Reading Roars!

Fancy an evening of live music this Friday? A duo named “Branded” will be performing at The Pheasant pub in Southampton Street.

In an earlier post, I said that The Pheasant was ranked the lowest of all pubs in the Reading Pubs league table - but don’t let that put you off. I’ve not been there and Maurice, Branded guitarist, did say that it has slightly improved recently.

On to the music itself. Branded will offer “the usual mix of rock cliches, served up in the best possible taste” (so I’m guessing that’s a dollop of Don McLean’s American Pie, Guns n Roses’ Sweet Child o’Mine/Paradise City and Sweet Home Alabama).

I returned to Zero Degrees on Saturday night.  Busy, busy, busy!  As expected.  What I wasn’t expecting was a no-trainers policy.  I didn’t think it was going to happen purely because, well, Zero Degrees seemed different to me. 

I was ok, as I was wearing more formal looking shoes, but my (male) friend had stripes on his footwear.  Fortunately, and surprisingly, after being told no, he was excused by the doorman as his trainers were black.  So white trainers bad, black trainers good.   His girlfriend, incidentally, was wearing shoes with a very striking floral design and that was perfectly ok.

A ridiculous rule (like we all stare at each other’s feet, and do white trainers really spell trouble?), and one to remember.

And now for a seemingly random and non-Reading related entry.  Are there any readers/bloggers here based in Vancouver, Canada?

Updates from me have hardly been coming in thick and fast lately.  Well,  perhaps thick.  It’s been such a busy month.  Anyway, news about the so-called “Russian scam” landed in my in-box yesterday.  It’s happening in Reading, apparently:

Reading Police are making people aware of a rise in distraction thefts of mobile phones in Reading Town Centre from customers at Bistros and Cafes.  The method used by the offenders is to distract the victim by pushing a newspaper or map under their nose and ask for directions.

 

Whilst the victim is trying to help , an accomplice steals the phone. The description of these offenders varies on each occasion, sometimes groups of 2 or more, sometimes in families and of Eastern European appearance.  Please warn your NHW members or staff.  Also please make sure your mobile phone is post-coded (with a UV pen) and obtain the phone’s unique electronic code so that it can be deactivated if stolen.  This can be achieved by keying in *#06# and then record the number that is displayed on the screen.

If you have any information about the above message that is of an urgent nature please contact our police enquiry centre on 0845 8 505 505 and state you are responding to this Ringmaster message. 

So it’s confirmed: Sidwell out, someone else in.  That someone else is Boavista’s Kalifa Cisse (who?), signed by Reading FC for “just under” €1 million.

Cisse is a French defensive midfielder just 22 years of age.  Apparently there was quite a bit of competition for his signature (he was linked to Bolton back in January 2007).  He’s also “very nice”, according to John Madejski.

As for Sidwell, he’s now had his Chelsea medical and is close to signing with the London club (where he will undoubtedly earn a lot more.  Money, eh).

Good luck to the both of them, but especially Cisse, who will probably spend less time anyway warming the bench than the Blues-bound Sidwell.

Doing anything this evening?  How about a bit of African adventure?  A cultural adventure, that is.  A quick reminder that tonight is Ethiopian night at Global Cafe. 

To whet your appetite, here are 5 quick facts about Ethiopia (source: Wikipedia).  The country is:

• the second most populous nation in Africa
• the second-oldest officially Christian nation
• roughly the size of Bolivia
• the spiritual homeland of the Rastafari movement
• currently hosting the HQ of the African Union

Maybe I’ll see you there?

Taste of Malaysia will be back at the Global Cafe this Sunday (13 May) and the following (20 May). If you miss either of those dates, fear not, as Taste of Malaysia’s Malaysian food will also be offered at Palmer Grill (229c London Rd), as of Monday 14 May.

I visited Palmer Grill late this afternoon and found the staff there very friendly and helpful. Worth checking out if you’re hungry and in the Cemetery Junction area (and it makes an interesting change from the usual fish & chips/kebab/burger, or all three at once).

VISA Europe is coming to town.

The credit card company, reports the Reading Chronicle’s Business Editor Alan Bunce, will occupy Queens Road’s Kennet Wharf, formerly used by the nonsensical-sounding 186k. Bunce adds that the transfer represents the biggest inward investment since Hutchison 3G joined the party in 2001.

Reports suggest that Chelski, sorry, Chelsea have agreed to sign Reading star Steve Sidwell, according to The Guardian’s Jeremy Wilson.

The Mirror says the club’s Special One, who has had a less than special season, offered the midfielder a deal worth a stunning £50k per week, but adds that Fergie has now also spoken to him.

So is it to be the winning Reds from up North or the London club, minus Shevchenko and (the £130k per week) Ballack?

The Reading Beer & Cider Festival is a momentous, tremendously important event in Reading’s proud cultural calendar. With the departure of WOMAD this year, the 2007 festival (only the 13th) felt even more important.

In 2006 there were apparently 13,100 guzzling visitors. This year, no idea, but surely a greater number as the queue we joined to get in on Friday night was staggeringly long. I looked at the Lenin tomb-like line of visitors and whimpered. It was going to be a two-hour wait, I thought. A two-hour boring wait. A two-hour boring wait in the cold. No cutesy characters or overhead screens (like you get at Disney parks) here. The lady behind me in the queue said that she’d seen nothing like it. “It wasn’t this bad last year,” she said. Cheers.

Amazingly, it wasn’t so bad. The queue moved a bit. Then a bit more. It was more like Sainsbury’s than a crowded airport terminal (US Immigration springs to mind). And then we were in, paying just £7 each (including glass hire).

I was aching for a beer, but there was so much choice (there were 430+ ales). We didn’t have a programme, so there was no guidance. We found a bit of space and asked the volunteer serving behind the table for a bit of assistance. After we tried sample after free sample (we could have sampled our way all evening), we both chose pints of light stuff (name forgotten), which were really tasty.

Sitting down, I felt as if I were in a giant pub. The place was busy, but there was no leery shouting. It was all rather civilised and good-natured. After my pint, I was getting that warm and friendly feeling, the queue now a thing of the past. Surely it was time for another?

It certainly was. Time for something a little different. We headed straight to the foreign beers section, now armed with a programme plucked from someone’s table. Again, so much choice! We agreed to try a strong fruit beer from the Low Countries: Het Anker Boscoulis (6.5%), described as a “fruit beer, based on wild fruits”). After much waiting, we were presented with a glass of Anker (there were actually 3 different types of Anker available, such was the choice). It was dark, rich and syrupy, tasting a little like honey. Really sensuous. Quite exciting.

It was time for a snack. There was hot Mexican food and pittas in the outside area, but I wanted pub snacks to go with the pub drinks and pub atmosphere. There wasn’t much that I could see: parsnip crisps and Mini Cheddars, but no Walker’s Sensations or pork scratchings. Anyway, if you’re hungry, you’re hungry.

A cider followed. Which cider, I can’t remember (there were more than 130 ciders and perries). It had a bit of a sharp taste. It was consumed very quickly.

I was really enjoying myself now. There was a band playing, so we went to enjoy the music. We checked out the T-shirts, badges and other items. Time was running out, however, so we went to the mini tent next door for another beer. At this point, I noticed how a few girls were sporting a balloon hat in the shape of a man’s (very long) appendage. Curious.

The evening drew to a close. We had a super time (though, how can I put this, our souvenir glasses later lost their structure) and I’m very much looking forward to next year’s event. Minus the hangover.