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The New Inn in Chippenham is probably one of the oldest pubs there.  It is small and cozy and they had a fire going on this cool spring day.  I took in a bit of racing on tele and settled into enjoying my beer with my new best friend, the largest labrador retriever in the world.

Some lads came in and told a sad tale of some 14-year-old that took some bad doping advice by snorting a gram of X followed by some massive dose of MeowMeow.  I get the feeling they were going to visit the dealer to adjust his user instructions; as I left, the younger fellow nodded my way and said to the older one, “maybe we shouldn’t have said all that.”  I had a bet to place, though, and no time for their amateur dramatics.

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There’s something reminiscent of a Tom Waits song about the Brunel on a sunny but still cold early spring afternoon.  It is a very comfortable, old , warehouse-like interior with bad service but good beer and populated by old drunks.  Very “Fumblin’ With the Blues,” or “Yesterday is Here,” or, for that matter, any alcohol soaked railroad blues.  Too bad the piped in music was such pop shite.

 

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I completely forgot to photograph anything in or outside of the Pack Horse after changing from my running kit having finally escaped the estate catacombs that protect the rest of the world from the Old Lane. I blame the charming landlady for getting me into a conversation about running; she runs a bit, and has done the London Marathon in the past.  And, she’s simply a bright and pleasant chat companion, the sort you hope for when you are sitting around drinking mid-afternoon on a Friday.

The bar is cool, too.  Chippenham has an active real ale movement and there wasn’t a lager to be spotted in front of the patrons bunched up at the curve in the bar where some wee risers of staircases take you into some smaller rooms and a short segment of additional bar.  This customers were potty and surreal the way old codgers should be although I suspect most are younger than me.  There were only two ales on that I noticed, Moles and Doom Bar (but what more could you ask?); they also had BOTH Black Rats: cider and perry.  There’s a big garden for better weather to come and the house is much better suited to the civilised than the Old Lane will ever hope to be (I shall return).

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It was about a mile and a half from the Lysley Arms to the Old Lane, where Carlsberg was £2.35 a pint.

To be so superficially pretty inside, populated by so many pleasant subrbanites, and to exist in the midst of a fine–if somewhat sterile*–modern housing estate, the Lane embodies much of the worst of what the modern estate pub has to offer.  Here’s my visit.

I arrived at the bar and one of the employees, who was hoisting a glass or two with a couple, spied me standing there, muttered “fuckin’ ‘ell” in complete disgust, then dashed behind the bar and disappeared into the galley.  Two minutes into the resulting uncomfortable silence, the fat chick in the trio-made-two offered, “you might get noticed quicker next door.”  Not sure if she meant in another room or in the medical clinic across the car park, I looped my arm to make a broad pantomime pointing gesture toward an apparent hallway and asked, “in there?”  She repeated herself, slowly, as if ordering a Jaeger Bomb in a foreign land; to this, I answered with my original question phrased for the slow, “yes, so the other room is in there?”

At the other bar, my approach sent most of the staff scattering to hidden regimes of the building, but one very unhappy old tubbo deigned to wait me out by languidly wiping the bar with a filthy, damp cloth; 15 or 20 seconds was all she could do and, without looking my direction (that is to say, directly in front of her) she turned and rushed out to assist a table that didn’t welcome her interference at all.  I pulled my camera out, smiling at this developing comedic situation and decided to shoot a bit of the dreadful decor.  In the mirror, you can see the next character:

“Are you waiting?” she asked, a bit too loud and not just a little bit threateningly.

Turning slowly, I answered, “Ages, love.  Do me a Carlsburg, please.”

Oh, and to top all this shit off, the Muzak had Stevie Nicks AND the Doobie Brothers…why not just come around and kick me in the balls while you’re taking the piss?

But, the Carlsberg was £2.35.

*It reminds me a lot of Langford Village in Bicester, where we lived a happy if dull year.

