Although I’ll be blogging about all the usual things one blogs about, the main focus will be on real ale and CAMRA-related topics. Having explored Twitter for a while now, I soon realised that I was gravitating towards that subject area and decided the imminent relaunch of my blog should follow suit.
In short, I’m a strange breed. The stereotypical view of CAMRA members tends to revolve heavily around beards, jumpers and tick lists. I’m more or less everything this common view says CAMRA members should not be: I’m twenty-three years old, I don’t wear jumpers, and I have a girlfriend. Upon discovering real ale at the age of twenty, I realised I’d found my true passion. I continued to drink real ale on a relatively regular basis, often visiting my local real ale pub, The Globe in Dunstable, which offers a staggering thirteen handpumps.
In early 2009, I decided I wanted to become more involved with CAMRA and volunteered my services to my local branch in South Bedfordshire. I was delighted to become the new Branch Young Members’ Contact and accepted the position of Press Officer for the branch shortly afterwards. I thoroughly enjoy my involvement with CAMRA and have met many fantastic new friends as a result. That’s what makes voluntary work so worthwhile and lifts the spirits more than a few zeroes hitting your bank account at the end of the month.
Outside of CAMRA, I am a self-employed web designer and search engineer (in short, I optimise clients’ websites to increase their ranking in internet search engines and increase their internet sales and enquiries). As I work from home and start working as soon as I wake up (and it’s not unusual for the sunrise to wake me up before 6 a.m.) I don’t feel I’m able to relax at home in the evening. In effect, I’m trying to relax and unwind in my office in which I’ve slept overnight and been working in since six o’clock in the morning. As a result, I’ll often take the mile-long walk to The Globe in order to enjoy a pint or two and meet new and existing friends. Before I started working for myself, visits to the pub were a weekly event – if that!
