ALTHOUGH I know I've mentioned my Good Pub Guide recently, it's fast becoming a favourite book of mine and so I feel the need to mention it again. It's a simple idea for a book: there's no beginning, middle or end, and not much in the way of plot. The title characters, if you can call them that, are all lovingly described pubs. But it's a page-turner.
I wouldn't usually consider myself to be a "pub guy". I have friends who swear by the pub as a place of sanctuary, a level playing field where the woes of the world can be shouted at each other over a few pints of Guinness. But in a busy pub, I tend to focus more on the rowdiness and potential aggressiveness of other drinkers, and rarely pay attention to the details.
I like a good, quiet, old-fashioned pub, however, one with the potential for striking up a conversation about the tides with an old sea dog or meeting other interesting characters, like the builder in the bar at the Isle of Coll Hotel a few years ago who told me of the pitfalls and positives of building Scandinavian-style wooden houses in the Hebrides. Pubs, though, basically disappoint me more than I would care to admit.
I love this book so much because it describes pubs the way I want them to be ("honey-coloured stone walls and rugs on bare boards, Pimms and cider in jugs, and picnic sets in the wild flower meadow") and misses out bits like "also known for being full of mad men on Fridays and Saturdays - watch your back!" I'm aware that it may be overly romanticising places people go in order to drink beer, but it's a book I've been genuinely enjoying. In fact, I've even been ticking off where I've been and underlining where I want to go. Just as long as list-making doesn't become a regular habit, and I start compiling lists of the top 10 ways to cook potatoes or favourite types of pencils ...
I probably use lists more than I realise. With a mind like mine, which seems to work in old-fashioned time, I end up writing things for my own benefit. I'm still here in the recording studio in North Wales with my band, and time has taken on a distinct feeling of its own. I'm going to bed later and later and getting up later and later. If I stay here any longer, the day is eventually going to overlap with the night and I'll have no need for lists, apart from maybe a post-it note reminding me to get out of my pyjamas.
I've been meaning to take a drive to Pen-y-Gwryd, a famous, family-run mountain inn in nearby Llanberis, with a "homely slate-floored log-cabin bar" which even has, according to the guide, "a worthy collection of illustrious boots from famous climbs" on display. That sounds like my kind of place. But I'm running out of days, and since I'm here principally to record an album, I think the guilt of leaving the studio for a few hours to eat Welsh rarebit with a glass of mulled wine (one of the pub's specialities) would almost definitely override the work in hand.
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