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With a delivery slot scheduled conveniently anytime between 8 and noon, I was going to do a half day at work if the dishwasher arrived  by 10…as you can see, I wound up burning a whole vacation day (I got a few hours prep work on a group meeting talk before the appliance arrived but the day was really already shot).  To make the most of my time, I went for a run from Calne to Chippenham.  Fortunately there were stops to be found en route, the first of which was the large, old travellers’ rest the Lysley Arms.

I had a Wickwar BOB, which always makes me think of stuttering (‘b’ is a difficult consonant for a stammerer) and that always leads me to Bob in Blackadder…a smile is a smile, though, no matter how far you have to figuratively travel to acquire it.

The Lysley is a sprawling pub but every room is small so you get a sense of intimacy.  Most were in for food and appeared to have travelled to get here–foot traffic, the odd [sic] runner notwithstanding, is nonexistent and will largely remain so until the trails dry a bit.  Real fires in iron stoves, exposed stonework and timbers, and friendly but not cloying staff make this a pleasure worthy of the trip.

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The previous post was better, but I wanted to showcase the screensavers pieced together by Squeezin’ (with my gratitude for these).  The pics, in order, are

Venue	Where	beer #
The Princess Hotel (done around 5 am New Year’s Day)	Swindon	1
The Bank House	Cheltenham	2
At the New Year’s Races in Cheltenham (watching my nag drag in)	Cheltenham	3
Midlands Hotel	Cheltenham	4
The Queen’s Tap	Swindon	5
The Four Candles	Oxford	6
The Turf Tavern (at the sign commemorating Clinton failing to inhale there)	Oxford	7
The White Horse	Oxford	8
O’Neill’s	Oxford	9
Ellington’s	Swindon	10
The Red Lion	Oxford	11
The Gloucester Arms	Oxford	12
Eurobar	Oxford	13
The Volunteer	Faringdon	14
The Red Lion	Faringdon	15
The Bell	Faringdon	16
The Lamb and Flag	Oxford	17
The Bird and Baby	Oxford	18
Far  The Madding Crowd	Oxford	19
Southbrook Inn	Swindon	20
The White Hart	Wolvercote, Oxfordshire	21
The Red Lion	Wolvercote, Oxfordshire	22
The Plough	Oxford	23
The Gardener’s Arms	Oxford	24
The Rose and Crown	Oxford	25
TP’s	Swindon	26
The De’s Cut	Oxford	27
The King and Queen	Longcot, Oxfordshire	28
The Woodman Inn	Fernham, Oxfordshire	29
The Eagle	Little Cocks Swell, Oxfordshire	30
The Wheatsheaf	Faringdon, Oxfordshire	31
Faringdon Folly	Faringdon, Oxfordshire	32
Salisbury Cathedral	Salisbury	33
The King’s Arms	Salisbury	34
The Old Castle Pub	Salisbury	35
The keep at Old Sarum	Salisbury	36
Wheatsheaf	Lower Woodford, Wiltshire	37
Bridge Inn	Upper Woodford, Wiltshire	38
Black Horse	Great Durnford, Wiltshire	39
Wilsford Cum Lake sign (heh, heh)	Wiltshire	40
Stonehenge (really a great disappointment)	Wiltshire	41
King’s Arms	Amesbury, Wiltshire	42
George Hotel	Amesbury, Wiltshire	43
New Inn	Amesbury, Wiltshire	44
The Greyhound	Amesbury, Wiltshire	45
Royal Oak	Oxford	46
The Red Lion	Marston, Oxfordshire	47
The Angel and Greyhound	Oxford	48
The University Club	Oxford	49
The GW Hotel	Swindon	50
Jude the Obscure	Oxford	51
The Victoria	Oxford	52
The Rickety Press	Oxford	53
Wahoo Sport Bar	Oxford	54
The Oxford Retreat	Oxford	55
The Grapes	Oxford	56
The Rolleston	Swindon	57
The Baker’s Arms	Swindon	58
