It's Live8 day - but forget all this politically correct bollocks about Africa!! - far more important things are happening like Ian celebrating his birthday. It also corresponds with the final of the one day cricket series, which barring a miracle bigger than GWB signing up for the Kyoto treaty should be England vs. the Aussies. So a cricket watching session in the Old Royal should be the starting point for the day at around 4.00pm unless some brave chaps wish to get there earlier.
An urgent message was received by Chap on the bus into town. Dave had arrived at the OR to find they were being politically correct on showing the 'Live 8' bollocks!!. Chap arrived just after Phil & Dave and found Phil had made polite enquiries all to no avail about the cricket so a contingency plan was hatched. We decided to wait for the others to arrive before finding another pub to view the match. However, by the time Tone had arrived and checked the score on his mobile England were at 33 for 5 so we gave up on the idea so Ian, Chap, Tone, Dave, Phil, Simbers, Rog & Steve settled into a pacey start in the OR. Later in the proceedings England had made a bit of a recovery around 130 for 5 so we decided to make tracks to a pub with the cricket on.
What a bloody struggle this proved to be!!. We tried several venues around Colmore Row & Bennetts Hill all to no avail (bloody Live 8 again!!), but finally one heroic pub which shone like a torch in the dark of political correctness and had wall to wall cricket. It was of course our old favourite stomping ground the Troc. Here we were joined by Steve B and settled down to consume more ale whilst watching a nail biting end to the crickers!!. Nige joined us later in the proceedings from work. After several more beers it was time to move on.
The Chaps then lobbed on to the Shakespeare as it was a nice warm evening and the beer garden beckoned. Here Tone went into beer frenzy mode as he had just brought a new house and insisted on buying loads of beer, whilst birthday boy Ian was doing attempting to use all his political avoidance tactics for being photographed. Time flies when you're having fun and at 11.15 some of the motley crew departed for home. However some more hardened stalwarts decided it was time for more beer so Chap, Nige, Dave, Phil & Steve flagged down a taxi and headed for the Adam and Eve.
A few more beers were consumed at the A & E whilst listening to the live band, Phil finding a new friend and Nige struggling to stay awake. Steve said his goodbyes, whilst Nige did an infamous 'Heggy' disappearing trick leaving Dave, Phil and Chap to head for town around 1.30am in search of a curry.
We lost Phil on the way (barfing his way down Barford - sorry Bradford Street) leaving Chap & Dave to hit Mr Shah's for a rather nice ruby. A nice way to end the day proceedings.
Disclaimer - the political views expressed on this page are not necessarily those of the author (ho!, ho!)
