I believe in living life the way that you want to live it every day, and if you do that, you don’t really need to have New Year’s resolutions – Tom Ford
Several times over the festive period I took a walk as far away from the teasing open doors of The Scruffy as I could. In receipt of a book entitled Walking Through Bradford’s History written by a local lad and soon to be “serialised” in The Trumpit.
Regulars here will know of my feelings towards the orgy of house building over here in North Bradford, green fields ripped up to facilitate excessive profiteering, enabled by weak national and local government policies, cheap money and short memories. Negative equity…what’s that?
I walked across the still available open spaces of Idle Moor as numerous locals with dogs enjoyed the fresh air and ancient fields. How long before the next strip is carved up?
Bradford is rich with open space and history; this book is a very good guide to exploring it.
Tombola Time
To assist those new year resolutions, Aldi has a range of home fitness equipment, guaranteed to be populating the trestle tables of the summer church fairs in a few short months.
Pictures of super-fit models adorn the promotional booklet; if only you could get your nose out of the monster tin of Quality Street? Save your money, go for a walk, eat a bit less, eat a bit better.
Love Your Local
A succession of pub demolitions have left real ale fans reeling. So began this article in the T&A to bring in the New Year with typical festive cheer. But is the loss of the pubs mentioned here so bad, in particular, for lovers of real ale?
Whilst the pub business has been contracting for many years – there were approximately 47,600 pubs operating in the United Kingdom in 2018. This represented a decrease of approximately 7,200 pubs in the last ten years, and over 13,200 pubs since 2000 (statista.com) – there have also been significant increases in the number of independently owned pubs. Small can be beautiful.
Just like any business, a pub in isolation can simply outlive it’s market; or the demographic may change over time; tastes too also change. And supermarkets continue to offer stupidly cheap alcohol for those happy to get pissed talking to the wall.
In some cases, certainly in London, the asset value can offer debt ridden pub operating companies (pubcos) a fast buck as I wrote back in 2012.
Change though is all around us. Who would have thought just over a decade ago that household names like BHs, Comet and Woolworths would vanish? Love your local.
Inevitably…
I popped in earlier in the week, worried as to the fiscal impact of Dry January and whispers that even Fat Lad had succumbed. Whilst my contribution would be a trickle to replace the loss of the big river Fat Lad, every little helps.
Something had changed; true the Christmas decorations had thankfully vanished but the walls were bare, the cheap & nasty prints had gone and there was a smell of paint. I gripped the wall, surely they were not converting it to a wine bar at last?
I knew things were okay as I spotted old Smouldering Sue sat on her arse in the corner, working hard as ever.
“What do you want you dole dosser?” she greeted me in her usual friendly tones. “‘Ave you got nothing better to do?” She pulled me a pint with a little wink, taking care not to splash her fake gold.
The usual crowd was thin and Mr Dead was just leaving as well. Fortunately, in walked Three Jags Pete, the scruffiest millionaire I know, another day on the pitch, one step closer to Sandals.
The conversation flowed as Smouldering took a quick nap, wiped out by several days of UV rays.
Eventually, Three Jags left for his mansion just as Graham the Plasterer wandered in with son and Jack Russell both in tow, all covered in plaster. The dog was trying to mount the snoozing Smouldering wearing a bright pink collar; Graham was unapologetic.
“It’s sister died and I’m not wasting brass on another collar. Besides its tri-sexual!” he claimed. I knew I shouldn’t have pursued this as Smouldering woke to serve local wine connoisseur, Martin, with a bottle of vintage Echo Falls 2020.
“Tri-sexual?” I asked.
“It’ll try anything!”
It was time for the comfort of Harry and Look North with the shock piece on dodgy driving in Bradford.
And Finally
Behind a guy in Aldi at the checkout, I noted the contents of his shopping; a 20 pack of Bud and jumbo bag of jelly babies. He must have missed the yoga mats.
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