The Dolphin	Swindon	59
Marsh Farm Hotel	Royal Wootton Bassett	60
The Cross Keys	Royal Wootton Bassett	61
The Old School	Oxford	62
The King’s Arms	Oxford	63
The Swan and Castle	Oxford	64
The Victoria Arms	Marston, Oxfordshire	65
The Black Swan	Abingdon, Oxfordshire	66
The Blue Boar	Abingdon, Oxfordshire	67
The Bowyer Arms	Radley, Oxfordshire	68
Zen Bar	Swindon	69
Sir Daniel Arms	Swindon	70
White Hart	Lyneham, Wiltshire	71
Sodom	Wiltshire	72
The Angel	Royal Wootton Bassett, Wiltshire	73
Cape of Good Hope	Oxford	74
Rudi’s	Swindon	75
Burn’s Day Lunch (Haggis, Neeps, Tatties, Whisky, and 2 beers)	Oxford	76
Swindon Wildcats 3, Sheffield Steeldogs 4 (SO)	Swindon	77
The Longwall	Oxford	78
The Royal George	Purton, Wiltshire	79
Riff’s Bar	Greatfield, Wiltshire	80
Magic Roundabout	Swindon	81
The Three Tuns	Wroughton	82
The Havana	Swindon	83
The Lydiard	Swindon	84
The Savoy	Swindon	85
The Brewer’s Arms	Cirencester	86
The White Horse	Woolstone	87
The College Farm	Watchfield	88
The Horse and Jockey	Ashton Keynes, Gloucestershire	89
The Vale Hotel	Cricklade	90
Goldfinger Tavern	Highworth, Wiltshire	91
The Red Lion	Northmoor, Oxfordshire	92
The Bell Inn	Standlake, Oxfordshire	93
The Maybush	Newbridge, Oxfordshire	94
The Beehive (this is about 100 yards from the house we are moving to)	Swindon	95
Baker Street	Swindon	96
Steam Railway Company Pub	Swindon	97
The Pig on the Hill	Swindon	98
Long’s Bar	Swindon	99
near Parliament, with a Cuban cigar and a bunch of dirty looks (and after 5 pub stops)	London Marathon	100
The Bear	Oxford	101
The Old Tom	Oxford	102
The Crown	Oxford	103
The Beehive	Carterton, Oxfordshire	104
The Crown Inn	Faringdon, Oxfordshire	105
Romany Inn	Bampton, Oxfordshire	106
Talbot Hotel	Bampton, Oxfordshire	107
The George Inn	Sandy Lane, Wiltshire	108
The White Hart	Calne, Wiltshire	109
The now defunct King George	Calne, Wiltshire	110
Barrington Arms	Shrivenham, Oxfordshire	111
Groves Company Inn	Swindon	112
Revolution	Swindon	113
The Plough	Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire	114
The George and Dragon	Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire	115
The Fish	Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire	116
Great Western Railway Staff Association	Didcot, Oxfordshire	117
The Prince of Wales	Didcot, Oxfordshire	118
Tap and Barrel (good read goes along with this pic)	Swindon	119
Old Town Festival	Swindon Town Gardens	120
Cock Inn	Combe, Oxfordshire	121
Three Horseshoes	Long Hanborough, Oxfordshire	122
Swindon Pride 2012	Swindon (duh)	123
Wernham Hogg’s	Slough, Berkshire	124
The Myrtle Grove	Risca, Gwent, Wales	125
The Sirhowy	Blackwood, Gwent, Wales	126
Railway Tavern	Sirhowy, Blaenau Gwent, Wales	127
The Castle	Bryn Serth, Blaenau Gwent, Wales	128
The Coach and Horses	Ashvale, Blaenau Gwent, Wales	129
Ye Olde Red Lion Hotel	Tredegar, Blaenau Gwent, Wales	130
The Tumble Inn	Pontypridd, Wales	131
The Maltster’s Arms	Pontypridd, Wales	132
Wyvern Theatre	Swindon	133
Byron’s Bar	Swindon	134
The Bear Hotel	Wantage, Oxfordshire	135
Source ot the River Thames	Kemble, Gloucestershire	136
Carpenter’s Arms	Lacock, Wiltshire	137
Mill House	Chippenham, Wiltshire	138
Sunny’s Pool Bar	Swindon	139
The Royal Oak	Marlborough, Wiltshire	140
The Lamb Inn	Marlborough, Wiltshire	141
The Crown	Marlborough, Wiltshire	142
IMS/TOF Mass Spectrometer	Oxford University	143
New Year’s Eve on Ferndale Road	Swindon	144

