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Spring in England is usually glorious, coming convulsively starting at the end of February until it collapses in a sweaty mess close to the end of June. MOST years. This year the continuous cold and endless precipitation have pushed the start back. Some hearty fruit varieties blossomed a couple of weeks ago, but this year even the blackthorn (usually a riot of insect activity in early March) has yet to pop. Riding for miles every day past the bare limbs of so many trees has me at the breaking point.

But, walking past you can see the leaf and flower buds are ready to go. This is the second day in a row over 10° C (50° F), and we may see 16° C (61° F) on the weekend). I fully expect to go into work via a winter landscape and return through a forest, any day now.

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So, four years now (or, rather, next week it will be…here’s the annual reports for years Three, Two, and One for historical perspective).

We just received our new visas valid until 2016 but plan to take the next step toward citizenship in a year, Indefinite Leave to Remain…sort of the British Green Card.  There is an exam, first, but in general it is all downhill from here.

The view from Western Street near the new house…also all downhill

Additionally, we are in the process of moving house (which is why I rushed the annual report a week forward) from just north of the Oasis over to Old Town to a house situated close walks to either the Beehive or the Castle or the Globe (recently reopened!)—three locals instead of one and all three of high quality—and dozens of others a short walk. The new house has three bedrooms each larger than its counterpart in the old house, the two receptions are larger and made into more of an open-plan configuration, the bath is larger and has a tub (not just a shower), and there is a finished basement; on the down side, the kitchen is a little narrower and more primitive as is the small garden but everything we do and everywhere we normally go in Swindon (save for the butcher) is so close.

The only races I did this past year were the London Marathon (5 pubs plus a can of Carling on the last mile) and the Beerathon (5 miles with a pint and a hefty food item between each) and the mileage run for the year suffered from this lack of focus—1950 give or take about 25 (most estimates pretty good using gmap-pedometer), while the last several years (except for the year of the wreck) were in the 2200-2500 range.

On the runs, I visited  255 new pubs with a stunning 67 new ones (steep part of the graph) in September when I took two weeks off work and ran at least 10 miles per day in new territory each day. The 1000th wasn’t as big a thrill as I thought it would be, but I saw some really nice places and met some really fine folk. The September holiday found me visiting Gloucester, South Wales, Slough (exotic, I know) and Exeter along with some nearer-to-Swindon trips. The 100 Yellow Beer Challenge was responsible for a lot of second visits to pubs I might not otherwise have gone to after an initial stop and many of these seemed better the second time around. Oh, and my Workingman’s Club appears to have failed or at least hasn’t been open the last several times I’ve popped by (I have a grand one scoped out for the new neighbourhood, though).

Best pubs in Year Four (reverse order by First Visit write-up):
The Southgate Inn, Devizes
Byron’s, Swindon
The Hop Inn, Swindon
Dicey Reilly’s, Teignmouth
The Brass Monkey, Teignmouth
One Eyed Jack’s, Gloucester
Ye Olde Red Lion, Tredegar
The Rose of Denmark, Woolwich
The Volunteer Rifleman’s Arms
The Green Dragon, Marlborough
The British Lion, Devizes
The Blue Boar, Alsbourne (for the Dr. Who connections)

Favourite write-ups:
Postboxes
British Citizenship Exam Prep
Risk Assessment-Bins
Oxford Tourists
Assize Court, Bristol

Cock Flavour
Paul Simon in Hyde Park
Edie’s Lawn
The hunt
The Bremen Musicians (German children’s story)
Sex Tourism in Wiltshire
Modern Algebra for Omid
Burns’ Day Lunch

There are others search for ‘made me laugh.’  The blog may or may not have made some of the over 100,000 visitors laugh, but the damn fools keep checking in (that’s you, that is).

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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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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 Cotswold Water Parks is a series of reservoirs filling the marshland at the headwaters of the Thames.  There are sailing clubs, a pretty interesting overhead towrope system that allows skiers on this truly tiny pond to circle past the two jump ramps, and there are campsites and resort hotels all over.  Some of it is pretty nice, and a lot of it is horrible.

