This weekend was one of the more hectic ones I have had for a while, with a diversity of activity and entertainment on my travels across Hampshire and Berkshire. Firstly on Friday night I visited my old village of Tadley and The Fox and Hounds pub…..actually, Tadley is not a village anymore, it is a town now, though how it calls itself a town is questionable, it doesn’t even have a Greggs or a MacDonald’s. The Fox now features two bouncers on the door to keep the peace, though it would seem they have arrived fifteen years late as it seems a lot more subdued than it used to be. Many of the same old people are still there sitting in the same seats as they always did and it seems that as the world moves on, time stands still in the life stereotypical pub regulars who live in the hazy comfort zone of their own wacky view of the world. All the same it was a good evening catching up with mates and others who I haven’t spoken to for several years, not by choice may I add, just by circumstance.

Saturday was a football day which began with a kind of personal derby featuring my local team and Broughton (where Diane lives). Di’s daughter plays for Broughton, so I had to support them really, but I was looking forward to the team of my home town showing the villagers what nice hosts they were. Unfortunately there was a lady (well sort of lady) with a son called something hideous like Jaguar, who screamed her head off for the duration of the game thus giving the impression that I lived on a sink estate full of psychotic women who would punch you in the face as soon as look at you. Broughton played well and deservedly won 4-0, a result and performance that was far more pleasing on the eye than what was served up at the Madjeski Stadium in the afternoon where Reading FC lost 0-2 to Watford, playing some of the worst football I have seen from this team for some time. For comedy purposes George and I are now blessed with a new female season ticket holder about four rows back, who despite having a two year old daughter, revels in calling referees “fucking cunts” at ten minute intervals. Tourettes seems epidemic in women at amateur and professional levels of the game.

On Saturday night I cheered myself up by going with Diane to watch the Inbetweeners movie set in Greece. The common consensus from film critics is that if you laugh out loud (or LOL in text speak) during a movie more than five times, you can consider it a comedy success. We did this a lot more than that and whilst I am no critic, I loved this film, it was full of feel good and hilarious moments that reminded me of similar trips I had in Ibiza, Corfu, Kos and the Canaries as a young and naive fool. It also made me feel tinges of jealousy towards my two lads who are now a matter of a couple of years away from similar trips abroad with their mates. The Inbetweeners makes you laugh, but it also make you realise how old you are, it is twenty four years since I went to Ibiza with my mates on a holiday that was so similar to the Inbetweeners movie, featuring dodgy apartments, dubious girls ranked from one to ten, condoms blown up over heads, hospitalisations, crap dancing, summer romances, sunburn, shaved eyebrows, vomiting, tequila, sleep in ditches or sunbeds and a fear of foreign food. The only difference between 1987 and 2011 is that we were all shit scared of getting AIDS. I avoided a Scottish girl for two weeks because allegedly, sleeping with a girl from Edinburgh the supposed European AIDS capital, was a death sentence.

We finished the weekend with a meander around the Test Valley, starting with a stroll around the beautiful village of Kimbridge. I say it is beautiful, but that is just an assumption as Kimbridge is an area of the River Test surrounded by barbed wire and brick walls with metal spikes on top, tax paying peasants aren’t allowed in, it is a village for the elite land owner only, no one else is welcome. Not to be beaten, we moved on to the charming village of Stockbridge where we visited the Three Cups pub where you can treat yourself to a view of their hideous new extension, a burger for £11.95 and a chance meeting and gossip with former World of Sport presenter Dickie Davies. We decided against the burger, instead crossing the road to the recently opened and trendy looking Stokes restaurant where we had a rather expensive but exquisite afternoon snack and a splendid glass of white wine as we watched the world go by from our roadside window seat. It is wonderful place, refurbished tastefully with an ambiance that makes you feel like you are on holiday, I highly reccomend it for a special occasion……..or a weekly visit if you have pots of disposable cash.