Some Journey

I suppose it's the lot of the aging to point out the faults in this ever changing world, why else would a programme like Grumpy Old Men become so popular - it's watched by a nation of grumpy aging people nodding in agreement (even if their guilty themselves) at the celebs putting the world to rights.

I have considered joining CAMRA in the last year, my love for real ale having grown exponentially since the discovery of some pubs with real variety. However, after careful scrutiny of the leaflet I couldn't see the point. It didn't offer me value for money. What might be a suitable alternative would be to buy this year's CAMRA Good Beer Guide (proceeds to CAMRA, etc.) but after thumbing through it I was hit by a horrible realisation.

I live in a town that has gone from being the centre of the UK shoe industry to being the town with the largest concentration of bars, pubs, and licensed venues in the universe. The town once dubbed Shoesville has been renamed Pubtown, it has meant that the town centre is a buzzing nest of vipers just about every night of the week. It brings in huge amounts of revenue for the council, but puts tremendous pressure on the police force and subsequently they spend more time sorting out drunken idiots on the main drag than preventing crime.

But that isn't my point today. If I was to go on a virtual tour of my town's nightlife we'd be here all day, there are 17 drinking establishments on the main road leading into the town centre alone and for someone of my age there are maybe two or three places that I wouldn't feel like a pervert in a schoolyard, and two of these places are anachronistic pubs - they could easily still be in 1970 (apart from the prices). The other place is so bloody espensive and exclusive that you leave feeling as though you're glad you're getting old if this is what it costs the young to have a reasonable time.

In my town there are about 400 pubs - I'm not kidding, but it is a big town. There are 3 (yes THREE) specialist real ale pubs, and another 6 pubs that have a changing real ale rota - the rest are lager and John Smiths pubs. Of the 3 specialist real ale pubs, one is incredibly parochial, one is a bit of dive and the other is about the most successful pub in town for a clientel of my age - the place heaves most nights and you rarely see flesh younger than 30 in there.

The villages around the town used to have some of the best watering holes in the country, now they are restaurants and bistros and concentrate on the discerning diner rather than drinker - beer is not a profit making business on a large scale, lager makes the money because most casual drinkers will have a pint of lager. I have no problem with lager, I drink it at home, but we used to be a country of fine brewers and while we still have many micro breweries in existence, fewer and fewer pubs are stocking real beer and worse still some that do have no idea how to keep it. Plus the aggravation for people in this area like me (and there seems to be a lot of us) is that with all this choice, we only really have less than a handful of places to go to.