Monthly Archives: October 2025

Speak easy, Caerdydd

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With America’s decision to inflict a further four years of the narcissistic pathological liar on the rest of the world, there seems little reason to afford them the previous levels of attention. Even some of their historic cultural characteristics no longer provide a reason to spend a dime in their direction.

About 100 years ago, the speakeasy was America’s quintessential creation for getting around prohibition. For the last 10 years Cardiff has its own version (without the prohibition) with its own discreet method of entry…

Yes, I’m missing my regular visits to New Orleans. But, the first ever cocktail, Sazerac, created in NOLA, is ably recreated here on my own doorstep…

The Dead Canary (What We Do In The Shallows) also has a uniquely Welsh twist, with a creative drinks menu that includes stories of Welsh coastal history attached to each unique cocktail…

And some quite uniquely presented concoctions. Who needs a glass when you can drink your rum-based cocktail out of a skull? This one named Walter and the Wreckers…

Until we speak again, the speakeasy is alive and well, and discreetly open in a quiet back alleyway in Cardiff city centre…

Town Planning wins!?

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Yes, I know, that’s a crazy statement in so many ways. I was a town planner many years ago, so please… hear me out. There are rare moments in life when the planning system fails to completely fuck everything up.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not with the intention of doing something good… that hardly aligns with the built-in values system. No, accidents do happen, and sometimes with wonderful consequences.

Take the Salutation pub in tbe university area of Manchester, for example. I was there when it stood alone in acres of cleared derelict land back in the 1970’s. Now, surrounded by modernism on all sides, it’s survival is all the more heroic. Particularly, as it’s largely a student-run enterprize these days…

Then, there’s the issue of what to do with old underground Victorian public toilets. In most cases, at ground level, they are rusting gates and railings secured by a sturdy lock and chain. Left as eyesores to blight the urban landscape, while desperate passers-by go in search of somewhere for a leak.

But, on Great Bridgewater Street in the centre of Manchester something altogether different is happening. For nearly 30 years, The Temple (of Convenience) has been welcoming thirsty punters… and not just for the relief of a good slash!

Until we speak again, don’t just knock the town planners, raise a glass or two to celebrate their occasional mishaps!

It seems my current focus on liquidity knows no end. For those of you wondering if Manchester has anything non-pub related… well, these are my 50th anniversary recollections, so you’ll just have to go and see for yourself?

Nostalgia for liquidity

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Some assets hold more liquidity than others. It appears memory is one. So, it’s 50 years since I got a train from Cardiff to Manchester to do the student thing. 

A time for nostalgia, I thought. Retrace some of the steps that memory serves me… though it also seems ‘progress’ may have erased a few.

Did I really drink my way through 4 years of studies? Is that what many students really do? Relying on muscle memory alone seems to be pointing that way.

Hydes, Holts, Robinsons, et al, occupy much of my mental bandwidth. They refresh the mind to cope with sad reflections on hostelries since closed down.

Manchester is a wonderful city in so many different ways. But there’s little that’s drawing my attention, on this particular journey into nostalgia, that doesn’t have liquidity at its heart.

Until we speak again, it appears my two favourites back in the day… the Jolly Angler in Ancoats and the White Swan in Fallowfield… both succumbed. I guess liquidity didn’t come to their rescue in the final reckoning.

Worcester (without the sauce)

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Unwittingly, 2025 is turning into the ‘without‘ tour. Previously, on Junos View, Dundee was explored without the famous cake. Now, that unpronounceable place (to foreigners and indigenous idiot’s) – Wuss-ter, has been discovered without any of the Lea & Perrins strange brown thing (sauce).

So, here’s the thing…

Once upon a time, across the border, there’s this old thing… called Ingerlund. And, it’s full of these really old things… called cities, and towns, and things. Some are older than others, but Worcester is definitely an older thing.

If you’re coming here, it’s probably going to be a history thing… particularly if you’re into Tudor things.

Or, maybe, it’s a religious thing… with a particularly impressive one of those cathedral things.

Then again, perhaps it’s an imbibing thing… with a good few of those old pub-like things.

But, it’s definitely an eating thing. Though, in my case, the pie and a pint thing was fully booked up… so it had to be an Anatolian thing…

Then again, for me it’s that strange notion of being the largest place in the UK by population I haven’t visited, thing… until now. After all, that’s what Dundee was prior to Worcester.

Until we speak again, it used to be a thing… now it’s done! As for you, it depends on your thing…

Bravo… Nobel

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Making the right decision shouldn’t always have to be a brave decision. But, when you come under constant pressure from history’s most despicable lying narcissist, a certain amount of bravery is unfortunately required.

Bravo, Nobel Peace Prize panel for recognising the importance of Maria Corina Machado in her continuing fight to uphold the principles of democracy. Even while having to remain in hiding, she provides opposition to the bulldozing of basic humanity by another despicable autocratic… the one in Venezuela.

As a panel, you have shown the world we don’t have to give in to the demands of bullies (former DPP’s excepted).

Until we speak again, you’ve also spared us from what would have followed if the world’s oldest grumpy teenager had been given the reward for a mega sense of entitlement.