Another old-fashioned pub gets an unwanted revamp

MY husband and I rarely go out for a drink.

Without doubt, we consume more wine than is good for us, but mostly at home.

As a result, recycling day is always something of an embarrassment, listening to the clinking and smashing of bottles being tipped into the dustcart. I remember a binman asking me once: “Been having a party?” Sadly, we hadn’t.

Yet I can’t remember the last time the pair of us walked in to a pub without the primary intention of ordering a meal.

When we were younger we often popped in to our local to socialise over a glass or two, and maybe play darts. Not any more.

I think it was having a family that scuppered it. Paying a babysitter made no sense when you could stick the kids in bed and collapse on the sofa with a cheap supermarket plonk. And we didn’t have to argue about whose turn it was to drive.

Nowadays, being middle-aged and boring, we’re more likely to head out to a restaurant, and maybe take a taxi home.

The occasional girls’ night out is a different matter. We do still like to find a civilised pub where we can set up a tab and natter nonstop until they chuck us out.

Sounds like the Anchor and Hope in Winchester Street would have suited us perfectly, had we discovered it in time.

It was touching to read about how much the place meant to its regulars, and how sad they are to lose the landlord and landlady who made it the heart of their little community.

What they are mourning is one of the vanishing breed of no-frills drinkers’ pubs that didn’t mess about with hideously misspelt ‘Pub Fayre’ straight out of the cash-and-carry, but simply offered a genuine, personal welcome.

The owners, Enterprise Inns, say it will be revamped and reopened. They are looking for someone to take on the “business opportunity”.

That’s the trouble, say the regulars. The bean-counters regard it as “just another asset”, and it will lose its soul.

In our increasingly corporate world things seem to go that way, whether it’s ‘cloned’ High Streets, Tesco buying up corner shops, or the plethora of chain restaurants.

Sometimes, I confess, I’m as guilty as the next man of failing to value what we’ve got till it’s gone.