In the resort hotel/awful columns you would find the Old Boathouse listed.  It is neither old (it doesn’t appear on Google Maps aerial views as of this posting), nor a boathouse.  It looks for all the world like the common area of a modern subdivision (that’s American for ‘estate’).

Did I say, “common?”  Make that dead common, but they have resort prices so you really savour that £3.80 lager while they pipe department store soft jazz stylings out to the deck when you just want to enjoy the breeze through the rushes.

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Figuring that I was about 10 miles out of Gloucester I rang for a stop at the next pub I saw which turned out to be the oddly named Severn Bore.  This was a very lucky choice as I was greeted by this:

 

The pub had just done a beer fest with more than 20 real ales on and they deeply discounted the remainders.  So…many…beers…

I settled on the low alcohol (you read right) Low Rider which was a tart and hoppy yellow ale, slightly cloudy but a refreshing drink.

Out at the garden, overlooking the River Severn I remembered what the Severn Bore (the phenomenon that gives the pub its name) meant when I noticed the river flow coming from the right meeting the incoming tide from the left.  The Severn has a couple of bottlenecks on it that cause these churning interfaces but more to the point they also cause significant outward currents when the tide ebbs and the backed up waters are released.  People surf on the resulting waves as the tide goes out, and the skillful can ride these for miles (although you really get only the one shot at it).  I’ve seen this on television a few times but it seems the pub is at a prime viewing location.  Here’s a link to some video.

The couple that run the pub are grand and their dogs are friendly.  The menu looks worthy of better palates than mine.  And, they really go over the top with the beer festival offerings.

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Start of the run, in Fairford

 

Another day, another 13.6 miles, another six pubs, and some more pretty scenery.  The weather continues to hold, which is absolutely surreal both after the summer (such as it was) we just suffered and my past record of shitty weather on holiday (we seemed to have broken that streak over New Years weekend a couple of years back and have had good luck with it since).

I spent a lot of this run on busy A-roads on which you assume a strange rhythm of running anywhere from 10 seconds to a couple of minutes then hopping up onto the verge (that’s “shoulder,” American-English speakers) and slogging slowly through waist deep nettles and briars–invigorating.

USAF influence on the area is palpable…this is in the bar at the Bull Hotel, Fairford

There was a cricket pitch and some fields to cross just out of Meysey Hampton and I couldn’t find the off-road trails on the way to Kempsford.  After Castle Eaton, which is supposed to be a charming village in which many movies and tv shows set in the 18th and 19th centuries are filmed but none of that was apparent on the route I took.

A bridge in Castle Eaton, but if you google pictures of ‘bridge in Castle Eaton’ you get these fantastic stone structures. Still, nice place for a beer break.

The final four miles were along the Thames Path into Cricklade but this was really not as pretty as I hoped (a bit dull, in fact).

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The August Bank Holiday weekend has been hot and sunny the past few years, so this one was an especially big disappointment weather-wise; still the entertainment was superb.

The Swindon Mela, an asian festival now in its tenth year, was Saturday in the Town Gardens and there were more and better vendor stalls than ever before, with the community welfare based ones (NHS screenings, yoga, massage) largely grouped together in a part of the park not used last year and more and better food stalls than ever before.  Also, they stock ice-cold Cobra lager in the tents.

There were some very good musical acts, including a bunch of avant-garde types (or, maybe just hippies) that call their act Coach and played some very appealing psychedelic rock.  There was an acoustic group that played Bollywood classics, too, and they were brilliant (didn’t catch the full name of the act but the dude on 6-string was called Jazz); they were followed by a very sad display of Asian hip-hop so we left the Bowl and tried the other stages.

The dance acts were (as last year) a hoot mainly because there is always one talented middle-age Indian woman and two or more clumsy middle-age white ladies and then a bunch of children whose talents range the gamut of age and experience; they all seem to be having a grand time and that and the music is infectious.  A men’s drumming group did a 15 minute set and they seemed to be having a better time than the dancers.  Another successful Mela, I think.

