getbracknell - Reading Evening Post

I was recently released from the Digital Media Dungeon for a training course in How to be an Analytical Geek at the Manchester Evening News, and can happily confirm that whether you are in Bracknell or the bustling, cultural metropolis that is Manchester, the birthplace of modern-day “cool”, and Oasis…

…Monday nights are still dull.

This Monday night gone was pay day, an earlier glance at the bank account suggested that I had saved money last month.

You’ve got to understand that this was a huge step, as the big TWO-FIVE approaches, for the first time ever there wasn’t a big fat minus sign on the 14th of the month!

A double celebration was in order, but as we’ve already learned, Monday nights are dull, dull, dull.

So using the tried and trusted approach, me and my buddy Steph popped out to the Old Manor (hey, the saving wasn’t that big!).

The Manor is probably the most famous pub in Bracknell, (I can think of no other reasons other than it is in the centre of town and cheap!), it was the first pub to adopt the smoking ban (it’s a Wetherspoons), and has only just installed Sky.

But it is arguably the busiest and most popular pub in town on a Friday and Saturday night (if you can name a better one I’m listening!) and where yours truly has spent more nights than he can remember. Literally.

The offending Hedgehog

I digress, there were important issues to discuss. Why were Abbey using a hedgehog to advertise savings (I got why there was a squirrel, but a hedgehog?? Answers on a postcard), and why did Steph’s new colleague (a 50 year-old-man), have to be the most annoying in East Berkshire?

Unfortunately, the Fosters was off (no jokes), so a couple of pints of Abbot Ale and we were no closer to solving these mysteries.

Fortunately help was at hand when ‘Dave’ (the name isn’t to protect him from the media spotlight that often comes from being featured in this blog, I just can’t remember it) the painting hairdresser changed the subject completely by introducing himself to the three lads who were sitting opposite us.

‘Dave’ didn’t look much like a hairdresser. I think you know what I mean, but what was astounding was that the three lads opposite, wait for it, were all called James!

Imagine that, you, your mate, and your other mate are all called James.

Sitting round one table.

It’s the kind of fascinating nugget that I know you, my two loyal readers, will lap up.

It was no dull Monday in Bracknell, I had the headache in the morning to prove it.

I guess it’s always worth remembering that it’s not where you go, it’s who you go with.

I’ll remind myself of that the next time Steph and I are strolling home from what we’ve tentatively entitled Monday Club, and attempting to remember the words to the Ghostbusters theme tune.