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The run from Lacock was pleasantly cool and I was shielded from the breeze on the farm tracks I took up to the highway into Chippenham. Just inside the town limits, I spotted the Mill House off to the right and decided it can’t possibly be as horrible as it looks, even though they don’t even bother with a pub sign and fill the allotted signage space with adverts for their wares. And, I was right, it wasn’t as bad as it looks and was actually a very pleasant place to squat for a beer even though most of the things I found compelling about it are things that would usually push it far down the list.

 

 

Strike one, it was rammed full of breeders. Ahead of me in line, one poor woman got trapped in a conversation with one woman who said things like, “ooo, yeah, I’d like to have two more of each once this one is in school,” gesturing to one of the horde of disease laden and screaming liabilities running around without supervision.
“How many do you have then? Is it five?”
“Six, four girls and two boys. I want to even it out some, me. When are you having kids?”
“Oh, it is probably not in the cards for me, after I had the operation last year,” Trapped Lady replied indicating a chosen path but communicating to her tormentor it involved an effort at fertility.
“There’s always a chance, love.” I thought I was going to laugh so turned to feign looking out the door and was confronted with Little Sister of Trapped Lady queued behind me. After an uncomfortable moment, I raised an eyebrow and spun my eyes back toward the non-versation and she cracked up. Fortunately, the staff had nearly caught up and I could move on to my beverage.

 

Strike two, it is one of those Denny’s sort of pubs, more food than booze and not very good food. Except, the food looked especially appetising and smelled fantastic.

Strike three, it is where the 70′s never died. But, not only am I used to that (not my first trip to Chippenham and, mind, I live in Swindon), I find it endearing and comfortable and besides the fact that the child-to-adult ratio seems more apropos of Ireland in the 70′s the folks I encountered were salt-of-the-earth…just don’t try to steal a chip from any of the pensioners here.

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Lilienthal Library

There’s not much you might consider remarkable about the September running streak, really, except that I managed to remain clothed in public the entire time (ie, only a streak in that there was an unbroken string).  I ran every day of September and (until I got the flu last week) I covered a minimum of 10 miles every day.  A semi-statistical breakdown of these follows, and there are a few photos that didn’t make it into other posts last month (maybe just a shot or two from Germany, who knows).  The total, 330 miles, is the most I’ve done in a month since my mid-30′s when, tripping and stoned almost continuously, I barely felt the effort (doing it piss drunk is quite a bit more difficult even before factoring in the extra 15 years or so of decrepitude).

Total: 330.2 miles
Swindon: 86.0 miles (10 runs)
other Wiltshire: 103.7 (8½ runs–crossed from Glocs)
Oxford: 40.0 (4 runs)
Gloucestershire: 18.4 (1½ runs–crossed to Wilts)
Devon: 21.5 (1 run)
Berkshire: 15.0 (1 run)
Wales: 23.3 (2 runs)
Germany: 22.3 (2 runs)

Had a trip to Germany for work toward the end of the month and with that and the change of seasons did both of my runs there in the pre-dawn darkness; a shame, really, as both areas (Hamburg near the airport and Borgfeld/Lilienthal near Bremen) looked very nice for this kind of excursion.  In Borgfeld, I stayed in a rental room across from this restaurant/microbrewery (the beers were fantastic):

…and the breakfast suited the post-workout refuel although within hours I was crippled with nausea, fever, a mid-range migraine, and a free-flowing waste-relief valve.  This continued the next several days, but once home I felt I could try for another — if shorter — run but only managed a mile before turning around and heading back to bed.  Yikes.