Sunday was nice out and I barbecued a large hunk of pork shoulder and got in a bit of a run.

Monday, we went to our second (previous one written up here) Devizes International Street Festival (the 100th anniversary of the Devizes Fayre, it turns out).  Devizes rules, and I could spend a week wandering the medieval trails around town (rumour has it there are smugglers’ tunnels between most of the pubs and out to the canals, as well, but I haven’t found any…yet).  The Festival is our regular visit together even though I use this as a running start or finish once every few months.

I had hoped to catch Ska Cubano, but we already planned to leave before their set was to start, but we did catch Jon Amor’s Blues Band who seemed to be playing for each other as much as for the crowd–that always helps get the crowd on board but it doesn’t hurt that they are one of the best blues-rock acts I’ve seen in a couple of years.  There was also a group from Mali, headed by Vieux Farka Touré whose guitar sounds reminded me a bit of the African bits of Graceland.  These guys were fun but every now and then one of them would look out at the crowd and appear to be thinking, “these poor white people must be starved for entertainment…standing around in this cold, hellish deluge when there are perfectly good, warm bars to go into;” but, no, they’re just English (and they’ll be in the bar as soon as they need a refill).

We caught this bit of street theatre as well, made to look like a silent movie with a pianist accompanying the players.  Everything was broad gestures and all the sets and props were black, white or grey.  It was loads of fun, if a bit too long, and the rain held off until the last few minutes when the chase scene started.  After getting some more beer and cider after this performance, we continued on to tour some of the town but the Millenium Cross at the Church was so spectacular it deserves its own blog entry.

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When dicking off in Bremen, there is only one place to be.  This could have been covered here, but I thought it deserved its own post (since the Bremen city fathers decided it deserved its own pavilion).

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The rest of the week in Bremen was wrapped up in 9 and 10 hour work days running experiments in the lab followed by some experimental dining (with mornings and one afternoon either running or taking long strolls to cover a bit of the city and its outlying neighbourhoods, mapped above).  Our colleagues at the instrument manufacturer took us to a Turkish restaurant (Tendüre) that I would highly recommend (you could make a meal off the mezze, alone).

Left to my own devices for Wednesday night, I found a lovely Italian bistro called Pizzeria Cassetta in the Neustadt about a mile from the hotel (and a few doors down from the pool hall where I later watched the Spain v Portugal football match).  Cassetta looks like a neighbourhood bar but was packed largely on the merits of the cheap but incredibly authentic Italian food cooked by incredibly authentic Italian dudes.  I ordered a cuarto litro of the house Montepulciano and watched the service like it was a floor show.

I marveled as plate after scrumptious platter of fine Italian cuisine emerged from the kitchen where one busy chef plated like a machine.  When mine (a ziti with artichoke hearts, mushrooms, garlic and a cream-based tomato sauce) came out, it never saw what hit it as I devoured it and a second quarter liter of the house wine in mere minutes.  Wonderful and a perfect foil to the heavy German fare during the day.

I had less interest in watching the Italy v Germany match than in watching the German fans so I sought out a venue that would allow me to observe while I enjoyed my Thursday supper.  I have, in the past, sworn off and sworn at Mexican food in Europe but decided to give Mexcal, a restaurant I had spotted on a run earlier in the week, a shot.

Wonder of wonders, I was the only one of about 30 customers that wasn’t watching the game despite, wonder of wonders, this being the most authentic and delicious Mexican meal I have had outside of places in Nogales, South Tucson or, at a push, the Buford Highway Guatemalan/Mexican corridor in Atlanta.  Granted, the chiles were not hot but otherwise the spices were perfect.

My ‘taco’ had marinated grilled chicken slices and succulent beef along with mouth-watering shrimps.  The burrito was a complex and challenging compilation of chicken, beans that retained texture but were flavoured like delicate broth throughout, and rice that failed to be bland or dry.  The guacamole was made with sour cream instead of mayo and was, therefore, something I could (and did) slather on everything.  Wonderful.

