Me on Radio Cumbria

It would be understandable if you missed my little interview slot on Radio Cumbria about the forthcoming Cumbrian beer festival at The Rake.

Fortunately, just for posterity, with a little computer jiggery pokery, I captured a recording.

Click Here.

Yes, I know there were rather a lot of ums and errs. I'd be rubbish on Just a Minute.

Adding Insult To Injury

As Pete Brown so eloquently fumed, the royal wedding beer ban is "shameful, depressing, snobbish, bigoted, blinkered, rude, clueless, cruel, idiotic."


In a second kidney punch to Britain's brewers the wedding is going to feature British wine.


Don't misunderstand me, I applaud the royals willingness to support British wine.


Apparently "The decision is in keeping with the couple's desire to show off 'what Britain  does best’".


Well, bugger me, what a fucking insult.


If you were not a republican before, you should be now.


Here's the link to the story. (Warning: it's the Daily Fucking Mail. At least it's a mirror site so that vile shitrag doesn't get the benefit of your clicks.)

CAMRA's keg-bashing Motion 13

CAMRA's AGM is taking place in Sheffield this weekend. You can follow its fascinating tweet-stream at http://twitter.com/#!/CAMRA_Official.

Amongst the generally tedious and nitpicking motions being discussed today is:

MOTION 13 

This Conference believes in the beneficial health effects of real ale and believes that other ale products with chemical and gas additives can have a detrimental effect on public health. Conference believes that the differences between the two are significant and measurable, but acknowledges that research on this area has so far been minimal. Conference therefore resolves that CAMRA shall work with other interested parties to quantify the differences in health terms between real ale and other ale products. 

Would the proposers, West Lancashire Branch, care to offer evidence for the statement "gas additives can have a detrimental effect on public health" or is it just an example of seventies throwback keg-bashing?

In order to do so they would have to demonstrate that CO2 and Nitrogen used to dispense evil keg beer are somehow chemically different to the gases we find in the air we breath.

Somehow I doubt they can.

I also doubt they can find any evidence that "chemical additives" have any detrimental effect on public health for that matter. A detrimental effect on flavour maybe.

I suspect the word "chemical" is simply a weasel word used to provoke fear and disgust in those whose scientific education is lacking. 

Let's see if the motion is passed. My money is on a pass. It will be a victory for stupidity.




UPDATE: The motion wasn't passed. I'm glad I was wrong.

A CAMRA marketing department brainstorming session.

Written, produced and directed by @s_pickthall

The new Michael Jackson statue seems OK to me.