Official A2K Gathering in Chicago, May 7th, 2006!

great, eva. i can't come, but i'd still love my share.

On architecture tours, I'm interested in looking at some links on tours. The trolley one sounded amusing when I first read about it, and the boat one sounds like fun. I'd like to look at the sites Joe and realJohn mentioned to see about other possibilities. Who knows, I might like to go on all of them.

Won't have a chance to review the tour info for a few days.

Eva's self-interested views make sense.

So is the Goddess of Love meeting us at the Duke of Perth, or what?

Is there a law of opposites whereby the better the advertising the worse the product? probably not there are too many dreadful furniture shop adverts with Linda Barker flogging awful three piece suites for it to work. In the case of John Smiths Extra Smooth Bitter it has a strong argument though. Replacing the cardboard cut-out man with comedy's hottest property Peter Kay has improved product knowledge of John Smiths immeasurably. But as good and as funny as those adverts are it is even more laughable to suggest John Smiths is a good beer.

Don't get me wrong it will not poison you and is quite drinkable but in an age when top beers like Timothy Taylor Landlord, Shepherd Neames Spitfire, Abbot Ale, Marston's Pedigree and Theakston's are available (to name but a few) why on earth drink this stuff. I am generally in favour of the condition of canned beers when allied to the brilliant technology of the widget ( I confess to being involved in the polymer industry when they were developed.) but over the years have tended to but bottled beers more and more and have preferred the taste and texture of bottled beer to the gassy canned variety.

John Smiths is probably extra smooth because it is brewed in a process mor akin to a chemical process than a brewery. Rather than small lots it is brewed in thousands of gallons at a time. Any sense of individuality is lost in such processes. The beer might be of good strength and has a consistency many micro breweries can only dream of (or fear more like) but where is the character. This is as comfortable in a real pub as the BMW driving, mobile phone fetishist new man we all loathe. Give me the toothless old salt who has seen the world and I'll drink with him.