Big houses, safe streets, and loads of farm roads and wildlife preserves await you in Lilienthal and Borgfeld, if you go:

September 2012 was also the busiest month for pub visits (67  included the 1000th) since I landed in England, largely due to the unsupervised nature of my vacation (Jackie left me to my own devices for two weeks and, surprisingly, there were no legal or medical catastrophes).  I stopped including ‘dead pubs’ quite a few months ago unless they are of significant importance or beauty (and, for those, I will still follow the original set of rules); had this not been the case, I could easily have boosted the count by another 20-30.

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The disappointment and shock [SHOCK!] of returning to the bus station from the Three Crowns just as the next bus left for Swindon was ameliorated by looking up and seeing the lights of the Gladstone Arms beaming down the street, beckoning.  A fat couple pushed past me and hurried into the dining room through the door to the left and I turned into the bar on the right.  ”You folks pick up a couple of menus and I’ll just serve this bloke, first.”  Result, and they had Bath Ales Gem, so there was another result.

A table booking came in for four and the bar man said, “yeah, and is that all four for the Challenge?  Only three?  Now, you do understand this is really quite hot?  It is not just a bit spicy, it is really, REALLY hot.  Okay, then, see you at 8:30;”  he clicked the phone switch then did a double take at the phone and said, disdainfully, “you muppet.”

 

 

Now I was intrigued.  The description of the meal sounds innocuous enough: a half pound burger with a plate of chili covered fries.  But, the chillies used are Scotch Bonnets (habañero), and this is backed by a capsacin extract the is rated at 7.5 MILLION Scoville units.  The mayo is a ruse to make you think it is something cooling but the red chillies are very hot, too; unfortunately I don’t eat mayo, anyway (the bartender assured me “oh, we can just give you the chillies, no mayo”).  He showed me the disclaimer, which is funny but might exclude me on the third point.  After that description and the fact that this is only on for the month of September, I think you would have to be mad to rush down there to try it.

So, not rushing, I think this is my dinner for Friday.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

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When there are three buses per hour, missing one isn’t a crisis and in fact can serve the greater good, and no greater good can be done than to try a new stout for me.  Milk Stout, which has won multiple awards for the Bristol Beer Factory, was like a big, bitter chocolate milk, a tall mocha, an inky black beer, all at once in sequence…very nice.  There were six (or seven?) ales on offer at the Three Crowns along with three ciders and a perry AND CAMRA members get 30p off a pint.  Awesome.

The crowd here chatted amongst themselves about beer fests and gossiped about folks they had seen at one bar or another.  The younger barkeep that replaced the guy that served me started talking about drinks he inexplicably was required to make at some cookie-cutter bar he used to work at and the guy on the right (in the bar picture) had some story about flaming Sambuca with a coffee bean in the bottom…not an endorsement, no, more of a mention of stupid things you’ll drink after drinking a stupid amount prior.  This is now tied for my favourite Chippenham pub (with the Rose and Crown, down the road a hundred or so meters).

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The signs were all bad for this.  Literally, the signs were bad: from the generic Greene King sign with the pub name stencilled on, to the Hungry Horse sign by the entrance I cringed, braced myself, and reached for the door handle.  I really don’t like Hungry Horse pubs, irrationally in most cases: they are what they are, the Denny’s of British dining (and the irony is not lost on me that Denny’s is sort of the British dining equivalent of cheap precast chain restaurants in the States).

I thought I remembered someone saying the Rowden Arms was a wonderful old pub so was surprised to see what looks like a roadside diner from the States show at the place I had marked for it on the map (I think the one I had in mind is in Bath, in retrospect).  But, the place was alright.  I had a nice chat with the bartender who directed me to the Eddie Cochran wreck site just up the hill, and the others in for drinks were great folks, funny and welcoming.  Thinking back, most Hungry Horse bars are alright, but I have this uncontrollable, nay, visceral reaction every time.  I should look at the archives and find out which one was so bad….