German fans, watching their team getting their ass handed to them

Even more wonderful, the Germans like their beer cold and will serve it in pitchers (at a price about the same for 1.5 liters as two pints cost in Britain).  I was a bit dismayed by the claim, on the little collar/napkin on my glass, that König Pils is the king of beers, but I’ll let you decide who to follow:

Perhaps not so much “King of Beers” as the Kaiser:

I left Mexcal at halftime and the streets’ large beer gardens were still full of singing football fans, their collective voices eerily echoing all over the town centre.  I veered off toward the hotel a few miles away but soon needed a toilet and found refuge in a bar called Charly Treff, occupied only by two old dudes (one sewing buttons on a corduroy vest like those that appeared in several hundred photographs and artist renderings all over the walls of this weird little establishment).  The game was on the tele when I returned but no one was watching with the home squad behind 2-0.  I had a beer and then completed my journey home for the night.

Charly Treff from Google street view (it was dark out when I tried, and failed, to get a good photo on my own)

Charly Treff bathroom: any place that has a puke sink fitted to the bathroom wall is alright by me!

The last day at the lab we had a breakthrough just before I left to do a couple of hours worth of daytime tourism before my flight.  I ventured up as far as the Hauptbahnhoff, a marvelous example of rail station architecture, then continued north to the Bürgerpark looking for a beer garden (yet finding none that really called my name).

The Germans of the modern world are much more accepting of alternative lifestyles, I believe, since on the search for a tram back to the centre I spotted a designated alley to cruise men:

In town, the area called the Schnoor is a network of medieval streets too small for most motor vehicles and, as I learned, overrun with tourists during the day.  This was a shame since I had spotted many good bars on evening runs (when the tourists give way to the local populace) and only had the will to venture as deep into their midst as Gasthof zum Kaiser Friederich, about 100 meters from my tram.  Still, a very tall, very cold, very refreshing glass of witbier suited my temperament and fortified me for the trip home.

Not really hungry when I arrived at Bremen Airport, I opted for lunch when I realised the place in there was preparing the pasta to order with a real chef tossing the noodles with one of about 15 sauces of your choice.  The line was big so I ordered two glasses of wine to get me through the wait and the dining…and this was almost too much except that the food was better than I would have expected in a restaurant OUTSIDE the airport.  What a treat!  I will miss this city until I get another chance to explore it in more detail….

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An arduous journey culminated in landing at the tiny Bremen Airport (larger than the one in Athens, Georgia but smaller than Lovell Field in Chattanooga).  My hotel was attached to the lobby by a covered walk across the tramway and after exchanging notes with my colleague who arrived earlier I retired to my room where I cracked open a Becks and found a rubbery packet placed on my pillow (but I’ve stayed in crappier places that I SHOULD have been able to say that about).

I awoke at 5 by habit but was still sleepy and lounged around till 6 before stretching and going for a bit of a run around the bleak neighbourhood (mostly industrial park).  There are as many bike lanes in Bremen as in a Dutch city, so finding a place to run is pretty straightforward.  Work was a chore because we left so many bits we actually needed back in Oxford (on the advice of my boss and the folks at the development labs).  Non-disclosure agreements limit that discussion to essential that.

Okay, it means radio-controlled clock; but, I like the idea of getting my daily newspaper at a place called, “Funk Hour.”

Work went on, regardless, and we eventually released our tired hosts and my Russian mate went home to the hotel.  I opted to change back into my running gear and went out to explore the beer/running dichotomy, Bremen style.

Bremen is never going to be a huge tourist spot, but it is quite a charming city.  It has a contrarian history (one of the furthest west Soviet Republics, until this was quickly quashed) and the folks here are quite nice if you try at all to meet them halfway.  For instance, I sometimes can surprise myself at my comprehension of spoken German because, although I have good grades on my high school transcripts for German language coursework I have absolutely no recollection of ever enrolling, attending, or being examined in these lessons; nonetheless, I managed to follow the simplified-for-my-consumption conversations at the three bars I hit on the route.  Very nice of them to let me try.

