Post 533: Friday fish and chips and beer.
All summer there were weddings and holidays that separated my regular meets with Dave but after two quick texts a hasty response made a confident booking in the diary for a beer.
The beery meets with pals has been a regular thing I’ve arranged for years and years but this year, because I haven’t been fit we’ve missed a few dates. But meeting up with Dave would be a pre-cursor to a winter beer at the seaside, all welcome.
In the early 90’s were the first Beer Festival days out in Hove town hall; of sweedish wooden design the Hall was a great place to house over a hundred ales, beers and other alcoholic and mineral drinks that you could partake of in short sessions arranged by CAMRA (the CAMpaign for Real Ale) and enjoyed by the masses that flocked through the doors for a light lubrication.
But as the decades passed and the pals married and had kids (which we, my Darling and I already had) there was a flow of many of the group to not attend due to other important family ties, but a central core of serious Beer-Fest trippers always joined me for a drink or three until now with my bestie dead and the actual ‘Beer Festival’ in new premises that has no atmosphere, we have a day out enjoying the pubs in various seaside destinations for a ‘Beer crawl’ through the older pubs left along the way.
But today was just Dave and I.
I was excited to get up and shower before my Darling because I wanted to be a nice smelling customer for the tattoo man Gary when he inks my Prostate pin-man later. He’s told me tales that would make your hair curl about some of the ‘events’ and incidents that occur in a tattooists chair, but the smelly customer is one that I’m certainly not going to be. As it was, after dropping off my Darling to SW (Slimming World group) I raced to the other side of the high street to the parlour that was my only concern today. There’s now gain without pain, I tell myself as I hope skip and jump in the door greeting all three of the artists waiting there next customers.
I was early and Gary jumped up and thought he was late, but no, I wanted to talk about the right arm sleeve of Sussex animals etc. to get a jump start ignoring my next tat. And here I have to reiterate how unbelievable this sudden love for inking is; a year ago I was in-inked and proud of it, but now I feel that as my world is ever shrinking and my ability to be me as I’ve always been, I have found a tattoo on my body not a dirty horrible thing I would think of in the past, but a very personal piece of art nobody can take from me. My body, my art, my choice.
So I jumped up on the chair and Gary set himself up beside me and took off my shoe (good job I showered) and off we went. While the first cut was a reminder that there was continuous pain while cutting, when the needle was being dipped in the ink away from my leg the pain disappeared immediately.
When it finished just an hour later the pin-man was done and he will now lead me on my path wherever this cancer takes me.
He’ll be there forever; my pin-man, my friend.
My leg was wrapped in cling-film and I payed up and booked the next tattoo appointment and stepped out to the blustery by dry day outside the comfort of the parlour. But I was off to meet my pal so I soon forgot about the tattoo and drove off to park in the busy town centre where a large tired Wethersooons pub was located. It used to be a car showroom and service shop and the walls were covered in vehicle memorabilia and a few large signs explaining that there was a closure coming up of the premises to make refurbishments.
Good, I thought as I walked headlong into the smells of beer initially and the ln the pungent smell everyone knows and hates, namely the sour milk on the carpet smells. “Sheesh” what a stink.
I had a notion Dave was walking towards the pub as I received a text that he was off the train and striding towards me but I need a wee so I fought my way, slicing through the cheesy smell like a knight through the forest of briars to the comfort of the loo which the smells were a pleasant surprise compared to the carpet stink.
I was ashes up and fought my way back to the long wooden bar of my beers and the crowd that was there as I passed by when I arrived was gone and only one person was there would you believe, yes, my mate. We clocked each other and I, like a scene out of love story open my arms a sped up towards him to give him a big man-hug. We both needed that initial contact which just showed how glad we both were to finally meet up. We hardly see each other, hardly ever text, but when we meet we are great pals.
We got beers and started catching up, ordered fish and chips and more drinks. Unlike the shoddy conditions of the carpet the fish and chips could not be better. The two cleaned plates were a testament to the quality. Just lovely, and unexpected.
With only two hours allowed in the carpark Dave was watching his watch nervously as the time raced around those first two hours from half past one, but having my Darlings car was a godsend because the pub-crawl could now be extended to anyplace we wished rather than if I was walking and bussing we would be more limited to pubs in the town centre which neither of us knew well. So off I drove to two other pubs in quaint villages heading ever closer to my pal Dave’s home, which was on purpose so I could get home home safely and finish the day with a happy drive back to my Darling and a short debrief of beery chatter and to show off my lovely new tat.
The pubs I chose were fabulous and one had just last week changed hands but looked amazing and was full of diners looking for the table at the bar we sat on. But we were only there a little while and the rest is history.
What a great day out. Yes there was only one beer for me to enjoy with the lunch time meal but I was just happy to be incessantly nattering to my mate and checking out the pubs for another visit with my Darling perhaps, later.
I was home and safe and my Darling glad to see me but needed to get to bed early as it was a ‘school-night’ so I was left with the Haribo’s and the tv, after I got the cat off me and put him out, just in case I dropped off in front of the telly and he, the little rascal, headed up to be with mummy and her early night. Not a good idea.
So that was my wonderful Friday finished. Dave asked if we are having a Christmas beer-fest in Hastings to which I say a resounding yes, and will leave me with my usual job of rounding up the posse for the first and last ‘Fest’ of the year.
In other news, my Daughter in law has finished her radiotherapy for the lymphoma that’s needed the treatment and is now tired but relieved that that’s over now.
She’s been online looking for the booking and concerts for next year’s entertainment, a great idea to distance herself from the riggers of the therapy; with some success.
A doctor from my surgery caught up with me when I got home 7pm (a late one for him) to say that the advice for my heart pills was that Digoxin was the replacement for the beta-blocker Bisoprolol. That’s concluded that. But where are my other pills? I thought but didn’t think to ask whilst he was on the phone to me, dratt and double dratt!
But Boots have text me with two my received prescriptions. I wonder what they are?
Time will tell.
I’ll await a text to say the pills are ready.
I have already contacted the surgery three times about the hospice letter emailed sometime after Monday.
I have till Wednesday to get the pills, that’s when I run out.
I’ll be contacting the surgery on Monday, that’s for sure.
So that’s it for a great day out and because I was very careful what I sat in I survived the day with massive consequences for my back, I am not feeling any worse (or better) than normal. Ace!
So take care and enjoy your weekends. I must go for that fungi walk tomorrow so I can feel even more normal than I was already. Oh, and I must clean and put some new cream on my fab pin-man tattoo.
Good night.
