Angel to the rescue

It feels a bit odd to be writing a beer and music blog when I've not felt like drinking much since mid-December, and I've missed some of my music events too. It's all through feeling under the weather with severe sinus trouble, which has among other things affected my taste buds so that beer has seemed to have little flavour, and as for singing: coughs and sneezes may spread diseases, but they're not an attractive way to deliver a song. And my husky voice was not exactly in the Rod Stewart league. I've had so little to drink this month, I've almost been an involuntary conscript to Alcohol Concern's Dry January campaign. Incidentally, I've just checked their website and 4297 people have signed up; only 99.9932% of the population left to recruit for the final three days of the month.

A few people have asked me whether I felt better for not drinking. The answer was no. Some have then gone on to ask whether, in that case, do I feel worse? The answer was, "No; I'm a beer drinker, not an alcoholic!" My bank account has heaved a few sighs of relief though.

Unfortunately, I have missed out on two planned trips to the National Winter Ales Festival, a CAMRA coach trip to West Lancs pubs, two pub crawls, as well as various other events. The good news is that I am feeling somewhat better, proved by the fact that I actually fancied a drink on Saturday evening for the first time in weeks. I couldn't have one because of the antibiotics, but they run out on Wednesday, so I'm particularly looking forward to Friday when I'll be meeting some old friends from the union for a few pints and something to eat at the Angel pub, just off Rochdale Road, Manchester. I don't remember going there before, but I see that it received CAMRA's North Manchester Real Ale Pub of the Year Award in 2010, so it should be good.

In advance of Friday, cheers!