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Approaching the Bath Road roundabout from the north, a Wadworth pub, a beautiful building of Cotswold stone, emerges but the focus at the Pheasant is the carvery, which is something of a downer.  I have to admit the food looked and smelled tempting and the lounge was warm and seemed a nice place to meet up with some friends (and for a change I was actually dressed like an employed and sane adult and sort of fit in), it just wasn’t what I wanted at the time.  Attempts to start up a conversation were deflected all but rudely but as not only a stranger but a foreigner that might be understandable.  It was a bit friendlier at the Kingfisher and the Rowden Arms, both nearby and both a bit less posh than this restaurant/pub, but the focus here seems more on feeding the middle classes than in hospitality.

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After a dry run (that is, I did my daily run and couldn’t find a pub that was both open and new to me), changed into dry clothing, stashed my backpack, and headed out to the outer reaches of Chippenham where I knew there were a few on a loop back into town.  The Kingfisher soon appeared and I limped in (120 miles ran in 10 days is beginning to take its toll on me).  The house is a Wadworth so I got a 6X as a recovery drink.

The decor is odd but compelling…sort of like a nice seaside bar along the South Carolina/Georgia coast, with lots of windows and a sort of corrugation to the wood on the bar (bamboo, perhaps?).  There was only one other guy besides the bartender in the place and he almost immediately asked about my knowledge of the monarchs of England (for a pub quiz he was preparing, I believe he said).  ”I know the Queen’s portrait on the coinage is the same age as she was when it was minted.”  He looked at me as though I was insane (trust me, I see that look frequently).  ”No, really,” I continued, “on 70′s coinage she’s still hot but now she’s stern and dour.”

 

As the glass slowly dried, the conversation turned to bleaching paper after the bartender started talking about the mass of counterfeit pound coins that come through (about one in three are bogus).  I said that if one is rejected by a machine I usually turn it over at a newstand or the commissary at work, and he and the rummy had increasingly large notes that they had received and subsequently shifted.  Tempted to have a second pint here, I felt guilty for not doing so as the conversation turned to the slow trading day in the pub.  Oh, well, it’s Monday and the Olympics and Paralympics are done…the rush couldn’t have lasted forever.

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A few doors down the hill from the Angel, I spotted some chubby chicks in a romantic embrace (although it might only have been wrestling were it not for the tongue action).  This seemed worth a quick visit and I ordered a Carling then promptly (as I had been to four other venues this trip and at one I had a Black Dragon) forgot to document the 121st in the 100 Beer Challenge as I was confronted and confounded by the sausage fest.  Dudes, everywhere.

The house was big and tidy (spotless), and painted brightly.  The guys seemed rapt with their quiet conversations with one another, showing no evidence of being lured in by the girl-on-girl action at the door…one even appeared to be wearing designer jeans, ironed.  Sometimes you’re right and mistaken all at once.

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I missed my bus but the Angel was just across from the Bear.  However, it seems to take the ‘hotel’ remit a bit more seriously and caters, on first glance, to a somewhat more upscale clientele.  It seemed by design that I didn’t feel comfortable at the bar that went ghostly silent after I ordered, so I drank up and drifted off.  Looks like a nice place to stay, though.

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I got a Fosters at the Bear Hotel because the place was right next to a bus stop.  As classy inside as that endorsement would lead you to think, it was also empty (the warmth of the bartender obviously too spare to reel in the custom).  I retired to the enclosed yard to chat with the middle-aged ladies out having a few before a night shift at a local factory.

The yard is about 15 feet on edge and is open to the skies but only accessible from the hotel.  There are some sturdy rings in the wall that indicate this was some sort of hitching area in centuries past, but they probably serve the fetish community well enough, these days.  I assume.

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Usually, pubs called the Bridge House are in fairly ancient buildings but this Wetherspoons house appears to be roughly 20 years old.  No matter, there are plenty of cheap ales and ciders to choose and I was tempted into an apple-based beverage from Gwynt Y Ddraig–a pint of Black Dragon with a smoked peat aftertaste and 7.5% ABV.

