It's Easter Sunday. For the first time in what feels like weeks, there's enough blue up above to make a sailor a natty pair of tailored shorts. I wander down to the village shop to buy a newspaper and then I do something hardly ever do...

... I fancy a pint.

Clarity: I fancy a pint quite often and act upon that fancy with abandon. Just not in the village where I live.

So today I call in on a pub where I used to be a regular. I buy a brown beer and sit outside. Sit under a dirty, knackered plastic sheeting roof. A manic blackbird shrills at nothing in particular. Snow stubbornly refuses to melt on the barbecue. Bar runners wave in the breeze, pegged on a clothes line alongside t-shirts and odd socks and knickers.

A lazy dog refuses to acknowledge its finger-clicking owner. Kids are told to stop doing whatever they're doing out of sight but within earshot of a fence splintering.

I think.

Much of my pub time is defined by specifics. A great saltbeef sandwich. A pint of Jaipur. A range of beers I've read about on Twitter. The prospect of a quality Scotch egg. The promise of a certain cask. Meeting friends. Escaping meetings. Into a festival. Out of habit.

This time? It's just for the fun of sitting in the spring sun, with a pint, with the newspaper, outside a pub. Because I could. Because I fancied it. >

"I thought the Sarries were going to get run over..."

Ummm... pardon?

The old guy with a camouflage jacket, half an Oakham JHB and a beard you could lose a gassed badger in points at my t-shirt.

It's this one.

"Yesterday... did you not see? The way Munster muscled up... but fair play to Farrell, he kept the score ticking over".

I didn't see Saracens beat Munster in the Heineken Cup on Sunday. I was too busy drinking beer / falling asleep / wash / rinse / repeat on a train straight outta St Pancras. In fact, I was reading through the results as the hirsute chap began to talk at me.

I drank deep from my pint of Oakham Green Devil. We started discussing problems with modern-day scrummage (the phases still allow the front row to hit a retreating brick wall), the inflexibility of most second-row forwards, favourite playing positions back in the day (me: hooker, because due to playing volleyball I could chuck a ball and due to my lack of height I could dangle enough to actually hook the ball. him: wing, he could run fast within a one-yard corridor from the touchline and could pass to A.N. Nobody and then jump if anyone came near him).

We talked of our rugger heroes (me: Bill Beaumont, Wade Dooley, Brian Moore. him: Barry John). We talked about the stupidity of boxers who return to the ring and risk death for the sake of funding a lifestyle they've become addicted to. We talked of how too many professional footballers have too much time, too much money and too little sensible support to save themselves from becoming chronic gamblers and/or gak hooverers.

We loved the tale of how a local drunk driver had been given his license back even though found guilty. Because if he re-offended, he'd get a life ban.

We talked and drank and laughed. Because I wore a certain t-shirt in a certain pub at a certain time.

You just don't get that on Twitter or Facebook.

You get that down the pub.

Sometimes, I need to remind myself of that.

It's a grand place to be. After all, pubs aren't just for Christmas... >

Marble. Oakham. Thornbridge. Brewdog.

Four of my favourite breweries. If a pub is serving one of their beers, that's probably what I'll end up drinking. Sometimes, there may be two of those breweries on offer. Very occasionally (like Derby's Flowerpot on a good weekend) there may be three to choose from. Rarely do I see all four together.

So the beer boards I saw yesterday had me salivating. A pub with six casks on handpull and another seven served on gravity straight from the cellar, offering a stellar lineup of some of Britain's best beers. The effortlessly-drinkable Marble Pint. A bundle of bitter fruits in Oakham Citra. Some lush, copper-hoppy goodness of Thornbridge Lumford. And the grassy-edged, toffee-middled, floral-riven experience that is Brewdog Punk IPA.

Drank in that order, with another sneaky Pint at the end, it was quite possibly the finest afternoon's cask beer drinking that I've ever had. In a pub that was comfy, clean, buzzing with friendly locals. And a ladies netball team. And a bunch of raspberry-cider drinkers wearing the shortest skirts and highest heels known to man.

So, that's a pub offering top-quality beers from my favourite brewers on a regular basis. With comfy chairs. And engaging customers. With a bus stop right outside. Three guesses where I'm going to be on a regular basis from now on...

The Queen's Head, Marlpool. And they have a Facebook page too. I'll see you at the bar...

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