Down an alley I spotted the Spitzen Gebel and dashed in for a pilsner.  I had a Haake Beck, which I think I could get used to, then smelled something strange…hey! Folks were smoking in here!  I only have an occasional stogie, but this is what a bar should be like.  The small venue was packed and friendly and reasonably priced.  Moreover, I was the only non-local in the place despite its proximity to what should have been the highest density of visitors in the town.

Needing nourishment and loving a kebab, I found a döner place.  No, check that, I found a very good döner place and had quite a delicious pita with lamb, salad, and chilli sauce; not at all greasy and the meat tasted like (and had the texture of) meat.  Result.

Tasty and high quality though it was, I wanted something to was it down and to cleanse the palate.  About a third of the way back to hotel I spotted the weird little side street bar, Baldu, with its Tiki Bar interior and 70′s soundtrack.  I ordered a Franziskaner Weißbier and received an enormous glass of this faintly orange and wheat loveliness that I can still make out, faintly, even after the ‘run’ continued on for one more stop.

Everyone else in the bar was drinking equally large or strong drinks backed with shots of something or other (I recognised vodka and got one for myself after even the bartender rendered horrific face-pulls on some spicy black shot one of the punters bought her…the vodka enhanced the FW, whereas the mystery tipple might have ruined it).

The run started to approach my shoddy airport neighbourhood so I scanned side streets until I spotted a bier sign down one.  I pulled up to the building to find it was a pool hall complete with some stinky bikers out front.  It was still pretty tame inside, the soundtrack included Meat Loaf and the house wine was, I shit you not, Motörhead Shiraz…I had already ordered another Haake Beck but I really wanted to toast Lemmy (maybe I can get someone from work to come shoot a few racks before I have to leave).

 

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So it has come to this…1000 posts in less than 3 years (975 days, to be precise).

In that time we have come quite far together:  712 pub stops, 4025 miles running (1740 unique miles in the UK, at that), almost 96000 views of this blog  (averaging about 200/day the last few months after slow beginnings) and tons of ridiculous shit that I should bring me disgrace.  In that same time, I have only managed my way onto one proper publication (with acknowledgements in a few others, although another paper from the Cambridge work is almost finished) and one patent, and for that meager output I truly am ashamed; but, my big bag of guilt still has a bit of spandex left and, besides, I left plenty of tired, old impropriety across the Atlantic to make room for new experiences so let’s keep piling it in.

One of my favourite pub experiences was early on at the Chequers in Cottenham which I hope has reopened since we left the area. I have some favourite pubs in various places but no one favourite nationwide yet.  The map, linked here and over to the left of the page gives you the names of pubs reviewed or otherwise used as a template for my blather in this document and makes a nearly comprehensive reference for planning a pub crawl in Oxford, Swindon, Cambridge, Ely, Faringdon, Kidlington and Bicester; many other areas are covered less extensively but it should continue to grow over the coming years.

Pub count by date...summer surge came late this year

Here are some of my favourite posts out of that ridiculous collection, if you are at all interested or just bored:

Picking on the deceased, especially one’s betters, is always worthy: Arthur Stanley Eddington plaque.    Other times, the sciences offer jobs that are hard to resist (but the job has been filled and removed from the HR site since then).  Never sure if it was an attractant or repellent, and still don’t understand what the dog had to do with it (unless it was a Cocker).

Many articles about running as tourism have been posted, but some are better than others.  Place names tend to be the best for humour…like these here.  Or this one. We actually drove about 10 miles out of our way one weekend trip for this hamlet, but the signs have been stolen so often they stopped putting them up.  Claims to never having paid for it aside, this was a nice if mistaken sight.  Deep in Cambridgeshire you find some good place names, and they seem to treat strangers well on Hills Road Cambridge.  Our first trip to Wales resulted in disappointment with this highway’s promise.

The daily Haiku was a feature early on, before I realised just how many pubs were going to be reviewed.  The best ones happened spontaneously like this one on a trip to London.