 

A few young women passed with one saying, “oo, let’s go back ‘here where the light’s good and have a look at your fake tan.”  This was a deceiving start since, while the rest of their conversation was as insipid as you might have hoped, it was really more of a high velocity mantra-like repetition and rearrangement of six-to-ten words from each of them.  An example from one: “…andthat’swhyI’mignoringherbecausesheignoredmeshedidsheignoredmejustlikethat [pause, breathe] yesshedidsheignoredmejustlikethatsothat’swhatI’mdoingI’mignoringher….”  Very disappointing.

 

 

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The Rose and Crown is a nut house, but in a good way.  Current ales are listed on a board as you enter and since both Brains S.A. and Brains IPA were on I specifically ordered Brains S.A. “Whah?” asked the barman to which I slowly repeated, “Brains,” doing my best zombie voice (which is to say, my voice).  He moved to a pump with no clip on it and one of the punters at the bar said, “oi, that’s the wrong one.”  ”I know what I’m fockin’ doin’, you Welsh git.”  From across the room, a woman broke from her argument with another bloke to yell over, “he IS wrong.  Men are ALWAYS wrong.”  Her partner answered, “that’s SEXIST that is, you fat bitch.”  I believe we have found my favourite bar in Chippenham.

 

 

A thin, swishy guy sashayed in with a “helllloooooo!!!” for each person he encountered.  Without asking, the barmaid produced some strange concoction for him, something that looked like a Guinness shandy with the Guinness floated carefully on top.  The arguing couple continued with the man saying, “oh, yeah, well you’re a…a…oi,” he redirected to the bar, “what’re those things what live under a bridge?”  ”Transvestites,” offered the queenie guy.  Yep, indeed, I think I have found a home from home.

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Sort of loaded from my stops at the Commercial Rooms and the V-Shed, I ran up to the baggage drop of the Chippenham Half Marathon only to realise my timing chip had escaped the twist ties on my shoes (probably somewhere in the murky waters in Bristol if not back in Cardiff).  I dropped my bag under my race number and went to negotiate a replacement chip.  They issued me another number without question and I lounged about on the ground half stretching and half contorting to put it in place. I reached my starting pen just in time for the September 11 minute of silence.

The Chippenham Half is pretty small, about 1500 runners this time.  I chose it in particular because the Bristol Half is the same day and would likely draw a huge crowd keeping this pack small.  It worked: even the few bottlenecks near the start were easy to negotiate and there was very little jockeying for space.

{I like this photo so until they post the race photos I’m leaving this one in from the Langley Tap post.}

This is the sort of race and race crowd I used to love back when I was smoking a lot of pot and wandering around in a psychedelic otherworld: good scenery, friendly folks both on the route and in the crowd, good organisation so there is little chance you actually have to think for yourself.  A very pleasant morning out, overall.

My goal was really just to finish but I had hoped to do a bit better than the 1:41 and some seconds that I actually managed.  However, I was treated to a five minute break for beer at the roughly 11 mile mark thanks to the management of the Langley Tap.

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I didn’t really need another beer and this was more of a café than a pub, but I couldn’t possibly resist a bar named Steamers (see this Urban Dictionary entry if you aren’t already smirking).  I got a Grolsch which was green.  Not the container but the beer itself: for the uninitiated, when you store a beer and it gets very warm then very cold for a couple of cycles it tends to become foul tasting and somewhat viscous.  Yum yum.

As a side note, several of the Atlanta area Hash House Harrier kennels (Southern Comfort was my first ATL HHH) initiate newcomers to their trails with a can of Non Alcoholic beer that has been driven around in the boot of a local hasher’s car at least one summer long (average evening temperatures exceed 80F/27C with sunny days regularly reaching upper 90′s F/upper 30′s C and an occasional weeklong period in excess of 104F/40C).   At least they serve it to you warm.  At Steamers it shows up cold and is as surprising and unwelcome as a turd on your chest (see this Urban Dictionary entry if you aren’t already smirking).