The debonair Basil Marigold's

Now, every now and again it is nice to head into a pub and have a quiet pint in honour of all the good things in the world, Real Ale is one of those. I tend not to be a lager drinker, unless its Czech. So imagine my surprise when, while walking past a local pub I spot a new type of drink! I presume of course that it's a new style of drink. It may be that pubs are now going the route of Fast food takeaway's by offering you the ability to 'max it', here perhaps you can make your drink larger, for £2.40. I have a feeling though that this may not be the case. It seemd the case in the other window too. The famous saying about pub lanlords, 'You don't have to be a pedant speller to work here, but it helps' seems apt right now.

The irony is of course that this event occurred today, over a few thousand miles away in what was then one of the most advanced collection of states. How many people know that we actually run marathons in honour of a battle, fought over 2500 years ago, which it can be argued help define our western civilisation as we know it. but to remove myth from fact , it was the Athenian army that travelled the 26 miles from Marathon back to Athens. Pheidippedes, the runner, actually travelled 140miles to Sparta to deliver the request for help against the Persians from the fledgling Athenian demokratia. So, we run in honour of the Athenians (mainly) defeating the Persian Empire and altering the course of history by proving they, the invincible Persian hordes, were in fact beatable, as they finally proved 10 years later when they were destroyed by the Spartan/Athenian army at Plataea (after the Spartans had immortalised their hoplite prowess at the 'hot gates' of Thermopylae, if you have n

Okay, it hurt. It hurt pretty bad but at the end of all the pain and suffering I got my free T-shirt for running the half marathon at Worksop....No wait, I didn't get my free T-shirt at all...I got through the finish and went to get my T-shirt and was in fact told that the box of Extra large T shirts, unlike me hadn't turned up for the event. So all I got was a plastic bag and a bottle of water! This is not the point of running of course, the goody bag at the end, each event differs, but none have ever surpassed Mansfield Half marathon who after completion gave me a bag of biscuits, crisps and water and then handed me a box of 6 free range eggs??? Which if I wasn't completely shattered from racing a hilly course in 27degree heat I may have asked, why? So, I could whip up a post race omelette? The only real comparison to inappropriate post race gifts was the kilomathon this year when I was handed after a race a token to redeem my free half pint sample of real ale from the be