As I write this I am suffering stigmata…okay, I accidentally stabbed myself in the palm with a screwdriver this morning.  Still, religion figures into the blog from time-to-time as it did about the ex-masturbators and the fisting-for-Jesus folks.  In Italy, it is hard to escape the influence of the Church and so we gave into its temptations.

An eternal Dylan fan and no stranger to public nudity and substance abuse, I felt kinship with these guys.  Other times the news is just ironic on its own.  Romance is alive and well in Ireland, as this guy proves.

With luck running will continue and I’ll cover many more miles of virgin territory and review loads of worthy races (although my feelings have not changed for the ‘Finisher’s Medal’).  Barely 1/10 of 1% into the stock of pubs to visit, I should be able to maintain this pace of coverage for awhile, as well.  Best, to all, and here’s to 1000 more of this nonsense.

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I had the humbling experience of stumbling upon the boyhood home of a god among men, Arthur Stanley Eddington.  They say he used to kill crocodiles with his bare hands for sport.  Women and men, alike, would disrobe and lay prostrate before him when he entered a room, submitting to his insatiable, varied and highly imaginative sexual appetites.  He alone is responsible for the temperate climate of our beloved England.  His passing was a blow from which the world is still reeling; it stunned the Axis powers into capitulation at the end of WWII but left the populace so devastated that we still toil to climb from the resulting chaos.  I have it on good authority that he was a consummate gentleman, as well.

The plaque may be a bit hard to read on a small screen.  Here is the relevant text:
“This house was the boyhood home of Arthur Stanley Eddington, one of the foremost scientists, not only of the 20th century, but of the entire history of the human species … {purple prose deleted in the interest of space} … making science more meaningful, not only to scientists, but to all rational and curious individuals. His achievements will radiate for the duration of the human species!”  Note that the achievements ‘radiate’ and not ‘resonate.’  Woowheeee!

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We shot hundreds of photos on this trip, but once you pare out the shots for family, the detail photos of architectural and landscape features that probably only interest the two of us, and the ones from the marathon all that are left are a few things I shot with this blog entry in mind…so here we go.

I wanted to go to the church Santa Croce primarily for the tombs of Machiavelli, Galileo, Rossini, Michelangelo (who, nevertheless, is actually interred in Ravenna), and a dozen others plus the memorials to the likes of Fermi and Marconi.  However, the above painting of Jesus Entering Limbo is stunning.  It is hard to imagine what kind of uproar would occur if this were even exhibited in some southern US towns much less hung in a Southern Baptist Church.  My photo doesn’t do it justice, either…the actual painting has that depth that makes you imagine that, should you touch a character on the painting the flesh would feel warm or the chemise would fold under your hand.  Plus, it is just damned hot.  Well done.

Also at Santa Croce, I spotted this bit of graffiti in the men’s loo.  The full size of the door, it was hard to get the entire shot in the frame…plus I was laughing pretty hard:

Speaking of the pope or, rather, wearing a mitre on your “little pope,” they’ve got these vending machines outside of many of the pharmacies in town:

The Duomo and its Baptistery are the landmarks you most often use in the old sector of town.  The dome was built in place and without separate support as the city fathers banned buttresses and it was to be so huge that scaffolding couldn’t be acquired sufficient to the task.  But, Brunelleschi was determined to build something to dwarf the Pantheon in Rome and built it such that it supported itself as it went up (remember that this is the 15th century).

The Duomo…spot it and you are not lost

Brunelleschi was pretty cocky in other ways.  We didn’t make it to Santa Maria Novello (although we stayed in a hotel only a couple hundred meters away), but there is a crucifix in there carved by Brunelleschi to demonstrate to Botticelli the proper way to represent the Redeemer.  What a dick.

One of the more welcome sights of the Marathon, passing this Baptistery 4 miles from the finish

My final shot from this ecclesiastical tour is classic.  As I raised the camera Jackie said, “you are awful;” the fact remains, she saw it, too:

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I knew about this before but this was the first time I’ve run past it (last week around lunchtime).  Impressive in its stupidity, no?

