Birthday drinks

Today is the Minx's birthday!

I gave her one of my presents to her - a watering can! - first thing but saved the others until the miniMinx arrived later and we could all do presents together. We did start the celebrations while she was still on the train, though, with a drink in the beer garden at The Snooty Fox.

This used to be their car park with a tatty little square of grass in the corner, which constituted the original beer garden. I'm not sure when they changed it but I can see that simply buying some permits for the car park in the market square to free up the space out back for customers rather than cars makes a lot of sense. Like everywhere else with a beer garden they must have been aching for the lockdown to end but the good weather to continue. 

Once we'd collected the miniMinx from Oxenholme station, we had lunch at The Station Inn, which was very good. By my calculations, this is the fifth pub I've visited since they re-opened and this was the first not to collect names (for track and trace), although there was some evidence in the form of biros* and scraps of paper that they have been previously. 

The wearing of face masks by staff and also the process of unloading trays of drinks has also been pretty inconsistent. To be clear, I'm not knocking anyone - I've been entirely happy in every pub I've been to - but, once again, the guidance just doesn't seem clear or well communicated.

Anyway, back to the birthday! The Minx opened her presents in the afternoon, which was lovely, and then we returned to the Snooty for dinner. I've written on here before in previous years that the Minx doesn't really enjoy being the centre of attention on her birthday but this year, happily, I think we got it right.

*I don't know where that came from. When was the last time you heard anyone say "biro"?

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-10.7 kgs