, with Thurls, for a few afternoon pints in Hitchin. It is just a few pints too – the days of boozy excess, though chatted about, are long gone on the evidence of today’s outing.

That starts at Hitchin’s Wetherspoon’s. It’s alright, it’s quite nice, it’s certainly better than The White House back in Luton. It’s the erstwhile Conservative Club, so Martin says. The main appeal, and the most customers, are out back in the (rather nicely set out) garden. We take a table, under an umbrella, out of the sun, but rather too close to a gaggle of Hertfordshire youths who are a bit loud and leery and thankfully don’t stay too long.

Nice to see Thurls again. It’s been a long time. He spends a long time on the phone to Mick – making plans… almost certainly for a more exciting time than he’s having now. But, hey, that’s fine… I’ll just sit here supping at me pint and staring into the middle distance and “Mick says hello”.

I request the salutation be returned. Thurls gets off the phone. We talk political naïve bollocks, then move on to the second (of three) pubs…