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Update on 13th August 2011 — Okay, fair enough…some of you have taken offense at the smarmy tone of this post. I’m sure you will all feel vindicated by this ‘proper’ press article: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2011/08/13/edl-to-gather-in-telford_n_926111.html

Telford is a shit hole.  There’s no two ways about it, and that’s a shame because for a new city it has avoided a lot of the architectural and city-planning gaffes that make Milton Keynes such a shit hole.  Telford has its share of run down council housing but nothing too dangerous looking; moreover, it has large neighborhoods filled with trees and what appears to be decent housing.

They put up a mall and couldn't incorporate this historic chapel, choosing instead to dismantle it and put it in a playground...tsk

So, what makes it so shitty?  Ah, the people do and they seem proud of the fact.  If there was any demand for a restaurant that served anything other than a carvery with a buffet of slimy, overcooked vegetables (even by English standards) then we wouldn’t have spent two hours driving around looking for a place to eat.  Even the chippies and kebab places were shuttered as if awaiting a riot.

Finally, we spotted a Greene King pub and while the food isn’t great at these, they serve it hot, cheap, and with beer; unless you are in Dawley, Telford and the signs showing the food that draw you in didn’t mention that the kitchen closed sometime before 8pm when you arrived.  Granted, the blokes were helpful, directing us back to a mall Wetherspoons on a Friday night (I knew it was a bad idea to start, but I really wanted to see just how bad…and maybe I’d be wrong and could get a plate of pasta and a beer).  Before we set off to the Wetherspoons fiasco, we did note one progressive sign on the wall of the pub:

The Wetherspoons was adjacent to an ASDA grocery store but it should probably be renamed ASBO, from the swarms of drunken teenagers hanging about.  It has been a long time since I’ve seen that many white trash kids in one place…back home it would usually only happen when a Molly Hatchett tribute band was in town, or the carnival (everyone wants to go see their daddy if his tou comes near enough, don’t they?).  And, the girls…obviously they spent all the money from their pole dancing tips on eye makeup because there wasn’t enough left to buy a skirt to cover their cooters (bless ‘em)…or maybe they just needed to air out their genitals, it’s really hard to be certain.

NOT a Telford shop window

The Wetherspoons had bouncers that let us through but the place was 8 deep at the bar (where we would have ordered food or at least a round as it was going to be worth it to watch one or two of the inevitable fights that was imminent).  Instead, we just went to the ASDA and got some sandwich makings and headed back to the hotel room.

Mmmm...the healthy choice for supper

The next morning, I went for a nice run through the area to see, up close, what sort of environment was responsible for producing this many miscreants which thrives merely on copious quantities of alcopops and anonymous sex (hey, not that there’s anything wrong with it…I was young once too; but 1) you’d have to substitute “powerful psychedelics” for alcopops, 2) to this day I only tolerate, very well thank you, but not thrive on, large volumes of alcohol, and 3) I’ve always needed an occasional pizza or other nourishment).

Trotting over the streets glistening with vomit and broken glass, I was surprised at the lack of graffiti.  I can only suspect that the Telford Town Council has somehow found a way of channeling this undesirable behaviour:

There were some pleasantly wooded trails, and I only was a little shocked when I saw the first female condom I have seen in years, this one in Telford slag-size:

So if you’ve never been to Telford I hope you found this informative but I do encourage you to investigate it for yourselves.  A good source are the Telford pages on another blog I frequent, with one example here, and another, less well written one here.  Cheers.

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The long run was pleasant enough after the St Aldates Tavern and it eventually found me trotting down Cowley Road to the Cape of Good Hope where a looney was preaching to people in the garden whilst waving a blanket around.  Surely, the election is already over, I thought to myself and settled into a window seat to watch the show.

