Sunday 22/11/09

There comes a point after which, when events have conspired against you so painfully, you think that the world is officially taking the piss out of you. The final shot has been fired at the HMS Maidenhead Nightlife, and it has officially been sunk. The clever ones have jumped ship. And those who stayed, for reasons of honourable obligation and pure blind stupidity, have been held to ransom by the pirates known as JD Wetherspoon.

My history with Maidenhead’s nightlife isn’t great. It seems we only go there as it is pretty much the only place in the home counties where everybody can reach and get back from without too much trouble (which is a bad sign when deciding where to go out). Firstly, it was Smokey’s, the place you go when you’re 18 and so is your IQ. Next, Wetherspoons, the place you go before Smokey’s because it’s cheaper (provided you wear long trousers). And then we found the Bear, where you go if Smokey’s doesn’t even fit into your plans.

For literally months, the Bear has become a home to us. Ok, so we may have been there only about a dozen times in the last year making it a home for somebody with little need for an actual home; somebody who lives in a caravan most of the time but enjoys sleeping inside brickwork at the average of once a month. We still felt immense loyalty to it. It has a booth, the sign of true class, a pool table, with a fair £5 cue deposit, and two bars, although I have never seen the second bar in use, ever. That doesn’t sell it well, but trust me. It has charm.

But not for long. It closes this week because it’s being sold to Wetherspoon, who already own one place in town. The Bear was where we went to get away from Spoons. It’s like being a football fan, watching your favourite player being tapped up by Real Madrid, who also bought your favourite player last season but let him rot in the reserves. You get disillusioned with football, and write Real Madrid off as a bunch of wankers.

You can try to make sense of that analogy.

Maidenhead just needs to be written off, from the giant plant pots on the high street to the morons in the skate park. The terrorists would do well to forget about attacking London and direct their attentions towards Maidenhead. A bomb in the high street would not necessarily be a bad thing. For starters, there are more white people (who, let’s face it, are the terrorists’ targets) than in London. A good explosion in Queen Street would see off more religious folk than an Auschwitz shower room. Secondly, the catastrophic destruction would hasten a redevelopment of the town, something much needed. And thirdly, it would convince my friends to go to High Wycombe for a change, with the exodus convincing Wetherspoon that there is no market for them in Maidenhead. At which point we return.

Come on Osama, do it for us!