Gold Dust

L is running in a 10k at Clumber Park which has a very reasonable start time of 12 noon. 

I wouldn't mind having a look at the Off Road Duathlon that they are also holding but that starts at 9am. That’s a bit early, think we’ll have a lie in instead.

When we get there, I find that the problem with a 12 noon start is that the Clumber Park café only serves breakfast, e.g. bacon rolls, in the morning. I don't fancy a burger, so I’ll just have to wait until later for breakie.

The 10k turns out to be not very off road at all, in fact so on road even I could have done it. L does well though and then we head home for a mid-afternoon breakfast.

We have various grand plans for the evening but in the end, after moving away from the best beers last week, these are distilled down to find a decent beer and stay there. We hit gold dust in pub one, the Falcon. Tuck is on as is a coffee styled beer from a brewery I can’t remember. We stay put all night but fail to drink it dry and then pick up a curry from the Park Tandoori on the way home. Very naughty.

(Saturday 18^th October)

One Day I Might Make Mine

L runs the Coalville 10k which is at Snibston Discovery Museum this morning. It’s organised by the same people who did the Loughborough Half Marathon. It’s also clearly done very much on the cheap but a run is a run when you need one and it’s a good place for L to make her comeback. One day I might make mine...

Instead I walk the dogs. MD takes a dislike to some stags, which are actually artificial statues but he barks them off all the same. I take him up close so that he can see how statuesque they are but he’s still not convinced and converses nosily with each one in turn.

There are quite a few runners in festive fancy dress today, that is if you count a pig onesie as festive. The Santa suits are quiet festive though and a chap with a chicken on his head comes in second. I don’t think he could lay his hands on a turkey.

In the afternoon it’s the dog club's AGM where I’m elected club secretary. Somebody has to do it and everybody, apart from me, thought it ought to be me.

In the evening we make up for a Saturday in with a night in the Falcon on the promise of either their new Christmas Ale or their Butterscotch Winter Warmer. Neither are on sadly, so it’s another night on the excellent Tuck.

(Sunday 1^st December)

A Quiet Revolution

I limp the boys around park, trying to kick their footballs with my good leg without standing on the bad one. Not easy. The calf tightness has eased but my knee is terrible.

L and I get back into the quiet revolution at home. Basically L paints while I chuck things away. I take a load of old CD racks to the tip in readiness for the one big new one I’ve purchased. The spare room looks almost empty now.

We head into Nottingham in the evening and first to the Falcon Inn on Canning Circus, a long standing real ale pub that’s never really been much good for any length of time. Once a Shipstones house, it’s had a variety of owners and a variety of business plans since. None of which have worked.

The one business plan that they hadn't tried was the entitled simply ‘sell good beer’. Enter Hucknall’s Lincoln Green Brewery, who have only been brewing since May 2012, and Adrian Draper, licensee at Fellows Morton & Clayton.

The result is eight ales across the bar and a packed pub. We somehow find a seat and settle in for a session on the jewel of their crown, Lincoln Green’s own Tuck. This is a 4.7% Porter and it’s awesome. Suddenly Nottingham has its own Old Peculiar.

We were originally on our way to the Peacock for some of the aforementioned but honestly this is better. Three pints later we do eventually leave for the Peacock, just for a point of comparison you understand.

We’ll be back soon though; Lincoln Green’s website says that they have two 5.5% ales coming up next. A butterscotch flavoured dark ale and a Christmas cake flavoured winter special.

When we do get to the Peacock the actual Old Peculiar isn’t as good at all, mainly because it’s a bit ‘old’ tonight. We should have stayed put.

We round the evening off with a curry at the Noor.

(Saturday 16^th November)