Humid and warm after this, and though tempted and willing, opted to keep MY clothing on

The music was largely funk and 60′s afropop and samba tinged jazz in this large room with windows all the way around from Cowley Road to Iffley Road.  The Doom Bar was perfect and I had a good view as the bartender went out and gently urged the kook to move along.  I followed him out and looked around a bit for a fish and chip shop, but a dash back up Cowley and then down Iffley led me to none.

the couple that have just turned the corner seem amused (see closeup below)

As I headed toward the city center I spotted my friend now only partially clothed and gaining a bigger audience.  I’m sure he does several shows a day if you are really interested.

The woman eating chips coming down Cowley Road is in for a shock

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We were in Olney, a small market town about halfway between Milton Keynes and Northampton, to check out a museum for which Jackie might reorganise/modernise the research library and archives. The town was home to (and the museum devoted to) William Cowper (a poet and translator of Homer that was much admired by the likes of Wordsworth and Coleridge) and John Newton, a reformed slave trader that became a vicar and wrote the hymn “Amazing Grace.” Cowper kept bunnies as pets, so he gets my vote of the two.

For lunch we stopped in the Two Brewers where I washed a duck liver pate based Ploughman’s lunch down with an IPA.  The pate was rich and came with some really good bread, some pickles and pickled beets and onions, a bunch of mild cheddar cubes, some salad, and some slaw.  Jackie had a really tasty meat lasagne.

The pub has two bars with the dining area taking up the larger one and a huge garden out back.  If Jackie opts to take this assignment (it’s a long trip for a volunteer post, but it is a cool job nonetheless), I’ll come back to the Brewers, for sure.

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We had a half hour to kill before the taping of the Vote Now Show (a special series of the Now Show, topical comedy and satire sort of like a British version of the Daily Show on radio) so we walked a few blocks up and ducked into the Horse and Groom.  This was a good choice, architecturally, as it was covered in etched glass and Victorian tiling and filled with dark brown wood and odd patrons.  In addition, the drinks were cheap but there were no hand pumps for the ales.  I had a Sam Smith’s Stout which was fairly pleasant if no more challenging than a Guinness.

There is a front bar and some snugs at the back with a large skylight and yet more etched glass and some nice stained glass ornamentation.  When I used to think about British pubs before moving here, this is the sort of place I had in mind.

We finished up and made our way to BBC Broadcasting House for the taping.  The building is one of those 1930′s wonders that even someone as illiterate in architectural styles can place.  There are Art Deco scultures within and without with allegorical significance to the people of the time and if I wasn’t already bootlegging the performance I would have risked taking a few photos.  Google BBC Broadcasting House and Eric Gill if you are really interested.

George Orwell worked here in the 1940′s and modeled Room 101 (from the novel 1984) on a meeting room there where he had to endure the torture of mind numbingly tedious scripting meetings.

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After a morning spent prowling the stolen antiquities at the British Museum we were a bit peckish and set off through the University of London neighbourhoods to try and find some nourishment, but wound up looping back to the area adjacent to Russell Square tube station before we found the Friend at Hand (actually there was a really nice looking Italian place next to the tube stop but it closed at 2:30 and we got there at 2:31).

After a week without air traffic, you can actually move freely in tourist sites

I had a Mad Goose Pale Ale from Purity Brewing and ordered up the roast beef which was served up a bit overdone with roast potatoes to complement the big plop of mashed potatoes; there were also peas and carrots and it really was delicious in spite of the overcooked beef.  Jamie enjoyed her big glass of wine more than the chicken caesar salad but it was really just some ballast for continued tourism.

There was a smattering of live entertainment that the Irish manager (hey, maybe that explains the slavish devotion to the taters) pointed out as a truck driver tried to maneuver a huge tractor-trailer rig into one very narrow street from another one that was even smaller and through an approximate 135 degree turn.  Fortunately for the drunks behind us (a middle aged businessman and a much younger–but not young–female companion) the outside fixtures that the truck hit several times during the multiple attempts at the turn weren’t sent hurtling through the window and onto their table, not that they would be likely to notice.  What a fun place!

 

Google satellite view as of 28 May 2011...don't remember low flying aircraft on our visit