Changes *

Couple of weeks ago, coming home (very) late after trip to see JJ in Northampton, got off last train at New Cross Station. Walked out and was aghast to see in front of me new three or four-storey building. What the fuck is it? I don't recall ever seeing any building work going on there. I can't even remember what was there before they built this place - an animal hospital or some shit like that? Anyway, ain't it weird to suddenly come across something new in the neighbourhood. So, on I walk up to New Cross Road and turn right and look over the road and find that the Amersham Arms is "closed for refurbishment", which is, I fear, a euphamism for gentrifying the place. I've been to one or two gigs in there over the years - John Otway, Eddie and the Hot Rods, a brilliant rock band whose repertoire included songs with such titles as Disco Hard On and Rock n Roll Motherfucker and one or two others - but, primarily, the Amersham was where I would go and watch Celtic games. That is, until they didn't pay up for their Setanta subs and we had to relocate to the Marquis. Anyway, so now, the times they are a changing for the Amersham. And on I walked and found - at 1.30 on a Tuesday morning - the New Cross Inn open and doing a roaring trade. It seems to me that the New Cross Inn is the only pub in the area which takes advantage of the new licensing laws, but I may be wrong. The New Cross Inn is a strange place. It used to be a right dirty dive, but it had a good and lively music night on both a Friday and Saturday night, which were always packed out. Then it got the refurbished treatment and it seemed to nosedive. It put on the football, but still, it was the Marquis, with its no frills or food policy, which was always packed out for the matches. Now, the New Cross Inn is trying desperately to get the Goldsmiths' art crowd in, but I'm not too sure how successful it is with its art exhibitions and its "club nights" - we shall see, we shall see. Anyway, off I go home.

Few days later, I'm trying to get certain things off my mind and, so, take a walk toward Greenwich. I need a drink, but decide not to go into the Hobgoblin or the Marquis or the Five Bells cos I fear that, should I bump into anyone I know, I'll be a tearful wreck. So I walk on to the newly renamed Royal Albert. Only trouble is that the door is locked at around 3pm in the afternoon, so I don't enter. So I walk on further and, rather than walk to Greenwich, decide to head for the - fuck, I forget the name of it. That one down Deptford Church Street at the roundabout. Used to have a theatre upstairs (seem to remember one of my brothers being dragged on to to the stage for a dance during a scene in a Flann O'Brien play we went to see here). The one next to that estate which seems to house the largest ratio of artists anywhere in the world. Anyway, whatever the fuck it's called, in I go and have a couple of pints and fail to solve one clue in the Guardian crossword. As I said, I had something quite big on my mind. I've never noticed the pub being a gay bar before, having drank in there every week for about a year when the boy done his karate down the road and I would wait for him in here, but now I notice many photographs of muscular and naked men. Just never noticed it before, is all I'm saying. Nice pub, nice people, nice beer. Might even pop down today for a quick one.

And the point of all this is? Fuck knows, just something to write about is all that it is!

Peace and love.

UPDATE: The Birds Nest is the nice pub in Deptford Church St.

*David Bowie