Guest Reviewer: Matt
These reviews were brought to you in association with What Would Puskas Do?
(which, if it is not online yet, will be very soon indeed...)
and Puskas's famed
online journal, also, oddly, entitled What would Puskas Do?
Puskas herself is a ginger cat, wit and raconteur, widely renowned
throughout the intellectual circles of London's fashionable Colliers
Wood.
A note on the scoring system. Because of the auspicious television
event
of the evening when these pubs were visited, all will be rated in terms
of
Doctor Whos. Thus, a pub nearing perfection will be awarded the rating
"Tom Baker", a good pub which might be considered "a bit hard" will be
awarded the rating
"John Pertwee". A decent, solid pub will be given the mark "Patrick
Troughton". A pub which is alright, but possibly a touch fey, with the
chance that it
may go off to cure sick animals at a moment's notice, will be given the
mark "Peter Davidson" and a pub which is utterly shite will be marked
"Sylvester McCoy".
A pub which is not merely shite, but full of fat, shouty blokes will be
denoted
"Colin Baker". A pub which is probably good, but which we cannot recall
the details of fully will gain the "William Hartnell" score, and a pub
which
had the potential to be good, but was ruined by external factors beyond
its control
(bad weather, unpleasant crowd, worst script in the history of
Hollywood) will be
given the mark of "Paul McGann". A pub which is nothing more than
pointless
will be ranked "Peter Cushing". No pubs will be given the rating
"Christopher Eccleston"
as it would be meaningless at this stage - even now, writing up the
notes
the following day, having watched the video, the only fair way that
score
could be achieved would be if we peered into a pub and thought "That
looks
pretty good - but we need to go back later to review it in more
detail".
Which obviously would be silly. Anyway, do you understand? Good? On
with the report...
REVIEWS
Coach and Horses, Kew - A very pleasant pub to start the evening
in, although it was raining, and it would have been enjoyable to sit
outside, facing Kew Green (overtones
of McGann there?) Decent beer - the bottled Kew Brew was both
appropriate and refreshing.
A tad middle-class, though (hardly suprsing in Kew, really, but it
would set the tone for the evening).
Overall rating: Davidson/Troughton.
The Shaftesbury - Homely, but still rather Richmondish in its flavour.
Not a bad pub, though. We drank Ram and Special, and watched some of the
Israel - Ireland match, where the heroic Tal Ben-Haim stood firm against
wave upon wave of Irish attacks.
Overall rating - Davison to Troughton.
The Orange Tree, Richmond - Just opposite the Orange Tree Theatre,
another very pleasant
pub.Drank Double Chocolate Stout. The bare wooden floor at the front of
the pub, and larger
number of "Youths" tended to make this pub about as Pertwee as we were
going to find in Richmond.
Still, in real terms, it was more Davidson. A speed dating poster
adorned the rear wall. 'Nuff Said.
Overall Rating: Davidson.
Above: The Orange Tree
The Old Ship - The Garish red neon sign outside made this pub
something of an oddity in
the Youngs Stakes - not very like them, at all. Still, we were in
Richmond, and it wasn't Pertwee.
A pleasant-looking young woman in a hat sat near the door on a table of
other relatively pleasant
looking young women without hats. Can't guarantee she'll be there when
you visit, though, so you may want to discount that section of the
review. Drinking St George's in here. Not a bad pint, although
the pub really should not have the neon. It does not help. We started
thinking of food at this point. Then a young
man with a guitar started to strum it - not playing any tunes, not
tuning up, just strumming, presumably
trying to impress his girlfriend, sat opposite him. A strange tactic to
use. Not long after the pub
was invaded by Cunts. A large bloke with too many tatoos, presumably
public-school educated, and his "rugger-bugger"
mates. Pah. The only upside was they were accompanied by a young lady
who
had arguably the largest cleavage in the world. They seemed more
concerned with irritating her, though. We left the Cunts and the lady
behind. Or so we thought.
Overall rating: Troughton.
The Waterman's Arms - easily the best, and, not coincidentally,
the least-Richmond of all the evening's pubs. We ambled upstairs and
ate some good Thai food, and drank - I had a bottle of Christmas
Pudding, for reasons I cannot adequately explain here. Neil, sensibly,
chose Champion.
A television hid inside some strange kind of 70s-style wooden cabinet.
Whatever happened to those?
People are now proud to disply their televisions, much as they are
proud to display their
toilet paper, and don't feel the need to hide it under
ridiculous-looking dolls with over-sized skirts.
Upon leaving, we discovered that the Cunts had followed us into this
pub, too. Maybe it's part of some
sort of Richmond pub-crawl. Shame - I had thought we'd left them
behind. Overall rating: Baker (although the late arrival of the Cunts
does give it a McGannish quality, which is unfair, but so was that film)
White Cross - A decent effort of a pub, sadly without the
impressively cleavaged woman of the previous two, but,
in mitigation, also without the Cunts. Ram and Special drunk here, to
round off the evening. Which it
does nicely. Overall impressions - on the river, which is good,
although once again, it had a neon sign outside, which is bad - what is
it about Richmond that makes Youngs Pubs want to display a neon sign?
Not good.
Also not good is the newly designed Ramrod bottle - is it meant to be
two rams or one on the logo?
More disturbingly, why does it conjour images of genitalia? Bring back
the old labels. Much better. No need
to try to be trendy - we'll drink it anyway.
Overall rating: Troughton - Pertwee.
Above: The impression of Neon after several pints of Young's
Which rounds off the first expedition to Richmond. Others will, no
doubt, be forthcoming in the none-too-distant future.