Beer and humbugs

I'm not a big Christmas celebrator.

Mostly it's the relentless pushing of a commercial agenda on people and the pressure of some stupid "perfection" model that I just don't relate to at all.

So, me and the boy tend to make like a couple of squirrels and semi-hibernate somewhere enjoying the odd (quite often, urban) amble in the outside to forrage for nuts (well, beer, obvs) then returning to play games, watch films and eat our own body-weight in sausage rolls.

So it was this year.  We decided to hole up in our flat in Bristol - we've done some domestic jobs we'd been meaning to for a little while, we're finally getting on top of the laundry, we've done some silly coding so that we can see our shelf of orchids come into flower in a couple of weeks, and we've played some games.

On the morning of the 25th we mooched around a bit then put a duck in the oven to roast in its own juices for a few hours (chuck a standard 3-person duck in the roasting tin; sprinkle copiously with salt; stuff a bit of thyme up it; prick the skin; chuck it in the oven - first hot for about 15mins then at about 150-deg C then leave it on its own for several hours).

We struck out to South Bristol as we thought, being a residential area, there was the greatest chance of encountering an open pub with decent beer.

We've stumbled on some really fun pubs in the past, in just this way. 

The first place we came across looked OK but was only serving Wickwar beer - by no means awful but not really what we were looking for.  So we continued to North Street.

First we landed at the Hen and Chicken which, when I lived in the area a long time ago was a great place to get beaten up, it's definitely a good place these days - not amazing, but good.  It was rammed inside but they had Two Bridges beer, Wild Beer - Bibble and a BBF special beer on as well as the more standard Gem.  Service is always a little bit slow but we got served without too much hassle, found a couple of bar stools and enjoyed a couple of decent pints in the company of about 60 other people.  We remarked that it's not the ideal place for us since it doesn't have any quiet corners - nevertheless the beer was good so we weren't complaining...at least not until a couple of kids got screamy.

Look, I know places are supposed to be family friendly and I also know this area of town is no longer a working class part of town - all the houses are owned by middle class professionals attracted by the gentrification of the area following the establishment of the brilliant "Tobacco Factory".  It wasn't even as if I was that surprised to see so many young kids with their 30-something parents.

I see lots of social media comments about "Christmas Pub Goers" whose manifold sins seem to revolve around not knowing how pubs are supposed to work (allowing their mates to add to their order when they've just come in and there's a huge queue at the bar; asking for Guiness Shandy; asking for loads of lattes in a busy beer bar...you know the people...).

I'd like to add...
- The open area between the bar and the route to the loo (which is the only open space) is NOT a playground for your kids to tear around screaming.  It's not my job to not trip over your children who aren't looking where they're going.

- in an already noisy, open bar high-pitched screaming (in hysterical jolity or amidst a melt-down) is not conducive to other patrons' enjoyment of their beer.

- You are responsible for your kids' behaviour and trust me none of the rest of us find their screaming adorable. 

So, as you can imagine, we was a bit grumpy once we'd finished our beer and decided we couldn't bear it any more.

That aside, well done Hen and Chicken for having a decent community friendly facility in what was a complete shithole before.

So, we kinda resolved ourselves that nowhere else might be open and we reamined grateful that H&C was open and had decent beer but we struck out in the general direction of home.

We passed The Old Bookshop which we'd visited in the past and sort of liked but had been fairly unimpressed by the beer.  It was open and, not only that, the sign on the door said it was open all day.  Well, it would have been rude not to...
What a difference!
There were plenty of people inside and there were clearly some families but the noise level was so much lower (and beard and trendy tattoo quotient much higher).  There were 2 cask and 8 keg pumps on so we grabbed a couple of pints, climbed onto stools in the window and enjoyed the chilled ambience.
It was such a contrast to the previous place that it probably felt disproportionately lovely...nevertheless it took all our willpower to not stay for another.

We headed back for our beautifully cooked duck and congratulated ourselves on the 5 mile walk, good beer and perfect choice of celebratory fowl.

Here we are at Boxing Day and there will be the angst, later, of working out where might be open for a pint...